Men are really good at being intimate with each other.
The are better at it than you think.
It might not look like intimacy to the kind of people who love to talk about things like ‘intimacy, triggers, social justice, gender politics and mental health.’
Those people, blinded by their bias and unaware hostility towards men are without a clue and delusional in their assessment.
It might not look like intimacy to the moaning elites who use words like privilege, problematic or toxic.
But hey, what they call ‘righteous’ and ‘just’, with their social justice agenda, is blind, poorly thought out, reactive and the furthest thing from justice imaginable.
I’ve had countless elites tell me that men are toxic and problematic because we are not intimate. That apparently means we don’t discuss our feelings, worries and troubles with each other.
Discussing feelings, troubles and worries is how WOMEN approach intimacy.
Male intimacy doesn’t necessarily involve discussing feelings. Male intimacy is more active. No, I don’t mean that. Male intimacy can be accomplished fully clothed.
To get to the heart of male intimacy, let’s check in with our old friend the online etymology dictionary:
intimate
1630s, "closely acquainted, very familiar," also "inmost, intrinsic," from Late Latin intimatus, past participle of intimare "make known, announce, impress," from Latin intimus "inmost, innermost, deepest" (adj.), also used figuratively, of affections, feelings, and as a noun, "close friend."
It’s easy to be intimate with another man. Intimacy is a product of being closely acquainted, very familiar, almost intrinsic. This happens with two things: proximity and time.
We become intimate with each other when we fish, hunt, hike and cycle together. Men become intimate with each other when they spend time fixing cars, building sheds and gardening.
If you spend enough time with someone, it’s not difficult to know how they are. With enough familiarity, it’s easy to spot when a dude’s inner world is off. We can know a person intrinsically without them ever ‘talking about feelings’ or engaging in any of the performative status bending psychobabble that’s so in vogue these days.
Walk with someone. Breath with someone. Do things together long enough and you’ll become attuned to them on a preverbal instinctive level. Emotions are there between people without discussion. So are connections.
Men who spend a lot of time together doing things become intimate on a preverbal level. We don’t need to know what we think, believe or feel from one moment to another to know each other.
Have you experienced a deep closeness and almost intrinsic familiarity with someone without talking with them?
If this is difficult, go for an hour long walk with someone and don’t say a thing at all.
Let me know how it goes.
Upon rereading this, I think that this notion of intimacy is bigger than how the psychological professions tend to regard it.
You can't understand anyone till the two of you have truly danced the tango.