Ah, dating. The ultimate rite of passage for a teen. Or middle schooler. Or, indeed, my six-year-old sister, who swoons at the mere mention of her beau. But I’m not even going to go into that, because everyone already knows and accepts that six is too young. So let’s talk about sixteen, shall we?



While there is a positive correlation between one’s age and the propriety of dating endeavors (up to roughly age 45), the effect of this function is fairly negligible during highschool.



Just what is it, exactly, that motivates young people to date? Being a member of the teen community, I have had many people try to convince me to give it a try. The most common thing I hear (or heard, since I’ve finally convinced them to lay off) is that “dating is fun”. Let’s break this statement down:



Dating-Make a list of highschool relationships which you have either witnessed or participated in. Out of this list, cross off any which could realistically be expected to end in marriage. Now cross out any which have already ended in such a way that nobody was upset and the two parties remain friends. Write down your percentage (original number-those crossed out divided by the original number times one hundred). If it is higher than 10%, pat yourself on the back, then come join us in reality. For the rest of you, ponder your ridiculously low success rate. Now think about all the people that were hurt or lost friends because of all those failed relationships. Neat, isn’t it?



is-present active participle of the verb “to be”. Do I really have to go deeper into this?



fun-Enjoyable. Amusing. Rewarding. Entertaining. You get the idea.



Now put it all together. Didn’t your parents ever teach you not to have fun at somebody else’s expense? Let’s just pretend for a second that there is an absolute guarantee that you personally will not be hurt. Or even that you are ready, willing and able to handle any sort of disappointment which might come of this endeavor. Cool. But what about the other half of this hypothetical potential relationship? Are you really prepared to jump into their lives and mess with their emotions for fun?



So, for those of us who aren’t maladjusted and cruel, “fun” isn’t enough motivation. Ok. How about a more powerful word. To heck with it, let’s just jump to the most powerful word and motivation in the lives of young people, sex. Sure, there’s the potential for some physical hanky-panky. And there’s the biochemical things going on there, where pheromones from the sweat (that’s right, sweat) of people of (usually) the opposite sex does some stuff to your brain, and of course you can dig around and find the most primal center of the human (or animal) mind, the part that contains instinctual coding. While instinct plays a very small part in the life of the average human, what it all boils down to is our animal instinct to produce more of our species. So sex is definitely a strong motivator, whether or not we admit it.



I think we can all accept that just about every human has a deeply engrained need to reproduce. Yay, sex. Wait, we have to raise our children. We can’t just give birth to them and leave, like much of the animal kingdom. And there are all kinds of mean and nasty microbes that like to eat people that are too careless about sex. And there’s the whole stigma that society places on having sex at a young age, not to mention the moral or religious issues. Nuts. Probably better suppress that particular instinct for a bit later on, hmm?



But what about that lovely ritual of protracted, fruitless foreplay that teens like to call “making out”? Making what out where? Is this also “fun”? And it’s harmless, right? I will grant that making out is, biologically at least, mostly harmless. Pretty much the worst disease which can be spread that way (provided nobody has a split lip) is a cough or a cold. Emotionally, however, it implies a deep commitment (to most people), one that makes it all the more painful when a relationship falls apart. Besides, while the motivation behind “making out” is rooted in the instinctual sex drive discussed above, it serves no biological purpose.



The methodology of dating itself is another story entirely. Don’t worry, I’ll get around to making fun of that too. For now, however, I would be much obliged if anyone could help me out by explaining what motivates people under the age of consent that aren’t ready or willing to start families to date.



Since I know it will come up:

The author is not suffering from a case of “sour grapes”. He has never had a bad relationship, never been dumped, never even wanted to date. So, to the best of his abilities, the above column is completely objective (if a little exaggerated).

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