You're absolutely right. Homophobia didn't increase. What changed was the social arenas that allowed men to form friendships in spite of it has dissolved. Loneliness is up because the institutions that used to make male connection safe: churches, fraternal orgs, bowling leagues, union halls, VFWs, softball teams, barbershops have all been gutted, turned into business ideas, or dissolved.

Think about your grandfather's era:

Yes, the culture was deeply homophobic. But a man could spend every Wednesday at the lodge, every Sunday at church, fish with his friends, hunt, drink, play cards—all in male spaces, no questions asked, no suspicions raised. There were scripted ways to be close to other men without risking masculinity. Did it solve everything? Hell no. Was it emotionally mature? Not really. But it worked as scaffolding for adult male friendship.

Now? The institutions that provided that cover are gone or crumbling. The internet replaced the Elks Club. Church is out, especially for millennials and Gen Z. So even as homophobia has declined in the culture, the absence of those shared spaces means men don't have anywhere to go be together without suspicion.

To clarify, I'm not saying that homophobia is up. I'm saying that the antidotes, the social architectures that let men be friends anyway, are gone. Residual effects of over a century of homophobia stand exposed with no institutions around to act as a counter.

Maybe you think that re-establishing or creating new institutions that serve as arenas for male friendship is the way forward. That's respectable, but every attempt adds to the graveyard of failed loneliness cures. Why? Because the factors that caused the decline of the past institutions are still in effect.

To me at least, it seems much more possible to teach folks how to build connection - the new institutions will follow.