Spoiler So, I’ve been thinking lately about this subject. In particular, people who can’t seem to fathom that girls can be just friends with guys, nothing more (and vice versa). I remember reading somewhere that guys tend to prefer being friends with those uglier than themselves, and the opposite being true for women (preferring to hang around with either those of equal attractiveness or more attractive). Idk how true that is, I mean beauty is subjective anyway. There’s this unspoken assumption that if a girl is simply friends with a guy, then there must be something wrong with that girl- that she must be repulsive in some way. And that if the girl is attractive then she will get with the guy (regardless of orientation, because clearly, he’s the guy that will “change” her and all that). :rolle: Spoiler That’s the trouble, with some guys it becomes apparent they’ve never had a close friendship with the opposite sex before, so when a friendship begins to form- they jump to try and form a romantic bond with them. When we’re younger we’re told that if someone of the opposite sex talks to you, they must secretly want you in that way- that it’s never just friendship. I think for some people, they never un-learn this. What tends to happen is that I get close to a guy, we talk about games, and bond over our crushes on girls. It feels quite platonic on both sides, but then the guy gets the wrong idea. He admits he’s never been as close to a girl as he has with me, and that he can talk about things to me that he could never talk to other girls about. I think for some guys, they fear that they’ll never hold an emotional connection with a woman, so they cling to any potential possibilities- even when the girl comes out and tells them that they’re a lesbian, they don’t want to accept it because they’ve never felt such a connection as they have with her. They tell themselves they’ll be the exception, that it’ll be different with them. Spoiler I once knew a girl, she was a friend of a friend. When they found out that I might not be as straight as she thought, she told me that if it turned out I was gay or bi, we could no longer be friends, or even be near each other. At first, I thought this to be odd- she hung around guys she wasn’t into that seemed to be flirty with her, why was she fine with that but seemed to fear so deeply that I’d hit on her? Then, overtime I came to realise. Her male friends weren’t actually her friends, but more just objects to her to reach a goal. She wasn’t close to any of them, and had a tendency to ditch them whenever she could to hang out with her straight female friends instead. She’d only hang out with her male friends if she wanted a picture of them acting suspiciously flirty together in order to get whatever boy she was currently pursuing at the time jealous. She seemed to fear the idea of being emotionally close to someone who had the potential to be attracted to her, preferring to keep those interested that she wasn’t interested in distant from herself, only to be used to make someone else jealous. That’s why I didn’t fit in with her plan, she presumed since I like girls that I must like her, which she would be fine with if I was a boy because she could use that to make whoever she was trying to impress jealous, which she couldn’t really do with me in fear of appearing to look “like a lesbian” and potentially deterring her crush. Even though if she did that she could just appear to be bisexual, but since the guys she was pursuing were most likely homophobic themselves, appearing 100% straight was probably a less risky strategy, even if they were the type of guys who like lesbians but don’t like gay guys or something. Although there is a tendency in teenage girls to think that lesbian=ugly, so she might’ve been afraid of that as well. But I mean, she was already quite ugly anyway. Particularly personality wise imo. Don't need to be a certain sexuality to be ugly.
Oh gosh, I agree with this. People who think that men and women can't be just friends get on my nerves, and It's much more common for men to think this in my experience. I usually just prefer having same-sex friendships. *shrug* It's ironic because I am more tomboyish in interests, but hey, some girls are too. Sometimes guy friends make me uncomfortable with their advances so I tend to be more wary around them.
Me and my best friend (a girl) have had trouble with people's attitudes on this recently. We were on a course together with her boyfriend (who's a trans guy) and several other people. And despite everyone knowing her boyfriend was right there and that I was gay, everyone told us that we should be a couple since we got on so well. Even one of the teachers (again who had full knowledge of everything) said, dead serious, that we should "go on a cinema date together". They went on and on and couldn't really grasp the idea that we're just close friends. Even knowing that you're gay, I think a lot of girls (queer or not) have experienced what you've found, Canterpiece, (that when become close friends with a guy, he gets the wrong idea) and so they think there's some possibility that you'll do it too. It's the opposite problem in some ways: these girls seem to fear that they'll be the exception - that I'll decide I am attracted to them after all. I understand these worries though, women do need to protect themselves and be careful. Boys deserve close, unromantic friendships with girls; girls deserve close, unromantic friendships with boys. It doesn't happen enough and it's a real shame, especially since I've always gotten on better with girls than guys.
That assumption has never made sense to me. My best friend is a guy and we've been friends for years! He doesn't like me like that and obviously I don't like him. We're just really close friends. And the notion that men and women can't be friends it utterly ridiculous.
I had this one female straight friend in particular that I had a wonderful friendship with. She was so much fun to be around and we supported each other through whatever circumstances that we were faced with. Once my partner at the time met her...even he fell in love with her. However, it was her boyfriend who had a difficult time dealing with our friendship which caused a lot of friction because although with my permission...she told him that I was a gay man and due to his stereotypical views of a gay man's behavior...he never believed I was and threatened me a few times behind her back. Needless to say...she moved away with him and I never heard from her again. All in all...opposite sex friendships can work.
Yeah, I have this problem with a close friend of mine (who's a guy). It's almost amusing because I could be talking about rainbows/pride flags/ the lesbian flag/ those quizzes on "What kind of lesbian are you?" and we'll still get people coming up to us and referring to us as boyfriend and girlfriend. People sat next to us, that could clearly hear the conversation. They ask me if I like him, and it's like do you not hear our conversations? :lol: ---------- Post added 22nd Jan 2017 at 08:33 PM ---------- I'm kinda used to people referring to us that way, but it does irk me a little. Yes, I get I'm ruining your "OTP". :dry:
Is this mainly a problem in larger groups? I was in a small program for my high school years. Same groups of kids cut off from the rest of the school, which was small its self. Guys and girls were pretty interchangeable. There were a few rotations where the same girls would group up and guys too. But they easily dispersed back into the main groups. The most clear gender divide happened with sports. My program got to mix in with the rest of the school and guys hung out with guys in the same team and girls did the same. Male sports teams where like the stereotypes you hear about. And the girls sports team was kind of scary because the star volleyball players cold probably break me over there knees. (Girls were pretty varied and didn't sync up like the guys did though?) If you didn't have a friend of the opposite sex you were gay, not if ands or buts. Your relationship was speculated about. Teachers would glance at you whenever LGBT topics came up. Don't use the school bathroom unless you want a headache. Avoid the 2nd flood girls room during lunch unless you want an invitation. Etc. (I'm not sure how the rest of the school worked)
It doesn't normally annoy me when they say stupid things, but it did this week. We (me and my best friend) spent about a day around town and kept on bumping into this friend we both know. Long story short, she (the friend) messaged me later asking whether we'd enjoyed our "couple's day out" and whether my best friend's boyfriend knew we'd spent the day together. I was speechless.
Personally i try to make friends with everyone i meet and get to know no matter what gender it is because i think the opposite sex can be friends with each other.
Interesting, I suppose it depends on what you consider to be a "small" or "large" group. Even in the classes I have now, there's a definite gender gap. All the girls sit in one corner of the room, and the majority of the guys (bar one) sit on the other side. In group photos it certainly shows. Although in my English I'm the only girl. Since I do IT it's primarily guys on our floor, which makes the gender gap more noticeable since the girls that are there tend to stay in their own little group. With maths it's a tad more mixed, my friend group in maths are mainly guys but I'm also friends with a girl in that group. There are also two other girls who hang out outside of our friend group in a pair. I know in my Secondary, if a guy hung around with girls, or a girl hung around with guys then that guy was suspected of being gay. There was a sort of a "Well if he's not trying to get with her, why is he talking to them?" mindset, not so much when a girl tried to hang with guys, in which case she was "trying to be tough/ is secretly a slut". I know I knew a guy in secondary and we had this handshake and people would laugh and call him gay (even though he was straight) because having a friendship handshake with someone of the opposite sex is apparently a "gay" thing to do. ---------- Post added 23rd Jan 2017 at 01:55 PM ---------- As in my IT group is like that.
