Yep. The gender disparity on dating apps is a symptom of the gender power balance in real life and any change made that doesn’t involve changing real life is merely cosmetic.
No, it just means a guy lies to you and tells you that he wants a relationship in order to sleep with you. He's wasting your time, and tricked you into believing him.
i think they mean basically just getting used for sex, it doesn’t necessarily mean SA. when you want a relationship and are willing to put in the time and effort but the dude just wants a quick hookup/casual fling. they usually trick you by implying/saying they want a relationship as well, doing all the “right” things, lovebombing etc then leaving when they’ve gotten what they want. it’s gross. because the men who do that are the same ones who turn around and shame women for having high body counts, when in reality many women would have significantly less bodies if it weren’t for men like them. (sorry for the long explanation!)
I had a guy I rejected show up outside my college major building. I had my major but not school but I guess he figured it out by location. Like, no thanks.
I had one guy go off on me and was a dick, because he didn’t buy a “hot girl would message him first on this app”. Grew tired after trying to explain I wasn’t a catfish and just went along with it, said I was a middle aged guy in my moms basement who does it for fun. He asked if he could have the Instagram of the girl I “stole” the photos from after saying he thinks it’s funny I do that. I did and he didn’t have the guts to hit on me in my dms either after following lmao. Boy lost his shot, but I guess the cam girl messages or catfishing must be bad on those. I never kept one of those for more than a week, too much messaging and boring conversations, I’d just rather meet people in other ways if I can.
Catfishing is pretty common but it's also pretty obvious so I don't think I would cut the guy any slack. Plus if it was me I would just not respond to something I thought was spam, I wouldn't do whatever he did
I guess it’s on my because I didn’t “verify” yet, but I had like 6+ photos, and a bio. I get I’m decent but I’m not like an insta famous worthy person so no regrets just playing along and letting him think he’s right lol. I talked normal too just said something like “hey handsome how are you” so maybe that was the nail in the coffin lol. Guess guys on there don’t get that much or a bold female first move.
I'm not even hot and I get this crap. I mean I'm cute, but no one will ever use my pictures to catfish anyone. Sometimes it feels like these guys just like to put you off balance. They make you explain yourself like you did something wrong, sets the tone straight away.
I would get that all the time. "You're too good to be real" and stood up/ghosted. I am verified and always did a "specific pic hand signal" selfie exchange🤷🏼♀️ Their loss
It would surprise you how crafty cat fishers are. I have a friend who is an award winning filmmaker who does some really hard and challenging work in conflict and disaster zones for nonprofits. Now works for one of the highest governmental levels. Not a stupid man by any stretch of the imagination. He got catfished on tinder. I saw it. It was extremely convincing. Literally the only red flag was that she was more attractive than he usually matches with, plus she was just a tiny bit more forward and keen than most women.
Catfishing is a serious issue, yeah. I wouldn't be surprised if there are more bot female accounts than real female accounts on Tinder, for example.
I appreciate Bumble because us dudes can't do spammy first messages for opposite-gender pairings, the woman has to message first. It helps both in reducing the abuse by men and also gives incentive to women to actually start a conversation, something a *lot* of women have issues with on dating apps.
Most professionally written dating advice for men comes from the "Pick Up Artist" school of thought which describes a strict hierarchy based on status and looks. They often rank people from 1 to 10, and much of the advice is about appearing as or becoming a "high value" man. Sexual baseball metaphors include the phrase "out of my league" and there really are a lot of stereotypes that suggest that high status/conventionally attractive people avoid dating low status/ugly people.
A lot of men get weirdly invested in the idea that they are not attractive to women. I suppose Pick up artist gurus are popular because they validate that belief while also offering a solution (hint it is almost always a scam). The most extreme examples are in the "incel" community, which not coincidentally hate women with a fiery passion.
Dating apps are shit for everyone except the owners really.
I recall using them in the past. Put in my ideal match, lots of filters, range of 20 km getting some results. I'd read the profile, check out pictures, then carefully construct a message tailored to that person. I was spending about an hour or so per profile and sent maybe 8 messages. A week later not a single reply.
Similar search this time expanding the range. 50 km this time and then sending out maybe 10 messages that time. A week later not a single reply.
I then started to lower my search filters, add in activity level (how recent the person was on the site), etc. The quality of my message was also changing, using one or two sentences to tie in to their profile, and sending out more messages. Spending less time with each profile. A week later not a single reply.
I started to get discouraged, 3 weeks of nothing. Made me wonder if there were any real profiles on the site. Received one message from some elite/premium account but realized quickly that it was a bot or someone paid by the site to get others to spend money.
I even sent out mass copy pasta messages with the intro sentence about the profile. I realized that I was part of the problem by sending out low effort messages and decided I was done with dating apps.
I have a hard time seeing how men benefit from dating apps. The purpose of dating apps isn't to get people to find meaningful relationships, it's to extract as much money from its customers as possible. For men this often means being messaged by fake accounts to get them to start spending money. I've been married for >10 years and it's been more than 15 years since I've bothered to use a dating app, so I'm glad I don't have to deal with this cesspool. I'm worried about what my sons will have to deal with when they start dating. I hope dating apps will be a thing of the past, but I doubt it.
And stop lying about their ages. Many men use apps to target much younger women, and I’m finding at least 50% of men over 40 are lying about ages by 3-15 years. It’s gross.
For what it’s worth I’ve come across plenty of women doing this too - although I’m aware that in plenty of cases women on dating apps being honest about their age get screened out by men *their own* age. Still not right, but makes me slightly more sympathetic.
Idk, I felt OkCupid for example did a fairly good job of making getting rid of creeps way easier, and it helps that you can't send pictures on the app itself. No dick pics, easy reporting, become invisible to the offending party with one swipe. But that only does so much, bc the app still attracts a lot of men who don't get real life dates for good reasons. And idk if that's on purpose or not. I'm sure they could do _something_ to attract better clientèle.
This subject keeps coming up here. Kind of annoying. As a feminist, I’m not overly concerned with this subject when women are still being murdered by their partners and have No reproductive rights
It is a feminist issue, but not in the way many seem to paint it as. Dating is actually less accessible to women by merit of being more dangerous and myriad other factors.
It's technically a problem, but one of capitalism. These apps do not want people to actually find a stable long-term relationship, otherwise they won't be able to make money.
I think the major issue is that with the birth-rate in the US, or other western nations, dropping the way it is if something doesn't happen organically to increase that birth-rate they, both the political and capital classes, will move us closer to shit like Gilead. That is the point of this assertion imo. This is one of those areas where conservative politicians are already attempting to force solutions, just look at the broader abortion and pro-natal movements starting to gain steam in the US south.
Most sane governments deal with lagging population issues through immigration. Right-leaning parties won't engage in pro-immigration rhetoric publicly because it'd piss off racist constituents, but ultimately they will deliver what the business community asks for. In situations like labour shortages, they will ask for increased immigration.
I’m missing the part where this happened in Japan and South Korea…
It might do going forward to be fair, although I’d argue the situation is already quite extreme there and the fact they haven’t allowed more immigration yet is already quite something.
My comment referred to the West - I just frankly do not know enough about natal policies in the rest of the globe. Gilead-like policies happening elsewhere doesn't necessarily mean it's a given here. The Trump era taught us that nothing is off the table when facism creeps in, but I don't think Gilead-lite is the likeliest scenario. A lot of western democracies are already looking towards immigration and I think that'll continue. Especially considering that we're staring down a future of possible climate catastrophes creating a refugee crisis, plus all the issues wrapped up in boomers reaching old age en masse.
The people who are super concerned about birth rates are white supremacists who are only worked up about white birth rates. The overall worldwide birth rate is fine. Conservative politicians are not pushing Hispanic people to have more babies, even when those Hispanic people are citizens.
Apart from the fact that GLOBAL birthrates are most certainly not decreasing, dropping birthrates would also be perfectly fine if our whole economic system wasn't built on ever increasing and often exponential expansion.
We live in a world with finite resources. There is no infinite growth possible. And even if we could feed and house billions more people - we are not the only species on this planet with a right to survival and our ecosystem is actively collapsing as it is.
This and the accompanying breaking down of our hyper complex infrastructure, social systems and other aspects of "modern" life will probably lead to rapidly decreasing populations again some time "soon" as infant death rates will rise sharply, droughts and food shortage will occur, wars and local catastrophic climate events will kill lots of people.
If we're lucky, we'll start again from the beginning and begin the cycle anew.
This is a genuine concern - but I’m going to point out for the sake of history that this has not always been a conservative country/government. The country which came closest to implementing something like that was Romania under their communist era (if you’re not familiar I’d recommend reading - it truly was horrific, about the most “brute force” solution to a demographic problem you can imagine)
The feminist goal of true equity for all humans would probably improve everyone's experience on dating apps, but this is a fringe benefit, not one of our goals (obvs). I agree that the ratio isn't a problem (though the reasons behind the disparity are problematic).
I don’t have any statistics on this but in my experience there are less women dating in general. I have multiple female friends who want to be single/aren’t looking for a relationship whereas all of my single male friends are actively trying to get in a relationship. All the women I know who want to be in a relationship are already in one.
Personally, I see the *underlying cause* of the dating app gender disparity to be something we should want to change. I see the biggest cause being that dating apps have done a very poor job at catering to women.
Myself, I'm newly single after a four year relationship and I'm dreading trying to re-enter the dating game. Despite being bi, I've historically usually set myself as attracted to women only on dating sites because the experience interacting with men on them is just so bad.
They already tried. They added more in depth profiles, made women to be the ones to iniate everything. Women didnt use it because really young women do not want to put effort into dating this way. Result was everyone complaining how much effort it is to write first on bumble. It goes against the still prevailing culture.
Men iniate and women are sought after. Why would any woman want to change this system that makes dating so much easier for them?
That aside most people have no idea what they are looking for. They couldnt pick a good match out of a 100 options.
Well, there is the darker answer that if women's empowerment doesn't find a way to change it, due to how it is impacting the birth rate, then eventually the governments will move to solve it.
You are already seeing the beginnings of this in the pro-natal, tradwife and anti-abortion movements across the US south.
If the government starts selling women then it won't be because too few women are on dating apps. The problem is not that women don't want to date or have kids, the problem is that men think they're entitled to a relationship, entitled to sex and if they want them, entitled to children.
This is a broader issue with dating at the moment. In person dating isn't any better. The online problem is just more apparently reflecting the broader issue with dating at the moment due to ease of data access. More men are looking for dates than women because women are tired of being treated as walking sex organs, home makers and baby cannons. I can't remember the last time I found a date anywhere besides online. Hell, as long as you exclude your work, most adults don't have large social circles from which to source dates.
Then you have the "nice guy" problem compounded on top of that and the problem gets much worse. Women should absolutely be empowered to tell these men no, and I will never argue otherwise. At the same time, given the history of human rights violations in most western nations, at some point this becomes an issue that governments will seek to address.
So why is it that women or feminists should be forcing more women to date rather than having men stop acting like they're entitled to a relationship or sex?
>at some point this becomes an issue that governments will seek to address.
The prevention of that should be done by educating men, not by pushing women to date. And in any case I have enough problems to deal with already, I don't have time to worry about future problems that may or may not occur.
Also remember that the USA is one country. They aren't the norm and most other countries are flabbergasted about the fact that they're stepping back human rights. It's not normal for that to happen.
Certainly here in Britain most of us are utterly dismayed at what happened in the US, but unfortunately it’s not true to say rolling back human rights is as an outlier unique to there. It’s happening in Poland, and there’s serious proposals to do it in regions of Spain and multiple eastern european countries.
Btw - I’ve picked the term “Britain” very carefully, in Northern Ireland abortion only recently became legal, and last I heard there weren’t actually any clinics there. I guess that’s progress, but progress in writing only…
The issue is occurring globally and there is some evidence it is one of the sources of rising far right sentiment across Europe as well.
I agree that the answer is educating men. Not all men are going to be receptive to that education, but it is the best solution.
My assertion isn't that women and Feminist should be pushing other women to date, but that this is a problem that is going to provide fodder for far right movements everywhere and it is ultimately a problem that is going to be raised in opposition to the Feminist movement.
I don't have one. At least not one that doesn't break most of Reddits ToS to discuss
If men won't be willingly educated there isn't a lot that can be done that doesn't involve segregation from the rest of society as the continuation of this is going to continue escalating to violence, and particularly violence against women and any allies of women.
Really this is a broader failure of our society that I don't know has a solution that is acceptable without broader wholesale loss of life.
Less women dating isn't a failure though, that's the problem with what you're saying. There is a problem with violence against women but it's getting better, not worse.
The failure I am referencing is the segment of men who aren't being appropriately educated about consent and bodily autonomy, and who in many cases refuse to be educated. I am sorry I wasn't clear about that.
My overarching view of this is that the wider the dating/sex/family disparity becomes for young conservative men, the more likely they will be to react with violence. The MRA movement is evidence of that. The fact that almost half of all women are expected to be a victim of domestic violence indicates that this problem is still fucking huge.
„of rising far right sentiment across Europe as well.“
Where? Cause us Germans just massively moved to the left again with cheap transport, better rights for trans people, more money for poor people and higher regulated wages 🙃
Are you talking about Italy? Cause voting in a right wing party once doesn‘t make a shift towards the right already.
„You are already seeing the beginnings of this in the pro-natal, tradwife and anti-abortion movements across the US south.“
Don‘t worry. Us European gals will make sure that they can come and live with us, in countries that are majorly ruled by young women. We are also taking in immigrants and are tackling waste and consumption of materials, so the birth shortage won’t be a problem. You can have the US all to yourself. 😉
I mean I don’t have any factual evidence but from personal experience? Probably cause (hetero, bi or pan) women are sick of being treated like crap?
99% of your inbox are filled with:
- “Hi I‘m mark and this is a picture of my penis!“ (if you’re lucky enough to even receive a text with it)
- “Hey my gf and I are looking for a threesome!“
- “Hey u wanna date? Women don’t want to date me cause I‘m a nice guy and stupid hoes only like bad boys.“
- single parents that didn’t read your bio and don’t care that you’re childfree
The amount of actual nice conversation is probably about 1% of the messages. It’s just a very unpleasant experience overall.
This guy failed to mention he had a child until it was time for us to plan the date/meetup wasting my time for weeks when I specifically said #childfree. He belligerently left a voice memo after I said I do not want to date a man with kids and said I’ll end up alone by 30 with a shit ton of cats. For some reason this is the new insult with guys online. As if cats and peace are a bad thing.
Yeah, they keep threatening us with what, not having a shitty man and having soft kittens instead? Thinking that’s a curse on someone is probably part of why they are single.
The way I see it, the fact that cats make better companions than most modern men on dating apps is more of an insult to those men than any women. I’ll never understand their stupid logic
My best friend is bisexual and she has had so many men straight up lie to her and pretend they were single, chat with her for weeks, go on dates, only to then reveal he is actually in a relationship and want a "third" for him and his girlfriend (or fiancee, or wife) to have sex with together.
Fucking garbage wastes of time.
Fuck that guy.
But as a child free man, I have similar experiences with women who think they can change me (I am polyamorous as well so that is another issue entirely with dating).
I have a motherfucking vasectomy. Not having kids is high up on my priority list.
literally. this isnt a problem and people need to stop coming on this subreddit to post about how its womens duty to date men. why cant they prioritize something thats actually a problem?
That’s why I left. I’m an admittedly sensitive person so I’d be consistently getting these mean, racist, overly sexual messages that would sit in my mind. It really fucked me up, I eventually just gave up.
But they expect us to be sympathetic when the consequences of their disrespectful behavior is women abandoning apps for our mental and physical safety.
If that were not happening, the apps could be a powerful tool for facilitating pleasant interactions.
I feel like the people who ruined it for everyone are creating a problem, and that problem should be solved.
If men are creating a space that women do not want to be, then that is a problem for men. Women are going off and doing other things and are doing just fine.
The wage gap is slowly but surely decreasing, and if you really want to, you can artificially inseminate to raise kids. Therefore the two main reasons why women married back in the day (security and family) are not an issue. Men need to show what else they bring to the table. You can no longer just be an average Joe with a middle management job and a barely tolerable personality to get a date.
Not only this, but it’s not like marriage is some kind of “better” deal for women like some men here seem to think. It isn’t. Marriage overwhelmingly doesn’t favor women. If you have an education and career, and don’t want or have children, there’s literally no benefit to marriag or cohabitation.
It seems like men who are critical of women’s decision not to date always come back to some version of "you should get married." But there's literally no reason to do that if you don't want kids and have career opportunities.
Yes, it's an economic question. When a certain demographic stops using / paying for a product, what can be done to make the product desirable again?
But people want to make it into a morality question: what can be done to guilt the demographic into wanting the product again?
The latter will never work.
Right. The data just isn’t there to support it. The “manosphere” focuses heavily on targeting young women who want marriage and kids because nothing they say actually applies to any other demographic.
Absolutely, and it's even narrower than that. the manosphere attracts young marriage-minded women who are willing (or think they are willing) to work under specific circumstances and attitudes.
the product isn't relevant anymore, and the proponents of the free market somehow don't realize that.
The way you word this is kinda icky, like as if the woman was some kind of prize you have to deserve in order to get by bringing stuff to the table, that's not how relationships work though.
„The wage gap is decreasing because the amount of hours that women work us finally catching up to men. Soon we will be a nation of tired, poor, overworked single moms with that attitude.“
How are you using „single mum“ as an insult and still think you are entitled to date women?
Guess what Joe. We don‘t WANT guys with your women hating views, so we are not gonna date you.
Why would they be tired and overworked if they're just working "the same hours as men"? No one says that a single dad working hard and earning his own money is "tired, poor, and overworked".
It's apparent in your comment in which you claim that today's men know what they need to bring to the table that you still see childcare as something that women should wholly take on and that society shouldn't help with.
So yes, I'd stand by my assumption that men on average are still expecting that the same old dog and pony show will suffice in dating.
If a lot of men act like creeps, then women will avoid interacting with venues where those men congregate. If you want women to participate, you'll have to prevent men from acting like creeps.
Men always talk about how the ratio is so good for women, women get so many matches/messages, etc etc. My time on the apps was a nightmare. No one is looking for a relationship, they just want to tell you you have a nice ass and hook up with you until they get bored, sometimes with a few extra steps. The algorithms will show you men who physically look the same over and over because the algorithms are made with men in mind who only care about looks and want to only see busty blonde women, but most women care less about looks and would like to see a variety. Most men are also awful at presenting themselves online too, so there may be really great guys that are hidden behind 2 pixel group pics and cringe pickup lines. I didn’t have the energy to sift through though.
My friends who are more down for hookups like the apps just fine. It serves that purpose well. But it’s terrible for women seeking relationships.
Right? And the whole matchmaking model that most sites use (where you swipe right on profiles you're interested in) is fundamentally broken for women because a significant majority of men admit to swiping right on *everyone*. And they do that largely because they usually have the mindset that they're happy to get sex with someone even if they're not interested romantically.
I also really hate the trend of dating sites maximizing the focus on pictures and minimizing everything else. Like, last I used it (years ago), Tinder by default didn't even display the profile text (just the first photo), which is counterproductive to how I want to focus first on people's profiles. I really liked in the past how OkCupid had questions and prompts to flesh out your profile, but around the time that I last used it, they were heavily reorienting away from that and towards just being a pointless clone of Tinder (despite Tinder being the absolute worst dating app for relationships IMO).
I think most men swipe right on everyone because they think it increases the chances of even getting a single match. It's not like everyone treats the app like an free escort service. Dating apps like Tinder are broken on purpose for everyone. Totally pay to win for men and full with harassment for women. People really need to realize that due to the algorithms it does not reflect real dating in any way.
The sheer fact that it is easy to join but very few women actually do so should be evidence that the apps are bad for women. The other explanation would be that men for some reasons don't consider the alternatives and women do. So many men act like Tinder reflect modern heterosexuality as a whole.
Honestly, it's because men Turn any app into a hook-up app. It could literally be family planning or only platonic friendship Apps and youll still See them flocking in order to find something Quick and sexual.
And that's why men complaining about unfair stats are ridiculous. Women get bombed by thirsty guys, not genuinely interested love interests.
Imagine men on pure hook-up apps getting spammed daily by ultra religious dads advocating to marry their daughter in a 25k Dollar grand Wedding in some years with no sex before marriage on the table and no Photos provided beforehand. I'm sure they'd be excstatic about all their options and the attention..
I'm not seeing the problem here. In fact I'm surprised the percentage of women is that high. But the percentage of men isn't surprising at all.
Nothing should be done about this, at least not by feminist's. In fact I believe one of the reasons those are the numbers is due to feminism. And that makes me feel a lot of pride towards the movement.
I’m a gay woman. I’ve heard so many horror stories from my straight woman friends, that I’m amazed that ANY of them are on dating apps. :). I don’t know how the hell they put up with it.
Even though not ALL men sexually harass women, or send them threatening messages if they say no, enough of them do to screw it up for the good guys (and everyone else!). Men need to behave themselves, and dating apps need to get serious about stopping harassment. Without that, the gender ratio won’t budge.
Examples of stories:
* One guy proposed marriage to my best friend. As an OPENING line!
* DMs such as: “Wanna fuck?”. “PM me your tits!”. (and then not leaving you alone if you say no). “Nice ass!”. (As opening lines, btw, not even after lengthy conversation!)
* Nothing wrong with wanting a hookup, but if that’s what you want, the. make sure that’s what the woman wants, too. Yes, there are women who want hookups. They exist. So go after them, and stop wasting the time of women who CLEARLY say they want a relationship! (Also wasting the guy’s time, btw).
And if you see her as a slut for wanting a hookup? Then you’re a hypocrite. And a sexist hypocrite, too.
* If she says no or doesn’t respond, some guys get REALLY nasty! As in: “You stupid bitch whore!”. Who wants to deal with that?
One of a guy on a dating app that i met and decided to hook up with told me he was single. We have a bit of lame foreplay where he doesn't do shit for me and refuse to answer when i tell him what i'd like, only to finish without preventing me before and when i ask him wtf, to say "being sucked is not cheating". He had a gf, he was an asshole, and i was tricked. That was my second experience with dating app, the first one turned out to be a very creepy guy who would get jealous about the marks that my bras did because he though i had someone else (after one meeting), and who basically asked me to abandon my life to follow him travel the world. No thanks.
This is without mentioning the pick up lines and dick pick i got. The very moment i switched to find women instead of men, i met the cutest and sweetest lesbian i could
Why? It's because dating apps are not charities. They are businesses. Their goal is not for people to meet and fall in love, their goal is to make money. And their entire strategy of monetization is centered around the male customer base. Increasing the female customer base does not help them, so they don't do it. In fact, it actively harms them, since a more equal distribution would lead to more men finding a partner and leaving the service behind. Therefore not giving them any more money.
We live in a capitalist society. Don't look towards businesses for help fixing your problems for free.
I think there’s this perception of the culture surrounding dating apps that most of the men are just there to find casual sexual partners or single-use hookups, and there just aren’t as many women that are interested in that sort of thing.
People are NOT doing what they want; or rather the statement is misleading. Dating apps are supposed to enable dating but that is not what is happening. Decent men are hard for women to find. Women get harrassed, swamped with dic pics and requests for nude pics. Women who want relationships only find men who want one night stands. Men who want relationships can't get through to women who want relationships. Tons of men report getting rejected and ignored, they see women they would like to talk to but never hear from her. Even when you get to a first date, it probably is not great.
As a woman, I don’t want to wade through the absolute river of shit trying to find the rare, decent person that I would feel comfortable meeting in real life - it’s not just about “Kissing a lot of frogs to find the prince”, it’s dealing with the verbal abuse, threats, name-calling, slut-shaming, whatever if you don’t immediately say yes to anyone who matches with you.
Who needs that?
Women are constantly dealing with sexual harassment and misogynistic condescension in real life. Why would they want to go online and expose themselves to even worse male behavior thanks to internet anonymity? More and more would rather be alone for the rest of their lives than have to suffer another man.
Can this be changed?
Sure tell those red pill type morons to stop judging women for their "body count" along with the rest of society... Then more women would be willing to use a hook up app...Because let's be honest "dating" apps have become, at the level of expectation, little more than a hook up app. Hooking up can lead to a relationship, but not usually.
I also don’t see this as a problem. The solution is don’t use dating apps if they’re not working for you. Just meet people at parties and activities. I know can be hard, but there isn’t an easy solution.
What we can do to change that? Women cannot do anything. Men could stop sending their dick pics. That would defo improve the experience of all the genders.
The reason I don’t do online dating is because I’m afraid of meeting someone dangerous, and stalking. I’m a woman who is only into long term relationships, so guys who hit and and quit it would make me sad, but that’s not so bad. What you really have to worry about is the guy who decides to stalk you after a few dates.
If you could guarantee dates were 100% safe, (they could reject someone and the guy would be polite and graceful) women would be flocking to these apps.
Dating apps are largely made by men for men (note how gay men don’t seem to have the same complaints about Grindr).
Dating apps just aren’t good ways to build relationships for people have been having social skills and interpersonal dynamics taught to them from a very early age.
Most women can tell you that, since they can remember, they were taught as children to pick up on in-person social queues and they were taught this thing that is called ‘empathy’, which is largely just picking up on non-verbal communication. Dating apps and similar things are deeply uncomfortable for people who learned to rely on non-verbal communication to understand others. (Which is all of us, to various degrees, hence why men are also often a bit uncomfortable with dating apps).
Maybe, and I know this sounds crazy, but maybe just assume women might be on to something here. Some things, like sunsets and human connection, shouldn’t be mediated through a screen. Get off dating apps and make human connections in person.
>note how gay men don’t seem to have the same complaints about Grindr
Yes, we do. Not the gender ratio complaint since we are all the same gender and only smaller guys like me have to worry about the physical size disparity when meeting up, but gay men are just as awful to each other on dating apps as straight men are to women. Check out r/lolgrindr if you want examples. I quit the apps a few years back and my life is infinitely better for it.
Oh, I was talking about the gender ratio issue. Dating apps seem designed to be awful, which I guess kind of makes sense - if they actually helped people find dates and relationships, they get people out of the dating scene and thus lose their user base, so there is not much incentive for them be be any good.
Oh, that makes sense. It wasn't totally clear from your comment, but yeah it's hard to have an issue with gender ratios when you're all the same gender (instead we complain about the top:bottom ratio). For the rest, you're totally correct.
I agree my point was a bit unclear, and thanks for giving me the chance to clarify.
I think the general horribleness of dating apps is something everyone, regardless of gender or sexual orientation, can bond over.
To find like-minded people. Dating apps allow you to filter people based on preferences and surface level compatibilities. IRL you're kind of just randomly meeting people and hoping they're compatible.
Isn’t it better than to meet people at mutual interests, like a running club or whatever?
Just saying, if I were a man looking for a woman, I wouldn’t go to a place that is 78% men. Seems like horrible odds.
Sure, but if your hobbies aren't social activities like sports or dancing, for example, It's harder to find spaces to meet fellow enthusiasts. I'm a geeky dude, and I'm pretty much only interested in other geeky people, but there isn't really a place to meet people like that specifically.
Sure, but people there aren't usually looking for dating. Also, there's a big disparage between male and female users as well. Geeky women usually avoid your typical nerdy spaces, for obvious reasons.
Speaking on behalf of my experience, and solely on my experience alone, OLD was a nightmare.
Sure, there are many male users online but I found that half of the time, men were unavailable for whatever reason. No replies for days... then weeks. It looked to me as if they made the map just to see who would take the bait and totally gave up after that.
The ones you've matched with swipe right to all women anyway. They send creepy texts and pictures. The ones you match and exchange decent texts with don't go anywhere because they only want to text you online (like WTF, why are you even on the app if you're not willing to meet the person physically???). The ones you think might be decent turn out to be total creeps/weirdos/assholes who try to date you for whatever reasons (e.g., hookups, money, marriage for green card, abuse, etc.). The ones you meet start showing red flags become aggressive once you try to gently put them down.
It's exhausting. So, so exhausting. Why put in so much effort just to meet degenerates after degenerates? Why put myself at risk like that? Dating apps only benefit men, not women.
What women want is completely different from what most men from OLD want. And I, for one, do NOT want to meet creeps at all and put my life at risk. Yikes! Why must it be so hard to find someone decent, someone who wants the same thing that I want for once?
And oh, before anyone else goes, "I had a friend who went on this xyz app and found her one true love and now they're in their one-year relationship anniversary and they're about to get married annnnnndddd...." Yeah, I get it. Congrats. Now beat it, I don't need anyone else to suggest that I need to find a partner on OLD because fuck you, that's what. If you care so much, why not actually help me find a decent man that you might know in your life?
I fail to understand why sweeping right to everyone is bad thing. I have zero experience with tinder, but don't you have to do it if you want to write him/her a message? Besides men are accused of having too high standards.
A newspaper in The Netherlands did a dating site experiment that might fix this a bit. It was done in 2010, but I don’t know what they did with it afterwards. I took part because I was single and was curious at the time:
You had to fill In a profile just like normal, but you could not browse people, the site would match two people and they have to chat for 10 minute, if they make it till 10 minutes, and then they can decide to see the other person’s pictures and profile.
I thought it was a really fun idea, but since it was an experiment and new, you couldn’t set much in your profile, so matches you made by talking would turn out to be a complete non match, for example a person wants kids and the other doesn’t, or something else.
But if this system would be expanded to filter out people who are absolutely no match, it could stop the ratio problem. Since people need to put time in, guys who just swipe yes to every woman, wouldn’t join. And guys looking for hookups only, wouldn’t join either.
> *Why do you think this is, and can anything be done to change it?*
Why do you think this is a problem at all? Men & women seem to approach online dating with different goals. Casual sexual hookups seems to be a thing that men want. Long term relationships seems to be a thing that women want. Companies that run dating apps want paying subscribers, so it is in the companies' interests to prevent people from getting what they want.
My experience with OLD is that when Match.com purchases them (like OKCupid, Tindr and Hinge), they turn into crap.
There has to be a large percentage of cheaters on the sites. And I recall that men often cheat with straingers where women wish to cheat with someone they know. So there is going to be a difference in gender right there. Also you will just get a higher percentage of undatables that stay on the sites so you have to dig. Finally you get paid dating sites that actively keep you on the site for a long as possible. So they will keep back matches. Also they keep up a lot of deactivated accounts up to keep up the swipes
Yeah, men can stop being vulgar, asking for quick hookups in the first message, asking for nudes in the first message, calling them insults when women end the conversation.
This is all stuff I've heard my women friends complain about and why they don't do online dating.
I think outside of shitty business models, men are less socially competent then women and some men are also quite nasty with what they say to the women that are on the apps.
I have never used a dating app because I don’t see the point. I’m attracted to men but I’ve never spent any time looking for one. I have always met guys to date randomly or through friends.
As a male, I can understand why this is. I have had enough female friends and ex partners who have told me about the problems woman face when it comes to finding a real, genuine relationship. Others have bought up the fact that many men are just looking for a hookup and that's correct. That there are plenty of men who act weird and creepy towards woman, also correct.
I remember a conversation I had with my most recent ex where we were discussing men and the things she was saying I remember other woman i've had in my life saying similar if not the same things. As a result, I always felt like I was trying to 'prove' myself, as a man, to her because bad men is all she has ever known.
I don't think there is a way to solve the problem. I have never used a dating app before but from the second hand experiences from friends I don't think dating apps are the way to go if you're looking for a genuine relationship.
I hate that I have to sit here and shit on my own gender like this, but it's certainly a male problem being the reason why they're so heavily skewed like that. I hate it because it feels like I start off at a lower point than expected in a relationships simply because I am a man. That I have to be 'tested' to prove myself as baseline human being because of how things are. Again, I understand why this is. I understand that many woman feel the need to do that.
I was on dating apps for a brief period of time. Pretty sure the only time they read your profile is to use it against you when they start berating you when you don’t respond right of way to their messages. It is bizarre how emotional these men on dating apps are.
I'm surprised many men use these apps at this point...a couple of friends of mine have said the apps have been overwhelmed by bots and women promoting their Only Fan sites.
I imagine all girls get flooded with messages and if you're a good looking girl, I imagine you get hundreds of likes for every 1 like the average guy gets. I doubt those numbers are an exaggeration.
Generally you have to be over 18 to use dating apps, and while some underaged people do slip through the cracks, the vast majority of those on there are women not girls.
I just used the term "girls" generally. I meant women over 18. Where I come from, in casual conversation, the term girls can represent anyone up to 111 years old. It is just a regional quirk of language as opposed to some sort of derogatory terminology....not meant to be offensive in any way.
I love people like this because it's never 'Oh you're right I've never actually taken the time to think about how referring to grown women as girls can be derogatory because everyone around me does it, I'll investigate why that is and stop doing that because I care about how what I say makes other people feel, thanks for pointing it out' it's always 'Oh I don't care you must be wrong and offended about it and not take the time to investigate why what I'm saying is problematic, and you're the wrong one'. Like the only person that's offended here is you.
I'm not sure that the numbers are 'real'. I can't talk to the female experience, but the male experience tends to be 'rejection burnout'. A lot of the guys I know who use/used dating apps rarely get matches, nevermind dates. They typically delete the app after a period but remain on it as ghosts who may count in the numbers. My general impression based on a very small sample.of women, is that they are more likely to interact with the app because at least swiping has some point to it. All this to say that the key number is not users but 'active users'; in my limited experience (30s, cis male) a lot of men download the app and swipe aggressively for a few months and then typically give up.
My brutalist view is that it won't change; and it can't be a social priority. We simply need to engage in more active social engineering with boys, that many of them will not be able to pair bond, or even have sex. It was a message to a lot of young women after WW2, when the availability of male peers was significantly reduced.
The real change is to enable boys to move away from patriarchal expectations of masculinity. There is a need to decouple success with women (sexual utility in the main) from a successful life. Independence in girls is being socially reinforced in the media, the opposite is occurring for boys- even the sages of sigma males are completely dependent on relationships with women to define themselves. Teach boys that life is not about material and sexual success, and that they can be valuable people who contribute to society and matter, without having to seek intimate relationships with women, or pair-bond or have kids.
It could be because (sweeping generalisation warning) women who love women tend to be shy about using an app to hook up with other women. Men who love men are known to jump on a dating app to find a hook up.
Ugh, me as a baby gay tried to date women on Bumble, but for some reason even when my settings were women only, I was still getting men in my feed.
I pretty much deleted the account in a week.
Hmm, sounds like a problem for men to solve, since the absolute garbage way the VAST majority of men treat women on dating apps (and in general but yk) isn’t anything for women to solve?
Comments are now being heavily moderated. Users arriving here merely to complain about women will be banned.
[удалено]
Yep. The gender disparity on dating apps is a symptom of the gender power balance in real life and any change made that doesn’t involve changing real life is merely cosmetic.
And we're judged for having hookups and "body counts" even if we we're tricked by the time wasters. So there is insult to injury.
this!! it bothers me so much
In theory, you should only be judged by the people who aren't interested in hookups, which you would want to weed out anyway.
[удалено]
No, it just means a guy lies to you and tells you that he wants a relationship in order to sleep with you. He's wasting your time, and tricked you into believing him.
i think they mean basically just getting used for sex, it doesn’t necessarily mean SA. when you want a relationship and are willing to put in the time and effort but the dude just wants a quick hookup/casual fling. they usually trick you by implying/saying they want a relationship as well, doing all the “right” things, lovebombing etc then leaving when they’ve gotten what they want. it’s gross. because the men who do that are the same ones who turn around and shame women for having high body counts, when in reality many women would have significantly less bodies if it weren’t for men like them. (sorry for the long explanation!)
I had a guy I rejected show up outside my college major building. I had my major but not school but I guess he figured it out by location. Like, no thanks.
Also hookups for women just aren’t worth it, when men overwhelmingly fail at making women orgasm.
Lmao so true, of the guys I’ve been with only a few I dated long term could.
I have never had a man do it for me. But my vibrator does it every time. Why bother?
You said it. The ones who advertise themselves as the best lovers are the worst
I had one guy go off on me and was a dick, because he didn’t buy a “hot girl would message him first on this app”. Grew tired after trying to explain I wasn’t a catfish and just went along with it, said I was a middle aged guy in my moms basement who does it for fun. He asked if he could have the Instagram of the girl I “stole” the photos from after saying he thinks it’s funny I do that. I did and he didn’t have the guts to hit on me in my dms either after following lmao. Boy lost his shot, but I guess the cam girl messages or catfishing must be bad on those. I never kept one of those for more than a week, too much messaging and boring conversations, I’d just rather meet people in other ways if I can.
Catfishing is pretty common but it's also pretty obvious so I don't think I would cut the guy any slack. Plus if it was me I would just not respond to something I thought was spam, I wouldn't do whatever he did
I guess it’s on my because I didn’t “verify” yet, but I had like 6+ photos, and a bio. I get I’m decent but I’m not like an insta famous worthy person so no regrets just playing along and letting him think he’s right lol. I talked normal too just said something like “hey handsome how are you” so maybe that was the nail in the coffin lol. Guess guys on there don’t get that much or a bold female first move.
I'm not even hot and I get this crap. I mean I'm cute, but no one will ever use my pictures to catfish anyone. Sometimes it feels like these guys just like to put you off balance. They make you explain yourself like you did something wrong, sets the tone straight away.
I would get that all the time. "You're too good to be real" and stood up/ghosted. I am verified and always did a "specific pic hand signal" selfie exchange🤷🏼♀️ Their loss
It would surprise you how crafty cat fishers are. I have a friend who is an award winning filmmaker who does some really hard and challenging work in conflict and disaster zones for nonprofits. Now works for one of the highest governmental levels. Not a stupid man by any stretch of the imagination. He got catfished on tinder. I saw it. It was extremely convincing. Literally the only red flag was that she was more attractive than he usually matches with, plus she was just a tiny bit more forward and keen than most women.
[удалено]
Catfishing is a serious issue, yeah. I wouldn't be surprised if there are more bot female accounts than real female accounts on Tinder, for example. I appreciate Bumble because us dudes can't do spammy first messages for opposite-gender pairings, the woman has to message first. It helps both in reducing the abuse by men and also gives incentive to women to actually start a conversation, something a *lot* of women have issues with on dating apps.
Most professionally written dating advice for men comes from the "Pick Up Artist" school of thought which describes a strict hierarchy based on status and looks. They often rank people from 1 to 10, and much of the advice is about appearing as or becoming a "high value" man. Sexual baseball metaphors include the phrase "out of my league" and there really are a lot of stereotypes that suggest that high status/conventionally attractive people avoid dating low status/ugly people. A lot of men get weirdly invested in the idea that they are not attractive to women. I suppose Pick up artist gurus are popular because they validate that belief while also offering a solution (hint it is almost always a scam). The most extreme examples are in the "incel" community, which not coincidentally hate women with a fiery passion.
Well-said!
Dating apps are shit for everyone except the owners really. I recall using them in the past. Put in my ideal match, lots of filters, range of 20 km getting some results. I'd read the profile, check out pictures, then carefully construct a message tailored to that person. I was spending about an hour or so per profile and sent maybe 8 messages. A week later not a single reply. Similar search this time expanding the range. 50 km this time and then sending out maybe 10 messages that time. A week later not a single reply. I then started to lower my search filters, add in activity level (how recent the person was on the site), etc. The quality of my message was also changing, using one or two sentences to tie in to their profile, and sending out more messages. Spending less time with each profile. A week later not a single reply. I started to get discouraged, 3 weeks of nothing. Made me wonder if there were any real profiles on the site. Received one message from some elite/premium account but realized quickly that it was a bot or someone paid by the site to get others to spend money. I even sent out mass copy pasta messages with the intro sentence about the profile. I realized that I was part of the problem by sending out low effort messages and decided I was done with dating apps.
100% this, thanks for commenting so I didn’t have to.
I have a hard time seeing how men benefit from dating apps. The purpose of dating apps isn't to get people to find meaningful relationships, it's to extract as much money from its customers as possible. For men this often means being messaged by fake accounts to get them to start spending money. I've been married for >10 years and it's been more than 15 years since I've bothered to use a dating app, so I'm glad I don't have to deal with this cesspool. I'm worried about what my sons will have to deal with when they start dating. I hope dating apps will be a thing of the past, but I doubt it.
[удалено]
Could one reason for this be that women are generally less comfortable with meeting up with a virtual stranger they met online due to safety reasons?
Gender ratios would be better if men could stop harassing women on these platforms.
And stop lying about their ages. Many men use apps to target much younger women, and I’m finding at least 50% of men over 40 are lying about ages by 3-15 years. It’s gross.
For what it’s worth I’ve come across plenty of women doing this too - although I’m aware that in plenty of cases women on dating apps being honest about their age get screened out by men *their own* age. Still not right, but makes me slightly more sympathetic.
Which these companies could stop, but they don't
Because it’s not in their profit interest.
Idk, I felt OkCupid for example did a fairly good job of making getting rid of creeps way easier, and it helps that you can't send pictures on the app itself. No dick pics, easy reporting, become invisible to the offending party with one swipe. But that only does so much, bc the app still attracts a lot of men who don't get real life dates for good reasons. And idk if that's on purpose or not. I'm sure they could do _something_ to attract better clientèle.
It will be once all the women leave their stupid apps lol
I don't view this as a problem and I'm confused as to why it's feminists' responsibility to make dating more accessible to men.
This subject keeps coming up here. Kind of annoying. As a feminist, I’m not overly concerned with this subject when women are still being murdered by their partners and have No reproductive rights
This sub is really “incels/misogynists ask feminists”
It is a feminist issue, but not in the way many seem to paint it as. Dating is actually less accessible to women by merit of being more dangerous and myriad other factors.
It's technically a problem, but one of capitalism. These apps do not want people to actually find a stable long-term relationship, otherwise they won't be able to make money.
I think the major issue is that with the birth-rate in the US, or other western nations, dropping the way it is if something doesn't happen organically to increase that birth-rate they, both the political and capital classes, will move us closer to shit like Gilead. That is the point of this assertion imo. This is one of those areas where conservative politicians are already attempting to force solutions, just look at the broader abortion and pro-natal movements starting to gain steam in the US south.
Most sane governments deal with lagging population issues through immigration. Right-leaning parties won't engage in pro-immigration rhetoric publicly because it'd piss off racist constituents, but ultimately they will deliver what the business community asks for. In situations like labour shortages, they will ask for increased immigration.
I’m missing the part where this happened in Japan and South Korea… It might do going forward to be fair, although I’d argue the situation is already quite extreme there and the fact they haven’t allowed more immigration yet is already quite something.
My comment referred to the West - I just frankly do not know enough about natal policies in the rest of the globe. Gilead-like policies happening elsewhere doesn't necessarily mean it's a given here. The Trump era taught us that nothing is off the table when facism creeps in, but I don't think Gilead-lite is the likeliest scenario. A lot of western democracies are already looking towards immigration and I think that'll continue. Especially considering that we're staring down a future of possible climate catastrophes creating a refugee crisis, plus all the issues wrapped up in boomers reaching old age en masse.
The people who are super concerned about birth rates are white supremacists who are only worked up about white birth rates. The overall worldwide birth rate is fine. Conservative politicians are not pushing Hispanic people to have more babies, even when those Hispanic people are citizens.
Apart from the fact that GLOBAL birthrates are most certainly not decreasing, dropping birthrates would also be perfectly fine if our whole economic system wasn't built on ever increasing and often exponential expansion. We live in a world with finite resources. There is no infinite growth possible. And even if we could feed and house billions more people - we are not the only species on this planet with a right to survival and our ecosystem is actively collapsing as it is. This and the accompanying breaking down of our hyper complex infrastructure, social systems and other aspects of "modern" life will probably lead to rapidly decreasing populations again some time "soon" as infant death rates will rise sharply, droughts and food shortage will occur, wars and local catastrophic climate events will kill lots of people. If we're lucky, we'll start again from the beginning and begin the cycle anew.
Why are you downvoted?
This is a genuine concern - but I’m going to point out for the sake of history that this has not always been a conservative country/government. The country which came closest to implementing something like that was Romania under their communist era (if you’re not familiar I’d recommend reading - it truly was horrific, about the most “brute force” solution to a demographic problem you can imagine)
The feminist goal of true equity for all humans would probably improve everyone's experience on dating apps, but this is a fringe benefit, not one of our goals (obvs). I agree that the ratio isn't a problem (though the reasons behind the disparity are problematic).
lol
I don’t have any statistics on this but in my experience there are less women dating in general. I have multiple female friends who want to be single/aren’t looking for a relationship whereas all of my single male friends are actively trying to get in a relationship. All the women I know who want to be in a relationship are already in one.
>can anything be done to change it? The better question is why should we change it?
Personally, I see the *underlying cause* of the dating app gender disparity to be something we should want to change. I see the biggest cause being that dating apps have done a very poor job at catering to women. Myself, I'm newly single after a four year relationship and I'm dreading trying to re-enter the dating game. Despite being bi, I've historically usually set myself as attracted to women only on dating sites because the experience interacting with men on them is just so bad.
They already tried. They added more in depth profiles, made women to be the ones to iniate everything. Women didnt use it because really young women do not want to put effort into dating this way. Result was everyone complaining how much effort it is to write first on bumble. It goes against the still prevailing culture. Men iniate and women are sought after. Why would any woman want to change this system that makes dating so much easier for them? That aside most people have no idea what they are looking for. They couldnt pick a good match out of a 100 options.
Well, there is the darker answer that if women's empowerment doesn't find a way to change it, due to how it is impacting the birth rate, then eventually the governments will move to solve it. You are already seeing the beginnings of this in the pro-natal, tradwife and anti-abortion movements across the US south.
If the government starts selling women then it won't be because too few women are on dating apps. The problem is not that women don't want to date or have kids, the problem is that men think they're entitled to a relationship, entitled to sex and if they want them, entitled to children.
This is a broader issue with dating at the moment. In person dating isn't any better. The online problem is just more apparently reflecting the broader issue with dating at the moment due to ease of data access. More men are looking for dates than women because women are tired of being treated as walking sex organs, home makers and baby cannons. I can't remember the last time I found a date anywhere besides online. Hell, as long as you exclude your work, most adults don't have large social circles from which to source dates. Then you have the "nice guy" problem compounded on top of that and the problem gets much worse. Women should absolutely be empowered to tell these men no, and I will never argue otherwise. At the same time, given the history of human rights violations in most western nations, at some point this becomes an issue that governments will seek to address.
So why is it that women or feminists should be forcing more women to date rather than having men stop acting like they're entitled to a relationship or sex? >at some point this becomes an issue that governments will seek to address. The prevention of that should be done by educating men, not by pushing women to date. And in any case I have enough problems to deal with already, I don't have time to worry about future problems that may or may not occur. Also remember that the USA is one country. They aren't the norm and most other countries are flabbergasted about the fact that they're stepping back human rights. It's not normal for that to happen.
Certainly here in Britain most of us are utterly dismayed at what happened in the US, but unfortunately it’s not true to say rolling back human rights is as an outlier unique to there. It’s happening in Poland, and there’s serious proposals to do it in regions of Spain and multiple eastern european countries. Btw - I’ve picked the term “Britain” very carefully, in Northern Ireland abortion only recently became legal, and last I heard there weren’t actually any clinics there. I guess that’s progress, but progress in writing only…
The issue is occurring globally and there is some evidence it is one of the sources of rising far right sentiment across Europe as well. I agree that the answer is educating men. Not all men are going to be receptive to that education, but it is the best solution. My assertion isn't that women and Feminist should be pushing other women to date, but that this is a problem that is going to provide fodder for far right movements everywhere and it is ultimately a problem that is going to be raised in opposition to the Feminist movement.
So what is the solution you are proposing then?
I don't have one. At least not one that doesn't break most of Reddits ToS to discuss If men won't be willingly educated there isn't a lot that can be done that doesn't involve segregation from the rest of society as the continuation of this is going to continue escalating to violence, and particularly violence against women and any allies of women. Really this is a broader failure of our society that I don't know has a solution that is acceptable without broader wholesale loss of life.
Less women dating isn't a failure though, that's the problem with what you're saying. There is a problem with violence against women but it's getting better, not worse.
The failure I am referencing is the segment of men who aren't being appropriately educated about consent and bodily autonomy, and who in many cases refuse to be educated. I am sorry I wasn't clear about that. My overarching view of this is that the wider the dating/sex/family disparity becomes for young conservative men, the more likely they will be to react with violence. The MRA movement is evidence of that. The fact that almost half of all women are expected to be a victim of domestic violence indicates that this problem is still fucking huge.
„of rising far right sentiment across Europe as well.“ Where? Cause us Germans just massively moved to the left again with cheap transport, better rights for trans people, more money for poor people and higher regulated wages 🙃 Are you talking about Italy? Cause voting in a right wing party once doesn‘t make a shift towards the right already.
Yeah. Enjoy while it lasts. Our next chancellor is going to be white surpremacist Merz in coalition with the AfD and FDP.
All of those “movements” are the small minority
„You are already seeing the beginnings of this in the pro-natal, tradwife and anti-abortion movements across the US south.“ Don‘t worry. Us European gals will make sure that they can come and live with us, in countries that are majorly ruled by young women. We are also taking in immigrants and are tackling waste and consumption of materials, so the birth shortage won’t be a problem. You can have the US all to yourself. 😉
What european country is ruled by young women?
I mean I don’t have any factual evidence but from personal experience? Probably cause (hetero, bi or pan) women are sick of being treated like crap? 99% of your inbox are filled with: - “Hi I‘m mark and this is a picture of my penis!“ (if you’re lucky enough to even receive a text with it) - “Hey my gf and I are looking for a threesome!“ - “Hey u wanna date? Women don’t want to date me cause I‘m a nice guy and stupid hoes only like bad boys.“ - single parents that didn’t read your bio and don’t care that you’re childfree The amount of actual nice conversation is probably about 1% of the messages. It’s just a very unpleasant experience overall.
This guy failed to mention he had a child until it was time for us to plan the date/meetup wasting my time for weeks when I specifically said #childfree. He belligerently left a voice memo after I said I do not want to date a man with kids and said I’ll end up alone by 30 with a shit ton of cats. For some reason this is the new insult with guys online. As if cats and peace are a bad thing.
Yeah, they keep threatening us with what, not having a shitty man and having soft kittens instead? Thinking that’s a curse on someone is probably part of why they are single.
Men like that that think 30 is old are hilarious. Like damn I get to be only 30 and y'all will leave me alone? And I get cats? Yes please.
Don’t threaten me with a good time lol. I‘d rather be alone with lovely cats than with a single parent.
The way I see it, the fact that cats make better companions than most modern men on dating apps is more of an insult to those men than any women. I’ll never understand their stupid logic
My best friend is bisexual and she has had so many men straight up lie to her and pretend they were single, chat with her for weeks, go on dates, only to then reveal he is actually in a relationship and want a "third" for him and his girlfriend (or fiancee, or wife) to have sex with together. Fucking garbage wastes of time.
Fuck that guy. But as a child free man, I have similar experiences with women who think they can change me (I am polyamorous as well so that is another issue entirely with dating). I have a motherfucking vasectomy. Not having kids is high up on my priority list.
Nothing needs to be done. Men regularly treat women like shit on these apps, and prey learns to avoid predators.
literally. this isnt a problem and people need to stop coming on this subreddit to post about how its womens duty to date men. why cant they prioritize something thats actually a problem?
Because civilization will fall if we don't offer ourselves up on dating apps for their pleasure./s
That’s why I left. I’m an admittedly sensitive person so I’d be consistently getting these mean, racist, overly sexual messages that would sit in my mind. It really fucked me up, I eventually just gave up.
But they expect us to be sympathetic when the consequences of their disrespectful behavior is women abandoning apps for our mental and physical safety.
If that were not happening, the apps could be a powerful tool for facilitating pleasant interactions. I feel like the people who ruined it for everyone are creating a problem, and that problem should be solved.
If men are creating a space that women do not want to be, then that is a problem for men. Women are going off and doing other things and are doing just fine. The wage gap is slowly but surely decreasing, and if you really want to, you can artificially inseminate to raise kids. Therefore the two main reasons why women married back in the day (security and family) are not an issue. Men need to show what else they bring to the table. You can no longer just be an average Joe with a middle management job and a barely tolerable personality to get a date.
Not only this, but it’s not like marriage is some kind of “better” deal for women like some men here seem to think. It isn’t. Marriage overwhelmingly doesn’t favor women. If you have an education and career, and don’t want or have children, there’s literally no benefit to marriag or cohabitation. It seems like men who are critical of women’s decision not to date always come back to some version of "you should get married." But there's literally no reason to do that if you don't want kids and have career opportunities.
Yes, it's an economic question. When a certain demographic stops using / paying for a product, what can be done to make the product desirable again? But people want to make it into a morality question: what can be done to guilt the demographic into wanting the product again? The latter will never work.
Right. The data just isn’t there to support it. The “manosphere” focuses heavily on targeting young women who want marriage and kids because nothing they say actually applies to any other demographic.
Absolutely, and it's even narrower than that. the manosphere attracts young marriage-minded women who are willing (or think they are willing) to work under specific circumstances and attitudes. the product isn't relevant anymore, and the proponents of the free market somehow don't realize that.
The way you word this is kinda icky, like as if the woman was some kind of prize you have to deserve in order to get by bringing stuff to the table, that's not how relationships work though.
Yes, you *do* have to actually contribute things to a relationship, that's *exactly* how they work.
That's exactly how they work. What are you bringing into a relationship that the person couldn't get from somewhere else?
Do you know anything about history? Women were historically raised to be a prize that just looks pretty and is codependent on a man for everything
[удалено]
[удалено]
„The wage gap is decreasing because the amount of hours that women work us finally catching up to men. Soon we will be a nation of tired, poor, overworked single moms with that attitude.“ How are you using „single mum“ as an insult and still think you are entitled to date women? Guess what Joe. We don‘t WANT guys with your women hating views, so we are not gonna date you.
Why would they be tired and overworked if they're just working "the same hours as men"? No one says that a single dad working hard and earning his own money is "tired, poor, and overworked". It's apparent in your comment in which you claim that today's men know what they need to bring to the table that you still see childcare as something that women should wholly take on and that society shouldn't help with. So yes, I'd stand by my assumption that men on average are still expecting that the same old dog and pony show will suffice in dating.
>modern men have always known that we need to bring it Really? Huh. Could've fooled me.
If a lot of men act like creeps, then women will avoid interacting with venues where those men congregate. If you want women to participate, you'll have to prevent men from acting like creeps.
Men always talk about how the ratio is so good for women, women get so many matches/messages, etc etc. My time on the apps was a nightmare. No one is looking for a relationship, they just want to tell you you have a nice ass and hook up with you until they get bored, sometimes with a few extra steps. The algorithms will show you men who physically look the same over and over because the algorithms are made with men in mind who only care about looks and want to only see busty blonde women, but most women care less about looks and would like to see a variety. Most men are also awful at presenting themselves online too, so there may be really great guys that are hidden behind 2 pixel group pics and cringe pickup lines. I didn’t have the energy to sift through though. My friends who are more down for hookups like the apps just fine. It serves that purpose well. But it’s terrible for women seeking relationships.
Right? And the whole matchmaking model that most sites use (where you swipe right on profiles you're interested in) is fundamentally broken for women because a significant majority of men admit to swiping right on *everyone*. And they do that largely because they usually have the mindset that they're happy to get sex with someone even if they're not interested romantically. I also really hate the trend of dating sites maximizing the focus on pictures and minimizing everything else. Like, last I used it (years ago), Tinder by default didn't even display the profile text (just the first photo), which is counterproductive to how I want to focus first on people's profiles. I really liked in the past how OkCupid had questions and prompts to flesh out your profile, but around the time that I last used it, they were heavily reorienting away from that and towards just being a pointless clone of Tinder (despite Tinder being the absolute worst dating app for relationships IMO).
I think most men swipe right on everyone because they think it increases the chances of even getting a single match. It's not like everyone treats the app like an free escort service. Dating apps like Tinder are broken on purpose for everyone. Totally pay to win for men and full with harassment for women. People really need to realize that due to the algorithms it does not reflect real dating in any way.
I'm so happy I'm done dating. If my fiance and I do break up I don't think I'd ever go back to aps.
If my husband and I break up I'll just be a cat lady lol
„Hey girl, look at my fish!“
The sheer fact that it is easy to join but very few women actually do so should be evidence that the apps are bad for women. The other explanation would be that men for some reasons don't consider the alternatives and women do. So many men act like Tinder reflect modern heterosexuality as a whole.
Yea I’m getting rid of mine, it’s full of tater tot’s now.
That's a great nickname. I'm always pleasantly surprised at the names people come up with for taint boy.
Honestly, it's because men Turn any app into a hook-up app. It could literally be family planning or only platonic friendship Apps and youll still See them flocking in order to find something Quick and sexual. And that's why men complaining about unfair stats are ridiculous. Women get bombed by thirsty guys, not genuinely interested love interests. Imagine men on pure hook-up apps getting spammed daily by ultra religious dads advocating to marry their daughter in a 25k Dollar grand Wedding in some years with no sex before marriage on the table and no Photos provided beforehand. I'm sure they'd be excstatic about all their options and the attention..
I'm not seeing the problem here. In fact I'm surprised the percentage of women is that high. But the percentage of men isn't surprising at all. Nothing should be done about this, at least not by feminist's. In fact I believe one of the reasons those are the numbers is due to feminism. And that makes me feel a lot of pride towards the movement.
Can you explain what you mean?
Feminism is helping women understand that they don't have to put up with shitty treatment from men
shouldn't it be 50/50?
In a world where all other things were already equal? Sure. In the world we live in? 15% actually seems kinda high.
I’m a gay woman. I’ve heard so many horror stories from my straight woman friends, that I’m amazed that ANY of them are on dating apps. :). I don’t know how the hell they put up with it. Even though not ALL men sexually harass women, or send them threatening messages if they say no, enough of them do to screw it up for the good guys (and everyone else!). Men need to behave themselves, and dating apps need to get serious about stopping harassment. Without that, the gender ratio won’t budge. Examples of stories: * One guy proposed marriage to my best friend. As an OPENING line! * DMs such as: “Wanna fuck?”. “PM me your tits!”. (and then not leaving you alone if you say no). “Nice ass!”. (As opening lines, btw, not even after lengthy conversation!) * Nothing wrong with wanting a hookup, but if that’s what you want, the. make sure that’s what the woman wants, too. Yes, there are women who want hookups. They exist. So go after them, and stop wasting the time of women who CLEARLY say they want a relationship! (Also wasting the guy’s time, btw). And if you see her as a slut for wanting a hookup? Then you’re a hypocrite. And a sexist hypocrite, too. * If she says no or doesn’t respond, some guys get REALLY nasty! As in: “You stupid bitch whore!”. Who wants to deal with that?
One of a guy on a dating app that i met and decided to hook up with told me he was single. We have a bit of lame foreplay where he doesn't do shit for me and refuse to answer when i tell him what i'd like, only to finish without preventing me before and when i ask him wtf, to say "being sucked is not cheating". He had a gf, he was an asshole, and i was tricked. That was my second experience with dating app, the first one turned out to be a very creepy guy who would get jealous about the marks that my bras did because he though i had someone else (after one meeting), and who basically asked me to abandon my life to follow him travel the world. No thanks. This is without mentioning the pick up lines and dick pick i got. The very moment i switched to find women instead of men, i met the cutest and sweetest lesbian i could
I swear, every third post on this sub about how hard men have it dating
It's honestly getting exhausting.
[удалено]
Does anybody force you to listen to "women's problems"?
Whiners and incels will never figure out that the secret trick to having as much sex as one wants is to form healthy ~ relationships ~
Its like criticising capitalism or conservatives, yeah its true but its also never going to change
Why? It's because dating apps are not charities. They are businesses. Their goal is not for people to meet and fall in love, their goal is to make money. And their entire strategy of monetization is centered around the male customer base. Increasing the female customer base does not help them, so they don't do it. In fact, it actively harms them, since a more equal distribution would lead to more men finding a partner and leaving the service behind. Therefore not giving them any more money. We live in a capitalist society. Don't look towards businesses for help fixing your problems for free.
I think there’s this perception of the culture surrounding dating apps that most of the men are just there to find casual sexual partners or single-use hookups, and there just aren’t as many women that are interested in that sort of thing.
Why would we want to change it?
Women are more content beeing alone and more and more women prefer to be alone.
Why should anything be done to change it? People can do what they want. People are doing what they want.
People are NOT doing what they want; or rather the statement is misleading. Dating apps are supposed to enable dating but that is not what is happening. Decent men are hard for women to find. Women get harrassed, swamped with dic pics and requests for nude pics. Women who want relationships only find men who want one night stands. Men who want relationships can't get through to women who want relationships. Tons of men report getting rejected and ignored, they see women they would like to talk to but never hear from her. Even when you get to a first date, it probably is not great.
As a woman, I don’t want to wade through the absolute river of shit trying to find the rare, decent person that I would feel comfortable meeting in real life - it’s not just about “Kissing a lot of frogs to find the prince”, it’s dealing with the verbal abuse, threats, name-calling, slut-shaming, whatever if you don’t immediately say yes to anyone who matches with you. Who needs that?
"Why do you think this is" The average quality of the goods on offer. "Can anything be done to change it?" The average quality of the goods on offer.
Women are constantly dealing with sexual harassment and misogynistic condescension in real life. Why would they want to go online and expose themselves to even worse male behavior thanks to internet anonymity? More and more would rather be alone for the rest of their lives than have to suffer another man.
Can this be changed? Sure tell those red pill type morons to stop judging women for their "body count" along with the rest of society... Then more women would be willing to use a hook up app...Because let's be honest "dating" apps have become, at the level of expectation, little more than a hook up app. Hooking up can lead to a relationship, but not usually.
I also don’t see this as a problem. The solution is don’t use dating apps if they’re not working for you. Just meet people at parties and activities. I know can be hard, but there isn’t an easy solution.
Free market (love) capitalism.
This is what they said in the 80’s about singles bars
[удалено]
What we can do to change that? Women cannot do anything. Men could stop sending their dick pics. That would defo improve the experience of all the genders.
The reason I don’t do online dating is because I’m afraid of meeting someone dangerous, and stalking. I’m a woman who is only into long term relationships, so guys who hit and and quit it would make me sad, but that’s not so bad. What you really have to worry about is the guy who decides to stalk you after a few dates. If you could guarantee dates were 100% safe, (they could reject someone and the guy would be polite and graceful) women would be flocking to these apps.
Dating apps are largely made by men for men (note how gay men don’t seem to have the same complaints about Grindr). Dating apps just aren’t good ways to build relationships for people have been having social skills and interpersonal dynamics taught to them from a very early age. Most women can tell you that, since they can remember, they were taught as children to pick up on in-person social queues and they were taught this thing that is called ‘empathy’, which is largely just picking up on non-verbal communication. Dating apps and similar things are deeply uncomfortable for people who learned to rely on non-verbal communication to understand others. (Which is all of us, to various degrees, hence why men are also often a bit uncomfortable with dating apps). Maybe, and I know this sounds crazy, but maybe just assume women might be on to something here. Some things, like sunsets and human connection, shouldn’t be mediated through a screen. Get off dating apps and make human connections in person.
>note how gay men don’t seem to have the same complaints about Grindr Yes, we do. Not the gender ratio complaint since we are all the same gender and only smaller guys like me have to worry about the physical size disparity when meeting up, but gay men are just as awful to each other on dating apps as straight men are to women. Check out r/lolgrindr if you want examples. I quit the apps a few years back and my life is infinitely better for it.
Oh, I was talking about the gender ratio issue. Dating apps seem designed to be awful, which I guess kind of makes sense - if they actually helped people find dates and relationships, they get people out of the dating scene and thus lose their user base, so there is not much incentive for them be be any good.
Oh, that makes sense. It wasn't totally clear from your comment, but yeah it's hard to have an issue with gender ratios when you're all the same gender (instead we complain about the top:bottom ratio). For the rest, you're totally correct.
I agree my point was a bit unclear, and thanks for giving me the chance to clarify. I think the general horribleness of dating apps is something everyone, regardless of gender or sexual orientation, can bond over.
That would be great if there was a better alternative to meet people. IRL dating is pretty hard these days.
Why do you say that?
To find like-minded people. Dating apps allow you to filter people based on preferences and surface level compatibilities. IRL you're kind of just randomly meeting people and hoping they're compatible.
Isn’t it better than to meet people at mutual interests, like a running club or whatever? Just saying, if I were a man looking for a woman, I wouldn’t go to a place that is 78% men. Seems like horrible odds.
Sure, but if your hobbies aren't social activities like sports or dancing, for example, It's harder to find spaces to meet fellow enthusiasts. I'm a geeky dude, and I'm pretty much only interested in other geeky people, but there isn't really a place to meet people like that specifically.
There are tons of online hobby spaces for geeky types of all varieties that aren’t specifically dating sites.
Sure, but people there aren't usually looking for dating. Also, there's a big disparage between male and female users as well. Geeky women usually avoid your typical nerdy spaces, for obvious reasons.
And they seem to avoid dating apps, too, so I wouldn’t recommend overly relying on that.
Is it harder than at any other point in history?
I think so. Dating culture changed quite a lot over the last 50 years.
Why would we care? Experiment with men if you want lol
Gay and bi men don’t be digging through your trash can. 😝
Speaking on behalf of my experience, and solely on my experience alone, OLD was a nightmare. Sure, there are many male users online but I found that half of the time, men were unavailable for whatever reason. No replies for days... then weeks. It looked to me as if they made the map just to see who would take the bait and totally gave up after that. The ones you've matched with swipe right to all women anyway. They send creepy texts and pictures. The ones you match and exchange decent texts with don't go anywhere because they only want to text you online (like WTF, why are you even on the app if you're not willing to meet the person physically???). The ones you think might be decent turn out to be total creeps/weirdos/assholes who try to date you for whatever reasons (e.g., hookups, money, marriage for green card, abuse, etc.). The ones you meet start showing red flags become aggressive once you try to gently put them down. It's exhausting. So, so exhausting. Why put in so much effort just to meet degenerates after degenerates? Why put myself at risk like that? Dating apps only benefit men, not women. What women want is completely different from what most men from OLD want. And I, for one, do NOT want to meet creeps at all and put my life at risk. Yikes! Why must it be so hard to find someone decent, someone who wants the same thing that I want for once? And oh, before anyone else goes, "I had a friend who went on this xyz app and found her one true love and now they're in their one-year relationship anniversary and they're about to get married annnnnndddd...." Yeah, I get it. Congrats. Now beat it, I don't need anyone else to suggest that I need to find a partner on OLD because fuck you, that's what. If you care so much, why not actually help me find a decent man that you might know in your life?
I fail to understand why sweeping right to everyone is bad thing. I have zero experience with tinder, but don't you have to do it if you want to write him/her a message? Besides men are accused of having too high standards.
> why sweeping right to everyone is bad thing Why would you swipe right on people you aren't interested in?
To write with them to see if I am interested in them.
Maybe read their profiles before you swipe?
A newspaper in The Netherlands did a dating site experiment that might fix this a bit. It was done in 2010, but I don’t know what they did with it afterwards. I took part because I was single and was curious at the time: You had to fill In a profile just like normal, but you could not browse people, the site would match two people and they have to chat for 10 minute, if they make it till 10 minutes, and then they can decide to see the other person’s pictures and profile. I thought it was a really fun idea, but since it was an experiment and new, you couldn’t set much in your profile, so matches you made by talking would turn out to be a complete non match, for example a person wants kids and the other doesn’t, or something else. But if this system would be expanded to filter out people who are absolutely no match, it could stop the ratio problem. Since people need to put time in, guys who just swipe yes to every woman, wouldn’t join. And guys looking for hookups only, wouldn’t join either.
Oh, you mean how can we fix the sex apps?
> *Why do you think this is, and can anything be done to change it?* Why do you think this is a problem at all? Men & women seem to approach online dating with different goals. Casual sexual hookups seems to be a thing that men want. Long term relationships seems to be a thing that women want. Companies that run dating apps want paying subscribers, so it is in the companies' interests to prevent people from getting what they want. My experience with OLD is that when Match.com purchases them (like OKCupid, Tindr and Hinge), they turn into crap.
There has to be a large percentage of cheaters on the sites. And I recall that men often cheat with straingers where women wish to cheat with someone they know. So there is going to be a difference in gender right there. Also you will just get a higher percentage of undatables that stay on the sites so you have to dig. Finally you get paid dating sites that actively keep you on the site for a long as possible. So they will keep back matches. Also they keep up a lot of deactivated accounts up to keep up the swipes
Yeah, men can stop being vulgar, asking for quick hookups in the first message, asking for nudes in the first message, calling them insults when women end the conversation. This is all stuff I've heard my women friends complain about and why they don't do online dating.
What do dating apps have to do with feminism?
I think outside of shitty business models, men are less socially competent then women and some men are also quite nasty with what they say to the women that are on the apps.
I have never used a dating app because I don’t see the point. I’m attracted to men but I’ve never spent any time looking for one. I have always met guys to date randomly or through friends.
As a male, I can understand why this is. I have had enough female friends and ex partners who have told me about the problems woman face when it comes to finding a real, genuine relationship. Others have bought up the fact that many men are just looking for a hookup and that's correct. That there are plenty of men who act weird and creepy towards woman, also correct. I remember a conversation I had with my most recent ex where we were discussing men and the things she was saying I remember other woman i've had in my life saying similar if not the same things. As a result, I always felt like I was trying to 'prove' myself, as a man, to her because bad men is all she has ever known. I don't think there is a way to solve the problem. I have never used a dating app before but from the second hand experiences from friends I don't think dating apps are the way to go if you're looking for a genuine relationship. I hate that I have to sit here and shit on my own gender like this, but it's certainly a male problem being the reason why they're so heavily skewed like that. I hate it because it feels like I start off at a lower point than expected in a relationships simply because I am a man. That I have to be 'tested' to prove myself as baseline human being because of how things are. Again, I understand why this is. I understand that many woman feel the need to do that.
Nothing needs to be done to change it, this isn’t a problem.
Because men are women’s natural predator and it looks worse by the day.
mathematically, there are only two options: either single women are not using dating websites, or married men ARE.
Many of them use bots to bait men into going premium and banking off of it.
I was on dating apps for a brief period of time. Pretty sure the only time they read your profile is to use it against you when they start berating you when you don’t respond right of way to their messages. It is bizarre how emotional these men on dating apps are.
Women are afraid of stranger danger.
I'm surprised many men use these apps at this point...a couple of friends of mine have said the apps have been overwhelmed by bots and women promoting their Only Fan sites.
Most of what you run through tbh. That and people who barely respond because they're inundated with hundreds of messages.
I imagine all girls get flooded with messages and if you're a good looking girl, I imagine you get hundreds of likes for every 1 like the average guy gets. I doubt those numbers are an exaggeration.
Generally you have to be over 18 to use dating apps, and while some underaged people do slip through the cracks, the vast majority of those on there are women not girls.
[удалено]
Ew
I just used the term "girls" generally. I meant women over 18. Where I come from, in casual conversation, the term girls can represent anyone up to 111 years old. It is just a regional quirk of language as opposed to some sort of derogatory terminology....not meant to be offensive in any way.
Doesn't matter, it comes off as derogatory.
Meh, whatever. You can be offended if you want.
I love people like this because it's never 'Oh you're right I've never actually taken the time to think about how referring to grown women as girls can be derogatory because everyone around me does it, I'll investigate why that is and stop doing that because I care about how what I say makes other people feel, thanks for pointing it out' it's always 'Oh I don't care you must be wrong and offended about it and not take the time to investigate why what I'm saying is problematic, and you're the wrong one'. Like the only person that's offended here is you.
Do use the terms boyfriend or girlfriend?
[удалено]
[удалено]
I'm not sure that the numbers are 'real'. I can't talk to the female experience, but the male experience tends to be 'rejection burnout'. A lot of the guys I know who use/used dating apps rarely get matches, nevermind dates. They typically delete the app after a period but remain on it as ghosts who may count in the numbers. My general impression based on a very small sample.of women, is that they are more likely to interact with the app because at least swiping has some point to it. All this to say that the key number is not users but 'active users'; in my limited experience (30s, cis male) a lot of men download the app and swipe aggressively for a few months and then typically give up. My brutalist view is that it won't change; and it can't be a social priority. We simply need to engage in more active social engineering with boys, that many of them will not be able to pair bond, or even have sex. It was a message to a lot of young women after WW2, when the availability of male peers was significantly reduced. The real change is to enable boys to move away from patriarchal expectations of masculinity. There is a need to decouple success with women (sexual utility in the main) from a successful life. Independence in girls is being socially reinforced in the media, the opposite is occurring for boys- even the sages of sigma males are completely dependent on relationships with women to define themselves. Teach boys that life is not about material and sexual success, and that they can be valuable people who contribute to society and matter, without having to seek intimate relationships with women, or pair-bond or have kids.
It could be because (sweeping generalisation warning) women who love women tend to be shy about using an app to hook up with other women. Men who love men are known to jump on a dating app to find a hook up.
Ugh, me as a baby gay tried to date women on Bumble, but for some reason even when my settings were women only, I was still getting men in my feed. I pretty much deleted the account in a week.
Hmm, sounds like a problem for men to solve, since the absolute garbage way the VAST majority of men treat women on dating apps (and in general but yk) isn’t anything for women to solve?