Nearly a third of straight men say they want a gay best friend, a new survey has revealed.
When the online dating site gay-PARSHIP questioned Britain’s singletons, 29% of straight men said they would like to expand their social network to include a platonic gay best friend, with 25% wanting a friendship with a gay man and 32% with a lesbian.
The average Briton, says the survey, counts 4.6 people as good friends or “people they wouldn’t hesitate to call in a moment of crisis” but at the moment only 10% of straight men count a gay man or woman among their good friends. Fewer than one in 100 of them can claim more than two close gay friends.
However, two-thirds of the straight men said they would like to expand their social network in the near future, and they were not limiting their options to making friends with people of the same sex or sexuality.
Psychologist and dating expert Dr Nafsika Thalassis, said that with so many gay and straight friendships now portrayed in the media “the majority of straight men don’t feel threatened in the company of gay men and can see that genuine friendships are possible as well as rewarding.”
She added: “Although this survey shows a positive shift in the attitudes of straight men, there is still a large proportion, some 88%, who do not count a gay man among their close friends, with 35% of single men preferring to stick with a heterosexual framework.”
Gay-Parship, which describes itself as the gay arm of Europe’s largest premium online matchmaker, questioned 1,300 single adults about their relationships earlier this year.