Why men and women can never be “just” friends
Is friendship possible between a man and a woman? Can a heterosexual have a best friend of the opposite sex? What is the definition of “friend-zone”? These are questions that have been asked over time but without ever having a concrete explanation.
Men and women think differently, at least when it comes to the anatomy of the brain.
Neither a man nor a woman thinks of the friend zone in the same way as the other. This is because the brain is primarily made up of two different types of tissue, called gray matter (which represents the information processing centers) and white matter (which works to interconnect these processing centers).
Research has revealed that men think more with their gray matter, while women think more with their white matter.
Social psychologists have spent vast amounts of time investigating friendships of the opposite sex. After bringing eighty-eight pairs of opposite-sex friends into a lab and asking them a series of questions to escalate their romantic feelings toward their opposite-sex friends, researchers found that while women were generally not attracted to their friends males and viewed the relationship as strictly Platonic males tended to harbor romantic feelings for their female friends.
Other research has shown that a good percentage of people end up cheating on their spouses with supposedly their closest friends of the opposite sex.
Consider this. Would it be possible for a man whose best friend is “Adriana Lima” to move in next to her before heading out to a late-night party? Would it be possible for him to deviate from sexual attraction and maintain the state of friendship in the midst of temptation?
Now let’s twist the situation. Would a woman be able to contain her instincts if “David Beckham” was her best friend? Even after a drunken night?
According to Wikipedia, the phrase “friend-zone” is one of the most controversial, since it states that one of the two parties wishes to enter into a romantic or sexual relationship with the other.
So, in my opinion, humans were created to love the opposite sex and be same-sex friends, unless they were bisexual or homosexual.
Sure, men and women can be friends, but not without risk. A conditional friendship is usually more of a punishment than a relationship.
Having a coffee to talk about what is going on in your life should be done with your partner and not with the friend of the opposite sex.
Hugs to relieve pain and sadness should occur with the person you love and not with the person you respect and care about in a platonic sense.
From a man’s perspective, I can fairly say that no man can agree to his partner spending a great deal of time with a friend of the opposite sex discussing personal secrets, sexuality, and daily issues.
That’s my take on the subject and it reminds me of the movie When Harry Met Sally. The two protagonists end up becoming lovers no matter how hard they tried not to.