Synonymous with the term "arranged marriage" is "parental input." Observant Jews are not the only ones whose mothers actively seek eligible singles for their children; Koreans and Indians make us look rather mild.
Even irreligious Jewish mothers are upping their game, and their kids don't seem to mind, as Ji Hyun Lee reports in another article about arranged marriage entitled "Hey Mom, Call Me When You Find My Wife."
Websites have come into being as these Jewish moms go where their matriarchal ancestors have gone before. You can take the Jew out of the shtetl . . .
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| Colby and Geri Brin, who invented "Date My Single Kid" on faboverfifty.com |
Parents are often vilified as the most hopeless of matchmakers in television- and movie-dom, but that may be just the scriptwriters' biases.
There's even an Australian reality show called Please Marry My Boy, in which the bachelors can only go out with the gals their mothers select. The U.S. version barely lasted a season.
New York Magazine wrote of "The Yenta Experiment" as a Jewish (not religious) singleton was set up three different ways: Via Mom, ex, and dating site.
The best date? Mom's. Even though he wasn't Lysee's usual type, the mother based the blind date on the "fun-ness" of his personality.
Just a side-bar: The Indians call their profiles "bio-data," which I must say sounds less annoying than "résumé." We should totally adopt the term.
I know plenty of people that call their shidduch info their "shidduch profile" rather than "shidduch resume." It makes it seems less like fishing and more like, "here're are some basic facts about me."
ReplyDeletetotally agree on the term "bio-data." when a friend of mine first used the phrase, it threw me way off - but it really makes more sense, given what most people look for in a shidduch profile anyway.
ReplyDeleteAnon: As do I. I'm not applying for anything, I'm simply telling the world about myself.
ReplyDeletegelt: Maybe I just hate that piece of paper anyway, no matter what it's called.