“Why do you date so much?” 

And when I did decide to date, I always saw a serious future as an option with my boyfriends. Only when I knew we couldn’t end up together did I break things off. 

Now, that doesn’t mean you plan on marrying them or know for sure that they are “the one,” but if things keep going in this direction, that is where it should be headed.

This, of course, is quite the opposite of what many people today consider “dating.” 

Now, we tend to just fall into relationships with whatever is close to us, convenient, or has already been conquered. Friends will incestuously date within their group of friends, over and over and over. 

Friends with benefits whom people are not particularly interested in will become de facto boyfriends or girlfriends because, well, we need a date to a wedding. 

We will exist in a nebulous state of “sort-of dating” our “half-boyfriends” for years on end because it’s better than being single. 

And of course, if you ask these couples if they would ever consider settling down with said significant other, most would give you a resounding “no.” 

They would even justify with a “I don’t need to see a serious future with someone I’m dating, it’s just to have fun.”

 But could anything be more selfish, more unfair, more of an insult to the both of you?

First of all, how do we know that the other member of this couple feels the same way?

 Perhaps what is just a game for you–something to pass the time until something better comes along–is something serious to them. 

How many couples exist on two planes of commitment, completely unaware that the other doesn’t share their intentions. 

And even if you are both completely indifferent about the other in the long-term, why become a couple? Why give your time, romantic energy, or half-hearted commitment to someone you don’t see yourself ending up with–for what are likely completely valid reasons? Why stay in this limbo?

It must be tightly interlocked with our deep, gnawing fear of being single. We just passed Valentine’s Day, and think of the hordes of people who used the occasion to spill out their hearts about how incredibly lonely they felt, how left out from a society they imagined as coupled-up, how less-than being without a significant other made them feel. And you don’t need to have a holiday to see this kind of behavior — even on a Saturday night, you’re bound to hear a friend complain about how they just wish they had someone to go out with — as though friends, family, or just themselves is not company enough. Sometimes I would see these kind of sentiments during the long periods of my singlehood, when I was going out on dates here and there but not feeling anything magical, and feel like the only person my age who didn’t care that I was single. I liked being single! Some of my best memories are walking around my city completely alone, doing everything I want to do in the day and not having to consider another person’s itinerary — seeing sights and being alone with my thoughts. Just sitting by the water with a glass of iced tea and a book was some of the most wonderful pleasures I can recall. Of course, my memories shared with significant others are just as beautiful — though in a different way. And loving running hand-in-hand with someone in the rain doesn’t negate an afternoon-long stroll by myself on a warm spring day.

But so many people, I fear, can’t quite enjoy this aloneness. They must replace it with someone — whether to calm their own anxieties or to fulfill some kind of social expectation of themselves. 

We all know that the twenties are a perpetual state of being asked “if you’ve found someone,” and it can become grating, sure. But that is no reason to succumb to the pressure and pass your time with someone for whom lasting love will never be an option. 

If you want to have a friend with benefits, or a one night stand here and there, more power to you! 

But there’s no reason to transmute those into half-hearted relationships just so you can claim, when put on the spot, that you have “someone” in your life. 

Finally, there is someone out there who understands me completely and is capable of capturing my thoughts perfectly. This new era of thinking is getting really awful, devoid of moral values. What is the world turning into? 

I heartily agree with the author. 为什么要做贱自己，为什么？

One either

1. Dates, but breaks it off with there's no sparks

2. Friends with benefits - fine nothing wrong with that too, mutual physical gratification

3. Dates, sparks fly, serious relationship. If nothing goes wrong in this category, it is most likely that marriage comes into the equation

But unfortunately people nowadays do this more

1. Dates, no sparks, continues to do so and lead the other party on

Just like what the article said, how can you be sure that the other party feels the same as you do. One can argue that it is a mutual agreement. Nothing permanent, just a game. It might be a game to you, just someone to entertain and pass time with, but how can you be sure the other party doesn't want something more. There is bound to be one party weaker than the other, who will succumb more easily to their emotions while the other just takes and takes without a single care in the world. 

How insanely selfish is that. 

It's selfish and despicable, yet so many people do this and think there is nothing wrong with it. Moral values are nothing to them. I am pretty sure all of us are brought up to be kind souls, not to be selfish,  do unto others what you want done unto you, to have empathy. I am beginning to think that as we grow up, moral values are discarded along the way and they develop warped sense of morals. Morals that condone them to be the kind of selfish people they are turning out to be. 

Others might argue that times have changed, we are no longer boring and traditional. But that's a sad thing too. Traditions and morals define who are, and now that people are throwing these basic moral values out of the window, it's just pathetic. 

Times change, people change, things change. But there are certain things in life that remains the same, regardless of what era we're in. Wrong means wrong. There is no two way about that. 

Sadly, less and less of the world  shares the same sentiments as me now.

“本来，一个女人上了男人的当，就该死；

女人给当男人上，那更是淫恶，杀了她还污了刀。”

I sincerely hope that, these people out there, you can learn to love and respect yourself more, and the people you are using more.