Single Woman Hits Back At People Who Say She Can't Be Happy Alone — 'We Have Friends, Families, Neighbors, Colleagues... Who's Alone?'
There's a huge difference between single and alone, and she's tired of people conflating the two.
Ron Lach | Canva If you're single and past a certain age, you've likely experienced it time and time again: the pitying looks, the reflexive words of comfort telling you, "don't worry, you'll find someone." And if you're a single woman of a certain age? That probably goes double.
But the idea that being single automatically means you're lonely is ... well, pretty darn presumptuous. And one woman on TikTok is pushing back on that notion, and especially people who say you can't find happiness without a long-term partnership.
Writer Yael Wolfe thinks there's a huge difference between single and alone.
Wolfe, known on TikTok as @yael.wolfe, is a writer, photographer and artist who frequently creates videos about women's issues. Recently, a man on TikTok responded to one of her videos by insisting that any happiness Wolfe might feel being single will ultimately be fleeting because all humans are "hardwired for connection."
Wolfe was simply not having any of it.
The man's view certainly seems to be the majority opinion nowadays, and accordingly, Wolfe said "I get this comment constantly, like every other day." But Wolfe finds it totally wrong-headed.
Wolfe went on to explain how the idea that there's no difference between 'single' and 'alone' totally ignores other kinds of relationships.
"What's interesting to me," she said of the man's take, "is that it implies that the only relationship that matters is a romantic relationship."
Tellingly, Wolfe said she only receives this kind of pushback on videos where she's talking about "being single and being happy," as was the case with the man's comment in question. And she believes there's a reason for that.
"[People] remind me that there is no possible way that being happy will continue to exist the more that I am alone. Not single, but alone." Wolfe rejects the very principle of this argument on one all-important basis: "I am not alone. And I'm not sure I know any single women who are."
After all, the notion that single people are alone ignores basically every other type of human relationship besides a romantic partner — which of course forms the overwhelming majority of relationships we have in our lives. As Wolfe so aptly put it: "We have family, we have friends, we have colleagues, we have neighbors, we have pets, who's alone?"
Wolfe went on to say it is typically men who she hears this point of view from, and she thinks this is related to a deeper problem.
"We teach men that the only acceptable relationship they can really have is as a husband and a father," she said. "So if they don't have that, they have nothing." And the data says she's absolutely correct.
Studies show most men lack close friendships, and it's causing all kinds of problems.
Sociologists, mental health professionals and other experts have been studying the modern so-called "friendship recession" for years, and it's impacting both genders — a 2021 survey found that 53 percent of Americans say the primary person they lean on for support with a personal problem is their spouse or partner, rather than friends.
But the "friendship recession" is hitting men far harder — with much more dire impacts. That same survey found that just 21 percent of men reported having recently received emotional support from friends, and 15 percent responded not even having a single close friend to speak of. An Oxford University study found that this is in part due to the fact that men bond better with in-person interaction, an ever more rare commodity in our world, especially since the pandemic.
And the impact this dearth of male friendships is having is downright startling. Men's loneliness and isolation are not only ruining their romantic relationships, it's also been found to be a key factor in their susceptibility to radicalization into right-wing extremism.
The commenter who told Wolfe she'll never be happy because humans are "hard-wired for connection" is right in part — neuroscientific research has definitively found this to be true.
But "connection" has more meanings than just romance, and neuroscience tells us it is actually not romantic partnership but community — many connected individuals living their lives in cooperation and companionship alongside one another — for which we are mentally and emotionally hardwired. It's how we've survived this long as a species, in fact.
So Wolfe is absolutely right — there is a huge difference between single and alone, and the science indicates that the types of connections a single person like Wolfe has might just be far more important than a partner anyway. The sooner we begin unlearning the opposite, the better off we're likely to be.
John Sundholm is a news and entertainment writer who covers pop culture, social justice and human interest topics.