Best-selling author Harlan Cohen spoke passionately to UW-Madison students at the Memorial Union Theater Monday night about the dating principles that too many college students ignore.
Author of “The Naked Roommate: And 107 Other Issues You Might Run Into In College,” Cohen claimed that to feel comfortable dating, college students must recognize certain rules.
One rule is to accept what he called the “Universal Rejection Truth of Dating and Relationships.”
The principle states that “not every woman or man that you want to hold you, touch you and spread love oils on you” will want to do the same back to you.
He emphasized through personal anecdotes the importance of embracing the truth in order to come out of denial.
Cohen stressed the importance of training yourself to be confident in dating.
“It’s so easy not to train because alcohol, drugs and parties are so accessible.”
Another one of his rules about dating in college—to “take off the thong and put it on [their] heads,”—made the students’ “stomachs hurt from laughing,” said UW-Madison junior Andrea Webb.
He said students should consider the different emotions and physical features that this figurative thong exposes: embrace them or change them in a healthy way.
To test his own emotional thong, Cohen said he approached women at bars, clubs and grocery stores and recorded their responses. He discovered that anyone can be “unbelievably hot” if they personally
are comfortable with how they are.
To survive these two principles, college students must surround themselves with people who can remind them of how “smart, hot or intelligent” they are, according to Cohen.
Only after following these principles can college students have the opportunity to feel good about themselves and be confident about dating.
Through his interactive research on more than 100 campuses, Cohen discovered that the easiest way college students found to connect with people is through a “hook up.”
He discovered 15 different ways to hook up, including the “drunk hook up,” the “desperate hook up,” and the “repeat/back-up/text-at-3 a.m. hook up.”
“If you are in a room long enough, you will hook up,” Cohen said.
However, only after students feel confident with themselves can they start a healthy, intimate relationship and not fall victim to the frightening statistic that “one in five students has herpes.”
Cohen said the most important advice he could give to survive college dating is to take risks.
“You should have the courage to talk to someone soberly,” Cohen said. “If someone rejects you for a date, simply thank them for being honest.”
