Have you been “friend-zoned” before? How did you feel? Did you continue the relationship or did you break it off? Have you found a way to move through the unrequited love to continue the relationship, or was it better to move on?
These are comments by Bay Area Guy, dlz, and Jack on the post “The Friend Zone (or, How “Jerks” Are Made)“.
Bay Area Guy said:
It’s not that men think women aren’t good enough to spend time with unless they’re banging them, it’s the sense of shame and humiliation that a man feels by being in the Friend Zone. It’s as if he’s not good enough for her, that he’s defective somehow.
I’m sure others resent the way women use them for emotional support and favors, but won’t give them the time of day when it comes to any kind of intimacy.
For me, being Friend Zoned by a woman would be humiliating, and I would feel inferior just by spending time with her as just friends.
dlz said:
Speaking from a purely detached POV, I don’t care to keep many friends. I have enough. I take no offense at being friend zoned, attraction is what it is and I wouldn’t want to force a woman to be with me even if I could.
That said, a woman that I am not sexually or romantically involved with is of very little value to me. Just as I am not owed sex from any woman, no woman is owed friendship or favors from me. I very rarely hear of women being vilified for their expectations from men in this regard, not surprisingly. In fact, I very rarely hear of women being vilified for their own cases of being friend-zoned and their expectations of sex or relationships. Quite the contrary, I often see people being much more sympathetic to their story, which is a good thing.
However, we need to extend this same sympathy to men who face rejection as well, because saddling them with guilt over it more often than not leads to bitterness and what many refer to as PUA culture, and understandably so.
Jack said:
Exactly, it seems that some people seek to shame men who are not interested in friendship with a woman once their romantic proposal has been rejected. Bemoaning the friendzone doesn’t necessarily mean you think women are not good enough to spend time with unless you’re sleeping with them or that you think friendship with a woman is something derogatory. It means that you had a romantic interest in someone and they didn’t feel the same way and it hurts. That doesn’t imply entitlement its a very natural and human response.
Being in a friendship with someone that you are deeply attracted to can be a difficult thing and sometimes if someone rejects your advances you’d feel better just parting ways amicably. Some people already have enough platonic friends as it is and you may not want another one. So why can’t we talk about the entitlement some women seem to have about getting friendship from a man once they’ve turned them down? Some of these women are so entitled that they’ll cast sinister motives and thoughts to men who aren’t interested in being friends with them.
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I have discussed this subject matter lots and lots of times. What has p*ssed me off in the past is when a guy does reveal his true agenda quickly and becomes your ‘friend’. But all along FROM THE BEGINNING he fancied you. This also p*ssed me off when I realised that a relationship wasn’t sought, but a FWB situation was. For peets sake, what a huge bloody effort. What a waste of time! Guys please be more upfront, saves a lot of drama. You know this is the one when a guy becomes ‘friends’ with you and when he realises… Read more »
@NK: I hear you…Single men are interested in scoring…Married men are also interested in sex ( and sometimes they don’t let those wedding bands get in the way…!)….I do have some guy friends that I know all the way from HS that I trust and spill to…but for the most part, in the real world, I have to sh*t-test guys and sometimes abruptly walk away or pull my friends in to run interference….I have had guys that I have met for the first time and mistakenly think that I am having just a casual, sometimes political or economic, discussion when… Read more »
Contrary what women and feminist believe, most of friend zones are not sexual at all, its romantic and emotional. But according to them, we are just sex starved pig who always feel entitled sex.
Hmmm… this is an interesting topic to me, as a female, because I think I’ve recently been “friend-zoned” and yeah, it kind of sucks. It’s rejection, plain and simple. Do men and women move past it in different ways? Or do different HUMANS move past it in different ways? Are there different expectations or standards for the two sexes? I’m not sure. In my case, I struggle with feeling used – we slept together and then he told me he “needed to be single”; OK, I could get behind a FWB situation, but even that came off the table after… Read more »
we slept together and then he told me he “needed to be single”; OK, I could get behind a FWB situation, but even that came off the table after a couple more shags.
Without wanting to dismiss your experience (and yes, admittedly, it will come across that way), I think this comment illustrates why the Friend Zone is especially soul killing for men.
For women, at worst it’s a FWB zone. Guys in the Friend Zone will at most get a hug, maybe two.
I called this out on the other thread and I’m going to call it out again here. 1. Why are we playing the game of “who has it worse?” We assume that because a woman get’s the FWB card that she doesn’t experience as much pain as men because “at least she gets sex?” Really? How is that any different from someone saying “Guys stop bemoaning the friend zone, at least you get a friend and friends should be cherished.” 2. Women do experience the friendzone and men do experience the FWB zone and don’t want to be there. Maybe… Read more »
Yeah, good to come into men want sex and women want love stereotype again