Dating Outside Your Race, Culture & Religion
Date Outside Your Race: What To Expect? Women Who Don't Date Outside Their Culture, Religion; Passport Bros; Men With Fetishes, Hinge Preference, Bumble Ethnicity Filters
Race, Culture, Religion & Dating: Male, Female Preferences
One of the less common questions I get, but one that invites many discussions and opinions, is dating outside of one’s race. It’s a hot-topic button that people approach from various angles including idealistic, realistic, nuanced and more including related demographics such as culture and religion. Several clients have asked me about my thoughts about it, and frankly, it’s more involved than one can imagine, but only if you let it.
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Related Reads on Modern Dating by Eddie:
Dating App Algorithms (Important read as algorithms play a huge part the experience men and some women have on dating apps with respect to their race and corresponding filters used).
Dating Outside Your Race As A Man, Woman
Before the modern area, dating and mating outside one’s race was not as common as it is today. People were more limited in how far and how often they could travel. It was viewed primarily as a necessity vs. the luxury as it is more associated today.
Thanks to modern transportation and jobs that can be done remotely, people have more options and incentives to leave their hometowns and live abroad. The places with the most diversity have been larger metropolitan areas, cities housing refugees, ports and military bases, and universities.
Many folks have no problem dating outside their race. This is something more common in bigger cities and people who have grown up in more metropolitan areas, however, it’s not without some consequences, difficult convervations and long-term thinking and planning.
When dating in your teens and 20s, dating outside one’s race can be difficult, frustrating and at time inconsequential. On one hand, people are thinking less about long-term family planning but are also new to dating and more open to people of different races, cultures. That openness can be offset by being heavily influenced by parents, as these individuals are more likely to be dependent on family for housing and not as likely to stand up when difficult conversations arise.
Even after college, dating outside of one’s race can be a novel experience in the sense that people are naturally curious about the world around them, are like a sponge and eager to learn about people different from themselves and as such, are more open to date others outside their race.
Dating Outside Your Culture & Religion
With time, as people get older and start to think about things like whether or not to have kids, where to live, where to retire, and how to spend holidays, life gets real. These conversations are often what make or break relationships. Dating in the early stages is often low-stakes, but as time passes and people start to think about these life decisions and their many priorities change, and they may reassess their preferences vs deal-breakers.
It’s easy to live life in a bubble where there is not much change, whether in college or in your 20s, but sooner or later, there will be lots of change happening around you forcing decisions to be made sooner than later that were once shelved or even ignored indefinitly.
Parents and family members often play a significant role in the decisions, and while some may be fine with their kids and family members dating in their teens and 20s, they may suddenly change tune with age. Dating is seen as fickle and temporary, early in life, but more consequential with age and time as people learn from trial and error, parents desire to have grandkids becomes stronger and as one sees their friends settle down, move away, have kids and seemingly ‘progress in life’.
The person you are open to dating may not be the person you wish to settle with once other stakeholders and factors are carefully assessed.
Culture and religion are often discussed alongside race, at least with respect to dating. Dating for the first 3-6 months is often a low-stakes affair": people are infatuated with the idea of dating someone new, and that excitement and discovery can take up much of one’s bandwith and attention.
Early dating stage is about figuring out if you like the person, want to spend more time with them, how they treat you, what their vibe is like and what you have in common as well as where you differ. Some folks try to expedite the process, skip the chit-chat and ask more pressing questions upfront rather than be taken off guard later on.
Dating Implications: Race, Culture, Religion & Kids
Some people have very strong opinions about the early dating stages in that it should be free-flowing and things should evolve naturally. Others may treat it like a panel interview with rapid-fire questions to reduce false positives. Neither strategy is right, wrong, but each comes with its own limitations, drawbacks and requires different skillsets in order to execute objectives.
One involves more time, patience and desire to observe personality and read people. The other is based on the idea, hope that the person answers questions truthfully and doesn’t waver in their answers over time.
The truth is, someone can be steadfast in their goals and answers but those can easily and quickly change depending on things that happen along the way. This is why constant communication and check-ins are needed to make sure people remain on the same page. Beyond that, communication and reaffirmation means nothing if people are not actively planning for and around these answers, goals.
It’s one thing for a person to give the right answer when asked, prompted, but another to be proactive with said planning (job, finances, career, health, classes, training etc.) as well as take an invested role in the effort. Some folks become zombies and give the answer the other person may want to hear either because they want to avoid confrontation or hope the other person will budge on these matters.
Dating Outside Your Race As A Woman
There are other things to consider when dating outside of one’s race, especially for women. In my 12+ years of helping men and women date successfully, men are usually more open to dating people outside their race than women, whether it’s a curiosity, genuine openness or possibly a fetish. In some cases, some people may choose to date exclusively outside their race as it reminds them of an ex or because they have a strong distaste with their upbringing, culture with respect to gender norms and roles).