OH I LOVE STRAIGHT GUYS TOO!

Ours is a world where female friendships are celebrated by Oprah and the Traveling Pants and bestsellers like "The Girls From Ames." The bond between women and their hilarious gay male BFFs has been touted by, well, every romantic comedy ever made. Even gay-straight bromances get their due. But friendships between straight men and women wind up mangled by clichéd claptrap like "The Ugly Truth." Men are only interested in spreading their seed! Women are uptight prisses! And the only thing to do, of course, is to fall hopelessly in love.Frankly, I'm a little fed up with it. Some of the deepest, sweetest, most enduring friendships of my life have been with males. Men I went to college with, men I've toiled in crappy jobs with, men who stuck around long after I lost touch with the ex-girlfriends who introduced us. Guys who bartend. Guys who play in bands. Guys with black belts. Guys who make stuff with metal and soldering irons. Awesome fracking dudes. But does the radical notion of girl-on-guy friendship get its own greeting card, made-for-TV movie, or Styles section trend piece? Why do straight men so rarely get props for being good buddies?

Salon
July 27 2009