Because of guys get treated badly for being gay. And society thinks it okay for woman to be bi/lesbian. So if a guy says he is my boyfriend then he must be gay.
Female infantilisation is a part of it. Why do you think it’s a loooot more common to call an adult woman a girl than an adult man a boy?
Edit: wait shit this is just what you asked about but again. Shit.
Edit 2: Okay so generally speaking it’s a lot more acceptable. And sometimes encouraged. To treat women as a lot younger than they actually are because it plays into the whole “women need protecting” angle western society has. If a man is treated like a boy, that means he’s weaker than he should be. This infects a lot of other behaviour. This is also why you hear “me and the boys” more than “me and the boyfriends” as boyfriend is considered an immature term (why do you think so many people say “partner” or “lover” when they’re adults?)
Straight men are generally more afraid of being seen as gay than straight women are. I’ve known plenty of straight women who jokingly call themselves girlfriends, make out in front of guys for attention, etc etc. I’ve never met dudes who do the same.
Honestly, this might just be my view on it, but i think it has to do with how society views male, and female friendships – whilst “friend” is a gender-neutral term there are still some societal undertones to it. Personally, when a guy says he is going out with friends i ( and i believe society in general) automatically assume it’s an all-male friend group, whilst with women it tends to be assumed as a mixed company – hence why women feel the need to specify it’s their girl-friends aka girlfriends. I don’t know, but that’s the vibe i get, which could also come from my culture.
I assume it’s because English is a germania language, and thus is gendered. In Danish, some nouns have different forms depending on the gender, and in German, almost all professions and many nouns are gendered. Thus a male friend is a freund and a female friend is a freundin. It might be a similar concept that the word “friend” is inherently male.
A girlfriend is someone youre in a sexual relationship with, a boyfriend is someone youre in a sexual relationship with. Dont think anyone should use that term in any other way, its too confusing lol
I feel like calling female friends “girlfriends” has kinda fallen out of fashion in the last 20 years. Like most people just say friends because otherwise it’s unnecessarily confusing.
I’d say the majority of men are homophobic, and they are absolutely petrified of being thought of as gay. BECAUSE OH NO THEY MIGHT THINK I’M GAY. It’s super dumb, but plenty of guys are this way.
i think guys have much fewer friends of the opposite sex so there’s not a lot of reason to specify.
Maybe a little bit that they want to avoid the infantilization that ‘boy’friend implies.
There’s also the masculine default, generally everything is assumed male as standard, and specified to be female. Which could also explain why women tend to refer to other women as their ‘girlfriends’
I think that’s the main thing. Even when women use ‘girlfriend’ as a way to describe a platonic friend it get’s misinterpreted pretty often, they also use ‘guyfriend’ a lot to prevent this misinterpretation with platonic male friends to avoid that. If a guy started describing the homies as their ‘boyfriend’ nobody is going to understand it to mean a male platonic friend.
bc the biggest fear for a straight male is coming off as gay . ladies , if your bf is comfortable in his sexuality you’ll know . if your bf refuses to cry , he’s a fa***t
Everyone here speaks English and assumes it’s just the default state of things.
There are many languages/cultures where it’s not the norm to refer to female friends as girlfriends, because the term girlfriend/boyfriend means there is a romantic relationship.
Everyone’s so focused on the “guys fear the big gae” that they don’t stop to wonder why English-speaking women started using and normalizing the term “girlfriends” to refer to their friends, which is where the answer to the question really lies. It’s not the men who changed their use of the word, it’s the women.
Personally I wouldn’t call my male friends “boyfriends” because of the romantic undertone. It’s disrespectful to make implications about anyone’s sexuality. Using the word in casual conversation can cause confusion, as the person I’m talking to will start wondering if I am gay or not, and conversing is supposed to reduce confusion, not increase it. Using the term can also lead people on; I’ve been hit on by gay guys in the past because of the sound of my voice, and since I’m straight, I don’t want to give off the false idea that I’m gay and get their hopes up. Rejection sucks, after all. I don’t enjoy the extra attention just to let people down. For me, there is no upside and multiple downsides that can negatively affect the people I interact with, so why would I use that word for my friends?
Homophobia isn’t always a scapegoat you can turn to. There’s plenty of nuance if one cares to look for it. And again, the real question is why women started using the word, not why men aren’t.
Comments
Because of guys get treated badly for being gay. And society thinks it okay for woman to be bi/lesbian. So if a guy says he is my boyfriend then he must be gay.
Female infantilisation is a part of it. Why do you think it’s a loooot more common to call an adult woman a girl than an adult man a boy?
Edit: wait shit this is just what you asked about but again. Shit.
Edit 2: Okay so generally speaking it’s a lot more acceptable. And sometimes encouraged. To treat women as a lot younger than they actually are because it plays into the whole “women need protecting” angle western society has. If a man is treated like a boy, that means he’s weaker than he should be. This infects a lot of other behaviour. This is also why you hear “me and the boys” more than “me and the boyfriends” as boyfriend is considered an immature term (why do you think so many people say “partner” or “lover” when they’re adults?)
because men call other men gay if they do.
[removed]
Because of homophobia
What are you, gay?
[removed]
As a man, I prefer to give my male friends cute pet names like “sugar bear” and “honey bun”
For the same reason 30 year old women are called “girls” but 30 year old men are not called “boys”.
Society infantilizes women.
homie , gang , bros , adulterated sperm cells , are better notations
I do (I don’t)
Because that would be gay.
Homophobia
Lol. We just had this conversation at work an hour ago.
Girlfriends is typically like an endearing term for a close girl group. Boys call their boys group, the boys/bros/etc
Am I the only one who thinks it’s confusing to refer to someone who isn’t your girlfriend as “a girlfriend?”
Straight men are generally more afraid of being seen as gay than straight women are. I’ve known plenty of straight women who jokingly call themselves girlfriends, make out in front of guys for attention, etc etc. I’ve never met dudes who do the same.
Have you browsed the internet? There are men on here not wiping THEIR OWN asses, because that would be “gay”.
because the second, the absolute second they do, the boy friends will want to sleep with them.
Guy friends
I call my guy friends “fuck buddies.” We like to fuck around. Good times.
I thought it was for women to reassure the men in their lives that their friend is female and therefore not someone the man should be worried about
Because of the implication
Because we don’t go in the bathroom together wipe each others ass
Men say “guy friends” or “the guys” or even “the boys” all the time
Honestly, this might just be my view on it, but i think it has to do with how society views male, and female friendships – whilst “friend” is a gender-neutral term there are still some societal undertones to it. Personally, when a guy says he is going out with friends i ( and i believe society in general) automatically assume it’s an all-male friend group, whilst with women it tends to be assumed as a mixed company – hence why women feel the need to specify it’s their girl-friends aka girlfriends. I don’t know, but that’s the vibe i get, which could also come from my culture.
*shouts from three rooms over
GAAAAAAAAAY
“A person who thinks all the time”
I figured they called them their guy friends shrug
Because we have Bros.
I always say my gfs and everyone always assumes im lesbian… i dont think it works for guys to say bfs, and I dont think it works for women either.
I assume it’s because English is a germania language, and thus is gendered. In Danish, some nouns have different forms depending on the gender, and in German, almost all professions and many nouns are gendered. Thus a male friend is a freund and a female friend is a freundin. It might be a similar concept that the word “friend” is inherently male.
A girlfriend is someone youre in a sexual relationship with, a boyfriend is someone youre in a sexual relationship with. Dont think anyone should use that term in any other way, its too confusing lol
I feel like calling female friends “girlfriends” has kinda fallen out of fashion in the last 20 years. Like most people just say friends because otherwise it’s unnecessarily confusing.
Because I call my male friends “girlfriend” too
Homophobia
I tried explaining this to my 5 year old daughter, even I didn’t have a good explanation.
My great-grandparents (born in the 20s) would refer to my great-grandma’s male friends as his boyfriends. It used to happen, that much I know!
Fun fact: in Danish we have gendered words for friends but not for gf/bf.
Female friends = veninder
Male friends = venner (can also be used as a gender neutral term)
Girlfriend/boyfriend = kæreste (that is kinda neat for NB folks, too. Kæreste means “dearest”)
All I know is as a woman with plenty of women and men friends I just call them all “friends” crazy I know.
Because boys and girls have of the same social norms and they have different social norms. This is an instance where they can be different.
I tend to just refer to them as friends. Sometimes if I need to be specific, guy friends.
I’d say the majority of men are homophobic, and they are absolutely petrified of being thought of as gay. BECAUSE OH NO THEY MIGHT THINK I’M GAY. It’s super dumb, but plenty of guys are this way.
Are girls at risk of violence from other girls if they seem gay?
Boys are.
Short answer: homophobia
No homo
we dont wanna be gay, women dont have that cultural anomaly
Speak for yourself
Cowardice
Because patriarchal hetero-normative society
It comes off differently unfortunately
I wouldn’t even call my enemies what I call my best friend.
We boys, We friends, We boyfriends
Why do girls call their friends “girlfriends”? End the question right there.
Cuz that’s gay
Imma start doing this. Let you know how it goes
NO HOMO that’s why
i think guys have much fewer friends of the opposite sex so there’s not a lot of reason to specify.
Maybe a little bit that they want to avoid the infantilization that ‘boy’friend implies.
There’s also the masculine default, generally everything is assumed male as standard, and specified to be female. Which could also explain why women tend to refer to other women as their ‘girlfriends’
I think that’s the main thing. Even when women use ‘girlfriend’ as a way to describe a platonic friend it get’s misinterpreted pretty often, they also use ‘guyfriend’ a lot to prevent this misinterpretation with platonic male friends to avoid that. If a guy started describing the homies as their ‘boyfriend’ nobody is going to understand it to mean a male platonic friend.
bc the biggest fear for a straight male is coming off as gay . ladies , if your bf is comfortable in his sexuality you’ll know . if your bf refuses to cry , he’s a fa***t
We don’t??That explains the looks I get…
English and culture.
Everyone here speaks English and assumes it’s just the default state of things.
There are many languages/cultures where it’s not the norm to refer to female friends as girlfriends, because the term girlfriend/boyfriend means there is a romantic relationship.
Everyone’s so focused on the “guys fear the big gae” that they don’t stop to wonder why English-speaking women started using and normalizing the term “girlfriends” to refer to their friends, which is where the answer to the question really lies. It’s not the men who changed their use of the word, it’s the women.
Personally I wouldn’t call my male friends “boyfriends” because of the romantic undertone. It’s disrespectful to make implications about anyone’s sexuality. Using the word in casual conversation can cause confusion, as the person I’m talking to will start wondering if I am gay or not, and conversing is supposed to reduce confusion, not increase it. Using the term can also lead people on; I’ve been hit on by gay guys in the past because of the sound of my voice, and since I’m straight, I don’t want to give off the false idea that I’m gay and get their hopes up. Rejection sucks, after all. I don’t enjoy the extra attention just to let people down. For me, there is no upside and multiple downsides that can negatively affect the people I interact with, so why would I use that word for my friends?
Homophobia isn’t always a scapegoat you can turn to. There’s plenty of nuance if one cares to look for it. And again, the real question is why women started using the word, not why men aren’t.
Homophobia
I think it’s just an American thing.
It just sounds gay idk
cuz if a guy says “me and my boyfriend went to the movies” he’s not talking about fantasy football
Because they’re bisexual
Bc that’s gay