If you want to understand why millennial women are so enthusiastic about Taylor Swift’s whirlwind romance with Travis Kelsey, just look at the “Why I Stop Dating” section of TikTok. . There, people from the same demographic discuss their own experiences trying to find a date. Love in 2023.
There, the common story is a reversal of the swooning fairy tale in which the world’s most famous pop star appears to be having fun with the banner of his handsome and (seemingly) well-adjusted green walking mistress.
In fact, the world is so bad that many women are choosing to leave the dating game altogether.
On both TikTok and Instagram, “Why I Stopped Dating” videos frequently appear, often garnering hundreds of thousands of views and likes, with comments like “Six months, a year, I stopped dating, too.” It’s full of women like that. eternally.
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In one video, a woman tearfully asks, “Is anyone else tired of dating?” She talks about her realization she had when she cried for 20 minutes in her car. “I’m tired of useless conversations and meaningless interactions with people who get nowhere.” Along with the insensitive clichés of happy couples (“It’s going to happen when you least expect it!”), nearly 300 The comments reflect her feelings. “It’s mentally exhausting”, “I’ve lost a cause…divorced at 46, I’ve definitely gotten over it”, “I’m not here to collect trauma, just dating” I think he’s just using the app.” [the] Suitable person. “
The specific reasons women give vary. A woman quits Hinge because her self-confidence plummeted because the quality of the men the algorithm matched her with were questionable (675,000 views). A woman in her early 30s realized that she was overly invested in men who saw her only as a supporting character in his story (79,000 views). She’s a single parent who’s tired of being disappointed by a man who’s not who she initially pretended to be (80,000 views). A woman who is throwing in the towel because the current dating culture (meeting multiple people at once, constant ghosting, endless gaming) is incompatible with how she wants to live her life (420,000 1,000 views).
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“It’s a bit of a dumpster fire,” says Canadian author Jane Lovecairn, who chronicles her romantic trench days in a new book. 50 Worst Datess. Her stories are wild and often funny in hindsight. A prominent lawyer who casually tried to start a foursome with his girlfriend on their second date. A famous chef who confessed that she likes stealing things. A lingering relationship with a businessman who once drank too much and soiled himself in the lobby of the Ritz.
Lovecane says she has “essentially” stopped dating at this point, but likens her 10 years of searching for a partner on dating apps to gambling: sitting in front of a slot machine, hoping this time she’ll win. He says it’s like compulsively pulling a lever in anticipation. .
“It’s exhausting and a waste of effort,” Lovecane said, referring to not just swiping, but starting and continuing conversations, figuring out who’s a catfish, and assessing who’s just flaky. ” he says. “Unlike other areas of life, when it comes to dating, effort doesn’t equal results. In fact, you can be punished for your efforts.”
Lovecane, who has vowed not to use apps, hopes to meet people naturally offline. But she says the same devices that host the app have made her old-fashioned cute encounters obsolete. “When we go out, most people are always on their phones, but it used to be that if you walked into a coffee shop, people would make eye contact and look around,” she says. “Now it’s like you don’t even have a chance to meet someone because people are so focused on their phones and she’s probably swiping on Bumble or Tinder.”
Although there are many success stories of online dating, Lovecane said apps “encourage bad behavior” and technology more broadly is a “net negative” when it comes to finding that special someone. thinking.
“It encourages people to look for the next best thing, rather than working with the person in front of them who you connect with and who might be a good partner,” she says. “If you’re annoyed with someone, instead of letting them know and having a difficult conversation, you just let your anger build and turn on Tinder.”
Lovecane says he doesn’t know anyone who hasn’t had some kind of “terrible” experience using these apps. “Even if you have a great conversation over text or phone call, keep your expectations in the gutter,” she says. “If you go in with hope, you’ll probably leave in despair.”
The recognition that dating apps are largely contributing to what’s wrong with today’s dating is something the apps themselves recognize. Recently, Bumble changed its community guidelines to address the biggest scourges like bots and spamming accounts. A “revenge culture” where personal information and photos are shared without the person’s consent. You might even flake during a date, which is now classified as a crime under anti-bullying guidelines. The new “no-show” policy is aimed at combating the ghosting phenomenon that one of her two Gen Z users surveyed said she had experienced.
“As a platform committed to making the internet a safer and kinder place, it’s important that our Community Guidelines reinforce that and hold our members accountable,” a Bumble spokesperson said. For years, Bumble has used machine learning to eliminate harassment and other behaviors. In 2023 alone, he had over 8.2 million of her Bumble and sister app Badoo accounts blocked. He also seeks to combat swipe fatigue by analyzing user preferences and past matches to generate four hand-picked profiles and releasing new features that are sent to users every day.
The most heartbreaking thing about this trend is that most women who stop dating didn’t do so because they had an epiphany that they could live a fulfilling single life. It is a defensive measure and a retreat. For many, it is a deep loss and a source of grief.
“Dating is the epitome of the hopes, joys, dreams, fears, desires, and anxieties we have as humans,” says dating coach Lily Womble. “It’s not that frivolous. It’s actually a very tender and important epitome of our happiness.”
Womble is the founder of Date Brazen, which works with clients to create a more enjoyable approach to finding love. Part of the problem, she believes, is that dating culture hasn’t kept up with societal advances, with women less financially obligated to marry and settling for less-than-ideal partners.
“It can be a very difficult experience. [for women] “It’s about seeing this sea of men who can’t meet them emotionally because of how much the patriarchy has failed all of us, especially men with a culture of toxic masculinity,” Womble said. says. “I think women don’t need to settle down as much and men need to catch up more.”
One client recently told Womble that she has an internalized belief that it’s pathetic to want a relationship and pathetic not to have one yet. This is a common double bind that causes cognitive dissonance for a woman who feels like she’s all about being single, yet she really wants a partner. “These things feel contradictory, which leads to a lot of stress and ultimately leads to quitting,” she says.
solution? Give yourself permission to “want what you want” without apology or self-judgment, says Womble. “Desiring what you want completely attracts it to you,” she says. It’s not about waiting for the universe to drop a partner into your lap, it’s about letting your desires take up space in your life without feeling behind or feeling like you’re somehow wrong about something you haven’t accomplished yet. is to be allowed to occupy.
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It may also mean abandoning the rigid checklist of height and education. It could mean building walls that no one can overcome, or conversely, it could mean resisting the “gentle settlement” of “being nice and having jobs.” everything you want.
Rather than quitting completely, Womble suggests taking a “dating detox” for at least a month (don’t redownload the app on a Friday night when loneliness hits). “It’s an active, intentional effort to reset your nervous system,” she says. “Get out of the casino.”
Next, detox from “bad dating advice” that “doesn’t work and makes you lose faith in yourself,” such as directory listings and numbers games.
Finally, detox from “dating worries.” This means compassionately acknowledging the deep fear you have about dying alone and writing it down to remind yourself that it is a fear, not a fact.
“I think people over-equate to hopelessness,” Womble says. “If your last two relationships were bad, your brain will try to protect you from having them happen again. Your brain will try to gather evidence that you’re right in order to feel safe and secure. , they decide that it happens over and over again, and the feeling of hopelessness is perpetuated.”
Womble says you can overcome that spiral by opening yourself to the weakness of hope and actively looking for evidence that what you want exists. She made a video viral on TikTok a few weeks ago. In it, she gathers positive evidence that she can find love even in small things, like a casual interaction with a barista or a chance meeting with a handsome guy who quits her therapy session. I took on the challenge.
“You don’t have to be actively dating to build hope in your life,” says Womble. “Your desire is proof that it exists. And I will believe it for you until you can believe it yourself.”