Who Are We Dating?

                Social media has forever changed the landscape of relationships.  Growing up in the digital age, the term “Facebook official (FBO)” was just as important as the Declaration of Independence.  FBO meant everything to everyone beginning in middle school and I’m sure it now begins in elementary school.  The idea that social media is impressing in our minds is that if we do something, social media must be involved or else it doesn’t matter if it happened.  This especially applies to dating relationships.  Couples document their outings, their affections, and their important dates all over social media.  

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                 Going on dates now has an added element.  People now have to “check-in” or ‘gram a photo at the location or friends get to see a lengthy Snapchat story showing it all off.    It seems that we fail to fully take in the date and we instead focus on how we can share this event with others.  Think about it—as soon as a couple arrives at the intended destination, the selfies start flying.  Afterwards, people take to social media to rave about their experiences.  Essentially, we make sure to include our followers before the date, during the date, and after the date.

                Affectionate posts typically start out the same way that weight loss posts begin: “I normally don’t posts things like this but…” and then the writer proceeds to type out something resembling Song of Solomon.   The average relationship timeline goes like this: a few photos are posted by one featuring the significant other, significant others declare connection by making the relationship FBO, they sneakily drop the love bomb in a post, and then the relationship goes in a certain direction after that.  The direction is also very well documented, ranging from the published breakup records to the back-and-forth comment wars, or oppositely to the engagement announcements and so on and so forth. 

                Couples are always using social media to celebrate special dates.  From the countdowns to the anniversaries, there is never a shortage of important dates in time.  We’ve seen all sorts of numbers; people post their “happy one month” posts, while others are posting “thirty days until the wedding.”  It is easy for us to get caught up in moments and to forget about the relationship holistically.  We tend to enter tunnel vision and lose sight of everything other than that significant date. 

All of this really leads to the question of who we are dating.  Are we dating the person we claim to be dating OR are we dating the feelings that social media feeds us about dating?  Is the event more important than the post about the event?  Is the real emotion there or are we just writing it on social platforms to seem real?  Are the special dates genuinely important between the two people or is it the act of making our lives seem so perfect and grand that we care more about?  Call me old-school, but I do think we are getting away from the sincerity of courting someone we value and this is partly due to the influences of social media.