Comedian John Mulaney once joked that one of Jesus’ greatest miracles was having twelve close friends in his thirties. Sadly, the modern decline of friendship is real, and anything but a punchline.
The Survey Center on American Life reports that that in 1990, almost 70% of men had five or more close friends. By 2021, just 40% reported having that many. And the number who said they had no close friends quintupled. Women haven’t fared well, either, though their friend groups haven’t shrunk as rapidly.
Part of the challenge is that time together is the oxygen of friendship. Deprive it of that, and friendship tends to die or at least become more distant. And today, perhaps due to a faster pace of life and more “stuff” piled into our schedules, spending time with friends requires more effort and intentionality than in decades past. Research shows that Americans now spend half as much time with their friends (three hours a week) as they did just a decade ago.
Read the rest of this article by John Mulaney at Breakpoint.
West Port Experiment 
Leave a comment