> but I think everyone's opportunities are diminished by this I share your frustration, but I've also become very cynical about this. If people didn't want it

> but I think everyone's opportunities are diminished by this I share your frustration, but I've also become very cynical about this. If people didn't want it this way, they wouldn't do it. It seems to me in my social circle, partners are chosen first and foremost for the function they perform. "I needed a full-time mother for my children" "I didn't want to be alone anymore" "I felt time was running out" "I wanted a man with more status" "I wanted someone who's more down to earth" "I wanted someone to be there when I get home from work" "I wanted better sex" "I wanted someone who looks up to me". Almost everyone I know can and does distill their relationship into one of those sentences. You might think it's bleak, but people think nothing of it apparently. So I came to the conclusion that my ideal, to hook up with people who are interesting and whom you can love for who they are, this ideal practically doesn't exist in the wild. And if we're indeed mostly choosing partners for their function, I don't see how any opportunities are diminished by playing arbitrary (and sometimes inhumane) games. I may not like it, I will certainly not participate in it, but it seems to work out for pretty much everyone. This is only marginally related, but when my cat died, do you know what the most frequent first response of friends and family was? It wasn't "oh, so sorry, I know you loved her very much", or even "so what, it's just a cat", though both ends of the spectrum were certainly present. No, the most common reaction was: "are you getting a new one?" To most people, it's all about function.