And now, a close reading of Relationships FML: Dating after Harvard (for women), a dating advice column written by “Some Dude” affiliated with Harvard lifestyle publication The Voice.

Some Dude writes:

“I’m not going to sugarcoat it: in the post-college dating world, men have it easier. They continue to grow up emotionally and become more attractive because of it. Women tend to mature earlier, which is great for them at the time, but they don’t have that to look forward to after college. On the other hand, as they get older, it means that the quality of the best men available to them increases, so don’t fret if you haven’t met your soulmate yet: he could be worth the wait.”

Translation: Women are straight and peak in college. Yup, that’s right. After college, women cease to mature emotionally at ALL, which means that all they have to look forward to after college is maturing…physically? Men, however, keep getting more and more awesome and manly over time. Actually, being a man in general is great. Did I mention that we can pee standing up?

Some Dude writes:

So, how do you meet those higher-quality men? As I recommended to men last week, the solution isn’t to go looking for places where the best single guys look for girls. Why not? Multiple reasons, actually. The competition, of course: it’s easier to stand out when you’re standing alone, rather than in a pack (and you’re also more approachable that way). But also, in places where women go looking for relationships, you will often find a lot of opportunistic guys looking for just sex. If what you really want is a relationship, don’t settle.

Translation: It is definitely healthy to frame dating as a market in which women place competing bids on the rare and precious commodity also known as “men who aren’t douchebags.” Women are still really straight and shouldn’t go to places where “the best” single guys are looking for girls because “the best” single guys won’t pick them because women hate each other and will switch your foot cream with your face cream and feed you Kalteen bars to “help you lose weight” but really they’re just trying to make you fat. Also don’t go to places where other women look for relationships because then you’ll get all sad and desperate and sleep with a rando.

Some Dude writes:

Instead, look for places where single guys congregate when they’re not looking for a date — not necessarily only guys, or even only single guys, so long as single guys are part of the mix and there are very few single women looking for single men. My favorite go-to example is PAX East, an annual video game conference in Boston. There will be many undateable guys there too — but any woman present will have first pick of any guy she wants because there are so few women. (Yes, even the best quality men play video games.) Similar situations can be found at a variety of volunteer projects, particularly outdoorsy ones that are more likely to attract guys.

Translation: Go to places where a) no one is looking for a date and b) where you will be vastly outnumbered by hordes of sweaty young men (women are still straight). Go to these places even if you have no interest in the activity that takes place there and can’t talk about it at all; the men will be so horny that they won’t even notice. This is a good way to build a relationship based on mutual interests and respect.

Some Dude writes:

Another idea for post-college women: move to a city on the West Coast. The Boston Globe ran an article a few years ago on concentrations of single men and single women around the country. Boston is very usual, in that there are tons of both single men and women here, in nearly equal proportion. You can literally boost your luck by moving somewhere where the odds are stacked in your favor, as they are on the West Coast.

Translation: You clearly have nothing else going on in your life, since you’re reading this column, so why don’t you just, you know, drop everything and MOVE, you selfish cow.

Some Dude writes:

While men are often totally oblivious to how to improve their dating lives, women are usually painfully aware of their biggest flaws, but only see the hardest possible path to overcoming them and get discouraged. I hear over and over from women who are worried about their weight or their bust size — how attractive you are to a guy isn’t bound up in those, and the sooner you break out of that thinking, the better. Expensive plastic surgery or significant lifestyle changes are hardly required. How you move, how you dress, how you sound, and more can all be used to give yourself an immediate boost, with much less effort.

Translation: God, women are so WHINY sometimes. Why are they SO insecure? So just like, change how you move, dress, and sound, actually just like change EVERYTHING about yourself except don’t get plastic surgery because that’s, you know, slutty.

Some Dude writes:

Some other good news: in most US cities, women in their 20s now earn more than men. Money can’t buy happiness, but it does buy stability and confidence, which helps every aspect of your life, not just dating. A woman’s life after college looks pretty good all around.

Translation: This has nothing to do with anything I’ve been saying, but guess what? Before you get married and have babies and all of that stuff, you’ll make more money than your male peers, so you can use those 8 years of your life to make up for the remaining 35 years where you’ll make like 80 cents on the dollar compared to the men in your office. Try not to get TOO down about it, they’re just being compensated for their continued emotional growth, you know? Yeah life after college for women is really great.

So we really enjoyed this Crimson article on how to ask someone to formal^[1], but we thought that we could do a little better…

Commonly Asked Questions, Concerns, and/or Debilitating Fears about Formal Events:

Q: Who should I ask?

A: Who should you not ask? Exhaustive list below:

1. Strangers
2. Facebook friends. As in people with which you are only friends on Facebook.
3. Anyone you haven’t had more than 3 conversations with.
4. People who can’t and/or refuse to hold their alcohol.
5. Your unrequited love
6. People who post pictures of themselves taking pictures in a bathroom mirror. They will desert you to add to their collection.
7. A romantic interest (who you are not in a relationship with) who knows no one else at said event other than yourself.
8. Anyone who has ever tried to lick you^[2]
9. High schoolers

Q: How should I ask?

A: Nicely. But actually you should decide whether or not this person is your “date” to the event first. Ask yourself this question: would you mind if your guest hooked up with someone (not you) at said event? If the answer is yes, you want this person to be your date. Call them, ask them in person, bake them cupcakes, whatever, but make sure that your invitation includes some variant of the words “with me” or “my date.” If the answer is no, ask them, but include some variant of “with my friends” or “in a group” in order to signal that it’s not an exclusive date thing.^[3]

Q: Should I dance?

A: If there’s dancing, then yes. If not, I wouldn’t recommend it. Please note that you do not have to be GOOD at dancing in order to dance. This is Harvard, pretty much all of us were nerds in high school, so if we look really cool while we’re dancing, it’s probs because we’ve learned to front and/or are dancing ironically^[4]. Also you are not required to grind, as there are plenty of people out there who prefer to get to know someone before getting to know their package^[5]

Q: What if I’m awkward?

A: Again, pretty much all of us were nerds in high school. We got you.

If you’re feeling awkward, pretend like you’re not. NEVER  apologize for being awkward (or otherwise draw attention to your feelings of awkwardness) because then your date is put in the awkward position of telling you that you’re not awkward when you literally just did the MOST AWKWARD thing possible.

Note: this is not about pretending you’re someone you’re not, I would never advise that in any situation^[6], however, if your priority is to make your date comfortable, you need to make them feel like you’re comfortable. Run out of things to say? Offer to get them a drink. Too self-conscious to dance as a pair? Get some of your friends to dance with you. Someone else hit on your date? Laugh about it and move on. Don’t focus on how uncomfortable you feel, focus on how much fun you want your date to have.^[7]

Q: What’s your number one tip for making great formal memories?

A: Don’t black out^[8]

Getting to Know You^[1]

Your first date is not a big deal. Say it with me: your first date is not a big deal. If your crushbuddy^[2] has agreed to go out on a date with you, chances are that your crushbuddy is into you, so all you have to do is be your normal charming self and try your best not to freak them out.

For the purposes of this post, the first date is not a coffee/ice cream/froyo date–we’ll do a separate post on those at a later date. We’re talking a sit-down dinner first date- the kind that indicates that your interest is a little more than casual without binding you to your potential lover for eternity.

I wouldn't be making that face if I had read this post

Essential components of the Getting-to-Know-You First Date:

1) Easy exit
2) Reasonable prices
3) Conversation

Easy exit:

Q: What would you do if you were on a date with an insufferable bore who picks his ears and insults your mother?
A: Leave
Q: What would you do if your aforementioned date was on a boat cruise?
A: Drown

There are two reasons you want your date to have an easy exit. First, you want to give yourself the option to leave if the date goes badly. Second, you want your crushbuddy to have the same option. Knowing that either of you can leave whenever you please takes some of the pressure off of the situation and increases both of your comfort levels. Thus, we recommend that your first date be at a place that is easily accessible (i.e. not on a boat/10 T Stops away) and full of other people (so that you feel less awkward if you do have to excuse yourself/have fodder for conversation). We also recommend that your date have a defined duration–dinner and a movie has a clear end, while a walking tour of Boston does not. This way, no one feels pressured to keep the conversation going for hours and you don’t end up saying embarrassing things in an attempt to fill a lull.

Reasonable prices:

If you don’t know someone well and you buy them an extravagant gift, you’re going to make them uncomfortable. No Rialto. No L’Espalier. No VIP Bieber tix. None of that. You don’t know if your crushbuddy will want to split the bill or pay for you, and if you take your crushbuddy to a place that’s $40 a head, you’re probably never going to know. Besides, you don’t want to make your crushbuddy feel like they owe you for something, and you definitely don’t want them going out with you just for the venue. You, not your money, not lobster thermidore, not the Biebs, are the main attraction.

Conversation:

This is self-explanatory. If you take your crushbuddy to a place where you can’t talk, you’re not getting to know each other.

Recommendations:

Go to dinner. Go to dinner and a movie. Go to dinner and a show. Go to dinner and a bar, but go to dinner. If you’re not sure where you’d like to go to dinner, here’s a short list of accessible, busy, reasonably priced restaurants in the Square. The food at these places is solid, if not impressive, but the environments are comfortable and you won’t look gross eating any of the food.

Bertucci’s- Italian
Cafe of India- self-evident
Cambridge 1- “American” whatever that means
Spice- Thai

This fall, Ivyfed is bringing sexy back, and by sexy, we mean dating.

Look, we know dating has had its issues—when you think of dating you probably think of arcane gendered rituals that involve push-up bras and chastity belts for girls and $$$ for boys.  In a place like Harvard, which is pretty liberal when it comes to things like sex, gender norms, and LGBTQ issues, that kind of dating is pretty useless (wtf are you supposed to do when a boy dates a boy or *scandal* a girl dates a girl or *doublescandal* the girl is the one with the $$$). When we say dating, we’re not talking about waxing your eyebrows or your Mustang. Our definition is a lot simpler:

A date is doing an activity at a place with a person^[1]

Now, we know that Harvard kids can be tricky little bastards, mostly because we are tricky little bastards (and we’ve seen the Social Network) so we’re going to put a few restrictions on this definition:

1. Activity ≠ sex, homework, or class
2. Place ≠ your dorm room, dining hall, library, or lecture
3. Person ≠ your blood relative, high school student, or professor

Mini quiz time!

1. Office hours is/is not a date
2. Watching youtube videos on your futon is/is not a date
3. Studying for your 21a midterm is/is not a date
4. Afternoon delight is/is not a date^[2]

The answer to all of the above is “IS NOT a date”, in case you were wondering. There’s nothing wrong with watching Youtube videos on your futon, studying with your cuddle buddy, or putting your skyrocket in flight but these things are not dates.

So what is a date?

A date is a fun, relatively notawkward way to get to know someone outside of school or work. A date is a way to test drive a relationship in the “real world”—to carve out a little space in your life that’s just for you and your sigO. A date is a way to communicate to someone that you value their company enough to make time for them outside of your normal routine.

Over the next few months, we at Ivyfed are making it our mission to convince you that dates are great, whether you’re a swingin single or practically married. Tune in this fall for our first installment of Date Night, where we cover, you guessed it, First Dates!