But yes, the shiduch system fails people like me.
Of course the formal shidduch system fails you and many others. There are different positives and negatives to different styles of dating.
FFB women don’t necessarily appreciate the respect and seriousness frum men give them. I remember my coworkers being blown away that a guy would fly in to meet me and not expect anything physical. I also know that both my husband and I were on the same frum dating website and we never even saw each other’s profile because we didn’t fit the other’s preferences (we were both outside the other’s age range, for example).
@Dan, I know you appreciate your parents vetting girls for you and finding your awesome wife. I think it’s such a bracha that they were able to do that for you. If things hadn’t worked out as planned though and you were single at 30 would you need that same amount of intervention?
I think it’s SO important to have informal situations for people to meet and couldn’t we all agree that over a certain age (for giggles, let’s say 25) it isn’t going to lead to any more temptation than just normal living, working, etc.? It’s not going to lead to more one night stands. Are all these relationships going to be shomer negia until the chuppah, probably not, but I know lots of different types of people who consider themselves basically frum that are open about lots of stuff and none of them slept with their spouse before they got married. Frankly when you’re older and lived more you probably do need to date longer and get closer before marriage because you are trying to join two much more complex beings.
Should we keep the ideal of the formal frum shidduch system? Absolutely and I hope it continues to work for the majority of people and will one day work for my children (yikes it’s B”H coming up pretty soon for me)! It’s pure insanity, however, for older men and women to not be able to socialize in mixed company to meet people (and this is coming from someone who believes that men and women can’t really be friends). My roommate and I used to host mixed Shabbos meals and they were fun and now married couples definitely met at them. And we also introduced people who got to meet and avoid a very painful blind date because of getting to spend some time together in an innocuous setting and realize a date would be a waste of time. We followed Halacha though and were very careful about yichud (I remember once we somehow ended up with only one guy as our guest and so we had to keep our apartment door open and see all the strange looks of our neighbors going by)! Like I said, I met my husband at a shabbat dinner, another friend met her husband at kiddush. We both used an informal shadchan to set the actual first date but they weren’t really involved after a couple dates because it just wasn’t necessary. My roommate met her husband at Simchas Torah and they just started dating. That’s not a shanda, it’s awesome and the Kehilla has a cart full of frum kids because of it!
These kinds of encounters are public, wholesome, normal interactions. It is important after meeting someone not to “hang out” (as
@Dan also noted, Halacha clearly guides us on appropriate settings) and to move to a pretty formal frum dating if there is mutual interest but what the heck does that have to do with how you meet? Y’all are throwing the baby out with the bath water with your insistence only on pre-screened, formal introductions.
