ANOTHER ladies’ night, not by choice.
After midnight on a rainy night last week in Chapel Hill, N.C., a large group of sorority women at the University of North Carolina squeezed into the corner booth of a gritty basement bar. Bathed in a neon glow, they splashed beer from pitchers, traded jokes and belted out lyrics to a Taylor Swift heartache anthem thundering overhead. As a night out, it had everything — except guys.
“This is so typical, like all nights, 10 out of 10,” said Kate Andrew, a senior from Albemarle, N.C. The experience has grown tiresome: they slip on tight-fitting tops, hair sculpted, makeup just so, all for the benefit of one another, Ms. Andrew said, “because there are no guys.”
North Carolina, with a student body that is nearly 60 percent female, is just one of many large universities that at times feel eerily like women’s colleges. Women have represented about 57 percent of enrollments at American colleges since at least 2000, according to a recent report by the American Council on Education. Researchers there cite several reasons: women tend to have higher grades; men tend to drop out in disproportionate numbers; and female enrollment skews higher among older students, low-income students, and black and Hispanic students.
After reading a ton of news stories about how black women are struggling through the "Man-pocalypse" and all, I sometimes forget that the "Man-polcalypse" is foisted upon all women in the media, and not just black ones. It's our punishment for going to college and being successful. If only we'd never had this desire to do better, have a career or learn -- we'd all be so much happier! (Ignorance is bliss!) Because, you know, everything is our fault. No one wants to address the elephant in the room. (That elephant is named "Why are fewer men folks going to college?") Nope. Let's talk about these sad, sad young women and the 60-40 ratio.
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