SEX FILES: The Dating Plan B: When Potential Lovers Make Great Friends, Instead

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A few weeks ago, I was having coffee with a girlfriend and the conversation turned to dating. I told him that I wasn’t sure where things were going with a new person in my life. “At worst, we’ll end up being good friends,” I said. As soon as the words escaped me, I regretted it. Why was friendship framed as a consolation prize?

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Over the course of the last decade, I have come to realize that we as a society have a problem with friends. No, I don’t mean TV hit Friends 90s (although I have a few bones to choose from with Ross & Co.), but rather how we view friendships in relation to romantic relationships.

There is no better example of this in popular culture than The Friendzone, a term (coincidentally) coined by the aforementioned show. Entering this dreaded no-man’s-land means you’ve passed the point where a romantic relationship can form, and are instead doomed to be truly friends with the person (I know, another friend? How awful!). hierarchy we have created where romantic relationships are valued above all else and friendship is seen as a minor plan B.

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I find this strange given that my friendships almost always last longer than my romantic and sexual partners. Also, why do relationships have to be exclusively one or the other?

(For the record, I peeked behind the curtain of Friendzone and plan to write a Yelp review. There is wine and cheese! There is good conversation and inside jokes! There are people who care and respect the boundaries of others! book there later tonight.)

The uncertainty is uncomfortable. It is part of human nature to want to categorize and label everything to mitigate potential discomfort and ignorance. When it comes to my own relationships, I have a habit of approaching them like a high school student sneaking up on a gripping romance novel that was stolen from his parents’ top shelf. I want to move on to all the juicy parts. It’s almost as if I’m looking for a guarantee that if I invest my time, there will be a satisfying reward. But what if we allow ourselves to meet without trying to guess the ending?

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There is an expression for this. It’s called “stepping off the relationship elevator.”

Originally coined by author Amy Gahran, “The relationship escalator is one of many social scripts – customs about how people are “supposed” to behave, and how we “should” think or feel, in certain contexts, situations or interactions. These customs benefit many people, but not always, not all ”.

As Gahran writes, “The goal at the top of the escalator is to achieve a permanently monogamous cohabitation marriage (sexually and romantically exclusive between two people), legally sanctioned if possible. In many cases, buying a home and having children is also part of the goal. The partners are expected to stay together at the top of the escalator until death. “

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In our society, the escalator model of relationships – meeting, dating, defining, engaging, merging – is the standard “by which most people measure whether a developing intimate relationship is meaningful, ‘serious’, good , healthy, engaged or worth pursuing or continuing, ”says Gahran.

While Gahran points out that escalator relationships are popular for a reason (they can be incredibly satisfying), love isn’t one size fits all. In his book Stepping off the relationship escalator: rare love and life , explores alternative models of relationship and raises the question: what if we put aside the script and appreciate all forms of relationship equally?

I don’t have any answers yet, but I’ll keep you posted. In the meantime, we can start by removing the negative connotations of Friendzone. Rather than see it as a glitch site, let’s change the name to an exclusive VIP club, with plenty of luxurious seats and a zero time limit. If I’ve learned anything, it’s that there are always good snacks behind the velvet rope.