It’s funny how, little less than a decade ago when we were in our tweens, meeting boys on the internet was an ‘ABSOLUTE NO NO OH GOD ARE YOU CRAZY HE’S CLEARLY A PEDOPHILE PLANNING ON LOCKING YOU IN HIS BASEMENT FOR THE NEXT 15 YEARS’. Internet dating was the sturdy domain of our twice-divorced middle aged mothers and we all knew that, when we grew up, the man of our dreams would saunter into our [insert name of high-flying place of work here] and we’d be sorted for life. The internet was for Neopets and MySpace. Sometimes we’d talk to boys we didn’t know on MSN, and sometimes we’d even send them pictures of ourselves in our training bras … but that’s as far as it went.
Since our tweens, the iPhone has been invented, propelling social etiquette further forward than any other period in the last however many years and affecting pretty much every aspect of our daily lives. Mating rituals are no exception. What was considered ‘desperate’, ‘sad’, or ‘specifically for lame old people who can’t go out and pull in real life’, has now become an accepted social norm among the hip, young 20-something elite – internet dating has had an app-over. And just like facebook, twitter, and instagram, we’re all obsessed.
If I’m honest I can see why. The magic of talking to boys in Canada when you were snuggled up in your pink fluffy princess bedroom of your pre-teens was that you could construct a version of yourself without flaws; a witty, intelligent, blurry-webcam-quality-enhanced you who always said the right thing and who’s chest was a good two cup sizes bigger than in real life. After suffering the soul-crushing disappointment of finding out that the boy at school didn’t fancy us, and was going to the cinema with that HUSSY from year 8 instead, it was nice to be able to retreat to the comfort of our PC and the boys that we had tricked into falling in love with us. And I’m assuming the appeal of online dating to our parents’ generation is pretty similar. They’re forever complaining about their hectic work and family schedules and that there’s ‘no opportunity to meet good men’, so it makes sense to exploit the possibilities of the ever-expanding world wide web to kick start their love lives: but it doesn’t explain why the concept – albeit a sparkly new modernised version of it – has appealed so much to a largely speaking socially adept body of students and young professionals.
I first was made aware of the ‘geosocial networking’ apps by the absolutely overwhelming response of my gay friends to Grindr. It’s probably worth noting here that Grindr is not, strictly, a dating app, but rather is widely considered to be a ‘hook up’ device – it’s popularity among my gay male friends has always been primarily related to its usefulness in locating nearby one-night-only conquests. So, I had disregarded this particular concept as applicable to the broader social spectrum of 20-somethings on account of the fact that, true to our 14-year-old selves, happily trotting over to strangers house for no-strings sex was not safe and they were, as previously stated, quite clearly all rapists. But then Blendr showed up, and I stood corrected. My assumption that women would be less inclined to travel, un-chaperoned, to meet randomers was proved utterly void – obviously I’m just a big prude, and need to learn to walk on the wild side. But gradually, surely, these apps started infiltrating the entirety of my network of single friends, and soon I was the only one to have not jumped on the bandwagon. So when Tinder turned up on my radar, it seemed comparatively inoffensive. Marketed as an actual bona fide ‘dating app’ (just like POF and Zoosk), initial basal physical attraction gives way to an opportunity to actually converse (like on traditional dating sites) and then, possibly, entertain the idea of meeting up. Quite apart from the fact that ‘dating’ in itself seems like a horrendously daunting and grown-up thing to do, the app follows a far more conventional notion of ‘boy meets girl’ than its predecessors seemed to, and I was willing to give it a shot. So it was, that a few happy-swipes and strategically chosen pictures later, I had a nice chunky selection of men to chat to or even, *shock horror*, go on a DATE with.
But, sadly, my affair with Tinder, or geosocial networking at large, was short lived. The novelty of the message ‘it’s a match!’ every time I deigned to swipe right (indicating the profile has caught your fancy) soon wears off and only served to prove that, yes, guys really are pretty desperate. And the other unavoidable truth is that I had absolutely no intention of meeting up with these men in the first place. I guess those early ominous warnings that people on the internet are probably not who they say they are aren’t that easy to shake off, no matter how hard social networking culture tries to convince me otherwise. No, truth of the matter is, Tinder’s appeal to me was restricted the fact that it makes a great little portable ego booster. But I’m loathe to plaster my details (and location) across the internet for a plethora of strangers to see for the sake of ‘a little ego boost’. Especially since, unlike my 15-year-old self and the match.com obsessive generation before us, I’m still perfectly capable of getting my ego boost in real life.