My point of view: “Where have all the smart men gone?”

Recently I completed a telephone interview with Sarah – a journalist who was writing a story on the smart man drought that we apparently have in New Zealand. Sarah and I talked for about 30 minutes on things men and dating related. I have just had the opportunity to see the article – although I have had various pictures sent to my on my iPhone and have read the online version.

Where have all the smart men gone? | Stuff.co.nz

A shortage of bright single men does not surprise Tara Sutherland, a successful, high-flying career woman and part-time dive instructor.

The 37-year-old is attractive and has a busy social life. But at a time when her friends are having babies, the Telecom infrastructure designer is single.

Whilst the description of me might be a little over the top (me – attractive? high flying?) the rest of it is true.
At the end of this year, I will have been single for 7 years.

To be honest though, the only time when I ever think that there might be a man drought is when someone else talks about it. And it might sound like a long time but to be honest it has flown by and it is not as if I have put a whole lot of effort in to meeting a man. As I said to Sarah, the reporter, I don’t want to spend my Friday and Saturday nights hanging around town or in bars trying to meet someone. I would far rather spend my weekends doing the things that I enjoy and perhaps meet someone whilst doing them. It is actually more important to me that the man that I meet enjoys weekends, the outdoors and doing things similar to me than he does enjoy hanging out in the pub. Or that I find someone so quickly that the Friday and Saturday night meet/meat market is where I invest my time.

Me writing this blog post is not about disagreeing with the article – nor do I want to rubbish it at all – but I would quite like to put another couple of things about me and my relationship status out there. I just told Mum that I was writing this and she told me not to be uncharitable.

The article reads as if there is a chance that all single New Zealand women will be left with are the uneducated males.
I do not think that this is true – but a university degree does not necessarily an smart man make – and it doesn’t necessarily a nice man make. I am not looking for the guy in the pin striped suit with the flash car and the big office. If that is what he has when I decide that I like him, then great. But if he is a drainlayer with a pair of overalls and a van, then thats what he is. As long as he has two brain cells to rub together and as long as he is good to me.
I fail to see how this is ‘adapting’ … isn’t this falling for someone that you really like – rather than someone who just ticks items off your list?

Sure it seems that we are more picky now that we used to be. We (in general) get married a lot later than previous generations but we also have more options open to us. And when you think about it another way, we are all living a lot longer so why not take those extra years to really enjoy yourself, have some fun, do some traveling?

There are a couple of comments on the online article that I didn’t agree with;

One went straight to the “kiwi girls weigh too much and need to lose some weight so they do better in the dating game” (I am paraphrasing here). I immediately thought that that comment was so shallow, wished him the best of luck and read on.

One comment was that some girls have too many items on their list of what the man should have – more so than what he should be like.
This may be the case for some – but for me, my list is what he is like – and not like – as a person, not an object.

So I thought a little bit more about my list. What do I want?