Fraternizing With the Enemy

If you can believe the movies, men and women can't ever just be friends. It's required by unwritten social law that at least one member of a mixed-gender friendship be all full up with unrequited lust, if not outright L-U-V. Psychology Today said it best when it summed up the media's role in perpetuating this filthy lie:

"A certain classic film starring Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal convinced a nation of moviegoers that sex always comes between men and women, making true friendship impossible."

There is only one socially approved way around this rule: Straight ladies can be friends with gay boys. But beware, het ladies! Those gay boys may only be pretending to be gay in order to grease the path into your pants! The jury's still out on whether straight boys can be friends with gay ladies, and I'm pretty sure no one's allowed to be friends with bisexual people (unless that person is Rickie), since they can't really be trusted with either gender.

Cinematic representations of friendship notwithstanding, the challenges of building strong platonic relationships in a culture that values romantic love above all else are real for everyone. Straight people, at least, have a guidebook for how to interact with their same-sex friends: Women gossip and shop, often commiserating about their boyfriends' foibles; men watch sports, drink beer, and complain about their girlfriends.

But those with non-standard sexual identities are flying blind. With no guidebook, it's hard to know with whom you're supposed to seek kinship -- those of your own gender, or those of your own orientation? And what if your gender or orientation is fluid?

Should we create rosters and categories? Choose from List A if you're in the mood for stein-clinking and rugby-watching, from List B if you need a manicure and a trip to Bloomie's. But what if you just want to have a potluck? What list do you invite then?

It's hard enough to build long-lasting friendships in the adult world without all these stupid rules about cross-sex relationships and how they're supposed to work. In a perfect world, people would just relate to each other as people, not as genders or sexual orientations or Democrats or Republicans or whatever.

Tell me, readers, who are your best friends, and what does your social circle look like? Are they homogeneous or heterogeneous  in their gender and sexual orientation? What about race, class, national origin? What are the challenges you see in relating to people that are unlike yourself?

Related posts: Boys of Facebook, Top 10 Reasons You Shouldn't Be Friends With Me