We live a majority of our lives online, and that includes dating. Back in the day, dating was a face-to-face, extremely personal experience. Now with the invention of apps like Tinder, Bumble and PlentyOfFish, meeting the love of your life is more like you choosing the best flower in the patch, instead of you coming across a sunflower on a walk.
Social media has given us the power to choose. Instead of getting to know someone in a one-on-one conversation, we can choose if we like them based on a small bio and a few pictures. The funny thing is, we are embarrassed about it. In Elder Millenial, a comedy show created by Iliza Shlesinger on Netflix, she sheepishly admits that she met her fiance on a dating app, like everyone else in the audience. Online dating has become an almost normal taboo. None of us want to admit we have been there and done that, and we look down on people who find the loves of their lives between the swipes of Tinder.
What happened to the romance? What happened to boys who knocked on girls doors instead of sending a text from the driveway? Social media ruined it. Social media killed the butterflies in our stomach and brought us digital hearts in our DMs. Social media turned a sweet crush to a lustful need and as girls, we now sit in our bedrooms waiting for a text or on the rare occasion, a call from the boy you have never even met in real life. You’ve only seen him from behind a cell phone screen. We have traded face to face for FaceTime. We have sacrificed dinner dates for Skype dates, and we have chosen the old time love for the modern lust.
I still believe that there is a little bit of that traditional dating lingering around. I still believe in dinner dates, meeting the parents and making sure your siblings have approval before you even think about going on a second date. I still believe in fairytale happy endings and that someday, my Prince Charming will come, and not in the form of a Tinder profile.