It is beneficial to talk. Or so men are repeatedly advised, by everyone from mental health campaigners to the partners they live with. They remain puzzled by the common male habit to spend an entire evening in the pub with decades-old friends, yet come home with no insight about the personal struggles in each other's lives. What could they possibly be doing, all that while? Why haven't they inquired how X is coping with 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 innermost feelings, this style of male closeness—built on seemingly sidestepping meaningful conversation—can seem oddly hollow and sad. It's no surprise, one might think, that more than 25% of UK men report having no close friends; that male loneliness is endemic; that many hesitate to see a doctor unless seriously ill; that male suicide rates consistently exceed female ones; and that countless middle-aged men, especially, appear permanently frustrated for unspoken reasons. Suppressing everything up benefits nobody.
Rethinking the Value of Quiet Companionship
Yet, as per anthropologist Thomas Yarrow, this view may sell short the merits of the resilient and quiet friendship. Professor Yarrow, based at Durham University, was studying volunteers at a historic steam railway in northern England when he was impressed with the bond developed among these predominantly older men. His lengthy study has been distilled into a paper arguing that, particularly for men brought up in an era of the emotional restraint, the worth of friendships centered on shared hobbies—"doing things together, often in comfortable silence"—may be underrated.
This muted model of friendship "is not deficient or outdated, it's just different," Yarrow states.
Granted, this can sound disconcertingly similar to how young children play—alongside each other rather than engaging with each other. But Yarrow's argument is clear: just because it's not your ideal idea of friendship doesn't imply it lacks significance. Maybe we should leave these men in peace with their trains, golf, or classic car projects—whichever pursuit allows them to spend time in the presence of others who also value less chatter.
Past Words: A Tacit Language of Concern
Thankfully, Yarrow is explicitly not claiming that showing emotion is weak, nor calling for a reversion to the past. Rather, he highlights that emotionally expressive talk is not for everyone, and that more may be happening beneath the surface of apparently reticent friendships. Is he right?
As a female perspective, one is obviously no expert on male-to-male conversation. But professional observation suggests that while men may be hesitant initially to open up personal matters, once they begin, they can be astonishingly open. A lack of visible emotion should not be equated with a absence of feeling altogether.
Furthermore, while younger men raised in a more emotionally open culture may be more adept at articulating feelings, older men are far from incapable of it. Rebrand vulnerable emotions as acceptable "political opinions" or "team allegiance," and many men will readily express anger, yearning, disappointment, or pride endlessly.
What is striking about Yarrow's railway volunteers is that, for all their horror of discussing feelings, they nonetheless found ways to express what looks remarkably like concern and solidarity. When an older volunteer didn't appear and then returned struggling, his friends noticed and were worried. But, as the professor notes, they intentionally didn't probe what was wrong. Rather, they offered tea, cracked jokes, and tried to be discreetly supportive while maintaining normality. They were caring for each other pretty much as female friends would, but without ever naming the elephant in the room.
The Essential Issue: Does Bonding Need Words?
This is not everyone's preferred method of connecting, and it may not be yours. But if the real therapeutic value of friendship—what that fights loneliness and low mood—is simply the awareness that someone is there enough to walk through life's difficulties with you, must that always be put into words?
The debate continues. Perhaps the healthiest approach is to acknowledge that varied styles of friendship carry equal worth, respectively satisfying the emotional needs of different individuals in unique powerful way.
