Bad selfies, boring convos, and no sense of what women actually want, dating apps are on the out.
When it comes to exploring the dating world at uni you seem to be left with two options, Hinge or
Tinder. Every student that is also looking for love (or sex), you can bet will have a profile. It can’t be
denied that scrolling through Hinge with your housemates seems like a right of passage, itâs like a
game, seeing who pops up that you know, jumping with excitement when you get that match youâve
been waiting for, trying not to overthink why theyâre not replying to your messages. But I can’t help
but think âis this itâ? Is this dating in a modern world? Gone are the days of âmeet cutesâ and âslow
burnâ love stories, instead theyâre being replaced by a like to a profile that youâve carefully curated
to show off your best self.
My parents were introduced to each other by friends, as were my grandparents. Numerous friends’
parents met at school, my aunt was an air hostess, and her future husband was a passenger that
asked for her number. But now these stories are getting shorter, if theyâre still being told at all.
People donât even bother asking anymore- seeing as it will likely just be a dating app. I love seeing
the TikTok accounts that post peoples âmeet cutesâ, seeing how strangers met their partners, often
telling stories of romantic gestures and âfateâ. You canât help but wonder, âdoes this love still existâ?
We live in an online world, getting picked up and taken out for dinner or flowers being bought for
you is rare and fleeting, instead itâs a like on Hinge or a match on Tinder. Dating apps have redefined
the modern love story.
Arguably, there are positives to dating apps, Iâm not going to dispute that. You can connect with
people across the world, weave out those you know arenât for you before wasting time (and often
money) on a date. For many it can offer a safe space to be open about who you like and what youâre
looking for, when doing so in public might not be so easy. However, there is one key thing dating
apps take away from the dating experience: risk. As French philosopher Alain Badiou says âlove is a
spark of coincidence, free from calculationâ– the exact opposite of what dating apps would have you
believe. Publicity slogans for French online dating site Meetic include âget perfect love without
sufferingâ, and âbe in love without falling in loveâ, but what is love without suffering? The suffering
that can come from being vulnerable and opening yourself up to other people is part of what makes
love so poetic and romantic. What would Titanic be without the great love story and ultimate
tragedy of Jack and Rose? Would The Notebook still be coined an iconic romance if it was not for the
suffering and pain the characters experienced?
Take a liberal climate rights activist, would they ever swipe right on the profile of conservative
finance bro? Probably not. Yet, they could fall for each-other if they met in a dimly lit jazz club, three
glasses of wine in. They could end up having an epic love story, one in which they begin to
understand and respect each others differing views- a story straight from a romance novel, but this
story will never begin because they swiped left on a mere indifference. Often love is meeting
someone you never prepared for, someone you never could have expected to connect with, the very
anti-thesis of what a dating app is.
A personâs love life is undoubtably one of the most personal things about them, using dating apps
makes this connection less personal, instead creating a transactional process that lacks the human
connection that is so vital when dating someone. Theyâre designed in such a way to keep you stuck,
allowing the apps and the companies behind them to capitalise on keeping you ruminative and
dissatisfied. Often too much focus is placed on perfection, only exasperated by the fact that on
Hinge, for example, you only get a limited number of likes per day before payment is demanded.
This creates pressure to not âwasteâ a like, reinforcing the idea of waiting for perfection, which
usually leads to the very discontent that ensures you stay a loyal customer to the app that is
âdesigned to be deletedâ. The more you focus on finding someone who ticks all your boxes, the more
perfectionist you become, the more likely you are to rule someone out within moments of meeting
them. The more likely you are to rule someone out, the more you’re crawling back to the app,
swiping to see some more. With an endless supply of potential matches, itâs no surprise that people
keep going back for one more like, one more swipe, one more date.
Despite this, many great love stories have begun on a dating app, and Iâm not trying to take away
from that. They can be a great tool to make connections with many people you otherwise would
never of spoke to and can make the idea of going on a date feel a lot less daunting when you know
the other person has already âlikedâ you. In this modern world itâs just important to remember that
true connection out there still exists, your ability to love is not reliant on the number of likes you
receive on Hinge.