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Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022

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Wow, I didn’t know there were still otherwise intelligent people who think the problem with the dating market is matchmaking failure. In fact the issue is a blatantly obvious mismatch of supply and demand.

Dating apps have really blown a hole in the side of traditional dating advice.

“Get a decent career and make money.”- Doesn’t work in a world where women make up the majority of college graduates. There isn’t meaningful demand for that anymore. She is looking to fulfill her other needs.

“Just talk to her bro.”- Probably the biggest casualty. If she wanted to talk to men like you she would be on Bumble. If she was on Bumble and wanted to talk to you, then she would have swiped right. If she swiped right on you, you would have matched. You didn’t match, therefore she doesn’t want to talk to you. Q.E.D. “Well maybe she’s not on dating apps because she doesn’t want to wade through all the shit?” If you can’t get matches on a dating app, guess what? You’re the shit.

"Just talk to her" is not dating app advice. It's advice for your life off the app.

Yes, but my point is that if she does not have a dating app profile, OR if she does have one but did not swipe right, then her revealed preference is that she does not want an average to below average man to come up and talk with her

I'm not sure if the bar is same in each scenario, the average man who just comes up and talks to her is going to be displaying more confidence than the same guy texting her online.

In first impressions you are only what you signal. Even if you are swiped left on she's not ruling you out as much as ruling out a handicapped version of you who hasn't had the opportunity to show he has the balls to talk to her. You can't presume the latter is disqualified because the former was.

No woman wants an average or below average man to come up and talk with her. Yet, offline, women are approached by average guys plenty and always have been, and end up sleeping with them and forming relationships with them. Dating apps are not a real interaction, where personality, chemistry, confidence, or the vagaries of chance and a good mood can overcome a hyper-competitive low-effort meat market.

Don't use dating apps unless you're a genuine stud and can easily pull in NSA pussy. Then do whatever you want, king. But if you're a normal guy, dating apps are an unfriendly platform that emphasize your worst traits and minimize the best. You can overcome a lot by building a real rapport.

“Get a decent career and make money.”- Doesn’t work in a world where women make up the majority of college graduates.

It's better advice than ever if college educated women mostly want to date college educated men. It's women who don't get dating market value from going to college.

In fact the issue is a blatantly obvious mismatch of supply and demand.

I think this is highly dependent on age. Even before online dating, the conventional wisdom was that women had a massive edge between the ages of 18-30 but the power dynamic began shifting to men after that. It’s certainly matched what I’ve seen getting older. Right now all my close male friends are in their 30s, and every single one of them is married with kids. By contrast I have quite a few (mostly unhappily) single female friends in the same age range.