Last year the Daily Jolt posted a simple poll, asking, "Are you sexually satisfied?" Out of 1,039 Brown users, 69 percent voted "No." Surprised?
Of course not. Dating is harder to find at Brown than a C-average. But what's the problem? Who's to blame? And is that hottie single? (Yes, but s/he doesn't want to get too involved with anyone right now.)
This column discusses what ails Brown's dating scene, but even talking about it has somehow become taboo. Casual dating hasn't really been at the center of campus conversation since the Herald comics of Will Newman '04. For the underclassmen who missed it, Newman's humor was like this: "I hooked up with this chick last night. I was touching her left breast, which was fine. Then I touched her right one, and she slapped my hand away! So let's recap: Left breast, OK; right breast, waiting for marriage."
Newman graduated - and then nothing. No sexual tension. Comics about penguins and vague mafia conspiracies. Dating op-eds about being resigned to singlehood. Coitus columnists in post- whose articles were more middle school sex ed than "Sex in the City." And now only one in 10 Brown males on the Facebook are brave enough to openly want "Random Play." Roger Williams would be mortified: We've become raging Puritans!
What killed the dating on campus? Perhaps we're missing our playboys of yore - guys like Ted Turner '60 who allegedly got the royal boot for "fraternizing" with a female student. Perhaps we're made prudish by our collective mom, Ruth Simmons, who seems an asexual foil to the dapper pose struck by ex-prez Vartan Gregorian (and Gordon Gee's so-bad-he's-good persona). Maybe as a campus we've become less chic: Half the first-years meet online before August, the secret society has a Web site, and the donkey on the SciLi sailed away. And did any milestone declass us more than The Gap's descent into City Sports?
Whatever the cause, our dating scene lies fallow. And so we're stuck with the next best thing - loud parties and drunk hookups. No wonder we have five - five! - Facebook groups for awkward people. As a campus we are sexually frustrated, and the only ones doing anything about it that I know of are the athletic teams, the co-ed fraternities and Perkins.
Oh, and that Daily Jolt guy who posts on Saturday nights to see if any fine lady wants to "cuddle with a buff sophomore." Keep on soldiering, good sir. You inspire us all.
Generally speaking, Brown students are either in a relationship, date a lot (sketchy!) or are sexually frustrated (and awkward). Therefore, other than students in a serious relationship or recovering from one, everyone at Brown can be thought of as either "sketchy" or "awkward." Each one of us. Which one are you?
As you grapple with that flawless logic, recall that our main question is "Dating: WTF?" Since Herald dating columns are famous for promoting ridiculous heteronormative theories, let's have some fun. We'll work with the 80/20 Principle, which says that 80 percent of "resources" will go to 20 percent of the participants. There are lots of examples. Twenty percent of the population controls 80 percent of national income. 80 percent of a doctor's time is spent on 20 percent of her patients. And 20 percent of beer drinkers drink 80 percent of all beer. If this is you, Thirsty Von Swigs-a-lot, you're not invited to my kegger.
Perhaps this principle describes which Brown students are using up all your RC's condoms. Looking from a male perspective at the heterosexuals who actually date a lot, it seems that a small number of guys are the ones who are very successful with women; a limited minority of men are doing all the dating. So I posit an 80/20 theory that at Brown - outside of serious relationships - 20 percent of all guys date 80 percent of all women. Think of all the straight guys you know, and then estimate how many of them date a lot. Exactly 20.0 percent, right?
Close enough. The point is that the Brown dating scene is the domain of way too few men. Some call them "players," and they're more controversial than a minority orientation program. Can anything be done about our hanky-panky haves and have-nots? If dating is concentrated in the hands of a privileged male elite, can Brown students redistribute this wealth and deproblematize these power structures?
Not bloody likely. Scientists like Dr. David Buss who study human mating tell us that many female animal species choose males by finding the ones with the most other females attracted to him - and that women are often the same. The 80/20 Dating Principle may simply be evolutionary, and evolution is notoriously hard to change without the consent of a local school board.
Besides, to some extent college dating will probably always stink because it's optional. The random hookup scene is often the first choice, with dating being the funky alternative. Thus the final suspects in The Case of the Missing Dating Scene include competition, evolution and an awkward campus majority. Until Encyclopedia Brown arrives to unmask the true villain, we're stuck just talking about it. But perhaps that's exactly what we ought to be doing.
Andrew K. Stein '06 is a potluck of one.
