[HN Gopher] The toll of dating app burnout
___________________________________________________________________
The toll of dating app burnout
Author : irajdeep
Score : 123 points
Date : 2022-09-01 08:06 UTC (14 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.nytimes.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.nytimes.com)
| pizza234 wrote:
| > Dating apps just make it easy to connect with potential matches
| (relative to not having dating app burnouts)
|
| I don't know what's the universal experience regarding this, but
| for me and other people I know, males are extreme disadvantage in
| the context of dating apps; this applies also to the app that
| supposedly reverses the roles.
|
| I have the suspicion that the elephant is the room is that for
| men, online dating takes many, many hours (I can't quantify, but
| an hour a day or so, seems the minimum to me) of effort, often
| for nothing (I definitely know at least one man who's able to
| game the system, but he's an exception).
|
| This is definitely a recipe for burnout, and it's very specific
| to online dating . If one wants to find potential mates, any
| organized activity (sports, etc. - Meetup is perfect) will do;
| the effort to talk to a potential partner, in that case, is
| virtually zero.
| Mordisquitos wrote:
| What you're saying about the male disadvantage is indeed one,
| if not the most, important immediate cause of this burnout.
| However, I take a more systemic view. I think that the main
| problem is this: Dating apps, as for-profit
| publicly-traded enterprises, have no incentive to work on
| fixing the problem
|
| To put it bluntly, a large pool of men who struggle to get a
| date (an event that may even result in losing them as
| customers) and who feel the need to "pay to win" are the goose
| that lays the golden eggs for Tinder and the like.
|
| The only way out of this would be for a non-profit fully-FOSS
| dating platform to be created that considers satisfying its
| users dating objectives its one and only priority, rather than
| seeing them as a source of income. Make matching more likely by
| applying two-way filters in the swipe queue, discourage
| pointless accumulation of matches by clout-chasers and
| attention junkies, refuse any gamification, don't offer any
| feature for money but encourage donation on successful
| connection, and make "engagement" a _negative_ KPI--the KPI
| should be how many users successfully connect to another and
| stop using the app, and how quickly they achieve it in terms of
| app usage.
|
| Of course, setting up something like this would require
| significant effort and "investment" with no hope of profit.
| It's in my bucket list of plans on how to become a millionaire
| (from billionaire, that is).
| david38 wrote:
| This has literally been a major function of the church and
| other neighborhood organizations and activities.
| brianwawok wrote:
| From what I can tell, the dating apps are really really good
| for "good" looking men, and very bad for average to bad looking
| men.
|
| lucky for me I suppose I got married before dating apps became
| a thing..
| joking wrote:
| really good for those good looking men, who happen to don't
| want nothing serious, and then the women get burned of being
| dumped after a couple of nights.
|
| There's really aa difference between what men and women
| expect, and also between what they say and what they do. I'm
| pretty honest when I talk with someone, something serious and
| compromises are not on my horizon, a lot of women discard me
| when I say that, and I'm ok with it, but sometimes I continue
| talking with them, and they told me how many man lie saying
| that they want something just to get on the their bed sheets
| and they disappear after that. Overall, I found some great
| people and nice aquitances, but the time I had spent is not
| despreciable.
| bckr wrote:
| N=1 my friend did very well on Tinder as what I would
| consider below average in looks.
| spookybones wrote:
| How tall is he?
| bckr wrote:
| Average height. Grad student with minimal income living
| at home.
| causi wrote:
| That correlates with the data Okcupid published a while back
| where women rated 80% of men as below-average.
| kibwen wrote:
| That's somewhat misleading. Here's the original post: https
| ://web.archive.org/web/20091121080804/http://blog.okcup...
|
| It says that women rate most men as less attractive than
| average, yes. But then women are quite willing to message
| men who are rated as less attractive than average.
|
| Meanwhile, the men rank attractiveness on a shockingly
| mathematical-looking curve. However, at the same time, men
| overwhelmingly refuse to message any but the most
| attractive of women.
|
| Thus, if you're an average-looking man, your odds of
| getting messages are actually _greater_ than they are for
| an average-looking woman.
| causi wrote:
| _Thus, if you 're an average-looking man, your odds of
| getting messages are actually greater than they are for
| an average-looking woman._
|
| Untrue. If you're an average-looking man your _share_ of
| female-to-male messages is greater than an average-
| looking woman 's _share_ of male-to-female messages. The
| woman is still getting a far larger number of messages.
| kibwen wrote:
| Sure, adjust for the fact that 80% of users are men. That
| doesn't change the fact that talking about attractiveness
| alone is misleading, because men and women use that data
| in very different ways. Despite ranking most men at 2/5,
| women message those men at the same rate that men message
| women ranked 4/5.
| causi wrote:
| _Despite ranking most men at 2 /5, women message those
| men at the same rate that men message women ranked 4/5._
|
| No, they don't, or at least it isn't shown in that data.
| Those graphs refer to the proportions of messages for
| each gender, not raw numbers. Each male user sends 3.5
| times as many "first contact" messages as each female
| user, according to their 2016 data.
|
| _average-looking women are disadvantaged because men
| appear to be far more selective than women are:_
|
| Absolutely agree. But they're disadvantaged against other
| women, not against men, if you're measuring by, as you
| specified, "the odds of getting messages". An average man
| will receive fewer messages than an average woman.
| kibwen wrote:
| I'm not sure how that changes anything? Divide the all
| raw numbers by 3.5, the rates will stay the same.
|
| The point is, while average-looking men are disadvantaged
| by the sheer number of men on these apps, average-looking
| women are disadvantaged because men appear to be far more
| selective than women are:
|
| _" 2/3 of male messages go to the top 1/3 of women. When
| it comes down to actually choosing targets, men choose
| the modelesque. Someone like roomtodance above gets
| nearly 5 times as many messages as a typical woman and 28
| times as many messages as a woman at the low end of our
| curve. Site-wide, two-thirds of male messages go to the
| best-looking third of women. So basically, guys are
| fighting each other 2-for-1 for the absolute best-rated
| females, while plenty of potentially charming, even cute,
| girls go unwritten."_
| scarmig wrote:
| > men appear to be far more selective than women are
|
| It's unclear what you mean by more selective. If you're
| an average woman, you get more inbound interest than an
| average man. The tricky statistical massaging you're
| doing amounts to "well men are even more open-minded when
| it comes to more attractive woman." But that doesn't make
| sense: if a man has sent you a message, does it suddenly
| become half a message if he then messages someone else?
| You're penalizing men on open-mindedness for messaging
| more women.
|
| That said, the blog post is weirdly presented and its
| graphs a bit misleading because of the skewed
| distributions. What would be most useful is comparing the
| median number of messages received by men and the median
| number of messages received by women (or best of all
| calculating the Gini indices of the respective
| distributions), instead of bothering to use the star
| ratings at all.
|
| ETA:
|
| > Divide the all raw numbers by 3.5, the rates will stay
| the same.
|
| You're misunderstanding the data. It's not that men
| collectively send 3.5/4.5 of the messages; it's that each
| individual man sends 3.5 times as many messages as an
| individual woman. I.e. it already corrects for there
| being more men on the app. If men comprise 2/3 of users
| on dating apps, that means that 87.5% of all first
| messages are sent by men.
| [deleted]
| lvass wrote:
| I'm trying to picture a distribution where this holds true
| and holy crap, dating apps should display a "Abandon all
| hope ye who enter here" warning to every man who falls
| below or near median ELO scores.
| spywaregorilla wrote:
| I wonder though, what kind of distribution heterosexual
| men would provide if scrolling through registered as a
| woman. My guess? Pretty similar. A lot of guys,
| especially younger guys, just don't have a good idea of
| self presentation, chasing images that are very
| unappealing to a lot of women. Either lacking self
| confidence or just filling their profile with red flags.
| confidantlake wrote:
| Not like women's profile's are on average much better.
| They are simply much more in demand.
| spywaregorilla wrote:
| It's still a relevant question. The narrative so many men
| champion is that women are too picky and it's not fair.
| If men would be equally picky trying to find worthy men
| on these platforms, it's a very different story.
| noobker wrote:
| > any organized activity (sports, etc. - Meetup is perfect)
| will do
|
| Please don't come to my clubs looking to get laid -- parasitic
| mentality.
| mellosouls wrote:
| There's absolutely nothing wrong with going to Meetup for
| social networking, that's the whole point of it. "Getting
| laid" is an indirect outcome for people with better social
| networks, there is no need to shame people for trying to
| improve their outcomes in that regard.
| musingsole wrote:
| Indirect outcome -- come off it.
|
| Creating a Meetup group that filters all the horny trolls
| out of it is such a hassle. If a workplace can be toppled
| by one errant affair, small club groups can implode off the
| wrong wink.
|
| Idiots trying to use my Meetup groups as a stand-in for
| dates suck all the air out of the room.
| ealexhudson wrote:
| I think the problems are different. Men have a lot of trouble
| getting matches sure, and they think they have a rough time
| because of it. Women get matches, but the majority of the
| interest is low quality / aggressive / inappropriate and they
| spend a lot of time filtering, blacklisting, and otherwise
| getting burned out. Women spend as much time, if not more,
| wading through dross trying to find good matches: and are also
| at a significant safety disadvantage in the process.
|
| The net result is that neither men or women match easily, in
| many cases it's a tragedy of the commons. Even on the "app that
| reverses the roles" it's difficult to match to likely partners
| for either gender.
| scarmig wrote:
| > Women get matches, but the majority of the interest is low
| quality / aggressive / inappropriate and they spend a lot of
| time filtering, blacklisting, and otherwise getting burned
| out. Women spend as much time, if not more, wading through
| dross trying to find good matches: and are also at a
| significant safety disadvantage in the process.
|
| This makes the common mistake in assuming that when a man
| gets a match, the majority of time it will be a good, high
| quality one that puts equal effort into the dating process.
| This is not the case.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Hence the value of one's network in introducing potential
| suitors. Someone's mom or cousin or friend or uncle vetting
| potential (life) partners is a very valuable part of the
| process that saves everyone time.
|
| Of course, this requires having and maintaining the type of
| relationship with family and friends where this is possible.
|
| This type of "screening" value provided by brokers is not
| limited to dating, but also any low frequency, high cost
| transaction such as real estate, businesses, hiring workers,
| etc. This is the less cynical side of "it is not what you
| know, it is who you know", meaning that the cost of
| evaluating certain risks can be so high that it is worth
| offloading that onto one's network.
| throwaway0a5e wrote:
| >Women get matches, but the majority of the interest is low
| quality / aggressive inappropriate and they spend a lot of
| time filtering, blacklisting,
|
| It's not exactly surprising that the top % of men that most
| women keep matching with treat them as disposable. To those
| men they are.
| mrwh wrote:
| True from my experience and talking to female friends. Men
| have trouble at the top of the funnel; women have trouble
| further along (when, of course, more emotional investment has
| gone in, and more time too).
| sweezyjeezy wrote:
| "Women spend as much time, if not more" - I think the ratio
| of men:women is about 2:1 on most apps, but I would imagine
| it takes men more than 2x the time to wade through profiles
| and send a message, than to read that message and move on
| (even if the message is low-effort). So I'm not sure I can
| believe that women spend as much time, and certainly the
| effort spent on the app per date will be much higher for men,
| not least because of the gender ratio.
| kibwen wrote:
| The ratio is more like 4:1. And women receive such an
| overwhelming amount of low-quality messages that there's no
| point in crafting a high-effort message, as it will just be
| buried by spam in their inboxes.
| sweezyjeezy wrote:
| Nah I don't think that's true, at least for me - I tried
| low effort, I tried high effort. High effort has
| definitely worked better.
| thot_experiment wrote:
| Don't worry. I, an engineer, have the solution. We simply
| make a dating app with at least regex support for message
| filtering, you get to shoot yr shot and get immediate
| feedback in the form of being auto-blocked if you didn't
| make it past the filter.
|
| Just thinking about it makes me want to start dating
| again, it'd be like ad-block but for crypto bros.
| 29083011397778 wrote:
| > Don't worry. I, an engineer, have the solution
|
| I'm ready for the sarcasm
|
| > auto-blocked if you didn't make it past the filter
|
| This, if it could be made people-friendly, would be
| perfect. Block based on non-real and mis-spelled words to
| stay a step ahead of anyone trying to evade the filter
| with "dik", as well as filtering based on phrase, and
| down to the word. Then just auto-prioritize a list of
| words on a per-person basis, and let the rest be left as-
| is.
|
| It may not scale perfectly, but it'll be fun until Match
| group apes your product, makes it pay-to-play, and puts
| you out of business.
| wbgne wrote:
| > I think the ratio of men:women is about 2:1 on most apps
|
| Ratio is actually 3:1 and I agree with your viewpoint
| partly. People just keep swiping while talking to each
| other, so I don't see why x would be taking more time than
| y, however, women do indeed also need to spend that time
| finding their matches and QA them (excuse the engineering
| term), so I don't believe there are any parties winning
| here.
| russellbeattie wrote:
| Women have no idea what a "super swipe" is, or that it costs $2
| every time you use one to try to get their attention. Being in
| the Bay Area, which is famously hard for men to find matches,
| without using any of the paid boosts, I'll never get a match.
| The apps are literally designed to extract money from desperate
| men.
|
| Tinder specifically should be sued out of existence. It ignores
| location, will happily tell you your boost has been a "success"
| without a single match or you'll get a couple from 7,000 miles
| away. It's outright fraud.
| bergenty wrote:
| For me it's the opposite, when I get a match on a dating app my
| intentions are clear to the woman so it's easy for me to go
| straight in flirting/being romantic etc. In a neutral setting
| you first have to direct the conversation away from the neutral
| towards the romantic and then go from there. Much harder and
| more time intensive.
| nradov wrote:
| Organized activities can be a good way to meet people, but
| don't be that creepy guy in a sports league or hobby group who
| is constantly hitting on all the women. It just wrecks the
| activity for everyone, and discourages women from showing up at
| all. Context matters.
| antonymy wrote:
| Reading this article as a straight man is like listening to a
| rich friend complain about how they have too many rooms to
| decorate in their mansion whilst I struggle to make rent in a
| single bedroom apartment. Particularly this bit
|
| >She recommends that app users stop scrolling and talking to
| other matches once they have found nine people they feel some
| level of connection with, and dedicate their time to really
| trying to get to know those people first.
|
| Oh, stop at nine? Well I'll let you know when I eventually hit
| nine concurrent matches. Hasn't happened yet, eight years and
| counting. I'm sure I'll be able to stop scrolling any year now.
| It's like reading about a different planet.
| spoonjim wrote:
| If you want a relationship take everything lower priority than
| a relationship, transfer all that time to 50% the gym and 50%
| to going to physical places where you can talk to real women in
| meatspace.
| DontchaKnowit wrote:
| Okay straight up: where tf does one go to meet people in
| person?
|
| Like I just don't understand the scenario here?
|
| Post college, it just feels like online data is the only real
| option.
| spoonjim wrote:
| The grocery store. The bus stop. The town hearing on a
| shopping mall operator asking for a permit to cut down four
| trees. A coffee shop. Fuckin' anywhere!
| fxtentacle wrote:
| Thing is, if you're looking happy and you have something
| interesting to say and you can listen to others sharing
| their story, then I wouldn't know any place where you don't
| meet people.
|
| But here's some suggestions: bus stops, the park next to a
| bakery, library if you like books, art classes, sports
| events, museums, opera, larp if you like costumes, some
| cafes and cinemas have singles events, boat tours, zoo
|
| I'd advise against clubs, beaches, or sauna if you don't
| feel confident yet, because those locations are unnecessary
| difficult.
|
| And basically any place where something predictable happens
| that you and other people can stop and look at and talk
| about is easy. Like if you stand next to a construction
| site, girls who want to talk to you will have an obvious
| topic to initiate the conversation with.
| m463 wrote:
| I think you might want to try meetup activities.
|
| That said, you want to target the underachievers, not the
| people who are seriously doing the activities.
|
| http://www.sirc.org/publik/flirt.pdf
| LorenPechtel wrote:
| While I'm not on the market I have observed a problem
| with the meetup approach:
|
| I hike. I've met multiple people out there who see it as
| a way to meet the opposite sex. Oops--every man I've met
| doing this is in male-dominated groups, every woman I've
| met doing this is in female-dominated groups. Difficulty
| levels, not sexism.
| [deleted]
| pcbro141 wrote:
| These mainstream media articles on dating seem to almost always
| be completely absent of a man's perspective. Typically focused
| entirely on the woman's perspective.
| spoonjim wrote:
| Because women control dating. Women decide what they want and
| men will go to whatever place and do whatever thing is
| required to have sex with them.
| bilbo0s wrote:
| I know people here won't like to hear this, but it's women
| who pay the bills in mainstream media. There are a few male
| dominated verticals. Sports for instance. But for the most
| part, mainstream media has to be friendly to its consumers,
| which is mostly women.
|
| Again, there are male dominated niches, and if you consume
| media in those niches you do note a decided male bias to the
| content.
| seper8 wrote:
| More likely its due to the fact that people writing about
| dating are typically women...
| vhiremath4 wrote:
| Men should work on themselves (gym, purpose, income, friends,
| hobbies), go out, and meet women in real life. Being able to
| date as a capable man in today's society is hard. You have to
| be a lot of things and be constantly working on yourself. I
| have some theories as to why this is, but it's the truth. The
| top 10% of men in the dating pool end up dating 80% of the
| women. Most men have no dating or sexual prospects at all -
| it's very binary.
|
| I'm not stating this to brag but only for context: I get many
| concurrent matches when I'm on dating apps. I'm wealthy, pretty
| good looking (but short which is a big hit), and have a lot of
| hobbies and am in good shape. Overall, I'd say I get ~100x more
| matches than most guys and actually have girls who slide into
| my DMs on Twitter and Instagram. I still deleted all of the
| apps because I'd rather meet women in real life and I'm _way_
| happier and suggest all guys do the same for their mental
| health.
|
| Online dating doesn't compare to real life. Not saying it can't
| happen (my ex-ex-girlfriend and I met on Hinge and it was
| great), but it's just not the same. I find I can meet higher-
| quality women in real life because I can show up with full
| energy and depth and showcase confidence in a way that's
| impossible when she's looking at me in a sea of other matches.
| I also think dating apps are a bad deal for women as well. They
| meet a bunch of men who will sleep with them but aren't looking
| to settle down. It's hard for women to judge the real energy
| and confidence of a guy online. It's just not a great dynamic
| for both parties IMO unless you're exclusively looking to hook
| up (which is fine and people should do what they want).
| emptysongglass wrote:
| I'm also going to offer some advice to the men out there that
| may hit some people in the soft spot. I apologize in advance
| but this is some tough love: please, please work on your
| stamina for when you _do_ end up in bed with that special
| someone. Ejaculation isn 't the finish line and your partner
| will appreciate you aren't racing off to its little death.
|
| I've learned to really enjoy all the other feelings around
| sex not ejaculating and that has given me a whole new lease
| on the act and my partners have really, really appreciated
| that I don't go for 5 to 10 "cum and done".
|
| There's tons of methods of training yourself out there. Just
| Google around. It really helps when dates are thinking if
| they should keep dating you.
|
| And yes, sex isn't everything but good sex sure does help and
| it's an intrinsic, important part of coupling.
| mandeepj wrote:
| > please work on your stamina for when you do end up in bed
| with that special someone.
|
| I agree 100% and echo the same.
|
| > Just Google around.
|
| Google and YouTube will give you pelvis exercises, and
| that's "not" the solution. My friends with that syndrome
| have met therapists and doctors to no avail.
| confidantlake wrote:
| As a guy with extreme anxiety dating apps were life changing
| in a good way for me. I could put in a lot of effort into the
| looks aspect: gym mainly, but also clothes and professional
| photos. Then I could message and get comfortable and "know"
| the person before meeting them in real life. I had zero
| success in real life. I am far too anxious and socially inept
| to handle that. But I can definitely understand why they
| wouldn't be perfect for most.
| vhiremath4 wrote:
| Love this. Hoping you conquer your social anxiety over time
| though. Not just for dating but for yourself! I can
| understand btw - was prescribed antidepressants and
| antipsychotics from a young age and had to figure out how
| to live without them. Shit is hard.
| confidantlake wrote:
| Thank you for the kind words! Shit is hard. I am happily
| married so hopefully will never have to return to the
| dating pool :). Don't think I will ever conquer it, but I
| have learned to live with it and it is not bad as it once
| was. Ironically by accepting it and not trying to fight
| it, the power it has had over me has diminished. Good
| luck to you too and I hope you figure out whatever you
| are dealing with!
| vhiremath4 wrote:
| Surrender is so powerful. Much love to you and your
| family!
| vlod wrote:
| > I am far too anxious and socially inept to handle that.
|
| I was too (and still to a degree am). I once shared a
| rental with a female socialite. She said she accepts EVERY
| invitation to go out and suggested I do the same.
|
| Getting used to being around people and being in awkward
| situations where you have to talk to randoms will develop
| calluses. It is a skill you can develop by just practice.
| (public speaking is another example).
|
| I look forward to talking to you in a random party! :)
| amf12 wrote:
| +1 to this. I had crippling social anxiety. Working with
| a therapist, I tried out exposure therapy - which was
| basically going out of your comfort zone more often. It
| definitely helped with my social anxiety.
| mathewsanders wrote:
| For anyone in this situation and thinking nothing will
| help, I also had a positive experience with exposure
| therapy. Around 15 years ago I remember walking to get a
| pizza and approaching the restaurant getting pins and
| needles on my back, and drenching myself in sweat from
| anxiety.
|
| One of my no-gos was going to weight room/area of the gym
| (I could tolerate cardio area) and one of the first
| homework activities things my therapist gave me was going
| to weight room and sitting for 5 mins to do some
| stretches. It was awful, but within a few months I slowly
| progressed to the point I was even confident enough to
| work with a personal trainer.
|
| Slow but consistent incremental exposure to my triggers
| absolutely made a huge positive impact for me.
| kingcoleman wrote:
| It's interesting you mention gym anxiety. I've had severe
| social anxiety my whole life. But the gym has been my
| outlet for 20 years and a great way for me to be around
| people in close proximity with really ZERO obligation to
| interact beyond gym etiquette and such ("how many sets
| you have left?", asking for a spot or being asked). It's
| a low risk social situation and helps me stay motivated
| to be around other people training. Get out in the world
| in a regular predictable way.
|
| Due to a back injury (from pushing myself too hard, it
| wasn't just a shit-happens injury hencemy user name) that
| had me in horrible pain for the last 2 years I now get
| literal panic attacks in the environment I used to go to
| RESOLVE a panic attack. Ain't that some shit? My fear of
| reinjuring myself and going through the whole experience
| again is just too much. Even though I've learned my
| lesson and just desire to stay fit and functional I don't
| think I'll ever step foot in a traditional gym again. I
| like being able to sit down to make a poop in the morning
| without a burning ice pick shooting up my spine... I see
| what pro athletes talk about when a catastrophic injury
| and the painful and lonely recovery process robs them of
| the confidence to perform.
|
| In between the pandemic and this injury the last 3 years
| have been very isolating. I've developed real fear of
| being in public from the amount of time I've been alone
| and physically confined. I feel like I got out of a 3
| year relationship with a crazy overbearing girlfriend
| that no one could stand to be around and realizing how it
| just pushes people away.
|
| Is getting better but doing things like progressing from
| a coffee to-go from a cafe, to actually sitting down for
| prescribed lengths of time and observing the waves of
| anxiety has been... interesting. You have to continually
| and willfully push your boundaries as you said but in
| safe increments the same way you increase your lifts in
| safe manageable increment. But it's hard to quantify how
| much more difficult one social setting or situation will
| be versus another. What's the "add 5 pounds" for exposure
| therapy? Haha. I'm sure it's different for every person.
|
| I work with a therapist and it's going to be a process.
| Just started doing in office visits again. Social
| calluses indeed.
|
| In the same way I associate discomfort and stress with
| progress in powerlifting (and subsequently in physical
| therapy) I try to tell myself that I'm not going to
| improve socially by putting myself only in comfortable
| situations.
|
| Good luck. Looks like you've got a program that is
| working.
| confidantlake wrote:
| I am glad to hear :) Looking forward to it too!
| andrewflnr wrote:
| It must be nice getting invitations to go out.
| vlod wrote:
| Obviously one needs to expand their friend network.
|
| Sitting at home watching Netflix all evening and doom
| scrolling won't get you invites.
| muttled wrote:
| I have a lot of luck texting people "is anything fun
| going on this weekend?"
| rhodorhoades wrote:
| Coming from a guy who probably has "Forbes 30 under 30" in
| his tinder bio.
| DiggyJohnson wrote:
| This is an unfortunate comment for HN.
| vhiremath4 wrote:
| I didn't but whatever helps you justify reality.
| notart666 wrote:
| Seeing how many followers his Twitter has and other metrics
| the 30 under 30 list is still as useless as I remember it
| being. I wonder how much money his parents had to spend to
| help him look like this. Even then he gives off the vibes
| of someone desperate it's probably why he uses it so
| frequently. Can't find any real form of connection with
| others yet doesn't understand his own problems and why
| women find him so unappealing. A real life click bait but
| that's what gets the most attention on these sites instead
| of any real form of human connection, though physical
| appearances do play a big role. So does a lot of things
| like proximity and well personality.
| vhiremath4 wrote:
| My parents are not well off. I made money, took debt out
| on my own to go to college, and helped them retire
| actually. I agree 30u30 is a useless list.
| fxtentacle wrote:
| That almost reads like an ad-hominem attack against someone
| whose perception of reality you don't understand.
|
| My experience, too, is that the energy of meeting someone
| in person is much better than "meeting" someone online.
| Also, it's much easier to qualify if the person you're
| dating is mentally stable and at ease with themselves if
| you see them in person. It's way too easy to hide serious
| character flaws when only chatting online. But for a
| relationship, they'll be deal-breakers.
|
| That means unless you want to waste hours on dates that
| lead nowhere, you need to quickly meet the other person in-
| person to do the basic sanity check.
|
| Plus there's all that pheromone stuff which is impossible
| to check for online.
| Bubble_Pop_22 wrote:
| > The top 10% of men in the dating pool end up dating 80% of
| the women
|
| I am sorry but this is BS. Mathematically speaking it's
| impossible.
|
| It's the emotional component which makes people feel like
| perennial underdogs and say abominations like the above.
|
| No matter how rich you are you can only bring one girl to a
| dinner date per night. Even a guy like Dan Bilzerian is on
| the record saying that a vacation in which he brings more
| than 8 girls rapidly becomes hell
|
| What is true is that the top 1% of males is desired by 90% of
| women but that is also true the other way around given that
| men too have become extremely vulnerable to PR ,
| advertisement and the promotional industry in general. So
| they deeply desire Kim Kardashian even though the college
| girl next door is probably conventinally hotter considering
| age and height.
| LorenPechtel wrote:
| How is it impossible??
|
| Remember, for most people most days it's no date at all.
| commandlinefan wrote:
| > you can only bring one girl to a dinner date per night
|
| I don't think he was suggesting that those successful men
| are dating 8 women concurrently - rather, that the other
| seven women themselves would rather be single than date
| anybody in the "bottom" 90%. I've been married for a long
| time now, but this matched my observations from back when I
| was dating, and from everything I've heard, things have
| gotten much, much worse for men since I left the market.
| LorenPechtel wrote:
| It doesn't even take them preferring to be single.
|
| The basic problem is the dating apps have made the pool
| so large that they can keep trying to get the top 10% and
| the well never runs dry. Thus they don't settle for what
| they can actually get.
|
| Thus you get a lot of men with no dates and a lot of
| women who get dates with men they aren't good enough to
| actually hook. In reality both sides lose.
| david38 wrote:
| You don't understand the term mathematical.
|
| What emotional component? Who said anything about dinner?
|
| You bring a girl over at 6, then another at 8, then 10.
|
| You have a different girl for every day of the week.
|
| It's well known most girls during a certain period of their
| life will prefer to have a fraction of a high value guy
| than all of a low value guy.
| Bubble_Pop_22 wrote:
| > You have a different girl for every day of the week.
|
| And that girl has a different guy for every day of the
| week.
|
| It's like war. You only occupy the territory you control
| with your line of fire.
|
| Likewise you only occupy the time of the person who is
| with you. As soon as they are out the door then you don't
| occupy anything anymore and other people will.
|
| It's not a new concept either. All Playboy bunnies had
| boyfriends and they devoted their time 85% to their
| boyfriends and 15% to Hefner.
|
| Hefner got more variety in exchange for less claim on
| each individual Playboy bunny time.
| fxtentacle wrote:
| I believe op was using "dating" as an euphemism for "having
| sex with".
|
| That means dinner isn't required. Plus if the average
| unlucky guy has 1 date per 2 weeks, it would be entirely
| possible for a lucky guy to have 14x more dates. A 14:1
| starting ratio leading to a 10:1 success ratio seems
| plausible to me.
| stevage wrote:
| Mathematically it works fine if the high value men go on
| more dates than the average woman. Let's say women go on
| one date a week, and the hot men go on one date per night.
| It works out.
| Cpoll wrote:
| > Mathematically speaking it's impossible.
|
| Only if you assume the "dating pool" is 1:1 men/women. If
| you take the view that it's 10:1 men/women then that
| conclusion is "obvious."
|
| And at least in the context of Tinder, I have read that the
| ratio of users leans men.
| Bubble_Pop_22 wrote:
| It's always 1:1. Dating implies 1:1 dinner.
|
| Rappers, actors and people who feel the need to bring 5
| or 6 girls on a date, that's so rare that doesn't even
| merit counting. And also it ends up pretty quick.
| david38 wrote:
| It doesn't. It hasn't for some years.
|
| Dinner is no longer a requirement. Being exclusive is no
| longer the assumed default.
| S6eUL wrote:
| > The top 10% of men in the dating pool end up dating 80% of
| the women. [...] Most men have no dating or sexual prospects
| at all - it's very binary.
|
| I do not believe this to be true just based on what I observe
| in my social circles. It might be a bit skewed but these
| numbers sound absurd - do you have any source to back them
| up?
|
| Men and women are not so different.
| [deleted]
| poulsbohemian wrote:
| >The top 10% of men in the dating pool end up dating 80% of
| the women. Most men have no dating or sexual prospects at all
| - it's very binary.
|
| I've heard these numbers passed around but does anyone have a
| source for this? I ask in part because my own life
| experiences and observations match well with your first
| sentence - a person who works on themselves, IE: has hobbies
| and activities, has a viable career, etc - will be attractive
| to _someone_ out there in the world. There is a body size and
| shape that will appeal to everyone, education and career are
| negligible as long as you are doing "something" with your
| life, etc.
| fxtentacle wrote:
| Don't worry about it.
|
| It only means that your (purely online, purely digital)
| presentation in your dating profile isn't as good as it could
| be. But whether they like your profile text is almost
| uncorrelated to the fact whether the same women would enjoy
| spending time with you in real life.
|
| Plus there's ghostwriters, photoshop, and other services to fix
| your profile if you really want to. Or did you expect others to
| actually look in real-life like they look in their photoshopped
| Face-app-ed Tinder pictures? In that case, you've been
| comparing yourself to other people's aspirational advertising.
| There's a reason why even for models the RAW files of their
| photo-shoots are under NDA.
|
| The most contagious stuff in the world is genuine excitement
| and happiness. And I'd put pheromones at a close 2nd. But both
| only work if you do some social group activity in-person with
| others. In my opinion, social media and online dating exist
| purely to agree on date/time/location to meet in person.
| [deleted]
| info781 wrote:
| Learn to play tennis. Take some lessons, don't worry if you are
| not very good. I guarantee you will meet someone, guy or girl. It
| is a great social activity that you can't do alone.
| 9530jh9054ven wrote:
| The tennis practice wall would care to disagree that can't be
| done alone. One can very much so spend months playing tennis
| and never once see or speak to another human being.
| fleddr wrote:
| Women on dating apps have ample choice and thus try to select for
| the top 10-20% of men on offer. Exactly the type of men that have
| plenty of choice themselves. It's a kind of a too good to be true
| deal. You should assume that the very top of men would normally
| already be taken. They may not have the right motives to be this
| available. And even if the motive is genuine, you yourself should
| be an exceptionally attractive woman yourself, in one way or
| another.
|
| The other 80% of men are pretty much ignored. As a counter
| reaction, they deploy a dragnet approach. Spamming many low
| effort messages as any love is good love.
|
| Painting with a broad brush here, obviously.
| sweezyjeezy wrote:
| It can go both ways, I know perfectly fine, ordinary looking
| women who don't get many likes either and will more actively
| message people the way men do. I think part of the issue is the
| 'average' man not being realistic. These apps make it easy to
| think "why should I message this person if there's someone
| better a few swipes away", when they would be stoked to get
| that person's number in real life. The reason not to do this is
| that you barely have any time to demonstrate value on these
| apps over the more conventionally attractive people you're
| competing with, and you will end up wasting a lot of time.
|
| Sure some guys take the scattergun approach, but I think also a
| lot of men are being too picky and swiping past good matches.
| andreyk wrote:
| ""People just get fatigued. They get overwhelmed with the whole
| dating process," said Helen Fisher, a biological anthropologist
| who is a senior research fellow with the Kinsey Institute and
| chief science adviser to Match.com."
|
| I don't think this is dating app burnout, this is just dating
| burnout. Dating apps just make it easy to connect with potential
| matches (relative to not having dating app burnouts). And if you
| have dating burnout, take a break from dating! It's nice to just
| be ok with being single sometimes and enjoy other aspects of
| life.
|
| "Before she deleted the apps, she spent any moments of downtime
| swiping; after, she found she had time throughout the day to
| rest. ... But Dr. Turban believes that for some, simply deleting
| the apps is not enough. "It's important to understand why the
| apps are causing problems for you," he said, adding that
| therapists can be helpful for sorting these answers out. "Are you
| using the apps to self-soothe anxiety and inadvertently making
| your anxiety worse? Are you afraid you can't attain love, so
| you're settling for hookups, and that's making you unhappy?" ...
| "People binge, and that is what exhausts them," "
|
| Now this does represent burnout of dating apps, and is a result
| of just not using them with patience and reflection as to the
| emotions you associate with them.
|
| I generally view dating apps very positively (they, and in
| particular OkCupid, have led to numerous good relationships and
| friends) but as with anything it's possible to use them in an
| unhealthy way.
| grvdrm wrote:
| >I don't think this is dating app burnout, this is just dating
| burnout. Dating apps just make it easy to connect with
| potential matches (relative to not having dating app burnouts).
| And if you have dating burnout, take a break from dating! It's
| nice to just be ok with being single sometimes and enjoy other
| aspects of life.
|
| I was looking for a comment like this before I wrote one of my
| own! Completely agree! I'm a happily married guy, but used
| nearly every dating app that existed from 2004-2012. Everyone's
| talking about how dating apps suck. They were, for me, another
| way to meet folks during those years and probably how I met
| most women I dated. They had and still have their highs and
| lows. Apps don't magically solve dating.
|
| I think the real problem is the tunnel vision. You get sucked
| down the rabbit hole. Instead, spending time out with friends,
| exploring hobbies, and joining common-interest clubs are some
| of the ways that I was able to meet women when I least cared to
| meet them.
|
| And that's the real magic - I've always had the best
| relationships grow from the most chance encounters, in-person.
| Something that blossoms organically somehow. The apps can't
| really recreate that moment and subsequent sequence of good
| events.
| CuriouslyC wrote:
| The apps are garbage. The old okcupid was the best of them, but
| still not great, and it's ruined now (also, everyone has moved
| on to other apps that are worse). They're designed to maximize
| revenue rather than the happiness of the user. You also have to
| put in a shitload of work to make a slick profile, an in a lot
| of people's cases it's well worded bullshit.
|
| Profiles should be homogenous in form and style, and should
| include video Q/A in a fixed format so WYSIWYG. No clever
| bullshit, no editing images, just videos of your average self
| answering question.
| tevon wrote:
| Go build it then!
| tjoff wrote:
| Building is the easy part. Getting traction is not.
| stayfrosty420 wrote:
| >She recommends that app users stop scrolling and talking to
| other matches once they have found nine people they feel some
| level of connection with, and dedicate their time to really
| trying to get to know those people first.
|
| That really seems like quite a lot to me...
| c7DJTLrn wrote:
| Men and women have vastly different experiences on dating apps.
| vlod wrote:
| TLDR: stop trying to date and make yourself more interesting that
| potentials will want to date.
|
| It might be worth thinking about this the opposite way.
|
| Would you want to go out with someone who is so boring that all
| they do is sit around watching TV and swiping on dating apps?
|
| A lot of comments here (it's a numbers game, pay for premium,
| other "tricks"), is IMHO trying to shortcut/hack the system and
| is unlikely to get anywhere (or extremely hard). You want to
| rethink what everyone thinks is the "modern" way to date and do
| what's worked for 1000's of years.
|
| Interesting people with a wide range of interests and passions
| will not have problems. They will also have a network of like
| minding people and most likely don't use dating apps. It's worth
| trying to get into those circles.
|
| Here's some tips:
|
| - Stop using apps, you're being lazy/boring and unattractive to a
| partner. Put in the work.
|
| - Most importantly stop looking to date. People can tell you're
| desperate and it's extremely unattractive. Stop asking everyone
| you see with a pulse out for coffee or drinks. Be friendly and
| someone who's approachable to have an interesting conversation
| with, without worrying about the risk of being hit upon. I think
| women really take notice when people do NOT hit on them and just
| 'nice'.
|
| - Work is off limits. If there are social events be
| friendly/charming, but never hit on. If they have friends they
| will introduce you as a 'nice guy'. If you're creepy you'll never
| get into their circle.
|
| - Make yourself more interesting (as other have suggested). Join
| sport teams, tech meetups, volunteer to help FOOs. Go to art
| galleries, small music events etc. Do NOT go here to date. Go to
| be a a more interesting person. If you see a cute person nearby,
| say something witty or ask their opinion about a painting your
| both looking at, a sculpture, the bands latest album etc..
| (briefly, then disengage, SUPER important). Do not go full
| throttle and ask them out for coffee/drinks. The idea is to make
| yourself more comfortable talking to potentials and seem
| interesting w/o being creepy. It's a skill you have to develop.
| You can do this everywhere, at grocery stores, bars, museums.
| Interaction should not be more than 30 secs (no really). This
| prevents the creepy aspect. Again, you're trying to come across
| as non creepy and just want their opinion on the best salsa for
| tacos and move along.
|
| - Increase your network of friends in the circles you want. If
| you friends just smoke weed and play video games that's not
| ideal. If you're friends play tennis, go to museums, music...
| great. If not find how you can get into them.
|
| Some base tips (that you should be doing that you might not think
| is important, but helps with the above). This is obvious stuff,
| but somehow people have forgotten the the basics.
|
| - Shower and wear clean clothes when you go out for an event.
| Maybe I have a better sense of smell, but the amount of bad
| smells I get from people is ridiculous.
|
| - Shave. Most beards and hair fluff just looks silly and scruffy.
| If you face doesn't look kissable, it just makes everything else
| harder. If there's a group of men, you'll stand out with a clean
| face. Note: this is a great way to talk to people in bars. Go up
| to a group of the opposite sex. (becz they will feel comfortable
| and less intimidating) and say "My male friends all tell me that
| women prefer beards. I'm looking to date again and since I'm not
| going to hit on any of you, it would be really valuable to get
| some honest feedback from some good looking women." Important "DO
| NOT HIT ON THEM", be genuine and charming. After they provide
| feedback, thank them and walk away. Most likely they won't
| approach you as they are in a group and just want to chat with
| each other, but if they do, they will be able to find you.
|
| - Do NOT wear after-shave. Really it makes people gag and want to
| run away.
|
| - Go to the gym, run, get some dumbbells, long walks, whatever.
| Everyone could lose 10 pounds and it WILL make you feel more
| confident.
|
| - Don't be a scruffy dresser. No need to go overboard, but you
| can go far with a nice shirt, clean jeans and SHOES (not fancy,
| but with black socks). Women seems to notice shoes. All this WILL
| make you stand out in a group in a "care's about their appearance
| but not a fop.
|
| - Don't have bad breath. Yeah, it's ridiculous for it to be said.
|
| - Don't smoke/vape. I know people will have strong opinions, but
| it REALLY makes your breath smell. I can't even be around people
| of the same sex who do this. YMMV.
| chad_stevens wrote:
| So when do you get to make your move? Most women want the guy
| to be the Initiator.
| vlod wrote:
| This is what I mean by 'putting in the work'. Most people
| won't do this. They shortcut the below process becz they're
| just lonely and/or just want sex.
|
| To answer your question, WAAAY later than you think.
|
| Once you are friends and they are comfortable with you. You
| know their hobbies/passions and things that annoy them.
| You're trying to understand if this person is someone you
| want to hang out with for a long time and you'd have fun with
| them even if you weren't 'together'. You have to be really
| 'into' chillin with this person.
|
| Most people use the dating period to get to know one another.
| The problem is the desire to 'date' and have sex (as early as
| possible) is a real turn off. Your ability to not want sex
| makes you a LOT more attractive and serious. Women put up
| with this becz most guys do this. Not doing this puts you in
| a different league.
|
| Really you're trying to get the woman to let YOU know she's
| really into you and wants more.
| herbst wrote:
| I hate these apps and I've tried a lot of them. However without I
| wouldn't have my wonderful partner.
|
| We had been at the same party, we exchanged looks but nothing
| happened. Only a week or so later I checked a profile on some app
| with the most stupid intro ever 'i think I know you, have we
| seen?' and bam nearly 6 years later we are still together.
| blitzar wrote:
| > The toll of dating app burnout
|
| Friction burn from too much shagging is real?
| benknight87 wrote:
| Leaving the US five years ago and moving to Southeast Asia
| provided a swift solution to all of my dating problems.
| wing-_-nuts wrote:
| Are your dates typically fluent in english? I'm interested in
| relationships, not flings. Gotta be able to communicate to
| establish a strong relationship.
| doix wrote:
| Not the parent, but meeting people whilst traveling doesn't
| have to be locals. If you go to a popular
| backpacker/nomad/tourist spot and stay a hostel you'll meet
| loads of people (that almost certainly speak English). The
| best part is that these people also enjoy traveling, so you
| have something in common.
|
| You can take it a step further, if you stay in a surf hostel,
| you'll meet other people that like surfing. Replace surfing
| with any other activity you like (or want to learn). I think
| this works well, because you meet people that you have
| something in common with and have a similar lifestyle.
| nightlyhawk wrote:
| It's crazy how detrimental dating apps like Hinge has been for my
| mental health these last 6-8 months. I'm relatively pretty good-
| looking as an early 20s male and I've been on multiple dates but
| women always have the opportunity to "find someone better". I
| haven't been able to find a serious partner at all and I might be
| due to how long I have been out of the dating game but all this
| liking and swiping makes me so self-conscious and insecure.
|
| I've also started balding since I was 20 and it puts that much
| more pressure on me to find someone through these apps. It's so
| unhealthy but I don't know what to do anymore. Male pattern
| baldness is a horrible disease especially since it is genetic and
| not something that can necessarily be stopped, just slowed down
| by medications that aren't even effective for me, lol. I hate to
| think like this but it makes me mad that there are unhealthy and
| overweight individuals out there with great genetics and I'm just
| sitting here losing my hair at an unfair age even though I'm very
| health-conscious and fit.
|
| I know for a fact I will have no luck with dating apps if I shave
| my head and go bald in my early 20s and I might as well give up
| now. At least when I know that when I go bald by 25 or 26, I can
| at least delete the apps and maybe I will feel relieved?(probably
| not)
| sillyapple wrote:
| I was diagnosed with alopecia universalis at 25, lost all hair,
| it's also a genetic thing. Balding sucks. I can guarantee there
| are women out there that will not care about your hair or lack
| thereof.
| leephillips wrote:
| You will be pleasantly surprised when you discover how sexy a
| shiny dome can be.
| vlod wrote:
| Lol. How can you not find Captain Jean-Luc Picard [0]
| attractive!? (Irrespective of what team you play on)
|
| [0] https://imagecdn.handitv.com/KDqbG-1644609552-816-blog-
| picar...
| nightlyhawk wrote:
| lol I appreciate all the encouraging words guys, thank you
| lvass wrote:
| I gave up dating entirely in my early 20s, before dating apps
| were a thing. It was nothing short of a great decision. For me
| the juice isn't worth the squeeze, but a lot of people want it
| much more than I do, and they end up bitter if they take this
| path. Solitude isn't easy but it's amazing when you can
| appreciate it.
| vlod wrote:
| >I know for a fact I will have no luck with dating apps if I
| shave my head and go bald in my early 20s and I might as well
| give up now.
|
| Please don't give up in general, but please give up with apps.
| It's obviously doing your head in.
|
| If you just read the comments in this thread, the general
| consensus is that they (apps) don't work for the majority or
| they don't work for HN'rs.
|
| If you profiled the HN community, you'd probably won't be
| surprised we're (on average) not that good looking. We hack too
| much code, we're generally overweight (well there are some here
| that are REALLY into fitness), some have crazy or no hair, some
| have way too big ears, or even too many heads (zaphod
| beeblebrox).
|
| But a lot of us have SO's. wtf? How can that be?
|
| Think about this. Everyone on TV is so bloody good looking with
| shiny teeth and great hair. How can we (HN'rs) compete with
| that?
|
| Answer: A lot of people out there are boring as fuck and don't
| know anything of the world. They talk about sports, how crap
| their job is, the problems with their front lawn and about
| owning the other political party. That's it. Yawn.
|
| We're reading about some cool nuclear reactor type or how to
| bake bread, or reading about some benedictine monk seeing
| strange lightning.
|
| We generally still love to learn about cool stuff and can
| generally have a good conversation with above average IQ
| people. We can see the funny side of life and often are quite
| funny (which is very attractive to potentials).
|
| TLDR: Don't knock yourself down too much. We all have strange
| things going on and still get by. There's lots of good looking
| people that are SUPER dull.
|
| One could say we might even have an advantage! ;-)
| x-sp wrote:
| Taylor_OD wrote:
| ITT people who never used dating apps and have been married for
| years giving their opinion.
|
| Jokes aside... Dating apps suck. Generally so does going on first
| dates. So does interviewing for a job. So does making new/any
| friends.
|
| Lots of things are hard and are a numbers game. The nice part is
| that HOPEFULLY you only have to hit a home run once. You don't
| have to become an expert at dating. You just have to try enough
| to meet someone who is as weird and fucked up as you and wants to
| spend a lot of time being weird and fucked up together.
| [deleted]
| mrwh wrote:
| I'm currently trying to buy a house. It sucks! Does indeed feel
| like a general rule that anything with the potential to improve
| one's life significantly will frequently be unpleasant to go
| through.
| z3c0 wrote:
| Dating apps do suck, and they likely always will, because they
| have little incentive to help their users find a long-term
| partner. Dating apps are "rape-whistle" companies, meaning that
| if they actually solve the problems that they claim to solve,
| they would diminish their market.
|
| If a given app has been snatched up by Match, it's almost
| certainly being optimized towards having you addicted to
| swiping.
| dendriti wrote:
| One major issue driving the dissatisfaction with dating apps may
| be that a truly satisfied customer stops being a customer.
| hypertele-Xii wrote:
| Maybe a reverse business model? The dating app gets paid when
| you get married?
| Taylor_OD wrote:
| Like how recruiting companies work???
| irajdeep wrote:
| > The dating app gets paid when you get married?
|
| Wondering how it can be enforced from business model point of
| view.
| vitiral wrote:
| 1. The corporation is a person.
|
| 2. To use the dating app you must first marry a subsidiary
| of the corporation, which has a prenup with specific
| conditions.
|
| 3. To get married, you must first divorce the corporation
| and pay the prenup
| irajdeep wrote:
| That escalated quickly.
| soared wrote:
| Hinge is much better for this reason. They strictly limit the
| volume of potential matches you can see, force you to write
| longer text, etc. It seems much more built for driving real
| relationships.
| meristem wrote:
| Maybe the problem starts with talking about grown women using
| "girls".
| wintermutestwin wrote:
| Bah. I refer to grown women as "girls" because we are all
| children at heart and that's the level that I choose to connect
| with people on.
|
| This sculpture is a tangible reflection of my mindset:
| https://mymodernmet.com/alexander-milov-love-sculpture/
| zackmorris wrote:
| Thank you.
|
| My parents were involved in stuff like the National
| Organization for Women (NOW) while women's rights around
| abortion and equal pay etc were being attacked under the Reagan
| administration in the 80s. So I grew up having strong feminist
| role models all around me. I was taught to treat everyone as an
| equal, and to speak respectfully. Using terms like police
| officer instead of policeman, fire fighter instead of fireman,
| and so on. Think how quaint that sounds today!
|
| I'm appalled that pretty much all of that seems to have died
| since the 90s. Grown women on reality TV call themselves girls.
| Traditional gender roles seem to be cemented in place by
| marketing. I see the most chauvinistic, repulsive men being
| rewarded for being an "alpha".
|
| So I dunno, to me it feels like it's over. I don't see a way
| back to progress when half the population subscribes to gender
| stereotypes. I feel like I was prepared for an egalitarian
| world that never came to be.
|
| And not just feminism. All of the social justice causes I'm
| most passionate about, beginning with the destruction of wealth
| inequality, seem to have fallen by the wayside. It's just all
| bad news all the time on every front. Maybe there's a silver
| lining there that it's all fake. Maybe we can shift out of this
| false reality and manifest a better one. That thought is about
| all that's keeping me going anymore.
| inkcapmushroom wrote:
| Not that I've been on this world very long, but from what
| I've learned of history I think these things ebb and flow. No
| culture is naturally permanently fixed towards being
| "traditional" or "progressive" or whatever label, but
| cultures are always moving in different directions based on
| the forces of the day which I certainly won't claim to know.
| vlod wrote:
| >Grown women on reality TV...
|
| It is worth being careful about judging the present state of
| society based on social media/marketing (so you buy stuff you
| don't need) verses reality. i.e. a lot of people are normal
| IRL but rabid animals on twitter/fb.
|
| Nobody with an ounce of IQ should be watching reality TV
| (it's just grown up (barely) high school drama). In fact
| watching TV (in general), makes you dumber and angrier.
|
| I think there are still a lot of people that care about
| 'stuff'. Maybe other sources of input would be recommended.
| e.g. ACLU has regular meetings in big cities. Earth-Justice
| is big (although not sure about meetups).
| alistairSH wrote:
| Maybe I'm just yelling at clouds here, but my reaction was "no
| shit."
|
| I met my wife at a running club. Of my friend group, most met
| while active in sports or other activities. A few were introduced
| by common friends on a "you might like so-and-so" basis. And a
| few met in college. I'm only aware of two couples in my extended
| friend group who met using dating apps - and both of those were
| premium subscription models, not freebie Tinder-like apps.
|
| Dating apps strike me as a very low-quality (low fidelity?) way
| to match couples.
| swatcoder wrote:
| > Dating apps strike me as a very low-quality (low fidelity?)
| way to match couples.
|
| It's true, but a lot of people don't have the opportunity or
| patience for those other approaches. If they're not just
| homebody introverts in the first place, they may already have a
| pretty saturated schedule/network without many suitable people
| around to pair off with. This happens to _a lot_ of people as
| college recedes and life establishes a professional, mid-life
| rhythm.
|
| Dating apps are garbage, but alternatives aren't always
| practical.
| akomtu wrote:
| An idea that hasnt been tried in dating apps is introduction-
| only dating: you can't spam someone's inbox unless you know
| someone in common. Such an app could be run by a non-profit.
| Yes, I still have some naive optimism.
| jonatron wrote:
| Pay/Registration wall: https://www.printfriendly.com/p/g/cDPg3S
| LesZedCB wrote:
| people aren't commodities and dating apps juxtapose humans with
| all other online shopping.
|
| the medium is the message here. you scroll to find a new set of
| pans, and a new partner.
|
| not sustainable or humane.
| jononomo wrote:
| In my area (Lancaster, PA) the quality of women on Tinder is
| ridiculously low -- basically 100% of them are overweight single
| mothers without a college education who put cat ears and sparkles
| on their profile pictures. I have basically no choice but to
| move.
| randomopining wrote:
| It can be really bad in some areas. But tinder is usually low
| quality in general i believe.
| rdtwo wrote:
| Sometimes you are fishing in the wrong lake and there are no
| fish in it
| draw_down wrote:
| savryn wrote:
| I'm worried about this in the opposite direction, I hate the
| big city and I want to move rural and buy land etc, but I don't
| have a partner yet.
|
| If I move, as smart/thin/no children yet/no drug problems
| woman, I suppose I'll stand out right away (and less
| flatteringly, compensate for some of the legit
| downsides/difficult nature of dating me...)
|
| But the variety of eligible men will be way lower, and I think
| I'm romanticizing the types available ("maybe some engineer in
| his thirties will move back home to take care of his aging
| dad") Hallmark channel thinking, I know... The numbers would be
| against me and I'll be the fodder for gossip as an 'outsider'
| right away... Seems you can't make any mistakes in a small
| town, and petty folks might lie about you even if you don't.
|
| The best of the city men (smart, stable etc) want to stay in
| the city by disposition or are tied there by profession. And
| some of the best of city men in brains/looks/disposition combo
| somehow don't want children, so what's the point?
|
| Honesty on dating apps requires a lot of intuition about
| reverse-psychology and theory-of-minding and signaling (which
| is why average stem-y men often have terrible profiles, but I
| digress)
|
| Women often can't actually just state outright
| boundaries/goals, as it attracts bad elements that want to push
| those boundaries, exploit them, or indeed seemingly share your
| goals but for the wrong reasons.
|
| In my case, if you try to filter for men eager to leave the
| city to homestead, buy a cabin, leave the grind etc, by stating
| that, it accidentally attracts bad people eager to trap a
| woman, Kaszinski types (without even the harvard cred lmao).
|
| Maybe it's that misanthropy in women (and/or myself) gives me
| cat lady vibes at worst, but misanthropy in men becomes scary
| and deranged. Being too clear about a goal like that also
| scares off decent men who might consider it if they already
| were in love with you, but not ready to chop wood next month,
| easier to swipe left on ambivalence.
|
| The way to get the perfect intersection of a. wants to leave
| metropolis, b. wants family, and c. wholesomeness/decency is
| pragmatically in America just....Christianity.
|
| Christians Conservatives have such an easier time of this game,
| it's a cluster of unspoken boundaries and norms and vibes, that
| does all the filtering/signaling without outright stating it
| ("no hook-ups" just invites 'challenge accepted' sleaze,
| whereas implied christian morality basically signals sex will
| move way slower, men are far less presumptuous etc etc)
|
| It's a cohesive "aesthetic" but it feels super dishonest to me
| to try to co-opt it for benefits without going all-in.
| Christian partners would not be happy with my level of actual
| belief (I'd say 3/10).
|
| Regardless, there needs to be a dating app for people who can
| remote work post-covid who are willing to move anywhere or
| filter by big general regions.
|
| Changing the location on Hinge to talk to people and get the
| 'lay of the land' in small towns feels dishonest.
| vlod wrote:
| I know this sounds completely whacky, are there any meetups
| near you talking about farming, animal, horse raising etc?
|
| e.g. "How to start horse ranching" or "Beginner guide to
| essential tractor repairs". Maybe there's a farming
| conference you can go to where you can scope things out.
|
| I DO realize there's probably not many "How to raise farm
| goats" meetups in Manhattan but you might be lucky if you
| live close to somewhere more rural.
| scotuswroteus wrote:
| I'm really looking forward to know what hacker news thinks about
| dating. I definitely come here specifically to escape the rest of
| the internet, where no one talks about dating. /s
| gernb wrote:
| Honestly I don't know where else to look. I don't go to church. I
| have few friends and those I do have do not have any connections
| to introduce me to people. I choose a poor career for meeting
| people. No job I've ever had has had many people of the opposite
| sex in my division. Even now, in my team and a very large
| company, of the 45 people that I might interact with regularly,
| 43 are male and while there might be women at work I have no good
| excuse to talk to any of them.
|
| I'm not saying I want to meet someone at work. But, work is the
| 2nd most common place to meet someone. Friends are #1 but as I
| mentioned my friends don't come through here.
|
| Bars don't seem my thing. I am going to a dance event regularly
| but so far nothing there and even then, I can't talk while I
| dance as I need to concentrate on getting the moves right (it's a
| well known style of dance, not just club dancing)
|
| Trying to go to meetups but COVID is still a thing so outdoors
| only. And it can be burn out on those two because rarely is there
| anyone I might be interested in. (single, age appropriate, and
| seem compatible). I know it's a numbers game, I just am running
| out of ideas on how to increase the numbers.
|
| The apps don't work for me. I get at most 3~4 dates a year out of
| them. It's better than zero but not by much.
| atoav wrote:
| I am with the same girl for half my life, so I might not be
| totally qualified to answer, but I met most interesting girls
| outside a work context.
|
| That means: on concerts, on hacking camps, in art exhibitions,
| especially exhibition openings, on film sets etc. These places
| reflect my interests of course, so I don't go there because of
| women, I go there because the stuff there interests me. So for
| you it could be a sports club, a library, an animal rights
| organization or any number of other, similar places where
| people of similar interest gather.
|
| The point is: if you want to get to know people (regardless of
| their gender) exposing yourself to situations where you
| actually get the chance to meet new people is a good way to
| increase your chances. Just like your chances of rolling a 6
| increase with every roll of the dice.
|
| The important thing is to do it because you like, not because
| you expect to find women there.
| gernb wrote:
| I agree that getting out and doing thing you like will let
| you meet more people but just to be picky here. "concerts?" I
| couldn't talk to anyone at a concert as the music is too
| loud". "hacking camps", never seen more than 3% woman at any
| tech event. library? "shhh!, you're not supposed to talk at a
| library
|
| > The important thing is to do it because you like,
|
| As I said, I do, but none of the things I like involve enough
| people of the opposite sex. It doesn't help that I'm old so
| it might be true there are some 20 somethings at a hacking
| event but there are no 50 somethings.
| 60secs wrote:
| Are you looking for solutions or excuses?
| CaptArmchair wrote:
| Cooking classes, book club, movie club, volunteering (e.g.
| environment, local heritage, animal shelter, first
| aid,...), amateur acting, art classes, group travel,
| hanging out at vintage records store, coffee bar, dancing
| classes, music festivals, sports,...
| cableshaft wrote:
| Libraries have lots of events where you can talk. They've
| had to reinvent themselves a bit since the internet and are
| a bit more of a community center nowadays. I wouldn't
| dismiss them out of hand.
|
| I went to a travel blogging meetup at one last year (hosted
| by library staff members), some events on making podcasts,
| regular board game nights at another, and there's a whole
| maker lab set up in the basement of my nearest library,
| with 3D printers, multiple sound recording rooms, multiple
| video recording studios, a vinyl cutter, a laser cutter and
| computers with Adobe suite installed on them that you can
| use pretty much whenever.
|
| Just looking at next month at adult events at my nearest
| library: yoga, drawing with pencils and charcoal class,
| conversational ESL, STEM workshop, a DIY craft event, a
| cooking class, photography club, meditation class, mixing
| live albums with Logic Pro class, dungeons and dragons
| event, coffee and conversation event, business topics
| workshop, folk art craft diy, trivia night, open mic night,
| aztec dancing event, line dancing, toastmasters (public
| speaking), film club, financial planning talk, 24 hour
| comic book creation event, state paranormal history talk,
| knitting, writers group, and several book club events.
| That's not even the kid or teen events. That's a lot, and a
| wide variety of things.
| dalke wrote:
| I would like to know which dance style you are learning.
|
| My experience is there is a good number of 50 somethings in
| tango.
|
| And like I said elsewhere, it's much more of a cafe scene
| than a bar scene, making it easier to socialize.
| orangepurple wrote:
| There is a good flow chart for your dating life made by a
| specific YouTuber which I found highly effective. It can be
| found by searching YouTube for "wheat waffles flow chart"
| Nav_Panel wrote:
| I'll save everyone the trouble. Here's the flowchart:
| https://i.ibb.co/WcBtzw7/What-Should-You-Do-In-Your-
| Dating-L...
|
| Boring redpill ideology stuff.
| orangepurple wrote:
| There is just about nothing ideological about this flow
| chart
| Nav_Panel wrote:
| > sub5 / normie / chad
|
| > looksmaxx, moneymaxx, surgerymaxx
|
| > daygame, nightgame, warm approach
|
| The language itself reveals deeper structuring principles
| in terms of truths/untruths, from which the knowledge
| presented in the chart arises.
|
| The problem isn't that it's ideology; the NYT is equally
| ideological (ironically I had a far more visceral
| negative response to the angle of the OP article than to
| the above chart). The problem isn't even necessarily that
| it's TRP/manosphere ideology, but that it's treated
| unreflexively.
|
| The question that immediately comes to mind is "why are
| the only categories 'sub5', 'normie', and 'chad'? What
| grounding principles must I assume in order to decide
| which of these categories I'm a part of?" Same goes for
| the proposed actions: what worldview must I assume so
| that these action-words "make sense", are coherent?
|
| I can't speak for everyone, but when I personally dig
| into these questions, the answers I arrive at don't align
| with the other ways I elect to live in the world. I'm not
| saying the chart is "wrong", but rather that it's not
| relevant, for me at least.
| orangepurple wrote:
| I stand corrected. However, the question "What grounding
| principles must I assume in order to decide which of
| these categories I'm a part of?" has criteria WW outlines
| in "40 Differences in Treatment Between a Sub5, Normie &
| Chad." The theory isn't extremely rigorous and well
| defined.
| Nav_Panel wrote:
| The point isn't whether the criteria are _knowable_ or
| not, the point is whether one is _aligned_ with them, in
| terms of views /faiths/beliefs about how to live one's
| life. Better to think of it as a lens, perspective,
| frame, etc. which is neither true nor false, but instead
| accepted or rejected. In other words, it's a moral
| question.
| postsantum wrote:
| Slightly condescending virtue signalling allows you to
| pass information freely without the fear of being viewed
| as someone who is dead serious about that kind of charts
| (and probably frequents PUA-forums)
| orangepurple wrote:
| I don't understand what "slightly condescending virtue
| signalling" is and how it "allows you to pass information
| freely" and what the fear is regarding "being viewed as
| someone who is dead serious about that kind of charts" or
| what is wrong with someone who "frequents PUA-forums"
|
| I'm so far removed from this stuff generally I didn't
| really understand anything in that sentence (lol)
| confidantlake wrote:
| You aren't the only one :) I realize I am equally out of
| touch.
| derefr wrote:
| I mean, from what I can see, it covers the redpill PUA
| stuff _and_ the regular advice. It 's basically saying
| "if you want to date shallow women interested only in
| your appearance, do X; if you want to date short-term
| based on shared interests, do Y; if you want a long-term
| relationship, do Z" -- where some of the things below
| those split-offs happen to converge back together, due to
| e.g. the economics of attention in marketplaces like
| online dating; and the fact that "women at nightclubs"
| aren't one coherent group with shared goals but actually
| several independent groups that different men might want
| to meet for different reasons.
|
| Of course, the _phrasing_ is dumb as hell.
| msallin wrote:
| This is fascinating!
| derefr wrote:
| > "concerts?" I couldn't talk to anyone at a concert as the
| music is too loud". "hacking camps", never seen more than
| 3% woman at any tech event. library? "shhh!, you're not
| supposed to talk at a library
|
| Re: concerts and libraries, you meet people outside of them
| (for concerts, in line for them, or in the pit waiting for
| the show to start), not at them per se.
|
| I don't know about "hacking camps" (hackathons? code boot
| camps?) -- never been to one -- but a close cousin of
| these, [industry niche] startup events, tend to attract
| just as many business cofounders as technical cofounders;
| and the business cofounders tend to be an even gender
| split. (They also attract seed-stage VC scouts and
| marketing people, and these jobs actually tend to lean
| female.)
|
| > As I said, I do, but none of the things I like involve
| enough people of the opposite sex.
|
| So... take up some _new_ hobbies?
|
| And when I say that, I don't mean to work "bottom up"
| starting from what you might like; but rather, "top down",
| starting from what hobbies your ideal partner might have,
| and then filtering those for which ones you feel at least
| amicably neutral about. E.g. if you feel like you'd enjoy
| being with someone who's also 50yo and "creative", and
| you're not _against_ e.g. painting, or pottery, or creative
| writing; then attend a continuing-education course on one
| of those. Because that 's where you'll find other 50yos
| trying to learn those things.
| meheleventyone wrote:
| > I don't know about "hacking camps" (hackathons? code
| boot camps?) -- never been to one -- but a close cousin
| of these, [industry niche] startup events, tend to
| attract just as many business cofounders as technical
| cofounders; and the business cofounders tend to be an
| even gender split. (They also attract seed-stage VC
| scouts and marketing people, and these jobs actually tend
| to lean female.)
|
| I think people are going to be weirded out by someone
| hitting on them at a business event.
| derefr wrote:
| I'm not suggesting you do. You make connections, friends,
| people to work on things with. Then maybe something
| develops.
|
| However, I should note that as a technical cofounder
| attending these events, I've been approached and flirted
| with heavily by single female entrepreneurs who have
| ideas they haven't started building yet, who seem to be
| looking for a convenient all-in-one package of "a
| boyfriend who's also an entrepreneur, who can 'yes, and'
| my ambitions, and who has enough skill+experience to
| actually build the tech side of the things we imagine
| together." I'm neither single, nor a free agent business-
| wise, but some people can be both very pushy and
| presumptive.
| saargrin wrote:
| i feel like in current culture its considered kind of creepy
| to approach women in a non-party social context like
| hackathon
|
| they often complain they are made to feel uncomfortable by
| that
| jhanschoo wrote:
| In non-party social contexts consider becoming friends
| first approaching either sex with the same questions you'd
| ask people sharing the same interests. Then ask for
| contacts to share and receive opportunities for similar
| events. Then deepen your friendship and get to know each
| other better asking about events outside your groups'
| interests but more of pairwise mutual interest.
| dmatech wrote:
| Whether this comes across as stalking or courting depends
| on how weird or creepy you come across. Basically, once
| you leave university, your ability to spend a lot of time
| with people you're allowed to date kind of dries up,
| because people don't want to be counted at work.
| sleepdreamy wrote:
| How you 'feel' isn't always reality. I am not dating now,
| but it's a bit odd to suggest you can't put yourself out
| there because of the 'climate' or 'culture'. Who cares what
| the climate is, if you're being genuine and nice there is
| nothing to worry about.
|
| If you're worried you will be perceived as a creep then you
| need to work on your delivery/how you approach strangers.
|
| Members of the opposite sex are just people. They want to
| be treated normally. My most successful male friend(in
| terms of dating) just treats females like they're normal
| people. He pretty much never has trouble and he is a 6 at
| most with a shitbox car.
|
| I used to think women only care about money etc; and That
| is true..for a certain subset of women. So many more don't
| care at all, and just want a nice loyal person who won't
| shit on them. And yes, you need to moderately TRY to look
| attractive. Go to the gym, get a proper haircut, stop
| wearing those shitty jeans and ugly shoes. YOU also need to
| put in effort, it's not just on the other gender.
| orangepurple wrote:
| > Members of the opposite sex are just people. They want
| to be treated normally. My most successful male friend(in
| terms of dating) just treats females like they're normal
| people. He pretty much never has trouble and he is a 6 at
| most with a shitbox car.
|
| Just a suggestion. You _think_ he is a "6" but you are
| probably wrong because you are unable to view him from
| the perspective of a woman's gaze. See my other post in
| my profile's comments about the flow chart stuff.
| sleepdreamy wrote:
| I did even better than him when I was dating and am
| objectively more attractive in many ways. So no, I am not
| wrong. He is a solid 6. lmao.
|
| I appreciate your input though!
| bombcar wrote:
| If you're only interested in talking to the person if
| they're a potential partner, you're going to have a lot of
| failures (unless it's something like a speed dating
| course).
|
| You work on getting to know people as friends, some of whom
| you may consider dating.
| LorenPechtel wrote:
| And if your interests are things that mostly appeal to your
| own gender this doesn't work very well.
| tagami wrote:
| Your chance of rolling a six never changes. It's always
| 16.67%
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| Trying to be helpful: music events - volunteer to help
| organize. Cycling club. Gardening group, perhaps a local
| Japanese garden or some such, even just watering potted plants
| they need volunteers. Book club - really! Dog show if that's
| your thing. Art classes.
| gernb wrote:
| Let me also add, a thing I hate about dating apps is the
| pressure. At least for me, I meet someone I know nothing about
| and I feel like I have to decide at every moment "Do I want to
| be in a relationship with this person?". It feels very
| unnatural to me. There's a one in a million chance there will
| be instance chemistry but mostly no, I don't know the person
| well enough.
|
| Compare to most of the relationships I've had, those were
| people I knew 6+ months before we got interested in each other.
| Classmates, co-workers, group friends.
| awinter-py wrote:
| grad school is a legit possibility here
|
| not just for dating, for all kinds of 'network reboot'. doesn't
| have to be traditional grad school either, any kind of high-
| investment cohort-based bonding experience should do it
|
| agree with you that hollowing out of local institutions is
| rough, esp for over-30s post-pan. The web has not done a good
| job of delivering IRL social networks; tinder is IMO fairly
| good at this, with the caveat that it's impossible to turn the
| connections into a true community
| lapcat wrote:
| > grad school is a legit possibility here
|
| The tradeoffs though... like student loan debt!
| koeng wrote:
| You get paid for graduate school. Not much, but still get
| something.
| lapcat wrote:
| Sometimes. This varies widely.
| confidantlake wrote:
| In the US unless you are a TA or something you are
| probably paying.
| slig wrote:
| >I am going to a dance event regularly
|
| Is that ballroom dance with lead/follower? If that's the case,
| I cannot recommend it enough. It's hard as hell in the first
| couple of years, but then you'll grasp it. See this graph for
| the learning curve of ballroom dancing, and don't give up [1].
|
| [1]:
| https://www.salsafs.com/site/assets/articles/learning_curve....
| MezzoDelCammin wrote:
| I'm not sure this is too legit.
|
| I love ballroom, been doing it more or less since high school
| (10+ years and some breaks), but I wouldn't really use this
| curve for any other reason than to motivate new men to attend
| classes.
|
| In the beginning, followers may have a slightly easier time
| since it's probably a bit easier for a follower to learn from
| a more advanced leader than the other way around, but this
| plateaus pretty soon (low single digit months).
|
| Also, leaders tend to pick and followers accept / reject, so
| in that respect, "attractive followers" will have a bit of an
| easier time (more offers) than if you're a shy, not very
| attractive leader.
|
| But that's mostly just for newcomers. Eventually, few dances
| in, people get familiar with your level and you with theirs
| in a given group. And I've yet to see a place where one could
| get no partners, even as a "beginner with only a handful of
| introductory classes" (unless through some pretty obvious
| breaches of ethics / personal hygiene).
|
| Eventually (maybe a few months in), both leaders and
| followers have to do some introspection and practice things
| like technique, posture and musicality. And there's simply no
| way other than mindful practice.
| meristem wrote:
| From my experience in Human Factors this is not a real graph.
| It is bs disguised as information.
| [deleted]
| nprateem wrote:
| Learn pick up and stop hot girls in the street. You can get a
| cute girl's number in 5 minutes if you're confident and put
| them at ease. And you'll stick in their mind so it's more
| likely to result in a date.
| flopunctro wrote:
| No. Please don't do that. It's called Pick-Up Artistry, and
| it is toxic.
|
| You will benefit more if you try to be a considerate human
| being, and not treat women like prizes, or prey to be
| captured. This way, you actually have a chance to healthy
| relationships.
| nprateem wrote:
| Please don't associate your preconceptions & biases with
| me.
| bulkprotocol wrote:
| Meh, honestly you can do it. It's more so a cultural thing.
| It also has nothing to do with treating people like prizes
| or prey, in a chill environment people are okay conversing
| with total strangers, but its very location dependent.
|
| I met my last girlfriend this way. I know friends who found
| partners randomly chatting on the train, in ubers (pool
| when that was a thing), at bus stops etc.
|
| Just dont be an asshole or a creep/creepy looking, and youd
| be surprised how receptive people can be
| srvmshr wrote:
| It is called being 'creepy'. Please don't do it or suggest
| it. The outcomes are neither favorable or painless (depending
| on whether it's a Taser or Mace). It is far better to send
| dozens of messages or interests in Tinder - than make a
| spectacle of yourself, be it US or India or EU/Asia
| spoonjim wrote:
| Just go talk to random people in stores. Men and women. Make it
| based on shared interests. Find a way to start conversations
| with them. And work out and stay fit and wear decent clothes.
|
| On a dating app women are happy to swipe left and see who's
| next but when there is a man right in front of them the
| calculus is way different.
| JoeAltmaier wrote:
| As long as you are talking about pertinent things, and not
| hauling out meetup-lines.
|
| "Do you know a good brand of pasta sauce? I don't like
| garlic, and it seems everything has garlic in it."
|
| "Are the waist sizes honest here? I'm a 36 but some places
| that's like 40 inches."
|
| And leave it at that. Maybe somebody will continue the
| conversation, but most won't. It's a numbers game.
| probably_wrong wrote:
| > _Just go talk to random people in stores._
|
| I'd like to counter-argue with a quote from this random
| Reddit thread in /r/AskWomen [1] titled "What is one place
| you hate to be hit on?":
|
| > _Grocery store. I 'm just like, dude, leave me alone, I'm
| here to get my food and get out as quickly as possible. I'm
| not interested in having to pretend not to be annoyed by you
| interrupting my day, fuck off._
|
| And I'd like to point out that "Earth" is also an answer
| there.
|
| I feel for the OP because he's stuck between a rock and a
| hard place: hitting on women is often annoying for the woman
| being hit on, but at the same time _not_ hitting on women
| means that he can only date people who he meets for reasons
| other than dating. It 's like a Zen riddle: "What is that
| which you can only have once you stop desiring it?".
|
| This is the landscape that gave rise to the hell we call
| "dating apps", and I really wish we had something better.
|
| [1] https://old.reddit.com/r/AskWomen/comments/pzojno/what_is
| _on...
| eloisius wrote:
| In my experience, the voices you read on Reddit are a
| special breed of high-anxiety thinkers. Especially in
| dating/relationship threads. I think a lot of people on
| there are bent out of shape from some experience, and
| that's why they're on Reddit talking about dating and
| relationships instead of doing them. I avoid using reddit
| posts as a gauge for anything about people in real life.
| Not saying go out and start hitting on women at the bus
| stop, but there's nothing weird or socially unacceptable
| about talking to strangers if you don't make it weird. Just
| ask a small question or make a comment about something in
| the environment. Don't say "I couldn't help but notice your
| beautiful eyes m'lady." Band shirt, how do you cook that
| vegetable, whatever. If there's tension, she'll invite you
| to keep talking to her. If there's not, move on.
| bckr wrote:
| I'll expand this to say: talk to _people_.
|
| It's just so easy to understand when you look at it
| logically. Talking to people (skillfully, which requires
| practice) will eventually lead to befriending some
| percent of those you talk to. Befriending people will
| lead to more opportunities to befriend others from a
| place of more trust. It's a simple networking process.
|
| Eventually, some percent of the people you're meeting and
| befriending will be love interests. There will be mutual
| attraction, especially when you don't come across as
| desperate. Eventually some small percent of these mutual
| attractions will also be compatible partners under the
| right circumstances.
|
| It's just a numbers game!
|
| The problem is people design their conversion funnels all
| wrong. At the top of the funnel is conversations, then
| acquaintances, friends, mutual interests, compatible
| interests, partners.
|
| At every stage there is a network/feedback effect leading
| to more input at the top of the funnel.
|
| Go talk to people!
| spoonjim wrote:
| Yeah exactly. Online is the worst place to learn how to
| meet women in real life.
| spoonjim wrote:
| I'm saying talk to men and women because it shouldn't be
| just "hitting on" people, it should be "talking to people."
| And if you don't like to get talked to at the grocery
| store, I mean, fine, don't respond or put in earphones. If
| I never talked to anyone because of my fear that they
| didn't want to get talked to, then I'd never have talked to
| anyone at all.
| cjbgkagh wrote:
| There is a philosophy that has propagated recently that 'it
| can't hurt to ask'. I'm guessing this comes from popular
| self help gurus. I once fielded of a lot of questions from
| these people due to a job I had and it is incredibly
| annoying. I had to start being rude to people. I can only
| imagine how much worse it would be to be an attractive
| female.
| analogcollector wrote:
| Yeah I agree about the meetup thing. It can be really hit or
| miss. Maybe if you pick a good one like hiking or sports. You
| have to screen out the meetups where there are a lot of
| retirees or married couples.
| cafard wrote:
| Might I suggest volunteering?
| bell-cot wrote:
| THIS. But be mature, diverse, and kinda picky about what
| organizations you volunteer for, in what roles, and how much.
| Be especially wary of bringing your day job technical skills
| & attitude to a volunteer organization. (The food bank is
| far, _far_ more likely to need food and reliable food
| handlers than it is to need you building a fancy new AWS-
| hosted web site & database for them.)
| analogcollector wrote:
| This only works if you're in an area that isn't
| hypersaturated with retirees. Nearly every volunteer event I
| attend has people that are mostly 20-30 years older than me.
| Tiktaalik wrote:
| haha yeah. Volunteer at a cat sanctuary and you're likely
| to make friends with a whole bunch of nice grannies.
|
| Volunteering with a political campaign where the
| candidate's promises are strongly appealing to young people
| is probably the sweet spot in terms of meeting young
| people.
| wintermutestwin wrote:
| As someone responsible for volunteer coordination for a non-
| profit, I don't want to deal with people who aren't there due
| to passion for our mission. I actually developed conflict
| management training for volunteer coordinators of a certain
| non-profit that used a lot of college age volunteers who were
| generating a lot of drama due to their in-dating.
| cafard wrote:
| You have my sympathy. At the same time, do you really
| require passion, or can you get by with commitment? I
| suspect that most volunteer coordinators will be happy with
| volunteers who are perhaps not passionate but do turn out
| when they say they will, arrive prepared, and do the work.
| wintermutestwin wrote:
| In the specific case of my non-profit, passion is
| required in volunteers because the role requires a lot of
| patience that will overwhelm commitment.
|
| >I suspect that most volunteer coordinators will be happy
| with volunteers who are perhaps not passionate but do
| turn out when they say they will, arrive prepared, and do
| the work. Agreed.
| pizza234 wrote:
| > Trying to go to meetups but COVID is still a thing so
| outdoors only
|
| In which country COVID is still a thing that prevents indoors
| meetings?
|
| Regardless, outdoor there is a world of events happening; it
| isn't just "indoors". Just check on meetup.com.
|
| > I can't talk while I dance as I need to concentrate on
| getting the moves right (it's a well known style of dance, not
| just club dancing)
|
| At social dances, dancers often socialize on the sides of the
| dance floor, taking a break rather than dancing the whole
| evening; socializing or not is very much a choice.
| NegativeK wrote:
| > In which country COVID is still a thing that prevents
| indoors meetings?
|
| I think you're confusing unable to go to indoor meetings
| versus unwilling.
| langitbiru wrote:
| Some people use Twitter to find the one:
|
| https://twitter.com/ch402/status/1564631228166201345
|
| https://twitter.com/TwtJodohMY
| vorpalhex wrote:
| Do interesting things. Meet people who also do those
| interesting things. Do the interesting things together.
|
| Drinking alcohol at the alcohol place is not an interesting
| thing.
| fartsucker69 wrote:
| pick up other hobbies
|
| i started climbing and bouldering recently and while I haven't
| met anyone romantically (I have no interest in pushing this, I
| want to do it for the hobby first, and for meeting people
| second), the group I go with usually has more women than men
| and in the gyms it seems to be about a 50/50 split so I can
| easily see how you could meet someone there in the way you
| imagine.
|
| though I must emphasize not to do it to meet women as the
| primary purpose, I feel like that's kind of creepy vs. an event
| that is explicitly for that purpose (like single bars or
| whatever).
| stickfigure wrote:
| Long married now, but for many years, a trip to the climbing
| gym was my standard first date (that is - someone I met
| elsewhere, I would take them climbing). It worked really
| well:
|
| * It's a natural two-person activity with a bidirectional
| trust exercise.
|
| * Heights provide a little amygdala stimulation.
|
| * It's hard and physical and you feel like you deserve a beer
| afterwards.
|
| * If your date is not already a climber, you get to play the
| role of the teacher/master.
|
| * It weeds out the extremely uptight / neurotic.
| LesZedCB wrote:
| > though I must emphasize not to do it to meet women as the
| primary purpose
|
| just seconding this. the gym is already a pretty tough
| environment and people coming for this purpose make it
| outright hostile. it's not a bar.
|
| do climb though, it's a great way to get strong and do
| something fun!
| scarier wrote:
| I'm not convinced it's a pure numbers game, at least from a
| perspective of long-term success (for what it's worth, I was
| averaging 1-2 dates/year until I met my partner). I think it's
| much better to have two high-quality dates than dozens of low-
| quality ones. The advantage of dating apps over more
| traditional ways of meeting people is that you can much more
| effectively set up bandpass filters to focus your efforts on
| interesting people.
|
| I think the best thing you can do is focus on yourself,
| particularly by cultivating hobbies that you enjoy--bonus
| points if they're things you can enjoy alone and with others,
| because they're easy inroads and great first dates (worst case
| you get to spend a bit of time doing something you like!).
|
| The second thing I'd encourage is to get any potential
| dealbreakers out of the way early (e.g. religion, political
| views, desires for parenthood, career aspirations). It's a slow
| path, but it's helped me avoid the major pitfalls I've seen in
| my friend's' and colleagues' relationships.
| sweezyjeezy wrote:
| I don't think I fully agree with this. I think most people
| are quite bad at dating, I know I was. 1-2 per year for me
| would mean too much pressure. If I'm taking nothing else from
| using dating apps for the last 10 years, it's that I feel
| calm and have a good handle on my feelings in those
| situations, when good people come along I have a much better
| shot with them now. Obviously 2 good dates > loads of average
| ones, but the average ones aren't pointless either.
| scarier wrote:
| Fair point--I never got good at "dating" as a standalone
| skill. I still think that's the benefit of activity dates
| over bar/dinner-and-a-movie/whatever dates, though. Doing a
| thing that you're both already reasonably confident at
| helps counteract the anxiety and pressure from being on a
| date, and if you both have a good time doing the activity
| it makes follow-on conversions easier and less stressful
| since you have a common foundation to build and/or fall
| back on.
| Macacity wrote:
| > I think it's much better to have two high-quality dates
| than dozens of low-quality ones.
|
| But first you have to meet the person to go on a date with.
| Tiktaalik wrote:
| Keep an eye on municipal/state/fed politics and volunteer to
| help support a good candidate when there's elections. You will
| meet a lot of people.
| inkcapmushroom wrote:
| > I am going to a dance event regularly but so far nothing
| there and even then, I can't talk while I dance as I need to
| concentrate on getting the moves right
|
| I usually don't talk while dancing with someone too, but social
| partnered dancing is how I met my wife. You don't have to be
| super social, but hopefully you naturally form some friends out
| dancing you can talk with while you're sitting out a dance.
| Just the act of being friendly and social with others puts you
| in the right situation; women usually prefer someone like that
| to someone sitting by themselves silently.
| m463 wrote:
| http://www.sirc.org/publik/flirt.pdf
| sgjohnson wrote:
| > The apps don't work for me. I get at most 3~4 dates a year
| out of them. It's better than zero but not by much.
|
| Consider paying for them. From a male perspective, it's
| strictly a numbers game.
|
| Tinder Platinum did wonders for me. Saves your time, and gets
| you pushed higher in the stack of the cards, which leads to
| more matches.
| gernb wrote:
| I've paid for several. Hasn't helped at all.
| logicchains wrote:
| Not only this, but pay for a professional photographer (and
| even a stylist if you can afford it!). Photo quality has a
| huge effect on how attractive someone appears; bad lighting
| can make a 10 look like a 5, and good lighting, dress and
| posing can make a 5 look like an 8.
| vrc wrote:
| Just don't go too far past what you can deliver in person.
| The matching party could feel catfished and that will just
| push your failure down-funnel.
|
| I.E. don't take shots with perfectly styled hair, a leather
| jacket, and a motorcycle, if your day to day and date
| attire will be a t-shirt and jeans and you're going to
| arrive on an e-scooter.
| awinter-py wrote:
| yeah there's a harry stebbings interview of whitney wolfe
| where at the end he says 'bumble wasn't working that well for
| me until I dropped $300 a month for it, and blam', and she
| kind of chuckles and promises to work on his profile with him
|
| unintentional blindside question in a softball interview
| rdtwo wrote:
| Is there some sort of extra premium tier that's not
| advertised?
| sgjohnson wrote:
| $300 a month is super excessive.
|
| I was paying PS69 a year for Tinder Gold and then PS99 a
| year for Tinder Platinum.
| ChuckNorris89 wrote:
| Depends on the age as well. Tinder overcharges guys over
| 30. Platinum is EUR120 per year for me.
| sgjohnson wrote:
| I'm pretty sure that this is illegal in the EU.
| ChuckNorris89 wrote:
| A lot of things that are illegal in the EU still fly
| until the offending company is taken to court and order
| to pay damages and mend things.
|
| Having laws is one thing, enforcing them is another.
|
| Just look at the huge number of websites that are not
| GDPR compliant.
| dcow wrote:
| Actual question: if you do not make a product or service
| available in the EU, does your globally accessible
| marketing website need to be GDPR compliant?
| ChuckNorris89 wrote:
| IANL, but AFIK, yes, as long as EU users can access your
| website, it does have to be compliant. Though how you
| could get fined for breaching that is another matter.
|
| TBH, being GDPR compliant isn't _that_ hard, just don 't
| track your users lol. A lot of the web was GDPR compliant
| by default 20 years ago.
| rascul wrote:
| If you're not in the EU, you have no presence in the EU,
| and are not selling a product in the EU, then no. EU has
| no jurisdiction over you. But it might be a consideration
| if you entertain the possibility of doing any of those
| things in the future.
| awinter-py wrote:
| I think one of the apps got tagged for age-based pricing
| in california, had to pay damages or a fine
| Grimburger wrote:
| > gets you pushed higher in the stack of the cards
|
| What's the outcome when everyone pays for it?
| sgjohnson wrote:
| > What's the outcome when everyone pays for it?
|
| Back to the popularity contest, and virtually impossible to
| use without paying.
|
| Or they'll just add a higher tier.
|
| It's a very cruel numbers game.
| imtringued wrote:
| In theory the goal is to get married and quit the app but
| something tells me that their business model isn't based on
| that idea.
| sgjohnson wrote:
| > In theory the goal is to get married and quit the app
|
| It's very dependent on the age group (and of course,
| people themselves).
|
| I'd be willing to bet that in 18-25 (maybe even higher)
| age group most people are looking to have fun, not get
| married.
| Taylor_OD wrote:
| "Everyone" wont. When I was 22, in pretty good shape, and
| had a full head of hair I didnt need to pay for bumble.
| Last time I was on an app I was ~27, in okay shape, and
| bald. If I was taking it seriously I would have paid for it
| because I saw a massive impact on my matches based on
| age/hair status.
| bsnnkv wrote:
| I recommend taking up swing dancing if that's not already the
| style you're doing (Lindy Hop is great to start with).
|
| The majority of swing dance socials will have very low levels
| of intoxication (because everyone is there to dance!), and it
| is a social atmosphere where it is expected and encouraged to
| introduce yourself to strangers and ask them to dance. If you
| are a man (or dance the lead role), don't worry about not being
| able to do so much fancy stuff while you're dancing. Often,
| experienced followers are perfectly happy to try out individual
| stylistic variations while the leader holds a nice steady
| basic.
|
| I'd recommend going with the intention of trying to expand your
| social circle, and seeing where you end up!
|
| > dance
| MikeTheRocker wrote:
| Swing dancing is a lot of fun and a great place to meet
| people, but please don't be the guy that's obviously there to
| flirt. In my experience, most people there just want to enjoy
| their evening dancing, not getting hit on.
| bsnnkv wrote:
| Yes, for sure, please don't be that guy!
|
| I figured I'd add a bit of guidance in addition to "go with
| the intention of expanding your social circle" since I'm
| writing another message, for anyone that is interested:
|
| * Start going to swing dance classes (I recommend Lindy Hop
| for beginners)
|
| * In classes, say hello to all the people you dance with as
| you rotate, ask how they are doing, and start gradually
| making small talk focused around whatever moves you're
| learning that day (though not to the point of distracting
| from the class!)
|
| * Chances are some people coming to the class will be in
| couples. If there is one partner of the couple who you
| small talk a bit more freely with, at the beginning or the
| end of the classes, go and say hi and make some small talk
| with those couples, get to know their partners too
|
| * As a single person going to classes it's generally a lot
| more relaxed talking to couples than other single people to
| start with
|
| * Slowly start including others (couples or single people)
| in these pre/post class conversations
|
| * At this point everyone is probably still terrified at the
| idea of going to a social dance, thinking they aren't "good
| enough" yet
|
| * Make a group chat with the people you've been talking to
| before and after classes with the goal of coordinating a
| social dance that everyone can go to together so they don't
| feel so terrified of going alone
|
| * Add more and more people from the classes to the group
| chat, and more and more of the nice people you meet at the
| dances to the group chat (others in the group chat will be
| doing this too!)
|
| * Before you know it, you'll have a new social circle of
| 20+ friends, hooray!
| itsthejb wrote:
| This is a very real problem! I didn't actually work out the
| protocol here, seems tricky to ask for than a handful of
| people out, before you might get into trouble
|
| Alternatively, aim to make friends, and meet THEIR friends.
| This is always the absolutely best way
| itsthejb wrote:
| Swing dancing is indeed a great one. Although I did run into
| the issue that, eventually it didn't seem likely to REALLY be
| my thing, and for men there is actually a definite level of
| competitiveness to be aware of. That said, people were
| diverse, friendly, and the vibe is very cheerful and healthy
| hypertele-Xii wrote:
| > Honestly I don't know where else to look [...] Bars don't
| seem my thing
|
| So you _do_ know where to look, you just don 't want to look
| there.
| derefr wrote:
| More like: he likely wouldn't have anything in common with
| someone he met at a bar.
|
| He might not even drink!
| ChuckNorris89 wrote:
| I got news for you. Bars are rarely the place for
| successfully meeting a nice lady in most places. Quality
| women don't often hang around alone in bars waiting to meet a
| partner as they'll be hit on by tons of drunks and creeps.
| Ditto for clubs. They usually go in groups and stay together.
|
| YMMV but that's the case in my area in Europe. Maybe the US
| has a different culture.
| aloisdg wrote:
| The case in my area of Europe is that you can met a lot of
| people in a bar. I met my SO in one. Women do whatever they
| want to do.
| ChuckNorris89 wrote:
| Can I ask where you live?
| nicolas_t wrote:
| I've heard people saying that it's not possible to meet
| "quality" ladies in bars. Not been my experience at all.
| I met my SO in a nightclub in Japan. I've met a previous
| girlfriend in a bar in New York and my first girlfriend
| in a nightclub in Spain. All of them are highly educated
| with two of them having Phds.
|
| And, my experience doesn't seem to indicate that meeting
| interesting people in bars only happens in certain
| countries.
|
| That said, I didn't necessarily go to the bars or
| nightclubs purely with the objective of dating. I went
| there to have fun, dance and meet people (men and women).
| 16890c wrote:
| ChuckNorris89 wrote:
| Please don't twist my words and call me an incel. I
| didn't say women who go out are not nice. I said roaming
| the bars and clubs, hoping to meet a nice woman is not a
| recommend strategy for success where I live. And it's not
| some incel shit but it's what girls here will tell you as
| well.
|
| Sure, it can happen that you meet a compatible partner in
| a bar/club, but as a dating strategy is has a very poor
| ROI. You're better off with hobbies or dating apps.
| Taylor_OD wrote:
| Sure they dont hang around alone in bars. But because
| someone is with friends doesnt mean you cant talk to them.
| In fact I'd guess that most single people who go to bars,
| with or without friends, are open to the idea of talking to
| people they don't know.
|
| It's on you to figure out how to do that without making it
| weird.
| hypertele-Xii wrote:
| OC didn't say they were looking for quality women, just
| prospective dates in general.
|
| There are also quality bars.
| ChuckNorris89 wrote:
| You misunderstood. The quality of the bars is irrelevant
| here, as most people, guys and girls, go to the bar to
| sit at a table and drink with one or more friends, not to
| get hit on by random strangers.
|
| The Hollywood scene where girls hang around alone by the
| bar waiting for guys to hit on them doesn't exist here.
| samatman wrote:
| Your bars don't have pool tables?
|
| If you want to go to a bar and meet other people, go to
| one with a pool table. Hitting on women is much smoother
| when you meet their girlfriend's boyfriend first, and
| better tolerated whether she's interested or not.
| ChuckNorris89 wrote:
| In Germany/Switzerland it's not common to go to pool bars
| and talk to "meet other people". People will look at you
| funny if a random stranger from the bar talks to them for
| no reason. Here at bars, you're expected to bring you own
| group of friends and stick with them. Not every
| country/culture has such warm/welcoming social etiquettes
| as US/UK/etc/
| badlucklottery wrote:
| >The Hollywood scene where girls hang around alone by the
| bar waiting for guys to hit on them doesn't exist here.
|
| I don't know that it exists anywhere anymore. It can be
| dangerous for a woman to out drinking alone.
|
| But ladies do go out in _groups_. As a guy you just have
| to be nice and chat up the group and don 't get hyper
| focused on any one person. None of them are probably
| going to drop everything and go home with you that night.
| But you can often get a phone number (or two) and go on a
| real date from that.
| rdtwo wrote:
| It matters a lot actually. The noise level is a big deal
| and also different bars attract different groups and
| income levels
| grapeskin wrote:
| > I am going to a dance event regularly but so far nothing
| there and even then, I can't talk while I dance as I need to
| concentrate on getting the moves right (it's a well known style
| of dance, not just club dancing)
|
| Are you doing competitive dancing?
|
| If you're dancing for fun yet you're more concerned about
| dancing "properly" than you are about just socializing, people
| are probably wondering why you're taking it so seriously.
| inkcapmushroom wrote:
| I disagree. I partner dance socially and getting good at
| dancing played a big part in making me comfortable while at a
| dance event. If I feel like I'm tripping over my feet, I'll
| be embarrassed to try and talk to the partner after the
| dance, I'll just want to run away instead.
| dalke wrote:
| I don't agree with your conclusion.
|
| I took years of dance lessons, and at my peak was dancing
| about 25 hours per week. My social life was my dance friends,
| made after I started taking it so seriously. My friends also
| went to dance lessons, and worked to get the moves right. My
| now-wife, for example, studied for a year to be a ballroom
| dance instructor then taught courses and private lessons.
|
| In traveling dances like tango and waltz, the lead must learn
| not only the basic forward motion, but also how to turn
| corners, and how to avoid people. At the beginning, this took
| me a lot of effort. My first few tango milongas were mostly
| "step, step, stop, think; repeat" unable to hold a
| conversation and dance at the same time.
|
| Things got better once I had enough practice in moving about
| floor, but at the beginning, it was tough.
|
| And that was after several years of salsa dancing. A real
| beginning tango dancer would likely have it worse.
|
| There are also people who believe "if it's worth doing, it's
| worth doing well."
|
| And some people have a sort of impostor syndrome - they know
| they are beginners, they see the better dancers, and they
| think people won't like them or dance with them until they
| get better. This is wrong, but the solution isn't to suggest
| stop taking it so seriously, but to get those dancers to know
| it really is okay to be a beginner dancer - everyone was a
| beginner once. "Taking it seriously" is respected because
| that's what those better dancers did to become better.
|
| There's also the opposite - beginners who want to learn more
| complicated moves right away, before they even get the basics
| down, and end up making the follow annoyed for being lead
| into uncomfortable positions, being stepped on, etc. To
| anyone reading - don't be like that.
| dalke wrote:
| > I can't talk while I dance as I need to concentrate on
| getting the moves right (it's a well known style of dance, not
| just club dancing)
|
| I recognize that feeling! It took me a long time before it
| disappeared. Practice helps a lot. And if you forget a move,
| it's okay to get back to the basic (assuming you are doing a
| partner dance and not a line dance - I suck at line dances).
|
| I don't know which style of dance you mean. You may consider
| different dance styles.
|
| I did a bit of ballroom in grad school, then years later
| learned salsa, then added tango, then some swing and other
| dance styles (modern, Scottish country, Swedish folk dance).
|
| Each one has a different social scene. Where I lived, tango
| tends towards older people, and is usually combined with a
| social/cafe scene (a milonga). "Older" means 40s and up.
|
| Salsa is more at clubs. As a bouncer once pointed out, he loved
| the energy of the dancers, but they don't drink much so it
| doesn't make much revenue for the bar.
|
| It took a couple of years of salsa classes, and dancing salsa
| elsewhere, before I realized that I didn't like the salsa style
| my teacher taught, and preferred another studio. So that's also
| something to consider.
|
| Swing tended to be a younger, more energetic crowd (late
| teens/20s), with dance events at more specialized locales that
| had more open space (where I was, that was generally a
| yoga/dance studio or the OddFellows Hall, which hosted a lot of
| smaller dance events).
|
| My limited ballroom experience was that the higher levels tend
| towards ballroom studios. I got the feeling that engineers lean
| towards ballroom because there are more specific steps and
| progressions to learn.
|
| The folk dancing scene is pretty laid back. The basics aren't
| hard to learn, and people will help you with them. It's the
| most family-friendly of the dances I did, with quieter music,
| and more often held outside (if the weather is good) because it
| doesn't need a special dance floor.
|
| For what it's worth, at my peak I was dancing about 25 hours
| per week. I met my wife at a dance event, held at bar.
|
| Other things I did, to meet people, were local community
| college classes (as a new resident to the state, I like the
| local state history course the best; the teacher also hosted a
| monthly local history event, which I went to - nearly everyone
| was 55 and older so I was the youngest by far) and Sierra Club
| hikes.
| StreamBright wrote:
| The best locations are in my opinion where people already have
| lowered guard against getting hit on. For example: grocery
| store. The problem is that the introverts are not really good
| at small talk (not saying your are an introvert) and it is hard
| to come up with an opener.
| rdtwo wrote:
| Grocery store is a really poor example. Unless you go on busy
| days you have like 30 secconds to close which is not enough
| time
| selimthegrim wrote:
| There are certain grocery stores nationwide notorious for
| this - e.g. "Club Pub"(lix) in Tallahassee and a certain
| Safeway in DC.
| leephillips wrote:
| The "social Safeway" (there is also one called the
| "Soviet Safeway").
| trevordixon wrote:
| Are you satisfied with your friendships? I daresay it's more
| important to have abundant friendship than any romance, besides
| the fact that friendship leads to love.
| ChuckNorris89 wrote:
| Friendships are not enough for most people. We also need sex
| and physical intimacy with a partner.
|
| That's why dating is a multi billion dollar industry.
| mancerayder wrote:
| >Trying to go to meetups but COVID is still a thing so outdoors
| only. And it can be burn out on those two because rarely is
| there anyone I might be interested in. (single, age
| appropriate, and seem compatible). I know it's a numbers game,
| I just am running out of ideas on how to increase the numbers.
|
| Few things. First, why is covid still a thing? You can just as
| easily catch it on a date or at work, just go to the indoor
| meetups. I'm in a liberal big city in the US and covid isn't a
| thing anymore. It's been three years. I don't want to die
| alone, do you? I had long COVID, it sucks, but it's
| unfortunately not an option.
|
| Second, some meetups have different people going to it in each
| event. Those are the date targets. But, focus on making friends
| there, this happens if you go regularly, weekly, to the same
| ones.
| NoGravitas wrote:
| In this thread: incels.
| [deleted]
| sgjohnson wrote:
| I can't relate. I found a long-term relationship on Tinder. I
| found my wife on Tinder. Not to mention the countless flings. The
| key is to be honest about what you're looking for (though I found
| my wife when I "wasn't looking for anything in particular")
|
| > Abby, 28, has been on dating apps for eight years [...]. A
| committed user, she can easily spend two or more hours a day
| piling up matches, [...]. Not a single long-term relationship has
| blossomed from her efforts.
|
| Perhaps if you can't find what you're looking for in 8 years and
| 6000+ man-hours, the problem is you?
| cosmodisk wrote:
| I used dating sites before Tinder was invented. Abby is what I
| could describe as a professional dater. The person knows the
| platform inside out, seems to be always online, knows half of
| the people there, etc. Goes to lots and lots of dates
| and...well, nothing happens. It's either chasing some
| unrealistic expectations or some deeply rooted issues that
| won't let the person to form meaningful, longterm
| relationships.
| swagasaurus-rex wrote:
| You can't run from the problems you create
| bradlys wrote:
| You're likely well into the top 10% of attractiveness for men
| then if you got many matches and dates out of Tinder. You're
| not representative of men at large.
|
| The overwhelming majority of men will never get a single date
| from online dating.
| metadat wrote:
| Your attractiveness isn't a fixed value.
|
| You can do a lot of things to improve your level of
| attractiveness. Most of us don't roll out of bed looking like
| a peach, it takes conscious and consistent effort.
| nprateem wrote:
| > The key is to be honest about what you're looking for
|
| I'd say unless the girl is from out of town and it's a weekend
| you have to pretend you want a relationship even if you just
| want fun.
| sgjohnson wrote:
| > you have to pretend you want a relationship even if you
| just want fun.
|
| This wrongly presumes that every girl on Tinder wants a
| relationship. Not to mention that it's very dishonest.
| elteto wrote:
| You were probably following the two cardinal rules of Tinder:
|
| 1) Be attractive. 2) Don't be unattractive.
| StrLght wrote:
| So much to unpack here, surprised the article didn't try to
| address this: what is the reason for that?
|
| Surely after 8 years this person might have looked back on
| failed relationships, and tried to understand why they've
| failed. Is it because of the dating apps, and if so, why
| precisely? Is it because of the people on dating apps?
|
| I feel like pointing fingers at dating apps in general is just
| wrong.
| martin_a wrote:
| > I can't relate. I found a long-term relationship on Tinder.
|
| Survivorship bias. I have friends who found their partners on
| there, too. But I got ten times more friends who did not get
| anything meaningful out of dating apps.
| mpol wrote:
| > Perhaps [...] the problem is you?
|
| Maybe. Just some speculation here, but she might be looking for
| some kind of perfect man. Lots of people might seem perfect,
| but being perfect is quite something else. I would think
| finding a matching personality would be a better aim.
|
| Also, some people are quite suspicious and jealous, which are
| not attractive traits. The same counts for a certain aggressive
| attitude, and yes, many women have certain ways of coming
| accross as aggressive.
|
| Then there is the general issue that many people on dating
| sites are casual daters and not looking for the same as you. A
| lot of people that are good at relationships are already in a
| relationship. The people not being good at them will end up
| more on a dating site. Just a statistics thing, nothing
| directly personal.
|
| And something else... How do you recognize your life partner? I
| knew a friend who told me of a date, and she knew he was the
| right guy the moment she saw him. They are now together more
| than 10 years. I don't have that nose and am trying to refine
| my nose in that regard.
| bradlys wrote:
| As usual with all these trite dating app articles - not a single
| heterosexual man is represented. It's always the plight of gay
| men, straight women, and so forth. Often for these groups - they
| have abundant choice and are just unable to settle down with the
| idea they won't get to date an Instagram model.
|
| For most straight men - dating apps are a form of purgatory and
| Sisyphusian efforts. The difference is so starkly different
| compared to all of the other people I know who aren't straight
| men. Only straight men I know who don't have these issues tend to
| be incredibly physically attractive to the point where they'd
| have women come up to ask them out on dates everyday. (Unheard of
| for an average man)
|
| My advice is to pickup activities where women are and that have a
| natural social element. There are almost none of these btw.
| Social dancing is about the only one that exists still. The rest
| of activities out there that are social and involve meeting new
| people are completely dominated by men. Just brutally so. Most
| women I know don't go out to meet new people via social
| activities like dancing. They go to insular parties, hang out
| with core group of friends, or stay home and watch Netflix. Very
| few are truly outgoing and willing to take the leap and meet new
| people by themselves. I can count on maybe one hand all the women
| I've met who are like that - and I've met thousands.
| bowtie109 wrote:
| I enjoyed reading your response. I felt it stated something
| that had not been touched on by other comments.
| swagasaurus-rex wrote:
| The only real solution for enterprising men is to continue to
| do these social activities without an expectation of getting
| dates out of them. But you do make friends whose network could
| introduce you to many more people.
|
| Or travel. Either way you have to be social
| goethes_kind wrote:
| The last paragraph really resonates with me. I have been
| putting so much effort into trying to find the right activity.
| And literally yesterday I concluded that actually such an
| activity does not exist. Young women are not really out and
| about a lot in situations where one can easily approach them,
| and I guess they do not really need to.
| soared wrote:
| My experience is very different. At least in Denver thousands
| of men and women move here every month, so coed sports adult
| sports leagues are filled with single women looking to make
| friends and meet partners.
|
| Similarly, many comments have talked about bars not being a
| good place to meet single women. From my experience this also
| isn't true. You don't walk up to a girl alone at the bar like
| in the movies though - you're friend group mingles with another
| friend group, and one person in that friend group is probably
| single. The process is way slower than immediately going and
| talking to the person you want to meet.
|
| But, this is HN so our social skills level is probably one
| standard deviation lower than anywhere else.
| vlod wrote:
| Damn it. First rule in living in Denver (or Colorado), is not
| saying how great it is.
|
| Traffic is bad enough with the incoming flow. /s :)
| goethes_kind wrote:
| I guess experiences are very location dependent. This career
| path also makes things harder. Have you noticed how many
| cities who are known for being IT hubs end up with a huge
| young male surplus? That also makes things harder in real
| life. I don't know how it is in Denver.
| soared wrote:
| Yeah that's true. Denver is notorious for being male heavy,
| it's new nickname is "manver"!
| at_a_remove wrote:
| First, nobody cares about random straight guys. This has been
| enshrined in the incredibly hostile phrase "dick is abundant
| and low value." Second, if they were forced to interview some
| random hetero chump, it would give the whole game away. The
| realization that this essentially rests on men's desire
| ("thirst," as the kids say) is too much to be borne.
| c7DJTLrn wrote:
| I tried Tinder and Bumble for about a month and they made me feel
| like shit. I'm a living breathing person and I have to reduce
| myself into a short text description and some perfect pictures. I
| don't even take selfies so I'm already faking it! The whole
| concept is just vain and feels disgusting.
|
| I've simply accepted that I'm going to be single unless something
| dramatic happens in my life.
| soared wrote:
| Hinge is the only dating app I'd reccommend. Its much more
| purposeful in solving the issues you had compared to tinder and
| bumble.
| bionsystem wrote:
| I went on the site and can't figure out how to subscribe nor
| what's different about them (although they say a lot that
| they are). What's so good about them ?
| mathieuh wrote:
| Very happy to see a comment like this because I feel exactly
| the same. Luckily I much prefer being on my own in pretty much
| every situation.
| bionsystem wrote:
| I tried other apps a long time ago before tinder existed and
| felt the same. I've given up on dating years ago and will
| probably never go back. For me it felt like constant stress,
| pressure to appear perfect or near-perfect, and lots and lots
| of disappointment. It's not just the apps either (I was going
| to bars and club mainly to try and meet women).
|
| Quitting actually helped me recover from depression and now I'm
| alone and somewhat happy, while before I was a constantly
| dissatisfied mess. Hope you find someone if that's what you
| want, but just so you know, you can do well alone.
| mod wrote:
| I've twice signed up for dating apps and had the exact same
| experience you have. I do not like trying to prove how
| worthwhile I am in two sentences. I deleted them within 24
| hours. Disgust was a great word choice.
|
| I'm 39 and single, although I have decent success offline when
| I expend any effort.
|
| The women who I've dated in real life--I'm pretty sure they'd
| all ignore me on the dating app. Phrased differently, I find
| the women I've actually dated far more attractive (not only
| physically) than any who will engage with me online.
| vlod wrote:
| >The whole concept is just vain and feels disgusting.
|
| Agreed.
|
| >unless something dramatic happens in my life.
|
| I will kindly suggest that maybe that dramatic thing is you and
| what you will do starting today. e.g. Look at suggestions from
| others, NOT talking about apps.
| captainmuon wrote:
| I am glad to have been in a relationship for all the Tinder
| years, so I don't have firsthand experience. But I know quite a
| few people who have become miserable from dating apps. For some,
| using the apps become a compulsion and they stay up for hours,
| swiping endlessly, obsessing over their profiles or their
| potential matches.
|
| Then it changes dating a lot. Before, you often people from your
| extended social circle. You met people at your hobbies, at uni or
| even work, or when going out. You could ask common acquaintances
| to check someone out. And you had at least some kind of social
| connection.
|
| And dating apps remove all ambiguity. You are not in an innocent
| everyday situation where you happen to like somebody, you start
| flirting and you move closer and see what happens. It is clear
| from the beginning that you are both there looking for something.
| I would find that immensely stressful, everything becomes a
| performance. I can't flirt "on cue" and I've heard the same from
| other people.
|
| I wonder how modern dating would look like if the financial
| incentives of the app company was not the main driver. Maybe
| you'd have some "neutral" social network that people use IRL
| where dating was just an emergent side function? But maybe I'm
| biased because that's how online dating looked like in my early
| 20s?
| AmericanChopper wrote:
| > Maybe you'd have some "neutral" social network that people
| use IRL where dating was just an emergent side function?
|
| That's basically what Instagram is.
|
| But I've used the dating apps, and I really don't understand
| what the issue is with them. They're a great way to meet
| people.
| mpol wrote:
| > I can't flirt "on cue"
|
| I prefer to avoid flirting. In my experience, flirting can be
| done with anybody, I could even flirt with a male person. The
| person is interchangeable in flirting. Being curious about the
| person and shared interests and especially the shared view on
| relationships is for me a good way to start a conversation.
| bckr wrote:
| People seem to equate flirting with some weird things. I
| guess most of us did in middle school.
|
| But now I do flirt with people I want to befriend as well as
| date. Lots of eye contact and smiling. Quick gentle touches
| on the shoulder to emphasize a point or accompany laughter.
| Extra acknowledgement of their points, ideas, viewpoints.
| Light, pleasant teasing ("Look at you, stunning everyone with
| your outfit, Okay, I see you over there").
|
| Gotta be willing to try on new personas and interpersonal
| behaviors. Maybe take an improv class.
| eloisius wrote:
| > Maybe you'd have some "neutral" social network that people
| use IRL where dating was just an emergent side function? But
| maybe I'm biased because that's how online dating looked like
| in my early 20s?
|
| There is. It's instagram, and "sliding into" a stranger's DMs
| is how you walk across the room and say hi to someone you're
| attracted to.
| soco wrote:
| A good friend got happily married (three years already, or
| more?) over a dating app, so it _can_ work.
| srvmshr wrote:
| I met my wife over OkCupid. I have generally been successful
| with dating apps (about 20~25 dates over 2 years), but I
| agree the experience is toxic & mostly sucks
| jiggywiggy wrote:
| The article mention 10% of the users got into a serious
| relationship. It's quite a low success rate considering the
| hugeee amount of dates taking place.
| goethes_kind wrote:
| I would bet that is close to the amount of women on the app
| who are actually serious about dating rather than using it
| to judge their appeal or to get lots of attention and free
| dates with men.
| thdespou wrote:
| 10% is pretty high if it's really true. Not everyone is
| there for good reasons anyway. It's still not 0%.
| 16890c wrote:
| >And dating apps remove all ambiguity. [...] It is clear from
| the beginning that you are both there looking for something.
|
| This is precisely what I find appealing. Maybe I'm just
| socially deficient, but I find it stressful to navigate the
| ambiguity of real life encounters. Especially in todays climate
| where unsolicited advances can get you in trouble.
| goethes_kind wrote:
| The majority of women still do not use dating apps (thankfully)
| and of those who do use the app a lot give it a quick try, or
| use it to validate their appeal, rather than with the intent of
| actually dating.
|
| So although dating cultures have changed, people really
| overestimate the effect of dating apps.
| pcbro141 wrote:
| Is it just me or are most of these mainstream media dating
| articles written from a woman's perspective? I rarely see
| mainstream media discussing the struggles of modern dating from a
| straight man's perspective.
| [deleted]
| claytongulick wrote:
| I don't know whether to laugh or cry when I hear women bemoaning
| the lack of "good guys" on dating apps.
|
| Inevitably when I ask them about their height filters they look
| at me like I'm dumb and say "oh, only 5' 11" or above, duh".
|
| My wife, who is 5' 2" told me she did the same thing and would
| have never met me online (I'm 5' 9" in tall boots).
| confidantlake wrote:
| Saw a youtube segment on this. They were highly offended when a
| weight filter was discussed but saw no problem with the height
| filter.
| martin_a wrote:
| > "I just feel burned out,"
|
| Same, same.
|
| Been on and off dating apps for about 6-7 years now. Trying a new
| one like every quarter or so, quitting it after 6 months,
| frustrated by the whole experience. Giving it a new try at the
| beginning of each year, because "new year, new chances" or
| something like that.
|
| I know that as an obese person I do not work well with what most
| people are looking for, but the "no answer at all"-cases are
| still hurting. Rejections are "fine" (kind of), but no answer at
| all really fucks my brain up, even after all those years.
|
| Online dating is strange. There are fast-paced online dynamics,
| combined with our hormones, deeply-rooted human wishes,
| gamification elements and "pay2win"-stuff. Things that should not
| be thrown together are totally thrown together and we never
| learned how to handle that. At least I didn't.
| seper8 wrote:
| Dating apps are stacked against the bottom 80% of men, as
| research has proven that women rate the bottom 80% as below
| average and tend to like only the top 20% of men in dating
| apps.
|
| I'd focus on losing weight first if I were you.
| martin_a wrote:
| > top 20% of men
|
| Loooooooooong way to go then.
|
| > I'd focus on losing weight first if I were you.
|
| Yeah, I'm on it. It's complicated, but yes.
| gadders wrote:
| You can get there, mate. Good luck!
| martin_a wrote:
| Thank you very much!
| seper8 wrote:
| I feel you man, good luck
| martin_a wrote:
| Thanks!
| gadders wrote:
| Relevant chart:
|
| https://blogs.sas.com/content/sastraining/2014/10/16/how-
| do-...
| mpol wrote:
| > I know that as an obese person I do not work well with what
| most people are looking for
|
| Not wanting to be offensive, but I do understand where people
| are coming from. I myself am more in a niche, though it is
| physically less visible, and I also understand where you are
| coming from. I do believe it might be good to find a fitting
| partner, so not sure why the "most people" qualifier is there.
| What I am trying to get at :) If you are obese, how is your
| success rate with obese women? If out of 100 sent messages 1
| good conversation comes, it is still something.
| martin_a wrote:
| > If you are obese, how is your success rate with obese
| women?
|
| I've obviously got no real metrics, but I'd say it's not much
| better, not sure though. One woman directly told me she
| wasn't looking for somebody who "looks like her", which at
| least was a honest answer.
|
| On the other hand: I myself do not prefer girls who are very
| slim (is that the right word in English?), so I don't write
| to/like these woman. Not sure if my "success rate" would be
| better with those, though.
| herbst wrote:
| As a girl you open the app and get flooded with messages just
| because you show up as online. Some people will try for weeks
| or months, basically sending a hi every time they go online.
|
| I don't have a suggestion for this problem as some men tend to
| be really dedicated spamming the shit out of every female but
| my point is this is really nothing against you and you
| shouldn't be taking this personally at all.
| martin_a wrote:
| > you shouldn't be taking this personally at all.
|
| Yes, probably, though this is obviously not that easy and you
| start thinking whether you are the problem or not.
| gadders wrote:
| I've been married coming up on 20 years, so I'm well out of the
| game. I do however see a lot memes, tiktok videos from women
| about "creepy men" daring to ask them out in real life.
|
| I'm sure some men are creeps, but if you don't want people to
| speak to you in real life, then apps are your only option.
| testmasterflex wrote:
| Women only find unattractive men creepy. If a DiCaprio would
| approach them, there would be another story. And men (and
| women) can do a lot to enhance their attractiveness. Working
| out, eating healthy, make money, for example.
| gadders wrote:
| I'm sure there are complete weirdos out there, but I agree
| with what you say.
| strikelaserclaw wrote:
| but i'm sure that applies to women as well. It is just that
| women have no pressure to approach.
| Escapado wrote:
| I would say your post sums up the collective experience of my
| circle of friends(including female friends) and myself
| perfectly. It's a weird situation: The average woman between
| 20 and 40 gets approached relatively often (at least multiple
| times a year) and experiences a broad spectrum of guys
| hitting on her which necessitates strict selection. The
| average man between 20 and 40 may not even get approached at
| all, ever, and have to fight for attention, making it a
| numbers game where spray and pray might seem like one of the
| better strategies. And this is kind of a self-perpetuating
| system.
|
| I would also argue that you can work on your attractiveness
| but this can also easily take a toll on you and while working
| out and eating healthy are rather accessible for most people,
| making a lot of money or changing further features of
| themselves might not be. I have multiple friends who suffer
| from androgenic alopecia in their 30s or who have facial
| features which deviate so far from the norm that the only way
| to actually "fix" them would be to have plastic surgery.
|
| Sometimes I wonder if the smart move would be to actually
| move somewhere where the societal norms around this are
| different.
| nemomarx wrote:
| Not to sound callous, but as someone who's had plastic
| surgery in the past and is thinking about if I want
| anything else done, is it so bad to save up for or plan
| around?
|
| If something really gives you grief or you feel bad about
| your appearance, I think considering what you can do about
| it is probably helpful. My surgeon seemed to have a lot of
| clients in for hair loss and that's a big quality of life
| improvement to not have to worry about, I would think?
| Escapado wrote:
| I do not disagree with you at all. In fact I think it's a
| smart choice. What I would like to highlight though is
| that it's less accessible and I would argue more sensible
| as a topic than eating healthy or working out. I don't
| think it should be but I think it is.
| gadders wrote:
| I started going bald late 20's/early 30's and just started
| cutting my hair really short and then never gave it another
| thought. Being bald isn't unattractive - being _self-
| conscious_ about being bald is.
| Escapado wrote:
| I personally agree that it's not unattractive and being
| self-conscious about it can make it so. However seldomly
| people with a perfect hairline worry about that, and many
| balding people do so it's at least another thing to get
| the upper hand on. And it's also no suprise a lot of
| people fear it. Published data indicates that when women
| rate pictures of balding vs non-balding men, the former
| are rated worse and one could say the attitude one has
| would not have much of an impact on that. And it's the
| same with height, perceived fitness and wealth. What I am
| trying to say: It's simply not a level playing field and
| all these things add up.
| goethes_kind wrote:
| Being bald works well if you have a big frame/size. Then
| you just look very masculine. Unfortunately short guys
| are more likely to go bald and it works less well on
| short men.
| gadders wrote:
| I'm 5ft 8 or so and stocky. I'm no giant.
| kzrdude wrote:
| on the topic of DiCaprio, this chart of his girlfriends was
| spread around recently https://old.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautif
| ul/comments/azjti7/leo... and it's definitely interesting and
| weird at the same time. Judging just from this picture, it
| seems like he's not dating to find a life partner (which is
| what I imagine most want to do.. maybe just me?)
| gadders wrote:
| I think one of the InCel theories is that top 1% men are
| hooking up with (say) 50% of women (and not looking for a
| long term partner), preventing those women (and the rest of
| the men) being able to find a long term partner.
|
| I may have garbled this, but I think it is the gist of
| their theory.
| cjbgkagh wrote:
| Alpha widowing is a thing. Expectations get anchored at a
| high water mark so that dating most other men is a
| disappointment and a severe knock to their own self
| worth.
|
| Ideally people would be realistic but women especially
| are being encouraged to want more. I think this mismatch
| of expectations is very damaging to society. I know a lot
| of alpha widowed women who are now going through a major
| crisis in middle age and I expect the problem to get much
| worse.
| gadders wrote:
| Yes, I think it can particularly be an issue if women
| want to have children one day (not saying they all
| should).
|
| To find a guy you want to settle down with (and for you
| both to generate the required level of mutual trust) can
| take multiple years with no guarantee the relationship
| will endure.
| yamrzou wrote:
| https://archive.ph/b2aky
| cjbgkagh wrote:
| I see people making obvious mistakes on these apps. Probably the
| worst is narrowly defining what you want and telling everyone
| else to 'swipe left'. These apps give you an elo rating (maybe
| not exactly elo but same idea). So if someone with a low rating
| swipes left on your profile it really tanks your own elo score.
| So profiles need to have broad appeal in order to obtain and
| maintain a high elo score.
| quacksilver wrote:
| Is it the dating app that is responsible, or that
| people/prospective dates have became much more disposable in
| general, and no-one really cares?
|
| You probably want to date people in the top 5 or 10% of your
| target sex/gender/age range. As does everyone else in the
| expanded pool that people can now access with the internet or the
| apps. Everyone has probably been told by the apps that they can
| get someone in the top 5 or 10% of what is available to them, so
| will feel unhappy with anyone else.
|
| Most women will probably notice this as guys will only want to
| have sex with them if they are not what guys have been told they
| 'deserve' by the apps / society, or guys may settle for them if
| they are content with getting sex. A few will be able to
| optimally choose a guy or get all of the casual sex that they
| desire.
|
| Most guys will probably find that no-one wants to connect with
| them at all without payment, or getting something out of the deal
| or will be treated as if they don't exist. Things are probably
| really bad if they are in the bottom 10 to 30% in desirability. A
| few will be able to optimally choose a woman or get all of of
| casual sex that they desire.
|
| I am not sure about subcultures / non-cis / non-het groups or
| situations outside my country as I don't have experience of
| dating them and don't know how things work.
| irajdeep wrote:
| > Is it the dating app that is responsible, or that
| people/prospective dates have became much more disposable in
| general, and no-one really cares?
|
| "Everyone has probably been told by the apps that they can get
| someone in the top 5 or 10% of what is available to them, so
| will feel unhappy with anyone else." -- I think the fact that
| these apps have instilled a sense of "I can do better" attitude
| is probably one of the core problems here. So, I would still
| probably hold the dating apps responsible.
| testmasterflex wrote:
| If you are physically unattractive and introverted you will not
| have a good profile and end up not getting any matches and
| success.
|
| For those people I recommend hitting the gym, getting a tan and
| optionally bleaching your teeth. This alone will bump up your
| attraction level a lot + you will feel healthier.
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