A poll on love in friendships

[flamingsword]

Poll #34231 Philia: friendship-love

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 17

View Respondents

Do you love your friends?

View Answers

Yes
17 (100.0%)

No
0 (0.0%)

All of your friends?

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Yes!
9 (52.9%)

No, not really.
8 (47.1%)

In your understanding, do MOST people love their friends?

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Yes
12 (70.6%)

No
5 (29.4%)

Comments

[sabethea]

I love all my friends because I have precious few, really, and anyone who has stuck around in my life (whether virtually or in meat space) is someone I love dearly and who very much deserves my love.

I guess people I’d term as “friendly acquaintances” I don’t love in the same way because I don’t know them well enough to (say people on here I have mutual follows with but we rarely swap comments). But I wouldn’t call them “friends” in the same way I would you, or various others on here i know much better, or my old school friends.

Otoh, if I asked Jay if he loved his friends, he’d give me a look as if I’d lost the plot and say something like “I don’t really love anyone outside family” (to which I’d no doubt say “and not them some of the time” but that’s beside the point). Either that or he’d say he doesn’t have friends, which isn’t true, just “fellow fencers”.🤺 So I answered “no” to the last, as you also didn’t define whether you meant “all of” or “some of” your friends, which might make a difference to many people’s answers to that (I’m sure my sisters would both say “ some of them”.)

[flamingsword]

Thank you for your nuanced take! I was talking to nyyki, and she was saying she has friends she doesn’t love and that is honestly baffling to me? So I want to see how common it is for people to call what you term “friendly acquaintances” as friends that they don’t love.

[minoanmiss]

I guess people I’d term as “friendly acquaintances” I don’t love in the same way because I don’t know them well enough to (say people on here I have mutual follows with but we rarely swap comments). But I wouldn’t call them “friends” in the same way I would you, or various others on here i know much better, or my old school friends.

This is how I feel too. In fact this wonderful question reminds me of the experience of getting close enough to someone to realize I have come to love them and they are truly my friend.

[flamingsword]

Isn’t it a life affirming feeling? Now that you know someone well enough to realize that they are such a person that the world is made better for their existence in it?

[dhampyresa]

If I don't love them they're not my friend? They can be someone I'm friendLY with but not friends.

[flamingsword]

See, I am the same way. I can have friendly acquaintances that I don’t love yet, and I can have people that I know well enough to decide that that’s all they’ll ever be. But … “Friend” in my mind has a specific meaning of trust and love and reciprocal agreements of care. If I don’t love someone I don’t feel right leaning on them, and if I can’t lean on them - if their existence is not part of what keeps my ground steady - then how can they be a friend?