The Possibility of Platonic Friendship

Lengthy Intro

In this article I'm going to argue that Platonic friendship isn't possible. First I'm going to say what Platonic friendship is. Then I'm going to say why it's not possible.

Prepare yourself.

High-Speed Detour Into Abstraction

What does "Platonic" mean?
On the Platonic view of reality, two general types of things exist: Forms and Instances. The world we see, smell, taste, touch and hear is made up of Instances. Instances are embodied, material and exist within space and time. Anything that can be experienced via the five senses is an Instance.

In contrast to Instances, we have Forms. Forms are disembodied, immaterial and located outside of space and time. Our five senses are useless for knowing the Forms, and anything we can gain knowledge of through our senses is, in virtue of this fact, not a Form.

According to the Platonic view, ultimate reality is found in the Forms, not in their Instances, and Instances are what they are in virtue of their manifesting or instantiating certain Forms.

See?

"Platonic" applied to people
On the Platonic view, you are not your body. Your body exists in space and time, in the world we can see, smell, taste, touch and hear. The real you — what we'll call your Soul — exists in the world of the Forms. Your body is therefore related to your Soul in much the same way as the chairs above are related to the Form CHAIR.

"Platonic friendship," then?
Platonic friendship, then, is any friendship that isn't mediated by physical bodies. It's friendship between Souls. It's friendship that's supposedly so deep that those involved aren't even aware of (or, at least, aren't at all concerned with) the trivial features of their respective bodies. In particular, it's friendship where those involved aren't at all concerned with their respective sex organs. It's as if the friends involved are asexual.

"Platonic friendship" in use
All this is pretty academic, so let's see what the term looks like in actual use. A quick Google search for "Platonic friendship" produced the following anecdotes. (Names have been changed, and details have been condensed.) Add them to your understanding of the term.

After three months of marriage, Sharon noticed that her husband John was friendly with Martha, a girl he used to date. Sharon got jealous and confronted John. John responded that Sharon shouldn't have been jealous, since the friendship was strictly Platonic. Sharon wasn't jealous of John's friendship with Phil. For the same reasons, argued John, Sharon shouldn't have been jealous of his friendship with Martha.

Pat got busted for having Lisa in his dorm room after 10 p.m. According to Pat, his relationship with Lisa was strictly Platonic, so he shouldn't have been in any more trouble for having Lisa in his room after 10 p.m. than he would have been in had Scott been in his room after 10 p.m.

Becca's all confused about guys. She hasn't had an actual boyfriend in years, but, being a total tomboy, she's had nearly constant male companionship. The problem is, on almost every occasion, what she thought was a Platonic relationship turned into a huge mess. Either she found herself romantically interested in the guy, he found himself romantically interested in her, or both. In all cases, feelings got hurt and interaction became extremely awkward.

Laurel wanted to go camping with Jerome. Laurel's dad told her she couldn't because Jerome is a guy. Laurel responded that the friendship was strictly Platonic, and that her dad should therefore not have been any more concerned about her going camping with Jerome than he should have been concerned about her going camping with Samantha.

"Platonic friendship:" A working definition
Having analyzed the term "Platonic," and having noted a few examples of "Platonic friendship" in actual use, we can characterize Platonic friendships as friendships that manifest the following properties, which normally stand in tension with the other:

• The friendship exists between non-gay, non-celibate (but not necessarily sexually active) members of the opposite sex.
• The friendship is sexually safe, where "sexually safe" means that the friendship presents little risk of heartbreak, and little risk of spontaneous sexual contact resulting from unbridled passion.

How could non-gay, non-celibate members of the opposite sex ever have a sexually safe friendship, we're wondering?

Here's where the Platonism comes in — this is why the term "Platonic friendship" can't be properly appreciated without waxing philosophical: Perceived Platonic friendships are taken to be sexually safe because those involved in them think that they are friends with each other's Souls. They think they've gotten beyond their respective bodies, and that their sexes and sexual orientations have therefore become irrelevant to the relationship.

Return from Abstraction: Betty and Bob

So let's imagine two friends: a girl named Betty and a guy named Bob. Betty and Bob live in Colorado, and Bob's girlfriend lives in Milwaukee. Bob tells his girlfriend not to worry about Betty, since his friendship with Betty is strictly Platonic.

What does Bob mean by this? Essentially, he's telling his girlfriend that, as a result of his highly admirable friendship with Betty's disembodied Soul, Betty's sex organs are irrelevant to the whole affair — as if Betty's a neuter.

According to Bob, if Betty were a guy rather than a girl, nothing would be any different between the two of them, since this would just be a difference in Betty's body, which Bob doesn't even notice. In spite of the sexual compatibility between Betty and Bob, Bob's girlfriend has absolutely nothing to worry about, Bob claims.

Well I've never met Betty or Bob, but I'm inclined to think that Bob's full of it.

The Argument against Platonic Friendship

The over-arching idea behind Platonic friendship is that it's possible to have a friendship with someone in which the sex of that person just doesn't matter.

Because living human beings are embodied, however, friendships between living human beings will always be mediated by their bodies — bodies with sexual organs and all of the passions that come with them. But if this is the only way to have a friendship, then how could a friendship between non-gay, non-celibate members of the opposite sex ever be sexually safe?

A guy and a girl could meet in a chat room, I suppose, never come into personal contact, never reveal themselves as male, female, and so on, and, in this way, form a sexually safe relationship between non-gay, non-celibate members of the opposite sex. But so what? As the anecdotes above reveal, the possibility of this kind of friendship isn't what anybody's worrying about.

The point is, sex matters, and we're fooling ourselves if we think otherwise. It matters that I have one kind of sexual organ, and it matters that you have another. (And if this is making any of us blush, then I've proved my point.)

All this isn't to say that non-gay, non-celibate members of the opposite sex can't be "just friends." They surely can. It's to say that being "just friends" takes a lot of caution. It takes care and a realistic appraisal of one's ability to avoid temptation. It also takes the humility to admit it when one's gotten oneself in over one's head.

C O F F E E  S H O P

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What are your experiences with guy/girl friendships? Do they work or does someone end up getting hurt?

Join the discussion!

To say that Platonic friendship isn't possible is also to recognize that, even where a guy and a girl do exercise enough caution to be "just friends," the friendship they form will still be one between a guy and a girl, not one between two neuters.

Down with Platonic friendship, then, and up with intelligent, cautious interaction between the sexes.

The end.