men and women can't be friends

one of the great tragedies of our generation.

So, there I was.

In a classroom of 15 bright teenagers from around the world.

We had spent the last two weeks discussing difficult and important philosophical topics, often having heated debates as a result.

I was their teacher in those two weeks, and I walked with them through issues regarding God, death, poverty, war, historical atrocities and a handful of other themes.

As a result of the nature of such topics, my students were always eager to know what I personally believed.

This was understandable. They realised early on that my approach largely involved putting on my Socrates mask and poking holes in their positions, often without providing any strong alternatives of my own.

I was content with this. Like Socrates (I hope), I was able to show them that some of their deeply held beliefs regarding things like the possibility of eradicating poverty or the likelihood of peace on earth were standing on shaky ground, often justified by nebulous terms such as “human nature”, which often crack under closer examination.

Yet, my students wanted to know what I believed.

I would tell them that it was not my job to tell what I believe, but to tell them, to the best of my ability, what everyone else (within reason) has believed on these issues.

Still, they wanted to know.

So, I made a deal with them— on the last day of class, I would answer any personal question they asked.

Time passed, as it often does, and we found ourselves there— On the final day of class.

“What would they ask?” I thought, bracing for the worst and wondering if I’d be getting a call from HR sometime soon for giving them such a free pass.

They did ask about God, and war, and the death penalty, and the possibility of objective moral values, yet, sprinkled within all those questions was one that took me by surprise:

Can guys and girls be friends?

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Truth be told, I think I waffled a bit more than I should have on this question.

Maybe because it was unexpected, and, unlike the others, was certainly not something we covered in class.

But also, I was struck by how strange this question is.

My answer ended up being something like: Yes, guys and girls can be friends. But there’s a reason we’re asking this question in the first place.

I didn’t realise it at the time, but it would eventually dawn on me that:

Thought I: One of the greatest (the greatest) tragedies of our generation is that this is a question at all.

It signals a failure on multiple levels of society.

I have more to say on this, but I will leave the sociology to those better equipped to discuss these things than I.

This, of course, is long walks for short drinks of water, so I must spend this time dreaming philosophically as opposed to talking about stats, figures and psychological studies.

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So, here’s another thought:

Thought II: Being “friend-zoned” — what’s up with that?

The conversations around being friend-zoned highlight this all perfectly.

Being friend-zoned is the kind of thing that elicits sympathy. It is a thing of tragedy.

Yet, why did we reduce friendship to this?

Friendship— that great, timeless form of love?

That wonderful love, which brings humans together against all odds and creates oases in the wilderness.

The love at the heart of one of humanity's oldest stories, where we see Gilgamesh, the world’s first superhero, spiral into depression and anxiety because he fears death. And this fear is sparked by the death of his best friend, Enkidu.

Behold, Gilgamesh’s lament:

Despair is in my heart and my face is the face of one who has made a long journey. It was burned with heat and with cold. Why should I not wander over the pastures? My friend, my younger brother who seized and killed the Bull of Heaven and overthrew Humbaba in the cedar forest, my friend who was very dear to me and endured dangers beside me, Enkidu, my brother whom I loved, the end of mortality has overtaken him. I wept for him seven days and nights till the worm fastened on him. Because of my brother I am afraid of death; because of my brother I stray through the wilderness. His fate lies heavy upon me. How can I be silent, howcan I rest? He is dust and I shall die also and be laid in the earth for ever.'¹

Friendship, this great love that makes us understand one another, is now degraded into a “zone” which signals failure.

Now, friendship itself is not dead. Dudes remain friends with dudes, and duddettes remain friends with duddettes, yet, friendship across this chasm has been corrupted by talks of friend-zones and thirst.

How many heartbreaks would have been avoided if the people involved realised that being friends was always an option? A reasonable option— a beautiful option?

I used the word “thirst” a few moments ago, and, understandably, it might be wondered why I have done this.

I’m referring to the archetype of the “male best friend” who, in reality, is down bad for his lady friend and is holistically quite sus— always waiting for her to become single so he may sweep in.

These memes are funny. I’m a fan of them,

Yet, if they are funny because they are true, then we live in sad times. Truly sad times.

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Thought III: Are men human? Do men have souls?

In my mind, one of the greatest consequences of eroding friendships across the gender chasm is that we fail to understand each other.

I mean, fundamentally, sometimes we don’t see each other as human beings.

“Do men yearn?"

I’ve seen a few TikToks with this question at the centre.

And, like the TikToks about the male best friend, I know that a part of this is all jokes and vibes, and I want to keep that in mind.

Yet, the subject matter and the comments on such posts tend to suggest the presence of ever-disturbing truths at the scene.

What does it mean to genuinely wonder if men can yearn?

At the risk of sounding dramatic, this is the same as asking if men are human.

To yearn is human, as is to love and to hurt and to fail and to triumph, and to experience all the stages of falling in and out of love.

To ask if a being is capable of a part of this journey is to call into question their connection to something that binds us all.

One of the most perspective-breaking things that a person struggling in love can learn is that, when the universal is involved, the differences between us all begin to shatter and fall to the side.

What you feel when falling in and out of love can be and often is mirrored in the heart of the other person.

Yet, you might ask, what is the universal? How can we know it? Does such a thing exist? Great questions, for another day.

For now, humour me for some moments and let us pretend that there are universal human feelings, emotions and structures of belief which bind us all and make our differences pale in comparison to the warmth of being part of the human story.

But, back to my point, understanding how we are connected helps us understand ways to better approach the mysteries of being in community.

We might not solve these mysteries, but we might understand them.

And there are, indeed, many mysteries.

For instance,

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Epilogue: Dating Apps

Here’s one tiny reason to become close friends with someone across the gender chasm.

It illustrates my points in the previous thought quite nicely.

On a few occasions, I’ve been privy to the inner workings/experiences of my lady friends’ dating app profiles.

This, in my view, should be a canon event for anyone feeling perplexed by these apps— experience them through the eyes of someone across the gender chasm.

On one occasion, the friend in question received 950+ likes on day three (day three) of being on Bumble for the first time.

So, to any gents reading, you very well might be a solid human being with a stellar presence on that app. You might be doing everything right.

Yet, when you cross virtual paths with someone who might be “the one”, just know that you two very well might be extremely compatible, but your swipe potentially just became number 951, and was overtaken by 952 right before you finished reading this sentence.

And so the wind blows.

vibes est vida.

1. This translation — http://www.aina.org/books/eog/eog.pdf