Have you ever witnessed how much benefit men get from having your friendship, your mere presence in their lives? Have you ever felt uncomfortable with how they use your presence to boost their ego, shore up their masculinity or gain admiration from other males at your expense? Have you ever noticed how men insinuate physical connections when in reality there are none?
Much has been written about how much males gain from marriage, and how the union benefits male careers, social status, physical and emotional health. Much has also been written about how much males benefit from cohabitation, steady access to sex, female energy, not to say free household labor as well as a reduction in household expenses. But not much has been written about how males benefit from a female’s mere presence. From friendship, to companionship to simply belonging to your social circle, males gain a lot from having access to women.
Have you noticed how a male’s status increases from having access to women? Males who surround themselves with a lot of women are perceived as more successful than males who have no access to women at all. When males succeed financially, the tendency is to spend money to access female attention, whether it is through dating or partying, they seek to create the image of having a lot of female energy, even when that image is false. Even males who have no access to women will seek to create the illusion of having relationships they don’t actually have. Why?
Growing up I always had more male friendships than female ones. I never understood why, but men always hung out with me, and unconsciously I used to freely give them my time and energy. In fact, like most nice girls, I believed in the value of those friendships and overestimated their worth simply by placing too much importance on them. We all want to believe in the relationships we have, even when those connections show some red flags. But in my 20s and 30s I easily ignored those red flags. In the last three years, I started to greatly limit male access to me, and I have benefited greatly from distancing myself from connections that benefited males in ways that made me uncomfortable.
Have you ever analyzed the actual value of your friendships with males? Have you ever listed what they actually bring to your platonic friendship table? Have you ever observed what your male friends gain from your presence?
Many of you are still friends with your exes, many of you hang out with random males, Do you notice how your mere presence strokes the male ego, raises their social status, boosts their image? Under the guise of a platonic friendship, they still get to access you, your time, your emotional labor, you just now get to pay for half of that access. You probably never thought about this, but a friendship with a woman does a lot to boost a man’s image, even if he does not have the emotional qualifications nor the social skills to be in an actual romantic relationship. He still gets to be seen in public with a woman who would not date him if she was aware what he is getting out of her presence.
Many ladies aren’t even aware how a mere photo on social media boosts a man’s masculinity while at the same time it devalues her in the eyes of other men. We all think it is innocent to pose in a suggestive way, drape ourselves all over a male even surround a male with a group of females. A photo like this raises a man’s worth immediately. Suddenly everyone sees him as having female attention, social and sexual status. But what about the women in the same photo? They may not be interested in him at all, but posing suggestively or draping themselves over a man devalues them. It makes them look easy, loose, free and overly available in the eyes of other males. Your presence is valuable, don’t give it away so easily.
As someone who grew up in male company, I now see how many of those connections were not true and authentic friendships. It took decades to call it what it is, an illusion or a delusion that I had a true friend. I often suspected that the guys were benefiting in other ways from being connected to me, but I could never verbalize how. Perhaps I was emotionally immature to understand. Like most nice girls with low boundaries, I never took account of how much these friendships cost my emotional health, my reputation and my self worth. Perhaps I was too embarrassed to question their motives, nor could I defend my self worth. But, much of the gain the men got was hidden, never discussed, never addressed, never called out.
Without recounting each individual friendship in great detail, in the end over 90% of those friendships with males ended when the male finally realized that he could never have me, Yes, those great friends I thought so highly of were simply waiting for me to become single, or eventually interested. I had a college friend for over 20 years who called me as soon as his divorce was completed to tell me that he is ready for me now. He simply assumed that I was waiting for him.When I told him I don’t want to date him he was shocked, angry, called me names after 20 years of what I perceived to be a solid friendship. The remaining 10% males got blocked when I found out they told stories about dating me to their cronies and their girlfriends.
I have had many males hang out with me in order to insinuate a physical connection to their other male friends. Imagine how it feels when a bunch of low level incels believe that I slept with their unsleepable friend. It feels like a violation that no woman can ever prove, because she is never privy to those inuendos. Males validate each others’ fantasies and believe in them even when they are far fetched, because they rely on each other to shore up their masculinity. They rarely question each others’ reality or each others’ conquests because to do so comes with a risk that they too will be discredited.
I have had males use me to make their girlfriends and wives uncomfortable. I can’t count the number of times somebody’s girlfriend gave me the evil eye or somebody’s wife couldn’t look me in the face. Meanwhile, I wouldn’t touch her man with a 10 ft pole. Males are insecure, highly, highly insecure. And when their masculinity is shaky, they will try to destabilize their woman to make themselves feel more secure. However, like most good friends,I actually believed in that friendship with the male. Even though I knew what they were doing, I stayed silent to protect the friendship. Is that a true friendship? I wasn’t even being true to myself. Inside, I felt gross that my friendship was being used to insinuate a physical connection that never happened. But on the outside, I was silent, protecting my so called “friend”.
I am glad that most of those friendships ended, and I would not allow any male to boost his ego at my expense. Today I am very protective of my energy, I limit access to people I have vetted, and when a guy tries to insinuate something or stroke his own ego in my presence, I actually call him out. I don’t mind embarrassing males at all because I know that what they fear the most is exposure. No man wants his masculinity denied by a woman, especially not in front of friends. So when I suspect that a male has made a claim about me, I openly say No, that never happened, or I tell his wife in front of him, “You know that George and I never dated” which usually puts women at ease, and lets the male know not to dare make such an insinuation again.
You have to be firm, and you have to be respectful of your own image, because insecure males will use it to shore up their masculinity. The more insecure they are, the more likely they are to do it. Our silence protects them, but our openness shuts them up. Rest assured that most of these guys present as “nice guys” and will make it your fault when they are exposed. Be fine with that.
A few years ago a girlfriend of mine was devastated when she found out that the man she has been dating for six months was impotent. He never informed her, simply strung her along. When she found out he acted like it is none of her business, like she was ridiculous for complaining. She broke up with him only to find out the next day he was posting pictures online with a new girlfriend. Shortly after, that woman dumped him too, and immediately he was posting pictures on social media with three girls in their 20s. Why do males do that? To cover up the masculinity that is missing. But, notice how each woman’s presence was being used to create an illusion of his masculinity, potency and sexual prowess that he didn’t actually have. And to other males his illusion was believable. Nobody questioned him, in fact he was congratulated and admired for his ability to score so quickly. In the real world males get applause for what women provide for them. To the world it looked as if he had 5 women, in reality he disappointed and used all 5 of them. Incidentally, the 20 year olds were just hanging out with him (not dating him) because he kept paying for expensive dinners and nightclubs. They were too young to be interested. He still used their presence to create an illusion.
Currently, one of my girlfriends is accusing another of flirting with her husband. I was there, this did not happen. Instead, her unattractive husband has been acting like other women are after him, and is doing his best to make his wife feel insecure, trying to manipulate her into giving him something she doesn’t want. He is using the presence of women in our social group to trigger his wife, and it is working. Meanwhile, this guy is unattractive to us all. None of us pay any attention to him socially, he is ignored at most events, and none of the ladies in our group would ever flirt with another woman’s man. This guy is a 2/10 and his wife is an 8/10, so you can see why he is so insecure. But, simply allowing him in our social circle because his wife is our friend has destabilized our friendships. He is manipulating our friends just to trigger his wife emotionally and the only reason he can do this is because he has access to our circle of friends. I can think of two other women who are in similar situations with their partners, who are using female attention to disempower and make their girlfriends jealous, while no woman is actually interested in them.
Over the years I have dropped many male friends when I realized these connections felt icky to me. Sometimes, I wasn’t even aware of how or why this felt uncomfortable, only to later find out that a guy I politely rejected claimed to have had me anyway. Which leads me to wonder how many unsuspecting women get used under the guise of friendship to give away time and energy for a male’s personal gain. Of course this cannot be measured, but self-aware women know when their energy isn’t reciprocated correctly and respectfully.
The older I get, the more cognizant I am of my own value, my own energy, and who I give attention to. I have cleaned up my table and tightened my circle of friends. I am more aware of how my energy is used by other people, whether they reciprocate equally, and whether their presence is healthy. I am unapologetic about having to cut off a few barnacles, withdraw attention from people who feed on it, and don’t give away my time or attention so easily. I have benefited greatly from doing this. Many of the people I ended things with were males who were benefiting from my time, attention, advice, caring, and used that for their own personal gain.
But the greatest benefit to me has been speaking up. As uncomfortable as this is for women, nothing in the world feels more powerful than calling out a male when he has insinuated a connection at your expense. His story boosted his masculinity at the expense of your own worth. Why do males get a free pass for using their friends this way? Speaking up and calling them out has been so freeing and so cleansing for my energy, it feels like a spiritual detox.
Many women bottle up their emotions not wanting to cause a conflict. We all know the wrath a male can inflict when his mask has been pulled off and his illusion shattered. However, our silence is exactly what has created this imbalance between the genders, where our silence strengthens their insufferable egos. We have to speak up. Sure, men will avoid women like us, and that too is a good thing. Personally, I don’t want parasitic friendships, and I no longer value quantity over quality in my social circle. I realized that many of the males I kept in my circle weren’t true friends at all. They brought nothing to my table, but benefited greatly from my kindness and my attention.
Some of you are actively dating, and are struggling with blurred lines between romantic, platonic and friends with benefits type connections. I urge you to see that when the lines are blurred, they rarely benefit you. Somebody is always benefiting from your confusion under the guise of friendship. Redefine your friendships, create rules of engagement, list requirements for time and access to your company, and you will see that all your relationships will either improve or disintegrate. Don’t fear losing friends. The ones who disappear are no longer good enough for you.
Nothing changed until I started cutting people out of my life. I made some tough choices and many people were displeased with me. Be unapologetic with your self-respect. You will gain more respectful friends out of that. But, once I started ending so called “friendships” with males who were simply benefiting from me, even my dating life improved. There are higher standards in place now, my dating strategy is purely intentional, and no one gets access to me unless they step forward correctly.
Stop giving away your time freely to random males who just want to hang out and tap into your energy. No genuine friendship will come out of your indiscriminately pouring your attention into them. No male can entice me to hang out and give him my time or attention. But before your dating life can improve, you must cut off the useless males who are feeding on your attention. They are unattractive to healthy males who see you pouring into them, and they devalue you in the eyes of quality people. You can’t build a healthy social circle when you are surrounded by unhealthy attachments. It is impossible.