It’s easy to scroll through our numerous social media timelines and see complaints about the dating scene. We’ve discussed those difficulties right here on the blog. According to a recent report from a NYU professor, Scott Calloway, the ‘dating crisis’ is real. The result of more women becoming educated, means that many men who have never received formal education are being left without dating options.

Wall Street Journal recently reported that nearly 60% of college students are women. This is great news for women, not so great news for men who aren’t considering education. Women with degrees are usually looking for mates whose education level is the same or surpasses their own. Men who have difficulty staying employed and who never pursued formal education are being left out of the dating pool. Prof. Calloway believes that the lack of viable mating options for the class of men who are broke and alone, makes them a dangerous group, but I don’t believe that dating is the answer to this problem.

What Prof. Calloway is describing, is a growing number of men who are being fed by anti-women, anti-progressive rhetoric. On the internet they’re called Incels. Incel is an abbreviation for the phrase ‘involuntarily celibate’, people who self-define, as being unable to get a romantic or sexual partner despite desiring one.

There are numerous articles covering the danger and rage of incels , so why do people think providing a violent group of men a family to funnel their rage toward is a good idea?

“I don’t think men have to go to school to make money, or even to not be dangerous. If someone wants a family, money is important but not as important as character.”, said John Rogers, 35.

Rogers has an accounting degree but drives for InstaCart while he pursues other interest. He is a father already, but still unmarried. He doesn’t fall in the incel category by any measure, but he agreed with me that love doesn’t cure violence, but it certainly does prevent love from growing.

I think it’s important for men to invest in their own future, as well as their mental health if they truly desire building healthy families and not just being coupled out of pity, or male entitlement.

The current social climate sees an emergence of nontraditional couplings of a large variety. People no longer feel restricted to only forming family structures under the traditional framework of the nuclear family that is, man, woman, and child. This shift in societal norms is revealing who was previously protected by the stringent laws of the past that were solely designed to protect a patriarchal hierarchy. A group of men who could shield themselves behind entering a legal marriage with a child bride, abusing single mothers, or their own biological families.

Sasha Travis, 32, is a single woman currently finishing her master’s in social work at the University of Washington, she had this to say about her dating goals, “Starting a family is not my priority right now. I will be done with school soon, but I still need time to start my career, and while dating is fun, you meet a lot of creeps and weirdos. They can ruin it for the larger group. It gets exhausting after a while. It’s easier to just focus on myself.”

Focusing on yourself is paying off big time for women. The increase in degree obtaining women, means larger salaries and a more equal distributions of resources. This is better in the long-term for women, but what to make of the dating scene? That’s still to be seen. What I do know is that if incels are dangerous to the society around them, we need a culture shift, not more dates.

Programs used: Word

Date: 9/30/21

Al-Arshani, S. (2021, September 25). An NYU professor says fewer men going to college will lead to a 'mating crisis' with the US producing too many 'broke and alone' men. Yahoo! News. Retrieved September 30, 2021, from https://news.yahoo.com/nyu-professor-says-fewer-men-021341108.html.

Tolentino, J., & Farrow, J. M. and R. (2018, May 15). The rage of the incels. The New Yorker. Retrieved September 30, 2021, from https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-rage-of-the-incels.