<story><title>The Problem with Modern Romance Is Too Much Choice</title><url>http://nautil.us/issue/41/selection/the-problem-with-modern-romance-is-too-much-choice</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>colmvp</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m just going to preface this by saying I&amp;#x27;m a fairly physically unattractive man (short, Asian, assymetrical face with no strong jawline).&lt;p&gt;The quality of the women (based on intellect, personality, accomplishments, and appearance) who I&amp;#x27;ve met in real life first before dating have been vastly superior to the women who I managed to find a date with through online dating.&lt;p&gt;Besides the restrictiveness of the online dating medium, specifically its inability to capture personality or warmth, I think another reason is because the women I meet in real life are able to evaluate me individually for who I am whereas in online dating you&amp;#x27;re practically always being compared to dozens of people.&lt;p&gt;I also think that people are overly picky in online dating and treat their specifications as sacrosanct instead of something to constantly self evaluate. For example, it&amp;#x27;s fairly common for people to specify a preference for a single race, usually their own. When I used to go on match.com I saw plenty of white women who explicitly noted they only wanted to date white men. Fair enough. And you know, a lot of white women I know in real life might have the same preference given the nature of growing up in small towns dominated by a single ethnicity and having consumed culture that largely glamorizes white men. But they also ended up marry Asian men, not through online dating but perhaps because they got to know them in college or at work or through friends. Likewise I&amp;#x27;m certain that some of the women I dated in real life wouldn&amp;#x27;t have given me a chance in online dating. Perhaps it&amp;#x27;s because we could share laughter and gain trust in one another before even considering the concept of love. I&amp;#x27;m sure there&amp;#x27;s also studies that show repeated exposure of a person has a positive effect on their perception.&lt;p&gt;And if you read the story in Aziz Ansari&amp;#x27;s Modern Romance, he mentions a similar anecdote where he met two Indian dudes, one who was struggling to meet anyone through online dating, and the other who exclusively just met women in real life and had no problems in that realm.&lt;p&gt;I guess my unscientific observation is that while online dating is certainly gaining in popularity and can be successful for some people, that it can sort of be misrepresentative of reality.</text></comment>
<story><title>The Problem with Modern Romance Is Too Much Choice</title><url>http://nautil.us/issue/41/selection/the-problem-with-modern-romance-is-too-much-choice</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>curiousdater</author><text>So my experience and how it feels for an average to less then average guy in looks(I&amp;#x27;m causcasin ..5&amp;#x27;10..170.. fit)to be on all these damn apps.&lt;p&gt;Basically we all want something hot and or attractive to us.  I feel for women who are less to average in looks have it better then guys. Probably sign into these apps and get bombarded by guys.&lt;p&gt;I definitely date using match and plenty of fish(15 different dates a year) Tinder to me is crickets.  I&amp;#x27;m well aware of why and oh well that&amp;#x27;s how it goes but it does suck.&lt;p&gt;Though I&amp;#x27;ve then tried Grindr and other bi apps.  I&amp;#x27;ve  found both attractive yet if I had found some chick who I liked in my 20s(in my 30s I was in a long term relationship with a chick) and settled down I would most likely have never explored my interest in guys.  Would have just kept it to the normal curious fun a lot of us guys have with each other in our teens.&lt;p&gt;Well using Grindr and others I  now know what it feels like to be a chick... sign on and get tons of messages and choose which one catches your eye.  This happens each time you open the app. Hey if your into both it&amp;#x27;s a great way to beat loniless, meet new friends and have fun here&amp;#x2F;there.&lt;p&gt;Overall I just wanted to point out one mans use of these dating apps.  I&amp;#x27;m sure I&amp;#x27;m not alone in my struggle with finding the women I want and they want me too. If Tinder keeps you busy your one lucky dude! Probably alone in using those other apps or maybe not and that could be another thing these apps are changing how&amp;#x2F;who we date and meet?</text></comment>