11. Sam Graham-Felsen on the Fading Male Friendship

Sam Graham-Felsen is the historian at the Philip Roth Personal Library in Newark, New Jersey, and he’s the author of the acclaimed coming-of-age novel Green. We discuss…Subscribe now Sam’s article with New York Times Magazine, “Where Have All My Deep Male Friendships Gone?” Sam’s favorite boyhood comedy, Weird Al’s, UHF. When did American men stop being physically close? And do we need to go back to this: Should we take our best friends to our honeymoons? Was Albert Kinsey’s studies of sexuality, which popularized the prevalence of homosexuality, responsible for causing homohysteria? Is Dan Campbell making it okay for guys to display emotion, or is his “high masculinity” the only thing that gives him license to be vulnerable? Examples of healthy masculinity: David Goggins on JRE: Does the manosphere need to adopt friendship, community, and rootedness as its next message of wellness? Sam and I discuss our mid-life career pivots into typically female-dominated career fields. Sam explores the question, What makes a man? Sam recommends: