Are we the problem, or is it the love ‘market’?

A response to the Sundial article “Are Men the Problem, Or Are We?” and what this controversial take reveals about Columbia’s romantic culture.

Photo provided by Noel Ullom

By Noel Ullom

December 21, 2025

Just as Orpheus braved the depths of hell to charm the gods and retrieve Eurydice, as Antony abandoned his fleet during battle to follow Cleopatra, and as Juliet took a dagger to the chest to join Romeo in an unfamiliar heaven, so too did you submit to the wills of passion when you responded to their text within the very same hour of receiving it.

In her recent article — “Are Men the Problem, Or Are We?” — published in the latest print edition of the Sundial, Christina Ma (BC ’28) discusses the disappointingly impersonal and noncommittal nature of the modern dating world, rooting her examination in Columbia University’s campus. Before I begin, I want to acknowledge that I will be writing more specifically about heterosexual relationships in this response, as they are what Ma focused on. However, many of the points I make can be applied across sexualities. While I agree with some of Ma’s observations, such as the persistent dissatisfaction among many people with whom we interact regarding the unstable and unreliable nature of the dating scene at Columbia, I feel a strong urge to respond to what she argues is the origin of this frustration: namely, the dating “market.”

What is pretty telling is that we actually agree on this; the prevalence of the “market” approach to dating has certainly had a severely negative influence on our relationships to one another and ourselves. Where we diverge greatly in opinion, however, is how we should approach this market and if we are obligated to it. Ma argues that “Once you see dating as an economy of value exchange, it becomes less emotional and more strategic. Stop asking, ‘Am I drawn to him?’ And start asking, ‘Does he want what I want?’ Or ‘Do I have what he wants?’” While I already take great issue with the prioritization of male desire over female desire and the insinuation that a woman must change herself to satisfy a man’s demands but not vice versa, I strongly disagree with the notion that anyone, regardless of gender, ought to focus on molding and selling themselves for the sake of possibly being chosen.

I want to introduce you to the ideas of Erich Fromm, a German sociologist and psychoanalyst who wrote “The Art of Loving,” published in 1956. While there are naturally some outdated ideas in the book given its publication year, Fromm presents two helpful categories for how to understand love: passive love and active love. The market idea that Ma discusses and her advice to “become the kind of woman high-value men want” falls directly into the passive. Individuals in this category invest their energy into making themselves as “lovable” as possible, adjusting their looks or goals to align as closely as they can with their culture’s beauty standards and ideas of social and financial success. In return, they expect someone of equal or greater value to desire them, striking a “bargain.” Each individual thus becomes a commodity, working to increase their market value based on what they expect others to want. Love becomes an object, a noun, something that is earned in exchange for their self-directed efforts.

On the other hand — rather than asking “How do I make myself more lovable?” — active love asks “How do I love?” As opposed to treating love like an object, as would be necessary in the dating approach for which Ma advocates, Fromm asks readers to treat love like an action or an art. Like the art of painting, playing an instrument, or creative writing, the art of love requires practice. Love is not something that happens as a reward for aligning oneself with certain standards of beauty or success, like a gold-star sticker. Instead, Fromm argues that love is an active choice and a dedication to learning and practicing it. Love can take on many forms between different people, and each love offers its own lessons on how it can be performed and received. Like an artist feels most fulfilled in the completion of an artwork, Fromm argues, so too does the lover feel most fulfilled in the more nurtured and supported version of their partner that has emerged due to their partnership. In active love, giving is the reward, not the expense. 

I want to take this idea one step further. While an artist finds great pleasure in the completion of their work, I would argue they find equal pleasure in the experience of creating it. Even though one inevitably faces challenges during the creative process, a writer often finds themselves most content and inspired while they write, and a performer often finds themselves most stimulated and excited as they perform. Similarly, in treating love like an art form, we can come to understand the continuous experience of giving in a relationship as its own reward.

At the same time, there is great pleasure in the art of receiving another’s love, not in the expectation of it, but in opening oneself up emotionally. In her article, Ma writes, “We’re equal players; we must give as much as we receive.” While I agree with the sentiment that both partners should feel mutually cared for and respected, the insinuation that I hesitate to agree with is the notion that we should preemptively quantify how much we give based on what we receive. Though it is deeply important for two partners to ensure a healthy sharing of effort in a relationship, the mentality of treating each other like “players” in a game — implying that there must be winners and losers — encourages partners to concern themselves too much with quantifying how much love one is receiving and, by extension, to adopt a more self-centered approach to the partnership.

Throughout my personal experiences and many conversations about dating at Columbia with students of all genders and sexualities, I have come to believe that the focus on quantified reciprocity and exhibition of one’s value touches on why we struggle to perceive love — or more generally, attraction and intimacy — in the active sense. The school culture in which we live, share ideas, and measure our own success is an incredibly competitive one that fosters a desire to see immediate reward and make that reward visible to others. Whether this takes the form of good grades in the academic realm, plentiful friends in the social, or a highly sought-after internship in the occupational, we have come to enjoy and somewhat obsess over demonstrating our success and our rise to an elusive top. As a result, intimacy becomes another measuring rod of this success. Whether it is the number of people we are talking to, the number of people we have “gotten with,” or the looks, accomplishments, and social status of the person we are getting to know, intimacy offers another way in which our peers around us may evaluate who we are. 

This idea of self-extension through a partner directly relates to another point Fromm touches on, which is that we must move beyond the common and often unconscious assumption that a partner can serve as an add-on or supplement to ourselves. Fromm critiques this assumption by writing, “The main condition for the achievement of love is the overcoming of one’s narcissism. The narcissistic orientation is one in which one experiences as real only that which exists within oneself, while the phenomena in the outside world have no reality in themselves, but are experienced only from the viewpoint of their being useful or dangerous to one. The opposite pole to narcissism is objectivity; it is the faculty to see other people and things as they are, objectively, and to be able to separate this objective picture from a picture which is formed by one’s desires and fears.”

I want to be clear that while I am in no way shaming talking to or being intimate with multiple people, I am raising concerns about a pattern of hesitancy I have noticed here when it comes to commitment as a result of our considerably self-serving culture, and drawing attention to the struggles that harm all parties when dishonesty about motivation or intention emerges from it.

As Ma also points out in her article, people at this school have too often experienced or know of times when one or both individuals in a (trigger warning) situationship, or people who are starting to talk in a romantic/sexual context, are not entirely honest about their intentions or hesitations. As a result, one partner enters situations of both emotional and physical intimacy in an attempt to figure out if love can be practiced between them, while the other enjoys the temporary self-affirming benefits of the exchanges but eventually ends the partnership when the possibility of commitment draws near. I would also like to acknowledge that this uncertainty can be very real and stressful for the partner who ends the partnership, but I do believe that they owe it to the person they are talking to to be honest about this uncertainty, as they are not the only one figuring things out. I say this as someone who has been on both sides of this situation, as the person who was not entirely honest and the person on the receiving end, and has learned a lot from the pain of both.

Though it is not the case that people should always have to date with the intention of entering a long-term, monogamous relationship, or even that people should have to know exactly what they want, I do truly believe that we would all greatly benefit from opening ourselves up more to the potential of deeper connections, rather than treating ourselves and each other like players in a game. Ma argues for an approach to dating that is “less emotional,” but in this attempt to avoid pain that she suggests, we also steal from ourselves the chance to take risks, find pleasure and thrill in these risks, and open ourselves up to the possibility of sincerely personal connections in this increasingly impersonal world. Vulnerability is not a sacrifice in a market but the rare opportunity to discover new layers to a person and yourself. Intimacy is not a trophy but the powerful reminder that being human can mean more than what we produce or prove, a gift of life that is practiced and enjoyed rather than earned. Love is an active choice, not a passive consequence, whose pleasures and aches can form our most significant memories and characteristics. Love can mean the feeling in your chest when you hold hands with someone for the first time, the shared laugh you cannot control that leaves you gasping for air, or even just the pleasure you get from reminding someone that they matter to you. 

Active love must be continuously chosen, practiced, and exercised. While Ma asserts that women must be the ones to adjust themselves and their approaches to relationships if they hope to find meaningful connections, I strongly believe that people of all genders and sexualities would greatly benefit from reorienting their perspective and approach to attraction, dating, and love. No certain group of people should have to bear the weight of attempting to fix a dating world in which they are left unsatisfied, isolated, or confused, especially not when the issue has become so intertwined with the social and political culture in which we live. Reorienting your perspective will not reform our culture at large, but I promise you will notice yourself more often looking outward to appreciate all who surround you, rather than looking inward to make sure you deserve them.

One last idea from Fromm that I would like to include is his emphasis on love as something that moves beyond romantically or sexually involved partners. Fromm writes, “Love is not primarily a relationship to a specific person; it is an attitude, an orientation of character which determines the relatedness of a person to the world as a whole, not toward one object of love.” The art of loving is not just something practiced between you and a partner but something practiced between you and the world you move through at large. Your friends and family are part of this, yes, but consider more than that. Think about the person who serves your coffee in the morning, or even the birds you hear first thing when you wake up, the security guard you walk past every time you go to and from home, and the clouds that remind you to look up sometimes. True love — for a partner, friend, hobby, song, or place — does not require a reward in return. It is the reward.

Before I wrap up, I want to thank Christina Ma for her article. Although we disagree on many points, I always appreciate someone willing to discuss love and sexuality as the feelings and experiences that rule many aspects of our lives, rather than as trivialities. Alongside our relationships with others, love and sexuality play a major part in the way we interact with media, art, philosophy, politics, and most importantly, ourselves. Treating it as something other, as something outside the academic fields I have just described, is to ignore why people turn to such fields in the first place, among other things, trying to make sense of love and sex and to determine the consequences of their power over us. Christina, I wish you the best in your own endeavors, and here is to hoping we both find the meaningful experiences we are looking for!

I want to leave you all with one more quote, one of my favorite passages from Fromm:

“Infantile love follows the principle: ‘I love because I am loved.’

Mature love follows the principle: ‘I am loved because I love.’ 

Immature love says: ‘I love you because I need you.’

Mature love says: ‘I need you because I love you.’”