This is really a monumental societal change.
3rd spaces are nearly completely destroyed, and online seems to be the main option for ppl now.
I’m going to start dating again sometime soon, so this is something I’ve been thinking about a lot.
I hate that if I go on an app and make a contact, the ostensible purpose will be to date. When that’s the purpose, at some point an evaluation will have to be made. Either that purpose is met or it isn’t. You could have a conversation about being friends or considering your options, but I’m sure starting that conversation feels awkward and hurtful. It would feel like downgrading them from the original intent behind meeting.
Not starting that conversation could be delaying the dreams of two people though, so there would be a time crunch to make a decision before I might be ready. It feels like this will inevitably end up with throwing aside people who could be great to have as friends.
A connection shouldn’t be a decision, it should be something that happens. I’d rather just hang out with someone with the expectation that we’re hoping to be friends, and if there is a connection we’ll see it in each other sooner or later. Unfortunately for me, striking up conversations with single women to be friends with while having the thought of going further in the back of my mind might as well be the definition of creeper behavior.
Needing an app through a business to find love is fucking depressing.
Why is it a blue whale?
Well, I heard a big goal of every app these days is to get whales… Maybe this is what they meant? O.o (/jk)
Soon it’ll be the neighborg
Yes, absolutely. But also: I wonder how much of the online stat is stuff like people who met in online communities/groups compared to, say, dating sites and apps.
Because I could absolutely see a large portion of that line being people who met after joining a local meetup group for a shared interest like tabletop games, hiking, sports, etc.
It used to be that the dating pool was very limited in the way that making friends and dating in school is, where the odds are good that the thing you and your friends have most in common is your age and the distance that you live from each other. It wasn’t until college that I really met a diverse group of people who all shared a common interest in what they were passionate about. Nowadays I can go online, find people nearby who share a hobby of mine (or even meet people through an online hobby first and then physically meet years later), and maybe find lifelong friends or partners through that rather than somebody my friend happens to know or somebody I work with.
Nobody finding love in brothels anymore :'(
Alabama folk don’t even need to leave their home to find a life partner!
Fuck the commodification of human relationships. I wish people wouldn’t support that
Perfekt graph to display a shit society
I mean, we met online but not on a dating site.
First long term relationship, brother of my friend who came down here from up north. Had kids, never married, at midlife he got radicalized and hella racist and abusive, we split dramatically after 21 years, (not all his fault, I also did regrettable things in response to what was going on).
Second round met online, had a date, hooked up for awhile, really got on well. He’d had a string of 2 year relationships (from “good on paper” matches from eHarmony) so I said after 2 years we can live together. Our kids all got along, his parents liked me after awhile, he wanted to get married, I said you can ask after we’ve lived together 2 years. We are happy a dozen years in.
I don’t think it matters how you meet but it DOES hurt to think of people as a commodity, all that swiping and trying to maximize compatibility. People are people not clothing or toys.
all that swiping and trying to maximize compatibility. People are people not clothing or toys.
Exactly, all these apps need the user to be self absorbed. “Who’s YOUR right fit? Who is YOUR type? Who fits YOUR personal fantasy narrative?”
Love is about two people giving themselves toward each other, not obsessing over their “ROI” in some transactional economic thinking. But that simply doesn’t compute to a CEO and natural human friendship doesn’t return 4x to investors every quarter, so it’s gotta go, right?
Building a relationship should be out of interest in the other soul, and finding that person isn’t what these algorithms promote. They turn dating into just another job hunt with metrics to meet, a “market” of desirability, bullshit interviews, performative fakery, marketing, and ego.
I also met my partner online, but ~20 years ago on World of Warcraft LOL. Younger people ask me for dating advice and I’m like “Stay off those stupid apps and just go meet people who might like what you like and see what happens!”
Yeah that does bother me about the graph. It’s the digital age, you can’t just lump one value to “online” and expect it to be a representation that makes any sense, did they meet on a dating app? As gamers? Facebook friends? I met my fiancee on deviantart after she liked one of my photos and messaged me to tell me so.
Society is online now, third spaces are still a thing but they’re in a different form. This data is presented in a way to make you feel bad about the globalization of the Internet
Only goes to 2020. I think that after 2020, the online dating scene has seen a pretty sizeable decline.
Thats good news, but now I go to find newer stats.
No… no newer stats.
This is the most upsetting graph ive seen in many years… and this is why so many people are single. Its the reason I am single. I absolutely abhor “online dating”. The couple times I did try it it was regrettable, and I dont want to do that again. Lord, help me find a suitable wife.
Yeah those apps are predatory. Good call.
I’m praying for you there, friend. This is really sad seeing what’s happening to human relationships. It’s very INhuman.
The best thing you can do is be your best, genuine self, and go engage in what’s left that other people do together. Meetups, volunteering, interests, hobbies, social book clubs, whatever.
Don’t think about “dating” like “trying to score a wife.” Be your very best self and find a person with a mutual interest in being very best friends forever with you, and then see if romance can bloom from there.
An innocent shared coffee laughing about favorite movies is WAY less pressure than some formal “date” where two strangers dance around awkwardly feeling each other out for “flags” and sidestepping “deal breakers”.
That’s my 2¢ anyway. I hope you find genuine connection. :)
Grade school?
I can’t remember the stats, but a significant amount of people never make it more than a few miles away from where they grew up. That would mean, especially in rural areas where a large geographic area is concentrated into a single school, you likely have been near or around your eventual partner, and if you’re close in age you probably were aware of each other.
It’s something crazy like 25% of Americans will die within a mile of the house that they grew up in, and more than 50% will never leave the state they live in.
People had cooties back then. What gives?
Looks like a whale, mouth on the left
I’m not in the US but I met my wife online, as did a few of my friends. The overall process of finding someone compatible took years though and it wasn’t very much fun. It’s probably worse now that dating apps are actively invested in keeping you single and swiping.
