I’ve been thinking about something, and I’m honestly confused about where people draw the line between a best friend and a partner. I recently saw a reel where someone was asking people if they’d be okay with their partner having an opposite-gender best friend. My immediate reaction was: I’m okay with opposite-gender friends, but an opposite-gender best friend? That makes me uncomfortable. But then I realized I can’t even clearly define the difference between a best friend and a partner. For example, I’m a guy. I have male friends and one male best friend. If my best friend were a girl, I genuinely think I would’ve asked her out. So what’s actually the difference? You deeply care about your best friend, and you deeply care about your partner. You want both of them to be happy. You love spending time with both. You tell them your secrets, go on trips with them, and they’re usually the first people you want to share things with. So is the only difference that you have sex and physical intimacy with your partner? I’m not someone who’s uncomfortable with my partner interacting with the opposite gender. Friends are completely fine. But “friend” also means different things to different people. To me, normal friendship is laughing together, working together, asking about each other’s families, hanging out occasionally in groups, and supporting each other. But things start getting blurry when they’re extremely touchy, go on vacations together, share the same bed, cup, or spoon, get drunk and end up falling over each other, or constantly spend one-on-one time together. For example, the best friend picking her up, going clubbing together, spending the whole night together, and dropping her home. A lot of people say that’s completely normal in friendships. But personally, I feel like some of those things should be reserved for your partner or someone you’re romantically involved with. Then people argue that this just means I don’t know how to maintain platonic friendships. But couldn’t the same logic be applied elsewhere? Like, Johnny Sins’ wife is okay with him having sex with other people while they’re in a relationship. Why aren’t you okay with that? Person Y goes to a strip club every Saturday, and his wife is okay with it. Then, by the same logic, you should also be okay with your partner doing all these things. If you’re not comfortable with your partner doing them, does that mean you’re judgmental or mentally sick because you think people who work in the porn industry or at strip clubs are bad people? submitted by /u/jianjohn
Originally posted by u/jianjohn on r/AskMen
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