Living Single

The truth about singles in our society.

Bella DePaulo is author of Singled Out: How Singles Are Stereotyped, Stigmatized, and Ignored, and Still Live Happily Ever After. She teaches at UC Santa Barbara. See full bio

October 30, 2009

Nicky Grist: Single-Minded Change Agent

Nicky Grist, Executive Director of the AtMP, discusses her efforts to create a more just society for all single people. "Our work," she notes, "focuses on making it not matter whether a couple marries, or an individual remains single, or a family includes more than one or two adults. We think relationships are good for people, caring relationships are good for society, and society should treat caring relationships fairly based on what the people in them do for each other, not what they call each other." Don't miss her description of her most memorable experience as a single-minded change agent. Read More

October 30, 2009

What’s the Best Thing About Being Single?

Here's what I love best about living single. How about you?

October 27, 2009

They Survived Cancer, Only to Get Bashed by Singlism

The headline on CNN blared, "Childhood cancer survivors less likely to marry." Singlism so suffocates our reasoning capacities that of course the article devolved into the question, "What's WRONG with these childhood cancer survivors that they don't manage to marry as often as their siblings?" One of researchers even suggested a link between getting married (rather than staying single) and being capable of living your own life, independently. Read More

October 23, 2009

Shriver’s “Woman’s Nation” is Actually a Wife and Mother’s Nation: The Evidence

In her review and critique of the Shriver Report at the Women's Media Center, Gloria Steinem proclaimed that "anyone with a stake in increased equality also has a stake in the success of The Shriver Report." I, too, share Steinem's hope that "government and business will have to adjust policies to meet women's needs as parents and workers in order to keep the economy going, and also that more men will get accustomed to women as indispensable co-workers and co-breadwinners, and thus increase their share of the housework and childcare." But really, you're Gloria Steinem. Isn't the goal of honoring the many meaningful ways of leading a life at least as important as getting men to do more dishes and diapers? Read More

October 23, 2009

Shriver Report Serves Up Compulsory Marriage and Mothering

Women, the Shriver Report cares about you. The authors want you to be everything you can be - as long as you don't choose to stay single, to not have children, or, most horrible of all - both. You won't find an explicit call to marriage and parenting in the report. Those goals are simply assumed. In the Shriver Report, marriage and mothering are compulsory, in the same way that Adrienne Rich described heterosexuality as compulsory in her ground-breaking essay nearly three decades ago.

October 18, 2009

Who’s the Smuggest of Them All?

When people post these over-the-top, incessant, sappy, and embarrassing updates, I think they are revealing themselves as people quick to buy what popular culture is selling. They are grasping at the matrimania, without stepping back first to get away from the hype. Those who do step away from the fray may still decide that coupling or marriage is what they want - but I bet they won't brag about it relentlessly on Facebook. Read More

October 15, 2009

World’s Most Revolting Facebook Status Updates

What are your favorite examples of couples incessantly gushing over each other in their Facebook status updates? What do you make of the practice?

October 12, 2009

Do Relationships Need Lies to Survive?

A reporter asked me if relationships need lies to survive. She meant romantic relationships, but I like the bigger, broader meaning of the word better. Here's a longer version of my answers to her, and a link to her story. Also, at the end of this post, I explain the order in which I address topics in this blog. Read More

October 10, 2009

Universities Are Ruled by Married People

In contemporary society, the percentage of American adults who are single is inching ever closer to the 50% mark. Yet in our nation's colleges and universities, 89% of the presidents are married.

October 7, 2009

It’s Not Just About Couples

In the discussion around the web and in the MSM about that New York Times story comparing the economics of gay couples to that of married heterosexual couples, the point of view of people who are single has been recognized.