and think Helen Keller wasn’t real
wat? I’m not on any dating apps, is this a real conspiracy theory people believe?
there are many many more conspiracy theories out there that people believe than there is time for you to learn about all of them.
I spent years getting frustrated on the apps, now I’m ending up marrying my best friend’s sister who I’ve known for 16 years and I was always too afraid to ask out. Turned out she was feeling the same way.
Life’s weird when you’re socially awkward.anytime i asked out an awkward shy girl she tells me to f off, despite flirting with me.
and of course the outgoing demanding women can’t get enough of me, even though I loathe them.
Really long story:
I once knew a girl in high school who I, in a rare moment of boldness while we were away from prying eyes, asked if she would be my girlfriend. She had been my friend for a short while and she fucking chuckled immediately in response, almost instinctively and said “No, sorry.”. My autistic ass did not exactly immediately understand why she laughed until I ruminated later.
That said, she seemed to be very friendly with me afterward, like maybe she felt bad and still liked me as a friend… And despite feeling hurt by the way she responded I still hung out with her every once in a while. She eventually got a hot confident boyfriend, because she was also hot. And I kind of started avoiding her because it hurt seeing her with a guy who I felt clearly was better than me, caused me to spiral into self loathing when I saw him. I did not know I was autistic, I just knew I was an infamously weird dork.
Fast forward ~11 years later I stumble into her and she looks like shes a different and much sadder person. I don’t want to body shame but she looked a lot worse and I was no longer particularly attracted to her, she was ok looking. She was going on about a recent break up with a guy who she said cheated on her to the bartender.
Now I’m polyamorous, and I legit don’t understand and actively dislike monogamy, but obviously I have a faint idea of how painful being cheated on would feel like, and she seemed super sad and I felt bad for her. After talking with her and catching up a little for like 20 minutes, she drunkenly tried to make out with me.
I got away from her and the internal anger I felt was supremely intense. Like, what the actual fuck, fuck you. You fucking said no and now that you’re washed up and depressed about your ex using me as a fall back.
I cannot describe the feeling of grief flare as well. Like, maybe if she had said yes back then. Maybe I could of had a normal romantic experience as a high schooler instead of being what I was. Sure maybe also wouldn’t have worked out like most relationships, but still. I was a really lonely fucked up high schooler with a completely empty romantic life. Just a void.
I’m doing better now romantically but I was also still having trouble getting any romance at this point in my life even 11 year later. I was still painfully lonely. But the absolute bitterness I felt toward her made even pity for her out the fucking window for me and my desperation for any intimacy dried up instantly in that moment.
Part of me wonders if I should have just gone for it and I was being petty. I don’t know. It just makes me kind of sad to think about.
Hinge, Tinder, OkCupid, Plenty Of Fish and others are owned by one giant company called Match.com. You are not ugly, a monopoly just puts you down the pile by algorithm to prompt you to pay to increase your chances of more likes (that’s not to say that making your profile look good doesn’t matter). There are independent dating apps like Coffee and Bagel and Bumble, but either those apps don’t have many people or copying Match’s anti-consumer behaviour like Bumble does.
Can Lemmy be used for dating?
That really depends: are you looking for a nerdy man who lacks social skills or are you t4t and super online? If so, yeah probably. If not, feel free to try
I am a nerdy man who lacks social skills looking for a nerdy woman(ish person) who lacks social skills.
Any platform can be used for dating
I have read about people trying to use LinkedIn for dating, and I feel like that’s a red flag. Those men should probably be quarantined.
Everyone on LinkedIn should be quarantined.
Exhibit 1:

What the fuck‽
Oh yikes
…if you’re brave enough
There’s Alovoa… an open source platform but it’s even less densely populated than Lemmy
I bet someone did just that and succeeded
I honestly can’t afford to lose my wife because there’s no way I would find another partner in the modern dating scene. I feel like the bar is way higher than it was in the early 2000s.
I felt exactly this way, and then my wife left me in at the start of this year. The apps are now a complete shitshow compared to when I last used them in ~2020, and I’m not in any kind of scene adjacent to dating. This isn’t directed at you (good luck in your marriage), but to anyone else reading this there is hope. I randomly bumped into a girl six weeks ago, plucked up the courage to ask for her number (I’ve literally only done this once in my life) and we’ve been going steady since. I now believe in karma and am happier than I’ve ever been.
social media has convinced folks anything less than perfect means your partner is a total loser.
and everything you possible do is wonderful and perfect and above and criticism.
it’s literally insane and the reason why most people are single. they want their partner to be like an elite marathon runner while they can barely walk 5 blocks without getting winded.
people were way more humble and chill before social media brain rotted everyone, but that was over a decade ago at this point. also has nothing to do with dating apps, it’s just how folks thing about relationships now. also the popularity of toxic gender war bullshit is off the charts.
Dating apps should be publicly funded like a kind of public utility. And private dating apps heavily regulated and prevented from advertising. Because currently they making profit by keeping you single.
Like water and air, love should not be for profit.
We need 3rd spaces, online dating is just worse in general. People meet at trading card places and card shops because that’s just where people hang out, but that doesn’t exist anywhere else really besides bars.
People are becoming more isolated and more online, it’s way easier to see if you like someone (and you’ll be exposed to many people) if they happen to be in your vicinity rather than typing in text on a dating app.
it doesn’t mater, folks social skills have atrophied and their anxiety/depression levels have skyrocketed.
i do well on dating apps, but most women i meet have poor social skills and mental health problems, and refuse to address/acknowledge them. I’ve also seen this same thing in real life and it’s even worse with generation z. folks just no longer how to assert themselves or communicate. I ran a 3rd space for a decade almost, and basically quit because a few years after pandemic it became weirder and weirder and unstable and hostile folks kept coming and causing problems and blaming other folks for their rudeness.
you’re not going to be able to form healthy romantic relationships if you refuse to take care of your mental health and practice basic social graces.
Sometimes I wish Koi to Uso was real
is that what you tell yourself?
you really think a government dating app is going to help get you laid?
I think they think an app that isn’t being run by a corporation for profit would help them get laid. In theory the government could run and app for this purpose but I don’t think it would work well in practice at least not in the US.
Dumb women with low standards for our strong white trash base, make sure smart people never meet each other, and for the attractive minors who sign up lying about their ages… well, I’m sure you know they go to new Presidential sex dungeo… I mean… The “East Wing.”
I think it’s more that the entire business model of dating apps means they profit from people staying single and looking, not finding long term relationships.
but that’s not really how they work.
they have the same business model as most apps, as in all of it comes from a few dumbasses who spend $1000s out of desperation. the vast majority of their users spend nothing.
Public ≠ the government.
Hahaha!
You could have private ones but non-profit. Not sure the size of the minimum network effect though. Probably lower than for social media. Maybe we should add education courses on relationships too. And free therapy. It’s guberment all the way down!
I mean… most people are kind of boring. It’s not surprising that most profiles will thus be kind of boring.
The biggest factors I think are
- You live someplace shitty.
- Your photos are bad. This is different from you are bad.
- Your profile has red flags.
- You’re writing unimpressive messages.
The apps suck and are a capitalist nightmare, but there’s stuff you can do to improve the odds as a free user.
I just remembered some guy on lemmy that was like “i can’t get any dates on these things!” and when pressed, he revealed that he’d talk to women on there for a couple weeks, and then was surprised when nothing happened. No shit. You gotta ask people out.
I would say 1/100 people on dating apps are people I would actually want to talk to. I feel like the normal people just have people talking to them irl so they don’t go on dating apps (as would I if I weren’t stuck at home)
In my experience with Hinge- it was because I was openly queer. Hinge was far too normie, I had much better luck with Bumble.
That could be a factor. My perspective is limited to one of a man who doesn’t date men. I had some nice (and one memorably, laughably bad*) dates with queer people on hinge, but it wasn’t my primary experience.
The woman I am going to marry is the kind of person that would never use a dating app. Literally the same week I gave up on online dating, she asked me out at work.
Never had success trying to meet girls on the internet. Sometimes you just have to get lucky and hopefully there’s someone attractive who is interested in you wherever you work/study/hang out.
Meeting girls on the Internet absolutely works, it’s just that you should do everything except what you’re told.
Do NOT use dating apps. They are, for the most part, designed to keep you hooked and never actually find a worthy person. If you find your love, you stop being their client.
Use regular social media/weird and obscure places crafted with love/communities by interest/whatever, just not dating apps.
I found my girlfriend in an online chat, and we’re together for 2 years. She moved in with me, and we couldn’t be happier.
I feel like nowadays people like if someone doesn’t have a social media and doesn’t or never had any sort of dating app
I remember back in 2015-ish a guy I knew at work claimed he couldn’t get traction on dates because he didn’t have social media. I was like, I’m confident that is not the primary problem here.
But yeah, today there’s a bigger backlash against big social media. There’s more than just weirdos who don’t have Facebook et el
I’ve been judged negatively for not having social media but never by anyone I was actually interested in dating. Being obsessed with social media is a big turn off for me.
It definitely helps to weed out people. I work in a kitchen so it’s pretty social and I’ve had people tell me they can’t find me on insta or whatever and then ask what I even do in my free time which lends itself to more organic conversation instead of just judging how I run a social media profile or something. I also don’t take pictures like it never crosses my mind unless it’s my cats being funny so if I did have a social media I think it’d actually make me look less interesting
Probably just messaging fake accounts/bots to make it look like women use the app but then real women get the flack for it
Yeah, that’s what they do. People don’t notice that? I’ve known several guys that worked this kind of jobs on and off when really strapped for money. Pretending to be women online. Unethical AF, of course, but this is more widespread than you could possibly imagine. And it’s not hard at all to get hired. I feel sorry for the dudes falling for it, though.
Helen Keller wasn’t real
wat
Deaf, blind, and socialist? She’s just woke propaganda
Hellen Keller went with Goku and Sonic to take The Ring to Narnia for Zordon.
you’re not real either, buddy.
Shut up Jaden Smith
Reminded me of a terrible joke.
Why couldn’t Hellen Keller drive a car?
Because she was a woman.
Years ago, a friend of mine once had: “Seeking partner skilled in armed combat for the coming apocalypse. Must not be averse to cannibalism” as their bio.
Got 'em a couple DMs I think
Yeah that sounds like a fun person
Tinder, Azar, Her, Hinge, match.com, meetic, Ok Cupid, Plenty of Fish, and The League are all owned by a single company.
The ratio of women to men on their dating apps are also wack.
How is that not an anti-trust issue? Each one started as an independent company trying to add value by bringing something new to the table, and they bought them all up to eliminate the competition and enshittified them all with the same profit-gouging algorithms.
Not to mention the concerted effort they made to make in-person dating a social taboo so that everyone literally depends on the dating apps to find potential partners.
Back before I gave up on dating, when I was still on reddit, I can’t tell you how many times I heard the same advice. “Don’t approach people in person, nobody wants to be bothered. Just use the apps where you know they want to be approached.”
That with the systematic minimization of the shittiness of the apps, and the victim blaming “just work on yourself bro, you must be a shit person if you can’t find a partner, so you’d find a partner if you could just stop being a shit person.”
Looking back, I wonder how much of that was astroturfing by the Match Group marketing department…
How is that not an anti-trust issue?
Because we live in the bad place. Conservatives are unlikely to pursue anti-trust unless they’re using it as a tool to hurt out-group (eg: they might try to break up an organization they perceive as being too queer).
We don’t have a strong left in the US. You get glimmers every so often - Lina Khan was trying to do anti-trust work, but then trump returned and that’s all moot.
A lot of problems would go away or be less bad if we stopped letting power consolidate. Unfortunately, this is the bad place.
Yeah, that’s so true. Ironically, anti-trust laws are more often used to help corporate interests maintain their monopolies and duopolies.
Any time a new startup comes in and threatens to claim a significant portion of the market share, these entrenched big business interests accusing them of “monopolistic practices” even though it’s literally the opposite. It’s plain old DARVO.
We do not live in a free market. That’s a myth told by the oligarch caste to enable and maintain their corruption, capture, and control of the market.
This makes total sense!
I met my husband on Tinder in 2014, 3 years before consolidation in 2017. When I was using it it was only a joint venture with Match Group
I also had some success before 2014 on okcupid (initially owned by IAC which used to contain Match Group and has since separated from match group but Match group kept OkCupid) and POF (sold in 2015 to Match Group)
Makes sense to me why I had a way different experience on dating websites back when I was single compared to my single friends now.
Good lord they own basically all the major ones.
Also all the different “X People Meet” apps, but no Linux People Meet? 😭 /s
Also all the different “X People Meet” apps, but no Linux People Meet? 😭 /s
Tbh, isn’t that just Alovoa? I had never heard of it until I saw it on FDroid
Lmao an open source meet up app. Never heard of it, but interesting to know it exists
I met my girlfriend on IRC, we’ve been living together for 7 years now. She was trolling people with goatse pics and we started talking about philosophy and poetry etc and then it turned out that she’s a super cute canadian girl. This is usually not the story we tell people when they ask how we met.
A girlfriend that trolls people with goatse? lucky bastard
You’d never guess if you just met her, she’s a 5’2 ballet dancer but she knows everything about various serial killers. People are complex, we have many sides.
That’s the most crazy story i have read and the best one probably
Also, THIS is how you are supposed to meet people online not with dating apps, dating apps just suck and make you choose the most sexy “option” and maybe their interests maybe
This is usually not the story we tell people when they ask how we met.
Honestly, it’s a way better story than telling people you met on a dating app. And the ones that would be weirded out by the story are probably not people you’d want to spend a lot of time around
Holy shit, I didn’t think that was even possible. I can’t let myself start thinking that’s a possibility, I just can’t. That could lead to disaster.
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them
Hey no kink shaming in the guild!
We meet here bro 😘
no Linux People Meet?
Are you sure there’s no transfemme one?
Feeld is there too. Their matching and like system is very much weighted towards paying not-cheap monthly prices.
What’s this “Helen Keller wasn’t real” meme? I’ve never heard (or seen) it
Neither has she, lololol
I don’t get it.
Is it because she’s dead?
She was blind and deaf but yes she did in 1968.
sigh
It’s ok, that one got a chuckle outta me
Just a dumb conspiracy theory where people either think a) she wasn’t actually blind and deaf, or b) she didn’t actually write the books she wrote and shrugs everything she achieved.
https://www.distractify.com/p/is-helen-keller-real-conspiracy
“Hellen Keller wasn’t real” is an immediate swipe away from a profile. I don’t care if they’re joking or if they’re actually a nut job conspiracy theorist. If the latter, obviously we’re not gonna vibe, and if the former, that entire joke/line of thinking is prefaced on ableism and the idea that a deaf and blind woman could not have accomplished what she did, not to mention the erasure of a prominent socialist, suffragist, and activist. I fucking hate that joke.
This is the first I’ve ever heard about it, and I’m so confused
It started as a joke, and now there are actual people who believe that she was either not a real person, or that her accomplishments were faked. People with disabilities are already assumed to be lesser than able bodied people, and this particular trend is stripping away one of the most prominent examples to the contrary. It is also erasing one of the most prominent examples of a famous socialist woman in American history, and a southern American socialist woman at that. Her story is amazing, but more importantly, she is historically significant. She is an example to so many people, and she has been liberal-washed for a century, and now she’s being erased entirely. It’s disgusting.
Sickening. I had no idea she was being attacked in this way.
I guess this is another moon landing flat earth sovereign citizen thing.
it’s a nothingburger that people online like to tilt at.
because they are all brave Knights errant, who are rescuing damsels or something.
where you around for Bonsai Kittens? lots of people lost their shit over that thinking it was some legit thing.
This is not at all comparable to bonsai kittens. Bonsai kittens were not at all based in reality. Hellen Keller was an actual, real human person who is being erased by idiotic conspiracy theorists. She was a disabled woman who overcame profound disability to become an incredibly example to millions of people, while also being a highly intelligent political thinker. She has been liberal washed for a century, and now she is being erased entirely. It’s not a funny little joke to disregard the accomplishments of someone who represents something that profound to people who are routinely discriminated against. The woman grew up at a time when disabled people were locked away in hospitals, homes, and attics.
Do you have any idea how utterly insulting it is to see people saying she could not have done what she did, or that she did not even exist, simply because they cannot imagine that a woman with her disabilities could learn language? As if to say that disabled people should be outright rejected because their experience is different from an an able bodied persons?
This has nothing to do with “rescuing damsels,” and the suggestion that it does is insulting in and of itself. The woman is dead, she cannot rescue herself, she deserves the recognition that she has lost. When she is taught in schools, it’s an abbreviated, liberal washed, abridged few paragraphs, when the reality is that she is one of the most important figures in the American disability rights movement, and one of the most prominent examples of a socialist woman in US history, especially southern American US history.
dude, idiots think bonsai kittens were real and were going around outraged about it.
just like idiots think helen keller isn’t real.
you are taking idiots way too seriously. please go outside and enjoy the sunshine and stop being ragebaited. you are not saving the world by being angry on the internet at stupid people. all you are doing is inflating your own ego and making yourself miserable.
A VERY prominent and UNAPOLOGETIC socialist. The way history has defanged her and turned her into a simpleton who learned to speak is an absolute appalling insult to the strong, principled woman she was.
Exactly! She’s one of my favorite historical figures, but when if she wasn’t, even if our politics did not align so well, she does not deserve to swept into the dustbin like this, liberal washed and eventually erased entirely. It’s disgusting.
There are absolutely a lot of awful realizations about how inhumanly the world treats people, but the realization that you don’t even get to have the legacy of the life you lived? That’s maybe the most heinous one.
Doesn’t matter had sex.
And they’re fake hikers and travelers too. I met somebody irl who said one of their interests was eating food but they just go to the places for the vibes and not for the food. Whereas I’m the complete opposite, I would go to a crack den for the best food.
swipes right
A date I had said their hobbies were walking and hiking among other things. Our 1st date was at a local park with a 20 step stair case that took her out… It was my first exposure to this bizarre labelling that goes on here.
There wasn’t a 2nd lol
Humans are just animals at the end of the day. This is all a sexual display of fitness. Hiking and traveling tell people you’re physically and financially fit. You can move around no issue. You are social. You are socially and physically healthy.
They lie a ton and show pics of hiking from 5 years ago and act like they can still do all that. Or they never could and the pics are deceiving… Regardless, it’s just a game all genders are playing to show sexual fitness. It looks like carbon copies because it’s the best way to communicate “my body moves well and I can afford luxury”.
joke is on them.
I can’t afford luxury shit, but I can ride my non luxury bike like 150 miles in a day.
“my body moves well and I can afford luxury”
Swipes right
I love walking and hiking, but having to walk uphill takes me out, too.
I had a firdt date with someone who loved hiking. I asked her if she wanted to go on a trail i like. I was worrued that it was maybe to long and steep, or maybe even to short. When we met, she was way bigger than i expected. I told ger that we could do something else, but she insiated. She was super slow and i was worried sge’s gonna pass out. She asked me if how far we have to go, when i could still see my car. Similar thing happened when i went on a vike ride with someone who was really into cycling
a vike ride
I feel like this could be really uncomfortable because of the helmet horns.
I invited a girl out on a bike ride and she literally did pass out. Was able to revive her and walk her home.
She never talked to me again.
Best Chinese food I’ve had was in a legit city basement.
Best philly cheesesteak I’ve ever had was from a hospital cafeteria.
The best food is usually in places like that too. My home city has this literal hole in a wall mexican place. You know it’s good when it’s also a grocery store and nobody speaks good English except for the kids who are the wait staff. Best fucking food I’ve ever had and I’m gutted because they closed down 6 months later and I don’t know if they moved or went out of business 😭😭😭
There’s this bengali place I love that is also a grocery store. It’s so epic
I have a Pavlovian response to seeing shelves of spices and dried peppers in unlabeled bags in a language I can’t read because of this. If I’m already hungry and I walk in to a new place and see that suddenly I’m ravenous.
amen brother.
best places to eat are the places with no white people. whitey has no taste.
but sucks that usually such places don’t last and get replaced with generic white person food.
No need to get all racist, mate
They do be trifflin
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Ohh a group of my friends has someone like that. Although everyone has been getting increasingly distant from her as she won’t turn up to anything that isn’t fancy enough for her, and there is an increasing feeling that she only ever messages us when she doesn’t have anything else she would rather do going on - we hear from her much more when she is unemployed and single.














