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fiddlesticks – you have convinced me start posting in this thread again.
“Why can’t you just give people a CHANCE? Why do you NEED to see a picture and decide based on that?”
He is giving people a chance. The better people. For HIM. If he is at all similar to me, the picture was more to establish a baseline than to be the deciding factor. A guy has a limited amount of dates he can physically do (and pay for, but that’s a whole other conversation). That means some girls will be rejected. A sane person will reject those that are highly, highly unlikely to ever be his wife, if he can choose from those that are far, far more likely to be his wife.
Personally, I’d feel a whole lot more insulted if I was rejected for something important to ME like not happy/kind/good/frum etc. enough, than something out of my control like my looks. How shallow are these girls? Additionally, how do they know it’s the looks? Would they feel better if it was after a date? Why?
Comparing wife-finding to friendships is undermining the premise of the shidduch system.
While physical attraction can slightly change over time if the emotional attraction is growing, it is limited in both quantity and quality of attraction. (It can make an “8” a “10” but it can’t make a “2” a “10” and you never really forget the real number. These numbers are just an approximation of an objectively subjective measurement of the amount of relative attractiveness a girl has.)
OoM – Your arguments are the closest thing I’ve heard to rational here, but they are still somewhat flawed. You are saying that it is in the guy’s benefit not to decide based on pictures, because of the bias. Problems:
A) A cost/benefit analysis is in order: the difference in how much MORE flawed the picture makes the decision vs. time/expense/energy etc. saved by avoiding many complete wastes of time.
B) It can only matter in the pre-date decisions. Maybe the other pre-date decisions are made first, or by a proxy?
C) Is it assuming that the bias of attraction is a bad thing? Most men wouldn’t get married without it.
D) I don’t think any guy makes his decision on looks alone. WIY seemed to me to be trying to make a point on an extreme example.
Celebrities are just a bad example. Their problems could come from so many places that you can’t really isolate the cause.
frumnotyeshivish: I am not saying that it is in a guy’s best interest to decide without the picture. I was just articulating the ideal rational extreme (which is probably not something human beings should strive for anyhow). My point was that the intangibility of the ideal notwithstanding, it ought to be borne in mind so as to keep your reality as close to it as you can.
I get your arguments. But I am not trying to say that the practice is stam wrong. I just think that the way WIY is using it is.
Also, have you ever read Notes from Underground?
There are times that you just know that the reason you are rejected is because of your looks over other things.
Comparing friends to spouses doesn’t actually undermine the system, it points out the ridiculousness of basing your decisions on looks. You don’t choose your best friend based on looking at a group of pictures before you choose this person to be your confidant, why should you choose your spouse that way?
I did not for one minute say that looks aren’t important. I said that basing your initial decision to date someone based on their looks is ridiculous, unfair, and the girls are better off without someone who does that. To reject someone based on the shape of their nose or the size of their eyes as opposed to whether or not she’ll make a good wife is unfair. Of course the second a guy sees a picture, he’ll either want to look more into her or say feh, she’s not for me. His judgement is completely clouded by this measly little picture of a girl as opposed to the rest, more important information on the page that actually make a difference to your marriage, as opposed to her looks, which should take a secondary stance as opposed to the most important.
I’m not saying that he has to go out with every single girl. But I can bet you that he’s been redt girls that on paper would be what he’s looking for, but because he already knows what they look like, he rejects them based on that.
Let’s be real-most guys are not going to get a drop dead gorgeous stunner. So why not bring your expectations down to reality, take the rose colored glasses off, and give the girl who’s not a model but is still pretty a chance?
Personally, I’d rather be rejected knowing that he didn’t like something in my hashkafah or personality, because that’s what’s important to me, and if the guy doesn’t think that we’re compatible based on that, then that’s fine with me, because at least a chance was given. I’m obviously not going to go out with someone that’s totally off my radar, but sometimes everything can make sense on paper but when you meet them and you speak to them, the pieces may not match up exactly as well as you thought they would. But that’s also giving a chance, and like I mentioned before, they can very often be looked at as learning experiences, and help to fine tune what you’re looking for.
OoM – the Russian classic? No. (thanks Wikipedia…)
fiddlesticks – “There are times that you just know that the reason you are rejected is because of your looks…” I guess I’ll have to take your word for it. If it helps, I understand this part of your response the best.
As far as friends vs. spouses are concerned, your point is ludicrous. Marriage is different. Not being attracted to your spouse is a recipe toward making ex-spouses; being attracted to your friends is a recipe toward ex-friends.
“I said that basing your initial decision to date someone based on their looks is ridiculous, unfair, and the girls are better off without someone who does that. To reject someone based on the shape of their nose or the size of their eyes as opposed to whether or not she’ll make a good wife is unfair.”
If they are better off, then why complain? The system self-selects for you.
As far as your good wife argument, two points:
1. In your definition, looks don’t factor in to whats makes a “good wife.” To men, they do. They also use their own definition when deciding.
2. Men have to make decisions, who to cross off and who not. Unlike the rest of the important characteristics which add to the “goodness” of a potential wife, looks are pretty easy to get a clue about. No phone calls needed. People are busy.
If you think pictures are inaccurate and misleading, what do you think of references?
“…I can bet you that he’s been redt girls that on paper would be what he’s looking for, but because he already knows what they look like, he rejects them based on that. “
What do you think he’s LOOKING for again?
“Let’s be real-most guys are not going to get a drop dead gorgeous stunner.”
I think you are wrong. Beauty is subjective.
“[If he rejected me for my personality/views I’d be okay with that] because at least a chance was given.”
I fail to see how a decision about looks doesn’t give a chance but personality does. Those are two distinct areas of compatibility. You need both. A chance was given for both. Your statement seems to be implying that you feel you would stand more of a chance if you were evaluated solely on your personality/views. Someone else might stand more of a chance if evaluated just on looks. This doesn’t speak to the merits of evaluating only one or the other.
Your learning experience idea is very nice. I have a better idea. Find a learning experience that doesn’t involve someone who has better things to do than pay to spend awkward time with a total stranger on date that has no hope of getting anywhere.
I have a better idea. How about a balance is found between putting equal considerations on looks and personality and doing an FBI background check, and trying something a little out of the box?
Did you not read what I wrote, or are you just skimming? I wrote that I didn’t say that I don’t think looks aren’t important. I understand that they are important. What I said was basing the initial decision while your judgement is clouded based on looks is ridiculous. Obviously there is a difference between going out with someone who’s of average looks and someone who has something that makes them look unusual. I’m talking about someone who’s pretty. Yes, everyone has their own individual tastes, I’m not arguing that. But how many times have you heard people say, “I never thought I would marry someone that looked like that!” It happens more often then you think it does. When people are a little more open minded about looks, you’ll be surprised what you end up finding yourself attracted to.
So instead of learning anything from dating, let’s instead just slap together guys and girls, and make them marry each other, instead of letting people mature a little while dating. A guy or a girl on their very first date is not going to act the same as on their third or fourth first date. You don’t need to date a million people, but you can learn a lot about yourself, and what you’re looking for. Just because something makes sense on paper doesn’t mean it’s going to make sense when you actually meet someone.
Oh, and by the way, you’re little comment there about the premise of choosing friends the same way as a marriage because not being attracted to people is a recipe for ex-marriages? Can I flip that on you now and say that there are plenty of marriages where people are so enamored by looks that they don’t see the real person underneath and it ends up being a horror story? I personally know people that have gone through this. And don’t tell me that, “well, they were dumb.” No, they weren’t dumb. They placed an over emphasis on looks as opposed to anything else and were blinded and not able to see anything else.
OOM: I think you exaggerate the method of selection that WIY uses. He doesn’t sound like he dates the one supermodel out of a 1000 girls. There are certain girls a person wouldn’t wanna date on first looks, and that may be figured out many times from a picture. He may even whittle down half his list like that.
At the end of the day, he has a big enough of selection that he can rely on G-d that there will be at least one girl with the right personality and Hashkafos out of the remaining girls.
Yes, WIY, it is hard to tell if you are saying you only date supermodels or just only date “10”‘s.
Would you please post some pictures of your last few dates?
I think the Shidduch Crisis should be renamed the Shadchan Crisis. It is no secret that there are both boys and girls out there just getting older every day – either waiting by the phone or sitting through mindless dates with ppl who ‘dont make sense.’ I think the shadchonim of today need to be taken out back and shot. After all it is very often THEY who control the situation. They get miffed by a girl just once, she is black-listed. Meanwhile, an eligible guy (possible bashert?) never gets call because ‘there arent the right girls out there. I wonder if the shadchonim decided to think for once about the SINGLES instead of themselves or their grande silver menorahs they might earn for shadchonus maybe more people would be married today. Think about it – we do not have the bais hamikdosh for a variety of reasons including the lack of chesed in today’s world. Since when did ‘setting someone up’ become a $10,000 fee up front? These people make me embarrassed to be a frum Jew.
If a boy is being redt 10 girls at the same time (I have 100s of resumes) and they all sound basically the same from similar homes hashkafos….so I should go on a date with every one of them?
Baruch Hashem our population has boomed and there are many 100’s if not thousands of eligible girls that can be redt to the same pool of guys. A picture is one method of quickly cutting the numbers down.
I can have ten pictures of attractive girls and still only like the looks of one of them
I think it was the last one was particularly telling.
I can have ten pictures of attractive girls and still only like the looks of one of them
I think it was the last one was particularly telling.
Hmm. Well, I won’t tell if you won’t tell.
snortface
The dude with the blocks makes it all the more ridiculous. Stop playing with childrens toys and bring us some grown up data already. Its been long enough…. how many excess girls are there expressed as an integer, not a percentage? How large in the OTD issue? How many BTs are there? How much one way crossover is there between groups such as chassidish or sefardic and yeshivish? We’ve been over this countless times.
Any child can isolate a single variable from a complex world and make a theoretical argument. Refusing to admit the limitations of this ‘analysis’ is even more childish! How much longer are people going to be bought by a sophomoric idea and a loud voice?
Get rid of the resumes. Is it okay, that a boy is given 10 resumes to choose a girl from?? I say to the girls stop giving in resumes. Let the boys deal with each girl as in individual, not as a sheet of paper. I think resumes are cold. We did not have a shidduch “crisis” when we first got married and you can be sure we did not use “resumes” This is not a job, this is looking for ones life partner. Automatically a girl is turned down because of her looks. I think it is horrible and disrespectful to the girls out there. Get rid of the resumes!!
In my neck of the woods there are no shidduch resumes. and there is no shidduch crisis. Maybe the resume and shidduch crisis crowd need to look outside of their daled amos and see how things are done in other communities and copy what works.
Squeak, yes it was amateurish. Couldn’t they have at least had it printed instead of hand written?
He did give a number of excess girls, besides a percentage, so I don’t understand that complaint.
I agree that the other factors weren’t accounted for, but it’s really, really hard to believe that they play a major role.
The Queen, in your neck of the woods, what are the typical ages of chassanim/kallahs?
Shmoneh Esra L’chupa – mostly within a year or two to the chupa. When you become smarter than the Torah, you run into problems.
It is a fictitious number. Where is the real one?
Squeak, it sounded like it was supposed to be an approximation of the actual numbers.
Certainly, the presentation doesn’t inspire confidence in the accuracy.
DaasYochid: Do boys also have resumes? Or just the girls need them? I think it’s demeaning.
I’ve been posting here for years that they should start getting married younger. (DY could always be counted on to shlug up my proposal.) Glad they’re finally catching up.
You want the girls to get married younger, which would increase the gap. If the boys get married younger, the girls getting married younger will keep the gap the same.
The question as far as boys getting married younger is, at what cost? Will they lose years of learning, and will they be prepared for marriage?
Torah613Torah -“Re thread title: I am still not married. Of course there is a shidduch crisis”
I’m still not married, but there isn’t a Shidduch crisis!
But there is a Loshon Horah crisis.
DY: No gap needed.
At what cost you ask. Maybe at a cost of less heartache for all the young people, their parents, and family who are stranded in the shidduch crisis.
It is true that the boys are less mature when they get married later. I know young men who are unbelievably immature at a time when other young men are already husbands and fathers. If the expectations change, the people will change with them.
Mazal77 -“Get rid of the resumes. I say to the girls stop giving in resumes.”
Yes, get rid of them, just send pictures.
“Automatically a girl is turned down because of her looks.”
Yes, and that’s the way it should be! Why should men/boys waste their time?!?
Health: In that case, boys should give pictures too. Why should women/girls waste their time?
At what cost you ask. Maybe at a cost of less heartache for all the young people, their parents, and family who are stranded in the shidduch crisis.
That’s not cost, that’s benefit. You say it outweighs the cost? Fine, valid opinion, but acknowledge the cost.
I know young men who are unbelievably immature at a time when other young men are already husbands and fathers.
Marriage matures. Agreed, but isn’t there a minimum starting maturity needed?
If the expectations change, the people will change with them.
Again, agreed, but would you say if the expectation was to marry at 14 years old, they would be mature at 14?
You also never addressed the years of lost learning.
Queen -“Health: In that case, boys should give pictures too. Why should women/girls waste their time?”
Where do you live? I live in Lakewood.
To answer your question – any Shadchin who asks, I send them a picture!
DY: For thousands of years in Europe, pre-Europe and among the Sefardim, Yidden got married not long after their Bar/Bas Mitzvah. No one is suggesting we go back to that age marriage but it is worthwhile discussing how did they manage it? Were the Yidden for all those doros — our zeidas and bubbes — primitive? The Mishna where Chazal advise us Shemone Esrei L’Chuppa is advise when to be married by, not when to start considering marriage.
Yidden got married not long after their Bar/Bas Mitzvah. No one is suggesting we go back to that age marriage
Why not?
Because we’ve become spoiled and it takes time to unspoil a generation. But Rav Avigdor Miller zt’l advised: “A Beis Yaakov girl should be wed soon after or before graduation. Every day after she leaves the Beis Yaakov marks another step away from idealism, for the street and the office and the secular school have an unfailing effect which increases from day to day.” (Awake My Glory) And Rav Miller lived, and advised, our very own dor so one cannot shrug off the aforementioned Chazal as being for a different era.
one cannot shrug off the aforementioned Chazal as being for a different era
What if we’re too spoiled?
Even the roshei yeshiva pushing for 21 (which are not all RY) aren’t saying 18. Are they all shrugging off Chazal?
If we’re too spoiled then we shouldn’t rush back to marrying at an average age of 14. 17-19 is more reasonable for our dor until we can reach the madreiga of our zeidas and bubbes of not-too-long ago. It takes building up, but we should work our way back.
The Chasidim do it today, so clearly what I’m suggesting isn’t crazy. And Rav Miller, a real Litvak, suggested it and (like other Litvaks who were alive at the same time as many people today) practiced it.
You can tell a 19 year old litvish boy he is getting married in half a year and expect him to mature. Litvish boys are made up of different DNA from other boys? In the IDF you have 19 year olds making life and death decisions. In the chassidish world many are heads of household.
Pictures lie.
Yidden got married not long after their Bar/Bas Mitzvah. No one is suggesting we go back to that age marriage
Why not?
For one its ILLEGAL in the United States. You cannot get married in any state before 16.
For thousands of years in Europe, pre-Europe and among the Sefardim, Yidden got married not long after their Bar/Bas Mitzvah.
And went straight to work, which is DY’s point.
using the shidduch island analogy I think the problem is not that we have an excess of girls on shidduch island, but rather there are barriers in place that keep people off the island altogether.
for some, the admission price to the island is simply to high. you wont promise $X for x years, you are not invited.
for some admission is based on their ability to fit neatly into the little boxes we created. wrong yeshiva. wrong by. wrong camp. wrong tableware on shabbos. not balebattishe enough. too heimish.
the problem, I think, is exacerbated by the fact that when people hit a certain age, they accidently disembark on fantasy island instead of shidduch island.
Perhaps the extra girls on shidduch island should marry chassidim.
17-19 is more reasonable for our dor
So why aren’t any roshei yeshiva suggesting it?
Litvish boys are made up of different DNA from other boys?
Different culture. This cannot be ignored.
In the IDF you have 19 year olds making life and death decisions
My 3 year old knows how to put his shirt on. Does that mean he’s ready to get married? You can’t compare one skill set to another.
And went straight to work, which is DY’s point.
That’s closely related to one of my points, which hasn’t been answered.
zsdad: In New York it is possible to legally get married at age 14.
“in the chassidish world many are heads of household.”
generalizations are always bad and the 2 young chassidishe couples i know are hardly proof of anything, but, these 2 couples eat all meals by mommy. all bills are paid by tatty. the only thing that changed from one day to the next is that they have a new roomate. how difficult is it to be a head of such a household?
For one its ILLEGAL in the United States. You cannot get married in any state before 16.
Doesn’t stop anyone else from having babies. So the children will still be the responsibility of the parents. In the current system of support they are anyway.
I had heard the reason there is a crisis is because in the yeshivsh world Boys marry girls 3-4 years younger. There is also a huge population explosion in the yeshivish commuty as there are more and more births every year
So there are more 19 year old boys and girls than 23 year old boys and girls hence the differnce between 19 year old girls and 23 year old boys.
In the chassidic communities where the boys and girls are the same age there is no shortage
So why aren’t any roshei yeshiva suggesting it?
Rav Miller suggested it. Other Litvish gedolim (especially in EY) are also in favor of it.
And this new proposal by the Litvishe gedolim for the boys to marry younger is a very big step in the direction I’m suggesting. I wouldn’t expect the chasanim to jump from age 23 to 19 overnight. 21 is a good first step.
APY: Not all Chasidishe tatti’s are gevirim. The non-gevirim manage it too.
“Perhaps the extra girls on shidduch island should marry chassidim.”
Chassidishe boys are mostly looking to marry chassidishe girls. There are some shidduchim of Chassidishe boys with litvish girls, however, the boys aren’t usually your average chassidishe boy if they are marrying a litvish girl.
Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, because litvish girls probably aren’t looking for your average chassidishe boy.
“2 young chassidishe couples i know are hardly proof of anything”
I know loads and loads of chassidish couples. The Tattys aren’t all supporting the couples, and yes many of the Mommies cook the meals in the beginning.
How is it better for girls to stay stranded without having an opportunity to find a shidduch, rather than a young couple 19-20 years old getting some support in the beginning whether monetary or meals or both.
Is marriage just a new roommate if you aren’t cooking a meal every day?
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