It was the week before Valentine's Day, a period of time Yale students fondly (or not) refer to Sex Week. And that's not because everyone is feeling particularly frisky given the impending holiday, although they might be. No, Sex Week is school-sponsored, an old university's attempt at meeting its modern and increasingly sexually active students. This past winter, we were treated to explicit seminars, sex toys and free STI testing. As a mere freshman, I had to see a pocket rocket to believe it.
One of the new additions to the event this year was GoodCrush Yale. Launched this past February, GoodCrush has two functions. One facet is labeled the CrushFinder; it enables college kids to list five romantic interests and ultimately, the Crushfinder creates couples. The other section is called Missed Connections; if a student either sees or meets a person of interest but is unaware of his or her name, that student can write up a description that the interest will hopefully see.
On Feb. 10, I received an email -- from student government, no less -- that told me I could "enter the email addresses of up to five crushes per month and see if [my] crush [was] a good crush." What were the future leaders of America trying to tell me? Was I, like a large percentage of my highly educated but socially inept peers, incapable of using my words to ask someone out?
Sadly, I have discovered that the answer to that question is invariably yes -- turning red and avoiding eye contact is my modus operandi. I am, however, acutely aware that a digital Magic 8 ball would only serve to push me back to the middle school days of finding out if that boy liked me through Max who found out from Ben who heard it directly from Willie. Rather than releasing me from the shackles of broccoli-in-braces adolescence, GoodCrush was throwing away the key.
With Warden GoodCrush, there's always the chance that you are going to be let down. At first, I was checking my email just once a day for the promised match: not a big deal. Then, it was every hour: getting a little scarier. Finally, I was tearing my hair out, waiting for the crush that deep down I knew was never going to come.
Personally, I would rather be rejected in person than have my computer constantly confirm my single status.
So, good effort, GoodCrush. Your intention may be to better my social life, but it seems it might end up hurting it (and me, in the process).