This comment was by Anthony on the post Help! I’m Stuck in the Dreaded Friend Zone by Betty Russell
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In my opinion, this is a question of semantics. You’re not really in the “friend zone”, IMHO, until you’ve actually heard the words “I don’t think of you that way”, or something similar. This implies that you’ve made it known that you’d like to be “more than friends” and that she’s not interested. Without that, you’re simply “friends”, and if you want more and haven’t made that clear, that’s your own fault, and you simply can’t say you’ve “been friend zoned”.
The Friend Zone is reserved, in my experience, for women who know damned well that you’re interested, and would definitely jump at the chance to get more serious with them, but they just don’t feel the same way. What I call the “true friend zone” (my own personal term) are the ones who really are great friends, because there’s enough to make them worth having as friends, and just letting go of the fact that your attraction to them is a separate thing that’ll probably never be realized.
Labels are tricky, but I think it’s safe to say you’re not in the friend zone until you’ve been “friend zoned”, which implies that you’ve forced the issue. I know, because it happened to me more times than I can count.
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