There has never been a time in history when love has been harder to find than today. In previous generations specifically prior to the 1980’s, 85% of the population was married. This is not the case today. According to Pew Research Center, millennials are much less likely to be living with a family of their own than previous generations when they were the same age. As the population of single adults increases worldwide, countries are battling the ideals of the romance era and modern entertainment against the reality of future population decline.
Adult men and women are not meeting cute or marrying late, they aren’t marrying at all.
Back Then There Was Help
Gone are the days of the strategic marriage, a practice developed in Britain’s early tribal groups who arranged marriages as a strategic tool to ensure their inheritance of, and continued dominance over, land, wealth and status. As early as 2350 B.C. The first recorded evidence of marriage ceremonies uniting one woman and one man occurred in Mesopotamia.
Our ancestors truly believed it took a village to make a marriage but modern day villages have all but disappeared, leaving the average single fending for themselves when it comes to finding love.
Most singles need help and have no idea how to find it. One woman in particular turned to the one place where you can find the answer to anything, including ‘Where is my future husband?’, and that’s the Internet. New York native Kimber-lee Alston is looking for love, and she’s turning to her modern day ‘village’ to do it. And that village might include you.
Crowdsourcing For Love
The Dating Truth spoke with Ms. Alston over the phone and she described that what started off as partly a joke and part frustration is now a full-fledged campaign to find love.
“Black women are rarely depicted as the love interest”, Ms. Alston a dark-skinned woman of Caribbean descent bemoaned.
Her goal is to highlight the challenges that black women face in the dating world as well as celebrate how lovable black women truly are. She has launched her campaign on IfundWomen, a Startup funding platform for female entrepreneurs. The campaign which ends in March runs a little over 30 days.
The goal is to raise at minimum $25,000 which will contribute to her hiring a matchmaker and even traveling worldwide to find love. She also hopes to be able to help others find love as well.
When asked what dating has been like up to this point, Kimber-lee echoed the sentiments of many black women in metropolitan cities. Stating that the lack of options, coupled with a lack of diversity has made it difficult to find a suitable partner. Ms. Alston who lives in the Bay Area in Northern California is living a circumstantial truth. When it comes to dating as a numbers game, the numbers do not favor black women.
Statistics for Black Women
For every 100 black women living in the Bay Area, there are only 88 black men, according to a KQED Lowdown analysis. This gender imbalance is notably greater than in any other racial group, and reflects the disproportionately high rate of incarceration among black males. An alarming statistic considering that just twenty minutes south of San Francisco, San Jose is often referred to as Man Jose for having a 3:1 male to female ratio. With these staggering statistics there is no wonder a campaign like Ms. Alston’s is necessary.
The Dating Truth Founder, Fauna Solomon expressed support for Ms. Alston’s campaign stating, “Too often we see women of other races having a range of emotions when it comes to love. We see their tears, their fears, their rejection, and their frustration but rarely are black women portrayed as being vulnerable when they are single. Black women want love just like anyone else.”
As an underrepresented group, Black women have often been the recipient of bad press when it comes to finding partnership. This campaign comes at an appropriate time during Black History Month when positive stories are celebrated. Crowdsourcing your love life might just be the next wave in dating post pandemic, let’s celebrate women leading the charge.
To support Ms. Alston in her venture for love visit the donation page here: https://ifundwomen.com/projects/help-kimber-lee-find-husband