(2/3) “I’d also been engaged recently. We broke it off in January. I was trying to make some changes in my life. I stopped wearing make-up for a few months to see what sort of things I’d notice if I stopped looking in the mirror so much. I made a deal with myself that I wasn’t going to post any selfies for a while. I was only going to photograph things that weren’t me. I started posting photos of nature, art, and my teacup collection. That began to attract other people into my life who were interested in those things. One night Chris sent me a message. It was a photo of a bridge he’d just taken. We went back and forth for a couple weeks, then decided to meet. A few months earlier, I probably would have never agreed to meet. But I was at a point in my life where I was trying to be open to new things. I told him my only rule was that he couldn’t murder me.”
“And my only rule was that she had to wear her cat glasses.”
I often follow the popular photo blog called, Humans of New York,
which displays photography from Brandon Stanton. Recently I had noticed this
particular blog post and thought of our CS400ba course. Technology has truly
entered so many aspects of the personal and work lives. Online dating is a new
phenomenon, some popular smart phone applications and dating websites include
Tinder, Grinder and Plenty of Fish. However, as displayed in this blog post by
Stanton, digital technologies not originally created for dating purposes has led
to being used for that anyways.
As discussed throughout this semester, we have learned
much about how social formations are materially constituted as articulations of
technologies of collaboration and coordination. Do you feel that online dating
apps and websites allow for this to occur and thus create new cultural
imaginaries of social belonging? With this in mind, how do you feel about
online dating? Does it make dating too easy? Tedious? Fun? Revolutionary? Or
does this new form of dating seem to be taken too far by the increase of
technology and being connected via the internet in our globalized world today?
The revolution of online dating is incredible, I have so happy someone posted about it! I recently read Aziz Ansari's book on Modern Romance, which I recommend for everyone to read (not this is not paid advertisement!!!) especially if you are taking more communication courses in the future. His book discussed how it began, which was with Newspaper ads which gave a blurb about yourself and then a phone number to call where you'd listen to message and leave your own. The person would then call you back if you sounded interesting. This method relied on audio sound and charm, without considering looks. It then transformed into video ads of yourself which would be visual and audio depictions of a person. Now we see sites such as Eharmony or Tinder which rely solely on quick visual pictures of a person and if you're interested you follow through with more. Aziz mentioned is widening our range exponentially, as we might have only had access to people near us to date who lived in close proximity, for how else would you meet? However, with our widened and endless range of possibilities it appears people are marrying later and dating more people in between, finding it hard to settle down. I personally think that online dating is a blessing and a curse. Sure, we have endless possibilities but that may make it hard for us to appreciate who we have when we have it as we may be waiting for the next best thing or focus on finding that "true love". Additionally, I think tinder for example is extremely objective and can be incredibly sexist in the way many guys treat women through the apps. I immediately deleted the app after a few weeks as the messages were short of rude, off-putting and vulgar. Of course women have the ability to act the same but in my experience I have seen many more of my girlfriends receive inappropriate messages than my male friends did. Tinder makes us rely on the visual brand of ourselves and how we visually depict ourselves. The original newspaper ads show character and when you talk on the phone there is something more sincere and vulnerable than the same standard and objective message you can fire off to a large amount of people. I also think tinder has objectified people and people are no longer interested in dating someone or finding a connection but instead with using them for gratification or confidence. Read the Aziz book for more detail on this topic!
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