In his Saturday feature, “Do Guys Fight For Their Friendships?“, GMP founder Tom Matlack challenges the notion set forth in the New York Times that asserts men, in general, do not engage in emotional conflict with one another. That instead of talking through problems, they just disengage and walk away.
Women, asserts NYT author Ben Schranck, have hard conversations, talk through their problems, and come up with resolutions.
But GMP commenter Laramie White tells his own story of how he and his friends resolve issues… and it’s far from simply walking away:
I have been close friends with 5 men since college , starting in 1975. We have lost 2 of our brothers one in 2003 and one in 2011. The last 3 of us remain close even though we are in different parts of the country now, we talk at least once per month. We also track each other through social media websites.
We never had to fight each other but sometime he had to put the hard facts out on the table when someone from our group was messing up their life. We remained close friends even if hearing the truth was painful for that person. We still supported each other through the good times and bad time. Being there when someone lost their parents or other family members. Seeing our children being born and growing up through the years.
I thank The Lord for having these other four brothers in my life. Someone to call when needing to talk. Visiting them when I traveled home to visit. Just being able to call them my friends and brother since 1975. Not being afraid to tell them I love ya man for being my friend and brother.
And so we ask all of you, is there a huge divide between the way male friendships grow and resolve problems compared to the ways female friendships do?
Are men truly so hardened as suggested in the NYT?
What traditions do you have with your friends to show your friendship? How do you resolve problems?
About The Good Feed Blog Editors
Some 6 years ago my father passed away at 52. In the months after his death, one of my best friends from high school had a conflict with my brother. The nature of it seems irrelevant now. I had been caught in the middle. Both of them had said pretty terrible things about each other and I came to understand from my brother how he never liked my friend all through the years I was in high school and college. In the short term, yes, the parties walked away and avoided each other. I did not make an effort to broker a peace, I figured there was enough bad blood and nothing I could do would change that. But I learned recently that they resolved their issue through a combination of the passage of time and the realization that both had regret for what happened and wanted rid of it for themselves. They figured the best way to see that happen was to apologize to each other. And to me. Neither of them wanted to be the source of additional stress for me or my family. In retrospect they both felt like the timing of their conflict was poor as my family was grieving and could do without the additional drama. I remember at the height of tensions it had come close to resulting in a physical altercation on a few occasions.
Perhaps it is not such a bad thing to walk away, especially if you can come back later to resolve the problem when the intensity of the moment dissipates. These types of conflicts become monumentally more challenging to resolve emotionally and with closure when those involved allow their anger to drive them towards violence. I am thankful for having a friend and a brother who I consider to be “Good Men” because they did not allow it to get past the point of salvation.
Absolutely they do. However, I believe a large aspect of the conflict stems from an inability to talk about their emotions, let alone identify and explain them. It was always easier for me in relationships to identify a negative feeling and conclude that because I was feeling that negative feeling, I should go away. What a primal, foolish instinct that was. I think the realization that it was possible to have feelings other than “pissed off” or “uncomfortable” leads to a deeper realization of what we require in a relationship and what we need.
Of course, I have the impression that men and women resolve conflicts differently, as a very general rule. It’s certainly something that both women and men comment on a lot, whether the difference really is as big as it appears to be.
Let’s say for the sake of argument that women do resolve their friendship conflicts better than men do. (I doubt that’s true, but let’s say that they do for the moment.) One explanation could be that women tend to be much more sensitive about possible conflicts in the first place. In my experience, they may be more obsessive about making sure that everyone is happy and no one is mad at each other. They may elevate a minor disagreement into a major crisis and then solve the crisis. Make a mountain out of a molehill and then move the mountain – see how much better they are at resolving conflicts?
Resolving conflict more effectively could actually be a bad sign. Perhaps men and women approach conflict differently because their conflicts tend to be very different in the first place?
Meanwhile, in my experience women can hold grudges for much longer than men can. Something that a man would just shrug off and then move on, a woman may remember forever. The offending party will then get icy politeness and fake smiling to her face but in private all sorts of nasty comments. This is probably much truer for younger women than older women. Then there’s the concept of the “frenemy,” which is totally bizarre to most men but seems pretty common to many young women. This is conflict resolution?
(Perhaps my experience is skewed because somehow I’ve known a lot of very immature women who are a bad representative sampling of all women. I’m actually hoping that’s true.)
Sometimes what looks like “walking away” is just refusing to make a disagreement more important than it should be. You can’t hash out every single possible point of conflict the instant that you feel it. Men prefer not to be obsessed with checking in to make sure everyone is feeling the same way.
Well I fought in school with people I later became friends with…so….maybe? Never heard of women becoming friends after a fight.
Sometimes a conflict is petty and there is no rational reason to continue it so a man may decide it is better to accept a disagreement and disengage rather than aggravating a pointless argument into something major.
Other times a man may temporarily disengage until he is able to confront the issue without being overly influenced by anger or other strong emotions. When my dad used to get angry he would just leave and take a walk or go get a drink then come back in a little while calmed down and able to work things out rationally.
From my experience as a man, not every conflict needs to be resolved and not every conflict needs to be resolved immediately. It is not the same as “walking away.”
Of course we resolve conflicts differently. The typical male approach is what works best… FOR MEN. The fact that women find it unsatisfying isn’t a surprise, but it doesn’t mean their approach is better.