It is healthy to talk. Or so men are constantly instructed, from sources ranging from mental health advocates to the women they live with. These women are bemused by the common male tendency to pass an entire evening in the pub with longstanding friends, yet come home with no insight about the significant events in each other's lives. What might they possibly be doing, all that while? Why haven't they asked how X is handling his breakup, or how Y is dealing with the loss of his father?
For women, whose own friendships typically revolve around an deep and detailed understanding of each other's private feelings, this form of male closeness—built on seemingly sidestepping meaningful conversation—can seem strangely hollow and sad. No wonder, we think, that more than 25% of British men report having zero close friends; that male loneliness is pervasive; that many refuse to see a doctor until seriously ill; that male suicide rates repeatedly exceed female ones; and that countless middle-aged men, in particular, seem chronically angry for unarticulated reasons. Bottling emotions up benefits nobody.
Reconsidering the Value of Quiet Friendship
However, according to researcher Thomas Yarrow, this perspective may undervalue the strengths of the resilient and quiet friendship. Professor Yarrow, from Durham University, was studying volunteers at a historic steam railway in northern England when he was impressed with the closeness developed among these predominantly older men. His lengthy observation has been published as a paper contending that, particularly for men raised in an era of the stiff upper lip, the worth of friendships built around shared hobbies—"doing things together, often in companionable silence"—may be underrated.
This quiet form of friendship "is not deficient or anachronistic, it's just distinct," Yarrow states.
Granted, this can seem oddly similar to how young children play—next to each other rather than directly with each other. But Yarrow's argument is clear: just because it's not your ideal idea of friendship doesn't imply it lacks value. Maybe we should let these men in peace with their trains, golf, or classic car projects—whatever activity allows them to spend time in the presence of others who also value less talk.
Past Verbal Expression: The Unspoken Dialect of Concern
Fortunately, Yarrow is clearly not claiming that showing emotion is harmful, nor advocating for a reversion to the past. Rather, he highlights that touchy-feely talk is not for everyone, and that deeper things may be occurring beneath the exterior of apparently reticent friendships. Is he right?
As a female viewpoint, I'm clearly no expert on male-to-male conversation. But professional experience suggests that while men may be hesitant initially to open up sensitive matters, once they do, they can be astonishingly candid. A absence of visible emotion should not be equated with a lack of feeling altogether.
Furthermore, while younger men raised in a more emotionally open culture may be more adept at articulating feelings, traditional men are not at all incapable of it. Repackage soft emotions as masculine "political opinions" or "team allegiance," and many men will readily vent frustration, yearning, disappointment, or pride for hours.
The most striking about Yarrow's railway enthusiasts is that, for all their horror of discussing feelings, they nonetheless managed to communicate what seems remarkably like concern and solidarity. When an older volunteer was absent and then returned struggling, his friends noticed and were concerned. But, as the professor records, they deliberately didn't ask what was wrong. Instead, they offered tea, cracked jokes, and tried to be discreetly supportive while maintaining routine. They were looking out for each other much as female friends would, except without ever verbally acknowledging the elephant in the room.
The Core Issue: Is Connection Require Words?
This is not everyone's ideal way of bonding, and it may not be yours. But if the real therapeutic value of friendship—what that combats loneliness and despair—is simply the awareness that another person is there enough to be present in life's challenges with you, must that invariably be articulated with words?
This discussion persists. Maybe the most constructive approach is to acknowledge that different styles of friendship hold comparable worth, respectively satisfying the emotional needs of different individuals in their own powerful way.
