The Perils of Modern Romance and the Need for Representation

One week ago, I was excited to watch a season 2 of a show that I thought was a fresh of breath air among all the young adult romance themed shows I’d seen; Netflix’s Mismatched. One episode into season two, I realised this was a mis-match for me.

(I’ll pause while the dad joke makes you leave )

The show which had a good start, turned into the same old romance cliches, with characters having absolutely zero depth. But it got me thinking. We need young adult romances in this country. There’s no dearth of content about love stories out there, but its been a long time since my generation felt represented.

Why do we need representation you ask? Because we’re very confused. I think this has been the most accessible time to be dating. Apps on your phone show you potential partners in the area. There’s no fear of covid anymore so people are finally meeting other people in bars, coffee shops and bookstores. There’s even dating apps that you can filter by languages.

P.S: Kannadigas, there’s an app called Neene out there exclusively for Kannadigas to meet other Kannadigas.

But at the time where dating is as accessible as it gets, the confusion and the panic is real. A while back, I started talking to some friends about how they felt about dating now, they all had different responses.

One friend found the whole experience thrilling. He declared that he was now talking to six people at the same time, and some of them knew about it. This made him quite confident.

Another one talked about how she felt like it was a waste of time. She said that every person she talked to, always turned out to reveal one aspect of them self that she would not like, and this would render a two week conversation useless.

One more friend found the whole experience challenging. He felt like the whole experience made him feel like he was on display all the time, and worked on altering his dating profile and social media persona accordingly. He said that he felt that the app gave him a small window to impress a potential partner, and often times he felt the pressure.

Another friend mentioned that she felt out of place with regards to most dating terms thrown around. She mentioned that after talking to someone for a few weeks, the guy mentioned that he had a girlfriend. But the girlfriend knew about him being on the app, because they were ‘polyamorous’

She told me until that point she had no idea what polyamorous meant, and I, too confessed that this term was new. A quick google search later, we both sat in silence, thinking about the pace of the world we live in.

In case you missed it, polyamory is a type of non monogamous relationship that specifically involves multiple partners. It took me about a week or so to fully wrap my head around the concept. And no, this is not me being judgemental towards any lifestyle, but characterising how the dating culture has jumped leaps and bounds

With regards to me, I went to a school that had people proposing to each other in absolute filmy style. It wasn’t unheard of to have one guy propose to a girl more than 20 times after being rejected. A lot of the people mirrored the behaviour they saw in films, which was toxic to another extent. To jump from this culture to another more liberal one in 11th and 12th was a huge cultural shock. Suddenly I was learning and unlearning about what constituted healthy relationships.

College was another mega step ahead because suddenly it went from relationships to casual dating, to hookups and apps and a lot more. While talking to a few more friends, I realised this was the trend for a lot of people. Dating in the last 5 years has changed like never before.

When I asked around some more, a lot of people complained that despite having more access to options to ever before, they felt it still wasn’t enough. Despite putting endless filters of location, type, the search to find the one seems quite the challenge. A challenge that never existed within the time of my parents.

(Context, my dad married my mom 25 years ago, and he knew her because she lived two streets across from his house. And that was it)

After a lot of conversation, I came to the conclusion that the core of the problems that existed came from three main issues

1) Image: Since the advent of social media, the whole idea of building or maintaining a virtual presence has shot up. While apps like Facebook started as a way to keep in touch with your existing friends, it’s evolved into a platform where every post, every story is focused on building your online persona for hundred of followers, while following the latest cool trend.

We’re still materialistic, and instead of having nice houses, clothes and furniture, it’s turned into likes, matches and comments. While building the online image, one protects their persona at any cost. Facts about ourselves that we find cringey or lame, don’t make our bio or even our initial conversations. What we fail to understand is that by hiding things, you can never be completely yourself, which will feel like something is missing.

So if you like to sing in the shower, or have a good cry listening to Arijit Singh, flaunt that stuff! Talk about your previous breakups, issues and for once you’ll feel like you’re making progress beyond the small talk.

2) Fear of Missing Out: This one stands out as a rare condition among our generation. Jealousy has always been a strong emotion, but when jealousy meets carefully curated online profiles, it sends the mind into overdrive. No wonder people are talking to 7–8 people on apps these days. The urge to look for something better stands out.

But at the same time, it’s also our biggest weakness. Let me give you a simple example. When you order food from outside, and you’re looking for a new place, there’s very good chance you’ll spend hours looking at option after option and you’ll either order the place you always order from, or the one that you saw when you were at your hungriest. We’ve applied the same principle to our dating and it’s one big mess.

So next time you talk to someone, give it your 100%. And whatever happens, happens. It would be better off giving a lot to one, rather than tiny percentages to multiple people

3) The Media Confusion: Couple of months back, a close relative of mine started watching Euphoria for the first time. At one time he was confused, shocked and scared because he thought this was how his college was going to be like.

We’ve got unrestricted media access now. While shows like Euphoria may push the barrier of representation for a lot of communities, it is quite un relatable. At the same time, there are people now sharing memes and long huge carousels on Instagram with the tag “relationship advice”.

PSA: If you’re having a relationship dilemma, Instagram is not your solution. Your feed is based on your algorithm on what you like, and all that it does is put you in a bubble. Similarly shows like Euphoria and 13 Reasons Why aren’t the absolute truth.

So if you’re new to all this and confused, start with admitting that. A million problems of our modern dating could be solved if people admitted that they had no idea what they’re doing. Talk to the people you want to date, be honest. You’ll see a world of difference :)

If you’ve made it this far, give yourself a pat on the back. And like all dating advice, this isn’t absolute. Pick and choose what makes sense to you, because that’s all there is to it :)

But as a generation which needs to be represented, we need to go out of our way to demand the kind of content we want to see on screen. No more lazy cliches, there are no cliches anymore.

And if you’re looking for content that pushes the cliches out of the window, here’s a few off the top of my head

1) Modern Love Mumbai: Episode- I love Thane

2) Stuck in Love

3) Photograph (2016)

4) Little Things

And take some advice from our dear old Frankie Ramdayal. Pyaar- is to chill.