Aren't you sick of online love?

In a culture dominated by dating apps and fleeting online interactions, we can better find love through friends, community and tangible social interaction

By: Sophia Cohen Galvao/SATSC Contributor

I am sick of dating apps. Tinder, Hinge, Bumble, or even their celebrity cousin Raya . . . Give them your information — name, age, preferred gender, location — and the apps will do the trick. 

In a sleight of hand, the Tinders of the world will conjure you a list of all eligible bachelors in your area. Not even the most effective matchmaker in the hit TV show Bridgerton could achieve such a feat. It is so convenient that it becomes boring. 

One can spend upwards of hours swiping left and right, browsing through Tinder’s endless catalogue. When I was in New Brunswick, it was not uncommon for me to reach the bottom of the barrel: there were no profiles left for me to swipe on, I had gone through them all. In a province with less than 750,000 inhabitants, most of whom are over 50, setting an age range between 20 and 27 is very limiting. 

With so few fish in the sea, it was also not uncommon for me to cycle through the same young men. There was a friend I saw on there at least 10 times before I left the province. 

Seeing friends on Tinder is funny. Someone once asked me: “Do you swipe right on the homies?” I don’t, because the gesture might be misunderstood. But still, it could be a good “I see you, mister!” moment. In the past, it would not be shocking to see that your friends are available and looking for a partner. Courting was a much more public activity. 

During the 18th century in England, the period covered in Bridgerton, young women and men would attend balls with the explicit motive of matchmaking. There are more recent traces of this sort of tradition; Latin American quinceañera parties used to be held to signify a woman’s availability in the dating “market” and were an invitation to courtship. 

Now, I am not saying that we should bring these ideas back – oh, it was so complex and problematic – but they offer some perspective on how loneliness, privacy and dating have only recently begun to intersect. 

Thus, the awkwardness of seeing a friend on Tinder might be owed to a wider issue: the gradual erosion of community and how this is reflected in this blossoming culture of dating apps 

Tinder is not something you do with your friends. It is different from hanging out at a club or a bar, which are more communal activities. Tinder is as individualized as it can be. You can use it when you are in pyjamas while sitting in your bedroom on a Sunday afternoon. Everyone has their own profile and their own algorithm. Not one experience is the same. For this reason, you are alone. 

Tinder is much like LinkedIn, in that you must sell yourself to others to get the desired result. Your personality, your appearance, your biography, everything is up to scrutiny. On LinkedIn, we are looking for jobs and industry connections; selling yourself is precisely the mindset of this sort of network.

On Tinder, because we are looking for deeper human connection, dating becomes profoundly dehumanizing once we apply the same logic. It is sort of entrepreneurial, when you really think about it. In this Shark Tank for singletons, you are not looking for a million-dollar investment but just a tad of affection. 

Some people encounter the love of their life on Tinder. They date for years, get married, have three children and live happily ever after. Good for them! Others are not so lucky. I have come to realize that, when you keep “failing” on Tinder – getting ghosted, for example – these failures serve to further embed insecurities into your mind. They reinforce the warped views you have of yourself; they isolate you much more than you already are. 

Instead of insisting on Tinder when it is clearly not working out, why not look around yourself? Sometimes what you are looking for is hiding right under your nose, or right under the nose of someone you know. What is holding you back from asking? There is no shame in that, or at least there shouldn’t be. 

Many people do not know how to leave Tinder and enter the real world, where real action happens. It is much more convenient to sit on your bed and doom-swipe for an hour than to put yourself “out there”. It feels safer, too, than going to a bar, a club, or a concert by yourself. This is especially true for young women; I have thought about this safety element many times myself. And that is where community comes in. 

Before looking for a romantic partner, make friends! Connect with your classmates, turn them into trustworthy friends that can point you in the right directions. Join yoga classes, go to the gym, start participating in clubs and societies on campus and bond over your hobbies and shared interests. Your friends might be willing to tag along with you as you try to make it in the dating world. 

Making friends is not easy. One could argue it is no easier than finding a romantic partner. However, with friendship, the stakes are lower. Having people to keep an eye on you serves to soothe the anxiety that emerges from trying to put yourself out there. They will boost your self-worth and show you that you’re not starving for love, because you already have love; a different sort of love that is just as important as romantic love. 

Friends can also give their opinions on the person you are going out with and they might even know them. They might even be willing to set you up with someone they know! You know what they say: it’s a small world. 

Dating does not have to be a lonely experience. Breaking out of this loneliness is key to solving the issues that Tinder poses to contemporary sociability. However, to do so you must take a few steps back. Build community, make friends. One thing will lead to the other and soon enough you will have surpassed the insurmountable challenge of modern dating.