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A few weeks ago I went to a party for a friend of mine, and I met a woman at the party, and I met up with her this week for a sort of get to know you/networking sort of chat.
After meeting her, it really had me thinking a lot about friendships.
For a little perspective, I grew up in white middle class suburbia (I am black) so by default, I have always had diverse friends. The woman I met has a fairly similar upbringing to mine in most ways, and her parents are fairly similar to mine in upbringing and experiences too. So we had lots in common from that perspective.
But we had extremely differing philosophies on life and friendships, I found after spending more time talking to her.
I pick friends based loosely on similar attitudes and temperament. Some of my share ethnicity or religion. Some of us don't. Sometimes we share interests or taste in music or hobbies. Sometimes we don't. Some like camping and outdoorsy stuff. I hate that stuff. Some people like techno, some people like indie music and some people like soul music.
In college, I ended up making friends from all over, 1st gen Americans, people studying abroad, long time americans, hyphenated-americans, recent immigrants, really whoever unless of course they were the type who wasn't interested in making different types of friends.
The most critical thing my friends have in common is curiosity about how the world works. And a love for trying new things. My friends aren't very diverse from a class perspective, but are culturally and ethnically diverse. But overall, we really don't have a lot "in common" per se, other than liking to try new types of food.
But for this woman I met, the most important thing for her was really sharing a cultural and ethnic identity as a black american. And even more critical, being an active member in the black community and making and effort to improve it. These are all great goals (and good things to base a friendship on) but her philosophy also excludes any connection to "other cultures" in her personal life. She works in a corporate, largely white environment. She obviously has white acquaintances from all phases of her life, but for her being white (or asian or whatever) would take away from her goals in her personal life so she likes to stay divested from anything non-black. Almost like a black supremacist if you will (in her personal life).
It was really enlightening and interesting to me, so I thought I'd ask, what do your friendships look like? I don't have any friends like that. Most grew up having lots of types of friends, or started to appreciate when they got older, or grew up somewhere were there was only one dominant culture, so coming to the US made everything new.
So what is it like in your life? Do you strive to make all types of friends? Is it something that isn't on your radar at all? Or is it something that you haven't had an opportunity to do? Something you are starting to do?
After all the discussions on interracial dating, a discussion on interracial and intercultural friendships seemed appropriate.
I USE to have a lot of very diverse friends. My most recent closest circle being an arabic, spanish, and an asian female (half chinese half vietnamese). On campus, my closest circle was a black female from Haiti who spent most of her high school years in mexico, a white female, and an asian girl (korean). In my nursing school now, my closest circle is a white female, an indian male, and a hispanic female.
After college and through most of my 20s, most of my friends were Asian. Most of the girls I dated were Asian. It wasn't that I was necessarily racist. I would and did hang out with other races if I met them at work or through friends. I just tended that way because I thought that would give me the least path of resistance in terms of meeting more friends and good women (similar to your friend I guess).
That was a crock. A lot of Asian American guys are serious d@uchebags and most Asian American girls are not too down to Earth.
In my late 20s, I started playing in bands and mingling with a more diverse crowd. At that point, I was proactive about hanging with a more diverse crowd. Then I went to grad school and my friends ran the gamut of all races.
I have a girlfriend now and she is Latina. So now, I'm really open to hanging with any type of race or ethnicity just as long as they're good folk.
However, it seems to me that most people kind of want their own for their close circle. I mean, when I look at my white coworkers facebook pages, almost all of their friends are white. Mine is a veritable mix. It doesn't seem others make too much of an effort to branch out and make friends outside of their comfort zone. Some kind of do. But most don't. And I live in the NYC area too.
I know a lot of people and I can always call some one to hang out. However, true friendships are a different story. Of my closest friends, meaning people that would be in my wedding or atleast go to my bachelor party are 5 black dudes, 1 latin, 1 jewish, and 1 asian. Interesting enough, I only have latin female friends--but they are not as clost to me as my buddies.
I wonder how many of you have friends that are gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender?
Just curious.
Well, Mr. Park, being that gays are only about 10% of the population, you have to give us straights the benefit of the doubt on that one. We have a lesbian friend and we "know" a couple of her friends.... they all seem like good people, never had an issue with them.
I wonder how many of you have friends that are gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender?
Just curious.
My best female friend is a lesbian latina. I have to admit, I had to work hard to be friends with her, because I think with lesbians, they would prefer to have female friends.
My friends are pretty diverse culturally, ethnically, in terms of sexual orientation, in terms of religiosity, and in terms of interests.
Probably the least diversity by far among my friends lies in the fact that the vast majority are politically left-leaning. I do have conservative friends, but my closest friendships are definitely slanted toward the socially liberal.
I grew up in Atlanta, Ga until I was 15 up until then I have many friends of different colors, sex ,etc. Most of us grew up in broken homes. These days most of my friends are of the same race, not by choice mind you I just tend to hang out with a small group of friends & we're very close. These days I have more gay,bi friends then I did growing up. Out of all my friends I do believe I am the only one who was raised on the streets most of them had a good education & came from decent homes. What we do have in common is that our home life wasn't as good as it should have been. All our parents were divorced. & treated the dog better. Living out west I had more friends who was culturally different then what I was used to when I was young. As far as religion goes we all pretty much believe the same thing expect my best friend and he is
evangelical Chrisitan, the rest of us are pagan for the most part. Religions is hardly brought up between us seeing that we all accept each other as they are & as they believe.
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