"A few months ago, I realized I had a problem: I hadn’t spoken to a guy, romantically or platonically, in nearly half a year. Some may say that that’s not a problem at all, and to those people, I would respond, fair enough. I’m a girl’s girl through and through: I work at an all-female company, I surround myself with incredible female friends, and my love life knows no gender limitations. Given the widening gender divide, I understand that there’s an extent to which being able to cut off all contact with men who are not blood relatives is a major privilege. After I graduated college, I needed a break from dudes, and I was lucky enough to be able to take one. But after a while of not having male friends, I had to admit that something was…missing.
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In college, I had my share of fulfilling male friendships. I had guys I liked to cook and drink with, guys I could connect with over shared interests in class, and even some gym-bro types I bonded with over an interest in fitness. When I graduated, those connections quickly evaporated. Making friends as an adult is hard enough—but making male friends as an adult? That’s a tall fucking order. Between the Bumble BFF population being 95 percent female and the fact that I would rather watch a movie than a football game, my options for finding male friends feel slim to none. But why is that? Does it have to be this way? And if I really want one, what does it take to make male friends in 2024?
Can men and women be friends?
Let’s get the obvious, sexist question out of the way here: Can men and women be platonic friends? If you’re asking this question, it’s probably because you’ve had a crush on a friend of the opposite gender before. Trust me, I’ve been there, and in the moment it’s hard to feel like men and women can really be friends. But the assumption that neither gender is capable of developing truly platonic feelings for the other is dehumanizing. Just because it’s harder to reach across that gender divide and find someone who simply wants to be pals doesn’t mean it’s impossible.
There’s nothing wrong with crushing on your guy friend, just like there’s nothing necessarily wrong with your guy friend crushing on you—but entering all opposite-sex platonic relationships as if they’re bound to be flirtationships erases the value that friendship inherently holds. “Safety. Validation. Support. These are the key tenets of friendship, regardless of gender,” wrote Allie Volpeis in her recent piece for Vox on opposite-sex friendships. When we assume that “men and women can’t be friends” based on antiquated ideas of romance, we assume that at least one gender is going to let down their side of the deal of offering safety, validation, and support. And that’s a problem.
Why is it so hard to make male friends?
Meeting people in the wild is harder than ever
For me, the struggle to make male friends has been a problem of sheer accessibility. My interests lean almost 100% “feminine”: I love homemaking, reading, watching movies, putting together cute outfits, and cooking. Obviously, I know that men love these things, too, but they’re not exactly being loud about it online, which is the #1 way I’ve met people in my post-grad life. The Bumble BFF landscape is nearly all women, and the addition of an algorithm to the friend search doesn’t exactly make diversifying your desired friend group very easy.
“Entering all opposite-sex platonic relationships as if they’re bound to be flirtationships erases the value that friendship inherently holds.”
The places where I interact with men in public are at bars and the gym, which (frankly, thanks to men) aren’t exactly safe spaces for platonically approaching a potential buddy. Even rec league sports, which have given me the closest thing to male friendships in my post-grad life, make it challenging to genuinely sustain a lasting friendship with one or two people of the opposite gender. After the volleyball game is over, most people just want to go home, which is not exactly conducive to getting to know one another.
Marriage makes it harder to maintain guy-girl friendships
Aside from my own, very early-20s coded struggles to find a place where I could even meet a guy friend, there are other, bigger reasons why it’s so hard to find and maintain opposite-sex friendships. Marriage, for instance, is a huge one. As New York Times friendship correspondent Anna Goldfarb reported in her book, Modern Friendship, “43 percent of married women say they have a close friend who is a different gender. Meanwhile, nearly two-thirds of single, unmarried women say they have a close male friend. Clearly, marriage is an obstacle that the majority of different-gendered friendships can’t overcome.”
Having guy friends isn’t just a challenge for gals like me—young women simply trying to meet as many people as possible out in the world. It’s also hard for people in heterosexual marriages, who have limited spare time to spend with friends. Even if we’re all evolved and know that men and women can be platonic friends, it might seem like the easiest friendship to drop as life gets busier is the opposite-sex one. Jealousy is real, and since our culture prioritizes romantic relationships over platonic ones, maintaining guy friends post-marriage is tough. Heck, even non-married committed heterosexual relationships can throw a wrench in plans with friends of the opposite gender.
Here’s the biggie that no one wants to talk about when it comes to opposite-sex friendships: It’s not just hard for girls to make guy friends. It’s hard for guys to make guy friends! Look, I get that conversations about the “male loneliness epidemic” have been twisted into making excuses for men’s absolutely abominable behavior in the dating world, but that doesn’t mean that the male loneliness epidemic doesn’t still exist. According to the Survey Center on American Life, 15% of men claim to have no close friends. As John Patrick Hatcher, author of Anxiety Hacks for An Uncertain World, put it in Psychology Today, “[Men] would rather take a Razor scooter to the ankle 30 straight times than feel shamed for appearing needy or lacking an already existing base of friends.”
“Given the fact that dudes have a hard time even just making friends with each other, it’s no wonder a guy friend is so hard to find. Chances are, many of them haven’t even admitted to themselves that they want a new friend at all.”
To be clear, I don’t think it’s any woman’s job to fix the fact that men don’t consciously reach out for friends. But given the fact that dudes have a hard time even just making friends with each other, it’s no wonder a guy friend is so hard to find. Chances are, many of them haven’t even admitted to themselves that they want a new friend at all.
Is having male friends even important?
When I realized I had no guy friends, my initial reaction was, “What’s the big deal?” I’m incredibly happy with my life, which doesn’t include men. Why would I want anything to change? But as I navigate my young adult life, I know that limiting my friendships to one gender isn’t going to help me learn or grow as a human being. There’s probably a lot that a guy friend could teach me that I’m simply missing out on—and, obviously, a lot I could teach him, too.
As it turns out, there are plenty of reasons to have a friend of the opposite sex. For one, it opens both genders up to different things to do with friends. “According to research, women tend to lean into self-disclosure when hanging out, while men get together for shared activities or helping each other with a project or task,” said Volpeis. I wouldn’t know about the joys of rec league volleyball in a sweaty high school gym on a Monday night were it not for my hunt for male friends. Likewise, I know that many of my male friends in college yearned for a co-ed wine night where they could openly talk shit with me and my other girl friends, since that wasn’t a part of their male-only interactions.
I’m going to keep doing my rec league sports, crossing my fingers that they’ll lead to a close guy friend who just wants to be a pal. In the meantime, though, opportunities for men and women to become friends need to broaden, both on and offline. If the gender divide is ever going to close, men and women need to at least have a chance at seeing each other as human—and that starts with being a friend.
Emma Ginsberg, Associate Editor
Emma is a writer, editor, and podcast producer who has been creating at The Everygirl since 2021. She writes for all sections on the site, edits the Entertainment and Community sections, and helps produce The Everygirl Podcast. With a degree in American Studies, Emma is especially passionate about evaluating the impact pop culture and internet culture have on the day-to-day lives of real women.