This is really yet another article that stumbles over the artificiality of the American nuclear families. Not just friendships, but kinship and familial relations in most cultures on earth right now are already the center of life.
This idea of the marriage partner as quasi-mystical figure in the center of your life was cooked up not so long ago. In most places marriage is practical, arranged for reproduction, and people are embedded in wide networks of friend and kinship relations. If your whole life centers around your spouse, you are the WEIRD one (https://weirdpeople.fas.harvard.edu/qa-weird)
Also funnily enough of course even in the Western classical tradition the most iconic relationship is the male companionship. Hephaestion and Alexander, Achilles and Patroclus. The Iliad's not exactly La La Land.
>Also funnily enough of course even in the Western classical tradition the most iconic relationship is the male companionship
Yes, this is the thing to consider. Modernity has atomized us and destroyed the ancient understanding of friendship which was key to how they navigated the world. People retreated to marriage, which now also is faltering. I believe reclaiming friendship would radically transform our world in such a way that many other ailing institutions would be restored to health.
"A man without friends is like a man with one arm." -Serbian Proverb
This idea of the marriage partner as quasi-mystical figure in the center of your life was cooked up not so long ago. In most places marriage is practical, arranged for reproduction, and people are embedded in wide networks of friend and kinship relations. If your whole life centers around your spouse, you are the WEIRD one (https://weirdpeople.fas.harvard.edu/qa-weird)
Also funnily enough of course even in the Western classical tradition the most iconic relationship is the male companionship. Hephaestion and Alexander, Achilles and Patroclus. The Iliad's not exactly La La Land.
Another one of my favorite pieces on the topic comes from Vonnegut, a little too long to paste: https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/300997-ok-now-let-s-have-so...