It has been a hotly debated topic about whether men and women can be friends. Most stuff that I have seen written about this stuff says there is absolutely no way that a straight man and a straight woman can be friends without the sex getting in the way. Well this article is just my own opinion experience and not any scientific fact or research so please feel free to get involved and let me know your views on the matter.
So can men and women be friends? Without the whole ‘when Harry met Sally’ dramatics? I say without a shadow of a doubt, yes they can. I mean it would be stupid to deny that sexual attraction/tension can make its presence felt sometimes without warning. However it is somewhat deluded and a little insulting to think that IT is only reason that sexually available memebers of the opposite sex interact. For me, that is definitely not the case. I have a lot of guy friends, I mean a LOT! It isn’t something that I set out to do, it just happened. Don’t get me wrong, two of my closest friends are girls but I also have a few close male friends who are (gasp!) straight, single (yep) and (this will knock your socks off) very good looking and yet the closest thing that we have got to sexual tension is….well….it nothing really. I would like to point out here that I am straight and have a huge appreciation for the male kind - they can be funny, wierd and complex but would I want a world without them? Heck no…anyway I digress….
The reason I like hanging out with guys is that there are very few girls who are into sport like I am especially where I am…I adore sports especially soccer, athletics, tennis, boxercise and going to the gym. I like my girlie movies but I REALLY like action movies like the Bourne series, Gladiator (and yes, Russell Crowe in a skirt was an added bonus to what is a truly excellent film), the Mummy series etc. So how many girls could I invite over for a night in? Errrr…none. So I found myself chatting to the guys and from there form friendships. Guys found it cool that a girl was into what they were into and I found a group of people who I could spend time with and with whom I had a lot in common. The fact that they were men didn’t really enter into the equation. I am still in touch with many of them and not once has there been THAT awkward moment.
So yes, I think men and women can be friends. Why? Because for the perhaps the first time in history, men and women (in our society) can be educated equally, they are settling down later and hence they are showing that they can form and maintain strong and close friendships. Friends are seen as "the new family" (this I think is debatable but hey….) and it would be odd if this was divided along purely sexual lines.
Guys as friends, offer I believe a point of view that a girl wouldn’t. In a crisis, girlfriends will be there with the sympathy, the chocolate, the ice cream to emotionally and painstakingly go through it with you. A guy would patiently listen, probably agree with you and then shrug his shoulders and say "well thats life." Personally, it is an attitude, that we girlies could benefit from sometimes.
It is true that men and women are very very different not just physically but emotionally and psycologically but it is these differences that make friendships between the opposite sexes work. I do not believe it is necessarily the precursor to flirtation/sex/marriage but as Catherine Jarvie said on www.handbag.com, it is a "a healthy, knock-about meeting of two minds, whatever sex those grey cells may be." And on that note, I hope that this argument is finally put to bed…pardon the pun.
Take care and God Bless readers…
