Date for date’s sake

People, you got to wait a week before you hear from me. No point in bombarding my inbox with requests. It’s getting out of control.
Okay, I am wide awake now and any semblance of illusions about my popularity has vanished.

While on a mission to kill time, lying down on my bed with boredom my only company, I was religiously switching channels hoping to find something interesting, entertaining while at the same time intellectually stimulating. That’s when I found this show that offered all the ingredients to fight boredom with a huge dose on the entertainment quotient.

The show aptly titled as “Next” is a show where aspiring “daters” get a chance to date a hunk/babe (depending on your orientation). The “date” gets to evaluate all the “daters”; all five of them before he/she can pick someone to go on a second date. The rest are, yeah you guessed it right -“Next-ed”. The rejected ones don’t go home dejected as they get paid proportionally to the length of time one spends with the “date”. Not a bad deal huh!

The show of course has its fair share of reality TV antics with back slapping, scheming, and generous displays of anger and use of bad language. How else will an audience be able to relate to such a show? Also, how long can someone watch some random person go on a date with an even more random person.

Since I mentioned that I was looking for something that was intellectually stimulating as well, I sure was disappointed when after just two minutes into the show, I realized that the chances of me achieving my objective was one in a million, worse than even my chances of getting into Harvard Business School.

I also realized that the intellectual element had to come from within and that I was only a moron to expect it even after reading a brief description of the show on the channel guide. So I set out thinking about the whole dating exercise.

Dating is a cultural issue and so the perspective of each is a product of their culture. Of course it is a given that the process of getting to know a person is sure helped by spending time with them. And so from that angle, the concept of dating is indeed relevant. In fact there are some other tremendous advantages to the exercise as well. Like one of the survey conducted by a website in UK concluded that dating promotes healthier living. Going out on dates acts as the stimulus to shed those few extra pounds and brings about the realization that one needs to become more aware of how they look.

“The happy anticipation of a date will also produce a cocktail of "happy hormones" also known as endorphins. As well as creating feelings of wellbeing, euphoria and bliss, they also boost our immune system and are anti-aging” says the report.

Any health conscious individual would be upbeat after reading this especially since your workout regimen involves going out on dates, but then would a ludicrous excuse of wanting to stay in shape warrant the need to date?

An even more appalling concept is that of blind dates. Agreed it’s a fun thing to do. Fun, when it’s done once in a while. I know a friend of mine that goes on these random dates every week and right through the week, I am subjected to the highest degree of torture-listening to her escapades each time. I also know one that once told me she was going on a date because the girl in the pink tank top four rows away from her in her math class went on one! Surely, going out on dates just because it makes you look cool in front of your peers is only lunacy personified.

Read “I Kissed Dating Good-Bye” by Joshua Harris which discusses the pitfalls of dating and you will know what I am talking about. You will realize the rewards of waiting for romance. Dating is not the elixir to find the love of your life, it is only a medium and should be left at that.

What also came as a surprise was to know that there is a thriving industry revolving around this dating phenomenon. There are numerous websites that say they give you tips on how to find a date, behave when on a date and also what do to after a date. The NY Times also carried an article this past week about dating in which a website http://www.dontdatehimgirl.com/home/index.html was mentioned which carries posts from women about dreadful men they have dated. It bills itself as an informational site dedicated to outing sleazy men who lie to prospective partners about their personal characteristics, their resume and their marital status.

So much hoopla about dating...sad.

God Bless


And of course I “Next-ed” the show after the eleventh minute after I found out its concept only to switch channels to find another where the date gets to date the dater’s mom to select the right girl/boy ! No wonder it is said reality (TV) bites- actually shocks!