The Government wants to encourage couples to have (more) babies, but nobody’s really talking about the starting point: finding someone we like enough to have children with.
A recent Straits Times survey of 1,000 unmarried people explained the dating scene plainly: It’s bleak, it’s hard to meet new people, dating can be expensive and there are unrealistic expectations of love and relationships.
Throw into the mix talk of red flags and icks, and we can’t help but ask: “Is modern dating in Singapore ruined?”
In this episode, I chat with:
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Liu Zhiqun, co-founder of Kopi Date, a dating platform that curates one-on-one coffee dates, and
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Dr Kenneth Tan, an assistant professor of psychology at Singapore Management University, who studies relationships from end-to-end – that is from singlehood to why relationships end.
Highlights (click/tap above):
1:53 Has dating become harder?
5:29 21 years old, no dating experience
10:10 The ‘perfect partner’ problem
11:33 Has social media warped our idea of romance
14:21 Dating 101: teaching rejection in schools?
18:29 Why people don’t bring their best self on dates
21:46 “Why do I have to work for love as well?”
27:15 Is school the best place to look for love?
31:20 Fear of being alone leads to settling
32:34 Red flags, icks: are they just excuses?
36:25 Old-school gender rules in a modern dating world
41:52 Can the Government fix our love lives?
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Filmed by: Studio+65
Edited by: Eden Soh and Natasha Liew
Executive producer: Danson Cheong
Producers: Natasha Ann Zachariah and Elizabeth Law
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