Why do we have to friend someone in order to send them mail?
It's not a reciprocal thing, which could serve as a sort of spam filter—that, I can kind of understand a rationale for. But it's just pro forma: I must make someone my one-way buddy in order to send them mail. There's no burden to it, and also no benefit. I can send the message and then unfriend immediately after.
So, what's the point of it?
What harm would come of doing away with it?
As far as I can tell, right now it's just an extra bureaucratic step with at best vestigial use.
If the requirement were changed, then the people I friend would actually be BUDDIES, other glitchen I actually know and whose doings/feed/snaps I'm interested in having on my home page.