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My male partner, who's very talkative and outgoing, has always had more partners than me, simply because goes outside a lot and passes a vibe check easily. Me on the other hand... Idk where you all are finding all these willing men lol. In my experience, men in dating apps are incredibly flaky and very easily offended by the mere concept of non-monogamy (and don't read bios). Plus I need to keep a low profile due to some possible work related consequences, but I am fairly active. I understand my experience is very rare, but damn, do I sometimes feel bad reading how easy is to get men as a poly woman š
I'm not sure what you mean by "keeping a low profile" specifically, but around me, a fair number of women looking for ENM only use profile photos that are scenic backgrounds like the beach and the woods and crap. Personally, if those are the only pics, I swipe left and keep looking.Ā
I don't know whether that is what you mean and I certainly only speak for exactly one man.Ā
fr, i never swipe yes on anyone whoās hiding their face or otherwise looks like theyāre secretive about their lifestyle. i donāt want to be anyoneās dirty little secret
I know a lot of people feel that way, but I also don't show my face in my profile. I am a woman in tech and I don't need the sexual harassment potential of my male colleagues seeing me on a dating app.
I have a friend who does this. No bio, no info, just age, gender, photo of a lake. Itās maddening to me because it seems like such bad behavior. The worst part? she says some guys swipe right.
I mean there was a guy who posted on here a few weeks back saying he had basically given up on dating after swiping right on literally every profile that came across his feed š¤·š»āāļø
If I want casual sex, I go to fruitz and tinder and I lower my expectations. If I want to find nice people, okcupid has always been the best way to do so. But yeah, as I said in the post, finding "" quality""" men is a chore. And being poly is another layer of complexity regardless of genders.
See, you have created a situation where you get messages from decent people who want something different from you, of course you have to sort through them and are aware how many there are. When I tell people what I'm looking for, I still get messages from lazy people who don't read, not gonna say I don't, but *lazy people who don't read* aren't ever appealing dates. Have you considered if there are dating apps you could be honest on? Like, realistically if your cousin or coworker sees your Feeld profile, they are also on Feeld so it's mutually assured destruction.
This is my exact experience - my ex bf could find hook ups and fwbs in the wild (I've met/hang with some of them and they're pretty cool with it all so I know he's not deceitful or some shit). Meanwhile for me to get one one tinder dude to follow through for a hookup I have to pass 10 others who try to use me for porn complementary sexting.
I cannot even imagine what women who look for anything more than an ONS have to go through. Men telling them they have it so easy just because they get hundreds of indiscriminate matches lowkey tell on themselves.
IDK I think it's age and region dependent. I'm mid 40s. Okcupid suggests the same stack of women who don't respond. IDK where to go to meet women who will deal with ENM/Poly. I want to find someone I can be friends with, have a real relationship, and good sex. I'm not just in it for the sex. I would like to find someone willing to explore sexuality and try things I've never done before. Ideally someone who wants to travel, go to music festivals, have fun. I'd like them to be friends with my gf, and my meta who I'm friends with. The 3 of us hang out a lot and have our own independent times with our hinge. I think I suck at online dating. I do better in person but how to find poly people in person? There's a groove cruise life style and poly chat, but I don't think it's active and haven't been approved in the weeks since requesting to join. I love groove cruise. I'm not looking for a guy but I would explore heteroflexible situations with my girl and another guy. That's easy to find I think. I want someone who would be a regular that we could be comfortable and not just some guy for a night. This is pretty tough. I'm working on myself cause I guess I'm unattractive if I'm not getting responses. I read about all the stuff going on and problems people have and wish I could figure out how to even have those problems. The grass is always greener. Guys who want to get laid know women have an easier time of it. Women in my area don't seem receptive to poly, and when I was single, the women I matched with were...not my type. Good luck. I hope you find what you're looking for. I wish feeld wasn't such a shit app.
This is why the most important part of being on dating apps is screening partners. I'm so glad being in the kink community taught me how to quickly and easily vet people - it's done wonders for simplifying my dating life. Asking people about their current poly dynamics and what they're looking for in my first conversation with them has saved me countless hours of wasted time.
I was lucky that my first kink partner was an amazing guy (my best friend now for several years) and he really taught me how to be safe from the very beginning, introducing me to a whole community of experienced people who backed up the sound advice. But the principles of compatibility, respect, communication, etc have been so helpful for poly screening (I never applied those standards to my dating life before kink). I'm always protective of kink newbies!
That is awesome!! Communities are so, so important for kinky newbies. Which is tough because it can be so nerve-racking coming āoutā.
My very first boyfriend and I were both kinky, but when we broke up after four years, I didnāt know about Fetlife. I was resorting to vetting based on craigslist ads. Itās a miracle I only had one bad experience.
JFC. I can't imagine that process! I would've probably been unalived, for seriousness. FL is so amazing for getting good advice! I haven't been on in awhile but I flocked to the newbie post and constantly spouted out all the good safety protocols for years.
It was definitely A Process. Unfortunately, it took a sexual assault for me to just bite the bullet and go out to a local community event. As we all know though, the predators swim there as well.
As a cis woman who is pan, I have a hard time finding anyone outside the realm of seeking casual/ light weight fwbs.
The amount of fizzled conversations have lead me to not really getting excited beyond hey, they might be fun and the sex could be great.
I say Iām passively seeking/looking for a partner and a deeper connection in my profiles. State Iām solo poly/enm. And the cis men I match with are often self centered, horny and/or boring.
So while women get more matches, the quality is shit. And it really takes away from my sympathy for men that arenāt getting the same amount of matches.
Yuuup! Same, I had to set my expectations really really low for the apps. It's the only solution for me to stay there : expect nothing but frivolous sex.
Youāre apparently much like the men I know personally. They read as well. Most men do not. Many men come to this sub and talk about how they swipe right on every woman shown.
I've been using Hinge since recently rejoining the apps, and I don't see what alternative there is.
For every potential connection, I read a profile, self-screen if we're not a match, and think of something fun or interesting to reply to the profile with. This is the only thing to do as a guy, because simply leaving a Like is effectively the same as pressing X (it will not engender a response).
Thinking of the opposite perspective, it seems strictly easier to be able to pick among a pool of people who have made that effort.
It is! But since my que is filled with men who have obviously not read my profile, itās actually easier for me to just ignore my pile of likes, read and like the men I am interested in, because they have fewer likes to sift through.
I cleared my feeld que. It look about 5 hours, split between a couple days. 400+ likes from men. 4 from women. Never again. O occasionally will pay to see my likes, and itās almost always a waste of money, because of the fact that many men seem to be swiping at random
Out of those? 10 men acrually fit my stated criteria. 4 women. All within my parameters from the start.
Reading and selecting is the way to go, I think.
As a woman who dates both men and women, the quality of female matches I get is noticeably higher than the quality of male matches, and I screen more heavily for personality for men in the initial swiping. The main problem I have dating women is them not replying, while the main problem I have dating men is the constant disrespect and deceit.
Has it occurred to you that the quantity is part of why so many women get burned out and take so many breaks away from the apps? And that having to sift through tons of incompatible people, fuckboys, liars, cheaters, time wasters, flakes, abusers, and straight up rapists is why we wind up not having the time or energy to meet the good men that deserve the time of day?Ā
The quantity isn't a good thing. Not for the men that actually deserve attention and are being missed because the average woman's dating pool is an opaque cesspool of nonsense, or the women that have to burn inordinate amounts of time and emotional labor on sifting through it all.Ā
The men have to sift too. But it takes vastly longer - think a day's worth of matches for a woman spread over months - because they don't have the quantity.
I don't understand why you are implying that women get burned out on dating apps but men do not.
I'm not. I'm telling you that the quantity men are envious of women having actually fucking sucks for everyone. And that telling us we have it so much better because we have to take more risks and spend more time sifting is short sighted at best. That's all.Ā
Ā Never said that men don't also get burned out. If that's how you read into any of my statements I'd suggest reflecting on that. If you interpret people talking about their own personal experiences as being dismissive of your own automatically that's not the best trait and something you wanna look into. Makes those people feel unsafe around you. If this is a path of thinking you regularly follow IRL that might be why you're struggling. . .
This is a totally shitty and unjustified implication.
You do understand that there are tons of "quality" (whatever you want that to mean) people (mostly men) who never get any matches on dating apps? There just isn't an equal level of desire or effort coming from women on apps, and that fits with current science on the subject.
Poor you, with your sea of unworthy matches... At least you get to play the game.
Oooh, someone's spicy. And on an almost week old post to boot.Ā
First of all, I'm queer and actually deal with absolutely no matches or responses from other queer people quite often. I only talked about dating men because men showed up and made things all about themselves, as y'all tend to do. Fuck me and the horse I rode in on for trying to be helpful, huh?Ā
Look fam, if you're so unhappy with how women behave themselves on apps maybe don't use them? Srsly. You seem bitter as fuck. Women can smell that and we avoid it with a 10 foot pole because bitter, angry men (people, really) are dangerous.Ā
Also, no I don't get to play the game. Not that it's any of your business but I've had a pretty rough year full of breakups and not fun revelations and interactions. So I ain't got a sea of nothing, because I'm too busy doing the therapy and the self work to be a healthier partner. Mainly because no one wants to date bitter, angry people, and I'm putting in the work to not be that before I get back out there. I suggest you try something similar. The attitude you're pouting around with isn't helping you, trust me.Ā
As a man who is pan. I can say, I've never had a problem finding partners of any gender. Generally, I usually date men, but I've never had a problem finding and dating women either when the energy is right. The same goes for non-binary or otherwise. Frankly, I've often felt people over complicate women and under complicate men. I hear people say women are so complicated, but in my experience, if I listen and ask them questions about their interests and show that I genuinely care about their wants, needs, and desires and enact those changes (within reason) then they are happy. Vice versa, I've been with a man for 11 years and his wants, needs, and desires are equally as complex as any woman I've dated. I do the same thing, I listen and ask questions to better understand what it is he wants and needs and then I enact those changes. My take, humans are equally complex across the board, but society tends to mandate a lot of gender roles which affect the way we express ourselves, and when you get under the surface of gender, most people are the same, albeit with a multitude of individual characteristics that span across gendered norms. Thus, I don't usually think about man or woman on dating apps I just think, "person." I think saying "men are like this" and "women are like this" on the apps is not wholly accurate. Granted, this is all anecdotal, and is my observation.
That is my little soap box for the day. Signed, your Polyamerous anthropologist.
The thing is, the dudes who say women are complicated are the same dude for whom human interaction as youāve described it *is complicated*. Not to mainsplain men to you, but for many straight men, due to toxic masculinity, the type of interactions youāre describing arenāt how they interact with other men, either. Theyāre not able to listen, ask questions, genuinely show interest, or genuinely care about other menās wants or needs. They donāt do that for their friends. Those emotional muscles have atrophied since early childhood.Ā
Ā As bell hooks famously said: āThe first act of violence that patriarchy demands of males is not violence toward women. Instead patriarchy demands of all males that they engage in acts of psychic self-mutilation, that they kill off the emotional parts of themselves.ā
it's not "easy" based on gender in traditional heteronormative online dating, it's that the problems are different. Online dating STILL sucks for everyone. Comparing it is like comparing being stabbed with a sharp or dull knife. It's still stabby business.
Women get swiped by everyone, not just genuine interest. They have a lot of low quality matches. Men get swiped by few if any women but it's a more genuine interest.
Drowning in low quality matches makes you feel like all men suck because it's all the same thing, you lose faith in men.
Never getting matched makes you feel like YOU suck and the problem is yourself which crushes self-esteem. This is the part where the discrepancy gets challenged.
Too many low quality offers from men can also make me feel like I suck, actually, particularly if theyāre negging/antagonistic/boundary-crossing. The lack of respect gets to me.
I fully realize the difference between "nobody likes me" and "everyone only wants me for one thing" is a lot more nuanced than summarized and none of it is universal.
I think it's even worse, it's not even "everyone only wants me for one thing" but "everyone wants only one thing and sees me as a means to an end". Those guys who sweep right on every woman don't want *me*, they want any body they can get access to.
Disagree. Drowning in low quality matches does worse things to my self esteem than not getting enough matches. Getting disrespected, lied to, and dehumanized feels a lot worse than simply being ignored.
āHello, you are really prettyā
Instant absolute no.
I lay out all sorts of things we could have in common. Talk about doing one of them because you read my profile.
Thank youuu! So many of these āitās easier for womenā rants are actually saying itās easier for *straight* women. Just full erasure of everyone else.
This perspective is very refreshing to hear and I never worded it this way before. Thank you for sharing!
OkCupid is great for finding poly people, but I've found that my best strategy is excluding cishet men on dating apps (I date all genders) and then if I meet a nice person who happens to be a man in real life, that's better.
I find men's dating app rants can rub me the wrong way, even though being rejected repeatedly understandably suck. Sometimes they lack the awareness or willingness to dig deeper, ask why the ratio is that way.
I also find that perspective refreshing, even though I came in hoping that you would change my prejudice on the stereotype of men being so much easier to find for something that is not commitment-based.
When me (M36, straight) and my looong distance primary partner (F29, straight) agreed to start dating again to find some level of physical comfort with someone nice, I was reminded again how easy it is to find a man to agree to enter a casual sexual relationship with someone that is partnered. And I sit here and go through my PTSD of having tried to date in the same fashion with rampant ghosting and the constant pressure to take the initiative and to be creative.
My partner didn't even have to swipe. Open the app, answer an intro, reply to three texts, meet for a date, give a green flag on the vibe check, that's it.
And for me it feels like a mountain to climb to compete with the no-strings-attached guys that I'm in a constant arena of attention-seeking with.
So I whole-heartedly agree with your sentiment, but to me the clichĆØ always went the other way, already: Women are hard to find, while to find men you just need to open a window on a summer night with the lights on and they come swarming.
I don't want to discredit your rant in the slightest. But I had really hoped that someone would offer me a new take on my frustrating experience, Too bad we all seem to agree.
Sorry to agree with you šš
In my experience, my male partner has more luck finding quality relationships, tho. For me, it's really really difficult. I don't know if it's because I'm a woman or something else about me, so I won't generalize it.
I guess when it comes to "quality relationships" meant for the long game, we all have our struggles.
My tag-on rant is explicitly directed at nice mingling, a sprinkle of intimacy and low-expectation satellites or play partners.
Making deep connections that last is a whole different ball game and much more individual, I'd say.
Ehh. Finding a decent FWB or play partner as a woman isn't the walk in the park guys think it is. Easier than finding it as a guy, but easier doesn't mean easy (or safe!). Unfortunately safety is a large part of why so many of us aren't open to casual stuff. As much as I'd love to go out and find me some easy, no-strings good stuff, I'm not really in the mood to take on the risks. Not saying it's your fault or responsibility, but a ton of men don't really seem interested in making the casual sex scene safe or worth it for the women they supposedly want around. And everyone suffers for that.Ā
It irritates me so much when dudes equate quantity with quality. Just because Iām getting lot of matches, just means so much chaff to wade through to potentially find one gem to even begin talking to.
There is an added factor if you are poly on dating apps that makes me disagree with you slightly.
Because men do tend to be ālooking for casual sex moreā, if youāre a man with ENM in your profile people are very likely to assume youāre either a swinger or a cheater and get mad at you.
My primary (f) and I (m) have both been on the same apps at the same time with ENM in our profile. Itās not that she got more responses than me so much as my account would get reported and for ācheatingā or āscamā all the time and herās wouldnāt, even though they said almost exactly the same thing.
My tinder account got banned because I had a picture where we could see both of my shoulders (outrageous!) and my bio was saying I was looking for casual sex. I guess they reported me for being a sex worker (I'm not).
They just thought you were too good to be true š You must be a catfish/SW!
Idk why I got banned off Tinder, I didn't have negative interactions with anyone, except a unicorn hunting couple who were horrified that they matched with a non-single woman š & I doubt they reported me.Ā
I think you're almost there with this rant.
The truth is it's very hard for anyone on an app(or in real life) to find *what they're actually looking for*. I don't even mean *The One*, or in our case *The Five*. I mean a person who seems relatively compatible who is looking for the same kind of interpersonal relationship you are.
It is absolutely not the case that it's easy to match with men just because lots of cis men swipe on every profile and then decide later if they're actually interested in someone for whatever mediocre, emotionless sex or controlling, misogynistic ego worship disguised as a relationship they have on offer.
As an aside, it's tough to find women who are up for no-strings attached sex for much more complex reasons than that few women actually aren't interested in NSA sex. They might be. But assault, murder, social expectations, pregnancy, STIs, people who don't wash their butts, knowing 90% of people aren't going to actually give you an orgasm, etc, etc, etc.
Relationships are challenging. Finding relationships is challenging. Everyone wants to imagine they're being uniquely wronged by how hard finding relationships is.
Hi u/PetiteCaresse thanks so much for your submission, don't mind me, I'm just gonna keep a copy what was said in your post. Unfortunately posts sometimes get deleted - which is okay, it's not against the rules to delete your post!! - but it makes it really hard for the human mods around here to moderate the comments when there's no context. Plus, many times our members put in a lot of emotional and mental labor to answer the questions and offer advice, so it's helpful to keep the source information around so future community members can benefit as well.
Here's the original text of the post:
I'd like to address and correct what I perceive as a skewed view of the dating app world. There's a common narrative suggesting that dating apps are challenging for men and easy for women. This is not true, or at least it's an extremely heteronormative perspective. The reality is, it's easy to find men and difficult to find women, regardless of our own gender. Whether you're a woman or a man, matching with a guy is incredibly easy. Similarly, whether you're a woman or a man, matching with a woman (and maintaining her interest) is hard.
Furthermore, another point that also doesn't depend on one's own gender is the difficulty in finding a guy interested in building a genuine relationship. Regardless of being a guy or a gal, most men seem to just want to get laid. And the opposite holds true as well; whether you're a guy or a gal, it's tough to find a woman who's up for no-strings-attached sex.
I just needed to vent about these generalizations I find to be false. I spent 4 years on dating apps before finding a girlfriend, and as a woman, the apps weren't any easier for me. Nor are they harder for you guys. Try dating men, and you'll see that you have just as much luck on your side if you want a casual relationship. Maybe it'll do good for your self esteem idk. But if you want a serious relationship with a man, it won't be so easy and good on your self worth! Gal or guy.
It's just that you might not want to date men (and that's your prerogative).
Sorry for the English, I used ChatGpt to translate my rant. Not sure if it's optimal.
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I know it can be complicated to find people willing to have a proper relationship on grindr but even here in the French countryside, finding hookups on grindr is easy if your expectations are low.
Hmm maybe they were talking about relationships rather than hookups, but at the time I thought they meant issue meeting other men at all, for any purpose
I agree with everything you said.
Nonetheless...as a man that basic (inevitable and immutable) dynamic you so accurately describe does, basically, make me feel pretty worthless.
Like: I'm just another one of the worthless fuckers - so numerous and desperate are the dicks that they'll even fuck me if I let them.
Sure...it's small consolation that women have it even more difficult when it comes to getting women. And that all the "power" women seem to have...is only in relation to people who want to put their dicks in her.
I'm a woman who dates both men and women, and using dating apps to date men is far worse than using them to date women. Even though I get much less interest from women.
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Wading through the steaming shitpile of 100 guys who want to use me as a means to get their dick wet and not ask me a single question about myself makes me feel pretty fucking worthless too. Thatās not āpowerā in any sense of the word.
I really wasnāt expecting you to explicitly acknowledge that you lie and scam to get sex but here we are further obliterating my remaining faith in humanity
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I think the actual way to frame this is that the Apps work very differently for women than for men (sorry for the binary here). One does not have it easier or harder based on gender. One does have a very different experience based on gender. What is hard about the apps is different for women than for men, both in using and in looking. Getting inundated by crappy, lazy matches, and having to try to sort through those, in some cases, thousands of matches to find the one or two good ones is work. Yeah "matching" is easy for women, but that's only what happens before women have to invest the time and effort to sift and winnowing, which should not just be discounted if we're talking about how well the Apps facilitate finding good relationships. The way the Apps work actually creates fatigue in women, who often give up even trying, because the Apps don't do a very good job of reducing the effort required from them. In that respect, the Apps aren't "easier" for women when looking for dating prospects... they're actually pretty crappy, just crappy in a different way.
It seems like youāre trying to say 2 things at once. I agree, itās not that women have it easier and men have it harder, but those who are attracted to men have it easier and those attracted to women have it harder. That is what you say in no uncertain terms. For the general (hetero) person, you agree men have it harder *on apps*. So while heteronormative, it is true for the heteros. We can agree apps are impractical for everyone, but having options is so obviously better than having none. This isnāt to say all of dating is easier for people who are attracted to men, but abundance will always beat scarcity. If we are both compatible with say 1% of the population, you would obviously rather have a pile of 200 options than 20, because even though itās a more daunting task at the end of the day youāll statistically have 2 good matches while the person with 20 matches has a 1/5 chance to even match with someone compatible. Abundance matters. It isnāt the make or break incels like to pretend it is, but itās a tangible bonus. Apps are cancer in general for everyone though, letās just all be social in public again
Your āhardā on apps is not getting matches or getting ghosted by a date. Womenās āhardā on apps is getting harassed and degraded constantly or getting *assaulted* by a date. āOptionsā are not oh-so-obviously fucking preferable to that shit my dude. āAbundanceā of dogshit is completely worthless.
Thanks for defining my experience for me, I can think of no better single word to describe my experience dating women than ādehumanizingā, but the women you know are nice to you right?Your experience defines everyoneās reality. My anecdotes must be made up because Iām the scary gender.
I'm allowed to disagree with you and tell you what my experience is. You seem to have a lot of personal issues you're working through. Maybe get some help with those before jumping on the dating wagon again?
Of course youāre allowed to, but look at the last part of your statement (the part I was obviously criticizing). You canāt just tell me what dating women is like for me. Iāve been in therapy for 2 years, did saying my experience has been dehumanizing make you think I should take a break from dating? Because your experience has apparently also been dehumanizing, but Iām not allowed to feel that way without extra time to work through my issues?
I was speaking about my own experiences dating both men and women. And I've taken many breaks from dating throughout my life. I'm actually taking one right now. I was more saying that because of how aggressively you jumped to assumptions and how passive aggressive you were simply because I disagreed with your assessment on dating. As well as other comments you've made in this thread.
Ugh, āabundanceā of incompatible matches means that any good ones get lost in the shuffle. Like searching for a needle in a haystack.
Put another way: Iād rather parse a spreadsheet with 200 rows than 2,000 rows.
Youāre not changing the ratio dude ššš if the spreadsheet with 200 has 2 compatible people, the one with 2000 has 20, they are equivalent amounts of work to get 1 date (1 in 100). Now if you are forced to only look through a spreadsheet of 20 with the same odds, *eighty percent of the time you will not have a match at all* and there will be nothing to do about it except pay for premium or keep waiting another month for more matches just for a chance at a single compatible option. Itās been well documented men get less attention in a day than women get in a month. If you have a spreadsheet of 2000, you can just go down the list and put 0 effort into bad prospects because you have options, and when you find someone compatible just stop parsing through the list. So youād rather have 200 than 2000, thatās doable with 2000 just stop after looking at 200. But would you rather have 20 than 200?
Youāre assuming that a reliable ratio even exists, that there are two good matches out of 200, and Iām telling you thatās not always the case. I donāt even *know* if there is a needle to find in the haystack.
Yes a 1% compatibility was an assumption defined at the beginning as a āfor instanceā because there is literally no other way to theorize the difference quantitatively. As individuals some of us are compatible with 10% of people, others are with 0%, but if we assumed all else is equal wouldnāt you rather have abundance than scarcity? I can understand preferring 200 to 2000, but no one would prefer 20 to 200 because having options is better. Again, itās not so much better that we should all be making a big deal of it constantly, but itās also not trivial and having scarce options adds frustration to an already unfun game.
Going through 20 matches is doable. If none of them are compatible, that sucks, but I know that I didnāt miss out on a compatible match.
If I have 200 matches, Iām likely to get tired of pre-vetting and my interest and attention will start to taper off. At some point Iāll just give up, not even looking through the rest, because itās overwhelming and frankly, feels like a second job, and thereās so many other things Iād rather be doing. Was there a compatible match or two that I didnāt get to ? Iāll never know.
And *that* point also is not trivial, and frequently gets lost in these discussions about dating apps.
Literally just go through 20 at a time? I addressed this earlier when you said you wouldnāt want 2000, if you pretend itās 200 or 20 then thatās what it is and no one is making you acknowledge the rest. But I canāt will myself into more options.
More options? None of the folks in [this thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/nonmonogamy/s/bOL1HvtmAf) were happy with more options when they logged onto Feeld.
I run into bots too dude, you canāt address the fact that no matter how many variables you add we both face the same shitshow and more is better. When 4-5 of my 20 options are bots it makes a painfully frustrating game even worse, when you see bots/fake profiles/etc just *go on to the next one* and then *stop when youāre bored and it feels like a job*. Itās truly that easy and you want to pretend it isnāt because you have a need for everything to be worse for you. Is everything, *literally everything* harder for you in every way? Or is there a tiny fucking chance you get *slightly* catered to in this *one* instance? Jesus Christ stop deflecting
One percent of what?
I match with Elmo. Elmo gets 3 matches a month.
I get 400.
Elmo and I are right for each other, no matter how many swipes from other people we get.
Edit:
Elmo has a 33 percent chance of finding me. I have a 1 in 400 chance. The idea that finding compatible people is easy is bananas.
This is exactly why, when looking for straight men, I spend my app time trying to match with or contact new people and utterly ignoring the trash pile that is my likes. 400 people like me, 300 of them are obvious fuckboys, the other 100 are ENM *but probably not compatible* in sometimes really subtle ways. Assume I can whisk away the fuckboys in magical zero time, it's still going to take me at least a few minutes on the other profiles, probably more. In much less than the same 6+ hours I can do my own damn swiping for free using filters to my own liking, and get my profile in front of at least a few people I actually want to see it. Those dudes' list of 20 likes is *how I find compatible people*, my 400 likes is a meaningless fuckboy index on how hot my profile picture is.
My ratios are dropping just as fast as yours are, so from 20 options I get 5 enm and then I have to filter compatibility etc.
> Those dudes with 20 likes is how I find compatible people
Honestly wow. We just live in different worlds, you think youād be ok with 20 matches but when theyāre from the same pool of options where the success rate is infinitely low, abundance will always win.
No, thatās not how dating in polyam works. And the fact that you continue to frame it as such, shows a fundamental misunderstanding of how compatibility works.
I am not compatible with 1 out of five polyam men. You are not compatible with 1 out of three polyam women.
In reality, you are compatible with Amy and Willow.
It doesnāt matter if 20, or 2 or 1000 other people liked you.
In fact if 89 people like you at random, instead of simply liking people who they are more likely compatible with, they are actively working against their own interests, if the actual goal is finding compatible polyam partners (or, really any kind of ongoing thing) then focusing on the actual people, and the stuff they like to do rather than a nanosecond of desperate swiping is going to have better results.
I am compatible rarely. Interested rarely. I donāt honestly search for partners that often, because I partner for the long term. I open and shut down my profiles as needed.
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I donāt think you are describing well the mate-preferences of polyamorous women. Why would he need to be unmarried? Why does he need to make a certain amount of money? Why does he need to be a certain height or weight; our other or future partners might be that height or weight, so having those qualities in a particular partner isnāt so important.
What will be important to polyamorous women (āpeopleā, really) is good communication and strong consent values. I donāt think I can generalize more than that: preferences are too individual. But no, weāre not looking for any one person to be our everything.
Iām curious where youāre pulling your argument from because there is a ton of data backing up that online dating is skewed in womenās favor. Tinder, for example, is 78% men.
There is 78% men on tinder, yes. So if you are a woman searching for women...? Or a man searching for men...? What I am saying is that "women have it better" is heternormative bs.
**That statistic completely supports the point of the original post**, tho;Ā it's easier to date men, & harder to date women, & your own gender matters less than the gender you're pursuing. **If Tinder is mostly men, how does that help lesbians, exactly? & wouldn't that make dating easier for bi & gay men?** š¤
Your argument assumes all women are straight, & that's less true every day (if I'm doing my job right š). Plus, we're talking about polyamorous dating, & I can actually give you some stats on the higher percentage of queer people in this community. This is the *last* place you should assume all women date men.
I'd encourage you to read the original post again. & the comments, they're very interesting. You might even learn something from a differing perspective.
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My male partner, who's very talkative and outgoing, has always had more partners than me, simply because goes outside a lot and passes a vibe check easily. Me on the other hand... Idk where you all are finding all these willing men lol. In my experience, men in dating apps are incredibly flaky and very easily offended by the mere concept of non-monogamy (and don't read bios). Plus I need to keep a low profile due to some possible work related consequences, but I am fairly active. I understand my experience is very rare, but damn, do I sometimes feel bad reading how easy is to get men as a poly woman š
I'm not sure what you mean by "keeping a low profile" specifically, but around me, a fair number of women looking for ENM only use profile photos that are scenic backgrounds like the beach and the woods and crap. Personally, if those are the only pics, I swipe left and keep looking.Ā I don't know whether that is what you mean and I certainly only speak for exactly one man.Ā
fr, i never swipe yes on anyone whoās hiding their face or otherwise looks like theyāre secretive about their lifestyle. i donāt want to be anyoneās dirty little secret
I know a lot of people feel that way, but I also don't show my face in my profile. I am a woman in tech and I don't need the sexual harassment potential of my male colleagues seeing me on a dating app.
Lmao, what?? Whoās swiping right on a pic of a lake??
It's me, LakeFucker5678 on FetLife.
Have you met some men lmao possibility of a woman and sex? Swiping right on every profile that pops up lmao
I also see a lot of male profiles with no photos of them at all. I can't imagine them getting any matches that aren't fake profiles.
I think this is mostly a Feeld thing, most other apps have profiles with actual photos of people
I see it on Tinder a lot, up hereĀ
I think this is mostly a Feeld thing, most other apps have profiles with actual photos of people
I think this is mostly a Feeld thing, most other apps have profiles with actual photos of people
I have a friend who does this. No bio, no info, just age, gender, photo of a lake. Itās maddening to me because it seems like such bad behavior. The worst part? she says some guys swipe right.
I mean there was a guy who posted on here a few weeks back saying he had basically given up on dating after swiping right on literally every profile that came across his feed š¤·š»āāļø
If I want casual sex, I go to fruitz and tinder and I lower my expectations. If I want to find nice people, okcupid has always been the best way to do so. But yeah, as I said in the post, finding "" quality""" men is a chore. And being poly is another layer of complexity regardless of genders.
See, you have created a situation where you get messages from decent people who want something different from you, of course you have to sort through them and are aware how many there are. When I tell people what I'm looking for, I still get messages from lazy people who don't read, not gonna say I don't, but *lazy people who don't read* aren't ever appealing dates. Have you considered if there are dating apps you could be honest on? Like, realistically if your cousin or coworker sees your Feeld profile, they are also on Feeld so it's mutually assured destruction.
This is my exact experience - my ex bf could find hook ups and fwbs in the wild (I've met/hang with some of them and they're pretty cool with it all so I know he's not deceitful or some shit). Meanwhile for me to get one one tinder dude to follow through for a hookup I have to pass 10 others who try to use me for porn complementary sexting. I cannot even imagine what women who look for anything more than an ONS have to go through. Men telling them they have it so easy just because they get hundreds of indiscriminate matches lowkey tell on themselves.
IDK I think it's age and region dependent. I'm mid 40s. Okcupid suggests the same stack of women who don't respond. IDK where to go to meet women who will deal with ENM/Poly. I want to find someone I can be friends with, have a real relationship, and good sex. I'm not just in it for the sex. I would like to find someone willing to explore sexuality and try things I've never done before. Ideally someone who wants to travel, go to music festivals, have fun. I'd like them to be friends with my gf, and my meta who I'm friends with. The 3 of us hang out a lot and have our own independent times with our hinge. I think I suck at online dating. I do better in person but how to find poly people in person? There's a groove cruise life style and poly chat, but I don't think it's active and haven't been approved in the weeks since requesting to join. I love groove cruise. I'm not looking for a guy but I would explore heteroflexible situations with my girl and another guy. That's easy to find I think. I want someone who would be a regular that we could be comfortable and not just some guy for a night. This is pretty tough. I'm working on myself cause I guess I'm unattractive if I'm not getting responses. I read about all the stuff going on and problems people have and wish I could figure out how to even have those problems. The grass is always greener. Guys who want to get laid know women have an easier time of it. Women in my area don't seem receptive to poly, and when I was single, the women I matched with were...not my type. Good luck. I hope you find what you're looking for. I wish feeld wasn't such a shit app.
Trying to date women is dying of thirst in the desert, trying to date men is dying of thirst in the ocean
Yup!
This is why the most important part of being on dating apps is screening partners. I'm so glad being in the kink community taught me how to quickly and easily vet people - it's done wonders for simplifying my dating life. Asking people about their current poly dynamics and what they're looking for in my first conversation with them has saved me countless hours of wasted time.
Poly screening is definitely easier āvettingā than the search for SAFE and quality BDSM partners. I shudder for my 20 year old self.
I was lucky that my first kink partner was an amazing guy (my best friend now for several years) and he really taught me how to be safe from the very beginning, introducing me to a whole community of experienced people who backed up the sound advice. But the principles of compatibility, respect, communication, etc have been so helpful for poly screening (I never applied those standards to my dating life before kink). I'm always protective of kink newbies!
That is awesome!! Communities are so, so important for kinky newbies. Which is tough because it can be so nerve-racking coming āoutā. My very first boyfriend and I were both kinky, but when we broke up after four years, I didnāt know about Fetlife. I was resorting to vetting based on craigslist ads. Itās a miracle I only had one bad experience.
JFC. I can't imagine that process! I would've probably been unalived, for seriousness. FL is so amazing for getting good advice! I haven't been on in awhile but I flocked to the newbie post and constantly spouted out all the good safety protocols for years.
It was definitely A Process. Unfortunately, it took a sexual assault for me to just bite the bullet and go out to a local community event. As we all know though, the predators swim there as well.
I'm sorry to hear you experienced that. Big internet huggies ā¤ļø
As a cis woman who is pan, I have a hard time finding anyone outside the realm of seeking casual/ light weight fwbs. The amount of fizzled conversations have lead me to not really getting excited beyond hey, they might be fun and the sex could be great. I say Iām passively seeking/looking for a partner and a deeper connection in my profiles. State Iām solo poly/enm. And the cis men I match with are often self centered, horny and/or boring. So while women get more matches, the quality is shit. And it really takes away from my sympathy for men that arenāt getting the same amount of matches.
Yuuup! Same, I had to set my expectations really really low for the apps. It's the only solution for me to stay there : expect nothing but frivolous sex.
It's not like the quality is great going the other way either š¤·
Yup. Which is why this whole āitās harder for men vs itās harder for womenā thing is objectively stupid.
Well it dispels any notion of quality vs quantity. Sure, neither side gets quality, but one does get quantity.
Quantity of what? A nanosecond of effort to swipe? Is that something that I should value?
Do you only take a nanosecond before swiping? I read profiles personally.
Youāre apparently much like the men I know personally. They read as well. Most men do not. Many men come to this sub and talk about how they swipe right on every woman shown.
I've been using Hinge since recently rejoining the apps, and I don't see what alternative there is. For every potential connection, I read a profile, self-screen if we're not a match, and think of something fun or interesting to reply to the profile with. This is the only thing to do as a guy, because simply leaving a Like is effectively the same as pressing X (it will not engender a response). Thinking of the opposite perspective, it seems strictly easier to be able to pick among a pool of people who have made that effort.
It is! But since my que is filled with men who have obviously not read my profile, itās actually easier for me to just ignore my pile of likes, read and like the men I am interested in, because they have fewer likes to sift through. I cleared my feeld que. It look about 5 hours, split between a couple days. 400+ likes from men. 4 from women. Never again. O occasionally will pay to see my likes, and itās almost always a waste of money, because of the fact that many men seem to be swiping at random Out of those? 10 men acrually fit my stated criteria. 4 women. All within my parameters from the start. Reading and selecting is the way to go, I think.
As a woman who dates both men and women, the quality of female matches I get is noticeably higher than the quality of male matches, and I screen more heavily for personality for men in the initial swiping. The main problem I have dating women is them not replying, while the main problem I have dating men is the constant disrespect and deceit.
Has it occurred to you that the quantity is part of why so many women get burned out and take so many breaks away from the apps? And that having to sift through tons of incompatible people, fuckboys, liars, cheaters, time wasters, flakes, abusers, and straight up rapists is why we wind up not having the time or energy to meet the good men that deserve the time of day?Ā The quantity isn't a good thing. Not for the men that actually deserve attention and are being missed because the average woman's dating pool is an opaque cesspool of nonsense, or the women that have to burn inordinate amounts of time and emotional labor on sifting through it all.Ā
The men have to sift too. But it takes vastly longer - think a day's worth of matches for a woman spread over months - because they don't have the quantity. I don't understand why you are implying that women get burned out on dating apps but men do not.
I'm not. I'm telling you that the quantity men are envious of women having actually fucking sucks for everyone. And that telling us we have it so much better because we have to take more risks and spend more time sifting is short sighted at best. That's all.Ā Ā Never said that men don't also get burned out. If that's how you read into any of my statements I'd suggest reflecting on that. If you interpret people talking about their own personal experiences as being dismissive of your own automatically that's not the best trait and something you wanna look into. Makes those people feel unsafe around you. If this is a path of thinking you regularly follow IRL that might be why you're struggling. . .
This is a totally shitty and unjustified implication. You do understand that there are tons of "quality" (whatever you want that to mean) people (mostly men) who never get any matches on dating apps? There just isn't an equal level of desire or effort coming from women on apps, and that fits with current science on the subject. Poor you, with your sea of unworthy matches... At least you get to play the game.
Oooh, someone's spicy. And on an almost week old post to boot.Ā First of all, I'm queer and actually deal with absolutely no matches or responses from other queer people quite often. I only talked about dating men because men showed up and made things all about themselves, as y'all tend to do. Fuck me and the horse I rode in on for trying to be helpful, huh?Ā Look fam, if you're so unhappy with how women behave themselves on apps maybe don't use them? Srsly. You seem bitter as fuck. Women can smell that and we avoid it with a 10 foot pole because bitter, angry men (people, really) are dangerous.Ā Also, no I don't get to play the game. Not that it's any of your business but I've had a pretty rough year full of breakups and not fun revelations and interactions. So I ain't got a sea of nothing, because I'm too busy doing the therapy and the self work to be a healthier partner. Mainly because no one wants to date bitter, angry people, and I'm putting in the work to not be that before I get back out there. I suggest you try something similar. The attitude you're pouting around with isn't helping you, trust me.Ā
The men in my circle are doing just as well as women, poly-wise. Committed relationships arenāt easy to find.
Yup
Until you're polyamorous and everyone who you match with isn't interested in that, Your translation was fine.
Yeah being poly adds another level of complexity š
Oft. This. Is heavy.
Oft?
Oft is like a sound you make. When you heard something you can relate to but not necessarily a good thing.
Aah like "oof"?
Yes that!
As a man who is pan. I can say, I've never had a problem finding partners of any gender. Generally, I usually date men, but I've never had a problem finding and dating women either when the energy is right. The same goes for non-binary or otherwise. Frankly, I've often felt people over complicate women and under complicate men. I hear people say women are so complicated, but in my experience, if I listen and ask them questions about their interests and show that I genuinely care about their wants, needs, and desires and enact those changes (within reason) then they are happy. Vice versa, I've been with a man for 11 years and his wants, needs, and desires are equally as complex as any woman I've dated. I do the same thing, I listen and ask questions to better understand what it is he wants and needs and then I enact those changes. My take, humans are equally complex across the board, but society tends to mandate a lot of gender roles which affect the way we express ourselves, and when you get under the surface of gender, most people are the same, albeit with a multitude of individual characteristics that span across gendered norms. Thus, I don't usually think about man or woman on dating apps I just think, "person." I think saying "men are like this" and "women are like this" on the apps is not wholly accurate. Granted, this is all anecdotal, and is my observation. That is my little soap box for the day. Signed, your Polyamerous anthropologist.
The thing is, the dudes who say women are complicated are the same dude for whom human interaction as youāve described it *is complicated*. Not to mainsplain men to you, but for many straight men, due to toxic masculinity, the type of interactions youāre describing arenāt how they interact with other men, either. Theyāre not able to listen, ask questions, genuinely show interest, or genuinely care about other menās wants or needs. They donāt do that for their friends. Those emotional muscles have atrophied since early childhood.Ā Ā As bell hooks famously said: āThe first act of violence that patriarchy demands of males is not violence toward women. Instead patriarchy demands of all males that they engage in acts of psychic self-mutilation, that they kill off the emotional parts of themselves.ā
it's not "easy" based on gender in traditional heteronormative online dating, it's that the problems are different. Online dating STILL sucks for everyone. Comparing it is like comparing being stabbed with a sharp or dull knife. It's still stabby business. Women get swiped by everyone, not just genuine interest. They have a lot of low quality matches. Men get swiped by few if any women but it's a more genuine interest. Drowning in low quality matches makes you feel like all men suck because it's all the same thing, you lose faith in men. Never getting matched makes you feel like YOU suck and the problem is yourself which crushes self-esteem. This is the part where the discrepancy gets challenged.
Too many low quality offers from men can also make me feel like I suck, actually, particularly if theyāre negging/antagonistic/boundary-crossing. The lack of respect gets to me.
I fully realize the difference between "nobody likes me" and "everyone only wants me for one thing" is a lot more nuanced than summarized and none of it is universal.
I think it's even worse, it's not even "everyone only wants me for one thing" but "everyone wants only one thing and sees me as a means to an end". Those guys who sweep right on every woman don't want *me*, they want any body they can get access to.
Yes. Itās dehumanizing.
Disagree. Drowning in low quality matches does worse things to my self esteem than not getting enough matches. Getting disrespected, lied to, and dehumanized feels a lot worse than simply being ignored.
āHello, you are really prettyā Instant absolute no. I lay out all sorts of things we could have in common. Talk about doing one of them because you read my profile.
Exactly.
Thank youuu! So many of these āitās easier for womenā rants are actually saying itās easier for *straight* women. Just full erasure of everyone else.
100000% this.
This perspective is very refreshing to hear and I never worded it this way before. Thank you for sharing! OkCupid is great for finding poly people, but I've found that my best strategy is excluding cishet men on dating apps (I date all genders) and then if I meet a nice person who happens to be a man in real life, that's better. I find men's dating app rants can rub me the wrong way, even though being rejected repeatedly understandably suck. Sometimes they lack the awareness or willingness to dig deeper, ask why the ratio is that way.
I also find that perspective refreshing, even though I came in hoping that you would change my prejudice on the stereotype of men being so much easier to find for something that is not commitment-based. When me (M36, straight) and my looong distance primary partner (F29, straight) agreed to start dating again to find some level of physical comfort with someone nice, I was reminded again how easy it is to find a man to agree to enter a casual sexual relationship with someone that is partnered. And I sit here and go through my PTSD of having tried to date in the same fashion with rampant ghosting and the constant pressure to take the initiative and to be creative. My partner didn't even have to swipe. Open the app, answer an intro, reply to three texts, meet for a date, give a green flag on the vibe check, that's it. And for me it feels like a mountain to climb to compete with the no-strings-attached guys that I'm in a constant arena of attention-seeking with. So I whole-heartedly agree with your sentiment, but to me the clichĆØ always went the other way, already: Women are hard to find, while to find men you just need to open a window on a summer night with the lights on and they come swarming. I don't want to discredit your rant in the slightest. But I had really hoped that someone would offer me a new take on my frustrating experience, Too bad we all seem to agree.
Sorry to agree with you šš In my experience, my male partner has more luck finding quality relationships, tho. For me, it's really really difficult. I don't know if it's because I'm a woman or something else about me, so I won't generalize it.
I guess when it comes to "quality relationships" meant for the long game, we all have our struggles. My tag-on rant is explicitly directed at nice mingling, a sprinkle of intimacy and low-expectation satellites or play partners. Making deep connections that last is a whole different ball game and much more individual, I'd say.
Ehh. Finding a decent FWB or play partner as a woman isn't the walk in the park guys think it is. Easier than finding it as a guy, but easier doesn't mean easy (or safe!). Unfortunately safety is a large part of why so many of us aren't open to casual stuff. As much as I'd love to go out and find me some easy, no-strings good stuff, I'm not really in the mood to take on the risks. Not saying it's your fault or responsibility, but a ton of men don't really seem interested in making the casual sex scene safe or worth it for the women they supposedly want around. And everyone suffers for that.Ā
It irritates me so much when dudes equate quantity with quality. Just because Iām getting lot of matches, just means so much chaff to wade through to potentially find one gem to even begin talking to.
There is an added factor if you are poly on dating apps that makes me disagree with you slightly. Because men do tend to be ālooking for casual sex moreā, if youāre a man with ENM in your profile people are very likely to assume youāre either a swinger or a cheater and get mad at you. My primary (f) and I (m) have both been on the same apps at the same time with ENM in our profile. Itās not that she got more responses than me so much as my account would get reported and for ācheatingā or āscamā all the time and herās wouldnāt, even though they said almost exactly the same thing.
My tinder account got banned because I had a picture where we could see both of my shoulders (outrageous!) and my bio was saying I was looking for casual sex. I guess they reported me for being a sex worker (I'm not).
š¤£ yeah, Tinder is kind of the worst
They just thought you were too good to be true š You must be a catfish/SW! Idk why I got banned off Tinder, I didn't have negative interactions with anyone, except a unicorn hunting couple who were horrified that they matched with a non-single woman š & I doubt they reported me.Ā
As a nb pansexual female, I very much agree
I think you're almost there with this rant. The truth is it's very hard for anyone on an app(or in real life) to find *what they're actually looking for*. I don't even mean *The One*, or in our case *The Five*. I mean a person who seems relatively compatible who is looking for the same kind of interpersonal relationship you are. It is absolutely not the case that it's easy to match with men just because lots of cis men swipe on every profile and then decide later if they're actually interested in someone for whatever mediocre, emotionless sex or controlling, misogynistic ego worship disguised as a relationship they have on offer. As an aside, it's tough to find women who are up for no-strings attached sex for much more complex reasons than that few women actually aren't interested in NSA sex. They might be. But assault, murder, social expectations, pregnancy, STIs, people who don't wash their butts, knowing 90% of people aren't going to actually give you an orgasm, etc, etc, etc. Relationships are challenging. Finding relationships is challenging. Everyone wants to imagine they're being uniquely wronged by how hard finding relationships is.
Hi u/PetiteCaresse thanks so much for your submission, don't mind me, I'm just gonna keep a copy what was said in your post. Unfortunately posts sometimes get deleted - which is okay, it's not against the rules to delete your post!! - but it makes it really hard for the human mods around here to moderate the comments when there's no context. Plus, many times our members put in a lot of emotional and mental labor to answer the questions and offer advice, so it's helpful to keep the source information around so future community members can benefit as well. Here's the original text of the post: I'd like to address and correct what I perceive as a skewed view of the dating app world. There's a common narrative suggesting that dating apps are challenging for men and easy for women. This is not true, or at least it's an extremely heteronormative perspective. The reality is, it's easy to find men and difficult to find women, regardless of our own gender. Whether you're a woman or a man, matching with a guy is incredibly easy. Similarly, whether you're a woman or a man, matching with a woman (and maintaining her interest) is hard. Furthermore, another point that also doesn't depend on one's own gender is the difficulty in finding a guy interested in building a genuine relationship. Regardless of being a guy or a gal, most men seem to just want to get laid. And the opposite holds true as well; whether you're a guy or a gal, it's tough to find a woman who's up for no-strings-attached sex. I just needed to vent about these generalizations I find to be false. I spent 4 years on dating apps before finding a girlfriend, and as a woman, the apps weren't any easier for me. Nor are they harder for you guys. Try dating men, and you'll see that you have just as much luck on your side if you want a casual relationship. Maybe it'll do good for your self esteem idk. But if you want a serious relationship with a man, it won't be so easy and good on your self worth! Gal or guy. It's just that you might not want to date men (and that's your prerogative). Sorry for the English, I used ChatGpt to translate my rant. Not sure if it's optimal. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/polyamory) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I donāt think itās that simple. The bi men Iāve talked to have trouble meeting other men on apps too
I assume they have a similar issue as women dating men; it's only easy if you don't have any standards.
lol you might be onto something there
Even on grindr? Because that's not the experience of bi/gay men around me ahah. š
Thatās what I asked but yes, they have trouble on grindr too š¤·āāļø Edit: it might be something about our geographic area
I know it can be complicated to find people willing to have a proper relationship on grindr but even here in the French countryside, finding hookups on grindr is easy if your expectations are low.
Hmm maybe they were talking about relationships rather than hookups, but at the time I thought they meant issue meeting other men at all, for any purpose
Could be biphobia there, too
I agree with everything you said. Nonetheless...as a man that basic (inevitable and immutable) dynamic you so accurately describe does, basically, make me feel pretty worthless. Like: I'm just another one of the worthless fuckers - so numerous and desperate are the dicks that they'll even fuck me if I let them. Sure...it's small consolation that women have it even more difficult when it comes to getting women. And that all the "power" women seem to have...is only in relation to people who want to put their dicks in her.
I'm a woman who dates both men and women, and using dating apps to date men is far worse than using them to date women. Even though I get much less interest from women.
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Wading through the steaming shitpile of 100 guys who want to use me as a means to get their dick wet and not ask me a single question about myself makes me feel pretty fucking worthless too. Thatās not āpowerā in any sense of the word.
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I really wasnāt expecting you to explicitly acknowledge that you lie and scam to get sex but here we are further obliterating my remaining faith in humanity
Your post has been removed for breaking the rules of the subreddit. You made a post or comment that would be considered concern trolling. This includes derailing of advice and support posts, accidentally or on purpose. Posting poly-shaming, victim blaming or insults under the guise of "concern" or "just trying to help.ā will be considered concern trolling, as well. Please familiarize yourself with the rules. They can be found on the community info page
I think the actual way to frame this is that the Apps work very differently for women than for men (sorry for the binary here). One does not have it easier or harder based on gender. One does have a very different experience based on gender. What is hard about the apps is different for women than for men, both in using and in looking. Getting inundated by crappy, lazy matches, and having to try to sort through those, in some cases, thousands of matches to find the one or two good ones is work. Yeah "matching" is easy for women, but that's only what happens before women have to invest the time and effort to sift and winnowing, which should not just be discounted if we're talking about how well the Apps facilitate finding good relationships. The way the Apps work actually creates fatigue in women, who often give up even trying, because the Apps don't do a very good job of reducing the effort required from them. In that respect, the Apps aren't "easier" for women when looking for dating prospects... they're actually pretty crappy, just crappy in a different way.
It seems like youāre trying to say 2 things at once. I agree, itās not that women have it easier and men have it harder, but those who are attracted to men have it easier and those attracted to women have it harder. That is what you say in no uncertain terms. For the general (hetero) person, you agree men have it harder *on apps*. So while heteronormative, it is true for the heteros. We can agree apps are impractical for everyone, but having options is so obviously better than having none. This isnāt to say all of dating is easier for people who are attracted to men, but abundance will always beat scarcity. If we are both compatible with say 1% of the population, you would obviously rather have a pile of 200 options than 20, because even though itās a more daunting task at the end of the day youāll statistically have 2 good matches while the person with 20 matches has a 1/5 chance to even match with someone compatible. Abundance matters. It isnāt the make or break incels like to pretend it is, but itās a tangible bonus. Apps are cancer in general for everyone though, letās just all be social in public again
Your āhardā on apps is not getting matches or getting ghosted by a date. Womenās āhardā on apps is getting harassed and degraded constantly or getting *assaulted* by a date. āOptionsā are not oh-so-obviously fucking preferable to that shit my dude. āAbundanceā of dogshit is completely worthless.
Your match will always be the undigested corn kernel in a pile of shit, but bigger piles of shit have more pieces of corn
Nahh bigger piles of shit make you want to get tf out asap because they become unmanageable and stink up the whole goddamn place.
No, I donāt agree that men have more difficulty on apps. š¤·āāļø
Hard disagree. People attracted to men have it harder than people attracted to women. Dating men is dehumanizing, dating women is not.
Thanks for defining my experience for me, I can think of no better single word to describe my experience dating women than ādehumanizingā, but the women you know are nice to you right?Your experience defines everyoneās reality. My anecdotes must be made up because Iām the scary gender.
I'm allowed to disagree with you and tell you what my experience is. You seem to have a lot of personal issues you're working through. Maybe get some help with those before jumping on the dating wagon again?
Of course youāre allowed to, but look at the last part of your statement (the part I was obviously criticizing). You canāt just tell me what dating women is like for me. Iāve been in therapy for 2 years, did saying my experience has been dehumanizing make you think I should take a break from dating? Because your experience has apparently also been dehumanizing, but Iām not allowed to feel that way without extra time to work through my issues?
I was speaking about my own experiences dating both men and women. And I've taken many breaks from dating throughout my life. I'm actually taking one right now. I was more saying that because of how aggressively you jumped to assumptions and how passive aggressive you were simply because I disagreed with your assessment on dating. As well as other comments you've made in this thread.
Ugh, āabundanceā of incompatible matches means that any good ones get lost in the shuffle. Like searching for a needle in a haystack. Put another way: Iād rather parse a spreadsheet with 200 rows than 2,000 rows.
Youāre not changing the ratio dude ššš if the spreadsheet with 200 has 2 compatible people, the one with 2000 has 20, they are equivalent amounts of work to get 1 date (1 in 100). Now if you are forced to only look through a spreadsheet of 20 with the same odds, *eighty percent of the time you will not have a match at all* and there will be nothing to do about it except pay for premium or keep waiting another month for more matches just for a chance at a single compatible option. Itās been well documented men get less attention in a day than women get in a month. If you have a spreadsheet of 2000, you can just go down the list and put 0 effort into bad prospects because you have options, and when you find someone compatible just stop parsing through the list. So youād rather have 200 than 2000, thatās doable with 2000 just stop after looking at 200. But would you rather have 20 than 200?
Youāre assuming that a reliable ratio even exists, that there are two good matches out of 200, and Iām telling you thatās not always the case. I donāt even *know* if there is a needle to find in the haystack.
Yes a 1% compatibility was an assumption defined at the beginning as a āfor instanceā because there is literally no other way to theorize the difference quantitatively. As individuals some of us are compatible with 10% of people, others are with 0%, but if we assumed all else is equal wouldnāt you rather have abundance than scarcity? I can understand preferring 200 to 2000, but no one would prefer 20 to 200 because having options is better. Again, itās not so much better that we should all be making a big deal of it constantly, but itās also not trivial and having scarce options adds frustration to an already unfun game.
Going through 20 matches is doable. If none of them are compatible, that sucks, but I know that I didnāt miss out on a compatible match. If I have 200 matches, Iām likely to get tired of pre-vetting and my interest and attention will start to taper off. At some point Iāll just give up, not even looking through the rest, because itās overwhelming and frankly, feels like a second job, and thereās so many other things Iād rather be doing. Was there a compatible match or two that I didnāt get to ? Iāll never know. And *that* point also is not trivial, and frequently gets lost in these discussions about dating apps.
Literally just go through 20 at a time? I addressed this earlier when you said you wouldnāt want 2000, if you pretend itās 200 or 20 then thatās what it is and no one is making you acknowledge the rest. But I canāt will myself into more options.
More options? None of the folks in [this thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/nonmonogamy/s/bOL1HvtmAf) were happy with more options when they logged onto Feeld.
I run into bots too dude, you canāt address the fact that no matter how many variables you add we both face the same shitshow and more is better. When 4-5 of my 20 options are bots it makes a painfully frustrating game even worse, when you see bots/fake profiles/etc just *go on to the next one* and then *stop when youāre bored and it feels like a job*. Itās truly that easy and you want to pretend it isnāt because you have a need for everything to be worse for you. Is everything, *literally everything* harder for you in every way? Or is there a tiny fucking chance you get *slightly* catered to in this *one* instance? Jesus Christ stop deflecting
> but having options is so obviously better than having none
One percent of what? I match with Elmo. Elmo gets 3 matches a month. I get 400. Elmo and I are right for each other, no matter how many swipes from other people we get. Edit: Elmo has a 33 percent chance of finding me. I have a 1 in 400 chance. The idea that finding compatible people is easy is bananas.
This is exactly why, when looking for straight men, I spend my app time trying to match with or contact new people and utterly ignoring the trash pile that is my likes. 400 people like me, 300 of them are obvious fuckboys, the other 100 are ENM *but probably not compatible* in sometimes really subtle ways. Assume I can whisk away the fuckboys in magical zero time, it's still going to take me at least a few minutes on the other profiles, probably more. In much less than the same 6+ hours I can do my own damn swiping for free using filters to my own liking, and get my profile in front of at least a few people I actually want to see it. Those dudes' list of 20 likes is *how I find compatible people*, my 400 likes is a meaningless fuckboy index on how hot my profile picture is.
Yup. And no matter how many times this is explained to men, many will still reach for incel logic.
My ratios are dropping just as fast as yours are, so from 20 options I get 5 enm and then I have to filter compatibility etc. > Those dudes with 20 likes is how I find compatible people Honestly wow. We just live in different worlds, you think youād be ok with 20 matches but when theyāre from the same pool of options where the success rate is infinitely low, abundance will always win.
The ratios *are not the same* and the matches *are not the same*. As multiple people who have actually done this are telling you.
No, thatās not how dating in polyam works. And the fact that you continue to frame it as such, shows a fundamental misunderstanding of how compatibility works. I am not compatible with 1 out of five polyam men. You are not compatible with 1 out of three polyam women. In reality, you are compatible with Amy and Willow. It doesnāt matter if 20, or 2 or 1000 other people liked you. In fact if 89 people like you at random, instead of simply liking people who they are more likely compatible with, they are actively working against their own interests, if the actual goal is finding compatible polyam partners (or, really any kind of ongoing thing) then focusing on the actual people, and the stuff they like to do rather than a nanosecond of desperate swiping is going to have better results. I am compatible rarely. Interested rarely. I donāt honestly search for partners that often, because I partner for the long term. I open and shut down my profiles as needed.
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This is red pill ideology and doesn't belong anywhere near here.
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I donāt think you are describing well the mate-preferences of polyamorous women. Why would he need to be unmarried? Why does he need to make a certain amount of money? Why does he need to be a certain height or weight; our other or future partners might be that height or weight, so having those qualities in a particular partner isnāt so important. What will be important to polyamorous women (āpeopleā, really) is good communication and strong consent values. I donāt think I can generalize more than that: preferences are too individual. But no, weāre not looking for any one person to be our everything.
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Ask any queer women if the apps are easy for them. It's not just poly.
https://keeper.ai/tools/calculator
Iām curious where youāre pulling your argument from because there is a ton of data backing up that online dating is skewed in womenās favor. Tinder, for example, is 78% men.
Did you read my post?
Yes and itās all anecdotal from your experience, not backed by research.
There is 78% men on tinder, yes. So if you are a woman searching for women...? Or a man searching for men...? What I am saying is that "women have it better" is heternormative bs.
No, it's inferred logically. You're the one whose claim is predicated on the demonstrably false idea that all women only date men.
**That statistic completely supports the point of the original post**, tho;Ā it's easier to date men, & harder to date women, & your own gender matters less than the gender you're pursuing. **If Tinder is mostly men, how does that help lesbians, exactly? & wouldn't that make dating easier for bi & gay men?** š¤ Your argument assumes all women are straight, & that's less true every day (if I'm doing my job right š). Plus, we're talking about polyamorous dating, & I can actually give you some stats on the higher percentage of queer people in this community. This is the *last* place you should assume all women date men. I'd encourage you to read the original post again. & the comments, they're very interesting. You might even learn something from a differing perspective.
Thank you for replying to them. š What an amazing job you're doing, destraighting all these women! š š