While it is not impossible for men and women to maintain a platonic relationship, most men do their best to try and get out of the 'friendzone'.
In popular culture, the "friend zone" is a situation involving friends of the opposite gender, whereby one person develops romantic feelings and the other wants to be just friends.
More often than not, one party does not know about these feelings and seems satisfied with the platonic relationship.
"Like you see a chick and she is she hot, and you start playing out scenarios in your head where you do whatever to her. There are guys who will not act on it and there are ones who will be forward about it. Either way, it's not that authentic platonic friendship," he said.
Majid says the need to belong and the pressures of "relationship goals" raises unrealistic expectations for men when they meet a woman they are interested in.
"So if a girl is nice to you and she is fine, you may start already welcoming her into your life in that way, but she probably isn't feeling it. And rejections just mess up everything," he said.
OPTIONS ABOUND
However, journalist Geoffrey Murathime thinks women are not entirely innocent in these situations. The solution, he says, is to move on, improve and get another woman.
"The world has too many women. If one rejects you, move on. Another one will find you attractive and accept you. Rejection is a part of life for a man. Learn from it and grow positively," he said.
Nicholson adds because men and women look at the responsibilities of friendships differently, they tend to co-create the friendzone confusion.
"Men were more likely to see sex and romantic potential in an opposite-sex friend as a benefit, while women primarily saw it as a cost. As a result, men were also more likely than women to report that they had sex with an opposite-sex friend," he said.
"Men were also more likely to report friendship costs of lowered self-worth and giving time to help the friend, while women found their own inability to reciprocate the male's attraction as costly."
This means that when the friendships do not turn out as expected, men are often left feeling rejected or used, while women feel uncomfortable with the unequal attraction.
Njeri Mbugua/The Star
