In our culture, it's difficult for many men to hug each other without feeling shame. In the oft-times inverted world of contemporary values, vulnerability looks like weakness. Even a man who is comfortable with his own feelings may not have had much practice expressing them to other men. Males since boyhood are encouraged to shoulder their burdens alone, to compete with one another (usually for women), and to hide their pain. Almost every segment of society expects this of us, and expressions of love and empathy between men therefore threatens every one of these proscriptions for living.
Many contemporary men have grown tired of trying to be rugged and solitary mountains. So many of the images we've inherited about what it means to be a man just fail to satisfy ourselves, our mates, and our children. The drive to go it alone - even at the expense of others - deepens our sense of alienation from the world all around.
One solution might be for males to begin to see one another as allies rather than as competitors. Many of us, at the very core of our being, long for the same things and suffer from the same lacks. We bear wounds from fathers we never knew, who either weren't there or else they occupied a place in our homes but never felt available.
Perhaps at one point in our evolution, our penchant for competition as men served a purpose. We're all familiar with Darwinian schools of thought that tell us that a strong male can produce more offspring as well as protect them and his mate. But it's obvious that, in a world that counts its human population in the billions, the biological imperative is surely not our most crucial function. It's not only that the old modes of manhood no longer work so well in the real world; they also hold little relevance.
One approach to a new way of being may be for we men to help each other to do what women can never help them to do (though they have so often tried, and with the best intentions): to get in touch with our grief over lost fathers, estranged partners, distant children, and the damaged world that we've inherited and that we will bequeath upon the next generation.
From there, maybe we can learn to grow and nurture identities that are a lot closer to who we really are and much more in line with what we really want. From there, maybe we can contribute to the world from the place of our true male hearts rather than from a compulsion to constantly prove ourselves and compete with each other.