4th and Goal Commentary - April 25, 2001
Singles Suffering Stereotypes
By Bill McCartney
More and more Americans are plagued with what many see as a depression
inducing, and seemingly incurable disease. They're single!
I'm Bill McCartney... It's 4TH and Goal!
John's 33 years old, handsome, charming, and intelligent, but he's never
been married. We could make all kinds of assumptions from his singleness.
For instance, John must have some flaw keeping him single. Maybe
it's something in his personality that makes him unattractive to women.
Or, he probably wishes he were married. Maybe, he'd like to be set
up with my friend, Judy. Or, it could be that John is a closet-homosexual.
Ever notice how many stereotypes we have of the single men and women
we know? We often make up reasons for their singleness - reasons
that are almost always negative and likely have no bearing on reality.
Interestingly, psychologists say there's a social stigma attached to
being single, despite the fact that the ranks of single people have skyrocketed
over the last three decades. According to the latest Census data,
singles head 46 million American households!
Hey guys, let's be clear. Singleness is not a disease to be cured.
Singles don't necessarily have a reason for being single. There is
no universal age to get married. And, pity may not be the appropriate
response to singleness.
Not all singles are unhappy being unmarried. Not all singles feel
incomplete or lonely. Some single people live very full lives.
But, this doesn't mean they don't have struggles just like the rest of
us.
Those of us who are married need to spend time with singles, invite
them to dinner, hang out with them. Basically, we need to treat them
like human beings and not loners or matchmaking projects. Singles
and married couples need to learn about life from each other's perspectives.
Let's all do what we can to recognize and then eliminate the biases
that we have toward single people. When we do, we'll start operating
out of reality instead of stereotypes.
I'm Coach Bill McCartney.
Source Material: Kelleher, Kathleen. "So there are more single
people, but it's still a couples' world." LA Times February 2001.
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4th and Goal - Coaching for Life's Tough Calls, with Bill McCartney,
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