Male/Female Friendship

Upon being pushed, I will write a post about this, but be warned: I offer nothing black-and-white and no conclusions on this topic.

As Bethany discussed yesterday, I do think that guys and girls can be real friends. I've had certainly a lot of female acquaintances over the years, and more than a few good female friends. I don't think there's much debate as to whether guys can be friends with girls. I think the real topic is the differences between male-female friends and same-sex friends. Am I being too Freudian in my view that the sex drive inevitably taints all things with its nightshade touch? Perhaps, but I think it's a bit hard to escape his influence in modern society, as well as the lingering effects that Western culture's particular brand of Christianity has had on our cultural psyche. We are not sure whether sex has to taint everything, but we can sense that it does in the particular world in which we grew up in. As I've said before, I think that for whatever reason (and I'm not quite sure why this is--it would take great research and perhaps no one has an answer) there has been some sort of fear and loathing towards sex in Western European culture. I'm not sure if it is the same in other cultures, since I'm not that well-versed in them, but there has been an incredibly ambivalent view of sex in our culture for a very long time now. A lot of people link it to (especially medieval) Christianity, but I suspect that is not the cause of it, but merely an indication of what the mindsets were of those in power in those days.

My point in talking about this is that these issues inevitably lie there--perhaps dormant, but always present--when we speak of male-female friendships. In theory, yes they should work. And they do work, like Bethany said. But they work only because we are able to overcome our oftentimes powerful sexual/romantic (how much of a difference is there?) impulses because we think that being friends is more important and/or we know the other person would never reciprocate and we want to save our own pride. But the question is, what are the effects of these underlying urges and feelings? I've always of course believed that male-female friendships do work, because I've always had them and they are fun. But there is usually some underlying element of sexual tension. Either I've had a crush on the girl or she's had a crush on me. Very rarely has this not been the case.

Now who cares if one or the other is attracted to their friend, you say? Well, most of us don't most of the time. But it can lead to trouble if you take it past attraction into the oblivion of love, attachment, and eventually pain. Even if you don't get that far, I think there is always the possibility for sexual jealousy (is there really a worse emotion than this?) and other issues that come along with attachment. Jealousy and attachment is a whole other can of worms that I don't even think I could do justice in blog format. Why is love so possessive? I'm not sure if this is true for all males, but I think that most guys do not want to think about their girlfriends or love interests having sex with other guys either before them or after them. There is nothing quite like the nausea of thinking of your ex fucking another guy, am I right? I think a lot of guys would almost be happy if their girlfriends have never had sex with anyone else before them, because they don't like to think of themselves in sexual comparison to other guys, whereas this is perhaps less of a phenomenon with girls. I don't think many girls want to date inexperienced guys. I wonder why this is different.

I want to believe in the possibility for male-female friendship as much as anyone else. I at times can relate a lot more to females than males, because males in our culture are so obsessed with an outdated idea of emotional denial and stoicism as it relates to masculinity and strength. But I do think that these friendships will forever be "tainted" (to use Bethany's word), although I think that makes them all the more interesting and exciting to be in. A world of peace and magnanimous love would obviously be ideal, but we do not live in one. We live in a world of fleeting love, electric sexual desire, and the unyielding fear of having your heart broken. So we make due of it the best we can. And even if that means dealing with all of the emotional ups and downs that come with opposite-sex friendships, I think it's totally worth it. I, for one, believe they can exist. However, this (as everything is--almost) is a person-by-person thing. Some people I think lack the necessary tools for it to work.

--Edward