The Likelihood of a Bisexual Friendship
Can Men and Women be friends? Yes… with a really big BUT at the end. I decided that it would be interesting to see what my friends and family had to say on the subject, so I started a thread on Face Book and got some pretty interesting answers. While the answers were many and varied, they only fell into three categories. The first was the flat out “no way in hell”. Not surprisingly this was mostly voiced by men. The other extreme was “yes, absolutely!” with no strings attached. This came from women and, for the most part, they are kidding themselves. Don’t get mad at me yet, I’ll explain more fully later. The third group was pretty much in agreement, with a few discrepancies. This group of people said “Yes, but”.
The first thing you have to consider when trying to be “just friends” is that there is no way the friendship will be the same as an only women or an only men friendship. Don’t even try. All you’ll do if you go down that road is get into a huge mess and be asking yourself how you let this happen. Perfect example comes from a friend of mine we will call Mr. B. Mr. B’s wife is a nurse and has a man as a patient that she really likes a lot and started hanging out with him as a friend. She asked Mr. B if she could go clothes shopping with her patient so she could be his fashion consultant. Mr. B said “go ahead, but you're going to end up disappointed real soon if you think he just wants to be friends". She even bought him, and a few of her other patients without family, a Christmas gift. A few days later she was moping around the house and Mr. B asked her what was wrong. She said "I don't know why guys just can't be friends with girls." He said "your buddy has the hots for you doesn't he?” She nodded and told Mr. B that the patient had confided in another nurse that he had feelings for her and was asking about the state of her marriage. Most of the time we befriend the opposite sex because we are interested in them sexually. If you go into a friendship and don’t even consider the possibility that the other person is attracted to you it’s going to end in a mess. You can’t just assume the ease of friendship the way it is with those of the same sex.
What we women need to understand is it is significantly easier for us to enter into a friendship with a man and expect nothing else. Maybe it’s because we think differently and don’t have sex on the brain once every 7 seconds, or because we tend to size up the potential for a true mate in about 5 minutes. If we say yes, there is no way this is ending as just friendship. If we say no, but enjoy the company of the man in question, then it is easy for us to move into the friendship. Men see attractive/not attractive, and then move on accordingly. Usually if man doesn’t find a woman attractive even in the slightest he isn’t going to spend much time trying to get to know her. OF COURSE THERE ARE EXCEPTIONS TO THE RULE! STOP YELLING AT ME! This is a generalization or it would be a book. Possibly with many volumes.
That being said, there is still the possibility of friendship. How likely that is depends entirely on the two people in question.
First scenario: the attracted party knows the other is not interested in a sexual way and they are able to keep those feelings to themselves. Ultimately this will probably not work, as sooner or later the one attracted is going to feel the need to let these feelings out and then we have the whole mess where one is declaring undying love and devotion and the other is beating themselves up and asking “how did I let this happen”. This is not going to be a happy ending.
Second scenario: Both parties are attracted, but are otherwise attached. This goes one of two ways, either they are able to acknowledge the sexual tension and keep it as just friends, or they fall off the wagon and cheat on their significant others. Obviously this outcome completely depends on the level of attraction and just how strong the relationship is between each person and their significant other. If the attraction is strong and the relationships week there is no hope in hell. If all parties in question are happily married and have been friends for a long time then it is totally possible to remain just friends. As long as no one minds the occasional bout of sexual tension. It also helps if everyone in question has a similar sense of humor. Also it works if the attraction is mostly just flirtation and the relationships are strong. This is probably the most likely scenario to work.
Third scenario: Both were attracted, dated, became unattracted, and then broke up but stayed friends. This happens a lot more than you would think, but both parties have to be reasonable human beings. If either party is psycho the other person should probably just run away screaming and forget the whole “let’s just be friends” thing.
The final scenario I’m getting into right now: The two have either grown up together since they were young or worked closely together and quickly got passed any attraction (if there was any) and feel brotherly or sisterly towards each other. In that case, no matter how hot the other person is, any attraction would just be weird.
And there is one last scenario: If either party is homosexual. Then it works with almost no problems at all.
So do I think men and women can be friends? Yes, yes I do. I have quite a few male friends myself. Do I think it’s easy? Not in the slightest. You always have to work at any friendship for it work, but doubly so if it is a male/female friendship. Hollywood doesn’t help by cramming sappy romances down our throats where the friend realizes he or she has been in love with the other the whole time. However; if you can be rational about it, don’t try to read into each and every action the other does, and are basically just cool with it, it can work quite well.
Thanks to anyone who bother to answer my annoying questions on Face Book, but especially to Bobby, Craig, Matt, Amy, Mike, Chris, Jana, Kristen, Jack, and Leah
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