Jewish dating

Take a guess at which 'Jewish organization' has the largest number of young Jewish members (facebook doesn't count, despite Zuckerberg's MOT status).

It's not YPD, it's not Gesher-City, its JDate. Really. The single largest group of 20 and 30-somethings in St. Louis (and in most cities) is a website that exists purely for Jewish dating, and potentially marriage. It is useless to argue the chicken and the egg about which came about first, the lack of specific programming for this demographic, or the lack of engagement, but it is still interesting that the Gen Yid demographic would rather join a Jewish dating site, instead of align themselves with a community organization or temple.

It makes sense to a certain degree. A friend of mine was recently lamenting the problem of dating as a young Jew, particularly in St. Louis. While its not my place to judge certain patterns of dating behavior (although judge, I do), he raised some interesting points. The first problem is, where are all the Jewish women at? Second, where are the events at which to find these elusive characters in an environment that is casual, conducive to making friends and potential matches, and not awkward?

This is the beauty of JDate. Its all taken care of for you. You don't have to ask all those hard-to-ask questions that qualify a person as a potential match, its all done for you. They say everyone knows someone who met on Jdate. As more and more of my friends get married, I hear about more and more about Jdate's efficacy.

Granted it doesn't work for everyone. I also know several people who have gone on many a Jdate, and while they made a few friends here and there, the results left much to be desired.

Still, what if there was a place, or a stream of events that were casual enough to just drop by, like Mondays at the Muny (free seats, obviously), or Wednesday night jazz at the botanical gardens, meet a few people, share a glass of wine, and let things take their course.

That is the raison d'etre behind the Gcalendar we organized. Its simple, Just click the calendar link to see what is going on around the city. Also, if you shoot us an email, we put you on the calendar, and you can post your own events.

Then all you have to do is show up.

It's not just about singles. The hope is to provide for ourselves, to be the change we wish to see by simply connecting with the other young Jews in the STL metro area, and providing a forum and a sanctuary where we can express our vision for the future.