No one is allowed to have feelings anymore, for fear that they might get hurt. That’s the point vlogger Nicole Arbour wants to make in her new video called “Why Dating Is Fu*cked.”
What seems like many decades ago for some, courtship — taking your time to get to know someone, developing feelings, and expressing those feelings — once led to romance, and yes, sometimes heartache. This was dating.
But there’s very little dating happening in today’s society it seems. But what do we make of that? We can’t simply look at the past and say “well things are different now and that’s bad.” Instead we reflect on this as dating and relationships is obviously a big part of the human experience and important for many.
It seems a fear of dating is leading to a world where dating may cease to exist altogether. Some of us have become so afraid of the highs and lows of love that we prefer to “Netflix and Chill,” to casually online date. We swipe left or right based on appearance, sharing photos of potential dating profiles with our friends as we indulge in a good looking, or what we think is unfortunate looking, visage. We don’t meet anyone’s parents anymore. We have one night stands. Is this the natural evolution of modern dating? Or have we fallen out of touch with each other?
What Happened To Communication?
There is such a lack of communication that we are becoming increasingly insecure about who we are, and who will like us. We play games with potential partners by pretending we don’t like them in order to get them to like us.
We fear that if they were to act on their feelings by texting, calling, writing a letter, knocking on their front door, we would be considered clingy and crazy. And so we are left to make and break plans, ignore one another, stare at our phone screens hoping they ask to hang out at 3 in the morning because we know better than to expect a dinner date.
This is not the reality for everyone, of course. Many of us may find this emerging trend doesn’t resonate, and still value communication, connection, and intimacy. Despite technological advances and societal shifts away from interpersonal communication, we still find solace in holistic and historical approaches of good old fashioned dating, of sexual philosophies that practice intimacy and patience, of putting down the phone and picking up someone’s hand instead. But we are becoming a minority.
So this begs the questions: are we heading down a healthy path?
Ultimately it appears we can use dating as a way to understand social dynamics, lack of connection and the unfortunate path we seem to be heading down. By thinking about and feeling this out critically, we can learn a lot about ourselves, other people and ultimately create more self awareness.
Many believe dating is supposed to be filled with communication. If people aren’t interested in someone anymore, they should sit that person down and talk about it. But in our disconnected world, many of us are too afraid to let someone down, to watch them be hurt on their account, and so we simply run away. We “ghost” another person, so to speak.
Some have become so disconnected that they have no idea how to treat themselves or other people properly. This problem is pushing out dating filled with connection and intimacy for something filled with fear and insecurity.
Below is Nicole Arbour sharing her controversial but thought provoking opinions of modern dating. *She does swear a lot for those who may be watching this at work* What do you think?
via Collective - Evolution