Why Josh Can't Be Left Alone

Despite my lack of inspiration to blog lately, there is in fact still activity in my brain. In fact, a lot of it. One of the recurring themes is girls. Go figure.

I hope you've settled down from that shocker, because here comes another. I want to refine my opinion on platonic friendships. I'm not backtracking or saying I was wrong, but my thinking has evolved, and I want to share that with you. Yes that's right. My opinions aren't set in stone.

Specifically, I have in the past seemingly flaunted my opinion that a guy and girl can be friends with each other, in no different way than they are with their same sex friends. I have not changed my view that this is possible. But I do want to say that I think this is the minority, in any community.

So I'm not really backtracking, just flipping to the other side of the coin. Whereas before I found it useful (read: Attention grabbing) to minimize the risks, now I find it overly dramatic to pretend like I was mistaken. Come on, my superior analytic logic couldn't be that flawed...

I've never really bothered to qualify the definition of platonic that I have always used. In my mind, it is easy to be friends with somebody without wanting something more. When that more is an exclusive relationship. But when that more is a purely physical relationship, I think that is harder to separate. When we are with somebody of the opposite sex, on some level, even when we aren't interested in them, there is still some level of curiosity, if you will, in most cases.

And that is where the challenges start. When we are in Yeshiva, living in a controlled dorm forces limits on us that, willingly or not, safeguard us from having to cross any lines unintentionally. But I've been out of that cocoon for a few years now. And I've seen the number it's done on my friends.

One of the biggest debates is whether anybody is Shomer Negia. Notice that the assumption flipped from when we were in Yeshiva. Now I'm not going to dig too much into that debate now, as this post is already getting long. It is my assumption that those people who you know that strive to be more religious in all aspects probably do refrain from physical contact. But those that don't work at their level of religious practice probably aren't. Because frankly, aside from religious commitment, there probably is too much of a draw, and not enough of a reason, not to.

But we are all in that world, those of us who are single after graduating from carefully structured religious institutions. And for those of us not living at home or with another family, there is no intrinsic structure. And so it becomes our own decisions that will relay into whether we stick to the path we were on in Yeshiva, at our religious apex, if you will, or whether we will re-chart our own course.

A lot of this will have to do with the lines we draw. I've hesitated to publicize my line (aside from the fact that I've broken it numerous times, I'm also afraid that I'm shooting myself in the foot), but I've always tried to stay out of single girls' apartments. Anytime. But for me, once you cross that line, you enter into an unchaperoned world where boundaries get tested and there are no referees. That's not to say I would grab the nearest girl at a Shabbos meal. I think we all have some self-control. Probably quite a lot more than we give ourselves credit for. But I believe that there is a certain environment that is conducive to true platonic relationships, such as professional association, where lines are clear, as opposed to hanging out in a girl's apartment, where every decision is so subjective, and not necessarily made with our true goals in mind.

Part of the problem is probably due to a pervasive lack of belief in Gd. Judaism is a rote practice, at best a social club, even within Orthodoxy. If that is all, then an individual will make their own rules behind closed doors. And that is what I see with so many of my friends. We aren't the best judges, when sitting on a couch alone with the opposite sex, of whether a specific relationship is a true platonic relationship or whether curiosity isn't an underlying factor.

I've actually wanted to a do an in depth response to the Shomer Negia blog for a long time. And this wasn't meant to be it. But I don't think the challenges of being Shomer Negia are psychological. They are physical. They are pushing of the normal desires we were created with for good. But we have to realize that with every lifestyle decision we make, we are moving towards Gd or away from him. And if we let ourselves be blinded or fooled by our attitude towards the opposite sex, you can bet which way we'll slide.