Male friends vs. Female friends

Girl here. It's fluctuated through the years due to factors like moving and stuff, but my friend groups have either always been predominantly or entirely other girls; except for a period in high school / early college where I hung out with boys more. However, my best friend from the ages of about 9-18 was a boy. I can't lie and say things were entirely platonic (he was my first kiss), but in the end we settled into more of a brother / sister relationship.

These days I'm primarily friends with girls again. Mostly because the more adult life takes hold gender dynamics change. Can't be friends with single guys because most the time they eventually try flirting. Can't be friends with guys in a relationship because straight women are often very protective of their men. I'm really sad because my best guy friend I can't even hang out with anymore because his wife is so insecure and jealous :/

At this point in my life, men.

Things change as you and others age, marry, have kids.

Friends? My cat happens to be female, but I get along with cats of both sexes.

Female Friends for quite a while now. Going to an all boys high school kind of ruined my interest and ability to become friends with guys as an adult. Too much bullshit to cut through and deal with. College only reinforced that. And of my friends from middle school their drug problems, time and moving kind saw those all fall away. The only male friendships I have now are with my younger cousins, but that's still more familial than true friendships. Of the few women I am friends with we're not super close, like I'm going out of the country for one's wedding, but we aren't like talk every day, hang out every week type friends.

I'm anti-social and timid. Most of my social interaction is through the internet or at work, and I have more male friends than female friends. I will say my female friends are more empathetic though, but that's because men are typically taught to be more tough and self-sufficient where as women are expected to look to a man to rely on, so there's always this air of dude bro alpha male toughness that gets in the way of genuine serious emotional talk.

This is made worse when considering most of my male friends are conservative white men. I typically make friends based on superficial things we have in common like videogames and anime and only phase them out of my life once learning what their true values are.

I'm a guy. Most of my closest friends have been girls since I became an adult. I'm not sure if it's down to having a shit relationship with my father or if it's a cultural thing but I find it really hard to cut past the bravado and banter with other guys an actually have a real conversation. Mostly I just talk about sports, games, movies etc with my guy friends and if I want to talk about something serious I'll ask a girl.

Maybe it's in my head but I feel like there's a social pressure among guys to be funny and purvey confidence, and I feel like I will be judged negatively if I talk about something too personal, whereas I have none of that anxiety around girls and feel much more comfortable being myself.

I think it's got a little better now most of my friends and I are in our later twenties. I've been making a bit more effort be open with my closer male friends and it's been going quite well but there's still that feeling of discomfort there that I have to overcome.

Man here.

Friends were predominantly boys up and through first few months of college then suddenly I started befriending girls more, mostly because I started to break out into dating.

Friendships with women continued to grow while friendships with men dwindled.

Today, many years later, I still have mostly women as friends and that'll continue to grow because of my relationship status. Some men as friends. I always got along with women more due to shared interests.

I'm a man with 90% female friends. Most of my friendships with other men seem shallow by comparison to my female friendships. I find I can relax more around women and I feel less pressure. I've thought a lot about the source of this but I haven't found any satisfying answers.

I've only really ever had a handful of friends until pretty recently, because crippling dysmorphia/dysphoria in high school (1990s) and low self esteem convinced me that I was not worth being friends with. Most of my friends are gals that I've met through work; my last guy friend of 20 years moved to a different province with his family a couple of weeks ago, and I'm not really looking for a guy to fill that void because, for my whole life, I haven't wanted to have much to do with men at all. FWIW I'm a transgender/asexual woman, and apparently a REAL DOWNER

I'm a male, though what I learned about between male & female friends (don't take this personally; This is just what I heard), is that males tend to easily make friends with both genders than it is for girls & women.

Whenever you're a girl or a woman, they can also easily make friends with males, but you have to be very careful when making certain friends with other girls/women, as some of them will tend to stab you in the back with gossip/rumors, etc. Guys, we don't do that. Sometimes, we bicker & argue just as much as girls do, but after a while, we chill & make up.

*Please don't ban me*

I'm a guy. Most of my friends are women but my closest friend is male. He's also my oldest friend as I think I had mostly male friends as a kid and then it switched to mostly female friends as an adult. There are a few reasons I think that is. I'll be completely honest here, a lot of the female friends I made in college were women I was attracted to. Either it was a crush that I didn't pursue because they were in a relationship or I actually did ask them out but they turned me down. It's slightly uncomfortable to admit that because I think a lot of women are worried about their guy friends secretly wanting to date them. But for me, it's more that I liked their personalities and we got along so it seemed a waste to not have a friendship. The crushes naturally went away and I see them as just good friends.

Another thing is with a lot of male friend groups there is a lot of machismo going on and I've never had a desire to be like that. I've been friends who are physically aggressive or ultra competitive with each other. Guys who are just plain gross or being police to each others' masculinity. Women also tend to be more empathetic. I can open up about my feelings more with them in general but at the same time I shouldn't generalize because the male friends I chose to make can be plenty empathetic and there are things I can talk about with them that women can't relate to. I don't really have to have a guard up in terms of presenting myself as ultra masculine. Again I'm generalizing as I do have a number of male friends who are nothing like that - it's the fact that they aren't that way that we were able to develop friendships, really.

I'll be honest, I've had trouble making female friends. I think a large aspect of it was my parents always joking about them being my girlfriend or asking about if I've found a girlfriend, etc., when all I wanted was a friend/friends, not a girlfriend.

my closets friend is a woman. i mean we have a pretty crazy history with eachother. but yeah I talk to a woman more than anyone else.

I have a hard time opening up to men thanks to judgmental boys in middle and high school who knew I was gay well before I did. So I have always been more friends with girls past elementary school and it has just stayed that way ever since. I could probably count the number of men I'm friends with in person on one hand haha. It used to bother me but it doesn't really anymore since I'm with someone and just don't care much. Women rule.

I'm like 27 now so I barely have any friends.

my oldest friends are all female however. I still have a few close guy friends however. i'd guess I'm around 50/50.

I will say, female friends are much better at making plans to be social.

i'm an open book however, so I don't have issues talking w/ either gender.

I now have a girlfriend however, so I mostly hang out in person w/ my guy friends. my girlfriend kinda replaced a lot of the stuff I would do w/ my female friends.

I have mostly guy friends. I find it is much more uncomfortable for me to become friends with a woman, but once I do get over the initial uncomfortability it is pretty much the same as a guy friend. My best friend is a woman.

It's good to have both, for the perspectives on issues or for certain moods. I am lucky to have guys and gals who I can talk to about personal issues though, so it's cool.

PhazonBlonde said:

Can't be friends with single guys because most the time they eventually try flirting.

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... interesting. They still flirt even after they find out you're in a relationship? I always back off the flirting if I find out the woman is already taken. Lol

Cis straight male here and I've always had great friends of all spectrums and it's always been the same to me. I just treat people like people, first and foremost and try to associate with those who reflect values important to me. Haven't had a problem.

Mediking said:

... interesting. They still flirt even after they find out you're in a relationship? I always back off the flirting if I find out the woman is already taken. Lol

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I'm speaking in broad terms; i have a couple straight guy friends that are chill and don't flirt. I find it's worse though if I'm in a relationship with another girl, then they tend to respect it less and think it's ok to keep flirting even if they know I'm with someone.

(I'm a dude)

I have a bunch of male friends that are mostly acquaintance level. My best friend is a guy. I find I get along with women better, in general, though. My wife included, obviously. I'm usually hanging out with a bunch of women.

But I don't think it matters at the end of the day, friends are friends. Being friend with men is exhausting, though. So much bullshit to cut through. You gotta be a bro, first and foremost, and you dare not talk about anything serious.

I have both male and female friends, and they each fulfill different needs for me. It doesn't need to be an either-or lol. I think both are necessary.

PhazonBlonde said:

I'm speaking in broad terms; i have a couple straight guy friends that are chill and don't flirt. I find it's worse though if I'm in a relationship with another girl, then they tend to respect it less and think it's ok to keep flirting even if they know I'm with someone.

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Ahhh. I gotcha.

Well, I'm friends with individuals so I prefer those individuals. Whether they are guys or girls became kinda irrelevant. I don't go looking for guy or girl friends in particular and don't choose nights out based on which gender I wanna hang with that night.

My best friends are a guy and a girl. Back when I was young I only had guys as friends and that sucked big time.

I'm a guy and my friends are mostly guys now, but I agree with a lot of what was said about generally finding friendships with women to be more fulfilling and enjoyable. Especially the romantic relationships I've had with women I feel like have helped me grow and mature more than anything else in terms of stepping outside of my straight white male perspective.

What has pushed me away from a lot of my male friends lately is it feels like a lot of them just haven't grown up or matured at all as we've gotten older. They've become more conservative (politically, socially) too, and I just feel like now I align myself more with women who tend to be a bit more empathic and not as shitty/cynical about everything.

I do wish I had more platonic female friends again, but what I would really love would be to make some male friends who don't unironically complain about SJWs and don't have a negative shitty sarcastic attitude about everything and everyone. I don't have any friends to play video games with now because it stopped being fun playing with my guy friends.

Guy here and most of my best and oldest friends are guys, but due to distance (not that far but a 45 minute drive) and changes in life circumstances (they are all married with kids and I'm not) we don't hang out much anymore.

Most of the friends I hang out with now are women, because I work with alsmost all women (social services) and most of the people I hang out with are coworkers and people I met through coworkers.

I'd love to make some more guy friends but I'm too lazy and introverted to put in the effort to go out and find some in my current town.

Oh yeah, as a guy I definitely prefer female friends to men.

From adolescence through High School I only had male friends (nerdy crew). Then in College I gained a good amount of female friends to the point where it was probably 50/50. Then I met my wife, got married and moved away from most of my friends. The only friends who I remain close to are my male friends. We get together 3-4 times a year at each other's houses to have a weekend to ourselves (no wives or GF's) and it's pretty awesome. It's only a group of 4-5 but every time we hang out it's as if no time has passed. I consider my male friendships 'deep' in the sense that we discuss real life stuff and our shared history gives us a strong bond (one friend I've had since we were 5) I have a few male friends who I know as the husbands of my wive's Friends and those are much more typical 'bro' relationships. Nice guys to chill w/ and drink but not having a deep relationship or anything.

My female friends from College I see once every couple of years at a wedding or a big party, and it's great to see them but we don't make efforts to hang out otherwise or really contact each other. Now that people are having kids and have continued to move further away from each other, I'm sure I'll see them even less and less. I'm friends w/ some of my wife's female friends but it's all through the fact that I'm married to my wife, we're not texting or hanging out independently or anything.

My best friends are all men at the moment. I wouldn't say any of us are bro-y, though I guess it can seem that way from outside looking in. It's mostly just friends from college I keep in touch with over group chat, but we talk about all kinds of things, not just surface shit. Politics, relationships, struggles of life. We've talked each other through depression and keep one another from getting too down. I can't imagine having guy friends who aren't capable of all that anymore; seems kinda silly.

That's not to say I wouldn't like any friends who are women, but at the moment I'm not actively meeting new people at all. I freelance write so most of my days are spent at home or at places with WiFi so human interaction is low. I'm looking for better opportunities though, so eventually I'll start reaching out to different people 'cause that's how I am. I just gravitate towards fun personalities and people who are chill.

I have both, like both.

I definitely prefer women friends but unfortunately have fewer. I always worry that girls will think I'm hitting on them so I tend to avoid introducing myself to them.

I have both

That said, most are guys, for various reasons. There's something special about male comraderie as others have pointed out

A good friend is a blessing no matter the gender.

No close friends atm, but I've always preferred my guy friends. Not because I get along with them better, but I'm an emotional guy who catches feelings quick, so I tend to have my guard way up with women. Where as with guys I can be more of myself.

I am a man and have a lot more male friends than female. Maybe a 70/30 split if I had to guess. I can't say I have "preference", though I will say I can indulge more in my completely juvenile side with my male friends whereas with female friends I tend to be more adult or intellectual, so they do both offer me a different experience. I could be quoting Rick and Morty with the boys over a drunk game of Overwatch, but they wouldn't have time for listening to me passionately talk about the Hegelian dialectic. Likewise I doubt my female friends care much about how I can do SL1 runs in Dark Souls.

Interestingly I don't find either group of friends more empathetic than the other, both can be fucking vicious lol

Another guy here. Throughout most of my adolescence up until college my friends were almost all guys because of the gender separation that occurs at a younger age so naturally guys were the ones who shared my interests.

In college however most of the people I hung out with were women probably due to the fact that the ratio of men to women in my college was like 1 to 3.

I do judge on a person to person basis obviously but I've noticed a few things over the years.

1) I feel much more at ease with men than women. Much of this is probably because being the same gender we understand each other better. However I also just feel that guys are more laid back in general so it's much easier to be myself and just say what's on my mind without thinking. With women I always have the fear in my head that something I say will come across wrong or that I'm acting too friendly and it will be taken as me being creepy or just trying to get into their pants or something.

2) In my experience women are easier and faster to make friends with but those friendships are often much more fleeting than those with men. Women seem to jump between friends like crazy and there's a lot more 'friend drama' in my experience. If you become good friends with a guy you're friends for life barring some major falling out.

3) Women are much better at actually doing something with their friends and cultivating that relationship. The women I knew in uni would be going out like every weekend to a club or bar and having a damn good time. My guy friends on the other hand mostly just wanted to stay in and play video games or whatever. Could be that we were all introverts though too. It just seems to harder for guys to actually plan something as no one wants to be the one to initiate an event and everyone is just kinda waiting to be invited to do something. If I hadn't set up and planned a lot of the trips we did we wouldn't have gone on like 3/4 of them.

Wow, I have the exact opposite experience. My female friends can get really annoying, but my male circle is cool most of the time. Both are small tho.
It's more about their personalities than sex/gender in the end I'd say.

Not much difference other than more shared interests with my guy friends. Pool, Beer, video games etc.
Not that girls don't like those thing but none of my girl friends do.

Guy here.

I've always gravitated towards having girls as friends. I don't really do it on purpose, I think I just get along better with women.
That's not to say I don't have male friends. I've got a handful of them that I've stayed in touch with your decades now, and I hope I never lose touch with them.

I love my bros so I can be myself in the purest sense as I'm most comfortable with them, but I love hanging out with women as I get to be more social and more of a clown when I'm with a group of women or with a group of men and women.

My current friend pool is about 95% dudes. Vast majority of other women don't really share the same sort of outlook or hobbies and interests as me so there's a very small portion of women I talk to and engage with on a regular basis. Coming from a family that mainly consisted of a single dad and three older brothers I've come to appreciate how much more laid-back interactions with dudes are in general in comparision to other women for the most part. Broski's, booze and good times all around!

I had a both boys and girls as friends when I was a little girl. My daughter is 9 and has both boys and girls as friends. She is going through the same pattern that I did: tight, supportive friendships with girls, and shitty friendships with boys where they act like assholes whenever they feel like it. If she comes home and cries to me about something happening at school, it is always a boy she considered a friend doing something crappy to her.

It's to the point that she's asked to go to an all-girls middle school.

I like hanging out with women, usually more chill and often easier to talk about more personal stuff without having to feel like I have to uphold some image. Sucks that it gets so hard to uphold that friendship once they start dating someone, just gets awkward.

I've found that it's completely random. Male/Female/etc....they can all be good friends and they all have the potential to suck as human beings.

No preference here. I like good/kind/no drama people. I'll take them in any form.

I don't know if I would exactly call them friends, but most of the acquaintances at my school who were friendly and talked to me were female.

I'm a dude.

Was mostly friends with guys "by default" until college, where 90% of my friends were girls. Dunno if I have a "preference", though I might be more relaxed with girls in general when it comes to talking about relationships and all that stuff. I tend to dislike being in big groups of dudes, the macho atmosphere isn't for me.

For me, it was guy friends until college. Then my whole college program group was a big friend group. Now I have my usual dude group that we all just make fun of each other, and my friend circle st my bank that is 95% women, and also just spend all day making fun of each other lol.

It's changed a bit throughout the course of my life, maybe just because I tend to gravitate towards people I share things in common with in general regardless of gender. When I was younger (elementary and most of high school), my friends were predominantly girls. I was often made fun of for seeming "gay" and "fruity" as well, OP (although I actually have come out of the closet since then), but I never found it fair to be generalized that way just because I hung out with mostly girls.

After university, I find most of my close friends are guys at this point. I think it's because I joined a gay volleyball league and those guys have become my closest friends since then.

I prefer having male friends as that is what I am used to but I've started making more female friends lately and it's kinda nice. There is a sense of sisterhood at times that I like.

I'm a deadass dude from New York.

I chill with both, besides my female friends are the equivalent of Cardi B they're pretty much very bro-esque.. probably give me more shit than my boys.