Have you ever wondered …Can a Guy and Girl Really Have a Platonic Friendship?

In which we ask three men to get candid.

Portrait of Tammy Strobel

In which we ask three men to get candid.

My Reading Room

Carter Huff, 25

“It’s very possible for a guy to have a purely platonic friendship with a girl. In my opinion, the girls we get along with can be broadly categorised into two groups: those we’re attracted to, and those we’ll never feel attracted to. I’m not talking about physical attractiveness here. It’s just that there are people who you’ll never feel attracted to in that way because they don’t register as someone you can have sex with in your mind – like our friend’s younger sister, someone we’ve grown up with, and so on.”
My Reading Room

Marc Lim, 29

“Yes, but it’s incredibly difficult to maintain a friendship if there’s some sort of attraction, and especially if both parties are aware, simply because the dynamics of the relationship are now so different. It’s hard for a guy to accept unrequited romantic feelings; even harder to suppress them and behave like everything is normal while he’s around her. Personally, I would rather walk away from the platonic friendship if I couldn’t have the romantic relationship – it’s all or nothing. Which is why I’m now a monk.”
 
My Reading Room

Gary Lim, 22

“Although rare, it’s not impossible for two people of the opposite sex to develop a purely platonic relationship. Personally, I believe there has to be some sort of superficial attraction in the first place for a guy and a girl to become friends. But I have friends who have very close friendships with girls, and they maintain that there is zero sexual attraction there. So I guess it’s definitely possible!”

Text Compiled By Sophie Hong.