Anonymous · 3mo
Hello. Something I've begun to notice when watching anime is that, it often feels like the word 親友 comes up a lot when it feels like there's some kind of romantic subtext, especially between two female characters. I've started to wonder if the word has been used as kind of a euphemism, for when the creators can't just put romantic implications right on the surface. But I don't have anything to go on except my own hunches and interpretations. Do you think there's something to this, or is it just wishful thinking?
By itself, the word doesn't have any romantic implications per se, so just because you see the word 親友 doesn't necessarily mean there's some subtext that's being swept under the rug. The easiest way to think about it is that it's analogous to the phrase "being close with someone" in English.
However, as with pretty much everything, context is very important! Even in English, there's things like the difference between "I love you (because you're my one and only soulmate)" and "I love you (because you just did me a huge favor and I'm saying this because I appreciate you being a lifesaver)". So if you see someone describing a friend as their 親友, it may be in the sense that they want to distinguish it from the other words they could have used to call them a friend, such as 友達 (a "friend" in the sense that it's someone you enjoy hanging out with on a daily basis), 仲間 (a "friend" in that you're in the same boat regarding something or are like-minded), 知り合い (a "friend" in that you're just generally acquainted but may not know each other that closely), and so on and so forth. In contrast, while the word 恋人 technically means "a subject of romantic interest", it could easily refer to someone you have a crush on because they're attractive but don't actually know that well.
For someone to be a 親友, it has to be someone you have a meaningful emotional connection with, as in the kind of person you'd be willing to sit down and have a real heart-to-heart talk with. So it probably crops up in romantic or romantically-loaded situations a lot because that's also the kind of relationship lovers or potential lovers should ideally have. (Think in the sense that a lot of advice about romantic relationships will say that your partner should also be your friend.) I can definitely imagine a creator not wanting to call a relationship explicitly romantic and thus going for 親友 because that's how they can invoke emotional closeness without being firm about it, but I also don't think it would be that unusual to see a couple describing each other as 親友 in a situation where they want to make clear "we're not just dating out of attraction, we truly understand each other." So whether the usage is euphemistic or whether it's just saying how it is would depend on context.
