21st Century Dating

I've never been big into the dating scene, I've always preferred to meet my significant others the old fashioned way; through friends, rotten drunk or via a mutual dislike of another person. Maybe it's just that I'm not used to it - having never had to have it play a huge part in my life - but I'll admit it, I just don't get the 21st century dating thing. A lot of my friends, taken or otherwise, seem to have ended up on Tinder somehow or another, so I decided to sign up for the day to see how I could be finding a potential soulmate if life had worked out a little different (Sorry, Bek, I love you.)

First things first? The sign up for Tinder is ridiculously easy, a basic link up to your Facebook provides them with pictures, friends and likes. Convenient, if a little bit creepy. Then the fun bit comes. Basically tinder is one massive archive of Facebook profiles looking for a date, or a bit of fun. I'm presented with a picture, I can click on the picture to see a couple more, any mutual friends and any mutual interests, then I swipe left to discard the person into cyberspace, and right to await my verdict on whether I'm pretty enough to be picked by them. If we both swipe right, we're a match and we can talk to each other via a messaging system inbuilt into the app.

Maybe it's the old fashioned romantic in me, but isn't that a little cold? Sure, I've found a semi-attractive person (no offense, Jake) who also finds me semi attractive, and we both like Usain Bolt and the Go Compare Adverts (both pages on Facebook I liked circa 2012). This is, surely, dating for the lazy; missing only testaments of loyalty from bitter ex partners. I don't know about you, but finding out that someone likes to watch Usain Bolt clips at 2am and sings along to the Go Compare adverts is part of the fun of a relationship. Me and Bek play a game regularly called "tell me a thing" where each of us make the other drag up completely bizarre snippets of life that we're yet to know about each other. Picking me as a potential partner based completely on my looks and pages I don't even remember liking? It all seems a bit well... impersonal. Not to mention a little stupid. Also, I don't even really look a thing like that picture, it's all clever make-up, good lighting and a good old fashioned instagram filter.

I'm not saying that the app isn't convenient, it's good to know there's an attractive girl less than a kilometre from me when I'm standing in the middle of town, I just can't help thinking - perhaps in a very old fashioned way - maybe I could have just pulled my head away from a screen I already spend way too much time obsessing over and I might have actually seen her. Maybe even started a conversation. Crazy, I know. For those who use Tinder, fair play. It's a brilliant confidence boost when you're getting matches, if a bit of a kick in the teeth when you don't get one, but it's just not for me. I guess I'd rather get drunk, go home with a stranger and hope he's my soulmate instead of a degenerate that's nicked my purse when I wake up in the morning.

Have you tried Tinder or online dating? What was your experience?

S xo.