The Internet, The Dating Apocalypse, & You: A 1960s Film Strip
I find it amusing, perplexing, and vexing that humans scapegoat their own creations to justify behavior(s) rather than accept responsibility for their behavior(s). Enter the internet and online dating as the root cause of the “dating apocalypse”. The reality is that the “dating apocalypse” is not much different than an airplane crash…a series of events that fall into place to create a disaster that may be survivable, or may not be. Or if people are really fortunate, the situation is not deemed survivable but people do!
The internet is not to blame for the “dating apocalypse” because the internet did not cause dating to become an unintentional social behavior, it did not create socioeconomic parity, and it did not create divorce culture. The dating apocalypse is however, a function, of all *three* of these characteristics and the internet and dating services have splayed these characteristics out for all to see…if you’re paying attention to them.
Before the 21st century if a girl wasn’t interested in a guy, she didn’t go out with him. Period. In the 21st century that changed because this kind of behavior became the norm, particularly in my own experience. And as an introvert, it’s a waste of time to interact with someone I am not interested in, and much worse when that person is interacting with me but is ambivalent about it. Dating is no longer an intentional act. And I’ve found no difference in this behavior in my adult life in the “real world” versus using an online dating service.
To make a connection with another human being is an intentional act. You’re not going to experience “mind-blowing chemistry” if you’re not interested in having “mind-blowing chemistry” with the person you are going out with in the first place. And it’s really not going to happen if you are on the lookout for deal breakers at the first possible opportunity — a band someone likes that you don’t, or an activity someone likes that you don’t. Then there’s the winner of winners: “I really didn’t want to meet you in the first place” when they said “Hey do you want to meet?” Isn’t that hot?
Socioeconomic parity is big contributor. Portland, Oregon, where I have lived for 19 years has gone from up-and-coming funky-artsy town to full blown provincial capital full of people from bigger, more affluent ponds who came to Portland to become bigger fish in the much smaller pond. But these people still want to date like they live in the much bigger, more affluent ponds. They believe they’re a “catch”, “self-aware”, “successful”& “living their best life”…because they have a high-paying job.
Even if you throw the big-fish-small-pond-affluence component out the window, the gender spectrum has a pretty even socioeconomic parity.[The only real gender pay gap that exists today involves executives and professional athletes and those groups make too much money. Many of these people are miserable assholes living far beyond the happiness index.]With that comes independence, and with that comes the potential for self-centered-ness and hyper-individualism. And the more socioeconomic independence one has (as a single person) the more self-centered one becomes.
There’s nobody there to go and say “Hey dude, this behavior is driving me nuts.” And the longer you go the harder you have to work to overcome it. And even if you do overcome it and are just the greatest guy (in my case) ever but you may also be “the greatest guy ever, but…” and you’re finding yourself having to start over when you can stomach it again. People get discarded by others who justify their behavior because they’re effectively dumping a great guy and it’s OK because he’s so great. That logic is plain awful, and if you’re completely self-centered you are clueless as to why that is.
Something money doesn’t cover up is the reality that no matter our ages…single people are projects. Yes…the kind of “projects” that supposedly “successful” people want to avoid because they don’t want a relationship in the first place but it would be nice to bone someone at their convenience who can afford the plane ticket to Bali. The internet certainly did not create the twisted vision that people have for what a “relationship” actually is. On one hand it’s a very primal thing — an emotional investment is a primal thing. But people are trying to avoid the emotional investment part because it seems easy…until one person develops emotional attachment and there’s a 50% chance that will happen.
Mainstream divorce culture is decades old at this point. Both of my parents married their first spouses in 1963 and divorced in 1977. My parents have basically 3 things in common: difficult upbringings (equally difficult but different), marriages that lasted 14 years (but were dead after 5) and they both wanted the same things when they met. My dad by late 1970s standards was a loser because he was at a career crossroads and my mom was a house poor college professor fighting the politics of higher education women today have no idea even existed. There was also no maternity leave so my mom was back at work on Tuesday (maybe it was Wednesday)after giving birth to me on Saturday.
Many of the kids I went to school with had parents who eventually divorced…primarily after high school but that was in the late ’90s. My dad did the whole “stay together for the kids” thing in the late ’60s and discovered that doesn’t work. Divorce culture has had a decades-long ripple effect and people my age or older who get divorced seem to be in a camp that is quite gun shy about commitment or keeps committing to the same, wrong person expecting different results. It’s a very good thing that divorce no longer carries a stigma but I am finding that people are not humbled by it. Some people even think that they just deserve the world because they are divorced, as if they have no responsibility.
The internet did not create the glut of unavailable people who magically appear on the internet in the guise of appearing to want to make a romantic connection. And in fact as much as I don’t like the swipe concept of dating services, at least the snake oil of “compatibility by algorithm” has gone by the way of the dodo bird. That hasn’t stopped people from thinking you can be “compatible” with someone out of the box like ordering something off Amazon. My parents have been married 42 years…they’ve worked at it and they still quibble over the same shit that they did before I graced this planet.
The internet has simply become a collection area…a big virtual collection area for people who are mostly ambivalent about relationships, about dating, and about using dating services on the internet itself. Think of the internet as far as dating and relationships goes akin to the oil pan in your gas guzzling car. America is a very superficial country, full of single people who lack self-awareness, lack regard for other people unless a paycheck is involved, and believe their paycheck is what makes them “successful”. How could it be any other way that we just scapegoat this massive almost ethereal, non-quantifiable thing instead of ourselves?
