I was talking with my friend about how I’ve tried Tinder for a few months without even hanging out with 1 girl, and he said “Yea bro, no #@#$, you are disposable to them. They have thousands of matches, why would they pick out a short average looking guy?”
It stung a little bit when he told me that. But now that I think about it, i think I really felt what he said because it’s actually true.
However, I’m on the fence about fully embracing that idea. I don’t want to think poorly of women, so the way that I’ve typically justified it to myself is by saying “Look, if I had thousands of matches, I’d probably just pick out the cream of the crop as well and ignore the rest.”
For me personally, not to rant too much, but online dating has been an incredibly dehumanizing experience for me. I’ve never been asked my height and then be rejected this many times in my life. It’s almost as if I have nothing else of value besides my looks.
Can any other men relate to my experience?
26 comments
Only sociopaths consider people “disposable”.
Yes, I get zero attention on dating apps except for women with kids or very obese women. Nothing wrong with either of those traits but I’m not ready to have kids yet and I’m not into large women. Women have the advantage on dating apps, this isn’t to say that they don’t have their own problems like rude or creepy guys or things like safety to worry about which are totally valid and shouldn’t ever be minimized. Unfortunately meeting new people requires others to want to meet you and unfortunately on dating apps women are so flooded with options that they don’t want to meet average-looking men. It’s a very dehumanizing experience and I used to think of myself as pretty average maybe a little good-looking, I don’t think that anymore after being on dating apps. It had destroyed my sense of self-worth and self-esteem and made me hyperconscious about every little thing with my appearance. I can’t help it anymore either it’s become a habit and the loneliness and feeling unwanted/unloved just makes those feelings worse. Online dating is a cesspit that exploits men’s insecurities for money, however, they are a part of life now and if you want to increase your chances of getting a date/relationship you need to subject yourself to this mental torture.
You dont have to think poorly of women lol, just women ON DATING APPS. Yeah a woman would never tell you this but but your friend is right. Just drop the apps and go out into the real world doing things you like. In my experience its easier to make a connection that way and more fun (funner?? Idk)
No. I was still viewing men as human, even on dating apps.
Don’t listen to this friend. He sounds jaded.
Nobody is disposable. But if you’re someone random online they don’t know yet, you probably aren’t their first priority, and that’s ok.
> don’t want to think poorly of women
Hey, that’s great. You seem pretty aware that your friend sounds jaded.
Here’s how I resolved the question of disposability years ago: we’re all disposable. You, me, women, children, everyone. Yes, we’re all people, but on a macro scale we have no inherent value.
*And that’s ok*
Because we have no value, we get to pick and choose the people and groups we value and the standards for which we set to value people.
> Look, if I had thousands of matches, I’d probably just pick out the cream of the crop as well and ignore the rest
This basically. Pretend you could guarantee a match 40% of the time. Heck, you could bump it down to 25%. Do you really think your swiping patterns wouldn’t change? Of course they would.
> It’s almost as if I have nothing else of value besides my looks.
The two worst parts about OLD is how it places a lot more emphasis on looks and increased accesses to others by a lot, which leads to women having their ego inflated about their attractiveness and men deflated and is likely not reflective of the outside world
Its not a woman thing, its a people thing. All sorts of situations will land you in that category.
It’s not a man/woman problem, it’s a dating app problem. Endless swipes makes people APPEAR disposable. It’s really fucked up.
everyone is disposable. girls get used for sex and then ghosted.
you’re replaceable at your job too. don’t devote too much to anyone.
Not many wil have the courage to say the truth but yes, you are nothing and irrelevant if they do not deem you good enough.
That’s how it is even outside online dating.
Or do you think everyone REALLY cares for every random people they see? Worse yet, random that want something from them.
It’s a people issue, not an app one. WE do this.
My experiences swing between good and bad but the good is by far better. I don’t take it serious. I take breaks constantly. When I meet someone, I give it time to see what develops. All of this has made OLD MUCH easier for me.
Unfortunately online dating is based on what you see and less on what your read. And being disposable works both ways…
It’s not as if all women are winning and all men are losing. For every heterosexual woman who gets a successful relationship on a dating app a heterosexual man also gets a successful relationship.
Thinking of others as disposable is based on the options you have available. It’s also worth noting that actions speak louder than words. This goes for men and women.
The men that think like this are projecting. They see us as disposable fleshlights and think we see them the same way. Pay attention to how they describe women they’re not attracted to – as if they’re subhuman.
This is a legitimately stupid generalization.
No, if a woman truly values you and likes you you are not disposable.
Your friend is being an asshole for claiming such. We women will stick to a man if he is a gentleman, caring and treats us right. Even if you’re short it doesn’t matter! Some women like me have high standards for a guy but DO NOT mind height at all. I’m sure whoever you’re dating feels the same way when it comes to height.
Fuck your friend.
It’s a dating app. It’s not that ‘Men’ are disposable. It’s the fact that they are people i never met in my life, they can be anyone. It’s the same as thinking of someone on Reddit as ‘disposable’. I know you are a person, but I don’t know you and your existence is not that relevant for me until I do meet you. Maybe after talking a while you mean something, otherwise you are a stranger.
It’s not that women consider men as disposable. It’s because it’s an app. And because dating apps try to make you fabricate instant connexion to random people you might not have anything to do with.
For men might be different but that is because dating apps have more men ( I think. Honestly not going to look up statistics on that. Feel free to correct me)
So yes, if i have 60 matches I don’t speak to everyone, because you wouldn’t be able to anyway. And because it’s people i know nothing about, it doesn’t matter. I don’t expect them to be offended and if a guy doesn’t speak to me I am not offended or feel disposable. I don’t think women expect to be treated like they are your personal acquaintance either. Probably the numbers are just less discouraging.
To summarize, the reason why I left old in the first place. Also, I am a woman. Everybody there is just a picture and a couple of descriptions and you try to fabricate a relationship out of that and a couple of messages.
And surprise you meet and not what you expect.
Pretty empty.
Your friend sounds like a dick. Even if he’s a little right his delivery is severely lacking.
Ultimately, women may not see men as “disposable” but they may see a lot of men as “interchangeable”. The difference? One term implies you’re garbage and the other implies you just don’t appear special to them, which is fair! They don’t know you and yes, they get hundreds or thousands of likes and have a very hard time distinguishing between all of them.
Basically, there’s a difference between feeling disposable and being treated as such. There could be a lot of women out there who do see men as disposable and treat them like garbage but these apps are also designed by men or with men involved, so part of the issue falls on men seeing each other as “disposable” to women.
Try and remind yourself that while women may get tons of options a lot of those options may not stand out, they’re effectively looking for a needle in a haystack if the haystack was just thousands of men with (just for examples) fish photos and saying they love The Office.
You are not garbage and most women likely don’t see you that way, they just can’t see how unique you are through dating apps.
So, certainly many women are on dating apps for purposes other than really dating (attention, validation, ego stroking, etc.). To those women, I would guess we all are disposable, but that reflects much more on them than on you.
As for this idea that it is impossible to get dates on dating apps for anything but 10/10 gorgeous guys, its honestly just complete horseshit. I’m 5’7″, a little overweight (could lose like 5-10 lbs), and decent looking. I meet and date very attractive women on dating apps all the time. I do have an excellent career, but its not like that is super obvious on my profile.
Key is to have women look at your profile and help you build it. Have good photos that show you sincerely enjoying your life in the way you like to live it. Also, have a positive, funny blurb that tells them about your personality. For example “I am an engineer and a volunteer firefighter, so I have the skill to tell you why your laptop won’t connect to the internet, and the high intensity training to climb a ladder and get your cat out of a tree.” Little things like this go a long way in the dating app scene.
It sucks for most men that are out of the top 10% of “quality”, typically based on looks as that is pretty much what you have to go on. There are ways to improve matches but I’m not a guru so I’ll let you dig that up.
What I will say is that when I do match and am able to actually have a conversation, I like to meet the person within a day or two. One, because I like meeting new people but also because once you physically meet, it’s harder to look at eachother as “disposable” because you have put a real personality to a face. I find most people in general are nicer when it feels real and seeing eachother face to face is real.
“Scarcity breeds appreciation, plenty breeds complacency”
There is absolutely at least *some* truth to this. It would be the same for men, except in humans, men do most of the pursuing, so the average woman has more likes than the average man and therefore, “gets her pick”. You don’t need to think less of women as a result – the very rare men who are swarming with women also have this mentality.
I saw a friend of mine open her app and I kid you not, she had over 4k likes. Imagine that as a man (relatively impossible, unless over a very long time period). She literally bought Tinder+ to just pick between them. She doesn’t even swipe.
It’s unfortunate, but this is the name of the dating game as a man. The more “attractive” the woman is, the more you have to compete. This is why we can whine about things like having to pay for dates, but for the highest chance of success (especially for highly coveted women), you have to do it. You have to put in more effort to win her over. Why? Because if you don’t, someone else will. And she has a LOT of someone else’s waiting.
So just speaking for my personal process: I use hinge where everyone has to put their height in their profile. If ive thoroughly looked over someone’s profile and like what i see, then go back and see that they are not quite as tall as i like, ill still send a like. However, if their profile is kinda iffy and their height is on the low side, then i wont send a like.
Height is like the cherry on top for me. If you have a profile thats charming enough then im less likely to care about your height. If you seem just ok *and* youre short then im not going to waste my time.
Also for clarification what i deem to be “short” is anyone below 5’8″. Im 5’6″ and id like my date to be at least a little taller than me
So my advice would be to just be as charming as possible on your profile and get some good pictures and a lot of women will care a lot less about you being on the shorter side
To be honest, as a woman, I’ve felt disposable on Tinder. Guys will be chatting to me, we will get along great and then suddenly they stop. Or unmatch me. Because they found someone better. No one has the decency to be upfront about this, they just dispose of me as if I was nothing. So I don’t think it’s a gender thing.
No. I care for people deeply if I have a connection with someone and care for them it doesn’t matter where we meet
There are plenty of good single women not on dating apps too. Try going to a meetup or finding an activity you can do in person that involves other people.
Fuck your stupid friend for not raising you up, I wouldn’t call him a friend