Many of us have heard about the tragic tale of the boy who lives in the Friendzone. He’s in love with a girl, is nice to her, listens to her problems, maybe hangs out with her a couple of times and buys her food. Yet, despite being so nice to her, she hasn’t shown any romantic interest in him. Dejected, the boy may go on to complain to his friends about how this girl has placed him in the Friendzone.

The Friendzone concept, though, poses many problems. To oblige by the Friendzone theory, one must assume that a guy is entitled to romantic gestures whenever he is nice to a girl. For example, if he listens to a girl’s problems, he deserves romantic interest. Maybe, if he takes you to Chipotle, picks you up and all that and even pays for you, he deserves some kind of special favor. Then let’s say a guy takes a girl on a nice date, covers the expenses, and is polite the whole time… clearly he deserves an intimate reward. Of course, if a girl has the audacity to decide that she doesn’t like the guy or isn’t interested in him, that she is a- well we all know what he thinks she is.

This puts all girls in a hard and unfair situation: every time a boy that a girl isn’t in love with does anything nice for her, people think she’s leading him on. So she’s forced to decide: do I want to be intimate with him even though I don’t really like him that way, or do I choose to never talk to him again. What should she do? More times than not, this ends up with the girl having to cut off the budding friendship/romance with the boy and, therefore, losing an opportunity for both of them to gain a new friend.

Boys need to understand that they should treat a woman with respect regardless of what he’s getting out of it and that doing things for women does not mean they will like him. I firmly believe that a man should be the suitor of a girl and pursue her; however, if she decides she just isn’t very compelled by him, then she isn’t a horrible person. The guy who takes this girl and bashes her, though, is. Rather than forcing a girl into an unfair and oftentimes awkward situation, a guy should be forced to man up. If a girl doesn’t like him and he cannot handle being around her without falling deeper, he should give some space to the relationship, and then at a later point they can become friends-actual real friends.