The Brakes on Human Development [Opinion] - Part #5 - Dating Apps

For the previous post in this series and the disclaimer go here.

Continuing the series about the brakes on the development of our society, we're arriving at one that surged more recently and is close to the top 3 as well.
First of all, I have to apologize. I just noticed that I had put #3 on the post about social media, but it was actually #4 of the series already.
But let's get going.

Brake Candidate #5 - Dating Apps

While this is definitely in my top 5 of the factors with the worst impact on our society, it is also definitely my favorite one to write about since it is an impact factor and also an indication of why things are going so wrong at the same time.

First of all, I want to split this discussion into two parts.

Dating apps to:

• 1. Find a partner for a serious relationships
• 1. Find someone fast to cover primal urges

Let's split this into two general groups of people:

• Lazy/Coward
• Primates

To the Lazy/Coward people among us:

First of all, let's take a look at some statistics, following [1], 19% of all newly married couples met online, which, therefore, became the #1 place in front of through friends (17%), at college (15%) or at work (12%).
Additionally, the revenue of the online dating industry reached 3 billion dollars in 2017.

Then, I want to say that I'm not against meeting someone online or asking someone online out in general. I heard of many cases of people getting to know their partner in games or other online activities which are in my opinion also a nice way to get to know someone. I want to focus on people which use Dating Apps or Relationship websites and networks to find a partner more easily.

I really don't want to offend anyone, but™ let's be serious, people nowadays seem to have gotten extremely lazy and coward searching for love. Quite often I witnessed people preferring a save choice (someone they know likes them) than risking something to get someone they actually really like.

And this is just pathetic, in many cases, people seem to go out, date or even marry someone because the other person is a save choice and not because they're the love of their lives.
And this is exactly what, in my humble opinion, also causes these gigantic divorce rates. When people after a few years notice that the important part is not being married or having a partner but having someone they really care for, someone they love and someone who loves them back equally.

People prefer to jump out of planes, scuba dive with sharks or run a marathon rather than telling the one person they really have a crush on their true feelings.

I know that heartbreak can be terrible, but never getting there is way worse.
I, myself, prefer 100 times to be friend zoned than never trying it and eventually having to lose the one person I really like because I'd been too lazy or coward to make the first step.

I always was one of the more introvert, shy guys, never really the one which openly talked to strangers, but, the moment I saw my girlfriend the first time, I had to take the chance. I knew I'd regret it the rest of my life if I wouldn't.

In my opinion, the cause of this might be that many people had their hearts broken when they were young, maybe too young to deal with it properly as well, and then stopped taking the chances due to a fear of this happening again.

Which, ends up creating a huge industry of dating apps, dating sites, speed-dating events, single nights, etc, etc...

Which actually helps us to never take the chance since we're easily able to find a decent fit for us which means we don't necessarily have to wait or even risk finding the perfect fit. Quite interesting to that is that following [1] half of all British singles never asked someone for a data face to face. Additionally, also almost half of them never dumped someone in person as well. This shows that due to the hype in online dating people are not required anymore to really dedicate themselves to building a relationship since due to today's technology starting and finishing a relationship has become incredibly easy.
While all this is good if you're really desperate to find a partner this also means that it will be way easier for your partner to break up with you and it is way easier to not build any meaningful relationships anymore.

To the Primates among us:

Okay, I'll let the lazy or shy people off the hook now and I want to talk about the primates among us.

First of all, following [2] the use of these hookup apps is strongly correlated to an increase of STD which is definitely not a good thing at all.
Then, I have to ask again, similarly to previous posts.

What the freaking heck? Are you serious?

Seriously, I can't believe that there are people out there that are still uncertain whether or not we descend from primates.
I can't believe how easily people throw their moral standards over the board for some fast sex.
Again as in previous posts, I have to notice that, people are awfully good at abusing today's technology to get faster access to sex.
May it be in movies, series, on websites, in social networks, through social media in general in music or even personally.

First of all, I'm 100% sure that this would've happened in any of the previous centuries as well if they'd have had the technology.
But, since we're the first generation with access to it, we're the generation which has to deal with it.

Millions of people use apps like Tinder, or even more direct apps to find a fast match for a night every day.

Besides increasing the STD rates this is just terrible for the development of our society.
The more sex ranks up in importance the more really important things like solid relationships, morality and education lose ground.

Just a short reminder of Idiocracy here.

Maybe those apps should have to add warnings like cigar brands or booze have to in some countries.

Tinder could maybe add: "Swipe left if you're not as desperate", "Swipe right if your sexual organs speak louder than your brain".

But, at the same time, I see those apps as a great chance for the people not using these apps as well.
This kind of apps allow us to evaluate people quite easily before making new friendships or asking someone out. Just ask the person if they're using a similar app to know if they're the kind of person you'd like to be a friend of or have a relationship with.

Additionally, I had read in a couple of newspaper that a bunch of users of these apps start to long for serious relationships after a while and are likely to try out the more classic approaches of finding a partner due to the superficiality in these apps.

Conclusion:

Before I end this blog post I want to push some things in the right light.
First of all, in many parts of this post I exaggerated on purpose and
if you're a user of any of these apps by no means I want to say that you're stupid. In my opinion, your priorities are just a bit off and might you want to overthink them.

History taught us on many occasions that the fastest and easiest approach to a complex topic almost never lead to a good long-term solution, especially when feelings are involved.

And, if we ditch all this e-sexualisation we're able to focus on the meaningful things in life and achieve so much more.

Until the next time!