My thoughts here are in the heteronormative sense. No hate or disrespect to other pairings. I'm sure anthropologists and sociologists study this rigorously. The

My thoughts here are in the heteronormative sense. No hate or disrespect to other pairings. I'm sure anthropologists and sociologists study this rigorously. These are just some random layman musings. Just like in softwre engineering, I find human social systems fascinating. A recent example is the so-called "Bama Rush", which is rushing sororities at the University of Alabama, something I honestly probably never would've heard about were it not for Tiktok. Where I'm from we have nothing like Greek life so I find this fascinating. UA is an SEC school. SEC schools are a sporting division for the NCAA. UA college football is a big feeder for the NFL. Non-Americans may not realize that the Ivy League too is a sporting designation, not an academic one. Here are some things I learned: 1. UA itself is a feeder into Alabama politics, called The Machine [1]; 2. Pre-Civil War southern society had a very rigid structure. Correct or not, I tend to refer to this as plantation society. This is the realm of cotillions and debutantes. This harkens back to Regency England and earlier. The concept of a "debut" isn't exclusive to the South but it's more pronounced (it seems); 3. "Social proof" is such a huge factor in all of this. So much of this is about either seeking upward social mobility or, in the very least, insuring against downward social mobility. Greek life is a part of this; 4. Traditionally women went to college to get what's referred to somewhat derisively as an "MRS degree" (ie to find a husband). This sort of thing happened in the North too where colleges had "sister colleges" (eg Radcliffe for Harvard, which didn't admit women 60 years ago). Now I bring all this up because when I see comments about the importance of money (from other commenters and elsewhere), I think that's a very shallow (and basically incorrect) analysis. So much of matching in this environment is about social status and mobility. Power and money are proxies for that. You cannot ignore the importance of shared values in all of this. Thing is, you see this same pattern play out even somewhere like NYC, which very much isn't "plantation society". There are various proxies for social status like what school you went to (high school and college), where you work, your social connections and so on. In London, you see people reduce other people to what postcode they live in (eg W4, N1, etc). In LA in particular but probably elsewhere, if you're friends with an A-lister, you will be able to get into exclusive clubs, restaurants, etc even if by yourself. Just that connection alone is sufficient. You see a lot of these same themes play out in period fiction lkke Pride and Prejudice. Now you may think this is all very transactional. To a point it is. Compatibility does factor into it too. But you also find so many people who "settle". Another way of putting this is that they have certain goals and they find a partner who is sufficient for that. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Machine_(social_group) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Machine_(social_group)