I’m straight. I would say that I had a mixture of 60% male and 40% female friends, but an equal amount of acquaintances in either gender. While I had crushes like almost every grade, the idea that “you can’t be friends with the opposite gender” was never instilled in me, and luckily my family never did the “sexualized teasing” where they’d ask about my “girlfriends” or “dates” when I was just a kid, and cooties never really caught on at my school.

I also don’t think it’s your fault or any individual guy’s fault if a girl automatically thinks you’re hitting on them even if you’re just trying to be friends. I imagine most of them have experienced some outright dangerous situations with men and choose to be more cautious. It’s also not always about hostility, sometimes it’s just having uncomfortable experiences; I mean, whom amongst us have not misinterpret basic human kindness and attention from a girl as her falling in love with us?

It’s patriarchy, sure, but specifically it’s because we are rarely taught how to express or process any emotions from within or from others lol. We basically have to navigate it ourselves and many of our misconceptions are never addressed. And maybe you were taught those things or learned it, but unfortunately other people’s upbringing and mindsets will also affect our relationships without ever even meeting us.