Let’s round out this week with a guest blog post from @singlegirlslike. I’m sorry for dropping the ball on this one, I was too busy to post it any earlier.
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With internet dating becoming more and more socially acceptable over the past several years, and statistics claiming 30% of couples now meet on dating sites like match dot com, people often question my apparent aversion towards finding somebody online.
Have I actually tried internet dating? Well, I can’t knock it ’til I’ve tried it, right?
Here’s the thing: every time I physically went out with a guy I met online, he was never as smart, funny, charming or good-looking as he was on my computer screen. Without the luxury of having an indefinite amount of time to respond to my witty messages or emails, some of these guys turned out to be rather awkward and boring in real life.
I devoted some time developing an internet flirtation with someone, I built him up in my mind to be this amazing person. I might even have spoken to him on the phone a few times. But when I finally meet him in person, he has bad breath. Or wears brown corduroy pants in the middle of summer. Or has atrocious manners. And he comes up short. Literally.
One friend told me how she changed her friend’s online dating profile to help her friend receive more attention from potential suitors. While her intentions were sincere, I have to question the integrity of online profiles out there. Are the guys I find attractive really speaking for themselves, or do they have a friend acting on their behalf as a modern day Cyrano de Bergerac?
Yes, I understand the convenience and efficiency of online dating. Our mothers used to tell us that we can’t find Prince Charming sitting on the couch. Well, now we can! In our pajamas! At home! Maybe eating dinner over the sink? And mobile applications now allow us to troll for dudes on our cell phones wherever we go. What’s not to like?
To me, internet dating is the 21st century version of the mail-order bride. You shift through a “catalog” of faces. You can be specific about how far someone lives, how much money he/she makes and how tall/fat he/she is. I don’t need a computer telling me how attractive I am (okay, Cupid?), and I don’t need to answer a hundred questions to figure out if I’m compatible with someone.
Call me old-fashioned, but when I introduce my boyfriend or fiance to people and they ask how we met, I want more than just a ”we met online” story. I want a GOOD story. I want a “we were both shopping for the same bottle of wine” story. I want a “we were hiking in a national park and I rescued her from a poisonous rattlesnake” story. I want a “we were stuck in traffic on the highway in our respective open convertibles and started talking to each other” story.
I want a story that when told, elicits a chorus of “awww’s” – a story so fantastic, it could only be explained by fate, destiny and Santa Claus. When I meet the man of my dreams, I want one of those “and we’ve been together ever since” stories that you hear from old people before the internets. Whatever happened to meeting people in coffee shops or book stores? Again, call me old-fashioned.
Maybe I watched too many Disney princess movies or read too many fairy tales growing up. Maybe deep down in my bitchy, snarky core, I’m really a bleeding heart romantic. I want to believe in love at first sight, not love at first site.
Do I secretly mock single girls who internet date? No. Am I just as disappointed with the guys I meet in person as the ones I met online? Yes. Can an online relationship stem from a good story? Sure. (I’ve heard of a married couple who met online playing World of Warcraft, and now people like @LAIdiot and @SageStella are using social media to find romance on Twitter and even Facebook.)
I can’t advocate internet dating, but I’m not completely against it. In fact, it seems like half of my friends who got married lately met their spouses on a dating site. And they’re happy, so I’m happy for them.
Personally, I just don’t want anyone writing in the guestbook at my wedding “We’re so glad you ‘clicked!’” Call me old-fashioned.
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You can read more of @singlegirlslike’s thoughts on being a single girl on her blog www.stuffsinglegirlslike.com
I loved this. It’s so true, it seems like everyone is meeting on the internet now. I suppose it could make for a good story, though. Depends on how you meet on the internet. I think I would be less likely to join a dating website and more likely to leave it up to the Twitter or something similar. Either way, I really enjoyed this post!
I think I always sound like the girl who is IN LOVE with internet dating because I defend it all the time. Because I once was the same way – saying witty things about how weird, odd, awkward, mail-order bride like internet dating is. How I didn’t want to make cliche jokes about love at “first click” or that I was traditional in that I wanted “fate” to take over and lead me to my Mr. Right.
And then by a total freak thing, I ended up the girl on the internet dating site. And now I’m happily married living in Italy with my husband – some guy I met on a dating site.
Here’s the thing, people can be just as disingenuous in person as they are online. I can’t tell you how many guys I’ve talked to for weeks and then dated casually, only to find out that all that great stuff they said about themselves in the first week was actually all just a front. Sure, there are some things you can “hide” better when you’re online – like your height, looks, and such. But in person, the things you hide can be just as awful.
Anyways, I’m not saying the internet dating is the end all of dating because the fact is that people lie all the time, online AND in person. You have just as much of a chance bumping into a creep at the store looking for wine as you do when you sign up for match.com. I do think that internet dating does get a short stick from a lot of people though. It’s like all of a sudden people forget about all the duds they’ve met “in real life” and somehow now think they’re all just lingering on websites waiting to trick you.
Dating is tough beans – in person and online.
Good luck
All my best…
I can’t decide how I feel about internet dating. I’ll never condemn it, because my mom and stepdad met through it, and they’re so happy together. But I don’t think I’d ever try it either.
Dang Caroline! Congrats on your marriage. I personally am not a fan of dating websites, I’ve blogged before how boring I think they are. Finding someone over Twitter? Never imagined it, but I’m going with it.
I’m that girl who is love with online dating. Well, all except the name. I prefer to call it online meeting. I’ve always thought of dating sites as just another community for meeting people – the dating still has to take place in person.
I’ve been pretty lucky, though, and sometimes it seems like I’m in the minority. I’ve met many guys online with whom I’ve had one date. I’ve met several with whom I went out more than once, and have even had a couple of relationships come out of online dating (all various sites).
I’ve never had anyone misrepresent himself to me. Who I met in person was exactly who I met online. Sometimes, we didn’t exactly click in person the way I hoped, but that’s a chance you take no matter how you meet people.
I think the trick is not to close yourself off to anything. If you want to meet people, you have to accept that it’s probably going to happen when you least expect it. It could happen when you’re walking through the woods and get attacked by a snake – or it might happen when you’re signed in to your twitter account.
Great post!
your blog is pretty great!
@Carolina
It’s true that people can be disingenuous in person too. But there are some things you can’t hide when you meet someone in person. Like the fact that you are 5’6″ not 5’9″ as your profile claimed. Or the fact that you have a tattoo. On your face. (I’m not kidding. This date was the end of my very short experiment with internet dating.) And some people fall way shorter in the conversation category when they no longer have google at their fingertips.
I know that there are some amazing stories out there about internet dating. My experiment was too short lived to provide anything but anectodal evidence. But I don’t think I will be trying it again any time soon.