It's healthy to talk. Or so men are constantly told, by everyone from mental health advocates to the women they live with. They remain perplexed by the common male habit to spend an entire evening in the pub with longstanding friends, yet come home utterly clueless about the significant events in each other's lives. What might they possibly be doing, all that while? How come they didn't they inquired how X is handling his breakup, or how Y is managing the loss of his father?
For women, whose personal friendships typically center on an deep and encyclopaedic understanding of each other's private feelings, this form of male intimacy—built on seemingly sidestepping serious conversation—can look strangely hollow and sad. No wonder, one might think, that over a quarter of British men state having zero close friends; that male loneliness is pervasive; that many refuse to visit a doctor until seriously ill; that male suicide rates repeatedly exceed female ones; and that many middle-aged men, in particular, seem permanently angry for unspoken reasons. Bottling emotions up benefits no one.
Reconsidering the Value of Silent Companionship
However, according to researcher Thomas Yarrow, this view may sell short the strengths of the strong and quiet friendship. Professor Yarrow, based at Durham University, was studying volunteers at a heritage steam railway in the north of England when he was impressed with the closeness forged among these mostly older men. His four-year observation has been distilled into a paper contending that, especially for men brought up in an era of the emotional restraint, the value of friendships centered on shared activities—"shared activity, often in comfortable silence"—may be underappreciated.
This quiet form of friendship "is not deficient or outdated, it's just distinct," Yarrow suggests.
Granted, this can sound oddly similar to how toddlers interact—next to each other rather than engaging with each other. But Yarrow's argument is evident: just because it's not your ideal version of friendship doesn't imply it lacks significance. Perhaps we should let these men in peace with their trains, golf, or classic car projects—whichever activity allows them to spend time in the presence of others who likewise appreciate less talk.
Past Verbal Expression: The Unspoken Dialect of Concern
Thankfully, Yarrow is explicitly not arguing that expressing emotion is weak, nor advocating for a return to the past. Instead, he highlights that emotionally expressive talk is not for everyone, and that deeper things may be happening beneath the exterior of seemingly reserved friendships. Is he right?
From a woman's perspective, I'm obviously no expert on male-to-male conversation. But years of observation suggests that while men may be hesitant initially to discuss personal matters, once they begin, they can be astonishingly open. A absence of overt emotion should not be confused with a lack of feeling altogether.
Additionally, while younger men brought up in a more emotionally open culture may be better at voicing feelings, traditional men are not at all unable of it. Repackage soft emotions as masculine "sports loyalty" or "club allegiance," and many men will happily vent anger, yearning, discontent, or satisfaction endlessly.
The most notable about Yarrow's railway volunteers is that, for all their aversion of discussing feelings, they nonetheless managed to communicate what looks remarkably like care and affection. When an older volunteer was absent and later returned struggling, his friends observed and were concerned. But, as the professor notes, they deliberately didn't probe what was wrong. Instead, they made tea, told jokes, and tried to be discreetly supportive while maintaining normality. They were looking out for each other much as female friends would, but without ever naming the elephant in the room.
The Core Issue: Does Bonding Require Words?
It's not everyone's ideal way of connecting, and it may not be yours. But if the real therapeutic value of friendship—what that fights loneliness and despair—is simply knowing that another person is there enough to be present in life's difficulties with you, must that always be articulated with words?
This discussion continues. Maybe the healthiest approach is to acknowledge that different forms of friendship carry equal value, each satisfying the emotional needs of various individuals in their own powerful way.
