"Roses are red, violets are blue, Tinder matched us so we should screw."
When I downloaded Tinder, this was not my intention.
I did not intend for boys to think it was OK to send me messages like this.
Yet this is the assumption if you download any one of the many social media dating apps; that a "hook-up" is in the impending future.*
*For this purpose, we will define "hook-up" as anything sexual; this could be kissing, sex, etc. While the word hook-up is very ambiguous in itself, we will not attempt to define it further at this point in time.
Nothing kills the vibe like a dating app. They encourage faceless contact reliant upon texts, instant messages, snapchats and friend requests. It's easy to appear witty, intelligent and attractive online. Everyone loves the filters on snapchat and the ability to copy and paste funny one-liners from a search engine. But does this encourage actual relationships? Or simply hook-ups?
Recently, it was discovered that "digital eligibility exceeds physical eligibility," meaning that while someone may seem attractive online, they pale in comparison in real life.
Tinder allows us to fulfill some sort of need. We can create the person we want to be. The perfect package. This causes an immediate sense of gratification. The more people swipe right indicating they like us, the better we feel. In the real world where no one seems to speak their mind or make a move, in the technological world, we can boost an over inflated ego with a couple swipes or choruses of
"Wow... you're beautiful" and "hey:)"
It's almost more arousing to match and/or message with someone than it is to actually hook-up with them.
This, my friends, is a problem.
Gone are the days of calling on someone like in "Pride and Prejudice" and gone are the days where people simply asked other people to coffee to get to know them. This has now been replaced with the standard Tinder profile, complete with several extremely edited photos, a name, age and short 140 character bio.
Let's ask ourselves; by downloading social media dating apps like Tinder, are we only seeking to gratify ourselves in a superficial and frivolous way? Or are we actually seeking relationships?
If the answer is the latter (which I assume it is), we are far better off dealing with the cryptic signals offered from those we are interested in, than spending hours swiping away and crafting perfect messages.
We're only allowing others to see us through the guise of social media, and if we want to form real relationships, we need to put down our phones, delete those apps and enter the real world.
