Were Ross and Rachel really on a break?

“We were on a break” became the 5 words that hot super hyped up during and even after the 10 year long series of “F.R.I.E.N.D.S”. This twist came in between the romance of Ross played by David Schwimmer and Rachel played by Jennifer Aniston. The “we were on a break” refers, to the were-they-or-weren’t-they conundrum between Ross Geller and Rachel Green after the two lobsters’ found themselves in a situation where Rachel was of the opinion that Ross cheated on her after a “fight” whereas Ross was of the opinion that it was not a fight but a “breakup” after Rachel asked him “for a break” during an argument.

It’s a weirdly thin line that separates a “break” and a “break-up”, but Rachel can technically get off from blame here by pointing out that she didn’t outright break up with Ross. Sure, she didn’t confirm to Ross what “a break” actually meant, but it’s not like Ross stuck around for more than two seconds after she’d said those words. Maybe she could have explained it better had he not bailed.

Ross, who claimed to think he and Rachel had just broken up and she fell straight into the arms of her colleague Mark, slept with Chloe (the girl from the photocopy shop) and launched the endless argument over whether he was justified in doing so by the fact that they were, in fact, “on a break” and it wasn’t just a fight or an argument.

And to support this argument, Ross himself did not really help his case the following morning. He initially denied any wrongdoing. He could even have brazenly claimed that, since he thought they were broken up, he was free to pursue any woman. As he did agree with Rachel that he did a terrible thing by hooking up with another woman, though, it does put the blame on Ross.

Yes, he did play this card when they had their break-up argument, but it was only as a thin cover, before he went on his knees and begged Rachel to forgive him for not being true to her. Most people would just see this as an admission of guilt over being unfaithful.

The phrase of “we were on a break” had a recurring appearance through the following episodes often in an irritating manner and it wasn’t just used by Ross or Rachel but also by the other members of the friend circle.

Having given the background of where and why the phrase took birth, I am actually siding with Rachel here. A fight or a mere argument between two people in a relationship cannot be taken as a break up and it definitely does not give any of the parties a chance to move onto someone else. I also think that even though Rachel was pissed at what Ross had done, she was also hurt by the fact that it did not take him more than a few hours to do what he had done and completely disrespected the relationship he shared with Rachel. Even if they in fact had broken up, moving on seemed like quite an easy job for Ross.

What do you think of this? Were they or were they not on a break?