I’m a 22 year old straight man. I feel as though women my age are easier to talk to than men my age. I don’t really have many friends but most of the people I want to be friends with or enjoy chatting to are women (emphasis on the word ‘most’, I actually invited a male colleague last week to get McDonalds with me).
What I find hard about making friends with women is that I’m that worried about men judging me for being ‘that guy that prefers having female friends’. To the point that I’m struggling to make friends altogether.
I also have autism and struggle making friends regardless. I’ve spoke to counselling and other agencies that can help me with social skills but I’m even embarrassed to ask for advice specific to making female friends — because the general consensus is that what I desire is weird. At least 10 times I wanted to ask about stuff in therapy/counselling regarding this and I freeze up and start random conversations. I picked up on my Welsh counsellor’s accent and spent half a session talking about a holiday to Wales (the Brits will know where Llandudno is) that I went on to use up time so I didn’t feel the need to ask the real questions.
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Since you shitlords like to delete your posts, here’s an original copy of /u/Own-Syllabub-4848’s post (if available):
I’m a 22 year old straight man. I feel as though women my age are easier to talk to than men my age. I don’t really have many friends but most of the people I want to be friends with or enjoy chatting to are women (emphasis on the word ‘most’, I actually invited a male colleague last week to get McDonalds with me).
What I find hard about making friends with women is that I’m that worried about men judging me for being ‘that guy that prefers having female friends’. To the point that I’m struggling to make friends altogether.
I also have autism and struggle making friends regardless. I’ve spoke to counselling and other agencies that can help me with social skills but I’m even embarrassed to ask for advice specific to making female friends — because the general consensus is that what I desire is weird.
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Because it is absolutely impossible for women and men to be “just friends”.
I have a lot of female friends. At the end of the day, having a good time when you hang out is a lot more important than their gender imo
So long as you are clear to yourself and her that the friendships are platonic it’s fine.
I am with you!
I am now 48, married with kids, and before that I was a very pernicious person!
Through my teens and later years, all my true best friends were women. Did I sleep with most of them? Yes, but the friendships stayed.
I stay in touch with many of them, although rare, and in a very “friend level” even now.
For whatever reason, despite having many male “buddies,” females I seemed to have a deeper connection with.
I’ve always had lady friends as long as I can remember. Lots of dudes just think women are objects and don’t see them as actual people. Those are the people who think you can’t be friends
only works if theres no attraction there and god forbid one of you becomes hot
No. I’ve had tons of women friends throughout my life. Grew up with sisters so I’ve always gotten along well with both sexes. Has never felt weird to me, and I never got judge for it by my male friends. Which I’ve also had tons of throughout my life.
Point is, people are people. And it’s not weird to get along with people lol
I would stop stressing so much about what other people think and just start making friends 😉
It’s not? I’ve literally never had anyone say anything about me being friends with girls.
I have 3 platonic female friends and all three friendships are over 10 years, one almost 20. Never done anything with any of them, and never would. Do what makes you happy man. I believe women and men have unique insights and communication strategies and having both in your life makes you a more well rounded person.
A saturday round of golf with the boys is just as needed as lunch with a woman friend and discussing all the small things going on in life.
I had a lot of female friends up till they get boyfriends. Then they start acting really cold towards me.
It’s not weird.
Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.
I don’t think it’s weird, but the dynamic is already off due to how men and women operate. Most men only communicate with women they find attractive, while women often only have men around who are useful to them, but this isn’t always the case. I think it’s possible for men and women to be friends and build organic friendships, but that requires both people to keep the relationship platonic.
The biggest tell if a man and woman have a true friendship is on how they act when that friend gets into a relationship, or if that friend helps the other in a wingman/wingwoman situation to help their friend “score” in a sense. If you don’t want to see your friends thrive in all areas in life, which includes romance, you aren’t a true friend.
Nobody is judging you, make friends with whoever you want.
I dont know who thinks it’s weird. I know plenty of straight men and women who are friends. I’m a straight dude, and I’ve almost always had at least one good woman friend at any given time going all the way back to high school.
Sadly, I think it’s because a lot of men have proven countless times that they have an ulterior motive. And if I’m 100% honest with myself, if the woman I’m being friendly with, it’s only a matter of time before attraction can build between one or the other and then it can turn into something else. Or one person can not have the same feelings and it ruins the friendship.
There are some women that do prefer a man’s friendship, and they typically don’t have a lot of female friends. The biggest reason I sometimes find myself not enjoying a man’s friendship is because truth be told, we’re all dicks (no pun intended). We try to be competitive with each other, and we try to be the “alpha” in the friendship. When I hang out with a female friend, it doesn’t feel like we’re on the verge of a pissing match. Finding male friends that aren’t insecure can be one helluva thing, so I can understand preferring a female friendship. It’s gotten so bad that I think some people have resorted to befriending ChatGPT or some other AI.
i friendzone women first
i literally want to know they can be my friend first.
if they can’t, what’s the point? not gonna end up tied financially, emotionally etc to some asshat i can’t trust.
I much prefer talking to women than to men. Although I can talk to my BFF (male) for hours on end. Other males, tell the same stories and embellish them to the point they are unrealistic. Or they talk about their most recent bowl movement and their best sexual experiences.
Women are more genuine and talk about feelings and emotions. I am an emotional guy and can relate better. Plus, they are better to look at and smell better.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong to have friends from the opposite sex.
But both men and women can have hidden sexual intentions. Some men can have a woman as a friend in hope for “the right moment” to come. Some women keep men as friends as a back up options. Both are disgusting and not true friendships.
But in my opinion – those are a minority of all friendships.
Don’t wait around for the whole world to approve of you living life the way you want to live it.
Go be friends with whoever your friends are, and stop worrying about this kind of shit.
Just to clarify, has anyone actually explicitly told you it’s wrong or bad to have female friends?
You’ve only said you’re worried someone will judge you, and you’re hesitant to talk to your counselor about it. Which makes me think this is merely a fear and not something that has actually happened yet?
Regardless, I know you’re young but the sooner you learn the skill of not giving a fuck what people think of you, the better. I know it’s easier said than done, but practice makes perfect.
You cannot please everyone, so just do what YOU want to do.
There will always be someone who doesn’t like what clothes you wear, or a phrase you use, or the music you like, etc. don’t try to be what you think other people want, be what you actually are because there’s nothing wrong with that.
There’s nothing wrong with being friends with women. One of my closest friends that I met in college is a girl, and I credit her a ton for helping me come out of my shell when it came to talking ti strangers in general, girls especially
If you are too nice or friendly to men you may perceive as gay.
If you are too friendly with all the girls you will perceive as competitors to other men.
If you are too friendly with the girls you will perceive you want to hit on them by the girls.
Yup it is weird sometimes especially for spectrum people who will feel that they are being judged.
For other who don’t feel it and they don’t give a fuck how other perceive, they don’t care and don’t feel weird.
I think you’re over thinking it
Older guy here.
Most of my friends are women, including the friend I spend by FAR the most time with. I’ve known her for 15 years and some others for over 30. My wife is fine with it. She trusts me, and for good reason. Some of them I even had dated at one point and we found we were better friends than lovers.
I find women are much easier to talk with, and more authentic than most men and there isn’t any of the competition that can show up in some male friendships.
It has never even occurred to me to give a fuck if people think it’s weird. I will say that when I was looking for a partner/lover, having female friends was helpful – women would see this and felt I was safe and vouched for, and some of the women would direct people to me.
Also, it can be fun to have frank discussions about sex with women where there isn’t a chance of sleeping together.
ill drop the generalisations since everybody here mentioned it and ill address your specific case.
I don’t think it’s weird you want to be friends with women, but I think there’s something to be said that you more easily click with women. Again, not weird, but you are different to most men. The thing that stands out to me is that you’re very ‘chatty’ about surface level things. Women absolutely destroy men when it comes to casual socialisation between friends. Women bond through talking about stuff like that, relationships, knowing the person more. Men bond through ‘questing’, banter/insults and working with each other.
I’m similar to you, but I can’t bond with women too much because I am not interested in feminine stuff, my closest friends are men who like me, can’t stfu when they’re on a roll. We bond through deep talk about philosophy, core values, goals and dreams and speaking life into each other. I think if you found friends like that, which is insanely hard, you will find that it’s not so much you enjoy women more, but you enjoy expressing yourself rather than the general masculine bonding over projects and banter that general men do.