Fear not, solitary dedicated reader who I swear checks our blog every morning for new posts! Your Okay, Stupid prayers have been answered! The God(esses?) smile down on you with glad tidings this day. (Bee-tee-dubs, we do not update more than once or twice a week, so you're probably good if you back it off a skoatch. It's chill. I'm pretty sure I know who you are, anyway.)
Today my friend sent me an article "exploring" OKCupid's slimier male denizens. I swear, if you had told me this morning I would be sitting down to write a quasi-defense of OKCupid, I would have laughed in your face. Then, I read this article and realized I had much more to say on the subject than I thought.
Admittedly, I was full of the warm-fuzzies after seeing K's post on my Facebook wall. It's nice to know someone's listening out there! Then, having read the article, my happiness meter went directly into the toilet... 'Cause that's where shitty feelings go.
To read the full article, please go HERE. For the rest of us, let me quickly summarize. In an effort to experiment with just how far men are willing to go to get laid (I'm assuming that would be the general endgame for most of the guys who contacted him), the author created a fake profile, using a picture of a conventionally attractive, young, brunette girl. He then filled "her" profile with some of the most idiotic, nonsensical statements, terrible grammatical and spelling errors, and racially insensitive jokes I have seen admitted to an online dating website. He even threw in a light-hearted felony reference. You know, for kicks. Then he waited to see who would contact this "girl" and exactly how long it would take before they were turned off by her stupidity.
When I first started reading, the idea seemed like a relatively harmless and ultimately hilarious undertaking. Things turned for the worse after I got a few paragraphs in. As I was reading, the article began to depress me more and more. It painted a very bleak picture of what was available out there for us singles. The level of desperation involved for some of these guys was staggering. I began to question my chances for success in dating -- not only on the site, but in actual, real-world encounters -- with these kind of people in existence. Was this it? Was this really the summation of everything I had to choose from?? Imagine how terrifying it would be for you to realize there isn't a single soul on this Earth interested in sharing a real relationship with you. You are completely, utterly alone, surrounded by people simply wanting to get their rocks off. Well, that's precisely what I saw before me now. I was fishing in an empty sea.
After a few moments processing my thoughts, I went through the comments to gauge others' reactions. One particular comment struck a chord. I now realized why I was so unsettled and aggravated by this reading experience. First of all, it's a terrible article. It proves absolutely nothing but what we already know: 1) how shallow people will pursue someone based solely on their appearance, and 2) that really stupid people are going to do really stupid things. How is any of this news? You put some fake, naïve, attractive woman out there on the Internet and give them a moron's profile, of course guys are going to try to get some poon from her. It's Barbie Syndrome: all looks and no brains. For all appearances, she's an easy target. Over half these guys wouldn't dare try that shit if they thought she would shoot them down or have some actual intellectual response to their advances. Now, I'm not saying that preying on the weak isn't morally reprehensible, but let's please be realistic. There's always been sexual predators on the Internet. This is an accepted fact. It's why we take precautionary steps before actually meeting up with someone in real life. Moreover, being a sexual predator is by no means restricted to only males. Women share just as much of the blame. If a woman, who for some reason is sans vibrator, gets on a dating website for sex and sees some attractive, less-than-genius-level guy, she too will probably try get in some horizontal shuffle time. It's how the world works. And after considering all of this, I'm no longer depressed about the situation or the article; I'm just pissed off. I'm pissed off not just because it's a over-dramatized, journalistic-ally unsound "exposé" that does little more than sit back on its high horse and judge people desperately seeking some connection -- any connection (even a penis-vagina-hopefully-orgasm connection) -- from another person in the world, but also because it presumes these lowlifes are the only kind of people on dating sites at all. "Here" it seems to say "this is all ya get!"
Experience has taught me otherwise. I cannot be fooled, because I know better for a fact. I had the good fortune of meeting at least one really fantastic person through online dating, and I know quite a few friends (Not the least of which being C, of course) that are intelligent, caring, and genuine people who also have experimented with this medium. Granted, I have had experience with some real jerks too, but who hasn't? That holds true to the real world as much as the digital one. But you have to be willing to experience good and bad to find anything truly worth your time.
Rob Fee's article is meaningless and dull for more than just his falsely informed reasoning. To me, it's more interesting to explore why and how, all things being equal, guys will get in the way of themselves in pursuit of a woman. Whether by messaging someone with the same opener five times, contacting another user with little chemistry or commonality to themselves, or even when they seem to have everything going for them, they manage to screw up dates to such a degree that one has to wonder if they made up their entire past relationship experience. Understanding all of these things is just a more compelling concept and discussion than sitting around proving an apple is an apple, an orange is an orange, or an idiot is an idiot.
To be honest, I will actually sit here and claim that I have been contacted by very, very few truly moronic-beyond-hope individuals. Misguided? Yes, of course, like 90% of the time, but nowhere near the levels of stupidity exemplified by the men in the article. Why is that? I'm not an easy target. I say who I am, what I'm about, you can get a general sense of my intellectual level, and perhaps most importantly what I'm looking for. I mean, even the douche bags who go "hey, interested in something casual?" have grammatical structure down! They may not be able to read worth a damn, but that's more due to a lack of those reading comprehension skills mentioned in my last post. Furthermore, even guys requesting "something casual" are rare. Generally speaking, you can, and do, find whom you're looking for on the site.
If you take anything from this post, at least take hope. Hope that no, you are not alone. Put that fear to rest right now. You will find exactly what you want to find on OKCupid; whether it is a nice fling, a lasting friendship, or, hell, maybe even a stable relationship. The individuals who can give this to you are out there. Godspeed, my e-daters!
As for this blog, I intend to never, ever bait fellow users just for a talking point. Like I said, it's more fascinating to me discussing and dissecting why, given every opportunity otherwise, these guys completely miss their shot. My aim here is to educate; not ensnare, judge, and otherwise totally belittle the gentleman of OKC. The one exception to the aforementioned rule being that you're an asshole who creeps on my page before asking me to bone you, in which case I will gladly tear your ass apart using the written word.
Phew! I feel better... and possibly overly self-important, but what else is a blog for? Sorry, K, while I appreciate the thought, I had to speak my mind on that one.
Carry on about your business, readers, and expect a less enraged post very, very soon.
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