Love and Tinder

Finding love can be hard. Many of us may have faced this difficulty at one time or another. We go outside, but it seems to rain. We go to a party, but it gets shut down. We go to weddings, but everyone is taken. We go on social media, but they live miles away. There seems to be no other sources. However, with the world evolving, the internet gave us online dating.

Thanks to online dating, many people around the world have met new people within the dating scene. With a variety of different types of dating apps, people have many to choose from.  Eharmony, for example, is thought to be for an older audience of adults. You may also have heard of Christian Mingle, which people with religion based values often use. Yet there is another one that stands out and seems to be used the most within a younger adult community. This dating app is Tinder.

The most action I’ve seen off the app is playing it like a game with my girlfriends to match them up with people for fun. We never took the app seriously and just treated it as judging and looking at people’s profiles. Some may look at the app a bit differently, and seek for another person for themselves. 

I found myself to be a bit rusty with the actual on hand experience with the app. So I talked to a former Plattsburgh State college student, who now works as a nurse at Champlain Valley Physicians hospital, Bryn Walsh. I had talked to her to see if she could give me more information about being a user of the app. 

“I used Tinder pretty much everyday for about a year. Swiping through whenever I felt like it. I would go through my potential matches with my friends to see if the suitor was attractive or not or if we had previously known them. It was essentially like a game on my phone of potential matches,”  Walsh said. 

Through the years it seems as if Tinder has only gotten more popular. Tinder was made in 2012 and is mainly aimed toward 18 to mid 20 year olds. The app lets you, the user, fill out a mini personal profile to describe who you are to see if anyone has potential matches. Hard core users can pay for a premium plan that lets you get extra access to a less limited version of Tinder.

On the app you can let people know what you’re looking for in a relationship, and share your lifestyle and interests. There is also an “About Me” section where you can make a quick bio about yourself. Then Tinder allows you to add up to nine photos of your choosing if allowed access to your camera roll. However, the app lets you add some of your preferences like age, genders, distance from you, etc.

People use the app so often that there are a variety of reasons as to why you would have an account. 

“I had tinder because it was a great way to connect with people and it was easy to use. I was using this app to find romantic partners or to just explore what’s out there. I found that Tinder also gave me a confidence boost by creating all these matches with other attractive people which increased my self esteem,” Walsh said.

With the demographic within the app and the rise of hook-up culture, Tinder can be somewhere you test attraction, meet people to talk or get more serious. This type of culture consists of casually hooking up goes all the way from kissing to sex. But many people do use the app just for fun and see who they’d be interested in and to make friends with people they matched with. On the other hand, some do try or accidentally find love on the app as well. Creating this app with high intensity and chances for people to connect.

With how many are on Tinder, there are so many options and that you may feel overwhelmed. But once you take a moment to find what you want, your options become more obvious. 

“On Tinder, I was looking for single men to match with. I was initially looking for casual hookups with others but quickly grew tired of that, where I wanted to find someone that wanted to pursue a relationship with me,” Walsh said.

Meeting strangers on the internet can be scary for some: never knowing who really is behind the screen and who sees on their profile. You are expected to follow an honor code of telling the truth and believing others. But being safe is most important. Luckily if you match with someone on Tinder, you have the option to unmatch with them and they will leave your dms.

 “Who did I encounter? Mostly, I have encountered many single and not-single men my age who were looking to have sex — not form meaningful connections. However, I did meet my long-term boyfriend off of Tinder. We are from the same area so we have always known of each other. I came across him, always thought he was attractive, and we matched! Nothing happened for a few days, but I told my friend that I saw him on Tinder and then a few days later she saw him at the gym. They had been good friends for years but were not allowed to speak to each other due to his previous tyrannical gf who forced him to cut off the human population. They broke up and she mentioned that he should see if there is a connection with me. He reached out, we started talking, a few dates went by and now I want to marry this man! Crazy to think that this really came down if I swiped left or right,” Walsh said.  

At last love was found! Walsh and others on the app have found luck in the department of dating. There has been success and failures for some, but it’s up to you what you’re willing to do on the app. Although some people may look for love on Tinder, the majority of people use it as a go to hook up app. I’ve seen many people “get lucky” with the app. You could go as far as giving it a title like best wing man. Tinder is like the friend that lets your crush know you think they’re cute. However, for people who seem to be losing hope in the art of true romance, there’s hope to be kept. The proof in Walsh’s Story shows us that we explore further past the hello my name is, statements. 

With the app being fun and easy to access, the dangers can be hidden within the user’s excitement. As we all know the saying “stranger danger,” and with this app you can constantly be meeting strangers. So always a nice reminder, to stay aware of how much and who you are sharing with. 

Always make sure you don’t give personal information out. With the easy access to the app, it is easy for people to go under a false persona and catfish you. Like all media platforms, it is easy to lie. So be safe when using the app and be responsible.

Tinder is an app for finding people. You can meet new people you call ‘friends,’ ‘lovers,’ ‘acquaintances,’ ‘sneaky links,’ etc. So next time you may be feeling to lazy to go out, you keep running into the wrong people, or you’re done waiting for them to finally admit they’re in love with you, try out Tinder for a moment and see how you feel. You can try this new experience, and if you don’t like it, delete it.