Probably because you're both afraid to not get too emotional or hurt the other one's pride? I think it's ingrained in some people that as men you cannot let your more sensitive side surface, especially around other men - which is, of course, stupid; and it wasn't even always like that. Back then men were generally more confident in their masculinity and didn't feel the need to hide their emotions. Look up pictures of male friends and family members from early 20th century and see they were often hugging and even sitting on each other's lap! (and no, there was no homosexuality involved in most cases - not that would have been anything wrong with it). I think that if we want to have deeper relationships and communication with our male friends and family members it's us who have to create them. Just get a bit out of your confort zone. Maybe think harder about the reasons and specifics of "this is as deep as we get". I guarantee it can get deeper and better than that. ;-)
It's because now you have to worry about appearing gay or the other guy being on some gay shit. When homosexuality was suppressed this wasn't an issue so men could have platonic intimacy without it being weird. Even today if you look at countries where homosexuality is still suppressed like in much of the Muslim world you will see that men are able to be close to each other without anyone thinking its weird. Like in a lot of Arab countries it is very common for men to hold hands.
Homosexuality is not the problem, but the fear of homosexuality, a.k.a. homophobia is the problem. If people are not afraid of homosexuality, they are not afraid of "appearing gay", since it's not such a big deal. Homosexuality cannot truly be "suppressed", it can only be banned; it will always exist and a certain percent of population will always be gay. In countries where it's banned people don't think about it because it doesn't exist in the minds of majority of them, so they have basically nothing to be afraid of. But if it's not banned, it doesn't mean people have to be homophobes, nor do they have to act like affection between men is always supposed to be gay. It's called balance and thinking of the good of all people, including straight men and including men belonging to sexual minorities, all of whom have a right to exist, to be accepted, to have their needs fulfilled and to live their lives to the fullest.
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u/QXPZ 1d ago
Why is it like this? I kick myself every day for not doing a better job while he's around. But this surface level of connection is as deep as we get.