What is the difference between being a girlfriend and being friends with benefits? Is it really meaningful or important nowadays?

Well, one is a casual relationship and the other is committed. Being someone’s girlfriend means exclusivity on both sides, while friends with benefits are free to see (and sleep with) other people. So its something that should be done at a cool emotional temperature.

The problems arise when the emotional temperature rises too high, and one of the FWB wants more than just a casual relationship. This is rarely the man: once a man makes a girl into his FWB, he is unlikely to see her as girlfriend material.