Tinder revolutionized the online dating scene as we knew it. Praised for its ease and simplicity and criticized for superficiality and vanity, Tinder launched itself into the interwebs and has been navigating the aftermath of its success since its implementation in Sept. 2012. The matchmaking site has become a household name, and although there are strong opinions about the shallowness of it all, no one can deny the popularity of the app, contributing to it earning the TechCrunch’s Crunchie Award for the “Best New Startup for 2013.”
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While some people still have reservations about making dating decisions based on physical appearance alone, the internet at large has embraced Tinder and all the awkward that accompanies it. Real conversations posted on Instagram (@tinderlol), Reddit and blogs alike have garnered quite a bit of attention and showcase just how forward our generation can be when hiding behind the safety of a mobile device. One such blog, Tinder Lovin’, posts about Tinder interactions on Tumblr.
Where “let’s hookup” and “wanna come over tonight?” are usually present, poetry, sassy “z” snaps and “Save the Last Dance” references run rampant. Tinder Lovin’s creator (who wished to remain anonymous) is a student at the U and unabashedly abuses the app in order to poke fun at a concept he doesn’t believe is good for humanity.
The Daily Utah Chronicle sat down with the curator of the blog and asked a few questions about the app, why he does what he does and what he thinks of the way our generation communicates. When he heard about Tinder from his roommate, his initial reaction was, “This is f—ing absurd.” Then promptly downloaded it.
“This can’t be good for society,” he said of his first impression of the app. “This is a horrible idea. So of course I’m going to download it, and I will abuse it for my own amusement. And that’s remained unchanged throughout this entire thing.”
The first rule of his interactions is to never be mean. While others may use Tinder to bash people’s photos or start conversations with vulgarity, Tinder Lovin’ instead chooses to be as strange as he can.
“I didn’t like mean comments because they were offensive. I mean, I can be pretty callous, but I just didn’t like it because it wasn’t creative. It was so trite and two-dimensional. Take some pride in how you troll people,” he said.
The blog started with him just sitting on his phone while watching Netflix and right-swiping as many people as he could.
“You don’t need to be pretty to be a victim,” he said.
While most of his conversations are satirical and dripping with sarcasm, he’s not doing it to spare the feelings of his “victims.”
“Doing it for their feelings is a side effect. I don’t know what that says about me as a person, but I don’t care about your suffering as much as my art, and if you’re better for it, then sure … why not.”
Despite all of the negative hype surrounding Tinder as a cheap, easy, no-strings-attached means to hook up with strangers, Tinder Lovin’ himself has never cashed in on any matches, no matter how well they took his absurd, off-the-wall conversation starters.
“I’m a hermit … I have no interest in hooking up at all,” he said.
The idea of dating or hooking up isn’t what’s odd to him, though. It’s more so the way dating has become a checklist of qualities to measure a person’s worth.
“You’re scrolling through, and it turns into grocery store dating, looking at someone serially, yes, no, thumbs up, thumbs down, and what’s the point of human interaction if you’re not going to let it be human?” he said.
Without disputing the fact that, yes, he may be missing out on meeting people who are genuine and worth meeting because he won’t hook up, he still thinks there is a lot more life to live outside of your phone, hiding behind a carefully curated portrait of oneself.
“For all I know, the world is full of a bunch of other women trolling this kid,” he said.
He summed up his feelings about Tinder with a quote from Oscar Wilde: “Give a man a mask and he will tell you the truth.”
“That’s how I feel about online interaction,” he said. “It’s much more candid because there’s no physical, kinesthetic repercussions of what’s going on. I think you can tell a lot about a person by how they react to certain scenarios when they know they have no consequences to how they act.”
Since online dating shows no sign of disappearing anytime soon, learning to take someone’s online profile and interaction with a grain of salt and a heavy dose of humor may be the very lesson Tinder Lovin’ is unknowingly teaching us all. You can follow Tinder Lovin’ at http://tinderlovin.tumblr.com/.
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