Originally published in July 2018
It’s 2018, and we’re all up to speed on the classics. Ghosting, dick pic-ing, being three inches shorter than you said you were, non-disclosure of a child–we’ve seen it all. But there’s one subtle behavior we’re not acknowledging that I’d like to call out in the hopes that it fizzles out like flat Coke.
After we “match” with someone, very little has actually been accomplished. Matching doesn’t come with any real benefits, there’s no concierge helping two people along down a path to companionship, offering advice, encouragement, a cold drink. There’s just suddenly the ability to communicate with a person you couldn’t communicate with before. That’s actually very little anything. There’s work to be done.
Someone has to say hello first. It’s awkward, everyone hates it, but someone has to do it. It’s the woman. You might think it isn’t, you might think it’s the man’s “job” to show some spark of chivalry and begin a conversation, whyever you think the man will or should talk first, he won’t. I’ve been online dating for ten years. He won’t. So it’s on the woman to open the lines of communication if she ever wants to have contact with this sack of five photos and a two sentence bio that didn’t put her off her morning bagel. Ladies, we are the backbone of the universe.
So, I speak first. I don’t used a canned one-liner, I haven’t found a magic sentence that “works” every time, I just say whatever it is that comes to me to say. There is no sentence harder to write than the first sentence you say to someone on online dating. I earn my living as a writer and I still have difficulty with this. But you know what isn’t hard to write, like at all? A response to that first sentence.
The most trash dating app behavior in existence is this: ignoring the first message someone sends you–forever. No response, no explanation, just the skillful pretending that you don’t exist. Even though he matched with you thereby inviting you to speak to him. We’re not collecting each other’s faces like goddamn baseball cards, we’re matching for a reason–to try and connect and see if we can stomach two summer ales together on a patio. There is literally no point to any of this if we don’t actually speak. Throw your phone in a river, or write back.
It’s not like he didn’t “get” the message, he’s just matched with you. You aren’t looking at an old account some dude forgot to delete because he thought just removing the app from his phone was enough. This is an actively Tindering, Bumbling, Hinge-ing man. He’s there. He’s saying nothing, but his actions speak volumes. Allow me to translate:
“Sorry, your first communication didn’t impress me enough to warrant a response. You only get one shot though, and you blew it. Don’t try again, that’s just desperate.”
“Is that all you’ve got? Psssht. I got seven cooler messages before 11am.”
“Not witty enough. Next.”
“I’ve determined that your personality is incompatible to mine based on the first eight words you ever communicated to me. It’s science.”
“You don’t sound fun enough. I want someone fun. Someone wild and fun. Do you know anyone wild and fun? I want my life to be wild and fun. I want a woman to make my life wild and fun. Literally every day forever.”
“Actually, I changed my mind, you’re not cute.”
I’ve long lamented about the overall lack of manners on dating apps. I’m not new here. But the deeper down the rabid rabbit’s hole I go, the more behaviors I come across that are just nonsensical. There’s a massive percentage of dating app activity that carries a strong aftertaste of “why bother.” But we do bother, we do keep trying, because Jessica is due in November and this time last year she was living in a studio alone with no stove. It’ll work–you just have to keep trying.
And you know what, I will keep trying. And I will keep sending messages. And I’ve no doubt that most of the messages I send will never be responded to. Because they never are. But I can either let it make me angry, and push my sanity to the utter infinity pool edge, or I can make myself feel better and say something about it on a forum that doesn’t require you to respond–it only requires you to listen.
So listen up, Silent Sal–I see you. I see you see my message. I see you see my message and say nothing. I see you see my message and say nothing and I’m saying something, because if we never say anything that’s really saying something, and I’d rather not leave this unsaid. Write me back, bitch–I said it.