From: becher@vax.path.ox.ac.uk
Newsgroups: alt.romance
Subject: Re: "We could still be friends"
Date: 17 Dec 92 08:44:41 GMT
Organization: Oxford University Molecular Biology Data Centre
Nntp-Posting-User: becher

In article <1992Dec16.025624.24035@unislc.uucp>, erc@unislc.uucp (Ed Carp) writes:
> David Barrett (deb@spectra.eng.hawaii.edu) wrote:
> 
> : >>What do you do when someone says "I really like you, but it'll never be
> : >>anything more"?
> 
> : >But more times than not, when a person says this, he or she really means
> : >it and doesn't change his or her mind.
> : 
> : The hard part of hearing such a statement is that it gives a double message thatis a contradiction and usually the first part is dishonest if the unrealistic
> : second part is meant.  To keep from being optimistic about "they didn't really
> : mean it", probably better to write it off rather than wait for the possibly
> : confused person to make up their minds.  The likelyhood of changing their minds
> : again in the future is suggested by default.
> 
> Ed jumps into the fray with his asbestos underwear:
> 
> To hear someone say this annoys me, because I consider a romantic relationship
> a *possible* outgrowth of a friendship - not the only one, merely a possibility.
> To lock one out of one's life forever and ever this way is to deny that that
> psrt of you is ever accessible to your "friend".  I agree with David - it *is*
> a dishonest statement.  What is often meant is "well, either I don't have the
> heart to tell you to get lost, or I see some personal advantage to using you,
> so I'll just LJBF you, and that way I can have my cake and eat it, too."

Hey, I think you are being a bit harsh here. What if someone who you know is 
incompatible with you for a long term relationship declares their love to you? 
Why should you, especially in the case that you cannot avoid seeing them quite 
often in your spare time, tell them not to be friends? To me it seems obvious 
that in this case it is better and more honest to salvage a friendship out of 
this rather than call a halt to all communication.
> 
> The types of women who do this are very often the ones who, time after time,
> get involved with men who manipulate them, use them, then dump them, leaving
> them "heartbroken".  They seldom realize that it's *their* selection process
> that is faulty, and they are denying the infinite goodness of the universe
> that is reaching out to them via friends to give them love, preferring to
> waste their time chasing men who are obviously not good for them.  "All men
> are jerks" is their war cry, preferring to externalize the problem instead of
> taking a hard look at themselves and *why* they are attracted to men who
> abuse them.

Honestly, do you really believe this? Sounds more like you've been upset by a 
LJBF recently. I can be friends with a man who hasn't got the qualities I am
looking for in a longterm partner. So, again, why lose a fromer/potential 
friend by saying piss off to them? (If this is the alternative to saying "I 
like you as a friend but there can never be more between us")
> 
> I don't think I've *ever* told a woman "we'll never be more than friends"
> because I understand that love takes time to grow - and if what I feel now
> isn't love, that doesn't mean that I won't grow to love them in the future.
> That's where IMHO many women make that mistake - they assume that "chemistry"
> is the sole decisive factor in deciding whether or not to pursue a relationship.
> If it isn't there right from the start, they assume that they will never be
> "in love" with that person.
I've had to say these words to someone recently who is a friend, was a friend 
and there is an awful lot of chemistry floating about, as well. However, for 
many, many reasons I know I would never last a lifetime with him, and to spare 
him the pain of a year long fling, I felt that friends only was the thing to 
be. I am sure this is not a unique case! 

  But is "chemistry" love?  Certainly not.  I have
> known many, many people who have been together for many years, happily, and
> when they first met they either hated each other or were indifferent to each
> other.  Certainly, there was *something* that kept them around, whether it
> was mutual interests, circumstances, or just plain stubbornness - and that
> gave love the time it needed to grow.  This "chemistry" stuff that I hear
> women dishing out to seemingly evade personal responsibility isn't love -
> very often, it's hormones.
> 
> The universe is infinite in its ability to give you love - why not open
> yourself to *all* its manifestations, instead of stubbornly insisting that
> the universe do things your way?  I have almost always found that then I
> try and twist the universe into doing things "my way" it doesn't work.
> -- 
> Ed Carp			erc@apple.com, erc@saturn.upl.com	801/538-0177
> 
> Who and what would you be if you went beyond your deepest fears?