What I'm saying is... and this is not a come-on in any way, shape or form, is that men and women can't be friends because the sex part always gets in the way.Then, in a more recent movie called Young People F**king, there is the storyline of the best friends who decide to become friends with benefits, but discover romantic feelings for each other:
Sometimes its something, sometimes its meaningful sometimes its caressing faces, and fingers intertwined and whispering little secrets in ears and sometimes a fuck is just a fuck, its grinding your shit and emptying your balls and falling asleep right after you cum and that’s what you and I are going to do to one another coz that’s what friends are for..One slightly funny thing about the above two quotes is that the first one comes from Harry, the boy, while the second one comes from Kris, the girl. So that can beg a question as to whether or not it is just boys who think about the sex aspect of a cross-sex friendship or if it is also girls who have that mentality. It always seems like boys have the ulterior motive; that boys always has sex on the brain, that boys are more promiscuous than girls, which can lead to men wanting to have sexual relations with their female friends. Is sex the pure motive for opposite sex friendships for men? Is sex anyhow related to a motive for a female to have a male as a friend? In all honesty, how much does sex play in opposite sex friendships?
If the sex aspect does come into play in the relationship, who does it affect the most - girls or guys? Some may think that it will affect the girls more because they connect both emotionally and physically that the sex aspect may throw a wrench into things and that for guys, sex is a pleasurable thing they search for and they don't have the same emotional connection with sex that girls do. Some may think that it won't affect the girls because having that connection is better than having no connection at all.
First off, there has been an emphasis on heterosexual romantic relationships which leads to a cultural expectation that the relationship between a man and a woman should be romantic or sexual in nature. Therefore, cross-sex friendships are viewed as containing a hidden sexual agenda by at least one of the sexes, which is stereotypically the male (Kaplan, D.L & Keys, C.B. (1997). Sex and relationship variables as predictors of sexual attraction in cross-sex platonic friendships between young heterosexual adults. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 14(2), 191-206.) Halastis and Christakis (2009) found the same thing; attraction is an intense challenge in cross sex friendships even when there is no sexual tension because of the dominant social and cultural perception of there being manifest or latent sexual/romantic attraction in the friendship (Halatsis, P. & Christakis, N. (2009). The challenge of sexual attraction within heterosexuals' cross-sex friendship. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 26 (6-7), 919-937). But here is some food for thought - it is more cultural expectations or just the way we are hardwired? As in, is it more of something that has been instilled in us that women and men need to be together to procreate and continue family lines and all that jazz?
Secondly, does the attraction happen on both sides of the relationship or does one sex feel an attraction more than the other? Gut instinct says that guys feel the attraction more than women, but how accurate is that? Slightly surprisingly, a majority of men reported to having low to moderate levels of sexual attraction towards their female friends (53 % males and 31% females) in a study done by Schneider and Kenny (Schneider, C.S. & Kenny, D.A. (2000). Cross-sex friends who were once romantic partners: Are they platonic friends now? Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 17(3), 451-466). However, in Afifi and Faulkner's study (2000), they found that at least one member of many cross-sex friendships experience sexual attraction for their friend (Afifi, W. A & Faulkner, S. L. (2000). On being 'just friends': The frequency and impact of sexual activity in cross-sex friendships. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 17(2), 205-222). So even studies are at odds with each other as to how prevalent attraction is between men and women in a platonic relationship. It would be hard to refute that it does not happen as you can see in many stories that relationships arise out of friendships first, but when you have two people who have no desire to be in a relationship, does that thinking of the need to have sex with the opposite sex become too much to handle?
Finally, if the sexes are aware of this potential attraction, is that why they enter the relationship in the first place? We have the need to feel loved, wanted, enjoyed, surrounded by people we love and who love us; we are social creatures by habit so it would make sense to surround ourselves with people who love us in return, either sexual love or platonic love. Ackerman and Kenrick (2009) found that people do want to feel attractive to others, want to find that companionship and connect with romantic partners who are warm, committed, intelligent and interesting (Ackerman, J. M & Kenrick, D. T. (2009). Cooperative courtship: Helping friends raise and raze relationship barriers. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 35(10), 1285-1300). This should cause a pause in thought as it adds to the argument that there is always underlying reasons for the friendships; it is another reason why people are always looking for more than just a friendship. Another reason that was found in why cross-friendships occurred was in the hopes for potential relationships outside the immediate friendship; having a friend to introduce them to the opposite sex was perceived as beneficial to men and women in opposite sex friendships (Bleske, A.L. & Buss, D.M. (2000). Can men and women be just friends? Personal Relationships, 7, 131-151.). That statement has quite a bit of weight to it cause, come on, how many of us girls have heard that age old line 'is your friend hot?'. It gets annoying really. Furthermore, being in a cross-sex friendship may help people feel good about themselves when they are having one of those down in the dumps day, where they just want to feel sexy and wanted; 66% of individuals in cross-sex friendships engaged in sexual remarks, teasing or jokes with their opposite-sex friends (Afifi & Faulkner, 2000).
Okay, so what about individual sexes? When parsing men and women apart, how does their individual thinking apply to the relationship? With men, one may think that sex is clearly the main reason to enter into a non-relationship relationship with a woman as we all think that sex is the only thing on a male's mind. This was found in many, many studies: single men and mated men judged sexual attraction as a more important reason than did women for initiating their most important opposite-sex friendship (Bleske-Rechek, A.L & Buss, D.M. (2001). Opposite-sex friendship: Sex differences and similarities in initiation, selection and dissolution. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 27, 1310-1323), men more than women seem to be motivated by sexual attraction to establish cross-sex friendships; men enjoy flirting with cross-sex friends more than women and that men are more likely than women to believe that cross-sex friends can become sexual partners (Kaplan & Keys, 1997), sexual elements appears stronger for men (Halatsis & Christakis, 2009) and men valued the possibility of sexual activity within opposite-sex friends and preferred traits consistent with this possibility (eg physical attractiveness) in their friends (Ackerman & Kenrick, 2009). However, there was one study, just *one* that found that sex is clearly not the only motivator - men rated companionship, self-disclosure and gaining information about the opposite sex as higher in benefit than sex (Bleske & Buss, 2000). But, the evidence is pretty clear that men do have sex on the brain at all times and thus is the main reason why they enter into friendships with women.
Now lets look at the women; do women have sex on the brain as well or is there a different motivator to be friends with men? The evidence is not as plentiful as with the men, but it was found that women are likely to perceive their opposite-sex friends as both potential long-term partners and short-term sex partners (Bleske-Rechek & Buss, 2001) and single women perceived sexual attraction as a more important reason for initiating an opposite-sex friendship than did mated women (Bleske-Rechek & Buss, 2001). However, on the flip side, it was found in a study that four out of every ten women wanted a sexual dimension in at least some of their male friendship (Halatsis & Christakis, 2009), so that is a little less than half. It was finally found that women may form relationships with men who are both physically strong and willing to provide physical protection in dangerous situations (Ackerman & Kenrick, (2009). The evidence is fairly split as to what prompts women to enter into friendships with men - it could be because women feel the need to have that strong, masculine figure in their life (benevolent sexism at its finest) or that women are just as horny of creatures as men and are looking for that sexual aspect that is lacking in their life.
Once that sexual aspect has been introduced into the relationship, is the friendship then doomed and put into the 'friends with benefits' category instead or does the friendship remain intact with a little side funness? The evidence is quite one-sided when scientists looked at the aftermath of having sex with a friend - a substantial number of opposite-sex friendships end because of physical distance or failed attempts at romance (Bleske-Rechek & Buss (2001), causes confusion concerning the relationship's definition and nullifies the benefits of the cross-sex friendship (Halatsis & Charistakis, 2009) and that, for most of the participants, sexual attraction that emerges in cross-sex friendship is described as something that will inevitably devalue the friendship (Halatsis & Charistakis, 2009). This may have to do with the fact that there are added expectations placed on the friendship, that there is more pressure on the sexes to act and behave a certain way and also that jealousy may rear its ugly head as there may be a little bit of possessiveness that comes with that sexual attraction.
When it all comes down to it, yes, sex plays a massive role in cross-sex friendships. In a round about way, the answer to whether or not men and women can be just friends is no because both sexes usually have sex on the brain and once that sexual aspect has been introduced, the friendship deteriorates. The way Harry put it is the best way to answer this age old question:
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