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W.When she made a crude joke about a “riding girl with a whip” on a date with Georgie Sologood, she knew it was time for a quick exit. After she met Tom through her dating app in the summer of 2021, she expected a polite conversation over a few drinks. What she got was a two-hour rant about his ex-wife and creepy insinuations. I was working in music communication and was setting up a festival at the time.He started getting aggressive and I was doomed to fail. “He didn’t ask a single question about himself all night, so I don’t know how he could have known that.”
For 40-year-old Georgie, her bad experience after months of thoughtless swipes was the final straw. Focus on that instead,” she says. “We found that many of the men on the app also had serious problems. You never know who’s online.” Georgie acknowledges that people with emotional baggage aren’t limited to dating sites, but apps I feel that it gives me a chance to hide my bad behavior. She said, “The problem is you don’t have to reflect or change when something goes wrong. You can just swipe to the next person.”
By the fall of 2021, Georgie, who lives in Essex, was hard at work and enjoying her free time with friends and family. Then, suddenly, she met Mark Bamford, her 50-year-old, who lives in London and owns a music technology company. “He was featured at the British His Country Music Awards,” she says. “I was on the awards board, and someone suggested that I might be a good sponsor for the festival I was working on.” The pair immediately hit it off and exchanged numbers. . In January 2022, they had their first date in London and their relationship developed quickly. It’s very easy to be with him, but when I try to communicate through the app, I just don’t get it,” she says.
Mark, who dabbled in dating apps before meeting Georgie, feels the same way. Of course, people can multi-date with or without apps, but I think technology will lead you in the direction of seduction. We need to get more users instead of bringing people in. The more they bring people back, the more money we can make selling their data.”
The app puts a potential army of attractive suitors at its fingertips, so it’s no surprise that users are becoming more picky. I stopped using it in 2015. “One man said on the first date that he wanted children, and it was really intense,” she says. “He seemed to be checking what he wanted in a partner. , and if I didn’t find what I was looking for immediately, I just had to swipe again.”
She met her partner, James Davis, 50, a London personal trainer, in a pub shortly after quitting the app. “I was going through a divorce and was a little broken,” she says. “I’ve known James vaguely for years, but sparks flew when we met through a mutual friend in 2015.” He’s based in Ibiza, she’s based in Surrey. but that didn’t stop their connection. “I didn’t know what I wanted after the divorce, but we met in real life, so I had the opportunity to work it out over time,” says Claire. , you really only get one chance.” Six months later, the two became husband and wife and got married in 2017. Today, the two run a health and fitness business in London.
James, divorced in his 40s, also felt that dating apps were soulless. “I felt very sick by it,” he says. “I grew up meeting people in real life, so I felt it was too prescriptive. I know they wanted to rule out hookups, but it felt very defensive as a starting point.”
Dating apps encourage users to choose dates based on criteria such as height, age and occupation, but real-life encounters can bring us face-to-face with people we might not normally think of. Payal Sumaria, 41, said she never met her 29-year-old boyfriend, Sagar Patel, through the app due to their age difference. “We met last May at a mutual friend’s wedding. When we started chatting, we had no intentions. We were just the two of us in conversation. ‘ she says. They stayed in touch after the wedding and discovered a shared love of hiking. “It was just our two friends doing fun activities that we enjoyed.”
As a result, it became easier for them to open up and be honest with each other. “I felt very comfortable in his presence. I didn’t feel the need to impress him. I could talk to him for hours and we laughed constantly,” says Payal. says.
Before they met, Sagar had found it difficult to find matches on dating apps. “I was feeling a lot of pressure to get things flowing and be my ‘best self,’” he says. I feel like
Payal said she struggled with the app because it exacerbated her anxiety. “My mother died when I was very young, so I had some issues with being abandoned. It got worse.” In 2020, she met a particularly cruel man. “He was in great shape for a few dates, but then panicked. He was evasive and sent various messages. “It became very abusive,” she says. If it’s not what someone expected, it can erode confidence.”
April Ashby, 58, is a dating expert in Surrey who runs a traditional matchmaking service, but recently tried the app for herself to see what her competitors had to offer. confirmed. “I had only used them for a few weeks before I gave up,” she says. “It was exhausting like a full-time job. I had one guy ask me to sext him before we had a conversation. Lying is common and people often share old photos or “Why bother lying and saying you’re 10 years younger? People will find out eventually.”
Many of her own clients told her they were scared of dating apps after being targeted or victims of financial fraud. We can select the most vulnerable people based on
Like Payal and April, Cheshire marketing manager Rebecca Oliver, 32, has encountered many deceptive men online. “In 2021, I dated a really nice guy for a few months,” she says. “Then one day he had something wrong with his car and objected to a man who was helping him fix it. He started getting really angry and the police were called. “When the police arrived, he was back in glamor mode and realized he was hiding his true self. I felt like I was pulling a wool.”
Another date “started” when she offered to buy him ice cream. “He thought I was hinting that he couldn’t afford it himself, which was completely bizarre,” she says. “I realized there is much less accountability online. People can’t keep up a facade when they meet through their local community. can know.”
In the summer of 2021, she threw in the towel on the app and started focusing on herself. “Instead, I spent a lot of time getting her in shape,” she says. “Then later that year, my trainer asked if I wanted to be introduced to a friend of his who might like me. A blind date was set up with Ojeda.”I immediately felt more trust in the relationship because I felt like he brought the seal of approval,” she says.
Javier, who has never tried internet dating, says the concept seems too contrived. . “As soon as I met Rebecca, it was obvious I was growing legs.” Within six weeks, they were using a shared calendar. They soon met each other’s friends and family. “Five months later we had puppies, and Rebecca moved in last year. It’s grown very quickly, but in a very organic way,” he says.
She also believes that meeting through friends has made her less bound by dating rules. , I feel like I have to follow a certain schedule.
For Payal, leaving dating apps behind has had a positive impact on her mental health. “Apps can help you meet people, but they can be tiring because you have to answer the same questions over and over,” she says. “I felt like I was trying to explain my existence to a stranger,” she said. [in writing] It was also difficult, especially since I have dyslexia. Sometimes I would ask my friends to help me with the answer. “
Like Georgie, she believes that using apps makes it easier for people to hide their true selves, even after meeting them in person. “The hardest thing about dating is figuring out what the other person really wants. I’ve met some nice people, but a lot of them were emotionally incapable of a real relationship.” A lot of the time people don’t realize it and jump from date to date, and part of that goes away because meeting someone offline gives you a better idea of who that person is from the start. will be
Some names have changed
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