In a highly technological world, where so much of social interaction has become so...anti-social, we often find ourselves wondering how to form genuine connections, and have better relationships. Those thoughtful moments can make us feel bold like we are willing to try what we haven’t yet explored. It becomes easy to fall into the temptation of creating an online dating profile, but before you do, I want to be one of those old-schoolers who tells you not to.
Some of the most popular online dating sites and apps are Tinder, Match.com, EHarmony, OkCupid, and Jswipe. Over 50 million people use apps like Tinder per month, and collectively swipe 1 billion times per day. Even so, a third of people don’t go on real dates with people they match with on these sites. For all the swiping that’s happening on a daily basis, a third is a remarkable amount of bad results. So, why is online dating frustrating so many people?
Well, for starters, you are looking at and swiping through profiles that include incredibly limited amounts of information. An online profile only shows someone’s name, age, hobbies, occupation, and a photo or two. So you look at these very vague and superficial profiles, and you judge people based just on what’s written there. You then swipe right if you are interested, and left if you are not.
Let’s call online dating what it actually is. People Shopping. It’s an impersonal marketplace for human beings, where you make decisions on first glance, based solely on hobbies, age, and a photo. You are going through people the way you’d go through a pile of apples at the supermarket. I can’t blame you for that, because you don’t fall in love with someone’s career, hobbies, or looks. A vague profile does not show you the parts of someone’s personality that make them who they are, the very reasons that you might end up adoring them.
Because the superficial profiles are the only way people can make themselves look interesting, they often feel the need to lie. Yes, it’s very common for everyone to put his or her best foot forward, but with online dating, this concept is amplified. The anonymity of it all encourages dishonesty and misrepresentation. Either people’s pictures look nothing like them, their hobby is “weight-lifting”, but they haven’t been to the gym in months, or they are serial killers. You never know who is actually on the other side of the screen.
It’s also difficult to tell what someone is looking for. People use online dating for different reasons, and those reasons don’t always match. Some want serious relationships, others are just looking for casual flings, and some are just there to boost their egos when they aren’t feeling pretty. Those differences make miscommunication inevitable, and it’s how many people get hurt when they find out that the person they’ve been chatting with has opposing relationship goals.
What makes online dating most meaningless, is that it’s too easy. There’s not much effort going into each conversation. You get matched after two clicks, then you send that first “hey,” without much thought. With the help of emojis, default stickers, and suggested template texts, online dating makes it too easy to have conversations that blatantly lack chemistry and that abolish the need for any effort. When you meet someone in real life, though, you must gather up some courage to talk to them, and that makes the conversation exciting. Online, that excitement is stripped away from conversations, leaving an empty chat without spark, intuition, or a gut feeling — l like there often is in person — that the person you’re talking to is interested. You can’t date on spark alone, but you also can’t date without it.
Don’t swipe your way to your next date. After all, truly good things don’t come that easy.
