see this is the part that gets really annoying. NOBODY said not to return the keys, NOBODY said to leave someone at a loss.
SOME people are pretty nasty toward others who try to do what is right (because they need to believe it isn’t what’s right? Then just say so like a mensch. Or maybe some people can’t handle the exchange with maturity and sensibility so they just go for nasty)
sorry, i digress –
I said i didn’t feel comfortable so i found another way. Now i’m being accused of being misguided and over chumradik. and even tho i wrote another post explaining that small exchanges DO make changes, you prefer to consider it a chumra. Fine, go ask your rav and follow accordingly. But you may not be right about it being machmir to find other ways instead.
I grew up in coed settings. we mocked all those people who said you have to stay separate. we rolled our eyes at all of these same issues, “ha ha, let his car battery die he may want to marry you if you approach him”. But do you want to be really honest? We mocked and commented on how each of us and our friends had tons of platonic relationships. We laughed at all these ‘chumras’ knowing that we each could fill a page with names of boys or girls we didn’t touch. But the HONEST truth is that very very few had a list that ONLY contained people they didn’t touch. Everyone with all these platonic relationships had at least one that wasn’t.
And as the decades have passed, many being raised in this same environment and school system are involved in much worse than we ever were. So yes, you can have a million platonic relationships with men or women throughout your lives, but when you are not thoughtful (and you can review the definition of that with your rav) about these exchanges, you will always run the risk of that one relationship that isn’t.