Appropriateness and Friendship Boundaries

[Eaquae Legit]

We were having a discussion with Rei's father last night, and he startled us a bit by (quite calmly) stating that he has no independent heterosexual friendships. That is, he and his wife are friends with a number of couples, but he would never interact alone with the female halves of any of these couples. Rei's mom is in complete agreement with this, and would never have a similar relationship with any of the menfolk. It is "totally inappropriate".

This is totally foreign to Rei and I, who have any number of friends of the opposite gender and interact with all of them independently. He's shared an apartment with one of my female friends, and a male friend and I have a long-running joke about going on a date together should we find ourselves in the same city again. We don't have any sort of male/female clear-cut lines. And for most of our friends, the same sort of situation applies.

Is this just a generational thing? A religious thing? Simply a "personal comfort levels" thing?

We both agree that if one partner is uncomfortable with such a casual situation, the more casual one should respect that. They can negotiate their comfort zones, but one's partner's feelings are very important.

How do you pwebbers feel? Would you be comfortable with your girlfriend/boyfriend/husband/wife/etc. having independent relationships with the gender they're attracted to? How independent is independent?

Questions? Comments? Concerns? Post here!

[Gravity Defier]

Harry Burns: Would you like to have dinner?... Just friends.
Sally Albright: I thought you didn't believe men and women could be friends.
Harry Burns: When did I say that?
Sally Albright: On the ride to New York.
Harry Burns: No, no, no, I never said that... Yes, that's right, they can't be friends. Unless both of them are involved with other people, then they can... This is an amendment to the earlier rule. If the two people are in relationships, the pressure of possible involvement is lifted... That doesn't work either, because what happens then is, the person you're involved with can't understand why you need to be friends with the person you're just friends with. Like it means something is missing from the relationship and why do you have to go outside to get it? And when you say "No, no, no it's not true, nothing is missing from the relationship," the person you're involved with then accuses you of being secretly attracted to the person you're just friends with, which you probably are. I mean, come on, who the hell are we kidding, let's face it. Which brings us back to the earlier rule before the amendment, which is men and women can't be friends.

I felt like that had to be posted.


Since the majority of my friends are male, I would respect my (imaginary) partner's choice to have female friends and I'd hopefully trust them to stay out of situations in which things may happen that shouldn't be happening. I have no idea what the boundaries would be or should be but I look forward to hearing from people already in relationships...which is basically everyone.

[megxers]

I have somewhat skewed views on this because I've a. never been in a serious relationship, b. am technically still in like with my best friend who is engaged to someone else and he and I exchange many texts/IMs/etc, c. I may have hooked up with a friend less than 2 days after they ended their relationship...and it was premeditated. All of this makes me kind of skeptical....but on the other hand, there is the d.: one of my other best friends was in a long term relationship and his girlfriend was totally trusting to the point where he's slept on my floor/etc.

So basically I think it just depends on the situation/how well they knew each other previously/etc? Even though I have been multiple things on one side of it, honestly, I'm not sure how I'd feel on the other.

[Janus%TheDoorman]

EDIT: Pulp Fiction explains this better than I do. NSFW Language, of course

From my perspective, it's not a religious thing, and it's only generational is a very specific context - it's something ingrained in our instinctive social patterns, and the no inter-sex friends thing is just a response to the problem.

I've both had a partner who had male friends, including friends with at least some sexual attraction to my partner, and been attracted to someone in a relationship. Also, I've only ever been a guy, and this is definitely something I'd expect to be different from a female perspective, but I can't testify to that.

From the in-relationship perspective, you can consider the risk of your partner walking out on you for a friend of hers, but in anything I'd consider a healthy relationship, that risk is minimal. The real social risk is a friend making an advance on her which causes several problems. One, depending on aggressive he was, he may have crossed a line even if she hadn't been in a relationship - this is a whole other type of situation, and one I've never been in, so I wouldn't know how I'd react. Two, your partner may feel guilty - some might call this irrational, but it still happens, and having your girlfriend put into this position sucks. Three, it puts you in an awkward position the whole time. You'll likely pick up on any attraction, but if you confront him about it, you risk ruining their friendship, and possibly ruining your relationship with your girlfriend, so most guys will either ignore it, or try and warn him off subtly which takes significantly more social skill or you risk it backfiring and ending up back in the confrontation scenario. If you choose neither confrontation method, however, there's always that tension underlying their relationship, and the threat of all of those things happening.

I find the best response is to either become friends with him, as stealing your friend's girl violates just about every unspoken social rule, ever, or ask your girlfriend to end the friendship. This last one can be a bit distasteful, but since the biggest causes for concern aren't usually her closest friends, she'll likely be willing to do so gracefully. In general I'd blame these situations on the sort of guy who makes advances on a person in a relationship, but then I've also been on that end of it.

When you find yourself attracted to someone in a relationship, well there's not much to be done. Like I said earlier, if you're friends with her significant other, even mildly so, you're more likely to respect their relationship, but if not, your desire can be more easily acceptable, at least to yourself. "She's just with this guy for now, she's not really in love with him," or "Who cares about that guy? I'm just offering her a choice between me or him, and there's nothing wrong with her choosing me." are common justifications (These aren't all from me, some friends and I had a debate over whether or not it was acceptable to make advances on a woman if you knew she was in a relationship, but didn't know the guy). And it's always going to look like that from that perspective, so "the sort of guy who makes advances on a person is a relationship" is a convenient target, but a difficult social problem to address since from his perspective he's not violating any social rules, just competing with her significant other.

So yeah, the "no inter-sex friendships" is a way of dealing with a difficult social problem, and it's easy to view it as primitive and archaic when we've spent the last few decades really hashing out gender roles and sexuality in society, put it's a persistent problem, and it has an effective solution.

I said earlier that it's generational in a very specific context, which is that Generations X, Y, and Z have been raised by the Baby Boomers who went through a significant upheaval of traditional gender and sexuality roles - and so now we like to think of inter-sex relationships as having no particular risk, that men and women are perfectly capable of interacting with each other independent of their sexual identities.

Personally I think this is a bit wrong, and most people underestimate the risks associated with inter-sex relationships, but then that might just be my own hindsight. If you think the risks are low enough, have a blast.

[Satya]

Amendment to the rule that "men and women can't be 'just friends'" - if one of them is over 2 points higher/lower than the other on the 1-10 scale; example - if I'm an 8 and she's a 5, we can be friends, because there's no possibility of a further relationship. Shallow? Yes. Vain? Absolutely. True? No doubt. There's a clause to this dynamic, however - money. If the lower number has a significant income/monetary resources or considerable fame, it provides a modifier to their number proportional to the money/fame. A well-off doctor who would otherwise be a 5 becomes a 7, while a multi-millionaire actor who is otherwise a 5 becomes an 8, whilst a billionaire heir goes straight from a 5 to a 9.

[daPyr0x]

f*** everything about "appropriateness." I'm friends with my friends, and that's that. I have male friends, female friends. I'm still friends with some of the women I've dated. I've had "intimate" moments with women with whom I'm friends (obviously during my single days). That doesn't mean I'm any more likely to "cheat" with them than I am at any other point while going through my normal life.

I would have a big problem if I was in a relationship with someone who had a problem with me continuing those friendships. I may not have many friends, but the people I do have in my life mean something to me, and I don't consider my current relationship status as a prerequisite for which friendships I can entertain. There's one friend in particular, I've known her since probably the 9th grade. In fact, I was her first kiss, in a really super awkward first date sorta way. Obviously, we recognized that we're not compatible and now she's living with a guy who's, well, just like me (haha!). There was a time when her and I going to dinner, movies, or even just hanging out in my car late at night by the McD's together would have her boyfriend asking questions - and rightly so - but we're still friends (as am I with him now), and I wouldn't change that.

That being said, I definitely feel a twinge of jealousy when a woman I'm seeing goes out with male friends. Well, sometimes. It's not about whether or not I trust said woman to remain faithful (what, exactly, does that mean again?), but whether or not I trust the guys in question - or rather trust her to keep herself in safe situations. Guys are skeezy rapists. I can't let that prevent me from being okay with someone I'm with having their own life, though, so I just deal with it. I call that maturity.

[jotabe]

Satya, and here i thought that BACs believed in love as something immaterial and trascendent, more akin to destiny than to "material accidents"

[LilBee91]

I don't think I could ever tell my guy to ditch his female friends because he's dating me. This could be easier for me because my boyfriend and I have a lot of the same friends, so I know most of the girls he hangs out with (most of them were my friends first). I also have a lot of guy friends, one of whom we both know has had feelings for me in the past, but we trusted him. I have had plenty of male friends I have never had any attraction to. While I don't know if that is mutual, they are good enough friends to not cause any trouble in my relationships.

The only friendships I would hesitate to permit would be one with a former girlfriend, mainly because I'd be suspicious that she's up to something. Actually, if my man was friends with any woman I thought could be conspiring some devious plot, we'd probably have to have a chat--but he has better taste in friends than that.

As for friendships made after you're in a relationship--I think the same principles apply, though it can depend how they met and became friends. In sum, while I could get paranoid and jealous, I trust my man and his choice in friends, and I would expect him to do the same for me. Friendships make life better, no matter how awesome it was without them.

[jotabe]

Maybe it's because i'm fairly unexperienced relationship-wise, but i don't understand why a friend ex-s.o. can be more threatening. I mean, there is a reason why they broke up, right?

[Rei]

I think being friends with an ex while in another relationship is really a case-by-case basis. I mean, sometimes there isn't a good reason a that you broke up with them, or one of you may harbour feelings yet, or any number of other reasons where your current partner would have reason to be nervous. But then there are cases where that romantic interest really is entirely gone, but friendship still remains (albeit, I do think this is not overly common). At that point it comes down to the comfort level of you and your current partner, as well as your trust of each other.

Concerning being friends with someone of the same sex as your partner, this was something which caused tensions in one of my past relationships. In particular, while she admitted it would be very unfair of her to have her guy friends and enjoy spending time with them but to insist that I couldn't spend time with my girl friends, she still made it very clear that she was very uncomfortable with me spending time with girl friends all the same.

For me, I am not sure that I could ever give up spending time with my girl friends, if only because almost all of my friends ARE girls. In order for me to give that up save for when I'm with EL, I would have to pretty much give up my entire social circle.

[Eaquae Legit]

For me, I am not sure that I could ever give up spending time with my girl friends, if only because almost all of my friends ARE girls. In order for me to give that up save for when I'm with EL, I would have to pretty much give up my entire social circle, except for the gay guy.

Fixed that for ya.

[daPyr0x]

I think being friends with an ex while in another relationship is really a case-by-case basis. I mean, sometimes there isn't a good reason a that you broke up with them, or one of you may harbour feelings yet, or any number of other reasons where your current partner would have reason to be nervous. But then there are cases where that romantic interest really is entirely gone, but friendship still remains (albeit, I do think this is not overly common). At that point it comes down to the comfort level of you and your current partner, as well as your trust of each other.

I'd agree with you there, it definitely depends on circumstances and the specific situation encountered. I just like the idea of relationships being more about togetherness than exclusivity. Monogamy isn't the question here.

[Satya]

Satya, and here i thought that BACs believed in love as something immaterial and trascendent, more akin to destiny than to "material accidents"

People are people; attraction has an undeniable biological factor.

[Young Val]

Oddly enough, this has never been an issue for me from any angle when I'm in a relationship. I don't mind if my guy has female friends, and I've never had a boyfriend get upset about any of my guy friends.

The only time having friends of the opposite sex has been messy for me is when I'm single (which is really what the whole When Harry Met Sally thing is about). More than once (but most notably Once, and anyone who's an old-timer around here ought to remember my many, many Bob and DY posts bemoaning the current state of affairs between me and my pal, Dan) when I was single the lines of friendship I had with guys would get a little blurry.

I've had boyfriends cheat on me before, but they didn't cheat on me because they had female friends. They cheated on me because, quite frankly, they were assholes.

[powerfulcheese04]

I don't mind a guy I'm with having female friends. Most of mine haven't minded me having male friends.

I think it comes down to a case-by-case basis kind of thing. If there's a friend of your SO's who gives you pause (or a friend of yours that gives your SO pause) it's worth evaluating that friendship and making sure to clearly define boundaries with that friend.


I do know some people who do the no-friends-of-opposite gender things. They mostly go to really conservative churches. And, honestly, I think it's less about controlling cheating and more about controlling gossip. If you aren't friends with/never interact with people you could be attracted to who are not your spouse without your spouse/a group it's harder to be accused.

[Petra456]

I've never been one to care who my boyfriend hangs out with. My younger sister on the other hand is in a relationship where they get furious with each other if they find out they've been even talking to someone of the opposite sex... Which I find very strange.

Growing up my best friend was a guy, and a good number of the girls he dated never liked me because we were just way too close. For the longest time, his current fiancée wouldn't even talk to me, and it was because he refused to stop hanging out and doing things with me. We've kinda fallen out of the close relationship, and she stopped caring once she saw it really is like a brother/sister relationship.

Honestly, you need to be able to trust the one your with, so I have no problem if they hang out with other girls.

[Rei]

And, honestly, I think it's less about controlling cheating and more about controlling gossip. If you aren't friends with/never interact with people you could be attracted to who are not your spouse without your spouse/a group it's harder to be accused.

This reminds me of what the pastor (my uncle) said at my sister's wedding. Basically he advised that if one of them is out one-on-one with someone of the opposite sex, they should tell the other so that nobody can make a fuss about "Oh, you should be worried because I saw your husband with another lady".

I do find this a strange concern, but then our social circle is fairly small and most of us know each other or about each other and it's no secret that we hang out on our own or in groups varyingly.

[starlooker]

The problem isn't hanging out with someone of the relevant sex, at least, not after you've reached a certain maturity level. The problem is if you do that and feel you need to keep it a secret.

[daPyr0x]

The problem isn't hanging out with someone of the relevant sex, at least, not after you've reached a certain maturity level. The problem is if you do that and feel you need to keep it a secret.

This. A thousand times over.

[Eaquae Legit]

The problem isn't hanging out with someone of the relevant sex, at least, not after you've reached a certain maturity level. The problem is if you do that and feel you need to keep it a secret.

Indeed, this makes a lot of sense.

But what happens when one partner is very paranoid and demands the other to stop seeing his/her friends entirely? (My answer is that maybe this relationship isn't the best one, but I know the real world is messier.)

[starlooker]

Then that's a big huge giant red flag, and something is wrong.

[Eaquae Legit]

Then that's a big huge giant red flag, and something is wrong.

That was roughly my sentiment as well, but I was curious.

[Gravity Defier]

I'm honestly less worried about hypothetical man-friend and his friends of the opposite sex hanging out than I am about his friends, of either sex, getting along, or not, with me.

I'm pretty sure the last one's friends and family hated me. The longer I was around them, the more I retreated into myself, which probably didn't help. The one before...haha, his parents and I only talked once but they also hated me (pitied, at best) and made no secret of that.

[steph]

Disclaimer: These are my opinions for my relationship and I don't expect or judge anyone for choosing differently. I hope you can give me the same respect.

It is not appropriate for Brian to spend significant alone time with another female. It is not appropriate for me to spend significant time alone with another male. Not that I believe that Brian would ever cheat on me and I would never cheat on him, but it is impossible to happen if you are never in that situation. It's also a matter of how you define cheating. In my world, there is such thing as emotionally cheating. It has nothing to do (necessarily) with being attracted to someone else, but it's having another woman confidante instead of me. That is one of my roles and rights as a wife. Not that I'm the only one he is allowed to talk to, but it's not appropriate for him to withdraw from me and share his hopes and dreams with someone else. That is emotionally cheating. (This is especially wrong if done behind my back, as mentioned above posts.)

Examples to help you understand my boundaries:

If my friend Dan were to stop by for a few minutes when Brian wasn't home, that would be fine. If he were to stay for a few hours, that would not be ok. It would be fine for a group of guys that I've known and been friends with for awhile to come hang out while Brian was gone. But not one on one. It's ok for Dan to call once in a while and for us to chat for a 1/2 hour or so, check up, give advice, etc. If that were to start happening on a regular basis, say once a week, or if it were for several hours, that would not be appropriate.

All of this applies to both of us. I don't expect Brian to follow any "rules" that I don't follow myself.

For me, it's not hard to stay within these boundaries. I do interact with my male friends on facebook. I do get together with them for parties when everyone comes home at Christmas. I do talk to Dan on the phone when he calls. I run to them and give them HUGE big hugs when I see them. Brian does talk to some female friends he had in college. He even spent several days with one of them and her family when he was in DC last year. Brian did have a female friend at work give him a birthday present. Another one of his female friends at work comes to our pirate parties. It's ok to be friends with members of the opposite sex when married. It's just not ok to spend significant amounts of time with them or to confide in them.

Some links to help you understand my point of view and my culture:
The Family:A Proclamation to the World
Warning Signs of Infidelity

[LilBee91]

It has nothing to do (necessarily) with being attracted to someone else, but it's having another woman confidante instead of me.

I agree with this. That'd actually be my biggest worry.

[VelvetElvis]

I've had boyfriends cheat on me before, but they didn't cheat on me because they had female friends. They cheated on me because, quite frankly, they were assholes.

I love you.

[Caspian]

It has nothing to do (necessarily) with being attracted to someone else, but it's having another woman confidante instead of me.

If it's not necessarily to do with being attracted, would it be any different/better if he had a male confidante instead of you? Why/why not?

[steph]

I think he should have one or more male friends he can confide in, because sometimes you do need to vent/talk things through. He shouldn't do it in place of dealing with things with me, but more like in preparation of dealing with things with me. If he is choosing to confide his hopes, dreams and fears to anyone, male or female, instead of me, it's not ok. If it were a male, it's just a crappy, emotionally detached things to do. Having it be a female does set up a situation of a possible affair in the future.

[Gravity Defier]

If he is choosing to confide his hopes, dreams and fears to anyone, male or female, instead of me, it's not ok.

I can absolutely agree to this. I see nothing wrong with sharing those things, to a degree, with other friends (I hope I'm friends with my hypothetical) but not only should I get more than others, I shouldn't be kept out because someone else is getting that, otherwise, why am I with this person?

[starlooker]

I agree, to an extent, Steph. I guess that's where the secrecy bit comes in with me.

Honestly, my own personal boundaries actually are pretty conservative. However, I do not have a lot of male friends.

It was interesting when I first moved to Wichita, my fellow intern was male, and we were both in long-distance, long-term relationships. We spent a lot of hours in the same office. And since we were going through the exact same process, there was a lot of sharing done between us about feelings, hopes, dreams, experiences. Neither of us have a romantic partner in a similar field, so these are things that, even when our respective partners moved to be with us, could not have been really understood by that person.

However, all of this discussion was done strictly at work. And I would not have been comfortable going to dinner with him, like I did all the time with a female intern friend. Maybe we'd grab lunch somewhere together, but that was it. All other interactions were at work or around other people. And, to me, it was just instinctively a good boundary to have.

There's nothing I said to him that I would not say to my husband-to-be. It's just that husband-to-be could not fulfill that emotional need for someone to understand internship/clinical experience the way my fellow intern could. And I love that friendship I have/had with my colleague. But because of my romantic relationship, I instinctively wanted a pretty conservative, rigidly-bounded context for it. And I'm pretty sure he felt the same. We never really discussed it. However, whenever we did discuss "getting together sometime" it was always carefully phrased with, "the four of us should get together some time," or some other situation that would involve at least one of our significant others.

Who the person is makes a huge difference, though, to me. There are other men I would have no problem spending large amounts of time with and wouldn't feel the least bit uncomfortable -- but, then, these are men that I would not be able to explain certain feelings of mine to. There's not that risk for emotional infidelity, however nebulous a term I find that to be. Can't define it, all I know is that I will not play with fire.

[daPyr0x]

I just don't think it's necessarily 'wrong' to have close female friends, regardless of my marital status. I completely understand the viewpoint of "appropriateness," and to an extent agree with it. I just feel as though your partner detaching from you is an indicator of an issue within your relationship with your partner. Though it's plausible, even likely, that the introduction of a new friend could be the 'trigger,' in a truly happy relationship the partners wouldn't be pulling away regardless of with whom it was they're choosing to spend their time.

Why is this happening? What does this person offer? Why does the person I care so much about, who supposedly cares about me, do this? Is this the relationship I want to be in?

I fully respect you, Steph, for having set boundaries that you both live to and expect lived up to. I just think that for me the people with whom I'm close, the social relationships that I have, shouldn't be restricted by the boundaries of one relationship I have in particular. In my mind it's a little...sexist? In this day and age, where sexual orientation choices are pretty common, it's impossible to suggest that restricting your significant other to close personal friends with whom they'd spend a lot of time talking, perhaps, to members of the same sex definitively means that you're protecting against some sort of sexual offer or temptation.

I completely agree that as a wife you should expect to be the person to whom your husband speaks to the most, opens up to the most, etc. That's part of a marriage, and if that's not happening then something definitely needs to be addressed within the relationship. I just don't think my boundaries should be any different between my guy friends and my girl friends. If you can trust I'm not going to have sex with some of my friends, why not all of them?

[Gravity Defier]

In this day and age, where sexual orientation choices are pretty common, it's impossible to suggest that restricting your significant other to close personal friends with whom they'd spend a lot of time talking, perhaps, to members of the same sex definitively means that you're protecting against some sort of sexual offer or temptation.

As much as I believe in the sliding scale of human sexuality, where more people reside somewhere in between 100% straight and 100% homosexual and not at the poles themselves, I don't think that sexual orientation being more open perhaps than it has been in the past means that most people are going to act on same sex offers or temptations. So while the other may not be protected, I don't see this being a huge issue.

If you can trust I'm not going to have sex with some of my friends, why not all of them?

Unless you're bisexual, it could have something to do with you being more likely to find one half of your friend-set sexually attractive.

I'm not saying I don't think it can or should be done -I think it's okay to have friends of the sex you're attracted to- but there should be some boundaries in place once you're in a relationship, otherwise I think you're just asking for trouble. People make mistakes, even ones you trust. Why help them along by increasing the odds they'll make a mistake?

I think the boundaries tend to spell themselves out for most people and are different to each relationship, which is why I'm thinking most people here are okay with their SOs having friends of the sex they're attracted to. I could be wrong on that but I don't think anyone here is working in a boundary-less world.

[daPyr0x]

I guess I should include a disclaimer. I'm hardly the best relationship example or expert. Idealism rarely crosses over into the real world.

[Luet]

Thanks for taking the time and effort to type up your thoughts, Steph. I would have to say that my viewpoint on this topic follows very closely in line with yours. I would guess the similarity is because we both are part of conservative religions. And while they differ in many ways, I think they are fairly similar in lifestyle and moral culture.

[Eaquae Legit]

It was interesting when I first moved to Wichita, my fellow intern was male, and we were both in long-distance, long-term relationships. We spent a lot of hours in the same office. And since we were going through the exact same process, there was a lot of sharing done between us about feelings, hopes, dreams, experiences. Neither of us have a romantic partner in a similar field, so these are things that, even when our respective partners moved to be with us, could not have been really understood by that person.

I have a similar-situation friend. We're both in the same very tiny sub-field, and we both have personal reasons for being there (the total people I am aware of who meet those criteria: 2). However, he and Brent have their own little things that they can talk about and I'm not interested in or don't understand. I think the key to it is that neither Brent or I have many "exclusive" friendships - almost all our friends are mutual, so the main source of jealousy would be that two of us got to hang out and the other didn't.

It's much more open and trusting because the other person is quite involved anyway.

That, and no matter who else we talk to, it's never instead of each other.