The Moviemance

Recently it came to my attention that many men are forgoing the traditional dating system to instead have an occurrence that I like to call the moviemance. A moviemance is a series of dates that involves going to one another's houses to watch movies while getting to know each other in a more intimate and relaxed setting. There's no worry about who will have to pay, because there's no money involved. There's no worry about will there be obnoxious PDA, because you're not in public. There's no worry about will I go home with him tonight, because you're already at their house.

This idea of the moviemance in today's economy seems to be too good to be true, but there seems to be something missing in our current society, because of it. The lack of money spent on a date means there's less pressure to reciprocate anything and therefor less pressure to really see where a new relationship takes you. Instead it seems like the moviemance actually begins to pressure people to hookup before the time is right, because there's less social stigma against making out in one's own house. The moviemance actually begins to make one flippant towards spending time with one individual and instead begins to make people assume that when watching a movie with a close friend, it becomes assumed that you will be hooking up with that person. This leads to drama and heartache.

So while the economy has put us in this new dating rut of relationships on the cheap, it also has forced us into the idea that when no money is spent, we can be as flighty as we want with as many people, because there is no obligation to someone who hasn't made an investment in you and your life. It is my advice, then, that if you are really interested in someone and they say, "hey come over and watch a movie" that you should respond with "actually I just heard about this really great at the theatre, can we watch that one instead?" And chances are they'll say yes. This works extremely well if you live in a bigger city with half-price theatres or free movie previews or older movies being reshown on the silver screen, because this allows you to still keep the date cheap and keep yourself in a slow moving relationship, which could eventually blossom into something more.