It goes to reason that every problem has a cause; and therefore if one considers Duke's dismal dating scene a problem then it inherently must have a cause of some sort.
The dating scene at Duke, or rather the lack thereof, seems to have more students complaining than anything else, with the possible exception of the Matrix or L.Mo. And while many students enjoy venting about the dating scene, very few talk about what might be causing it. Like so many other problems, the dating scene is a result of the unique student population at Duke.
As one of the top universities in the country, Duke accepts only the best, and consequently, many Duke students share some rather significant character traits. Primarily, people here undertake far more than your average adolescent and manage their limited time much more efficiently. Yes, I know that we all love to complain about being procrastinators, but in comparisons to the rest of the people our age we are light years ahead--if we weren't, we wouldn't be here.
And while our impressive success and mighty ambitions are something to be admired, they do create a problem in two very important ways. First, they create a time draught that causes us to have to budget our hours and only use them for our most pressing obligations. Secondly, they instill in us a refusal to settle for anything but the best. These two characteristics intertwine and lead to the strikingly low occurance of dating and relationship on campus.
After all, relationships take up a huge amount of time, especially if the two people live on the same campus or in the same dorm. With such close proximity to one another, you are bound to spend hours each day doing essentially nothing. For most Duke students, overburdened with classes, homework, meetings, etc., spending hours with their respective others is a luxury they can't afford if they still want to stay on top of everything.
That is unless you find a person worth all that time. Unfortunately, this is very difficult to achieve due to my second point earlier--our great ambitions. Duke students expect a lot from themselves and consequently a lot from everyone else as well.
We made the highest grades, won the biggest awards and applied to the best schools. It comes as no surprise that when it comes to romantic interests we are just as scrutinizing.
If we are to make the huge effort and time commitment that a relationship requires, the other person must be truly extraordinary. However, it's very hard to find someone who lives up to our expectations right away. It takes many days and dates to truly get to know someone and gain an appreciation for their personality, neuroses and all, yet this is time that we would rather spend on all our other obligations.
Of course, on the other end of the spectrum you have people who are seemingly incapable of being single. You know who I'm talking about--those people who haven't been single for more than a month altogether since they turned 16.
This is even worse than people who don't date at all. It's a great truth that if you don't know how to be happy by yourself, you will never be truly happy with someone else either. Therefore, if we are to have a campus that is significantly skewed toward one side, I think it's far better to have students who are strong and independent enough to be by themselves than those who would rather date anything available than be single.
However, if you are bothered by the lack of a dating scene, as most students seem to be, realize that a little more patience and fewer preconceived expectations is all it takes to change things around. I'm not saying that you lower your standards or settle; simply, don't write people off just because they don't measure up to your astronomical standards.
Just think about Duke--now that you are here you realize that it's not quite the Gothic Wonderland you were hoping for and that there are things that bother you, but this still doesn't change the fact that you know you made the right decision in coming here. The same is true for people; nothing and nobody will ever live up to our every single expectation, but that certainly doesn't mean that they're not worth our while.
Emin Hadziosmanovic is a Trinity sophomore. His column appears every other Wednesday.
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