I am all in favour of a shift to a more formalized, more equitable dating process. The system that I envision would involve a person, either acting as a volunteer, or, more likely, hired by a school or employed by some sort of governmental entity, acting neutrally as a chaperone/relationship counselor/bodyguard. If adopted universally, such a system could virtually eliminate date rape, coercive relationships, unplanned pregnancy (I envision the chaperone being a source of education about, and perhaps provider of the actual means of, birth control), and destroyed reputations.
Person A could approach a chaperone and request a relationship with Person B (regardless of A or B’s respective genders), and find out even before the question is put to B about a specific relationship with A whether such a relationship is even possible given the person’s preferences, and on what level. If not, A will not even have to risk humiliation by putting their name forward. The chaperones could keep records on who has requested relationships with who, and refuse to ask more than once (twice) to prevent harassment.
Some might say that such a system would take all of the romance out of, well, romance. I disagree: I think that rules enhance the beauty of the thing within them. But then, I find structured poetry far more moving than freeform poetry, and abstract art far less moving than representational art (with some exceptions for each). And, once the rules are enforced and learned as teenagers, like any art form, that’s when you can push the boundaries and even break the rules to make something more beautiful than the rules would ordinarily allow.
Yes, there are multiple problems with this system (foremost among them: finding, hiring, training, and paying for trustworthy people to act as chaperones), which is why it’s a vision, a concept, rather than an actual suggestion. I do, however, think that moving to a more formalized idea of courtship (with all of the patriarchal bugs from the original version ironed out of it) is an extremely attractive idea.
