Most of us have heard and maybe even used the dating/ hook up/ meet up app Tinder. It's a free and easy to use app for smartphone. It downloads in just minutes and will give you an option of downloading your information and pictures right from your facebook.
I first found out about Tinder my freshmen year of college. These are the Tinderella chronicles. Although Tinder is used and loved by many, it offers virtually no safety for it's users.
The first time I came across Tinder, I was in a friends dorm room with five or six of her sorority sisters sitting cross legged in a circle. We all downloaded Tinder while we drank. We joked about these Tinder parties and would ask for things like taco bell and pizza. We set the age range as high as it could go and got a ton of matches and likes from men older than our fathers. We swept right for interesting looking people and started ridiculous conversations with no intentions of meeting any of them. I remember we all swiped right for an older man who was obviously lying about his age. He said he was 24 but was atleast 40 from his pictures. He essentially copied and pasted the same lines to all of us. The next morning I walked to my job at Pinkberry on Magazine Street and had to run to the back of the store and into the store room because this "24" year old Tinder Dad we suspected was 40-plus came into Pinkberry with his wife and kids.
I deleted the app the next day but have a ton of friends who have used or still use Tinder. These are some of their stories.
Tinderella went out of town with her college age cousins to their grandparents beach house. She's an avid Tinder user and met a cute guy on the app. He told her he was a pilot for a private company and they arranged to meet up. When he got there, he called her and she heard a thick accent in his voice. He came in and she asked about his accent and he told he was actually from France. A French pilot? Hot. She was very into it. They started to make out and within a few minutes started having sex. He stopped unexpectedly after two minutes and she asked if everything was fine and he said plainly, "I already came." He completely stopped the sexual exchange and put his clothes He made a vague excuse about his friends waiting in the car and left. They messaged later about maybe meeting up the next day and he told her he hadn't had sex since he had been with his ex-girlfriend in France. When she woke up the next day, he had blocked her on Snapchat and hadn't responded to her Tnder messages. She changed his contact name to Vincent Nogasm.
Tinderella told me about being a third wheel on vacation with her two best friends who happened to be dating. They wanted to have some alone time in the hotel room so she let them be and tindered in the hotel lobby. She matched with someone who's main picture was a tasteful picture of him naked from the backside. He had some other pictures of nude art and after talking to him revealed he's a nude model and artist. HOT. She was into it and he picked her up. They drove around for a while and he brought out some mini liquor bottles and offered them to her. One of the ones he grabbed happened to be vanilla extract. She knew right then it would be a strange interaction. She told him she can't drink whiskey and chose the only mini vodka to sip. He couldn't get through the Jim Beam happily, so she suggested going to McDonald's for a Coke to use as a chaser. He offered to buy her something as well and she got a Diet Coke and they drove away back to the movie theatre parking lot. He was able to successfully drink the rest of the Jim Beam and washed it down with his coke. After a few minutes, he suggested making a move to the backseat. She pulled her chair up and adjusted the back of the chair so they'd have more room in the back. He tried to do the same and his door was jammed so he couldn't get out of the car and then had to stretch and move the driver's seat up from the back of the car. Awkward. He started badly kissing her and took his shirt off. Within a few minutes she had his pants off and touched his member. She started to give him oral and he said, "Whoa, you're going to make me bust too fast." She stopped and stared at him and thought about his gross use of the word "bust" and then he did just that-- all over his stomach and her hand. She cursed his family silently and he drove her home. All she told him when they departed was, "Thanks for the iced tea."
Tinderella matched with a cute guy on Tinder and they met at the local watering hole and made out. He is now her great friend who always hangs out at bars with her and they act as each other's wingmen.
Tinderella was at college and invited a cute Tinder guy to her apartment when her roommates were out of town. When he showed up, his lips were super chapped and scabbed over. He showed up so drunk that he had whiskey dick and wouldn't leave the apartment until 6 a.m.
Tinderella was freshly out of a break up and saw a hottie on Tinder and decided to meet up with him at Wine Night at their college. He was super nervous and got black out drunk but Tinderella had a great time and with him despite him being blackout drunk. She went back to his apartment and he couldn't perform due to being black out drunk so she laughed in his face and he got mad. But he made it up to her and they've been dating for a year and a half.
Tinderella was at the beach with friends and used the app to find a date for drinks. He was an army vet who lost hearing in one ear and feeling in his back and took her out for drinks and showed her around town. He past the friend test and stayed over in the hotel for two nights and took the friends to lunch. He drove a topless Jeep which was hella hard to climb in and out of. She jokingly called him her "boyfriend" the morning after and he went with it. She left the beach after a few days but has a new pen pal to send post cards too and he has plans to visit her city and fly her back to the beach.
Wreck Blynts met his Tinderella for margaritas after meeting on the app and nerding out over Kill Bill and shared interests for a few days. The night went well and after a few hours filled with butterflies and cheap tequila, they continued the night at the Blynts residence. Once arriving there, Tinderella spoke like a porn star and put her french language skills to work. Tinderella had an electric energy and an insatiable sexual desire for Wreck Blynts. Every time she nears ort before the fireworks, she throws up. At first, Wreck brushed it off and chalked it up to too many margaritas. But she insists the sexual escapades continue for the next six hours and every time, she vomits before she cums. After falling asleep briefly, they wake up and she intitiates one more time after declaring that she's slept it off and is sober now. Both exhausted from countless hours of attempting to make the other climax, they try once more. Finally, Tinderella is able to climax. But, as soon as she does, she's bent over in the garbage can throwing up once more. This fuels her to throw her clothes back on, apologize, and leave after deciding she'd be going to planned parenthood as soon as they opened.
Tinderella went to meet a hot girl but when she arrived at her destination, realized she was in a super sketchy area and thought getting out and meeting up with someone in this scary warehouse in the middle of nowhere was sketchy so she drove away in her carriage.
Tinderella went out to dinner with the most beautiful girl she had ever seen and made plans for a second date. Then the beautiful girl got roped back into an abusive relationship with her boyfriend and told Tinderella she had a great time but couldn't talk to her anymore and deleted her from Tinder.
Tinderella used Tinder kinda often and matched with an attractive tourist and invited him over. She thought it was a win that he looked like his picture and was well dressed. He got super aggressive and assaulted her. He left and immediately unmatched her so she couldn't contact him again or see their messages. Her phone got stolen and she had no way of contacting him or obtaining any information about him if she wanted to report. She looked on the app and on the website and found no way to try and report him, make a claim, or gain access to their messages after he unmatched with her. He was a tourist and left town after assaulting her without a trace. This was the last straw and Tinderella ended her relationship with Tinder and is now seeking therapy for the incident.
Tinder offers no protection or support for their users and creates an opportunity for rapists and serial rapists to unmatch their victims so they lose any messages and cannot be contacted. There needs to be an option to report, ban, or make a claim against some Tinder users they think predators. Tinderella's should be able to use the app to meet friends, hook ups, and partners without having to worry about being assaulted. Tinder doesn't post any guidelines for their users or talk about the importance of having consent before having sex or about getting kicked off the app or facing legal action for assaulting matches. This needs to be changed and Tinder needs to do better to protect Tinderellas and Tinderfellas.