Tinder

The first time I heard about Tinder was when I was a missionary. My little sister was explaining it to me through an email and I almost fell out of my chair it sounded so ridiculous.  And worldly.  And shallow.  And sketch.  And gross.  But keep in mind, I was also a missionary, so I considered things like hugging someone of the opposite sex inappropriate.  It's all about perceptions, right?

If you don't know about Tinder, it's kind of like a dating site that's free, pretty popular, and a lot more questionable.  You write a short bio, add a few photos of yourself and then you start judging people with the swipe of a finger.  If you like what you see, you swipe right.  If you're not interested, left.  If you both are interested in the other, you're matched and you can start chatting. It's kind of like a chat room, but more romantic.  I have heard of relationships and even marriages stemming from Tinder, but you never want to admit that you met that special someone through Tinder because it doesn't have the best reputation.  The fact that you get matched up with single people miles away just based off of photos is pretty superficial, and most often leads to superficial relationships.  A.K.A. hooking up.  Also, I'm talking about the use of Tinder in Utah (the land of the Mormons) so hooking up means making out.  Just to clarify.

So as you can imagine, my squeaky clean missionary self might have choked on the idea of Tinder and all it stands for, but we all know that once we get home from our missions we turn into our regular carnal selves again.  Jokes.  (And sadly slightly true.)  Anyway, it was just a matter of time before I made a Tinder account of my own.  Remember when I made a Match.com profile for that one class?  Well, I actually made a Tinder account first, but dropped it when I realized it didn't fit the assignment as well.  I moved on to better things.  But when my match.com profile was shut down because I was apparently too much AWESOME for the online dating world I remembered that I had made a Tinder account and hadn't done anything with it.  I mean, I had already downloaded the app, I might as well give it a try...right??

But don't judge!! I wasn't going to actually use it!  It was more like a joke!  I had made it for a class assignment!!

We all have our Tinder excuses.  But like all excuses, they don't really mean anything.  For example:  I excuse myself from donating blood because I'm too petite, but actually meet the weight requirements easily.  Here's another: I don't shave my legs more than once a month because I'm a hairless Asian, but mostly I'm just lazy.  Like I said, excuses.  I had made an account, added a few somewhat photogenic pictures of myself, and started swiping.  And swiping.  And swiping.  I swiped at work.  I swiped at the gym (the one time I went this week). I swiped while doing homework.  I swiped while eating cereal. (I probably swiped while eating other things, but mostly I just eat cereal.)  Something was so addicting about glancing at a photo for .2 seconds and judging if they were good enough for me.  I'd probably swipe right once for every fifteen guys. See?  I'm not desperate!  See how I turned down all those guys?  See how I have enough self respect and confidence to think I'm more attractive than the majority of them?  It's kind of like the really sick and shallow game I play when I sit in a room of 30 people or less and judge whether or not I'm the most attractive person.  I must have a skewed sense of judgment, because I usually come to the conclusion that I am the most aesthetically blessed in the room.  Anyway, if nothing screams poor/unsubstantial source of confidence like those two examples, I don't know what does.

But I wasn't just judging looks.  Oh no, I was judging people's character.  Their virtue.  Their very being.  All from a few pictures and a few sentences in their bio.  I mean, "a picture says a thousand words and you have TWO of them!"  Chances are I messed up that quote, but I'm too lazy to check.  But really.  I judged these guys hardcore.  It's like there was a contest for who was the most macho man of all masculine men in a 30 mile radius, and they were all on Tinder.  Seriously, I have never seen so many shirtless pics.  So many pictures of boys doing manly stuff like snowboarding/skiing, or fishing, or camping/backpacking somewhere epic, or hunting because GUNS!  Is this what guys think girls want?  Do they think they have to present themselves like this in order to get the equally desperate ladies on Tinder?  And I don't mean to only bash the guys, but since they're all I see, that's all I have to work with.  Although I'm sure the ladies have equally embarrassing and revealing pictures posted as well.

Shirtless pic, AND he's fishing.  Two birds, one stone.
Also, please note his poetic tagline.

But I deter.

And then the mirror selfies.  Oh my lanta, the selfies.  Don't you know that you ALWAYS look dumb in a mirror selfie?  First of all, you're not staring at the camera lens, you're staring at your phone's screen.  Second, your phone is blocking half your face.  Third, you had to have taken at least five other selfies just to get that perfect angle of your abs.  And fourth, do you really think your bathroom is the best setting for a picture?  I can't even tell you how good I felt about myself when I rejected these guys.  They might have washboard abs and pecs bigger than my own fully developed breasts (fairly certain they're done "growing"), but that's not all I look for in a man on Tinder. No sir, I care about things beyond appearance. I care about their character.  I care about what's in their heart.  I care about what kind of husband he could become.  Wait, you don't think about marriage before you even go on a first date?  Yeah, me neither...

But then things started to get serious. My roommate, Rachel, started conversations with some of my matches.  I know I wasn't doing this Tinder thing seriously, but it was pretty embarrassing when Rachel started a conversation with "Heyyy."  I knew I'd probably never meet the guy, but I turn red just thinking that someone put my face and "heyyy" together.  But regardless of how stupid I thought Tinder was, I was still swiping and every time I got a match with someone attractive it gave me a little ego boost.  I had no plans of actually meeting these guys, but it still made me feel good about myself.  In a super meaningless and warped way.

But then guys really did start asking if I wanted to hang out and even though I was taking this whole Tinder thing more seriously than I had originally planned, I was not going to "hang out" with anyone.  So I deleted it.

And gollyyyyy, did I feel good about myself after that.  I gained more confidence and respect for myself than when a really hot guy swiped right on my photo.  I had gone into this whole Tinder thing as a joke, and never really did get serious about it--but I still cared.  And that annoyed me.  So yeah.  I don't have a Tinder anymore, but I don't care if you have one.  I'll admit, it's fun.  But for now, I'm just going to continue living my very single life.  Because I actually kind of hate dating anyway.