Zaku: I think a lot of it depends on what a person wants out of a relationship. If you want someone simply for a short term relationship and not expect anything else, than not being friends first could easily work…
I know from experience though that Nathan and my friendship has taken our relationship through things that very few relationships can ever make it through. When I was in the hospital so long it was such an intense strain on the relationship… but being able to have that fundamental basis that we had as friends made it so that nathan could connect with me on more levels and those levels held us together. Its hard to explain without it being much too long…
I personally would never date someone without befriending them first. Its not that I have trust issues, its just that I don’t want someone who I would break up with at the first sign of trouble.
I know that I, and most of the girlfriends that I have, are prone to using the ‘don’t want to lose you as a friend’ excuse as just that… an excuse. I don’t think that a relationship can ruin a friendship if it’s a healthy relationship. I think that’s the strong foundation to a lasting closeness.
I know that my parents (married 40 years now) were close friends before they started to date, and same goes for most of the people I know who are still together.
If you want her to date you for more than just looks or initial perception… get to really know her. Make sure she really knows you. If you’re a good pairing you should both be able to tell.
Nate never asked me out. I never asked him out. We just ended up having our friendship evolve. We were secretly attracted to each other. We got together officially at a party at my house and spent the night lying under a tree and talking. He told me a year later that the moment that he realized that he was in love with me and didn’t see me as ‘just a friend’ was when we had been sitting in the hall a week before and I had been crying about a chemistry test and he gave me a hug and as he said: “had to really convince myself to let go”.
Our friendship before than hadn’t been perfect… we built our friendship on constant debate and discussion. I was a evolutionist atheist and he was a Christian Scientist who had been raised to believe that atheists were evil. I was the first one he’d ever met, and he spent months trying to convince me that atheists were evil. In that time I convinced him that morals were possible without religion. We never had movie nights together, never went to events alone together… he dated my friends…. It was a literal friendship, but it was able to use that basis to move beyond friendship in to love.
I know that after this if I ever end up dating again that I will never date someone without being friends first.
(sorry about the ramble. If only we had multiple words for friendship to explain the types..)