Quote:
Originally Posted by Lead543
it's okay to have same sex friends, but if you want to keep me around you have to keep them at a level that doesn't make me question.
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I agree Lead, and I don't think this is "old-fashioned." It's just good practice for maintaining boundaries and keeping a healthy relationship (unless one is in an open-relationship, where intimate settings can be shared w/others, but that doesn't apply here).
I definitely want ktspktsp to have same-sex friends, and I think that's a good thing. But what we are working on is an awareness of how to "keep them at a level that doesn't make me question," and that is something that I am always working on, too (keeping guy friendships at an emotional distance, even moreso than a physical one). In this situation, I'm totally fine w/3+ people camping, or 2 people in separate tents, or 2 people who are the same gender in the same tent (assuming both are heterosexual... would be the other way 'round if they were homosexual or bi).
I am curious, though, whether anyone who has replied to this thread would have felt differently when you were a teenager? I have a feeling most of us would have heard our parents telling us this stuff (don't share tents with someone of the opposite sex), and resented them for not trusting us... I know I would have. What happened in the interim, to make you change your mind and see things the way your parents would?
Also, I asked ktspktsp at one point, what if we were married in this situation? Would you still want to go? (This was a couple days ago, so he may have a different perspective now.) He said that if we were married, he hoped we'd trust each other even more than we do now, and that it wouldn't be an issue. I don't agree, but I was wondering what you guys thought. For me, the longer you know someone, the better you know what makes them tick, and what ticks them off!... and the better you learn how to honor and respect them. So I take the opposite view I guess (unless, of course, it becomes an open relationship.)