With This Webring: Problems with Internet Dating

Ironically enough, it was during a frustrated ninth game of Solitaire a month ago that I made a decision: I didn’t want to be single anymore. I’ve been single since 1980…and I’m 27 years old. Oh sure I’ve enjoyed sleeping alone on cold nights, having no plans on the weekends, going solo to dinner and the movies, and wondering about this thing called “sex” that everyone claims is such a hoot; but I’d had enough. Unfortunately, my location, my job and my profession offered me pittance for dating opportunities, so I once again turned to the cyber world for my solution.

As is the case with most adventures in my life, this one proved to be a great learning experience and nothing more. I’ve used two different dating sites in the last four years and I have come to realize many things; namely the many reasons why internet dating doesn’t work.

Now, before I begin, let me just say that I first tried internet dating because of the remarkable testimony of one of my college chums. She found the man of her dreams online shortly after moving across the country where she knew no one. They’ve been happily married for three years and are still going strong. That to say, internet dating can work…for a lucky few. For the rest of us, let this be a warning about the three major pitfalls that await you: money and the communication breakdown, cyber attraction, and too many fish in the sea.

I don’t know who first got the idea to try to capitalize off of love; perhaps it was the same person who decided that almost all viruses would be linked to pornographic internet sites. Regardless, you will be very hard-put to find a truly free dating service. Oh, they’ll tell you sign up is free—and it is—but if you want to do anything except browse personals all day, you’ve got to cough up the dough. Usually it’s not an exorbitant fee…something around $20 a month. The good news is that you can get a monthly discount if you subscribe for several months up front. That’s right! Invest in failure! Count on not having a successful meeting with any person in that humongous database for 90 days!

Internet dating is like Vegas. It seems impossible to lose, yet somehow you end up broke every time. These sites don’t make any money if Jon Doe and Ann Onymous find each other within one month, and they don’t make a whole lot if only Jon is a subscriber. But the house in this case has two advantages. First of all, the odds of finding love are greater than the worst odds in a casino, no matter how long you play. Secondly, in order for Jon and Ann to make that magical connection, they both have to be subscribers.

There are two problems with this dual-paid-subscription. First of all, there is the principle of the matter. There are a score of websites out there that provide so much more than a dating site does…and they are free! If you go to myspace.com or something similar, you can post music, scores of good-sized photographs, daily blogs, and even videos! Not to mention that there is a vast networking option available that gives you exposure to thousands of people through the few friends you already have. True, such sites are not designed to bring two people together in love, but they perform the exact same function as a dating site. The only thing I’ve found on dating sites that is somewhat unique is a personality test. Answer a bunch of questions about yourself and you get a color or symbol or doohickey that wraps up all that you are in a tidy little blurb. To their credit, I’ve found many of these tests to be accurate, but what good does that do?

Find five happily married couples and they will all have different relationships with each other. Some couples seem to be so opposite in nature that it’s something of a miracle they can live under the same roof—let alone be happy. Other couples are so alike in mannerisms, speech, taste (and sometimes looks) that they’re essentially counterparts. Then of course there’s everything in between. Finding out I’m a blue and the girl I’m trying to talk to is a red doesn’t tell me how our colors will mix together. Heck, I could take a date out to any Chinese restaurant, find our corresponding animals on the paper place mat and reach the same conclusion. “You are a monkey. Seek out tigers and zebras; avoid snakes and giraffes.” Invaluable advice and I get a meal! The problem is that a relationship isn’t about who I am and who my date is, it’s about we relate to each other. It’s how we fill in the gaps, compliment each other, and communicate with each other. The latter element is severely inhibited by the internet dating service, and it’s the second problem with needing both parties to be subscribers.

Once you’ve established your profile, you can look but not touch. But in order to give you the illusion that you’re making headway in your pursuits, you can wink or smile at someone who strikes your fancy. Said winks and smiles are usually accompanied by a pre-packaged phrase, depending on your attitude. You can be congenial, flirty, romantic, or invitational. The problem, of course, is that ambiguity abounds. Even if your smile just says, “Hey, I wanted to smile at you!” there is implied interest. Why else would you take the time to send the smile? It’s simply a timid way of saying, “Um…I exist…do you think I’m attractive enough to talk to?”

There really is no way to know for sure why someone smiled or winked at you, and the phrase only makes things worse. And what do you do once you’ve gotten the smile? Do you take it as a compliment and move on, respond in kind even if you aren’t interested, or go out of your way to send a smile of rejection that says, “Thanks, but you’re not hot enough”? And the kicker is, what if you are interested and really want to smile back?

You mull over the fifty pre-packaged options that say exactly what you want to say. But you’re not pre-packed and neither is the person you want to talk to. You want to say something that reflects who you are…you want to express yourself and perhaps guard your intentions by saying that you’re just curious at this point. Or maybe you are completely enthralled and you want them to know how serious you are. But none of those blasted winks or smiles say any of that! So what do you do?

…You turn to the email function. Ah, but there’s the rub. You can set up your email— even type it out—but you can’t send it until you pony up the dough. This might not be such a bad thing if you’re gung-ho and have already gotten a, “I might be interested” smile back, but what if you aren’t ready to declare your love just yet? Too bad, the stakes have gone up. It’ll cost you $25 just to see her hand. Now you’ve gotta make a commitment of sorts.

Let’s just pretend you’re bold and rich, so you decide it’s worth it. You want to talk to this person and the smiles are too ambiguous and confusing. You’re tired of seeing that someone stopped by your profile and didn’t smile. You want to know why. You want to know what the smiles you’re getting really mean. You want those people to know what your smiles mean. You pay your money…you’re a premium member.

But guess what? They’re not! So you can mull and write and send and wait and you’ll never hear back because they haven’t subscribed yet. …And there’s no way to tell them that you’re serious and that you really want to talk to them because the blasted winks don’t say that. You can even be so determined that you’ll pay for their membership for one month, but you can’t convey that to them either!

Communication breaks down. The business wants money, and it makes double the profit by requiring both parties to be members. After all, once that crucial connection is made, the site is worthless to for those two people and there won’t be a renewal next month. So you’ll never know how serious the person was about being interested in you. You won’t know why they stopped sending smiley faces your way. Your “Sent” folder is stuffed with all the things you want to say but never can. All you can do is hope that the other person steps out on a limb and takes a chance. But what if they already have? What if they had been a paying member for four months and finally had enough? What if they’re not going to subscribe unless there’s someone they really want to talk to? …Does that mean you weren’t worth it? Ah, the big question…and the biggest problem with the on-line dating site.

Before I get to that problem however, I did want to address the presumably trite issue of photos and attraction. A picture may be worth a thousand words, but a human being is far more than a series of pictures. How I look is not comprised of snap shots, no matter how clear or cunning. What I “look” like is comprised of the combination of my basic features with emotion and movement. It’s the tone of my voice, my posture, and my mannerisms. You could have twenty pictures of me and still not really know what I look like. You’ll know my body type and basic appearance, but those things aren’t how you determine attraction; lust perhaps, but not attraction.

The first time I tried online dating, I subscribed to the site for one girl. There was one girl I fell head-over-heels for and there was nothing that would stop me from talking to her. Not long after we “met” we exchanged more photos of each other. I was perplexed. She looked almost completely different in every single picture! The characteristics of her face changed drastically depending on the angle of the shot and her mood. I had a general idea of what her appearance was, but the photograph that had initially captured my interest was at odds with several others.

Fortunately, when I finally met her face-to-face, there was an attraction…but she was nothing like what my mind had conjured up. She was a real person, not a collection of photographs. The bottom line is that regardless of how many pictures you see, meeting that person from cyberspace is going to be very much like a blind date. Video will help a little, but that magic spark—that special attraction that binds two people together—cannot be formed apart from that person. You can be attracted to the virtual person you create in your mind, but rarely will fantasy and reality line up the way you’d like them to.

That said, it’s time to reveal the biggest problem with online dating: there are too many fish in the sea. In the “real” world, if we meet a person we attracted to, we accept the good with the bad. Our attraction and connection is based on who that person is as a whole, not the sum of their parts. We can’t add characteristics together to make the “perfect” person. To the contrary, we discover the characteristics we like after we meet the “perfect” person. We realize we are in love with someone and then we look and see what it is that we love about them.

Ever hear a poet say that words are not enough to express his love? It’s not romantic, it’s the truth. We can make a list of everything we love about someone, but that list will never seem to do that person justice…and rightly so. There is something intangible that makes our significant other “significant”. It’s about how they fit with us and how they capture our eyes in a way no one else can.

But will we like everything about them? No. There will be things we’d like to change, things we wish were different. But those flaws and quirks are part of that person so we have to, for all intents and purposes, accept them. In addition, those little things we don’t like might very well be the balance of something we do like. I might not like the fact that my girlfriend isn’t very outgoing, but her softness and quietness when we’re together is something I find extremely endearing. She might be too analytical to appreciate some of the comedy I like, but that analytical mind of hers is also what has kept us out of trouble and allows us to have deep conversations. There’s a give and take, a ying and yang so to speak. Every strength has a weakness and vice versa. We fit with our mates because of a unique interlocking of our characteristics—physically and otherwise.

And all that depth, all that intricate intertwining goes out the door with internet dating. Why? We don’t have to settle for “flaws”! There are thousands upon thousands of people on these sites! If you want a girl with straight brown hair, blue eyes, olive complexion, slender body, and great legs who can play pool and cook, chances are you can find her.

Dating services are designed to put you in the center of the relationship. It’s about what you want and need, not so much about the needs and wants of the other person. I received countless smiles and even emails from girls who met very few of the requisites I listed in my profile. I stated what my ideal match would be and they weren’t even close. Did that matter? No. They probably didn’t even read that part of the profile! Why? Because I was what they wanted. And I admit that I did the same thing. I emailed a girl when I knew my height and age were out of her range. Why? It was all about me. I typed out exactly what I wanted in my search criteria and she came up. I paid my money…she was the product.

Sound messed up? It is. But that’s the attitude these sites create.

There is no reason to settle for a flaw or physical characteristic I don’t like if I can easily find someone who doesn’t have it. If there comes a point where there isn’t someone who meets everything I want, I start to figure out what I wouldn’t mind doing without. …She can have green eyes now, be a little shorter, and not be that great at pool. In fact, heck, she doesn’t have to be able to play pool at all. But she has to cook.

If that search comes up empty, I keep adjusting my expectations. There are two problems with this. First of all, when I finally find my “Adjusted Gross Girl”, I’m going to balk a bit because she’s not everything I wanted. In real life, I have no list; I just want to meet someone I connect with. But the internet dating site gives me the chance to make a list, so I do. My attention shifts from our connection to my desires. By the time I am done, my list of characteristics is 50 items long and the girl I finally found meets only 30 of those. The dreaded question comes up: Am I settling? I might take her for granted and start thinking that if I found someone this close there must be someone even closer. I might cast her aside as soon as I find out she doesn’t exactly meet all 30 of the criteria I thought she did and move on to someone else. Initially I would have been blown away to find a girl who has 30 characteristics I like, but since I’m being catered to the only thing I see is that she’s barely batting over .500.

The second problem with adjusting expectations is my focus. You notice that my attention was on my particular tastes and desires. Though I might have been lowering my standards in a way, I was doing it in a very analytical manner that was continually reducing her to a product. I might as well be looking for a new car. Does it have all the functions I want? If so, what’s the cost? Does it come in the right color? What am I willing to do without? That perspective might work for an inanimate object that needs only to get me from place to place, but it will destroy any attempt at a real relationship with an actual person. After all, what out of all those characteristics is really going to make a relationship work? Does love really hinge on eye color or preference of leisure activities? If I knew there was someone I would connect perfectly with, would I toss her aside because she’s not the best cook in the world?

I have been attracted to eight girls in my life, and none of them were the same. It’s true that half of them played soccer and did gymnastics and six of them were honor students, but apart from that there were few similarities. There was one girl in particular who defied my “type”; in fact she was the opposite of my type in many ways. Yet I was fiercely attracted to her and pursued her until she told me I wasn’t her type. Now, had I come across her profile on an internet site, there is no doubt I wouldn’t have given her a second glance. Why should I get to know someone who is the opposite of me when there are so many people who match me perfectly?

Internet dating sites are essentially chaotic meat markets that raise expectations much higher than they are in the real world. Going back to the quandary I mentioned earlier, should I email a girl who seems really great but doesn’t meet at least 90% of my criteria? I might think she’s attractive, but is she worth the trouble when I’m pretty sure I could find someone even better on page 72 of my new search? How genuine can the smiles be when you know the one smiling at you probably smiled at fifty other people that day? The smile might mean something more, but there’s really no way to tell unless you can both read and send emails. And even then, will the emails stop once someone with the right color eyes comes along? What really can set you apart from the competition other than a series of photographs that may or may not really reflect who you are?

Two days ago I cancelled my membership to the dating site I had subscribed to. I had nearly three weeks left but I wanted to make a statement. Besides, I had grown weary of trying to figure everything out and wondering why the girl who smiled at me and said she loved my profile never actually read the whole thing. I got tired of sending out emails only to discover that the girl either wasn’t serious enough about the site to subscribe or simply didn’t have the money. Most of all, I got tired of analyzing women like they were some kind of product. I do have standards, but the standards I have can’t be realized in the narrow scope of information a dating site provides.

If you are going to try internet dating, remember the follies. One, the site is a business and the odds are against you coming out on top. The goal is to make money, not necessarily guarantee romantic success. Don’t expect too much real help, only just enough pseudo assistance to keep you subscribing. Two, you won’t know if there really is a connection until you physically meet that person. There is a reason why we have acquaintances, companions, friends, best friends, significant others and spouses. There are some people who will make great pen pals but aren’t meant to be an intimate part of your life. Pictures and words do not a person make. The “person” you create will be imaginary and comprised mainly of fantasy whether you like it or not. The real person might end up close to your fantasy but chances are there will be quite a few differences you didn’t see coming. Three, the lack of upfront communication will lead to great frustration and anxiety. Stated rejection is far easier to take than implied or questionable rejection. And even if it’s worth it to you to find out the truth, remember it has to be worth it for the other person as well or else you’ll have nothing but manufactured phrases to express yourself with. Fourth, and most importantly, internet dating will turn you into a shopper who is always looking for the fulfillment of your desires.

Love isn’t earned and it doesn’t respond to demand. You won’t find love or fulfillment in the gathering of all your desires. Love isn’t about who you are and who the other person is, it’s about how who you are together. Love is esteeming the other person above yourself, not seeking to satisfy some bogus checklist that a questionnaire and website helped you put together.

I have discovered this truth—that’s why I’ve given up the online dating game. I might not be in the best place to find love right now, but that’s okay; I would much rather find love in season and on its own terms. …So, for now at least, I am content to return to the simple game of Solitaire.