Interesting Article

Reading newspapers is like a box of chocolate. You never know what you are going to get. This line sounds familiar? Ok. Most people my age may not read newspapers (The Straits Times or Lianhe Zaobao. Not the Newpaper or Chinese tabloid papers, which in my opinion are more interested in maintaining readership by publishing sensational news, though these can prove to be interesting reads as well.) every day or even read newspapers for current affairs at all, preferring the web or adopting the "I got better things to do attitude" (Perhaps they do have better things to do. Who knows?). Ok. I digress. This post is not about trying to convince you to read the papers. Whether you get read the news or not, where you get your news from is none of my concern.

An article carried on "Saturday" section of The Straits Times today was about why locals are not getting dates. A perpetual problem I might say that evades the Government's efforts to solve it. No. This piece is written not by any Government agency, but by two university soon-to-be graduates. In it, they attributed this sad state of dating life as being to due 1) Leave it to Fate attitude 2) Unrealistic expectation 3) Lack of knowledge on approaching a date 4) Parents "reaping fruits of labour" when they convinced their children to concentrate on studies and work. because they (incorrectly, I might add) believed that girls would come looking for accomplished men later on 5) celebration of singlehood.

Well, I would very much like to leave it to Fate as well. Then again, things do not happen if you do not put in effort. Even for something like lottery, if you do not take the effort to mark the betting slip, you cannot expect to win even a consolation prize. (For the record, I do not encourage betting. However, I think this is a really good analogy.) Perhaps leaving to Fate has got something to do with the Korean, Japanese and especially Taiwanese idol dramas. Watch a few to get what I mean. "Fateful meeting", bickering (unusually), then ends up becoming a couple. Granted, these do happen in real life. However, thinking this is the norm in the real society is an enormous fallacy.

I supposed unrealistic expectation of a partner can also be attributed to these dramas, as purported by the article. Young people are flooded with images of beautiful/handsome specimen of both gender. They fantasize about these idols and then use them (or their on-screen persona) as yardsticks to measure real-life people. I have not met such people of course. Then again, I do not see them doesn't mean they do not exist.

Lack of knowledge on approaching date or maintaining a good relationship with your prospective partner. Hmm... seems like a problem most people would have, especially with males. There are exceptions of course. Instead of getting agencies to matchmake people, these agencies should conduct courses on how to gte a date, how to maintain a date etc etc etc. I realize that mankind has gotten on with this dating thing for centuries without need formal lessons on dating. However, let us not be egoistic and approach the problem logically. No girl/guy would fall for a guy/girl who behaves strangely/inappropriately (like confessing on the first date). Given someone is fish and expect someone to know how to cook it does not work. Maybe we need to teach someone how to cook a fish before giving him/her a fish. Ok. Maybe people are mislead by dramas which portray girl/guy attracted to intriguing guy/girl. Again, remember this is not a "rule of thumb" thing. Behaving weirdly grants you more chance of being called a weirdo (duh!) and pushes you further away from your prospective partner.

The idea of beauties will come to accomplished men. I supposed this is more of an idea of the older generation than the younger ones. This may or may not be true. In the current society, I supposed it is true that financial and social statuses are vital "criteria" in mating searching. However, they are usually not the only criteria and criteria differ depending on the individual. Better not simply rely on age-old theories of partner selection. Times change and so we have to looking around and ask ourselves, what is the current situation. We also have to remember that selection of partners may not be a logical process. Therefore, people who are deemed as better choices based on logical analyses may not end up with their desired partners. Better to review your strategy according to current reality.

Finally, celebration of singlehood. I think most people holding this idea would come to regret it at some stage of their lives. No one to celebrate an achievement, no one to share your woes. Ok, you may have friends to do that with for now. How about when they get hitched? What happens when they have children? Will they have that mich time for you? What will you do then? There are trade-offs whether in marriage or in being single. Weigh the trade-offs carefully. Think about the future you. Not the present you.

(Disclaimer: I am still single.)