Shut up, everyone, about the end of courtship

What a splendidly hypocritical way for me to come back to the blogosphere. Scolding relationship/dating experts who are desperately seeking page views, shares and retweets. But this topic has been weighing on me for some time and I wanna talk about it, dammit.

I’m completely disheartened by all the hookup culture/end of courtship talk. I know I’ve been in a relationship for over a year so it may seem that all of this should matter little to me. Especially considering we didn’t have a real, take-me-out-to-dinner date until a few weeks into our romance. But it makes me sad to think that singles everywhere are being told to put aside any expectations they have about dating and put up with inconsiderate, non-committal behavior.

It seems to be a byproduct of the constant lectures about being too available to the people we’re attracted to combined with new technology, stunted maturity and media that portrays hookup-only dating as the norm. But I’m not sure it is the norm, just because Girls says it is.

Just as “we accept the love we think we deserve” the same goes for the initial stages of that love. And the dating life we deserve/want looks different from individual to individual so it’s really a matter of finding someone whose expectations align with your own. If you want to be wined, dined, pursued and made to feel special, that’s exactly what you should demand.

That doesn’t necessarily mean writing off someone the second they send you a text at 10 p.m. asking if you care to meet up with a group rather than the one-on-one date you’d prefer. It’s about communicating those preferences. It’s your job to make what you want clear to a prospective partner. It’s their job to step up and comply or step down and leave you open to find someone who can.

I know it’s never that simple. Lonely people make concessions they shouldn’t. Deviant people make promises they have no intention of ever keeping. But at least acknowledging that not everyone—male or female—desires to be a part of the hookup culture is a step in the right direction. There are no real norms in this world. Especially when it comes to dating. So it’s a mistake to think you have to accept something that makes you unhappy or uncomfortable just because it’s “the norm” according to some relationship trend piece in a publication that will denounce the trend a year from now in favor of more traditional dating norms. Because, you know, vintage!

The older I get (a year and a half from 30 so I’m basically as wise as I’ll ever be) the more I shake off the expectations and norms I’m supposed to embrace so I can focus on what’s going to make me happy, healthy and well adjusted. And buying into every shocking new fad that crosses my computer screen threatens that happiness more than anything. 

I’m Baaack Or At Least Some Version of Me Is

It’s official. I’m that girl. The one who abandons all her (imaginary) friends when she gets a boyfriend. I didn’t really want to abandon you. Things just got so busy and… The truth of the matter is writing a blog about being single, dating and relationships is a bit of a challenge when you’re in a relationship. Especially when the blog is ostensibly unfiltered. I was faced with pushing out disingenuous posts or revealing too much about someone who wasn’t choosing to have his worst qualities broadcasted on the Internet. (Because let’s face it, no one wants to read about how sweet, cute, talented someone’s boyfriend is. We want dirt!) Plus, given my reactionary nature and the way I use writing to work through my frustrations, I would likely want to take back 75 percent of the posts the day after they were published. Especially the one entitled “Pick Up Your Socks: A Tale of Why My Boyfriend is the Worst Human Being On The Planet.”

Instead of taking either of these paths, I took none. I sat in a stalemate and did nothing. This became an even bigger problem because I missed it. As I said, writing is an outlet for me. A form of therapy. When I’m going through things and I’m not writing, my emotions get all tangled up into a big ball of stress. I could just write for me, but blogging provides some level of structure and discipline that forces me to put words on the page and get it all out in the open. If I can’t pretend I have people waiting to read my brilliant words, I am not as likely to produce anything. Especially if the product is going to force me to take an uncomfortable look at something I’m doing.

I considered breaking it off with the boy in order to continue writing about being single. But that wouldn’t be authentic either. It would make more sense to adapt the blog to my life rather than my life to the blog. (Ok I would never seriously make major life decisions based on a blog… unless someone wants to turn it into a book and move me to NYC… any takers?)

So I must continue writing. And I must continue this relationship for as long as it’s healthy and makes me happy (and makes him happy too I suppose). I’m not entirely sure what form future posts will take. I imagine the relationship will become fodder on some level, but I’m not going to throw it all out there because it’s not solely my story to share anymore. As always, I will offer up unsolicited opinions about general relational topics and analyze friends’ situations (using made up names of course). I do promise not to publish (too many) “I lurve my boyfriend so much and all other people should be as lucky as I am” posts. As I go through this redefinition process, I’m completely open to (nicely stated) suggestions. So speak up!  

Hear No Evil See No Evil Post No Evil

Last week Cheaterville.com was in the “news” for a sketchy ad they had designed to apparently warn the celebrities of the Toronto Film Festival against stepping out on their significant others between indie screenings and Q and A sessions. The concept of the site is similar to the original intent of Dontdatehimgirl.com, before they gave over to pressure (and, seemingly, human decency). Basically when someone feels they’ve been wronged by a cheating spouse/girlfriend/boyfriend/unusually close pet, they take to the site to rant in horrific detail about the transgressions of the trollop/whatever the male version of a trollop is. Best of all they get to include pictures and a detailed description of the cheater including height, weight, location, ethnicity and sign—the FBI doesn’t have files this extensive.

CHEATER! Of course he is; look at that vile facial hair

I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before this site goes the way of Don’t Date Him Girl and Don’t Date Her Dude and whatever other potentially libelous sites have fallen before them. In all honesty, it’s mildly amusing to think someone who committed such a terrible offense could be called out so publicly. But that’s only on a surface level. Upon contemplating the potential affects a site like this could have, the punishment doesn’t really fit the crime. Yeah, cheating sucks. But oftentimes the cuckold/whatever the female version of a cuckold is says a lot of things when the wounds are fresh that they may regret in time. But ranting on these sites is like letting a herd of kittens loose in the wild; you aren’t getting those suckers back (aw). And you aren’t going to unsay anything on the Internet.

Plus there is the fact that you can basically post whatever you want regardless of whether or not it is rooted in truth. Even if the defamed party implores them to remove the post they won’t. They simply instruct the individual to go directly to the person who posted it and work it out with them. 

So if vindictive little Sally gets ticked off at Susie, she can fabricate a story about Susie’s trampy little heart and post it on the site. Or perhaps Susie turned Broseph down one time too many, so he decides to get back at her with a particularly unsavory and untrue post. (Man, poor Susie is developing quite the unearned reputation.) Granted there is paragraph after paragraph of legal language that is supposedly designed to prevent such lies from being posted. But honestly, if a person is willing to post detailed lies (or sordid truths for that matter) about someone on a site designed to completely destroy their reputation, are they really going to stop to wade through the legalese? And how much is that going to hold up in court if someone does decide to go after them?

I’m sure they’ve got that all worked out with their lawyers. After all, the site’s creator wouldn’t be stupid enough to risk his reputation as upstanding dot com businessman, right? Whatever, he explains it all here by comparing the site to Facebook. In the same interview he defends the site as a tool to empower cheat victims. (He does, however, fail to defend his choice of publicity shot, but to each his own I guess.) And there may be something to this, but I don’t know that plastering someone’s face alongside their transgressions necessarily translates into power for the victims. It seems more like the perfect way to sink to revenge.

In addition to all this there is the clicker count that shows up every time a name is searched for. In my mind, this creates suspicion even if a cheat hasn’t been reported. “Why has this person been searched for? Is there someone else he’s seeing who checked? Did he cheat on someone and they searched to see if he cheated on someone else, but didn’t take the time to set up a profile?” So on and so forth. In reality, chances are it was just a curious someone like me poking around by entering various friends’ names (sorry Jesse, Matt and Josh, you will be happy to know your records are clean though).

Then there’s the creepy way the site’s advertising creates paranoia with billboards like “65% of Adultery Victims are Women” and  “7 Out of 10 Spouses Cheat: Don’t Worry Yours Isn’t One of Them.” So basically even if you don’t find your seemingly doting lovekins on the site, chances are he still is cheating so you better keep a close eye on him.

I understand the anger and wanting to publicly warn others about some of these scummy people. But, I don’t think the skeeviness of the cheaters outweighs the skeeviness of the site itself. Because while cheating is a terrible no good very bad thing, airing it all over some site that brags about being mocked by Gawker is sketchy and trashy as hell. So don’t do it kids. Just announce it on Facebook like a classy adult.

Oh The Folly of Young Love

Many moons ago I wronged a former boyfriend egregiously. It was a confusing time in my young life and I was making some selfish, ill-informed decisions that I wish I hadn’t if only for the fact that I was kind of a jerk to aforementioned boyfriend. I re-friended this former flame on Facebook today (our paths have virtually crossed due to mutual friends and we’ve ever-so-maturely decided to let bygones be bygones) and discovered that the always-vigilant social media powerhouse had kindly saved all the messages of our past life together five years earlier. And, man, love makes me moronic.

I’ve addressed before what a nitwit I have been in my younger years. So I’m hoping that age 21 was yet another one of those periods in my life when I was just a complete idiot. Though it likely points to the fact that in five years I will look back on 26-year-old me and think, “Wow I was just full of bollocks back then.” (Because I will be British at 31.)

Worse case scenario? Being in love turns me into a complete dolt. I’m going to go with the young-moron theory because the other option just doesn’t bode well for my future in romance—plus, in my, defense I have had a relationship or two since then that didn’t involve strange attempts at dramatic discourse every time I felt a tug of love. As such I would like to say a few things to the fresh of faced overly dramatic young lass I once was and you, dear reader, shall be privy to this tongue-lashing. Huzzah!

Dear Lovely, Naïve, Stupid, Stupid Girl,

It’s come to attention that you could use a little guidance in how to deal with all these feelings that are stirring up in your underdeveloped heart these days.

Right now it may seem like a terrible offense, every time Boyfriend eschews your company in order to study especially given the long-distance nature of your relationship, but suck it up young lady. Being committed to learning is an admirable quality and while it shouldn’t take precedence over you in the grand scheme of things, sometimes you are just going to have to deal. And if you do find Boyfriend neglecting you a bit too much, go easy on him. He’s young and dumb just like you and a little gentle guidance will yield much better results than tearful accusations.

Moreover when you feel you’ve been oh-so-wronged by your dear boy, maybe don’t have those conversations over Facebook. It is not the appropriate venue for long, drawn-out and overly dramatic games of “What if…will you?” (Actually maybe don’t play that game at all.) Not only will you get nothing accomplished, but the seemingly permanent Internet vault will bring these messages back to haunt and embarrass you in a future life. Plus, there is the creepy, stalk-factor of Facebook now. It lacks the capabilities in your current time, but eventually the omnipotent social network is going to start recommending counselors and relationship books based on your arguments.

Probably the biggest lesson you will learn in the fiasco that your fickle young heart is going to cause involves intentions of friendly guys who vie for your attention no matter how attached you are. Just because Friendly Charmer insists that he admires the relationship you have with Boyfriend and that he thinks Boyfriend himself is quite cool, doesn’t mean he’s not trying to get with you. He is. No matter how much you insist that he’s just being friendly. He’s not. He wants you and he will break you up with Boyfriend to get you. And Friendly Charmer will turn out to really, really suck. That’s not to say that you and Boyfriend should stay together. Or that you will want to take back the entire awful relationship you have with Friendly Charmer. It will shape you in more ways than you can possibly understand at the time, even though it broke you for a time. You will live, learn, grow and all that other crap that’s supposed to make suffering worth it in the end. No, that course of events was quite all right in terms of the master plan. It’s how you handled the transition that should have been reconsidered.

Just because Boyfriend is incredibly trusting and doesn’t question your friendship with Friendly Charmer doesn’t mean it’s ok for you to string him along while you figure out what you want. That’s disrespectful and unacceptable. It’s going to hurt Boyfriend and Friendly Stranger. Neither of whom deserve it, especially not Boyfriend. You will regret how selfish you were and in the end it won’t be worth the additional time you bought to make up your mind. You will convince yourself that by taking the time to make sure you want to be with Friendly Stranger rather than flip flopping after the decision is made, you will be doing the right thing. You are wrong. You are lying to yourself and you are lying to trusting boyfriend. Don’t do it.

Lastly, cutesy nicknames are not endearing. They are annoying and so embarrassing. You will never want to explain to someone how you decided to call Boyfriend, Schnookums, Pookie or Butterbottom in daily conversation. So don’t put it in writing. Old-fashioned ones like Darling, Dollface and Kitten are ok.

Sincerely A Wiser, but Still Hopelessly Flawed, you.

Courting in the Age of Social Media

My generation has become obsessed with Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, blogging, etc. It is a fantastic thing to be able to maintain contact with our friends and catch up with old classmates, but perhaps we should consider what it is doing to our romantic relationships. There are an infinite number of angles from which to view this phenomenon but the one that intrigues me most is what it does to the get-to-know you process in the beginning of a relationship.

A person can learn more about a potential partner with a visit to his or her Facebook page than they would discover with a two weeks’ worth of dates. My blog offers a more intimate view of my inner workings than I ever reveal to people I’ve just begun dating.

Does social media hinder or help the dating process? In my view it is detrimental. The discovery period is the best part of a relationship. Social media takes the mystery out of the beginning stages and could also cause premature judgments to be passed. When a person uncovers things about another individual’s past via Facebook, Twitter, etc. it does not give that individual the opportunity to explain the myriad of circumstances that inevitably lead to the decisions they made.

One stalker prowl through my page would reveal information about my past relationships, my chosen career path, who my friends are, what I like to do in my free time and what I believe in. Why even bother talking to me for the first three weeks of what would be a relationship?

So we are once again presented with the ubiquitous dilemma: do we delete our profiles so as to protect our privacy thereby cutting us off from many of the connections we’ve nurtured through social media so as to protect the mystery within our relationships? I suppose one could always reject friendship requests from potential partners, but then this would most definitely be construed as a lack of interest. That, however, is an entirely different discussion. Ultimately there is no way around it, social media has changed the dating landscape and we are just going to have to find a way to cope.