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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   37943 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 27, 2023

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Yes. Because everyone uses dating apps now

I'd like to see some numbers to back up that claim, I know nobody that has used dating apps for anything more than hook ups and even then, that's not exactly common. It's my experience that people find relationships through work/school or mutual friends.

My experience in general with how people talk about relationships and dating online has been one of bafflement. It's always this sturm und drang about how dating is impossible for the average man, women are ruthless harpies and the dating world has become this mad max style post apocalyptic wasteland ruled over by the new supermen. Then I look out the window and everything seems fine, people pursue relationships that aren't much changed from the kind that their parents would have pursued.

I've increasingly come round to the idea that talking about relationships online attracts a certain kind of individual, with a certain kind of world view and experiences and that this lends a certain tint to the discourse.

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And yet, the stats are what they are.

Maybe you're the "certain kind of individual"? My own social circles are chock full of men so lonely they've given up on even talking about it because there's nothing to say and nobody cares to do anything to help anyway. And they come from a variety of social classes too.

I mean, the stats are that 39% of relationships start on apps. So, yeah, lots of people meet their partners that way; more don't. I completely agree that the app experience and the in-person experience are night-and-day; conversations about dating will seem like two separate universes depending on whether the speaker meets more women online, or in real life.

Last time I checked, the average app had a 2-to-1 or 3-to-1 gender ratio, so galaxy-brain analysis aside, it's really just not that weird that apps suck for men.

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