I still recall the anticipation on campus leading up to Penn Date Drop’s first release in October. The dating service, introduced to Penn earlier in the fall semester, has students take an eight-minute questionnaire that results in one compatible match based on a 0% to 100% scale. Like the over 1,500 students that signed up for the service this fall, I was intrigued by the potential of finding the “perfect match” in the midst of our generation’s battle with situationships and the seeming absence of true love.
Then, two days prior to the release, Date Drop sent an email to participants stating, “We’ve got a gender gap: 98 more women signed up than men.” This gap didn’t surprise me, but its effects on the matching process did. Many women who signed up didn’t receive a romantic match and instead a “platonic” one — an option never advertised for a supposed dating platform. Out of my group of seven female friends that opened our matches together, only one of us paired with a romantic match. Shortly after, the same situation happened with Penn Marriage Pact, a similar college matching platform. It got me thinking: why are women at Penn more invested in the dating scene in comparison to the men on campus?
Universally, the target audience for dating culture is women. While sometimes direct, this messaging is often quite discreet and subliminal. The hundreds of women in rom-coms and novels whose entire plot is centered around finding “the one” or mainstream songs by female artists longing for a husband are amidst a long list of the ways society tells women that they need the right man to be fulfilled in life. At Penn, this culture is visible in who signs up for these matchmaking platforms and who doesn’t. It is the reflection of the centuries-old lesson where women are taught to prioritize romantic relationships while men are not. However, this idealized heterosexual romance is falling apart with our generation.
Singlehood, especially amongst women, has spread rampant amongst American society over the past decade. Following the COVID-19 pandemic, the percentage of single women in the 18-29 age group jumped from 38% to 45% in the span of two years. This jump signifies a change in the minds of women, particularly young women, when it comes to dating culture: they are no longer interested in the show.
Around the time of the Date Drop and Marriage Pact buzz, Chanté Joseph’s article, “Is Having a Boyfriend Embarrassing Now?,” took the world by storm. In her piece, Joseph also notes this shift in the way women are approaching dating culture; women going to great lengths to hide their boyfriends on social media or even outwardly admitting that a boyfriend brings down their “aura.” As she concluded her article, this line stuck with me: “Being partnered doesn’t affirm your womanhood anymore; it is no longer considered an achievement, and, if anything, it’s become more of a flex to pronounce yourself single.”
Joseph’s article is right to point out the shift in changing attitudes towards dating. However, this culture rooted in centuries-old tradition hasn’t disappeared overnight. While many women agree that romantic relationships could be a hindrance to their personal journey and even identity, many still feel the Titanic-esque longing for love, myself included. Given the gender gap on Penn dating services, it’s clear that many female students at Penn feel the same.
It’s safe to say that as young women on this preprofessional and competitive campus, a lot of us were the hyper-independent valedictorians, student leaders, or overachievers in high school. The thing with dating culture, though, is that it is deeply rooted in traditional gender norms, often forcing women to center their lives around male partners. Women who placed value on other pursuits, like academics or career ambitions, struggle to fit into or accept that dating culture. Still, beneath the surface, all of us are craving one thing: love.
But the solution for our yearning for love isn’t the dating algorithm platforms or, God forbid, the fraternity date nights. Love is all around us in both our existing relationships and relationships waiting to be found. We are already so loved by family, mentors, and friends. As college students there is a loving relationship to be found that is way more fulfilling than the love our dating culture advertises to us: a loving relationship with ourselves. Now is the time for us to experiment, explore, and create a full sense of security with ourselves, because that’s where true love lies.
GLORIA OLADEJO is a College first year studying law and society and Africana studies from Coopersburg, Pa. Her email is gloriao6@sas.upenn.edu.
