It has always been the Yiddishe way, for millennium, for the parents to make the shidduch decisions.
The kids making these decisions, to the extent it even happens (hopefully not too extensive), is a purely American thing without precedent in Jewish history.
Of course the boy and girl must agree to marry each other, that’s always been the case, but virtually everything up to that point always has, and should, go through the parents and shadchanim.