"I have friends who tell me I have the best dating luck in
the world. It’s not “luck,” I tell them, “use the apps, just reject the app
culture.”
In the age of constant connectivity, and dates at our
fingertips, a majority of young people are lonely. This isn’t because they
can’t find anyone to be with — its because they’re with too many people.
One of the reasons social media apps, especially dating
apps, are so popular, is that they simulate relationships and a vast network of
connections. The problem that poses, though, is that meaningful relationships
necessarily require attention and investment. So, users find themselves getting
constant connectivity, maybe a faint sensation of “romance,” but none of the
connections have any substance. Users get the illusion they can find thousands
of people to date, but then don’t actually date anyone.
With scores of apps designed to create romantic partnerships
available, sixty-one percent of young people say they are chronically lonely,
according to a Harvard survey. A record share, twenty-five percent, of
40-year-olds in America have never been married, according to Pew. Sex is on
the decline — reports calling the phenomenon a “sex recession” or a “sex
drought” — with 1 in 4 adults reporting having no sex in 2018, the share of
those people aged 18-29 doubling in the last decade. And of the sexual
encounters that do happen, staggering numbers are noncommittal. The current
generation is apparently the most “connected,” but, at the same time, is the most
isolated.
This month, Hinge CEO Justin McLeod told the Financial Times
in an interview that users are experiencing “dating app burnout,” due to being
“overwhelmed.”
“There’s so much activity, and so many people, and everyone
starts to look the same, and conversations are dying,” McLeod said.
“At the other end of the spectrum, a lot of users get very,
very little activity. They burn out because they’re trying to get that match,
and they send a lot of likes, but then they’re not even getting enough
[reciprocal] activity to go on one date,” he continued. And why would they,
when nothing much distinguishes one user from another?
Tons of stories have been published over the last few years
describing people’s frustration with endless swiping.
“‘A Decade of Fruitless Searching’: The Toll of Dating App
Burnout,” the New York Times.
“The Rise of Dating-App Fatigue,” the Atlantic.
“Dating burnout,” The Guardian, “Internet dating can feel
soul-destroying, unnerving and transactional.”
It would be easy to say that the apps, which present
thousands of potential matches to people looking for relationships at any given
moment, are killing the potential for genuine connection, but that would be
lacking as an explanation. There are also countless marriages that started with
a swipe.
It’s not the apps, it’s the culture around the apps.
The problem is people treating “matches,” who are actually
human beings with their own individual traits — which take time to learn and
interpret, let alone appreciate — as disposable and interchangeable. Not the
apps themselves.
Spending my 20’s in New York City, I watched all my friends
engaging in marathon dating. They would meet someone on Monday, and someone new
on Wednesday, but they were still “talking to” someone from Thursday, and I’d
hear about Monday’s date on Friday, but by Sunday, Wednesday’s person had
ghosted. I never remembered any names of the characters in their stories, I
didn’t need to bother trying to remember, anyway. There would just be a new
Monday person, and a new Wednesday person, and a new person they were “talking
to,” next week.
Take a look at the chat function in their dating app, the
inbox looks something like this:
Conversation A: Hey, what’s up?
Conversation B: Hey, what’s up?
Conversation C: Wyd
Conversation D-L: Hey, what’s up
Conversation M: What are you up to this weekend?
Conversation N: Hey, what are you up to tn
Conversation O: Hey, wyd
Repeat hundreds of times, for years — what McLeod was
probably talking about when he describes “burnout.” If not burned out, then
just bored to death. A bunch of my friends vowed off the apps forever. But then
it was even harder to meet anyone. And you’re back at square one, or square
zero, and then you turn 28, and then you turn 30, and maybe you adopt a dog.
So when I joined an app — Hinge, actually — when I was 25, I
decided I would take a different tack. I got on the app and deleted it the same
day.
The plan was to meet one person. One. And go on a date with
them. Maybe, hopefully, a few dates. But to delete the app when I had a first
date set, and only download it again when I had decided it certainly wouldn’t
work with that person. That’s it. No Monday person, no Wednesday person, no
“talking to” anyone else. One person at a time, even if there could be someone
else available on Thursday. I was going to actually give the person I’d meet a
chance to have my attention.
Another point on my plan was to never open a conversation
with, “Hey, what’s up?” I was going to only chat with someone who there was
something to say to, based on the prompts on their profile. I would only speak
to someone if I had something to say, or to ask, that I myself would like to
read or respond to.
So I started swiping, and a few minutes later I got a match.
Profile included some nice photos, student at School of Visual Arts listed as
occupation, keep scrolling, religion listed as Jewish, keep scrolling, profile
says no drinking, no smoking, no drugs.
“What kind of artist has no vices,” I opened a chat to ask.
My phone buzzed a few minutes later, “My artistic
inspiration comes by practicing mindfulness.”
I had just read about mindfulness, actually, in a Maimonides
book, I wrote back.
A date was set for 48 hours later in the next reply.
Sent my phone number, and deleted the dating app.
That date was five years ago, on January 21. We’re married
now.
Apps aren’t making people lonely. What is making so many
people lonely is treating each other like there is a better, newer version of
everyone you meet next week, and that no one is more than a two-dimensional
profile on your screen. And that you, yourself, are a two-dimensional profile,
and a photo, and a one sentence prompt, and all you have to say is, “wyd.”
Dating apps are a revolutionary tool in dating and marriage.
They’re just being used wrong. What makes the online dating experience work is
the same as what makes any relationship work no matter how it started: treating
others, and yourself, as a serious and valued person.
Use the apps, just reject the app culture.”
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