We've got a messy situation on our hands with the dating culture at BYU-Idaho and pretty much everywhere else for that matter. I describe many of these problems in this video. A student of ours also summarized some of the major points in the video and provided many of her own insights on her blog www.
We share her comments below. Also, if you are fed up with the dating culture and actually want to do something about it, share this article publicly on your Facebook page. There is no point in complaining if we are not going to do something about it! As a student at BYU-Idaho, I have noticed habits and patterns in the dating culture at my university that not are only lame, but are very dangerous and concerning.
I want to address the problems, the consequences, and maybe what we could do to change the culture. Professor Cole Ratcliffe describes many of these problems in the video above. Since we are members of the LDS faith and marriage is of high importance to us, students are confusing this as you need to hurry and find someone and get married, hence the name BYU-I-Do. Because of this false perception, many times returned missionaries will ask girls on dates and girls will automatically think "Wow, he wants to marry me or become exclusive.
A date is justadate. I think many girls need to stop assuming that every guy that asks them out want to marry them. Not only is that false, but it will cause a lot of miscommunication and problems later on. This also leads "older" men and women who are 25 and beyond to think "I'm never going to get married if I haven't found someone by now. Do you realize that most people in the world don't get married until they are almost thirty and some even beyond that?
I do understand that there are consequences for marrying later in life if you want to start a family and things like that. But we should never look down on "older" single students. Which by the way, 25 is still so young. It absolutely makes no sense.
