A recent USA Today article titled “Hooking up to getting hitched: Yes, it can happen” states that one-third of the marital relationships in a given sample started with a hookup. It emphasizes that articles and studies have been talking about “the hookup culture” and how it is affecting college students worldwide.

While I didn’t exactly come into college expecting to find my Mr. Darcy, I can’t help but think that this hookup culture has destroyed the idea of finding a future husband or wife while in school.

First things first

So what’s a hookup?

It’s this purposefully ambiguous term used by all of us college students to describe anything from making out to sex. (Yes, I said it. Sex. College students have sex, surprise!) We created this word to cover a wide variety of situations so that we can choose if we want to exaggerate our night or hide what really happened.

Brooke Davis in One Tree Hill captured this idea best when she said, “Relationships are just too hard, hooking up with boys is so much easier.” What makes relationships so hard, though? It’s not a new concept. People have been getting married and living happily ever after for years now.

Where is this change coming from?

I’ve seen couples sitting on their phones together in a restaurant, doing who knows what, but obviously not paying attention to each other or having a conversation. I wonder how they can consider themselves to be in a relationship, unless it’s one involving them and their cellphones. Hookups are easier for our generation because we are so focused on everything else, from getting good grades to an ex’s tweet to a best friend’s Instagram, that we don’t have the time and energy needed for an actual relationship.

Relationships don’t work in our culture because we don’t let them work.

Why do we do it?

Having someone who is just a “thing” is easy for us because it’s completely low-risk. It can end whenever needed, because, well, it never even really started. I don’t know how many times I hear someone say, “Oh, we’re just a thing.” What does that even mean?

In these “things” it’s better to be the person who cares less, because then it’s possible to walk away unscathed when it ends. And in college, we have school clubs, homework and graduation to worry about. Adding a relationship to the mix is just one more drop in the bucket. But man, where did the romance go?

Our culture is much more open sexually than any of before; having a one night stand isn’t something to be ashamed of, and in some ways, it’s even glorified. We just use that ambiguous term “hookup” and tell whatever story we feel like telling. So like Brooke Davis said, if it’s possible to have sex without a commitment, why should college students take the time to be in a relationship?

But when does it turn into something to be worried about? This open sexuality leads to a decline in actual relationships. I’m not saying college is where you have to meet your soul mate, sorry Princeton Mom, but it’s not about racking up a number either.

Are women the problem?

For Samantha on Sex and the City, hooking up is her way of tackling the sexual double standard by having sex “like a man.” She feels that by taking control of her own sexuality, she can keep the power rather than the man. We are in the fourth wave of feminism, one in which women are expected to do whatever they want to, not to please anyone, but to make themselves happy. They’re called “rebel women.” They fight for abortion rights, they raise hell when a man touches their ass and they treat their bodies like it’s a vessel for feelings. This fourth wave has its place for women like Samantha, who want to have the power over their own body and have the freedom to do what they want with it. But having a hookup isn’t synonymous with having power.

Kudos to you women who feel like you’re getting back at men for being able to have meaningless sex, but I don’t think it really makes us even with them. Feminism is about respecting oneself and settling for what is deserved and nothing else.

“Relationships” in college turn into sex-only “hangouts” because guys are fine with it. A study mentioned in the USA Today article above says that 50 percent of men feel positive after a hookup, and we women are too busy trying to make a name for ourselves and being independent. Samantha is a powerful business woman, without the time or the desire for a relationship, which is nothing to be ashamed of.

But honestly, wouldn’t it be better to share it with someone else?

The problem is, we don’t care enough to find out.

I’m no expert, but..

Dating isn’t for everyone. That’s easy enough to realize considering it involves having money for dates, foregoing college parties for a night at home with the beau, and above all, it means having feelings.

If you want to get down to the basics, a lot of it probably has to do with the need to make babies and populate the world, but it’s more than that. It’s being able to have someone next to you who cares about the same things you do.

I’m not your mom, so I’m not saying “stop hooking up” – studies do show that it works one-third of the time – but feelings aren’t a thing of the past and neither is dating, yet.

Women, give good guys a chance. They’re not all gone yet. Men, delete your Tinder and ask a girl on a real date. To the movies, not to your dorm room.

P.S. – Has anyone even tried walking under the Baker grape arbor yet?