The culture, especially the media, around relationships with others makes people feel like they aren't allowed to have deep relationships with other people who aren't inherently going to be seen or become romantic. unless you claim quite loudly that this other person is like family to you, people are going to read into your close relationships because it's all they are bombarded with and allowed to have.
Some people are terrified of being seen as gay for whatever personal reason they may have (whether or not they actually are) and are getting deprived of a vital support system that isn't based on one person you can be close with and then family. People will side-eye you or suggest it, and sometimes it can be confusing to recognize which it is you're actually feeling for someone. It makes romantic rejection seem more horrible because to some people, friendship is lesser and weaker, and just the designation for people they aren't interested in. It is devalued by constantly being overrun time and time again in media: two lifelong friends get together, or they get into a love triangle to be forgotten and belittled once the actual love interest is introduced.
A group of friends with girls and guys MUST have them getting together by the end or otherwise, it's not as powerful. Regardless of if they would naturally want to, and that's just speaking about characters, not real people with far more depth and feelings. They "deserve" each other romantically for it to be a satisfying good end for the audience's reinforced expectations at the end of nearly every movie, book, or show. And due to the lack of representation of all sorts of relationships, you'll have people shipping friends together. While there is nothing wrong with the basis of that (wanting to try "what ifs" or just trying to see how different things would be if X and Z end up together), it shows a clear problem with the lack of value in philia in general. Or the reality of queer people also being able to have platonic or queerplatonic relationships: it's just that due to the lack of previous representation for centuries, it feels like a slight to exclude that part of their identity. Do you know how you fix that? Having more than one queer person in your media and showing them get to have all types of relationships, romantic and platonic and all the nuanced varieties. Not by just having a token queer person. This is the token woman [who has to end up with the MC and has no personality outside of that] trope all over again.
Romance is a beautiful thing that can add to your story or just a fun-to-explore aspect, not that media these days will do anything but show you the establishment of it and then try to ruin it in a sequel/consequence episodes-- it's like writers rarely know how to write a healthy, untroubled established relationship in an interesting way, but that is a whole other issue.
All that to say Romance isn't the only type of valuable love, nor is it the objective "best" outcome. And people shouldn't have to be afraid to want to be close with their friends because of society's expectations and scrutiny. You deserve more support than just the push for nuclear families. You don't have to lose friends in the name of romance.
