DW Community Catch-up Thread
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Yeah, I mean, very recent ex pics or sexist rants would be a no-go for me too. But I think we’ve got to be able to rely on our instincts. I’ve never gotten serious with a guy and then found out he had sexist tendencies or weird stuff on social media or was married or had a criminal record. I dated a couple of cheaters, but I figured it out on my own from observing them. It wasn’t something I could have dug up.
I think it’s all too likely that some really unsavory stuff would never be revealed in an online search, and that if a guy is sketchy or “off,” you’re going to realize it pretty quickly once you spend a little time with him, so why not just meet up? Phone calls, skyping, long periods of chat and texting, online stalking, in most cases aren’t going to protect you from a guy who won’t be a good match for you. Experience and gut do that. Plus the long build-up to meeting can get you more invested in a guy than you should be, and more likely to overlook weird stuff once you meet him.
I felt like what a guy chose to say in his profile and how he acted during the course of a few emails via the website would give me enough of an indication that it would be fine to meet up, and then we’d meet in a public place and he wouldn’t know my last name, and I could get a better sense of him. Nothing beats in-person meeting.
In summary, the only thing you can rely on to keep you safe is your instinct, as taught in the book “The Gift of Fear.”
@Kate I’m just a very introverted, homebody type of person. I don’t like to go out a lot and I don’t really like being put in situations where I have to meet new people or make small talk (not just with guys – with anybody. I hate being social, I can’t even make small talk in the kitchen with colleagues).
For some people, meeting up with someone for a drink is low investment. For me, it’s a pretty big investment mentally to have to drag myself out of my comfort zone.
For me, it’s not so much about trying to protect myself from creepers or unearth something shady about a guy. I just need to get to a point where I feel comfortable agreeing to meet. It just so happens that adding people on social media has weeded out a few duds.
Ah, ok. I’m not very social either, but a drink on a weeknight was pretty low investment for me, beyond the extra effort of making sure I looked cute and the dog got out.
On the other hand, job interviews absolutely drain me, and I like doing a lot of research up front and having phone calls first to make sure I really want to go in there.
My friend who has been online dating started out ensuring that there was a lot more messaging time before meeting. She got obnoxious messages, of course, but deleted them and went on her way. When she got more lax and started meeting guys a lot quicker, she saw the obnoxiousness in person and it was a lot more draining for her. She got to the point of deactivating a lot quicker at that point.
I personally don’t do more than a couple messages. It’s hard for me to make myself spend time messaging someone I don’t know, and I get bored quickly. So, for me, I prefer to just meet them and then either see them again or just be done with it. But I think it just depends on the person and their preferences.
Yeah, I’d be offended if someone asked me to see more pictures. But, then again, there wouldn’t be a need for it. On Tinder, I use all 6 photos available to me. A few are of just my face, a few you can see my full body. I have a couple photos from weddings where I look nice, and also pics of myself hiking or other more casual shots where I’m not as put together and/or have my hair pulled back to balance it out. All photos except I think one are from the past year, and the “old” one is less than two years old.
I hate when I can’t tell what someone looks like, and would swipe left. A few weeks ago when I was visiting a friend of mine, her brother came over for dinner. He’s also on Tinder. He asked me what I thought of his profile, and I told him he needed to change his main picture because it was one where you couldn’t see his face and I wouldn’t be able to tell what he looks like. He told me he picked it because Tinder told him it was his best picture. And I was like, what? NO! Bad move! Pick the headshot of you in a suit at a wedding! Once I think you’re cute, I’ll swipe through to see the rest, but I don’t want to work that hard to find out what someone looks like.
So I thought things had naturally fizzled out with the guy I met a couple weeks ago and wasn’t interested in. Not long after we met I went on a work trip and he stopped contacting me around that time, likely due to my slow responses, but he resurfaced last night. So I rejected him, and felt a little guilty about it. He’s the first guy in awhile to like me more than I’ve liked him.
@Copa I always used all the pictures available too, but I once had a guy ask me for more photos. He specifically asked if I had any more full body shots and I was immediately turned off and not interested. I felt like he was trying to make sure that I wasn’t fat before he continued talking to me.
Yeah, so, my sister, who struggles with her weight, once showed up for a date and the guy said something about how she was thinner in her pictures, which I thought was incredibly cruel. Needless to say, the date ended before it started. That said, I do think it’s good to use pictures that are flattering but that also accurately represent how you look.
My good guy friend fully believes that women are intentionally deceptive with their photos. In my head I’m like, you’re an idiot. Obviously we’re going to put up a flattering picture.
Meanwhile, dudes are using photos that are like a decade old, or where they’re covering their face with sunglasses, but oh no that’s not deceptive at all…
I mean, I don’t doubt there are some people who only use their most flattering pictures. I use hiking or race pictures because I like outdoorsy crap and running, and they give a good idea of what I look like when I’m super casual (shorts + t-shirt, hair is doing what it wants, and tinted moisturizer on my face at most). One guy told me I’m “15% prettier” in person so I think I’ve done a good job of under-selling my looks. 😉 I’ve been out with one guy who didn’t look like his pics at all, to the point I wouldn’t have recognized him if I hadn’t known where he was sitting at our meeting spot, and I wasn’t attracted to him at all.
I’m never in situations where other people take pictures of me, so my photos on Tinder were always selfies. I know you’re supposed to put up a variety but my girlfriends and I always just take selfies together.
Also with tinder I found it really annoying that you have to use the square picture format. I know that was a thing for a long time because of instagram but the only pics that did show my body I had to use this app called “squarefit” to crop it.
With the new iphones, the samsung, and snapchat, I don’t find that many people take square photos anymore. That’s one of the reasons I liked Bumble better. Full screen pics!
Yeah, I actually hate the square fit photos on Tinder, too! It’s been awhile since I used Bumble, but I’m pretty sure that app basically resizes/crops your photos for you, so if you use the wrong size, you end up with a seriously zoomed-in version of a photo where it’s cropped all wrong. Or at least it used to do this. (Or I’m mistaking it for another app?)
