I'm starting a social club to solve the male loneliness epidemic
671 comments
·May 29, 2025keiferski
This idea appears every once in awhile, as it’s obviously a major issue in modern life.
The interesting thing though is how the solution is always location-agnostic. By that I mean it’s never really about a specific cafe or restaurant or soccer field, it’s always an app or service that organizes people to show up in various places.
I bring this up because if you look at places that had lively social activities a few decades or a century ago, they were almost always a specific place.
The neighborhood cafe where locals can stop by at any time and see other locals. The bar that everyone stops by after work twice a week. These are stationary physical locations that don’t require pre-planning, schedules, apps, or anything else.
JimDabell
It’s not always location-agnostic, but you’re more likely to hear about location-agnostic efforts because they have further reach.
For instance Men’s Sheds are a local effort with a thousand locations in the UK:
> Men’s Sheds encourage people to come together to make, repair and repurpose, supporting projects in their local communities. Improving wellbeing, reducing loneliness and combatting social isolation.
> Research gathered by the UKMSA Health and Wellbeing Survey, 2023, suggests 96% of Men’s Shed attendees feel less lonely since joining a Shed.
Unfortunately, sometimes you get things like this happening:
> 'We put the pressure on to join Men in Sheds'
> The 74-year-old added: "Eventually they let us in, just one morning, eventually it became all the time, and now it's 50% women, and we absolutely love it."
> When the women were allowed into the workshop, members decided to keep a quiet room with a model railway display in it, just for men.
> "We [the men] escape now and again [to the quiet room] and have a chat and weigh things up."
bcraven
You have selectively quoted that article. Note the last four paragraphs are:
>Andrew McNerney, 70, admitted there was initially some resistance to becoming a mixed group.
>He said: "There was apprehension, but in all honesty, it's turned out well.
>"We [the men] escape now and again [to the quiet room] and have a chat and weigh things up."
>But he added: "It's a lovely atmosphere, and it's been good."
JimDabell
Yes. I selectively pulled out the bits that I thought were relevant instead of quoting the whole thing.
I know he said that it’s been good, but taken in relation to the rest of the article, I don’t place much weight on it.
The women persistently pressured the men to join, the men were apprehensive, they allowed them in for one morning, one morning turned into all the time, women now comprise 50% of the group, and the men’s area is now relegated to a back room they escape to.
They got one of the men to say it was good, but that’s not the story that the article was telling.
xandrius
I agree with the post, if the genders were reversed, people wouldn't generally feel this open about it.
fragmede
> > But he added: "It's a lovely atmosphere, and it's been good."
Which man, who ever wants to get laid again, would be stupid enough to give anything short of an absolutely glowing review about that change to a reporter.
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notarobot123
The men are there to meet each other, not to avoid women. Gender segregation isn't the point - it's about building relationships.
philipallstar
> The men are there to meet each other, not to avoid women. Gender segregation isn't the point - it's about building relationships.
I'm not sure that's quite true. Men tend to talk and joke in a different way to women, which they then modify around women or be punished. The main difference between an old-school Personnel department and a modern HR department is HR is (self-)tasked with making sure the environment is always suitable for women.
Men have very few places, if any, where they can just be themselves, unmodified. And when those places exist, large shaming campaigns and marketing appear to tell them off and to entice women into them.
wvh
Don't disagree, but some hard things don't get said when the other gender is around, especially with men of a certain age. It takes a lot for many men to even out loud say the word "lonely" or "sad" or "worthless". A lot of male conversation is silent. The whole spiel is to project and feel capable of dealing with the world, to feel useful, to be a Man. To feel otherwise is not "masculine". To admit this to mixed company is a couple of bridges too far for most of us.
JimDabell
They had to be persistently pressured into letting women in, and when that happened they set aside a men-only room to escape to. Gender segregation may not be the point but it seems like it’s important to them.
xandrius
Then why women segregate themselves in groups? I'm not saying I'm pro gender segregation but if women can have their own gender segregated groups, why men should be treated differently?
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ctippett
I had never heard of Men's Sheds before. Thank you for mentioning it.
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jamesdeluk
Why didn't they start Women's Sheds?
aaronbaugher
Women do have their own spaces, at least here in the Midwest US. But women tend to think the men are having more fun over in their male-only spaces, so they want into them, and then those spaces become co-ed, and pretty soon the men are looking around for a new male-only space. Not because they don't enjoy spending time with women, but because there's something about a male-only space that lets a man relax and recharge in a different way.
That cycle tends to repeat, and you don't really see it in reverse. Men are mildly curious, at most, about what women do in their own spaces, and generally don't seek to join them. That probably adds to the perception women have that the male-only spaces are more fun.
subscribed
Oh, but why if they're having a functional clubs already?
I feel like men only spaces in the UK are frowned upon (see Garrick club narration). No matter the reason, the only way single sex spaces work here is women only.
lupusreal
What I find a bit remarkable is how they lost control of their club dynamics so severely. I've been a regular attendee of a few hacker spaces that were open to the public but never had the problem they describe.
I think maybe a key aspect is ensuring that all men, particular the ones that are classically unattractive (even repulsive) feel welcome as valued equals. Many women cannot countenance this and will try to shape group membership to be more agreeable; those women are free to leave. The rest are welcome to stay and at that point there shouldn't be any issues.
(Of course it goes without saying that actual harassment isn't tolerated, but being a smelly fat slob with a heart of gold doesn't count.)
maxerickson
This is a hilarious take.
Men must be welcome as an absolute, women must conform to your expectations or be excluded.
SiempreViernes
Uh, they don't describe any problem though? The piece is about how everyone agrees the change is for the better, its only people in this thread that describe women and men woodworking together as a problem.
idiotsecant
Yes, unfortunately sometimes social events are wildly successful and even more people want to join, and the existing members let them, and everyone has a great time together.
It's unfortunate, but it happens.
immibis
Why does the presence of women cause men to not have male friends?
jajko
Women tend to behave very differently in all-female group compared to when even a single man is present.
And if that man is charismatic or handsome its completely different dynamics and resulting behavior again.
Never thought about it myself but one female friend mentioned this once (how toxic their work environment becomes when there is no man), so started noticing it around.
As a married man I can understand these clubs fully. A man is never so relaxed, open and honest as when with other men, only men. I would expect the same among women, while accepting they always play their little games also just among themselves (which are very tiring for most men in long run and thus those clubs' popularity)
ReptileMan
The group dynamic changes the moment it is not single sex anymore.
watwut
[flagged]
lurk2
> The neighborhood cafe where locals can stop by at any time and see other locals. The bar that everyone stops by after work twice a week. These are stationary physical locations that don’t require pre-planning, schedules, apps, or anything else.
I’ve seen a number a theories on why these spaces declined:
1. Social media became more engaging than actual hangouts.
2. Rising levels of cultural and ethnic diversity lead to lower levels of social trust and a subsequent exit from public spaces (see e.g. Robert Putnam).
3. Independent bars and cafes got bought out by chains that favored higher rates of table turnover.
4. Civil Liberties movement made America into an open air insane asylum that normal people avoid venturing into.
5. Wages not keeping pace with inflation leaves less discretionary income available to pay for these spaces.
6. Decline of fraternal orders, friendly societies, and veteran clubhouses which were often the owners of the bars and / or cafes.
maerF0x0
(Similar to 2)
7. A loss of a common religious practice creating a space for community, and in the case of evangelical Christianity a shift to a female driven congregation and preaching.
(Which, ultimately, is very sad for the women in the church, too, because a lot of them want to be married to a Christian man, but struggle to find one if only for a purely supply issue)
_DeadFred_
1. True. When I was younger we all went to XYZ coffee shop in large part to see who we ran into there, catch up on gossip, let people know where to come hang that night. With social media you don't have/need that.
3. When I was younger we did item 1 above, but at Denny's late at night after everything shut down. The fact it was a chain didn't seem to impact the hang potential.
4. I grew up in Santa Cruz and it was always an insane asylum and had a homeless problem before having a homeless problem was cool, but it was also always a city full of people hanging out (don't know anymore was forced to move away).
0xfaded
Last time I was in Prague my friend brought me straight to the local pub, and without even ordering beer came out. Everyone knew each other and each other's dogs (Prague is very dog friendly, in fact one of the dogs was in the kitchen begging scraps). I have vague memories of similar scenes growing up in Australia, and have seen similar in Ireland. I don't know if anywhere like it in US cities, but maybe it's still like that out in the country.
scelerat
It seems to me that an underlying assumption of every so-called "social" app is that its users wish to avoid contact with people in real life. That the users wish for some sanitized, safe and dimensionally meager simulacrum of human interaction.
Obviously, that's not an absolute; clearly people yearn for human contact. But as you point out, there was a time when people participated in social activities and public life with a much higher degree of physical presence than they do now, and the popularity of apps which sidestep this indicate to me that people also desire not to engage with others so proximately.
If you want to have relationships with people, go to where people actually are, buckle your belt, set aside your dread of rejection or indifference, and introduce yourself.
lavelganzu
Isn't this merely a technological change? "A few decades or a century ago", being location-specific was the only possible option for a social club. Now there are more options; location-specific options still exist, and location-agnostic options exist also.
You can totally pick a convenient cafe or pub and start hanging out there & inviting your existing friends. In time you'll start to recognize the other regulars, and you can make a point of chatting with them regularly (but not overstaying your welcome especially early on!), find out what they're interested in, offer & request small favors, crack jokes, eventually a bit of friendly competition, casual debate about mutual interests while intentionally trusting them enough to let them change your mind a little, etc -- all the things you'd normally do to build a social connection with another man. The upside and downside of a location-based approach is that it's a very weak filter. The other regulars may be people whom it's a real stretch to learn to connect with.
Location-agnostic social activities are typically focused on an activity or interest, e.g. people who want to hike, watch a movie, play a game or sport, do political activism, do community service, etc. So the social group comes with a filter attached that ensures you will have an easier time connecting with them. This is great! There are some downsides, too, but nothing serious.
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KolibriFly
There's something irreplaceable about place-based community
km144
Probably that's just how we were wired. I'm probably often guilty of invoking an appeal to nature [1] when it comes to these things, but it's striking to me how few people who exist in modern society have the capacity to acknowledge that to live in this society is to entirely live within an experiment whose parameters have evolved from generation to generation over the past few centuries. We do not think critically enough about which of the technologies that "enhance" our lives actually enhance them. If personal automobiles are good for us, then to what end are they good? If social media is good for us, then to what end is it good? When you go beyond the first or second question, you start to realize the societal good is dubious at best.
flowingfocus
> The neighborhood cafe where locals can stop by at any time and see other locals
This is still the norm in some places. When I was cycling through the Balkans, I was surprised how many people sit in public spaces, usually close to a kiosk, and play cards, throw dice, or just chatter
jajko
Whole southern Europe is like that (sitting now in a small trattorria in Liguria province in Italy, I see this everywhere, and ie Spain, Portugal or Greece is same).
The problem mostly arises in big cities where a lot of young move for work, I'd call those socially sterile places.
nothercastle
Real estate is too expensive in the USA. To stay profitable you need to turn customers around quickly
Euphorbium
You are not supposed to stop by. You are supposed to spend money and keep going.
lovestory
Here in the Balkans and most of European countries always have public squares or similar gathering place for each neighborhood. I was shocked when I visited some USA states that absolutely have nothing of that sort. Not even a park that is tailored for a few hours hangout sessions. Even some public spaces like parks and library gardens are filled with corporate interests like Starbucks. You absolutely are expected to spend money whenever you go out which is depressing af.
teddyh
If the business doesn’t make enough money it will not be able to pay rent, and will be replaced with a more profitable business which will make enough money, probably by pressuring people to instead be customers, pay and move on. It’s what the system will produce.
Multicomp
The lack of deep friendships feel like a 3-fold problem.
1. You can't ever be real, if you are real, you are likely to be recorded doing something someone somewhere on the largest stage in the world (the public web) that someone will disapprove of, and someone else will raise their own profile by mining your impiety to prove their own concern and moral superiority.
2. Everyone is so mobile and connected online, they never have to break the ice and talk to those around them in the breakroom or geographical space, so all of our social skills have atrophied at best, or were never learned at worst. We know just enough civility to not get in fights, but we don't know how to easily break the ice or become acquaintances.
3. All the people that live in the cities are not close with each other, they didn't grow up together and don't go to church / rotary club / male-only spaces any longer because we are all supposed to pretend to be cool liberated yuppies in a hookup culture. Can't have real ties or any strongly held beliefs, that would make you religious (or worse, Religious on an actual religion), those people are bad. So I'm okay, you're okay, and we all smile. And inside, no real connections are ever made.
Not to mention testosterone levels dropping, schools being geared towards women, always co-ed spaces, and a breakup of younger and older generations because of cultural differences there too...not that the old people are always nice.
tdb7893
"if you are real, you are likely to be recorded doing something someone somewhere on the largest stage in the world (the public web) that someone will disapprove of" -> is this a concern for many men? It's never crossed my mind or been a problem for anyone I've known.
"they never have to break the ice and talk to those around them in the breakroom or geographical space" -> I've always talked to people at work and also I joined the most socially awkward hobby I've ever seen (historical sword fencing) and people are still very chatty. I also recently started volunteering at a wildlife rehabilitator and find myself just constantly chatting.
"Can't have real ties or any strongly held beliefs, that would make you religious (or worse, Religious on an actual religion), those people are bad" -> I've been friends with a lot of religious people but also non-religious people have strongly held beliefs (I hang out with a lot of vegans and I cannot imagine claiming they are afraid to publicly hold strong beliefs).
I think your post just goes to show how different mens' experiences can be because, while I'm sure a lot of men probably can connect with this, my personal experiences could not be more opposite. I think it depends a ton on the sorts of crowds you run in, it almost sounds to me like the people you meet are generally judgy and antisocial but I've found people I'm around to be generally friendly (though I've found many people are happy to chat but are often hard to actually organize to otherwise hang out since people in their 30s are busy and some of my friends have kids now).
rchaud
> is this a concern for many men? It's never crossed my mind or been a problem for anyone I've known.
Not for me, I have been to plenty of meetups in my city. If you're not liked or don't get along with the others, the worst that can happen is that you'll be politely ostracized. The paranoia about being publicly "cancelled" seems very overblown.
SoftTalker
Well we already have people on this page commenting on the demograpic represented on the submitted web site. Yes, in today's world there are almost always people looking to play "gotcha" and will try to pin you as a racist, misogynist, homophobe, or some other sort of bigot or pariah.
mrweasel
> is this a concern for many men? It's never crossed my mind or been a problem for anyone I've known
Yes, I talk to an older guy, probably mid-50s, at my gym. He completely stopped helping women at the gym or even giving advise. To my knowledge, no one ever accused him of anything, but he acknowledge that he absolutely have no experience talking to or otherwise interacting with younger women. He is terrified of doing or saying something wrong and lose access to the only gym in town, so he simply avoided women at the gym. He helps out the men, young and old, just not women.
yodsanklai
> he absolutely have no experience talking to or otherwise interacting with younger women.
A sad fact of life, but at 50, most men aren't attractive to women 10 years younger than them, and it becomes pretty awkward and socially unacceptable to do anything that could be interpreted as flirting.
Now I don't know about the situation in gyms in the US, maybe the situation is extreme there. But generally speaking, I don't find it particularly sad if people mind their own business in the gym.
const_cast
IMO this mostly stems from not having walkable, livable communities. People live in detached homes and they drive to work and the grocery store and… that’s it.
There’s next to zero room for random events because travel becomes such a deliberate action. I can’t just pop into a cafe - first I need to find it and drive there.
Also our social signals are completely fucked up. Headphones and phones means that most interactions are off-limits. Probably a lot of these people do want to talk, but they’re not signaling it. And I’m not gonna be the one to bother a stranger.
542354234235
To add, in walkable communities you are much more likely to be a “regular” at more places, since you are walking to the places nearby, and to share multiple regular places with other people. Walking 15 minutes to 30 minutes still keep you in about a 1-2 mile radius, which is pretty small and has a lot of overlap with other people walking. So you are likely to see the same people at the bar as at the gym or the coffee shop.
If you are driving 15 minutes to 30 minutes, especially if you get on a highway for any amount of time, you could be anywhere in a 15+ mile radius. Your grocery store and your preferred bar could be 20 miles away from each other, so not likely you will run into Jim from the bar in the cereal aisle.
jaredklewis
IME, none of those things are issues that prevent deep friendships in my own life.
1. I've never worried about this.
2. I regularly chat with strangers and acquaintances IRL, though I don't feel it does much to relieve loneliness or cultivate deep friendships.
3. I'm an atheist, but I don't think I've ever worried about being "religious" about something nor judged someone for being so.
I would analyze my own life as follows: friendship requires time spent together. I'm a parent with a full time job in a car centric city, which keeps me pretty busy. I may get one day or night a week to go be social or do hobbies or go to a rotary club or whatever. That's a limited amount of time, so there's a corresponding limit on how many friendships I can realistically maintain. Let alone start new friendships.
So I feel like "having it all" is not realistic. Everything takes time: working out, eating healthy, having friends, having a family, having a job, having a community, writing hacker news comments, and on and on. Most data shows that Dads now spend significantly more time with their kids than those of previous generations. So I think for people of my cohort (millennial dads) its just a case where we traded time with friends for time with family.
wkat4242
1) Real friends certainly let you be real. And the scene I frequent deeply frowns on unconsensual photography. Most of the events I go to they sticker all the cameras. I love that. I go there for the people not for Instagram.
That's not to say nobody takes pics but they do it in a quiet corner so they don't catch anyone by mistake. It makes it very respectful. The stickers are just a reminder so you don't just start flicking away when you're drunk. It makes everyone feel safer and more genuine.
2) I guess but nothing some quick ice breaking games won't fix
3) In a small town there's much more familiarity yes. But also a much deeper sense of being watched and judged. I can't live with that. Even the small city I lived in was too small for me. Everyone knows everyone's business and constantly gossip behind your back.
The nice thing in a big city is meeting new people and finding new places. And the variety. In a small town there's a lot of pressure to conform, eg often you're an outcast if you're not religious. I don't think they're bad but there's little acceptance of people who are different. So what do you do? Pretend. That's not real connection.
In a big city you can really be yourself because there's always others that are like you and you can meet them in like-minded places or events. And you can make real ties there. And even find out about other communities you might fit in.
I really hate going to male-exclusive places by the way. There's very few men I have a deep connection with (I'm male) because the whole BS thing that it's frowned upon to talk about feelings. "Men's weekends" just end up with too much beer, macho talk, shooting the shit and hanging in front of the TV watching boring sports or crappy porn. Nothing serious, fun or enlightening. That's my experience with those anyway. I find that exhausting and I always excuse myself from them now. I used to try to fit in but the others would know I hated it anyway so it was awkward.
I have much deeper relationships with lady friends. They're more open and less judgemental in general. I feel safer around them. So mixed events are a must for me.
margalabargala
> Men's weekends" just end up with [...] hanging in front of the TV watching boring sports or crappy porn.
How many situations are you in where group consumption of pornography is normal? I've been in very few.
blitzar
"Everyone knows" a gathering of women will involve a lingerie clad pillow fight and a gathering of men will involve watching porn.
nothercastle
Where do you go where they sticker cameras. Seems like my kind of place.
wkat4242
Like te_chris says, they're the more expressive parties. The "embrace different" ones. Not specifically queer in my case but certainly queer friendly.
Not necessarily as extreme as Berghain mind you. But just places and events where people are encouraged to dress or behave less typical.
Even the cosplay community now has signs to always ask before photographing a cosplayer as they might not want to be photographed without their knowledge.
te_chris
Queer nightclubs - Berghain and FOLD (London) e.g.
Some parties I occasionally go to in London have a “we really really don’t want you to use your phone on the dance floor and will tell you off” policy.
blitzar
Places where people are doing "weird" shit.
worthless-trash
> In a big city you can really be yourself because there's always others that > are like you and you can meet them in like-minded places. > And you can make real ties there.
This is a massive assumption, but maybe 'yourself' is limited to a standard deviation from the accepted mean.
wkat4242
Well yes of course there's a maximum deviation. If you're too different you won't fit in. Not a bad thing because then there's no real point in being there anyway.
That's why you have to pick the communities you engage in so you fit. You don't have to change yourself but you pick the community to suit.
It's not an assumption though. I live in a city of millions and I'm in some communities of only hundreds of people. Which thrive and even have their own places. That's the nice thing, in a city it's easy to have enough scale even to make niche communities thrive.
tbrownaw
Is it really that outrageous of an assumption to think that most people are not too far from the majority?
losteric
This is incredibly fatalistic.
I lived under all of this, plus two immigrant parents with no community / role modeling, isolated in suburbia as a kid with a chronically online 20s.
Yeah that nurturing left its mark. Yet I learned to see it, and learn new patterns. In my 30s I have deep friendships. Younger, older, men, women, nb. Most are still shallow, my energy is limited, but even there sometimes we touch into depth when it comes to relationship or existential stuff.
Rewrite your programming.
crtnptofvw
For me things like “loneliness epidemic” is fatalistic. End is nigh if some specific stat is not maintained. Giant foot will squish us all.
It’s pop-sci, gate-keeping, always be hustling zeitgeist obfuscated by high minded toxic positivity.
Media post says there’s an epidemic. Academics come up with a theory of social science in a world where the Executive branch is blatantly manipulating the market. Fed and Congress manipulate employment options, COL through rates and tax code.
Predictions of 10-12 billion people by 2100 do not line up with real birth trends.
So much of our social truisms are made up cable TV hype that zapped the elders brains into anxious compliance. Narratives propagated in service to a random researchers rent and food money search.
Fatalistic towards a social concept is not the same as “launch the nukes, humans suck.” Non-Christians can not believe without going about shooting Christians. Not accepting someone’s dissertation is the same thing.
JKCalhoun
> You can't ever be real, if you are real, you are likely to be recorded doing something…
I'm real all the time. What am I missing here?
rchaud
The 800lb elephant in the room about this whole idea - some people have trouble building friendships because they can't stop themselves from bringing up fringe topics with people they just met, and insisting on having conversations about them.
nothercastle
I think it’s mostly men just not being that interested in being friends with other men unless there is something tangible to gain. Also 1:1 friendship is hard to maintain if you don’t have a shared 3rd space. A 3rd space allowed you to maintain friendships much more time effectively.
BeFlatXIII
Isn't RFK diligently working day and night to find a cure?
latentsea
Elephant's weigh more like 11,000lbs. I think you mean Gorilla?
Speaking of Gorillas, have you ever read the book Chimpanzee Politics? Crazy how at the end the other two chimps break into the one chimps cage and literally rip his nuts off. Crazy huh?
Oh wait... I'm doing that thing again, aren't I?
tbrownaw
> What am I missing here?
"Friends" who prioritize being angry and spiteful online over their meatspace relationships, sounds like.
mock-possum
You’re missing that you’re probably not the kind of person who has the problem being outlined in the comment you’re replying to.
For what it’s worth, I remember being a closeted teenager, I remember feeling like I “couldn’t” be real - but that feeling was wrong. I just hadn’t figured that out yet at the time. It seemed too scary, too risky to be real. That’s probably one of the only pieces of advice I would have given my younger self if I could go back in time - come out sooner, come out before you’re ready, come out as bi before you know you’re gay, come out as curious/questioning before that even.
Force other people to deal with you as you are, instead of constantly working to make yourself into something that you think will be more acceptable to them. Take the risk of being real.
entropie
Your points are valid, but this I do not understand:
> Not to mention testosterone levels dropping
Why should declining testosterone levels prevent men from socializing and making friends? Logically, it should be the other way around, right?
BurningFrog
Increased testosterone increases confidence, motivation, goal-oriented behavior, risk-taking and social assertiveness.
mensetmanusman
It’s just the adders for all the other health metrics declining. Most are due to addiction to pleasure, lack of movement, obesity, etc.
nathan_compton
Don't get me wrong, I hate religion and everything, but America is still basically totally controlled by religious people and in many situations being non-religious is the weird thing. I can't imagine anyone would be feel stigmatized by religious belief in this country.
parpfish
> Everyone is so mobile and connected online, they never have to break the ice and talk to those around them
one of the unexpected consequences of social media is that people have been conflating being informed with being connected.
asking "what have you been up to?" was to be a nice easy opening into a conversation that lead to connection.
but thanks to broadcast updates on social media, your friends already know what have you've been up to, so they can delude themselves into thinking that they've maintained a relationship because they know superficial details.
but a relationship isn't built on updating a list of superficial facts. it's built by having a conversation
mynameisash
> thanks to broadcast updates on social media, your friends already know what have you've been up to, so they can delude themselves into thinking that they've maintained a relationship because they know superficial details.
This is a huge reason (possibly the top reason) why I quit Facebook. I wasn't getting value from my "connections", and I figured everyone knew, more or less, what I was doing (& I knew what they were doing), so we didn't actually interact. I figured if I was no longer going to be friends with these people, I didn't want a facade. So I quit it, and I don't use the other usual suspects (Instagram, Snapchat, tiktok, etc.)
It's great. I actually have some honest to goodness friends IRL that I hug, with whom I talk about real things, etc.
BlueTemplar
Hasn't this kind of usage of « social media » died down a decade ago ?
aaronbaugher
I don't think so. I think some of us early adopters of this stuff got tired of it and dropped out before being tired of social media was cool, but we were replaced by a new crowd that's as hooked on it as ever.
tayo42
>but thanks to broadcast updates on social media, your friends already know what have you've been up to, so they can delude themselves into thinking that they've maintained a relationship because they know superficial details.
I don't think this is really a big deal. "hey I saw you posted pictures from your trip. How was it" there, conversation started. Social media posts are basically all conversation starters.
Assuming you can even remember. I pretty quickly forget people's posts and updates.
parpfish
The problem is more that you never bother to have the convo where ask how things are going because your in your mind you think you’re all up-to-date.
Telemakhos
Sometimes I wish we could have "gentlemen's clubs" of the sort that existed in Victorian Britain (not the US strip club version), third-spaces where one could go to read or converse or play cards with other men or even have a meal or a drink. Having social space that's limited to a set of people one knows, more or less, and that has rules on behavior seems like a civilizing influence that's missing today.
rchaud
> Having social space that's limited to a set of people one knows, more or less, and that has rules on behavior seems like a civilizing influence that's missing today.
You just described a country club, right down to the innate classism and exclusivity rules.
Retric
Country club’s are really a subset of this kind of thing and tend to have an overly wide membership to the point where you’re unlikely to know every member. The VFW is another modern take that’s got a very different vibe.
Similarly historically it wasn’t just elitist hangouts. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_men's_club
mrguyorama
Notably, VFWs are struggling because the Vietnam vets are not very welcoming to the War on Terror vets.
No women to blame there. What is the cause of the male loneliness epidemic then?
piuantiderp
You just haven't been to a good one.
Aeolun
Isn’t the whole point that you get people of similar socioeconomic status? Half the reason expensive things are sometimes nicer is that there’s no massive crowd in those stores.
gadders
You also had Working Men's clubs and the British Legion for the working classes in the UK: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_men%27s_club
BurningFrog
Are male only country clubs legal?
pmc3
Not only are they legal, many male only city clubs exist today!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_gentlemen%27s_clubs_in...
Male-only country clubs also exist although are slightly more controversial and less common, such as Burning Tree, Garden City, Butler National, Augusta National (until the last ~10 years), Pine Valley (until the last few years).
The unfortunate reality for most of us is that these places are among the most desirable and hardest clubs to be accepted to in the world - and we probably wouldn't get in.
zerocrates
Private clubs have an exemption in several of the key civil rights laws, so they often can discriminate where businesses open to the public could not.
They can run into trouble when they allow the public to use their facilities, or grant membership so freely that they start to seem like they aren't really private.
chasebank
Probably not, but the country clubs where I live all have men's locker rooms that have full bars, poker tables, and lounge areas with big screen tv's.
amelius
Of course, there are also women only gyms/fitness clubs.
eesmith
In the US? Absolutely. Private clubs have a broad ability to discriminate.
For an example of gender discrimination at private golf clubs:
https://www.golflink.com/lifestyle/no-women-past-rock-chicag... lists Old Elm, Bob O'Link, Butler National, and Black Sheep Golf Club as four Chicago area male-only golf clubs.
> Perhaps no club makes its restriction more apparent than Black Sheep. At the end of the club’s lengthy driveway sits a large rock and the internal slogan amongst members is, “No Women Past the Rock.”
https://forums.golfwrx.com/topic/2013806-black-sheep-golf-cl... has a comment from last year verifying that gender restriction. I have not verified the others.
Slava_Propanei
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ToucanLoucan
Why do they need to be male-only to solve the male loneliness epidemic? Why can't men socialize in public spaces in a way that isn't offensive to others?
I say this as a former dude who has spent the vast, vast, vast majority of my life as a man, socializing with men and not-men, in public. I have never had a single issue.
rchaud
No, but just like everywhere else, you can engineer a byzantine set of hoops to jump through so that the only people who "qualify" end up being the "preferred" sort of clientele.
prisenco
I recommend everyone watch the series Lodge 49. It's free to watch with ads now.
Not only is a great show that touches on relationships and loneliness and modern alienation with a touch of magical realism and esoterica and alchemy but it focuses on a fraternal (in name only, women are members) order that your grandfather might have been a member of but have disappeared due to rising individualism, rising rents and displacement.
But there's no reason we couldn't start building them again. Not high end exclusive clubs like Soho House but just a place with books and a reasonable membership fee and a bar with cheap drinks for added revenue and occasional "open to the public" events.
There could be ones for software devs, ones focused on philosophy or great literature, ones for musicians or artists.
I've run the back-of-a-napkin numbers and even in expensive cities it doesn't seem impossible if your goal is to just break even and foster a community.
Gigachad
Think the main reason is because real estate is incredibly expensive now. To run some kind of social space and make it financially viable you need to be collecting a significant amount to pay rent and wages.
Only way I can see it working is if the government pays for social spaces. An extension of the library system but more focused on events and socialising rather than being a quiet space for reading.
vharuck
>Only way I can see it working is if the government pays for social spaces.
The government effectively does financially support social clubs by exempting them from taxes: https://www.irs.gov/charities-non-profits/other-non-profits/...
Actively providing money to clubs would be a tough sell. Grant writing is hard, grant reviewing and auditing is expensive, and there could be a PR nightmare if the government provided money to an "immoral" club or didn't provide money to certain classes of clubs.
Disposal8433
Freemasonry is hit or miss depending on who you meet and who you hangout with. Liberal freemasonry is even better IMHO because you actively work on yourself. You can choose to stay with men, be in a mixed group, and there are female only Lodges for the women who don't want to be with us stupid men.
I live in a big city where every member ends up knowing other member (male or female) even if your own Lodge is restricted to one sex. It's a lot of fun and I do believe it could be beneficial for a lot of incels.
adfm
There’s even an episode with a shout-out to Huell Howser! Can recommend.
Also, do check out the interactive map at the Huell Howser Archive, if you haven’t seen it [^0].
ed
I loved lodge 49. It inspired me to attend a welcome dinner at my local freemason lodge.
Sadly I discovered first hand why membership is declining (this lodge was a magnet for socially inept conspiracy theorists).
prisenco
Yeah... We can't revive the old lodges. The way forward is to create new ones.
iamacyborg
Soho House is pretty much the opposite of a high end exclusive club these days.
prisenco
$3000 a year and expensive menu items is too much for most Americans. Those are not the price points that can address social alienation.
ks2048
> It's free to watch with ads now.
Where? I searched and didn't see any where free.
prisenco
My mistake, I thought it was on Sling Freestream but it's on premium only.
Worth the $6.99 for AMC though.
dkkergoog
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dugmartin
These still exist in the US but the membership has plummeted. Some examples:
- Freemasons
- Odd Fellows
- Fraternal Order of Eagles
- Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks
- Loyal Order of Moose
achow
A billion dollar company started with this idea.
Schultz envisioned Starbucks as a “third place” between home and work, fostering community and connection.
https://mulcahyconsultants.com/2023/12/14/howard-schultz-and...
jonny_eh
My local one removed all its seats and is now take out only.
lotsofpulp
There is just too much liability, both legal and public relations wise, with operating cheap third places.
https://apnews.com/article/starbucks-racism-philadelphia-man...
chgs
In the U.K. there were lots of their places before American style capitalism invaded. Coffee houses predate America as a whole - on both sides of the Atlantic.
Animats
There's the Mechanics Institute Library in San Francisco. I used to be a member. If you want to see people sitting around in wing-backed chairs, half asleep, that's the place to go. It's quite a good library, too.
mitthrowaway2
You're not supposed to talk in a library, so it's explicitly not a social space.
Animats
And the Mechanics Institute librarians will shush people for talking.
chgs
Of course you are. The stereotype of the librarian saying “which” is decades out of date.
eesmith
My local library has both quiet areas and social areas, including meeting spaces. There are weekly social events for knitting, second-language practice, seniors, and more.
High school kids go there to work on class projects together, just like I did at the library when I was a teenager.
aspenmayer
Back in the day I would just go to Noisebridge and see what others were working on. Is that place still worth going to today?
dcsan
they had to move off mission around the corner to a backstreet, so there are less mission vagrant rogues trying to sneak in now, and still the hardcore of interesting people.
when i first moved back to the city from overseas, noisebridge was an awesome third place to hang out and hack on stuff while meeting regulars.
wkat4242
Those clubs still exist in London but they're just for the elite to make shady backroom deals with their rich buddies :)
They're really exclusive and they always have been. You and I would not get in, not now and not in the Victorian days. Even 'new money' is usually not ok. You really have to have gone to the right school and have the right family.
moritonal
Just to challenge that slightly. There is a range of clubs, some are honestly very easy to get into if you end up there for some work event and talk to at least two people. It's the ability to socialize, and lack of clubs focused on new industries that's made them elusive to the new-money (There isn't a National Software Club for example). I'll also knowledge most would run about £1-2k a quarter which is restrictive (by design) cost.
Veen
The working class used to have working men’s clubs, but they no longer serve the same purpose.
wkat4242
Ah I see, I misread that. I wasn't aware of those. Thanks!
didsomeonesay
Which new purpose do you allude to?
systemswizard
These places exist but are usually financially prohibitive for most people, and that’s even if they meet whatever requirements they have to join
lolinder
To be fair to our modern world this is how the Victorian gentleman's clubs were too—it's even in the name. If you weren't a gentleman you had the pub.
ninjin
There are also Working men's clubs and varieties thereof:
lukas099
Hell I’d take a pub. Bring back the neighborhood pub.
joshvm
They exist at either end of the class spectrum. Working Men's Clubs used to be very common around the UK and many still exist. The one near my childhood home is Victorian-era and was recently refurbished. As long as I can remember it had frosted windows. That's now gone and it's been rebranded it as a family-friendly event space. It's basically a member subsidized pub and your drinks should cost less.
erikerikson
Cognitive habit problems aside, this is one of the primary provisions of churches/temples/et cetera. Frequently featuring gender divided activities.
monocularvision
I realize that it is silly to tell non-believers to go to church to fix their problems but it’s funny how often people talk about place or group or organization that seems to be missing in society that was fulfilled by houses of worship in the past.
anal_reactor
That's true, but pretty much every religion beyond certain size focuses on growth and power at all costs, and treats the social function as a sidequest. I hate religion exactly because I see what it does to people's brains. Parents abandon their children "because priest told me to do so".
scoofy
I've never felt more connected to people than in NYC. I knew my neighbors, I had a huge social network, I just didn't like the NYC that much.
I honestly blame residential zoning. The place we would get to know our neighbors was at the corner shop, bar a block away, salon and pizza shop downstairs. All that goes away when you're walking more than a couple blocks to do anything.
forgotoldacc
I always hear stereotypes about people in big cities being unfriendly and there being no sense of community, but I've had the opposite experience. Coming from a town with a population of hundreds, yeah, everyone knew everybody, but the connections people had were decades old. And everyone hated everybody who wasn't already part of their very tight social network (and they hated most of the people in the network as well, but they just had no other choice but to deal with it). And nobody wanted to associate with direct neighbors.
But living in a city, I've had shopkeepers who regularly see me set aside items that they know I'll like and make sure nobody buys it before I get a chance. I have neighbors that greet me every time they see me. Some chat me up. I've stopped in random hole in the wall restaurants and had other regulars (who I didn't know) randomly give me free stuff to welcome me to the community. People were willing to welcome new people in.
Now I know people will want to rush in and say, "That's not a city experience. My small town has all that and your small town just sucked!" To which I say, okay. That's your anecdote against mine. But cities are just as welcoming as people think small towns are. If you choose to stay in your room and grimace every time you do happen to go outside, yeah, it's lonely. But it's very easy to turn that around in a city with potential friends everywhere you look. And having been to cities around the world, I see loads of people chatting and laughing outside.
scoofy
Yea, I loved the relationships in NYC, just not the grind. Everyone was trying to "make it" everything was expensive while at the same time there is garbage juice on the street in 90º heat. I'd go see my friends shows, but never got on the list because they had to get paying customers to get invited back. Tough living, and that's not even saying anything about trying to be a cyclist in the city.
I've lived in SF for the last decade, and I really see a difference. I know it's not that much less urban than Brooklyn or Queens, but it's the zoning. I don't have a convenience store on my block, much less a pizza restaurant or salon. We have a local bar, and have a similar relationship with the folks there as we did in Brooklyn, which is nice, but again, it's hard to get to know the folks in your "commercial zoned district" because everyone is slammed together, and you don't see them every day. Even though I live three blocks away, I'm still a face on the crowd.
There's honestly a big difference between a shop on your street and a shop a few blocks away... because everyone in the neighborhood is a few blocks away.
amelius
Americans will probably never admit it but they are really bad at urban planning.
samwalsh
Bouldering (indoor climbing) is the most social sport I’ve tried, and I’d highly recommend going on your own as you will find opportunities to meet new people, and others will talk to you (as long as you’re not wearing headphones!).
Bouldering provides an open space you can move freely in, with no inherent social hierarchy (no tutors, teachers), just people trying varying difficulties of bouldering routes. If someone can do a route you can’t, just ask them for tips, or if someone can’t do a route you can, ask if they want help, or cheer someone on when they do something difficult.
Bouldering provides lots of easy conversation starters, and as with all social situations, going on your own and showing vulnerability will always be endearing to others.
dwaltrip
Pickleball is another great option. I find open-play pickelball to be even more social than bouldering! It's also cheaper. There are courts everywhere these days!
profsummergig
Is it usually done in natural settings outdoors, or in a sort of gym, indoors?
samwalsh
In my experience people will start indoors and build experience before heading outdoors.
You could ask people in the bouldering gym whether they have any experience with outdoor bouldering and people will start sharing their favourite spots nearby, and might even invite you along.
Outdoors requires:
- your own climbing shoes
- someone with a bouldering mat
Whereas you will hire shoes from the bouldering gym as a beginner
You won’t need to bring anything to the bouldering gym other than a water bottle and some loose fit clothing
tonightstoast
Both! Usually outdoor bouldering is a bit more of an undertaking to get into since you’ll have to travel and bring matts & additional gear. But look up “climbing gym” on google and you should be able to find some if you’re in a reasonably sized metro. Not sure if you’re in the USA but the southwest has a ton of great outdoor bouldering.
sigmoid10
It ranges from high tech indoor and outdoor gyms with customisable holds all the way to a random rock somewhere in the middle of nature where local guys put a few mats under. If you start going to a gym you'll naturally learn about all the other places very quickly.
jajko
It brings automatically like-minded folks together into same place, I have to agree. I wouldnt expect spontaneous conversations automatically, at least where I go in Europe thats not the case. But maybe it takes just a polite few words, people in Switzerland are very shy and overly respectful of other's private sphere.
Headphones for any sort of climbing - please dont do that and politely advise others to refrain from use while climbing, thats 1) frowned upon massively in whole community; 2) increases risk of something bad happening; 3) just a bit too arrogant, one doesnt do that in ie restaurant neither
FirmwareBurner
I can disagree with this take.
For one, bouldering is not great if you have a fear of heights or maybe some mobility issues due to a previous injury. It's then a massively painful and risky chore and not a pleasurable activity but requires you to be at 100% health physically and mentally in order to do anything beyond kiddy walls. Otherwise you can fall and injure yourself pretty badly. Granted, that's mostly on you, not the sport but still, it's not a universally approachable sport by everyone by any stretch. At least I never gotten to enjoy it no matter how much I forced myself to based on the hype of those around me and the internet.
> with no inherit social hierarchy
Not 100% true. This might be your conscious way of wanting to see things, but in reality, all sports especially in male groups are inherently competitive where a clear hierarchy gets formed which leads to either admiration or repulsion based on abilities and results, even if it's just subconsciously, but it is there and everyone is aware of it even if we choose to ignore it for the sake of equality and inclusion.
IMHO, team sports like football, handball, volleyball, tennis, ping-pong, various martial arts etc are far better for socializing because you actually have to partner with others and play against others, versus solitary like bouldering.
> I’d highly recommend going on your own as you will find opportunities to meet new people, and others will talk to you
I feel like this take is 100% based on regional social customs of where you live, and not on the sport. This might be my experience of the German speaking country I moved to but from the locals, nobody here ever starts making conversation to you randomly. People tend to go with their social group and not interact with strangers, while those who go alone tend to want to be left alone to practice and not get interrupted with small talk by other who are there to make friends.
Just like the gym, it's definitely not a way to make friends here, since people got here to work out, not have conversations with strangers.
sfmz
It has a built-in gating function. People who are out-of-shape or with injuries will opt-out. Bouldering favors slim people. On the other hand, I think gating functions are necessary to build community. Often gating-functions are accomplished with wealth (gated community, country club), but its more interesting when its some other function.
Maybe good idea for a meetup might be to solve some tech challenge, idk. Solve X get invited to some hacker house/space maybe? (i'm saying this as a person who probably wouldn't solve it)
FirmwareBurner
>On the other hand, I think gating functions are necessary to build community.
Of course, obviously, 100% agree. But then why is there so much debate in this topic that "men's only social/recreational spaces" are somehow discriminatory? We humans segregate ourselves based on a lot of shared things all the time since childhood.
>Bouldering favors slim people.
You're missing my point. The point I was making is that where I live, what I noticed, is that people who go to perform solitary sports like bouldering, tend to do said activity for the workout itself, not to meet new people or socialize with strangers.
They go there alone or with their group, they boulder alone or together, then they go home, not reciprocate much to chit-chat of others since that's not what they came for. You can pick any other such sport, likes fitness studios/gym, the result will be the same, people go there to lift weights, then go home, any addition chit-chat is more of an annoying interruption from their workout. Sure, people here are polite and they'll answer your questions on technique or to spot you, but they won't open up to strangers and start to befriend you just because you engaged them in some conversation. Social etiquette differs heavily between cultures. Some are more isolationist towards strangers and value personal space, some are more open.
You have better chances in meeting people in socializing at teams sports like football, volleyball, martial arts, etc because the sport itself demands it. Or just to events where socializing is the main activity like concerts, pub quizzes, etc. but solitary sports like bouldering are pretty bad for that unless the bouldering gym is full of posers who only go there seeking to socialize instead of work out (there are some of those in every gym, you see them spend most of the time scrolling on their phone or taking selfies for Instagram stories instead of working out).
samwalsh
Sorry to hear that’s your experience.
I’m staying with my parents this week and I visited the local bouldering gym alone on Wednesday and last night.
On Wednesday I met someone called Nelly, and hung out with them for the session.
Yesterday I bumped into Nelly with their friends Maddie and Kate and climbed with them.
I’m leaving on Sunday so I gave one of them my number and they messaged me to say it was great fun climbing together.
Now we might be climbing again this weekend.
Granted, I approached them, but all it took was asking Nelly, “How did you find that route?” and asking them for tips.
The bouldering gym is what you make it, just hang out and don’t assume people will reject you (which can be a difficult headspace to get out of, but exposure therapy will fix that, and the bouldering gym can be that exposure therapy)
FirmwareBurner
You don't need to go to the bouldering gym to make small talk hoping it becomes more than that. You can make small talk everywhere like libraries, cafes, bars, meet-ups, concerts, stand-ups, etc. places where the main activity is talking, not exercising.
And if sports is your jam, team sports are better for socializing than solitary sports like bouldering, because you are forced to work together and build connections even without talking too much.
From my experience here, bouldering gym are the worst if socializing is your main goal because local people go there to exercise not hang around to talk to strangers and build connections, even if you're the one initiation the conversations. Socializing with strangers at the bouldering gym seems to be a mostly anglosphere thing or a big international city young urbanite thing as people mostly go there to hang out and meet new people instead of exercise. But again, bouldering is not a very easy sport for everyone to pick-up and master.
1oooqooq
it's like a daycare play space for adults. hopefully with less biting incidents.
cjohnson318
I think a lot of this boils down to the fact that most men are too insecure to engage with each other meaningfully. This causes them to appear overly competitive, or uninterested. How many times have you spoken to another man that can't stop trying to one-up you, or cannot be bothered to ask you a single question? That's the majority of my interactions with other men.
yesfitz
Is there a common thread between the men you describe beyond their gender?
I haven't experienced what you described since I was socializing with programmers and scientists on the East Coast. Now most of the men I socialize with are artists (at least part time) and IT generalists in the Midwest.
cjohnson318
That's difficult to say. Right now, my cohort is mainly other dads at my kids school, so we're all busy and kind of tired. I want to make friends, but it's hard to find people that are (1) available and (2) friendly. Full disclosure, I have insecurities too: I've got zero interest in trying to make friends in a group where I feel like I'll be judged or looked down upon for whatever. I still socialize, and I've learned a lot about socialization from my wife, but yeah, I realize that I've got a chip on my shoulder also.
Rendello
You put it in perfect words.
dennis_jeeves2
>How many times have you spoken to another man that can't stop trying to one-up you, or cannot be bothered to ask you a single question? That's the majority of my interactions with other men.
Very true. Statistically men don't care about other men, period. Conversely they care about women or their daughters more than their sons. A lot of it is biological - meaning mean are the dispensable gender. The term 'women and children' is not a coincidence.
blablabla123
Yeah, problems are way deeper and would have to be addressed in such a concept. Last year I read a Graphical Novel about it (Seek You) which goes into great detail. Root causes includes dysfunctional TV stereotypes (the lonely hero) among others.
cjohnson318
Dysfunctional media is a big one, dysfunctional families, the disintegration of the middle class, the rise of techbro culture where a whole generation suddenly had this expectation that you can and should be as wealthy as a doctor, with a fraction of the training or oversight.
fiforpg
I'd like to offer a contrarian view.
Much of the NYT article can be explained away by the Gell-Mann effect. During most of human history it was hard to maintain multiple strong bonds anyway; long distance communication pre-internet was hard too. There are plenty of modern opportunities for finding friends based on interests: conferences, concerts, sports bars etc. How much of this discussion is a moral panic caused by imprecise notions which by definition cannot be described by hard data?
solraph
I like the idea in general principle - but if I lived in the right city/country, and didn't already have something similar, my first thought based on the landing page pictures would be;
"This is only for white guys in their twenties."
I don't know if that's intentional, but if I was in the location target market, I'd close the tab at that point.
null
sandspar
This comment inadvertently reveals why clubs like this can't exist: there's always someone counting races and genders in photos. High functioning male social clubs generally have implicit rules, like "straight-acting gay guys are fine but don't make it weird" or "no weird lefties". But you can't have those rules anymore. So "male social clubs" get overrun with board game types who are OK with accepting everyone. Which means high status guys, the kind of guys who are trend setters, tend to stay away.
wkat4242
> High functioning male social clubs generally have implicit rules, like "straight acting gay guys are fine but don't make it weird" or "no weird lefties".
I think that whole conformation thing is why they don't work. Nobody wants to hang out with people pretending to be someone else so they fit in. Any social connection you make is then fake too.
> Which means high status guys, the kind of guys who are trend setters, tend to stay away.
The board games types can also be high status trend setters, just not in your circle. That's fine though. Nothing wrong with seeking out people that are like yourself.
But there's plenty of places where you can find what it sounds like you're looking for. Like sports bars. Won't find the board games types there and not many women either.
sandspar
Huh? "Conformist" is the most common type of person on Earth and conformists prefer hanging out with conformists. Social clubs are entirely a conformist phenomena, almost by definition. All those Elk clubs and bowling clubs and so on were chock full of conformists.
rchaud
But high status guys by definition wouldn't be seen dead in clubs like these to begin with. They are socially successful ladder climbers already, that's part and parcel of being high status.
flomo
I think a gracious reading here is a "boardgame type" is the sort of person you would only encounter at your friendly local game store etc. GP has a point, but I know plenty of 'high(er) status' groups include 'non-straight-acting' and 'weird lefty' guys, but they are cool guys to hang out with, and not like weirdos who slithered out of their mother's basement.
Popular people like other popular people, because that's how you throw a party.
Anyway I wish OP the best. But in the grand tradition of internet meetups, "these people are really fucking weird."
lurk2
> But high status guys by definition wouldn't be seen dead in clubs like these to begin with.
The problem with joining a club is not that it’s a club but that it’s a club governed by Title IX legislation and the Damoclesian threat of getting cancelled for telling the “It’s too white in here” college liberal that he’s no longer welcome to attend.
BlueTemplar
« board game types » ??
solraph
I guess it depends if you are after a club with men to help you climb some status ladder, or if you are after a club that helps you make male friends, regardless of where they come from.
rsynnott
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aaron695
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susiecambria
I very much appreciate these efforts. I don't think they, like I don't think men's sheds, have to be everything to all people.
I DO think social isolation, white boys and men in the US (and elsewhere? I have no idea), and voluntarism have confronted challenges for years. Robert Putnam's Bowling Alone that came out in 2000, the Do Good Institute report on voluntarism (https://dogood.umd.edu/sites/default/files/2019-07/Where%20A...) and the recent work of Scott Galloway and friends on boys are examples of investigations of problems, challenges, and solutions.
Having been in the public policy world for 20+ years, government may be part of the solution (okay, not in this climate). But more often, it is part of the problem. Government is fickle about consistent and long term funding and evaluation and nonprofit organizations may not actually do work in a way that helps (meaning, is effective).
Individuals and communities often step up to do something, often anything, that may address a need. Participation and reach may wax and wain and I think that's ok. It really is the nature of the beast. Best case, an effort fades away and there is already another underway or standing in the wings.
The bottom line for me is that efforts are made. As a policy wonk and social worker, I'd very much like for efforts to be grounded in some sort of theory of change or best practice or something. But since I'm not a funder or a wielder of power, I don't get to make this decision.
ojbyrne
My mother, somewhere around 1976, told me that basically when men get married, they lose all their friends. But they get all their wife’s friends. Which seems prescient to me. Including their husbands, obviously.
SoftTalker
I think most men do not maintain friendships unless there is some outside circumstances that keeps them in touch. School, work, church, clubs, or even just being neighbors.
Without exception the people who were my closest friends in high school didn't really keep in touch when we all went off to college. The friendships I made in college did not persist after graduation. There's a guy at work I had lunch with almost every day for years, he retired and that was the last time I saw him. There was a group of fathers I was friendly with because our kids were playing ball together on the same team. The kids got older and went their separate ways, and we really don't see each other anymore.
Maintaining friendships takes work if circumstances don't assist.
Might be largely the same for women, but it seems to me they tend to make more of an effort to keep in touch and keep getting together.
This is all just my experience so I could be way off I guess.
cogogo
I read somewhere long ago that the biggest factor in building friendships is shared experience - like the “circumstances” you described. More important than anything else. Ones those experiences go away so does the common ground.
kelnos
You specifically mention building friendships. What it takes to build and maintain friendships can be different. Once friendships are built on the back of a shared experience, they can survive the loss of that shared experience, if the parties recognize that things have changed, continue to value the friendship, and understand that maintaining the friendship will require a different kind of commitment and different levels and styles of interaction.
I'm not saying this is always easy, and sometimes one or more people in the friend group just decide that the friendships aren't that important to them to maintain. But it's absolutely possible, and can be very rewarding.
kelnos
My experience is a bit different from yours, and I wonder what happened with you vs. me that made it that way. (Granted, while I'm a man, the friend groups I'm about to describe are mixed-gender groups, so it's a little different from the overall discussion.)
I have three friends from high school that I still keep in touch with. We have a Whatsapp group that isn't super active, but we chat once or twice a month there. Even though we all live in different places now, we meet up roughly once per year, for a few days, to see each other and hang out, and our chat traffic jumps in frequency for a couple months after that meetup.
I have three friends from college that I still keep in touch with. We have a Signal group that's a bit more active than my high school friend group, with weekly activity. In-person meetings are rare; two of the friends have larger than average family obligations. In college we originally bonded over scifi TV shows, and when new episodes of some shows we all enjoy come out, we'll try to do group watches of them on Zoom (usually with a general chat/hangout before we start watching).
I have three friends from a previous job that I still keep in touch with (I have other friends from this same job that I still keep in touch with and see often enough, but this particular group struck me as a true "friend group" and not just a random collection of people who sometimes see each other in various combinations). We have a Slack workspace that was originally created for one of the guys' bachelor parties in 2018 (this is the only all-male group out of the three). Two of us still live within a ~30 minute drive of each other, but the other two have moved away. The Slack is very active, with near-daily activity, even though one of the four of us lives in a drastically different time zone now. In-person meetups are a bit more informal (and rare for the one of us who lives across the world); often it will just be two or three of the four, depending on who is visiting someone else's city at the time.
While I'm not involved in the day-to-day lives of these friends, they are still dear to me, and maintaining these connections is important to me. I guess it's important to all of us; in the past I've been a member of group chats where there are one or two people who never participate, even though the others do regularly, and it always feels like a bummer to see their name in the list but never hear from them (the former co-worker group I described is like this). It's a tough thing, though, when you think about it: to make these sorts of things successful, the friendships need to be of roughly the same importance to everyone in the group, and I expect that's a difficult bar to meet sometimes.
kimos
I agree and relate to this. Friend take work to maintain.
The friends that persist beyond what you describe are because we invent some shared project to work on together. Really doesn’t matter what it is.
throwaway2037
You just wrote my biography. Incredible. My experience is nearly identical.
Sohcahtoa82
In my experience, it's not the marriage that makes you lose the friends, it's the having children, unless you have kids of your own.
The split isn't married vs non-married, it's with kids vs without kids.
nkotov
Finding a third place helps a lot. For me, it's church. That's my community that's outside of work and family. But I also have hobbies (karting, gun range, etc.) and through that, I meet new people.
kylehotchkiss
Church works for me because I tried to pursue one based on the quality of its small/home groups and not just off Sunday service. Most people are going to find a Sunday service they like and find themselves stuck trying to actually find community. I think it's fair to say churches are failing to facilitate small groups better. It's not just having them, it's spawning new ones regularly, making sure to reach all the demographics. It takes a lot of resources to do that, which means maybe pastor needs a slightly smaller trendy shoe budget.
frankmatranga
As a recent grad in upstate New York, this exact problem of college friendships atrophying has been on my mind nonstop. My girlfriend and I host monthly cocktail parties in an attempt to stem the tide and even make new friends, but I’ve definitely been looking for male-focused groups. I’m interested!
doom2
I didn't stick around the Capital Region too long after college but I actually found the Troy community to be incredibly engaging. Maybe it was a function of time and place, but I got into cycling groups, community arts orgs, and volunteerism. It helped that I made friends in college who were already plugged into the local community.
frankmatranga
I do love Troy and it is indeed surprisingly lively. I think shifting from a “I’m here temporarily for school” to “I’m now an average local” has been difficult to navigate and kept me from thinking about those sorts of local communities. Your comment is a good reminder.
hakunin
I'm not far from you, and also trying to find a solution to a similar problem, albeit long time from college. Started a local meetup here, but it hasn't quite taken off. My area has very few people doing what I do, and I work remotely. School friends are all over the country at this point, and connections have been fading. Maybe it's something about upstate NY. Either way, added you on LinkedIn.
The other day I saw a post here on HN that featured a NYT article called "Where Have All My Deep Male Friendships Gone?" (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44098369) and it definitely hit home. As a guy in my early 30s, it made me realize how I've let many of my most meaningful friendships fade. I have a good group of friends - and my wife - but it doesn't feel like when I was in college and hung out with a crew of 10+ people on a weekly basis. So, I decided to do something about it. I’ve launched wave3.social - a platform to help guys build in-person social circles with actual depth. Think parlor.social or timeleft for guys: curated events and meaningful connections for men who don’t want their friendships to atrophy post-college.
It started as a Boston-based idea (where I live), but I built it with flexibility in mind so it could scale to other cities if there’s interest. It’s intentionally not on Meetup or Facebook - I wanted something that feels more intentional, with a better UX and less noise.
Right now, I'm in the “see if this resonates with anyone” stage. If this sounds interesting to you and you're in Boston or another city where this type of thing might be needed, drop a comment or shot me an email. I'd love to hear any feedback on the site and ideas on how we can fix the male loneliness epidemic in the work-from-home era.