It’s alive and well
What is romance? When a couple goes out for a ‘romantic dinner’ does the romance come from the act of eating the dinner or does the romance come from the feelings the couple has from one another? If romance stems from just eating the dinner, then is every dinner a romantic dinner?
The staff feels as though romance, true romance, is a product of the feelings of love and compassion that two people can have for one another. If this is the case, then how can romance ever be considered dead?
It is true that our generation may not go on the traditional kind of dates that our parents went on, but that does not mean we cannot have the same kinds of feelings for one another as older generations.
We are different from our parents’ generation, true, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. We are a generation raised with technology much more advanced than anything before it. Instantaneous communication around the world, global positioning systems and powerful computer algorithms have changed the way people meet each other and they have changed the way people have gone on dates, but the staff does not believe that these new technologies have killed romance.
Whether one finds their significant other by standing in the same line at Starbucks, being matched on eHarmony or by swiping right on Tinder it does not matter. So what if our generation would rather ‘Netflix and Chill’ than go out to a movie theater, it does not matter. It is the staff’s opinion that the only thing that matters to romance is the feeling a couple has for one another and the mutual respect that results from those feelings.
Older generations may attack us and say that our generation killed romance just because we do not do the same things that they did. As stated previously, romance is not some action or event it is something much more complicated. Romance is a mix of feelings that exist in a couple’s relationship that only they can define. Romance is different for everyone and every couple.
It’s dead and gone
It’s not hard to see a void where romance should be in our dating culture. Romance was once about devotion to another person, regardless of the circumstances in each others’ lives. It appears that our society now is only interested in the high points of being with another person: the sex, the other person’s physical features and the “honeymoon” phase of newfound connections. Not many couples know how to work through difficult situations as previous generations once did, but they refuse to believe that the puppy-love stage will eventually end and that a relationship will always be changing. Our attention spans find someone else to indulge in after we realize that relationships aren’t stagnant.
While the old standard for couples was to be in an acknowledged relationship before advancing towards the physical stage, it appears that a large percentage of our generation only seeks the latter. Now, all one has to do is swipe right on their smartphone screen to find their next one night stand. The fear of asking another person on a date has greatly diminished. No longer do you have to build up the courage to walk up to your crush, find the right words to say and pray that you don’t have to spend the rest of the week in shame as you awkwardly pass them on the sidewalk. Now, a person’s pride can remain fully intact by merely sending a message to their person of interest (vulgar wording optional) and not have to worry about being rejected by a tangible human.
Mainstream media seems to encourage a lack of romance among the Y generation and millennials. Turn the radio on to a Top 40 Hits station, and it will not take you long to hear repulsive lyrics. TV shows such as “The Bachelor” portray about two dozen random women fighting for a single man’s attention, and eventually, his proposal at the end of the season. When our society values fast, easy pleasures over commitment and hard work, I believe it’s safe to say that true romance is dead.
