One anecdatum: I simply lost most interest in having friends by 25. I lost the rest when I had a kid. Now my friends are my daughter’s friends parents. I don’t really like them, I just end up chit chatting with them while our daughters play.
The reason it bothers me is because these men end up overrelying on their girlfriend or wife for both emotional support and to manage their social life. Without the woman doing it for them, they get angry, misanthropic, and antisocial due to not having an outlet - and they don't see it as a problem at all. But their families get to watch them become more unpleasant and withdrawn as time goes by.
This is something I find really hard to talk about with the men I see doing it, especially when it's my own partner. Obviously it's not all men. But my dad DEFINITELY does it, and the result is that he's gone from being a fairly open-minded, liberal, and environmental kind of person to someone who can't seem to talk about anything other than guns, American politics (we're not even American), and the "idiotic" policies of our local politicians. He recites stuff he's heard on TV as if it's gospel truth. It seems impossible to have normal, non-political conversations with him anymore, he just doesn't have any knowledge or interest that doesn't come from TV.
He's my dad and I love him, but needless to say, when I see my partners going down the same path, it freaks me out. Sorry, I know that's a lot to extrapolate from your very short comment, but maybe it's just something to think about.
Perhaps it should.
I'm an immigrant too, although no language issues, so I have lots of friends in my home country and not many here, a lot of those were expats or work connected and the rest are via my wife and her work - she didn't grow up around here either but is American.
I'd hate to go down that road you talked about and I've seen people do so. We've not been able to have kids either so don't have that path of getting out of our bubble.
Food for thought indeed.
I've suggested a few times (gently) that she take her work mates up on their offer of going for a meal (I gather one of the women at work is in a similar boat), I'm introverted by nature so I only socialize in settings where there is a distraction (tech and chess as mentioned) but it's enough social life for me.
I don't really need anyone to bare my soul too, I've always handled that stuff myself.
This is one of my fastest upvoted comments ever. I think it struck a chord. There's no way of knowing whether it was men or women upvoting, but I have a feeling I'm not the only who has had these thoughts.
The cause is that “society” expects that to “grow up” a man must give up his hobbies and his friends and “settle down” (provide for a family as sole purpose in life).
Someone will say “that’s how the patriarchy harms men too!” But I don’t think I believe that; I don’t think men say “hey bro, we should totally just give up all that cool stuff we do, for no reason”.
Or is it that they seek a stable relationship because their social life was already starting to dwindle? And they fall back to letting their partner manage their social life because they simply wouldn't have one at all without that help.
I see it a lot in people I know. They didn't care one bit about having a stable relationship. That is until their friends started becoming busier in life, maybe some moved away for other commitments, and they started to feel lonelier and wanted someone who was going to be there for them.
All this becomes a vicious cycle as each time someone feels the group of friends is no longer able to satisfy their needs and they seek a partner, the group is fragmented even further, making it even more difficult to provide what the group needs. Eventually you reach the point where there isn't a group anymore.
While I don't know if I speak for many men, in my experience the best male friendships are comprised of multiple people. If you don't have that group, it is difficult to have the best kind of male friendship. That is not to say one-on-one friendships are bad or impossible, but it's just not quite the same.
I also think that women tend to get more emotional support from their relationships. Men don't really get this (at least explicitly) from their friends. They do get it from their intimate partners. For a lot of men, their partner is the only person they ever 'open up to'.
In general, I think there are strong cultural (and possibly even biological) reasons for the different approach to and amount of emphasis men and women put on socialising. In some circumstances, being a bit of a social recluse can be advantageous (e.g. extreme dedication to particular pursuits such as a career), but in total I think that men as a group suffer for this tendency. They are much more likely to end up alone and lonely in later life (discounting the fact that women live longer). I think this probably plays a large part in the high suicide rates amongst older men.
I think that something that could be done to address this issue - and something that would benefit both men and women in a variety of ways - would be to focus on removing cultural and financial barriers that keep men away from their families and in the workplace. For example, we shouldn't talk about maternity or paternity leave, but instead parental leave. The financial security of families should not be seen as a man's responsibility, but a shared responsibility (this goes back to the seemingly intractable issue of the relationship between financial status and attractiveness of men). These are really ingrained cultural attitudes but we can chip away at them.
Focussing on some of these sorts of issues would be good for men's mental health and a much more productive means of levelling the earnings gap between men and women than focussing almost exclusively on sexist discrimination in the workplace - a red herring in many (but certainly not all) cases. As most people are aware, a significant part of the earnings gap is down to the responsibilities women take on outside of the workplace, such as caring for children and elderly relatives or supporting the local school. We should be looking at what it is that is holding men back from participating more fully in their community. I think by not doing this, many men are missing out on one of the fundamental aspects of being human.
Sounds like me!
I don't want more than a couple of good friends. Anything more than that isn't friends, it's acquaintances with delusions of grandeur. That ends up leaving most of the pushing for socialization on my wife's plate, because ... I don't.
That said, I find that women maintaining the social relationships is a bit more stereotype than truth. I know more than a few women that are also pretty shit at it, and they're doubly embarrassed because they don't feel like they're fulfilling their gender role.
I'm young and already excuse myself by saying that I don't mind having just one or two close friends. But this is how it starts: we tend to think we can handle being mostly friendless, and yet, as we age, it seems that many of us can't.
Not sure what the solution is, but you've definitely underscored a big problem that I've (till now) underestimated. And I'm sure others have too.
> I mostly read the headlines and that is about it because just about everything is B.S. and nothing is going to change anyway.
Feeling like that is a strong sign that your emotional resources are close to being overwhelmed. If you're a vet, hopefully you have access to counselling services. I hope you try going at least once or twice. Most people can use a few sessions of counselling, even if they're totally healthy.
Off topic but I will say that it is almost criminal how many drugs that the military gives you for problems. Went in for sleep issues and came out with about 8 different meds.
Worst case I’ll just move to Alaska and become a mountain man like Jeremiah Johnson. Just kidding...sort of.
- HENRY DAVID THOREAU, 1854
That doesn't mean I'm going to get sucked into to some kind of tribe like a political party or a religion. Or maybe it's just as accurate to say I already got sucked into a scientific outlook and scepticism at a young age and now find it impossible to escape.
People age, and that includes their personalities.
The idea that people naturally veer to the right of the political spectrum as they age is a myth.
Would be interesting to see some stats to see if this narrative hypothesis is born out; do married/monogamously partnered men who become sole breadwinner lose more friends than those in other situations.
In fact most of my male friends also don't get too deep in discussing their feelings. So it might not just be a lack of friendship, but a deeper problem which is men having a hard time discussing their emotions with others.
Correct. My dad is not angry with my mom or any particular person. He just gets cranky and grumpy if my mom doesn't socialize him.
But people without children really have no excuse.
edit: to make things even worse if i go somewhere by myself with child, all i see are groups/cults of mothers discussing parenting stuff, it's very rare to see men, they are too busy working and it's very unlikely to make non romantic female friend
Travel is certainly more difficult than it used to be, but I've found that the types of trips I used to turn my nose up at (all-inclusive resort-ish) are appealing in a completely new way. We can put the toddler down to bed, set up a baby monitor, and go down and enjoy ourselves like we're actually adults, often meeting new folks.
I don't doubt the gender asymmetry that you imply; do you care to speculate about why it exists among middle-aged people?
Our days and hours are very scarce resources...almost all taken from us. I think the Spanish accommodated this by decreasing their daily work hours. If the US did that the US would employ more people, more meaningfully, and benefit from increased social “health”.
For a while I would make friends with people in their early 20s, as that was the age group that would be randomly free after my kids were in bed. I'm approaching 40 now though and am not sure how socially acceptable this still is...
I'm male and in a long term stable relationship and my true friends are just as important to me as they ever were. They are like family to me.
On the flip side my girlfriend has decided she suddenly no longer has much interest in hanging out with her friends, which is concerning. I have solitary hobbies I enjoy, and I can't fill the gap that her friends have left.
I haven't made new 'friends' because I just don't want more of a social life. I am a pretty strong introvert; I am loud and friendly and boisterous, but spending time with people tires me out.
During the week, I get up at 6am, spend time with my daughter while I get her ready for daycare. Then, I go to work, where I am talking and laughing and having fun with coworkers all day while I work. Then, I come home, picking up my daughter on the way home. We go for a walk, she tells me all sorts of stuff, and then I make dinner while my wife watches her. We eat, get our daughter to bed, and by then it is around 8pm or so. At this point I am tired, and just want to relax, maybe read or watch TV a bit, chat with my wife, and go to sleep. There is no way I would have the energy or time to socialize on weeknights; I am all socialed out from work. The few times we do have plans during the week, I dread it because I know how tired and unsocial I am going to feel.
On the weekends, I am spending time with my daughter and wife. In the morning, I will make us breakfast and we will either play outside or go for a hike. We then take her home for a nap, and we do chores around the house. I always feel like there is not enough time on the weekend to get everything done.
I have a few close friends who live far away; we all play video games together once a week. I chat with my family, and between my nieces and nephews on both sides, there are a lot of video chats to have.
How is this a bad thing? Why do I NEED more friends than what I have? I am not sure what more 'emotional support' I need; I am a super happy person, always optimistic, and my wife is there for me when I need her (which isn't super often). I also can talk to my parents and sister if I needed more emotional support, or my two close friends if they weren't around.
I don't think your dad's issue is lack of relationships, he just sounds like he is an angry person. Is he retired? Being retired is a WHOLE different dynamic.
In fact, the biggest thing I feel I am lacking is ALONE time to work on hobbies. Before I got married and had a kid, I had all sorts of fun hobbies I did; I built airplanes and helicopters, I built robots, programmed games for fun. I like building and designing stuff, alone in my workshop, but I don't have enough time now to do it very often. This is a fine sacrifice to make, because I love my family and want to spend time with them, but it isn't like I am sitting somewhere lonely.
I am curious, however, if there is something you think I am missing by not having more friends. I certainly can't see it, because the idea of having more friends that I have to visit and see just makes me feel tired even thinking about it.
I can't say what you need, I don't know you. Maybe you could ask your wife if she thinks you need more friends? If she says something like "eh? Why?" then you're probably fine. But if you get a long pause and then, "Well, it wouldn't hurt..." then maybe you should ask her more questions.
Firstly, getting more conservative as you get older is normal. And having fewer friends as you get older is normal. There are even jokes about it. You are trying to link the changes in your fathers politics to not having many friends, but you haven't argued why there's a causation vs just being a correlation.
I strongly suspect from your wording that this is because you can't accept that your fathers new politics might have any substance to it. You certainly don't sound like you try to understand why he's angry: you described him as changing from "open minded" (good, positive, liberal) to "recites stuff he heard on TV" (bad, closed minded, conservative). Maybe he feels angry because when he tries to explain how he sees the world and what concerns him, his daughter dismisses him and looks down on him? That'd make any parent kind of upset.
Secondly, you seem to be implying that men over-rely on women for emotional support. Perhaps that's been your experience. As a man, in every relationship I've ever been in, the woman has heavily relied on me for emotional support. This is especially true when in a stable relationship. If anything, girlfriends seem to cause more emotional needs than they solve - a non-trivial amount of emotional support needs that come my way seem to boil down to dramas or blowups between girlfriends.
Finally, I'm not sure men see "no need for a social life" once they get in a relationship. That's a very odd belief. One sad reality is that once a man gets in a stable relationship, women tend to make it hard to sustain relationships with anyone else, whether men or women. This is a pattern I've seen over and over again. I don't think it's really planned or deliberate but it happens. The first to go are obviously any female friends. Many women can't handle their man having close female friends especially if they're single or might become so. But it's pretty common for women to disapprove of male friends too, or to get upset if the man spends too much time out drinking with his buddies instead of spending it with her. The inevitable result is that the man has to pick: friends or girlfriend.
Anyway. If you really want to rebuild your relationship with your father, I suggest a two pronged approach:
1) LISTEN to him when he talks about politics and even engage with him. Don't attack him or make it clear that you feel your own politics are morally and intellectually superior. Ask him why he feels guns are so important, try to see the world from his perspective. If he's always talking about things he heard on TV that implies those are the things that vex and concern him the most. You don't have to agree, but if he feels you're at least trying and can make peace with that, it'll help.
2) Stop trying to find explanations for the way he's changing, especially dubious correlation/causation mixups that boil down to sexist generalisations. People do change as they get older. Moreover the world changes, and young people who have a less fixed identity are often more willing to bend to fit whatever way the wind seems to be blowing. If someone's personality or beliefs don't change with time, that can look to a younger person as if the person's personality has changed when from their perspective it's actually the world that's changing and they stayed the same i.e. what you see as "open mindedness" is in reality just a willingness to accept whatever odd new modern idea comes along, even ideas that seem self-evidently nonsensical to your father.
> He's my dad and I love him, but needless to say, when I see my partners going down the same path, it freaks me out.
Your dad is your partner?
> It seems impossible to have normal, non-political conversations with him anymore, he just doesn't have any knowledge or interest that doesn't come from TV.
And here you are doing the same thing. How about not making everything political? Things are toxic as it is. Do you need to bring toxic politics to HN?
Partners and Kids are nowhere near... I don't even have a drivers license ffs (mainly because public transport is quite good here).
Should I start with that?