Pretty early into our friendship, one of my friends revealed to me that our mutual, straight male friend had asked if they thought there were any “vibes” between him and I. They had answered a strong “no” on my behalf. After laughing at their recap, I started wondering why the mutual friend would’ve felt that way in the first place. I was acting with him the way I would any of my friends but that was leaving a space for questions.
I’m not immediately affectionate. I love being affectionate but it takes time for me to get comfortable so I immensely value reaching that level of comfort with my friends, especially the ones that are just as obnoxiously cuddly as I am. The friend in question is a huge softie and physical touches between us are common. But I, in all my obliviousness, had not thought about those seemingly platonic actions backfiring.
Being affectionate had never been a big issue for me but something had shifted. I now have more friends who are guys than I have since I was ten and what post-pubescent me has had to realize is that, in being friends with a straight single man, even as a queer woman, there comes a time where the potential for attraction will be addressed. Whether it’s announced and confirmed or vehemently denounced, the potential for their sexual interest in me will be discussed in our friendship.
Notably, queerness isn’t an impassible boundary — it does not mark me as inaccessible. Believing that my queerness removes me as a romantic option is in part what has made me more comfortable with befriending and being platonically affectionate with men, ironically enough. But when my sexuality or performance of gender does repel men, there is already a lack of initial attraction.
On the other hand, if a man is attracted, there’s not much to keep him from voicing that, sometimes regardless of his own relationship status honestly. Which is such a sharp turn from being friends with women loving women who, despite joking about it, are capable of hiding attraction out of fear of negatively impacting their friendships like nobody else.
Straight men lack the subtly I guess.
When objectification is coming from strangers, I can keep a level of detachment that helps with my negative reactions. Being objectified is, unfortunately, a common enough experience that I have mental safe guards in place. But knowing that that same attention can come from my friend, unbidden and at any point of our friendship, is simultaneously exhausting and discouraging.
I don’t want to change the way I love my friends and, as long as our boundaries are all respected, I don’t intend to. But I don’t know how to balance that with the reality that someone I love can easily slip back into objectifying me. At first I thought this wish for a balance was really childish of me but literally wanting to be treated like an equal by my friends is not an outrageous ask. The idea that men and women can’t be friends is wack but I was coming to the sharp awareness that I am not “one of the boys.”
My inner child was devastated. I was always the most masculine girl in my friend group; the one with the deepest voice, who swore swim trunks and her brother’s hand-me-downs with joy, who was most comfortable with being the boy avatar in video games and whatever else being the most masculine meant.
I have been comfortable in that expression of myself for years but being friends with more men made me question if my masculinity was enough. When we’re greeting each other, my friends get dapped up and I get a hug — as soon as I enter a social situation, I know I’m not on an equal level. I’m read as feminine even though I don’t see myself that way.
But what does my masculinity look like as an adult? It’s no longer old clothing and video games. For a long time it has been defined in contrast to others and even now I examine myself by framing my expression against those of men that I know. Beyond that, my gender performance is affected not just by contrast but also by expectations. Some of the gendered behaviors expected of me I vehemently reject because I actively want to be perceived in opposition to them. But there are simultaneously a whole host of actions that are unexpectedly gendered and impact how I am perceived.
A less than subtle example is when I want to hold my friend’s hand: if that friend is a straight man, that want can read as much differently than I am intending because holding hands, if not immediately seen as a romantic gesture, is perceived as more femininely platonic. Their reaction makes me question my masculinity because I know that I wouldn’t be romantically seen if I wasn’t perceived as more feminine and, at the same time, I don’t see my behaviors as feminine to begin with.
It’s conflicting, because I like interacting with the world the way I do but simultaneously want my self-perception to be respected and that is not feasible. If I want to be seen as X I have to behave like Y and Y only. I know I wouldn’t be able to perform in certain ways, like holding hands with my friends, without those unofficial guidelines. Sometimes I manipulate that to my benefit (see: any and every strategy to get free drinks at the club) but the majority of the time, the guidelines feel restrictive.
As a kid and in my teens, to be feminine was to be caged or subdued but in actuality, that’s gender roles as a whole. And while I’m rejecting the idea that femininity is a negative, I am also actively reconciling with what being perceived as feminine can mean for how my straight male friends and I interact with each other.
My performance of masculinity, perceived and actualized, cannot be compared to straight men’s; it is constructed and received differently. At times, it isn’t even realized but that does not negate my gender performance. I can’t look to others for validation of something they are unwilling to consider or comprehend.
