faceh
2mo ago
The fact that none of the dating apps will release good information on how successful their users are at getting matches, much less getting relationships, is already a tell for how abysmal it is.
This guy did a pretty good analysis with about the most reliable dataset available.
Here it is in text form.
https://www.swipestats.io/blog/tinder-statistics
Here's the crux:
Match Rates Women's average match rate: 30.7% (median: 32.96%)
Men's average match rate: 2.63% (median: 2.14%)
Women are 11-15 times more likely to match than men
Add in that there's a 2:1 ratio men to women in there, and this looks an AWFUL LOT like women matching exclusively with the 'top' 20% of men.
And here's a song that accurately reflects my feelings about the apps:
Yep.
The whole problem with apps is they've all converged on the "Swipe through cards endlessly" model rather than letting you target in on people you actually think would be a good match (how OKCupid used to work). Plus gamification algorithms.
My last foray into the apps, I FELT myself dehumanizing the people in the photos more as I went. You see 150 different profiles in like an hour, and you get very critical of even small flaws.
There's also the argument that men look better in motion since women like seeing men do things. So a dating app that let men post 5-10 second videos of themselves, e.g. playing guitar, rock climbing, playing tennis to showcase a skill would probably even things out a bit in the attractiveness field.
Have to assume the app companies don't want to deal with policing the content of millions of videos, though.
faceh
2mo ago
faceh
2mo ago
...
Is your belief that out of nowhere, for no reason at all, young people, around the planet, have chosen to 'stop trying', unlike every other generation that came before them?
Does that pass muster to you?
Or is it just possible that it got HARDER, (and/or the rewards have diminished) which made it much less appealing to try?
Anyway, here you go:
Tons of analysis of the issue.
A decent summation:
If I had to sum up this big messy story in a sentence, it would be this: Coupling is declining around the world, as women’s expectations rise and lower-income men’s fortunes fall; this combination is subverting the traditional role of straight marriage, in which men are seen as necessary for the economic insurance of their family.
I've spent inordinate amounts of time researching this stuff. I'm not 'proud' of that, but I can provide you just about whatever form of evidence you want.
Here, check out how dating apps work in South Korea, which is even worse off than the U.S.:
https://instagram.com/reel/DFyqCOmz-LM/
Does that seem 'reasonable' to you, or is it maybe a lot more competitive than it used to be?
faceh
2mo ago
I saw someone recently point out that bodybuilders are rarely with conventionally 'hot' women.
It seems likely that the time commitment required for being serious about bodybuilding and the lifestyle changes for diet and such would actually make it VERY HARD to date seriously, that's time, money, and effort that takes away from your fitness goals.
And of course there's evidence that women don't find the roided-out look very appealing anyway.
faceh
2mo ago
Although her first relationship was... interesting and unique to say the least.
That's becoming less true every single year. In every single country.
Call it dooming or blackpilling if you want, it is happening. It is observable.
If it were just some smallish subset of people experiencing it then we could say its something you can change individually.
When it is happening everywhere to everyone at the same time, that reads as a systemic/societal issue that no individual can change.
South Korea shows just how bad it can get.
We in the U.S. can fall even further if the course isn't changed.
faceh
2mo ago
Its one of those things that DOESN'T work when a bunch start doing it at once.
Too many men simping and a woman can simply bask in the attention whilst giving nothing back to any individual one.
Information asymetries also make it possible to condemn simping whilst continuing to do it on the downlow.
faceh
2mo ago
Nearly half of Gen Z guys say they're not dating at all.
You're SEEING some of them out, but how many of them are you just not seeing because they're not visible.
faceh
2mo ago
That's about how it works when men rate women.
I think people don't get how Power Law distributions dominate on dating apps.
So they think an "average" guy is doing okay on the apps, even if he is jealous of the more attractive guys who have it easier.
When in reality, the Average guy is barely scraping by, as virtually all serious female attention flows to a handful of Top Tier guys, so the mismatch is SEVERE.
Top tier guys obviously have no incentive to change this. Dating apps don't have much incentive either, since they can sell the lower tier guys various products that they imply will help, and those guys don't have many other options.
And of course these dating apps keep their data secret so we can't even look and judge how well they work for their stated purposes (not well).
So average guys are getting quietly more desperate but can't do anything about it or even talk about it because talking about it marks you as a loser and further lowers your status.
faceh
2mo ago
Yep.
Dating apps have made everyone so flighty that the OPTIMAL strategy is to try to have like 3-5 on the line at any given time, as most won't even lead to a date, so you run up the numbers as best you can.
But if you get a string of luck (if you're a dude) and actually GET 3 women to go on dates... suddenly your incentive changes to keep this bounty going and drag that out as long as possible.
faceh
2mo ago
Meet girls IRL
That's not how couples meet anymore. Especially among young people, who don't get out much anyway, they grew up in the digital world, and Covid made this even sharper. You can't meet Gen Z girls by just 'going out.'
The gender ratios in most public spaces are skewed towards men, which also makes women more averse to being approached over and over agan.
Women can get on the dating apps or any social media site and get all the attention she wants, so there's no need for her to entertain IRL offers.
Is it THAT hard?
Now what.
Anecdotally, in public I notice pairings where the guy is clearly a bit of a gymrat, good muscle definition, takes care of himself, and he's got a woman with actual physical fat rolls latched onto his arm.
And some guys are just into that. Whatever. But I think its the marginal effect of men having a harder time and the competition being stiffer.
The reverse pops up MUCH less often. Although I have seen a few petite, waifish women on the arms of some large, obese men.
And some women are into that. Whatever.
faceh
2mo ago
You're correct about the gender ratio on dating apps.
You're missing that every app that allows users to interact can become a dating app.
"Twitter is a dating app" is a meme, but it is also true. Instagram's gender ratio is more equalized.
So consider how many women have instagram, tiktok, snapchat, whatever, and put themselves out there with photos of themselves, and then entertain proposals from men who "slide into their DMs."
So that Kindergarten teacher who likes to crochet and collect Disney Memorabilia would need only start up an Instagram account and post a couple photos of herself holding her cute Tinkerbell ornament wearing a hat she made herself and has a decent shot at getting a guy's attention.
Because you seem to blame everything on women while rejecting any suggestion that unsuccessful men are to blame for their own lack of success .
JESUS FUCKING CHRIST I'M POINTING OUT A SYSTEMIC ISSUE THAT IS EFFECTING EVERYONE IN EVERY COUNTRY SIMULTANEOUSLY AND YOU THINK I'M PLACING BLAME ON ANY SPECIFIC GENDER, OR GROUP?
This is why the problem is impossible to discuss, everyone automatically assumes you're an incel, or bitter, or hate women, or are just motivated by envy or something OTHER than 'concern for the very trajectory of society.'
The only reason it reads any differently is because every other institution blames men explicitly. I don't have to make that argument, but pushing a different line automatically makes people assume you're blaming women instead. Even trying to make the case lowers your status and thus tends to make people take you less seriously.
There's no benefits to being the one person talking about it like this. Plenty of potential costs.
And so the issue goes undiscussed, let alone solved.
ahem.
No. I'm not blaming women. Women themselves are less happy than they've ever been. I feel bad for them too.
I'm blaming the lack of cultural pressure on women; a society that places zero expectations on women to settle or marry or have kids.
It is unsurprising that women live up to those expectations when Academia, Corporate America, Hollywood, Social Media, and all the dating apps are telling them they don't have to settle, ever.
Whilst continually telling men that they're worthless, from a young age.
Then giving men advice that provably isn't working. Anywhere. Then blaming men for this even though its clear there's something different causing it. "Why are the younger men turning aggressively to the right?" Because that's the only place that DOESN'T blame them.
do you have any suggestions that aren't basically "Reduce female agency"?
Identify the cohort of males who are carousing and stealing women's most fertile years and cull them. Just straight up kill 'em.
If that's too extreme, we can just castrate them. Compromise!
That cuts out a major factor that is both preventing women from settling AND is making them less marriageable. Heavily punish males who exploit young women's emotions and leave them worse off than they found them.
If that's still too extreme, then maybe just ban dating apps altogether.
If THAT is too extreme, just require every dating app to VERY publicly disclose their actual success rates for men and women forming relationships, so people can make an informed decision when using them. There's a reason they don't disclose them normally. They're abysmal.
And then, reduce or remove all economic policies that explicitly favor hiring women so that women are less likely to marry a corporation. There's enough competition amongst biological men without having to compete against Megacorps anyway.
Then reduce or remove most policies designed to allow an unmarried women to live 'comfortably' on the public dime, thus becoming brides of the state.
Basically, remove the economic policies that keep women from enduring any significant difficulties, ever, from childhood on, so that women will actually need a man in their life for more than just happy fun sexy times. This is called "ALIGNING THE INCENTIVES."
But that's about the most politically unpopular idea possible, since poor, single mothers are genuinely the most sympathetic group out there, across the political spectrum.
None of these steps are 'reducing female agency,' in the sense women are still fully able to make whatever choices they want without the law stepping in.
But they're leveling out the system so its not completely and utterly slanted against (average) men's interests, as it has been for like 50 years.
Every single one of those suggestions is tongue in cheek because the whole problem is that NOBODY serious is willing to even suggest any solution that admits that women have every single social and legal advantage possible over the average guy, and thus there might need to be a correction.
There's no political solution unless enough men are willing to do some things that will upset women en masse, or some strongman takes power who just does it. And even then it ain't guaranteed, since this problem exists in dicatorships too.
all I'm asking from YOU is that you politely stand aside and don't raise a fuss if men start taking steps that will address the problem since you're clearly not interested in accepting any responsibility or otherwise intervening to help.
If you suddenly start interfering with attempts to address the problem, you're really not on men's side anyway.
Unsurprising. Tinder commodifies sex, and men mostly play a numbers game. (The average woman at a sock hop in the 50s or at your church social probably gets vastly more attention than the average male too.)
And now she can get attention from almost every guy in a 20 mile radius.
The worst part, as I see it, is that every woman is AWARE they can hop on the apps for a quick confidence boost, casual sex, or even a free meal.
There's zero friction.
So even the ones who aren't actively using the apps are having their behavior modified by their existence.
Accept that you have stiff competition, but it's not as hopeless as blackpillers would have you believe. Do not succumb to blackpill solutions like "Women are all hypergamous slutwhores and we should just make them marry mesomeone."
Doesn't work when on a societal level we're trending towards the hellscape that is South Korean dating.
Even massive government subsidies hasn't helped
So we see that we in the U.S. haven't hit rock bottom yet.
i.e.
IT CAN IN FACT GET WORSE.
I don't have to be a blackpiller to say "Guys maybe we should TRY to change course because I see where this is going."
faceh
3mo ago
And unfortunately, that will just export the same problem, where foreigners losing out to U.S. men will also struggle romantically.
faceh
3mo ago
It is pretty much irrelevant to me when evaluating a potential long-term romantic partner unless maybe it is so ridiculously high that it indicates some kind of actual severe sex addiction.
Its associated with divorce risk after a certain point.
Of course YOU don't have to care about it.
But try to tell a single guy "yes you should settle for the girl that has like 6-12 guys she banged previously but don't worry I'm sure YOU'RE the one she sticks with and has NO remaining thoughts or feelings for the previous ones" with a straight face.
Why is it so impossible to be better? And why don't you simply date lower status women, and then elevate their status?
Because the odds are much higher that they divorce you and take your wealth and lower YOUR status.
Downside risk is serious, upside benefits are usually small.
McKenzie Bezos and Melinda Gates became billionaires... by divorcing billionaires.
What man would want that particular risk AFTER he went to the trouble of accumulating the wealth in order to be able to get the woman in the first place.
A woman would have to be worth that risk.
The absurdity of the situation is that men are told to accumulate more skills, wealth, and VALUE, for women who are less valuable and more likely to defect from the marriage, and thus to take much of the value the man worked so hard to acquire.
And literally EVERY SINGLE LEGAL CHANGE IN THE PAST 50+ YEARS HAS FAVORED WOMEN'S ABILITY TO DEFECT.
Why is it so impossible to suggest that women should settle earlier?
The stats are showing that:
- Women are less healthy than before.
- Women have more sex partners than before.
- Women have higher incidence of mental illness than before.
- Women have more aggressively liberal politics than before.
- Women are contributing less to relationships than before.
Conclusion: MEN SHOULD IMPROVE THEMSELVES.
Hilarious.
It ain't working. the women ain't happy, the men are lonely, when do we admit that current advice is insufficient?
A 26-year-old woman who became sexually active at 16 and slept with one guy every two years would exceed it.
And statistically she'd be more likely to divorce her partner later. You've kind of underscored how simple it would be for a woman, starting at 16, to rack up comically large numbers, and there is almost ZERO external pressure to NOT sleep around.
And it didn't used to be this way, women are just sleeping around more on average. We went from about 64% of women having 0-1 partners by marriage... to 27%. So hey, you've got about 1 in 4 shot if you get married. But your granddad had a 2/3 shot.
Unless you think this is a good thing the best you can argue is that its neutral and can be ignored.
Most non-overweight men aren't going to want a fat wife, but then most men are fat too.
Sure thing.
But men don't have to bear kids.
And men can make up for this issue in a lot of other ways.
I do hope that Ozempic comes to help out with this.
Oh, and guess what, obese women won't settle for an obese man, even though the reverse isn't true.
So the problem is, ONCE AGAIN, that men are told to 'get better' but women aren't pressured to settle for the so-called 'looksmatch.'
Loads of women are fat, but so are an equal number of men, which reduces the competion for the slim women.
Not precisely. This is my point about competition.
Any attractive women are a target for men of virtually all ages.
The sheer amount of choice she'll have, thanks to this competition, makes her less likely to settle.
Add in the effects of hypergamy and this explains almost ALL of the current strife in the dating market: Women get bombarded with attention during their most attractive, fertile years, decline to settle, and as time comes on become less marriageable overall.
-
Every single major cultural institution, Hollywood, Academia, Tikok/social media, dating apps(!) and every U.S. Corporation is telling them to never settle, never compromise, and they should delay marriage and kids so they can have money/career/travel etc.
-
Aside from the Catholic Church there are zero large cultural institutions sending the message “you should settle for a man who is decent and forgo other opportunities to bear children."
Not a huge surprise that the former message is internalized.
My wife started significantly more liberal than me, but is now radically more conservative than I am
Yes, I didn't include the political affiliation criteria because that's one of the most malleable traits for women.
On the other hand, a full on seventy motherflipping percent of unmarried women vote democrat.
40% of women aged 18-29 identify as VERY LIBERAL or Liberal.
Have you not heard about the recent, RADICAL political polarization among young women?
These women ALSO largely refuse to date conservative/Republican men.
So men don't HAVE to filter these women out, these women are filtering THEMSELVES out. And they go on social media and aggressively police other women on this issue.
Whoops.
(btw this wasn't the case 15 years ago when you got married, so I humbly suggest your advice is based on a qualitatively different scenario)
Its all well and good to say "it worked out for me."
But the situation has gotten drastically worse. Not acknowledging this is a huge oversight.
a lot of the men I talk to about dating are just weak losers. Stop being a weak loser. Women want a man who is going to take care of them, and in a sense "tame" them. Look at every single female erotica story and it's some version of "strong willed man tames crazy rebellious woman" (often wrapped in: strong man sees the thing in rebellious woman that nobody else saw and they tame each other, but she still wants him to remain strong and only tamed towards her).
And here it is.
"Men, be better."
Okay.
But now the best men get to sleep around with their pick of women and never have to commit.
The rest of the men have to compete for a smaller pool of women, because you can't even suggest that maybe we should make the pool of good women larger.
The relationships are not forming at all.
AT WHAT POINT do you start suggesting that we put pressure on women to lower their standards a bit and settle down earlier?
faceh
3mo ago
then date women in their lower to mid 30s.
How does a woman make it to her 30s without landing in a stable, committed relationship?
Especially if she was inundated with options in her 20's.
Doesn't this suggest there's some factor that makes her less suited for such a relationship?
There's some portion of women that are hypothetically bisexual. Or we could frame it negatively and say they are performatively pretending to be "queer" as stolen valor from actual LGB people. Refusing to admit that they are regular straight people; "cishet".
Is your advice to young men here "actively pursue bisexual/queer women and hope this one isn't sincere?"
Add on the correlation between mental illness and LGBT identification.
One large point I've found is that this was NOT a major issue that men had to negotiate even 15, 20 years ago, let alone 50.
So we're still in a world where the sexual marketplace is far more difficult than it was previously, which has ripple effects on actual relationships, and the approach men have to take to them.
Still a bit crazy to me that the advice boils down to "men need to become better AND keep lowering their standards until they find someone who meets them."
Almost nobody out there saying "Women need to lower standards and pick a partner earlier."
Just seems asymetrical.
faceh
3mo ago
The rest, guys who are hotter than your "average guy" and enjoy playing the field? I agree its not optimal for societal stability (and no fun, unless you are the hot dream guy).
Yes, and I think this is in fact a major factor causing the issue.
A lot of guys out there have realized they can be complete lotharios without consequence, and so will run through as many women as they can (decreasing those womens' marriageability) while having no intent to commit.
But that implies a VERY DIFFERENT solution.
And its not solved by telling men to 'become worthy.'
Is it even possible produce a meme to make chastity and commitment popular again without sounding icky and conservative?
If you ask me, it would have to make that point that finding a good guy solves almost every other problem a woman can have, if only due to creating a much more financially stable situation for all involved.
But more to the point, there has to be some way of enforcing commitment so that both parties don't worry as much about the other defecting.
And the basic marriage contract, paired with 'no-fault' divorce doesn't do it.
So maybe some meme like covenant marriages, rebranded with a catchier title, can shift the equilibrium a bit.
Couple the fact that Gen Z was raised with phones in their hand and thus don't remember a time before dating apps, and Covid demolishing the in-person social scene for a year or two... and arguably it never came back, as it got replaced with digital interactions.
And its not surprising that Gen Z is basically relegated to the apps for meeting new people to date.
But the bigger point is that literally any app where you users can interact with each other can become a de-facto dating app.
So the same rules are in play on Instagram, tiktok, twitch... take your pick.
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