Can a man and a woman "just be friends?"

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itullian said:
Without a romantic entanglement developing?

I say no. One or the other is gonna eventually get smitten. :love:

I know with me, if I was friends with a girl I was still looking for a way to get her to like me more or she was doing the same
and sooner or later one likes the other more or they :love: :yup:

So if you have an opposite sex friend-------watch out, if you’re not after them, they’re after you. :yup:

What say you?

ps----same with gays, only same sex friends instead.
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Moving from gender stereotyping to ageism, I’ve found it more difficult when younger, but easier when older and more mature. Despite what Billy Crystal may have said!
 
BlueEyedLady said:
Of course they can. I have a large and diverse group of friends, and all but one are male.

I think it says a lot about how you view and treat the opposite sex if you can’t maintain a friendship with them without things turning romantic and/or sexual.
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Indeed. I mean, I have a number of friends of both sexes. Among some of the girls I’ve thought “Could I ask them out?”, and under future circumstances I might, if we were both single and in a position to be in a relationship. If that isn’t the case, though, than I can be friends with them.

I know what the phrase conveys, but I won’t use “just friends”, because some of those relationships, even though they aren’t romantic, are very important to me.
 
Yes. My best friend is female and there is no romantic interest at all. Anybody who thinks just because they are the opposite sex means they MUST fall in love is generalising. I’m sure plenty do turn out that way but there are plenty that don’t.

To those who say she must feel for me then, clearly you have a lack of opposite sex friends.
 
George_Stegmeir said:
If you are a teen-ager or immature young adult immersed in contemporary secularist behavior, then the answer is a resounding NO!
However once one is mentally and emotionally mature, than the answer is yes.
The whole argument that a man and woman cannot “just be friends” is a result of an irrational desire of many young men to bed every girl or woman he meets (except possibly his mother or sister). This is largely due to raging hormones during adolesence, and culturally promulgated by the secular culture, such as the entertainment industry and the likes of Playboy magazine.
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I agree with you, even as a liberal. I also caught the humor in “except POSSIBLY his mother or sister.” At least, I hope it was meant to be humorous.
 
yesh of course, it seems half the girls i try to date, we end up being friends 🤷
 
Andre1000 said:
Of curse they can, especially if one has already a wife/girlfriend.
Love does not always mean romantic love. :hug3:
I only wanted to be more than a friend to a girl ONE TIME.
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Uh, if one of them has a spouse or a significant other, well that’s when it can really go south. I think that for the average everyday person it is a bad, bad idea. Exceptionally noted are St. Francis de Sales and St. Jean de Chantell who were the best of friends, but who lived in separate monestaries.
 
I think it’s possible - as others had said, easier as you get older and more mature. I’ve always had friends of all ages, some being men of the opposite gender, and I suppose the very fact of a lot of them being significantly older or younger (or gay) means a physical attraction is not really on the cards.

Then again, I don’t think of myself as being particularly good looking, and as another poster said know too much about most of them to want a date even if they offered. That helps too.
 
So, by your logic, people that are attracted to both men & women should have no friends al all? 🤷:rolleyes:
itullian said:
Without a romantic entanglement developing?

I say no. One or the other is gonna eventually get smitten. :love:

I know with me, if I was friends with a girl I was still looking for a way to get her to like me more or she was doing the same
and sooner or later one likes the other more or they :love: :yup:

So if you have an opposite sex friend-------watch out, if you’re not after them, they’re after you. :yup:

What say you?

ps----same with gays, only same sex friends instead.
Click to expand...
 
I say no, unless one is already married and the opposite sex friend is friends with both.

For example, I am married and have several male friends. BUT they are ALL also my husband’s friends, and I never, never see them alone.

I have too much respect for my marriage and my husband to do that.

This is not to say that I am attracted to my male friends. I am not. But I do know that there is a possibility of their being attracted to me (it has happened before), and I do not even want to put myself in the position of being a temptation or being tempted.

Back before I was married, I had several male friends, but I always knew that there was some attraction in the friendship, too. I knew that the friendship would need either to develop romantically, or it would die. Most, of course, died. Now that I am married I am able to retain long-term friendships with males, but only ones I share in common with my husband.
 
itullian said:
Without a romantic entanglement developing?

I say no. One or the other is gonna eventually get smitten. :love:

I know with me, if I was friends with a girl I was still looking for a way to get her to like me more or she was doing the same
and sooner or later one likes the other more or they :love: :yup:

So if you have an opposite sex friend-------watch out, if you’re not after them, they’re after you. :yup:

What say you?

ps----same with gays, only same sex friends instead.
Click to expand...
Yes of course it is possible. Of course there are women who think all men will eventually fall in love with them/want them and men who only see women one way. Maturity helps.
 
PatriceA said:
No, not naive. Mature and in a good marriage. I have friends of the opposite gender and so does my husband.

You can speak for yourself and your experience. But in my life, a man and a woman just being friends works.
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Yes, once you are married it really changes. Certainly I have friends who are female and my wife has friends who are male.
 
Yes, they can. They will only need to (learn to) deal with any sort of attraction that will pop up, along with temptations. If you’d like to rule out any possibility of ever being tempted and having to resist, I don’t know if such friendships would be possible unless between people who, like, can’t stand the sight of each other. But that’d be scrupulous, I believe.

I have lady friends, some of them I’ve had crushes on, some of them I still do, most of them don’t know or can’t prove it. It can be difficult at times but if you manage to rein your temper and get over your jealousy or your loss or your whatever, it can be done. Just don’t expect it to be like a friendship with a guy, not any more than your relationship with your sister is the same as with your brother.

For the record, I suspect people often exaggerate friendly impulses towards a person of the opposite sex, resulting in misguided romantic relationships. Having friends of both sexes helps know the difference and avoid misjudging such a relationship.
 
Of course they can. Some of my best friends have been male. Much less moodiness to deal with. LOL

Seriously, though. I have both male & female friends, as does my dh. Nothing changed when we got married; some of my male friends did become friends with my dh, others didn’t. Some of his female friends & I became friends, others didn’t. It’s not a problem for us.

We typically don’t see these friends alone, but not intentionally. Some live out of state, so we rarely see them at all, others live close, but schedules don’t allow for us to get together as often as we’d like. If we do see them, it’s usually large group setting. I’d have no problem w/ him going out for lunch, dinner, drinks, whatever w/ a female friend, and he’d have no problem with me doing the same w/ a male friend. It’s called trust. We’ve been married 11 years, and it’s never been an issue.
 
Having recently married, I have the same female friends that I had before I married.

I can say that I find approximately 50% of my female friends attractive. I don’t think I ever dated any of my current female friends, but there’s certainly a few that I would have been willing to see.

However, I don’t have any problem being alone with them and never will. Just because you’re attracted to someone, doesn’t mean you act on it. This is true many times even when you’re single, and no different when married.

As a guy in his 20’s, I have raging hormones, mind you. So I can’t imagine why this is a problem for others if it’s not a problem for me.
 
BlueEyedLady said:
I think it says a lot about how you view and treat the opposite sex if you can’t maintain a friendship with them without things turning romantic and/or sexual.
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I have to agree, whether or not you can “just be friends” depends on your view of the opposite gender (or their view of you). Or maybe it has to do with your own personal struggles (for example, someone who struggles with porn/lust might not “be able” to have opposite gender friends. But someone who doesn’t struggle with these, probably can).

I too am a female who has a lot of male friends. In fact, in high school and college all my friends were guys, and no, I didn’t date any of them and they didn’t come after me. They were like brothers and I was like a sister to them. I have both male and female friends now, but still, most of my friends are male and it mainly has to do with shared interests. I am not the type to be interested in stereotypical female activities: I don’t shop, I hate shoes, I am not into fashion, I hate reality TV, etc… (the stuff I always hear my female coworkers, except one, talking about at lunch). But I love hiking, camping, history channel documentaries, doing home repairs, etc. the stuff my male co-workers seem to talk about most.
 
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