Online Dating Isn’t Going Away, But Something Needs To Change
So I decided to do something about it
When I think about meeting new people, I imagine lying in bed alone, thumb swiping from one face to the next. It’s usually late and dark save for the small glow of my iPhone, the time of night where nothing is clear but the magnitude of one’s loneliness. I study the expressions of strangers on my screen, searching for a hint of self-awareness in their smiles. We’ll match, or not, it hardly matters. The chances that we’ll message are low. And if we do chat, the chances that we will carve out time in our already too-busy lives to make space for each other is almost zero. Mostly, swiping is a game, the goal of which is not to kill Angry Birds or to organize colored candies, but to stave off our collective loneliness, one night at a time.
In 2019, online dating has become so prevalent that it is nearly synonymous with dating at large. Swiping a stranger’s face at a bar has become (at least anecdotally) far more common than talking to a stranger at a bar. This is not all bad. In addition to fewer men inserting themselves into women’s private conversations at bars, studies show that online dating has increased inter-racial couples and makes long-term relationships stronger. When online dating works, it really works. But success stories are the outliers, not…
