The New Dating Landscape
written by Micah Brown
When I started dating in the 1990s, before the wide adoption of the Internet and the proliferation of dating apps, you had to find ways to meet people in person. There were no fancy algorithms to help find your perfect mate. There was only the bar, the club, the campus, and a chance to meet someone in a coffee shop that could turn into something more.
Looking back at it now, the old Gen Xer I am, the world felt incredibly small. If you wanted to find a foreign partner, you traveled or looked into the well-regarded mail-in brides from Eastern Europe (and other locales). The idea of a long-distance relationship seemed almost daunting before-times when I think about it now. How were you going to keep in touch? Unlimited long-distance calls and cell phones were not the norm, so talking on your landline could cost you an arm and a leg in long-distance charges.
Now? These days, you can meet and date somebody from across the globe, have video calls with them that cost nothing, and even share photographs from your phone. Having lived in both realities, I can understand why some people may see the modern dating scene as daunting.
While technology provides a much broader audience to share yourself with, it has also become saturated with profiles and people, meaning that your profile could get easily lost in the shuffle of thousands of others. How does one lone voice in the wilderness hope to find a mate in the rush of information that dating has now become?
The Numbers
A recent study has shown that more single adults are now than in the past. What’s more, there is a disconnect between the number of singles looking for a partner and those not. According to the Pew Research Center, 61% of men who identify as single are looking to date, while only 38% of single women are looking to find a partner. Speaking strictly of the Cis-Het men and women, this makes finding a date even more daunting if you’re a man.
If you happen to be a member of the LGBTQIA+ community, your numbers are much more favorable, with 80% of the single, queer population looking for love. Higher percentages of queer men and women (inclusive of Trans people) are all looking to find a partner.
Perhaps one of the most interesting numbers from the Pew Research Center shows that, despite the proliferation of dating sites and dating apps, as of 2019, only 12% of Americans had entered into a committed relationship with somebody they met online. Reading between the lines here, it could suggest that online dating is more geared toward hooking up and sex than dating and romance (I’m sure this is a massive shock to everybody).
The Landscape
I met my current partner back in 2006. We did not date back then, but I tried awkwardly to flirt with her whenever I saw her around. Skip forward to 2023, and we reconnected through social media and met for coffee, then movies, and then we were together. We married in 2024. Dating apps played no role in forming our relationship, though it was technology that reconnected us after we hadn’t seen each other in so long. I am not sad about it in the least.
The options you may face as a single person in the 2020s include one of many possible dating apps, continuing to go out to clubs, bars, and other social hot spots, or luck of the draw with who you sit next to during college biology.
Most people still meet long-term partners through friends and social interaction, so the wisdom shows that this is probably where you will find your long-term mate.
If you’re just looking to hook up and have a little sex, then the dating apps may be what you’re looking for, though it is very likely that you will have much better luck in that department if you happen to be a straight, Cis-woman looking for a straight, Cis-man.
The Rise of Poly
While polyamory has always existed in some form or another, it’s only been in recent years that it’s become (almost) socially acceptable as more people embrace the idea behind it.
Polyamory comes in many different forms. Often confused with an open relationship, polyamory focuses more on the romantic and emotional aspects of a relationship – with no stigma about loving more than one person. Generally speaking, an open relationship is going to be more akin to swingers or those who like to have sex with people other than their partner without a romantic entanglement. There is nothing wrong with any of this, just as there is nothing wrong with wanting a more traditional monogamous relationship.
With poly relationships on the rise, some dating apps have been catching up with the times and offering ways in which those who are poly can check that off in their profile and alert others to this fact. Some apps have even started focusing on poly relationships in a healthy manner, while others have, unfortunately, fallen to the idea of “Unicorn Hunting.”
For those unfamiliar with the term, Unicorn Hunting is when a predominantly straight couple goes looking for a second woman to bring into the bedroom for both of them to sleep with. This is considered unethical for many reasons, such as the potential for emotional manipulation, using the 3rd as a fantasy object instead of being a person, and the often-unconsidered consequences on a relationship.
If you want to be poly, that’s great! Many resources are available to learn more about it and how to open up your relationship ethically and lovingly.
The Kids Are All Right
I will admit there is much about relationships that I didn’t fully grasp when I was younger. The good news is that I’m seeing more young people in healthier, more communicative relationships. Instead of fumbling around, they are talking, being open about their other relationships (if there are any), and dealing with the jealousy that comes with a poly relationship if that happens to be what they are looking for.
There are relationship styles I now see that I do not understand, but that doesn’t make them wrong.
The idea that we must hate what we don’t understand is something that I have never understood. I know that my parents had issues adjusting to the poly relationships I had in the past, though now I have moved back to a more monogomish style of relationship with my wife. As my own children grow up, I’m sure I will be thrust into some new and exciting relationship dynamic that I haven’t yet experienced.
The world is wide open. Love is out there if you want to find it. If you don’t want to find it, cheers to you as well. Love yourself, if you can, and if you can’t just know that we love you! Hey, if people can hate those they’ve never met, we can love people we’ve never met.
Sources:
Alaimo, K. (2024, February 13). Opinion: A big reason so many Americans are still single. CNN. https://edition.cnn.com/2024/02/13/opinions/dating-apps-relationships-alaimo/index.html
