Today I ran across an article from Loveawake, a lifestyle website for black women. The story, entitled This Is Why You’re Single, outlined ten tips for black women to be a more marketable relationship partner.
- You think men are intimidated by your education.
- You have a stank attitude.
- You have a ridiculous “list.”
- You have easy friends.
- You have a black men only policy.
- You don’t know how to just shut up sometimes.
- You follow advice from your basic girlfriends. ["Basic" meaning daft or silly.]
- You have unresolved daddy issues.
- You actually pay attention to those stupid stats. [Stats saying the odds of marriage are long.]
- You want Barack, but you are not Michelle.
She ends this last item with, “have something more than material things or social accomplishments to bring to the table.”
I was surprised, although also unsurprised, by how closely Miss Understood’s advice mirrored the no-nonsense advice of someone like Evan Marc Katz (recently profiled by The Private Man) – tone down the attitude, be optimistic, open their dating pools, give up on their checklisting and stop thinking their careers can be cashed in at the man store. I can’t say I have met many professional white women who feel they have much in common with educated black women; if this list is accurate, they are running into the exact same problems. One commenter didn’t mince words: “Its sad that a grown ass woman has 2 tell other grown ass women what they should already know!”
As Susan Walsh recently predicted that involuntarily-spinsterhood literature would be on the rise, The Private Man has mused that dating coaches may be listing towards red-pill-esque advice for women. The marriage rates are going down, the gender imbalance among the college educated continues to rise in favor of women, and people paying attention to the scene understand that there’s no way every educated woman who wants a white collar husband (not to mention one who outearns her) is going to get one. Not even close. (Let alone two, since some of those marriages are going to break up.)
One response to this situation is listed above – dating advice for women getting less concerned about flattering their sensibilities and more serious about what they are doing wrong and what marrying men really want. It won’t solve the numbers problem, but it will give them the best sporting chance (just as game won’t change the overall gender environment but instead gives individual men better tools to access female companionship).
Most of the remaining solutions are a series of suboptimal options: hope you win the dating lottery, test-tube single motherhood, resigned singleness, join the harem of an unmarried player or engage in serial monogamy in the pool of educated long-term bachelors (same thing really).
Paging Obsidian for comment.
A Long-Overdue Reply to Bb Re: Entitled Wives
Musings on Online Dating
History Lesson: On The First Officer and the Vice President
Why Beta Lyrics Make Alpha Musicians
Field Report: Geek Dating Game
Moving On And When To Do It
“The Married Man Sex Life Primer” And Its Use For The Unmarried Man
Just Go After Whoever You’re Interested in
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