Male Friends Don’t Always Need to Talk About Their Feelings. And That's OK!

Male friendships often grow through shared activities rather than intimate conversation. For men over 50, the challenge may be less about changing that style than creating more opportunities for it.

A few weeks before fishing season, Atlantic magazine staff writer Tyler Austin Harper visited a friend with a six-pack and a bucket of fishing lures. For several hours, the men replaced rusty hooks and discussed equipment, fishing spots and the expected arrival of striped bass.

As the two men did their angling chores, Harper’s friend mentioned that his wife had observed that although the two men spent considerable time together, he knew little about Harper’s personal life. The friend had shrugged and told his wife: “There’s a lot of fishing to talk about!”

That exchange anchors Harper’s provocative essay, “I Love My Emotionally Stunted Friendships.” His argument is not that men should suppress their problems or avoid emotionally intimate relationships. It is that friendships built around fishing, sports, repairs and other shared pursuits should not automatically be treated as defective versions of women’s friendships.

That distinction matters for men entering the second half of life. Retirement, divorce, relocation, illness and the deaths of longtime friends can dismantle the routines that once kept men connected. A man may lose not only his job but also the coworkers he ate lunch with, the customers he visited and the informal conversations that filled his days. If his spouse managed the couple’s social calendar, widowhood or divorce can expose how little social structure he built on his own.

The consequences can be serious. A 2025 AARP survey found that 40% of Americans 45 and older were lonely, up from 35% in 2018 and 2010. Men were more likely than women to report loneliness—42% compared with 37%.

Earlier research from the Survey Center on American Life found a particularly sharp decline in male friendship. In 1990, 55% of men said they had at least six close friends. By 2021, that figure had fallen to 27%. Meanwhile, the percentage reporting no close friends rose from 3% to 15%.

The problem, Harper suggests, may be that men do not have enough friendships—not necessarily that the friendships they have are constructed incorrectly.

Face-to-face and shoulder-to-shoulder

Geoffrey Greif, a professor emeritus at the University of Maryland School of Social Work and author of Buddy System: Understanding Male Friendships, has described a common difference in friendship styles.

Women’s friendships, he has found, are often “face-to-face,” with conversation and personal disclosure serving as the central activity. Men’s relationships are more frequently “shoulder-to-shoulder.” Conversation happens while the friends are fishing, golfing, fixing a car, watching football or completing a project.

“Men’s friendships don’t need to look like women’s friendships,” Greif told Harper.

These are broad tendencies, not rules. Plenty of men want emotionally expressive friendships, and many women connect through activities. Age, personality, culture and sexual orientation can all shape how people relate. Nor should an activity become a permanent hiding place from grief, depression or other problems that require honest conversation or professional help.

Still, companionship does not become meaningless simply because two people are discussing fly rods instead of fear.

Harper describes the experience of British anthropologist Thomas Yarrow, who joined a group restoring historic railways after his divorce. The men did not question him about his marriage or conduct informal therapy sessions. They worked together, noticed when something seemed wrong and offered quiet acts of support.

The labor gave Yarrow a sense of competence and belonging when he needed both.

Connection is a health issue

Whether friendship involves deep conversation or rebuilding an engine, social connection is associated with better health. The U.S. Surgeon General’s social-connection advisory reports that poor social relationships, isolation and loneliness are associated with a 29% higher risk of heart disease and a 32% higher risk of stroke.

The most useful question, then, may not be whether a man shares enough feelings. It may be whether anyone would notice if he stopped showing up.

Does he have someone to call when the car will not start? Does someone expect him at the Saturday bike ride? If he becomes ill, would a friend check on him? Can he tell at least one person when the problem is bigger than something that can be fixed with tools?

Rebuilding the structure of friendship

Activity-based relationships require what researcher Richard Reeves has called “social scaffolding”: recurring places and occasions that bring people together. Churches, workplaces, civic organizations and neighborhood clubs once provided much of that structure. Remote work, retirement, suburban distance and screen time have weakened it.

Metro Atlanta men can deliberately rebuild it. The YMCA of Metro Atlanta offers Active Older Adult exercise classes, luncheons and outings. Volunteer organizations, community gardens, veterans groups, pickleball leagues, faith communities and parks programs create repeated contact around a shared purpose.

The U.S. Men’s Sheds Association takes the idea further, creating spaces—particularly for retirees—where people work on practical projects together. Its formula is refreshingly direct: somewhere to go, something to do and someone to talk to.

Making a friend after 50 rarely happens through one courageous conversation. More often, it begins by appearing in the same place at the same time, week after week. Conversation grows out of familiarity. Trust follows reliability. Personal disclosure may come later—or appear through actions rather than words.

Sometimes friendship sounds like a heartfelt conversation over coffee. Sometimes it sounds like a grunt of approval in a workshop.

And sometimes, as Harper reminds us, there really is a lot of fishing to talk about.