What women find in friends that they may not get from love
February 28, 2016 11:15 AM   Subscribe

Female friendship was not a consolation prize, some romance also-ran. Women who find affinity with one another are not settling. In fact, they may be doing the opposite, finding something vital that is lacking in their romantic entanglements, and thus setting their standards healthily higher. (SLNYT)
posted by quiet coyote (24 comments total) 23 users marked this as a favorite
 
Friendship’s Mystery, To my Dearest Lucasia
By Katherine Philips
1

Come, my Lucasia, since we see
That Miracles Mens faith do move,
By wonder and by prodigy
To the dull angry world let’s prove
There’s a Religion in our Love.


2

For though we were design’d t’ agree,
That Fate no liberty destroyes,
But our Election is as free
As Angels, who with greedy choice
Are yet determin’d to their joyes.


3

Our hearts are doubled by the loss,
Here Mixture is Addition grown ;
We both diffuse, and both ingross :
And we whose minds are so much one,
Never, yet ever are alone.


4

We court our own Captivity
Than Thrones more great and innocent :
’Twere banishment to be set free,
Since we wear fetters whose intent
Not Bondage is, but Ornament.


5

Divided joyes are tedious found,
And griefs united easier grow :
We are our selves but by rebound,
And all our Titles shuffled so,
Both Princes, and both Subjects too.


6

Our Hearts are mutual Victims laid,
While they (such power in Friendship lies)
Are Altars, Priests, and Off’rings made :
And each Heart which thus kindly dies,
Grows deathless by the Sacrifice.
posted by Saxon Kane at 11:53 AM on February 28, 2016 [3 favorites]


I found this a bit of a puzzling read. Friends are great, friendship is great, friendship is a good in itself and not a substitute for romantic love. Companionate marriage is lovely because it often combines these two great things, but obviously can't eliminate the benefits of having more than one friend in life. Aren't these things generally agreed to be true by basically everyone? And why are they distinctively true for women and not for men?

These aren't rhetorical questions / criticisms of the article - I really don't get what the surprising NYT-worthy point is, or what it has to do with women as opposed to men. Is it no longer normal for men to have these friendships, while women still do? I feel like most people I know - men and women - have several long-standing and deep-rooted friendships, with both other men and women, that can't possibly be superseded by romantic relationships. I feel like that's the human norm, at least among people who have the minimal economic security needed to have time off from labour and so to cultivate friendships. No?
posted by Aravis76 at 12:46 PM on February 28, 2016 [7 favorites]


the last paragraph suggested that perhaps friendships could be formalised in some way, so that's one "point". maybe it's about women because the author and her friends are women? also, previously, the consensus seemed to be that men (in particular) tend to lack friends.
posted by andrewcooke at 12:59 PM on February 28, 2016 [1 favorite]


I know several women who have married men and had kids and then divorced in their 50s or 60s, only to then partner with another woman. I wonder how often these relationships lack a sexual component; that these women have been so unfulfilled or abused by men that they would prefer the company of other women. I wonder if in some cases the emotional support that two women give each other is more fulfilling than any sexual relationship has ever been for them.

That friendship isn't really a thing that is formally celebrated or defined is perhaps part of the point of the article. Many relationships can be more important than relationships with a sexual component, but they are not recognized in our society the way marriage is. The depth and importance is diminished or underrated.
posted by jimmythefish at 12:59 PM on February 28, 2016


I've mentioned it before and will again: the worst decision in my life was to ask my roomie to move because of my stupid boyfriend who thought we were in a lesbian relationship (yes, the stupid of this is endless). She had similar issues with her dates.
Now, my friend is dead. And I blame myself, though there are many reasons she died.

If we had been men, it would have been the same, it is not a gender thing. Actually, she moved together with a man who feels exactly like me (and who is also a close friend). It's about contemporary life, or maybe modern, urban life going back to the start of modernity.

Just these few words make me really sad, and I am not able to elaborate right now. For us, friendships were better in many ways than relationships. There were reasons. But heck, someone actually died..
posted by mumimor at 1:02 PM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]


This makes me think of my good friend, L, who in a different way knows me better than my husband (and he knows me better than her in a different way). Friends can be like family and I wish we did have a better way to formally recognize that.

L is who I would call in the middle of the night for certain situations and I want to honor her and the place she has had in my life.

We've got rom-coms and bromances, bring on the lady-friendship stories!
posted by CMcG at 1:09 PM on February 28, 2016


I'm all in favour of stories celebrating friendships. (I'm not sure what formalising one's friendships would exactly mean - would it be a legally binding thing? how would it be undone, if things changed? which friends would be in or out and how would that territory be navigated? - so I'll leave that idea alone). I liked the Netflix Jessica Jones a lot partly because friendship was such an important dimension of the story. Buffy also did different-friends-shoring-up-different-elements-of-the-person beautifully. And then there's the triumvirate in Harry Potter, and the hobbits in The Lord of the Rings, and Jane Eyre and Helen Burns, and the study of female friendships/failures-to-click in Emma (Mrs Weston, Harriet, Jane Fairfax). And yesterday I read Naomi Novik's Uprooted, where female friendship drives the story forward. Possibly my problem is that I basically only consume 1) fantasy and 2) the 19th century, both of which tend to valorise friendship.
posted by Aravis76 at 1:36 PM on February 28, 2016


Aravis76: " I really don't get what the surprising NYT-worthy point is, or what it has to do with women as opposed to men. Is it no longer normal for men to have these friendships, while women still do? I feel like most people I know - men and women - have several long-standing and deep-rooted friendships, with both other men and women, that can't possibly be superseded by romantic relationships. I feel like that's the human norm"

Not discounting your experience at all, but I don't think it is the "human norm" and I do think it is more gendered than you're suggesting. In my experience (as a late 30s guy), maintaining long standing friendships is something women do well and men don't. I don't have any "long-standing and deep-rooted friendships" with other men. There's maybe one guy I can point to, but it's more of a "weak ties" thing: we lead different lives in different cities, so I probably talk to him a couple of times a year at most. That is literally the strongest male-male relationship I can point to outside of my family. As far as I can tell, none of my male acquaintances or colleagues seem to have genuine friendships with other men either. It just doesn't happen. From my perspective, this thing referred to in the article is both alien and admirable.
posted by langtonsant at 1:56 PM on February 28, 2016 [11 favorites]


.
posted by jpe at 2:18 PM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]


Thanks, langtonsant, that's a helpful reality-check.
posted by Aravis76 at 2:23 PM on February 28, 2016


When I saw this OP, for a moment, I felt a pang of sadness that it needed to exist at all.
posted by infini at 2:28 PM on February 28, 2016


I agree that there is a gendered aspect to this. I'm a gay man, and there have been several times in my life when an offer of friendship with a woman has come along that involved far greater amounts of emotional labor (given and received) than I was interested in either giving or receiving, for a status along the lines of say, 8th person to call to fill the table at brunch. I've certainly had friendships with women where the minimum expected labor exceeded that of my partner of over 2 decades. (Reading discussions here on what is an acceptable level of emotional labor in a romantic relationship often makes me wonder what some of the posters would make of what my partner and I have together.)

So, yes, I absolutely celebrate women's close friendships with each other. And I think they're very important, because the typical way that boys have been raised in the U.S. is antithetical to creating the kind of relationships the article talks about. So, women, maintain those friendships because most of the men in your life are going to be unable to match them.
posted by conic at 2:37 PM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]


I find this fascinating because my longest lasting and most trustworthy friendships are with men. I have female friends, but the things that I share with my male friends (development, art, political arguments) bridge those times that we have been out of touch. Female friends seem to need emotional connectivity that I think I missed the class on. I can certainly pat you and there there you- but the range of nuanced concern most women display is a puzzlement to me. I'm more likely to buy you whiskey and tell you "that _____ was an ASSHOLE".

That being said- most of the men in my cohort have the same friends they had since college at least.
posted by LuckyMonkey21 at 6:55 PM on February 28, 2016 [2 favorites]


I wonder if part of what so many of us find in friendships with women that we don't find in relationships with men is simple reciprocity.

With any gender of friend or partner, the female you will likely eventually find yourself being supportive of them through some sort of crisis. My experience has been that women, almost always, will have my back when I'm in crisis. A not insignificant portion of men, including some long-term partners, will listen for a minute or two and start looking at their phone, or otherwise trying to escape.

And, I think, men, and in particular straight men, don't have the same pressure to cultivate this sort of deep, long-term friendship, because the women in their lives already fill this role for them.
posted by mishafletch at 2:29 AM on February 29, 2016


I have female friends, but the things that I share with my male friends (development, art, political arguments) bridge those times that we have been out of touch. Female friends seem to need emotional connectivity that I think I missed the class on.

These are not really either/or. I have some friendships - with men and women - which are essentially a decade-long rambling argument about God and politics and books, punctuated by moments when emotional connection becomes more important. I do have a couple where emotional connection is at the fore (only with women) but it's not necessary that a friendship that thrives on one excludes the other.
posted by Aravis76 at 4:12 AM on February 29, 2016 [2 favorites]


I wonder how often these relationships lack a sexual component; that these women have been so unfulfilled or abused by men that they would prefer the company of other women. I wonder if in some cases the emotional support that two women give each other is more fulfilling than any sexual relationship has ever been for them.

Er, speaking personally, not everything is about sex? I mean, I guess I fall into the latter category? but I've never compared the friendships with my closest friends to a sexual relationship. It's like asking if your relationship with your brother or sister is more fulfilling than a sexual relationship. Ew. Ugh. It's gross to think about. It has nothing to do with sex.
posted by maryr at 9:24 AM on February 29, 2016


"He's a quiet man" that's all she said
And he's a thoughtful man
It's just he likes to keep
His thoughts up in his head

And we finally meet, and she tries to draw him out a bit
She says "He's writing something
Hey now, why don't you talk about it?"
And he doesn't make a sound

He's just staring at his coffee
And I know there's all this beauty
And this greatness she'll defend
But I think it's in my friend

I have a friend in a bright and distant town
She's found a common balance
Where you do your work and you do your love
And they pay you and praise your many talents

Well I'm passing through and we know we won't sleep
She laughs, puts up the tea
She says "You know I think you remember every part of me"
And the water starts to boil

And if I had a camera
Showing all the light we give
And showing where the light extends
I'd give it to my friends

Sometimes I see myself fine
Sometimes I need a witness
And I like the whole truth
But there are nights I only need forgiveness

Sometimes they say "I don't know who you are
But let me walk with you some"
And I say "I am alone, that's all
You can't save me from all the wrong I've done"

But they're waiting just the same
With their flashlights and their semaphores
And I'll act like I have faith and like that faith never ends
But I really just have friends


- My Friends, Dar Williams
posted by maryr at 9:28 AM on February 29, 2016 [1 favorite]


I don't mean to imply that my friendships with men are without emotional component. They are friendships LIKE men- long periods of silence , then discussions about things we love, and occasional forays into the overtly emotional.
posted by LuckyMonkey21 at 8:27 PM on February 29, 2016


I wasn't commenting on whether men's friendships lack an emotional component, only on whether women's friendships necessarily lack an intellectual one. I don't think they do, and I don't think "long periods of silence, discussions about things we love, occasional forays into the overtly emotional" = masculine. Unless I've been a man all along, without noticing, which is improbable.
posted by Aravis76 at 11:58 PM on February 29, 2016


I did not say that YOUR friendships with women lack an intellectual component - I said that mine did. That is a me thing, as opposed to a "this is the way all of them are". Most of mine fail the Bechdel test, and consist of drinking ,shopping ,or adventuring. I value them no less. And my experience of female friendship is that it is much more focussed on the day to day rhythms .
posted by LuckyMonkey21 at 7:52 AM on March 1, 2016


Right, but then maybe the "masculine" and "feminine" generalisations aren't adding anything to what you're saying about intellectual v emotional friendships -- it only makes sense to characterise the former as masculine if men in general have such friendships and women in general don't.
posted by Aravis76 at 8:21 AM on March 1, 2016


You are putting words in my comment- I characterized MY relationships as "Like Men" - as my experience of them has been. I'm saying that is my view of masculinity- nowhere did I say that women are incapable of intellectual discourse, or that those traits are primarily masculine. Are you womansplaining my lived experience?
posted by LuckyMonkey21 at 9:18 AM on March 1, 2016


People can place whatever importance they like onto their relationships, if it's ok with the people involved. But all Rebecca Traister's articles are about Rebecca Traister.
posted by O. Bender at 9:25 AM on March 1, 2016


I'm not seeking to invalidate your lived experience, of course; I'm saying that mine implies that the gendered patterns you observe don't hold for everyone. I do think calling those patterns masculine implies that the generalisation goes beyond your set of friends and applies to most men (and similarly, that the patterns you call feminine apply to most women); if you didn't mean that, we aren't disagreeing about anything.
posted by Aravis76 at 10:23 AM on March 1, 2016


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