So … SDU – officially Social Development Unit, unofficially Single Desperate Ugly or Single Desirable Unattached – depending on whichever side you swing to – is ‘calling it quits’ as the government appointed ‘official matchmaker’ after twenty-two years in business.
Or so as the broadsheet papers have reported one day ago in Singapore.
But apparently, the swinging bachelors and bachelorettes appear to be seeking help from private agencies. As the same report would care to elaborate, speed dating and matchmaking are big businesses in Singapore, with singletons chalking up ‘S$29 million on them each year in an effort to find love’.
So the former Government Cupid has now decided it’s high time to take a step back and assume a facilitating role instead. Rather than playing the matchmaker, the government agency will be accrediting private agencies providing such services.
Sounds like good business sense – afterall ain’t it easier to extract revenue from an established sector rather than attempting an ‘uphill climb’ against public disdain of governmental interference in the private affairs of citizens.
Just a little surprising that’s all, that it has to take the agency 22 years to realise the futility of its own efforts.
Gen X-I 
[…] This demand for greater liberty and a sense of self control over one’s romantic relationship and ultimately choice of life partner marks the fracture between the younger and older Chinese. As the interviews have illustrated in the same programme, while co-habitation may be unthinkable for the earlier generation, likewise the rebellious young may find the concept of traditional matchmaking repulsive. Rather, as a visit to a ’speed dating pub’ has illustrated, the young would very much prefer to retain autonomy over who to date and how to date (Umm… a rather common sentiment amongst young Singaporeans). […]
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