# Study: Aspirational pursuit of mates in online dating markets



## Lila

This study was posted on a different forum I follow and thought it would make a good discussion topic in Life After Divorce. The study findings could answer why online dating does not work for most.

Aspirational pursuit of mates in online dating markets

"_Romantic courtship is often described as taking place in a dating market where men and women compete for mates, but the detailed structure and dynamics of dating markets have historically been difficult to quantify for lack of suitable data. In recent years, however, the advent and vigorous growth of the online dating industry has provided a rich new source of information on mate pursuit. We present an empirical analysis of heterosexual dating markets in four large U.S. cities using data from a popular, free online dating service. We show that competition for mates creates a pronounced hierarchy of desirability that correlates strongly with user demographics and is remarkably consistent across cities. *We find that both men and women pursue partners who are on average about 25% more desirable than themselves by our measures and that they use different messaging strategies with partners of different desirability. * We also find that the probability of receiving a response to an advance drops markedly with increasing difference in desirability between the pursuer and the pursued. Strategic behaviors can improve one’s chances of attracting a more desirable mate, although the effects are modest._"

The study also found that men have the advantage on women when getting responses from these 25% more desirable women. Women are 5x more likely to respond to a perceived less desirable man than a man is to respond to a perceived less desirable woman.


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## ccpowerslave

Great article, especially this part:



> For men, desirability peaks around 50 and then declines.


Still haven’t hit my peak yet!


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## Lila

ccpowerslave said:


> Great article, especially this part:
> 
> 
> 
> Still haven’t hit my peak yet!


That was interesting. I'm usually the one on my soapbox telling financially secure under 50 year old men who have zero desire for kids to get a vasectomy. Have fun and enjoy the attention but be safe and smart.


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## ccpowerslave

Lila said:


> That was interesting. I'm usually the one on my soapbox telling financially secure under 50 year old men who have zero desire for kids to get a vasectomy. Have fun and enjoy the attention but be safe and smart.


Haha the only one who is going to benefit from it will be my wife, but it would have added a slight spring in my step that would have made me even more attractive if I wasn’t limping around due to a groin injury.

I happen to know a guy who had his kids and then immediately went to get a vasectomy. He was one of the unlucky guys who got an infection from it inside his scrotum. Scared me off of it.


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## sokillme

I am skeptical because "desirable" is relative, and it can be different from each individual person, even to one persons need and situation at the time. I don't think you an clarify that for a study. Also given how badly people pick mates, how half of marriages end in divorce and probably 25% of those are not happy, why should I believe what some study says desirable actually has any value at all? A personally start from the premise what people assume is desirable is very trivial and not a good assumption. This is the same people who more often then not gives really terrible advice when there are marital crisis. 

I mean if anything given the last year and a half we should all be pretty skeptical of people who are so call experts.


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## Lila

sokillme said:


> I am skeptical because "desirable" is relative, and it can be different from each individual person, even to one persons need and situation at the time. I don't think you an clarify that for a study. Also given how badly people pick mates, how half of marriages end in divorce and probably 25% of those are not happy, why should I believe what some study says desirable actually has any value at all? A personally start from the premise what people assume is desirable is very trivial and not a good assumption. This is the same people who more often then not gives really terrible advice when there are marital crisis.
> 
> I mean if anything given the last year and a half we should all be pretty skeptical of people who are so call experts.


@sokillme you should read the study I looked in the OP. All of your questions regarding how the study authors measured desirability are described in detail. Also this study is specific to online dating not real life.


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## Diana7

Apparently 20% of current committed relationships started with online dating. That's quite a lot, so it seems to work for a fair number.


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## coquille

That's an interesting article. Thanks for sharing. I like how the authors distinguish between desirability and matching. As much as we want to believe that desirability is subjective and varies between one individual and another, it is applicable if we just take into consideration the contacts initiated on these sites. Desirability is very much influenced by cultural norms and trends, while matching is very personal and subjective. 

Potential mates compete for a desirable mate, this desirability being set by society ( an Asian young woman with an undergraduate degree ranks the highest on the desirability scale; a 50-year old white man with an advanced degree and a successful career ranks highest), but potential mates also look ultimately for a matching mate if we take into consideration that the initial contact is aimed at finding a matching mate. Here matching is very subjective and depends on so many factors, and the older we are the more factors come into play and complicate the matching game. 

Re: women's peak is 18 and men's is 50 makes perfect sense from the point of view of desirability. 
I tried online dating for a while. I'm 51, I am fit, and I take care of myself. So many of the contacts did NOT read at all my profile. They just looked at the pictures and sent me a message. These individuals are clearly not looking for a matching mate. 
It is interesting that the study didn't go into California where I live. I thought initially that because California is a beast on its own because of the shallowness associated with Hollywood culture, but I don't think the findings they would get in California would be much different from the cities where the study took place.


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## lifeistooshort

I'm not at all surprised that less desirable men can get responses from more desirable women. Everyone knows that desirable women can easily use less desirable men, who will pay for the opportunity 

This dynamic doesn't exist between more desirable men and less desirable women.

Online dating is a shopping experience. A person who might meet someone IRL and be happy with them doesn't get the sane satisfaction online because they wonder if they can continueshopping and do better.

I've also observed that people seem to think they can shop for something better then they could actually get irl. I knew a lawyer who wasn't very attractive and couldn't get the model he thought he was entitled to irl, so he figured he'd sign up for old and put in what he wanted and she'd be supplied to him.

Didn't work.

I have Sirius xm radio and my bf doesn't. When he's in my car he's constantly flipping channels even if there's a song he likes on because he's got so many potential options that he wonders if he can do better. 

In his own car he's happy with a song he likes because the option potential isn't there.


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## coquille

lifeistooshort said:


> I'm not at all surprised that less desirable men can get responses from more desirable women. Everyone knows that desirable women can easily use less desirable men, who will pay for the opportunity
> 
> This dynamic doesn't exist between more desirable men and less desirable women.
> 
> Online dating is a shopping experience. A person who might meet someone IRL and be happy with them doesn't get the sane satisfaction online because they wonder if they can continueshopping and do better.
> 
> I've also observed that people seem to think they can shop for something better then they could actually get irl. I knew a lawyer who wasn't very attractive and couldn't get the model he thought he was entitled to irl, so he figured he'd sign up for old and put in what he wanted and she'd be supplied to him.
> 
> Didn't work.
> 
> I have Sirius xm radio and my bf doesn't. When he's in my car he's constantly flipping channels even if there's a song he likes on because he's got so many potential options that he wonders if he can do better.
> 
> In his own car he's happy with a song he likes because the option potential isn't there.


Totally agree with you that it is a shopping experience. People are sampling and keep sampling even if they meet someone who has the potential of being a good match. I had a hard time understanding this approach to online dating.


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## BlueWoman

sokillme said:


> I am skeptical because "desirable" is relative, and it can be different from each individual person, even to one persons need and situation at the time. I don't think you an clarify that for a study. Also given how badly people pick mates, how half of marriages end in divorce and probably 25% of those are not happy, why should I believe what some study says desirable actually has any value at all? A personally start from the premise what people assume is desirable is very trivial and not a good assumption. This is the same people who more often then not gives really terrible advice when there are marital crisis.
> 
> I mean if anything given the last year and a half we should all be pretty skeptical of people who are so call experts.



I understand where you are coming from. But this article isn't giving any advice, it's just stating what is happening (or happened during the study). And as someone who does online date, I would definitely say it is matching with my experiences. Yes, what each of us finds desirable is different, but there are trends that can be captured in statistics. 

It doesn't in any way change how I approach one-line dating. I am in a less "desirable" group (almost 50-year-old woman with an advanced degree). But fortunately for me, the men who are not interested are usually not all that desirable to me either, even though they may be desirable to other women. Having already spent time with a man who was not the right fit, I am well aware of how much unhappier I can be with the wrong person than single. The competition for my attention is not other men, but instead my single life satisfaction.


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## ccpowerslave

coquille said:


> a 50-year old white man with an advanced degree and a successful career ranks highest


👍👍😁😁😁😁👌👌👌


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## NTA

What is deisreable or undesireable varies. A couple of family members told that I was lucky to have a partner /husband even I have cancer.


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## coquille

ccpowerslave said:


> 👍👍😁😁😁😁👌👌👌


Are you now tempted to jump on a dating site just to see how many messages you're going to receive?


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## coquille

NTA said:


> What is deisreable or undesireable varies. A couple of family members told that I was lucky to have a partner /husband even I have cancer.


I agree with you that desirability varies between individuals and it also varies throughout one's life. What was desirable to me when I was in my 20s is not when I am in my 40s or 50s, but in the online dating world it is different in a weird way.


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## lifeistooshort

coquille said:


> Totally agree with you that it is a shopping experience. People are sampling and keep sampling even if they meet someone who has the potential of being a good match. I had a hard time understanding this approach to online dating.


I know another guy who is almost 60, short, and unattractive who still imagines he's going to get a 30-35 year old who's an 8-9. He is a good friend that I know through work and we've been friends for many years...he was a professional mentor of mine.

He's openly said if I was single and interested he'd be interested in 47 year old me because he very much likes my personality. We have great spirited discussions about economics and politics that I know he enjoys, and while I'm not 30 I look pretty good. A martial arts friend once told me 20 somethings have nothing on me body wise.

This particular guy is one of those that just has many platonic female friends and has never done anything unseemly beyond commenting that I look nice. But I find it interesting that he likes 47 year old me because he knows me, but when using an online service he's looking for much younger.


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## lifeistooshort

BlueWoman said:


> I understand where you are coming from. But this article isn't giving any advice, it's just stating what is happening (or happened during the study). And as someone who does online date, I would definitely say it is matching with my experiences. Yes, what each of us finds desirable is different, but there are trends that can be captured in statistics.
> 
> It doesn't in any way change how I approach one-line dating. I am in a less "desirable" group (almost 50-year-old woman with an advanced degree). But fortunately for me, the men who are not interested are usually not all that desirable to me either, even though they may be desirable to other women. Having already spent time with a man who was not the right fit, I am well aware of how much unhappier I can be with the wrong person than single.* The competition for my attention is not other men, but instead my single life satisfaction*.


Ain't that the truth.

Preach.


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## coquille

lifeistooshort said:


> I know another guy who is almost 60, short, and unattractive who still imagines he's going to get a 30-35 year old who's an 8-9. He is a good friend that I know through work and we've been friends for many years...he was a professional mentor of mine.
> 
> He's openly said if I was single and interested he'd be interested in 47 year old me because he very much likes my personality. We have great spirited discussions about economics and politics that I know he enjoys, and while I'm not 30 I look pretty good. A martial arts friend once told me 20 somethings have nothing on me body wise.
> 
> This particular guy is one of those that just has many platonic female friends and has never done anything unseemly beyond commenting that I look nice. But I find it interesting that he likes 47 year old me because he knows me, but when using an online service he's looking for much younger.


Yeah, a woman friend of mine who is 57 had a hard time finding a partner around her age. She said men her age are looking for much younger women. She was receiving messages from guys in their 70s only. We know this trend is already happening in real life, but online dating aggravated it.


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## Diana7

coquille said:


> Yeah, a woman friend of mine who is 57 had a hard time finding a partner around her age. She said men her age are looking for much younger women. She was receiving messages from guys in their 70s only. We know this trend is already happening in real life, but online dating aggravated it.


Yes I found that when was on OLD, it's even worse for women on Christian sites as there are far less women there anyway. However I did end up with a man slightly younger than me so there is hope.
A young lady I know who was in her late 20's was getting messages from men in their 50's. Needless to say she didn't reply.


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## lifeistooshort

coquille said:


> Yeah, a woman friend of mine who is 57 had a hard time finding a partner around her age. She said men her age are looking for much younger women. She was receiving messages from guys in their 70s only. We know this trend is already happening in real life, but online dating aggravated it.


I wonder if this is an OLD thing like I noticed with my friend. OLD lacks a human connection.

IRL I know many men who have comparably aged partners. I'm talking about divorced men who have gf's (as opposed to men who married younger and are still with a comparably aged wife).

I know 3 single men in their 50's off the top of my head and all of them would prefer a partner within range of them. My bf and I are 8 1/2 years apart and we met at a cycling club. I know many couples that cycle together and none have a large age difference. A 65 year old gf of mine that I know through cycling is married to a guy who is 69 and also cycles. He told me after his divorce at age 50 he briefly dated a 32 year old with young kids and quickly realized it was ridiculous and that a comparably aged partner was much better.. He then pursued my friend and they've been together for 16 years or so. 

It's an interesting psychological study in the different attitudes with an in person connection vs a fantasy shopping experience.


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## lifeistooshort

Diana7 said:


> Yes I found that when was on OLD, it's even worse for women on Christian sites as there are far less women there anyway. However I did end up with a man slightly younger than me so there is hope.
> A young lady I know who was in her late 20's was getting messages from men in their 50's. Needless to say she didn't reply.



When I was in my early 20’s, before OLD was a thing, you'd see this in the singles ads in the paper. These idiot men in their 50's and 60's were advertising for women 20-30.

As a member of their target audience I thought it was disgusting.


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## Lila

coquille said:


> That's an interesting article. Thanks for sharing. I like how the authors distinguish between desirability and matching. As much as we want to believe that desirability is subjective and varies between one individual and another, it is applicable if we just take into consideration the contacts initiated on these sites. Desirability is very much influenced by cultural norms and trends, while matching is very personal and subjective.
> 
> Potential mates compete for a desirable mate, this desirability being set by society ( an Asian young woman with an undergraduate degree ranks the highest on the desirability scale; a 50-year old white man with an advanced degree and a successful career ranks highest), but potential mates also look ultimately for a matching mate if we take into consideration that the initial contact is aimed at finding a matching mate. Here matching is very subjective and depends on so many factors, and the older we are the more factors come into play and complicate the matching game.
> 
> Re: women's peak is 18 and men's is 50 makes perfect sense from the point of view of desirability.
> I tried online dating for a while. I'm 51, I am fit, and I take care of myself. So many of the contacts did NOT read at all my profile. They just looked at the pictures and sent me a message. These individuals are clearly not looking for a matching mate.
> It is interesting that the study didn't go into California where I live. I thought initially that because California is a beast on its own because of the shallowness associated with Hollywood culture, but I don't think the findings they would get in California would be much different from the cities where the study took place.


This is great synopsis of the findings. 

They based the results on New York City, Boston, Chicago, and Seattle. They didn't explain why those four cities were chosen but it probably has to do with the popularity of dating app usage in those cities. I'm sure there could be an entire study based on regional usage and selection styles just within California alone.


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## coquille

Lila said:


> This is great synopsis of the findings.
> 
> They based the results on New York City, Boston, Chicago, and Seattle. They didn't explain why those four cities were chosen but it probably has to do with the popularity of dating app usage in those cities. I'm sure there could be an entire study based on regional usage and selection styles just within California alone.


True. I know from friends that the dating scene in NorCal is different from SoCal. Different cultures. The Central Valley is also much different from these two.


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## ccpowerslave

coquille said:


> Are you now tempted to jump on a dating site just to see how many messages you're going to receive?


No way. My wife would punch me in the nuts!

It’s just good to feel wanted 😁. It’s kind of sad when I look at an old picture of us I look like **** and she looks awesome. Now I’m like damn I fine and she looks much older. Kind of unfair but since I’m on the good side this time I will take a moment and celebrate.

One other thing if I was going to date I would not be looking for much younger women especially from a different generation. There are plenty of 10/10 women who are my age or older who actually have the same wisdom and life experience which to me is much more interesting and dare I say sexy.


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## DownByTheRiver

lifeistooshort said:


> I know another guy who is almost 60, short, and unattractive who still imagines he's going to get a 30-35 year old who's an 8-9. He is a good friend that I know through work and we've been friends for many years...he was a professional mentor of mine.
> 
> He's openly said if I was single and interested he'd be interested in 47 year old me because he very much likes my personality. We have great spirited discussions about economics and politics that I know he enjoys, and while I'm not 30 I look pretty good. A martial arts friend once told me 20 somethings have nothing on me body wise.
> 
> This particular guy is one of those that just has many platonic female friends and has never done anything unseemly beyond commenting that I look nice. But I find it interesting that he likes 47 year old me because he knows me, but when using an online service he's looking for much younger.


Men will often fall for women they are actually around on a regular basis. That was my strength.

I have trouble believing men peak at 50, and I think that would be restricted only to the online dating, and only because there are so many divorced women in their 30s and 40s out there online who probably wouldn't be "out there" at all hanging out at the places young people frequent to meet people. There's this demographic who are basically confined to online for social or practical (kids) reasons. 

The comment in the original post that women are more likely to respond to less desirables is because women are so much more afraid of hurting someone's feelings, I think, and a lot of them also think, Well, I'd be happy to just be friends, something the man rarely does.


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## ccpowerslave

Yeah one interesting thing here is I also wouldn’t do the OLD thing to start. I would hit the ladies at the gym and tell them I was single and almost all of them like to play matchmaker so I’m sure they’d set me up with blind dates with no effort on my part.


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## RandomDude

Huh? What? Men have the advantage in OLD what? I thought it was the opposite, you know with women getting flooded with men messaging them who 'swipe right' to everything and women picking and choosing making them err... 'picky' ?


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## DownByTheRiver

RandomDude said:


> Huh? What? Men have the advantage in OLD what? I thought it was the opposite, you know with women getting flooded with men messaging them who 'swipe right' to everything and women picking and choosing making them err... 'picky' ?


That's the hue and cry of the unchosen masses on the forums, certainly.


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## ccpowerslave

DownByTheRiver said:


> That's the hue and cry of the unchosen masses on the forums, certainly.


Sad...


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## RandomDude

DownByTheRiver said:


> That's the hue and cry of the unchosen masses on the forums, certainly.


But but, during my brief venture into OLD:








Online dating recommendations


So, I've recently decided to give online dating a shot, I've signed up on match, ******* and tinder so far. I was going to sign up for an offline dating agency (which costs ~$3K) for a year membership but decided against it, as I suspect their database would be very small due to price of...




www.talkaboutmarriage.com





Only 2%, 24%, and 50% response rate in 3 different sites, and thats considered good for a lowly male right? Lol

I'm sure women get better response rates no?


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## coquille

RandomDude said:


> Huh? What? Men have the advantage in OLD what? I thought it was the opposite, you know with women getting flooded with men messaging them who 'swipe right' to everything and women picking and choosing making them err... 'picky' ?


Not all men. Just the category considered desirable.


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## RandomDude

coquille said:


> Not all men. Just the category considered desirable.


I see, well I guess that makes one of the 'unchosen' then!


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## Lila

DownByTheRiver said:


> The comment in the original post that women are more likely to respond to less desirables is because women are so much more afraid of hurting someone's feelings, I think, and a lot of them also think, Well, I'd be happy to just be friends, something the man rarely does.


There is much truth to what you say. I remembered watching this experiment on tv where they put men and women in fat suits and set them up on dates. It was basically used to determine the difference in how men and women reacted when the person they were to meet was significantly heavier than in their pictures. The actors wore fat suits to disguise their true appearance. The results speak to your point. The women were much less likely to want to hurt the person's feelings so they made the best of the date whereas most men picked up and left as soon as they saw their date.


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## NTA

coquille said:


> Yeah, a woman friend of mine who is 57 had a hard time finding a partner around her age. She said men her age are looking for much younger women. She was receiving messages from guys in their 70s only. We know this trend is already happening in real life, but online dating aggravated it.


Can you describe her environment? Small town or big city? A city that attracts people for work whether a permanent position or a multi year transfer?

After my divorce I stayed in London. That's where I met my second husband. one main reason was because, at the time up, I saw more interracial couples. Something I don't see in a lot of US cities.


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## NTA

lifeistooshort said:


> When I was in my early 20’s, before OLD was a thing, you'd see this in the singles ads in the paper. These idiot men in their 50's and 60's were advertising for women 20-30.
> 
> As a member of their target audience I thought it was disgusting.


Did they try to make out as if they wanted more children? as in newborns.


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## DownByTheRiver

Lila said:


> There is much truth to what you say. I remembered watching this experiment on tv where they put men and women in fat suits and set them up on dates. It was basically used to determine the difference in how men and women reacted when the person they were to meet was significantly heavier than in their pictures. The actors wore fat suits to disguise their true appearance. The results speak to your point. The women were much less likely to want to hurt the person's feelings so they made the best of the date whereas most men picked up and left as soon as they saw their date.


Yeah, not surprising. It's not necessarily a slam to say men overall have less empathy. It's something that goes back millions of years, from what I've read. But it also goes to motive. Men are all about sex. If it ain't f'able, they're not interested. Women aren't as single-minded and may find value in a friendship sharing common interests. I, for example, will talk to any man who has a dog with him. I'm literally more interested in his dog.


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## ccpowerslave

DownByTheRiver said:


> Women aren't as single-minded and may find value in a friendship sharing common interests. I, for example, will talk to any man who has a dog with him. I'm literally more interested in his dog.


Hahaha. I noticed this when I was a student walking next to the library in Berkeley. There was a guy who had a wrinkle pup on campus and he was mobbed by women. He had probably 5-10 women surrounding him the entire time he was there.

Later I explained what I saw to my roommate and I was like dude I need to get a puppy.


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## NTA

RandomDude said:


> But but, during my brief venture into OLD:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Online dating recommendations
> 
> 
> So, I've recently decided to give online dating a shot, I've signed up on match, ******* and tinder so far. I was going to sign up for an offline dating agency (which costs ~$3K) for a year membership but decided against it, as I suspect their database would be very small due to price of...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.talkaboutmarriage.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Only 2%, 24%, and 50% response rate in 3 different sites, and thats considered good for a lowly male right? Lol
> 
> I'm sure women get better response rates no?


I was doing OLD in London. I broke through the age ceiling and stopped getting interest. Even my husband said that he would never have put my age in his search parameters (I'm 10 years older than he) unless he were looking for a quickie.


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## DownByTheRiver

RandomDude said:


> But but, during my brief venture into OLD:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Online dating recommendations
> 
> 
> So, I've recently decided to give online dating a shot, I've signed up on match, ******* and tinder so far. I was going to sign up for an offline dating agency (which costs ~$3K) for a year membership but decided against it, as I suspect their database would be very small due to price of...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.talkaboutmarriage.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Only 2%, 24%, and 50% response rate in 3 different sites, and thats considered good for a lowly male right? Lol
> 
> I'm sure women get better response rates no?


Nah. Only the top tier physically attractive percent of men and women get a lot of responses. And they get more unwanted ones by far than wanted ones. And of course, that group could easily date offline and stay busy, and it would be better dates and less of a gamble. There's really nothing to envy in the hot woman who gets unwanted "opportunities" all day long, or the man either. 

All but the most naive of women know men are firstly looking for sex online or off. Many of them may still have this fairytale where they believe their prince will come, but that bubble gets burst pretty quickly online and maybe not quickly enough offline. I don't know what the answer is. 

Men are just as bad as women with deluding themselves and thinking they're entitled to, like Lila's posted study says, women way more attractive than they themselves are, and men are even worse about overestimating their attractiveness. What straight men think is attractive in a man and what women do are often two very different things, as you can easily tell over the history of television and movies, where unattractive goofballs are paired with women who in real life probably have modeling in their background. 

Men put such a priority on women's bodies that they assume women do the same with men and just want someone buff and that that should qualify them for a superhot thin stacked woman, but that couldn't be further from the truth. All the women I've known liked face and hair, overall silhouette shape, and style more than muscles, which is more for special tastes, (though muscular men certainly have their fans.) 

Likewise, few women understand how much focus a lot of men put on extreme thinness paired with big boobs, which is not a natural phenomenon, but on the rare occasion they encounter one, they all drop their forks.


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## coquille

NTA said:


> Can you describe her environment? Small town or big city? A city that attracts people for work whether a permanent position or a multi year transfer?
> 
> After my divorce I stayed in London. That's where I met my second husband. one main reason was because, at the time up, I saw more interracial couples. Something I don't see in a lot of US cities.


Upper middle class suburb and overpriced coastal cities nearby. I'd say the culture around the cities in my area for the most part thrives on shallow display of wealth. Not a transitional place. People are settled for the most part.


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## sokillme

Lila said:


> @sokillme you should read the study I looked in the OP. All of your questions regarding how the study authors measured desirability are described in detail. Also this study is specific to online dating not real life.





Lila said:


> @sokillme you should read the study I looked in the OP. All of your questions regarding how the study authors measured desirability are described in detail. Also this study is specific to online dating not real life.


I don't dismiss the finding, It's just that I don't think the premise of what is considered desirable is a good way to choose a mate, in the sense that if you follow common traits of desirability it's very risky. I get the sense that the authors of the study at least tacitly agree with me. So in that context, I am not sure what the value in the study is really besides just pointing out trends. 

I think generally speaking, people pursue those who fit what they perceive their status to be according to their culture, probably because that is the most successful mating strategy. Status in terms of educationally (which I think for most is as much about earning power, as intellectual conversation) and level of attractiveness. It should be noted that these two traits seem to be interchangeable to a point where a very physically attractive person will be receptive to someone who is unattractive but has a high earning potential. This used to only be the case for women with men, but I feel that is changing now that women have almost reached earning parallel with men. The stigma of your wife making more then you is slowly going away, particularly for younger men, not sure it is for women though. 

So I agree with the study, but it should be noted that this information is what is considered politely acceptable, so there may just be that this is the only information that can be gleamed from a dating app. And shallow traits are the only kind that you can assess in the initial first dating steps, which is what online dating apps have to focus on. People today are lucky as they have a little more information then much of us had in the past. Online apps kind of skirt the line of what in the past might be, a random bar hookup, being set up by an acquaintance and a dating service. 

I think this is also where a lot of people really go wrong though too, particularly if these continue to be your only priorities after the initial first few dates. It's really kind of a very shallow way to pursue relationships long term, even adding the holy grail of a partner's quality that everyone is looking for - "chemistry". Don't get me wrong, all of those traits are important but I would say that Character should be your primary trait and the one you weigh the highest. Character is not one that is spoken about often, at least not as plainly as I do here. Things will be said like, "I want a good person". That is not enough in my mind. I think character means more then bring a good person, I think it adds the trait of courage as well. 

You can be a good person and still be a coward. Courage is what enables you to do the right thing even if it's hard. Courage is what enables people to live authentic and authentic people make good mates. Both of these are paramount in any emotional relationship. 

Maybe that isn't the point though, and maybe that IS your point to me.


----------



## NTA

Burbs to me means already married /settled. I realize sometimes you don't have a choice.


----------



## coquille

RandomDude said:


> I see, well I guess that makes one of the 'unchosen' then!


Desirability is completely separate from matching or compatibility. What the society might see as desirable in a man or a woman is irrelevant to me as an individual if I came to detach myself from society's standards and set my own list of the qualities or characteristics that I want in a partner. For example, if I am not attracted by white men, then white men's desirability means nothing to me as I feel that I would be more compatible with a brown or a black man. it's the same about other criteria such as social class or education level. 
Don't despair, you're someone soulmate and perfect match, and this is what matters. Who cares about desirability when you get self confidence, kindness, or other traits that make you an attractive partner?


----------



## Enigma32

RandomDude said:


> But but, during my brief venture into OLD:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Online dating recommendations
> 
> 
> So, I've recently decided to give online dating a shot, I've signed up on match, ******* and tinder so far. I was going to sign up for an offline dating agency (which costs ~$3K) for a year membership but decided against it, as I suspect their database would be very small due to price of...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.talkaboutmarriage.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Only 2%, 24%, and 50% response rate in 3 different sites, and thats considered good for a lowly male right? Lol
> 
> I'm sure women get better response rates no?


Ladies DEFINITELY have better responses. Don't take my word for it though, try making a fake profile using a very average girl's pics and see what happens. Over the years, I made just about any kind of OLD profile you could imagine just to see what happened.


----------



## Lila

sokillme said:


> I don't dismiss the finding, It's just that I don't think the premise of what is considered desirable is a good way to choose a mate, in the sense that if you follow common traits of desirability it's very risky. .....
> 
> Maybe that isn't the point though, and maybe that IS your point to me.


The debate on what exactly it means to be "desirable" will go on forever. 

I thought to share the article to help single people who, like me, struggle with online dating. It helps to know that the vast majority of online users, consciously or unconsciously, pursue people 25% more desirable (as defined by the study) than themselves. It helps at least in part to understand why most are unsuccessful at online dating. 

For reference, the study defined desirability based on the number of likes/messages a profile user received. The more likes/messages, the more desirable. Notice they did not discuss subjective variables such as personality or physical attractiveness. They only discuss quantifiable variables such as age and level of education.


----------



## Enigma32

Lila said:


> The debate on what exactly it means to be "desirable" will go on forever.
> 
> I thought to share the article to help single people who, like me, struggle with online dating. It helps to know that the vast majority of online users, consciously or unconsciously, pursue people 25% more desirable (as defined by the study) than themselves. It helps at least in part to understand why most are unsuccessful at online dating.
> 
> *For reference, the study defined desirability based on the number of likes/messages a profile user received. The more likes/messages, the more desirable.* Notice they did not discuss subjective variables such as personality or physical attractiveness. They only discuss quantifiable variables such as age and level of education.


Therein lies the fault of the study. If you have a medium that is overwhelmingly skewed in favor of females, then the amount of likes and messages one receives isn't exactly indicative of their actual, real world desirability.


----------



## Lila

Enigma32 said:


> Therein lies the fault of the study. If you have a medium that is overwhelmingly skewed in favor of females, then the amount of likes and messages one receives isn't exactly indicative of their actual, real world desirability.


I disagree. It's called normalizing data. It's a commonly used scientific method to compare data.

They rank all the women based on interest they get. 

They rank all the men based on the interest they get. 

Then they compare the ranking of the women showing interest to the ranking of the men and vice versa. Easy peezy.


----------



## RandomDude

coquille said:


> Desirability is completely separate from matching or compatibility. What the society might see as desirable in a man or a woman is irrelevant to me as an individual if I came to detach myself from society's standards and set my own list of the qualities or characteristics that I want in a partner. For example, if I am not attracted by white men, then white men's desirability means nothing to me as I feel that I would be more compatible with a brown or a black man. it's the same about other criteria such as social class or education level.
> Don't despair, you're someone soulmate and perfect match, and this is what matters. Who cares about desirability when you get self confidence, kindness, or other traits that make you an attractive partner?


Hahaha agreed 

Though I would never have had a chance online with my partner! Not to mention she would never have to go online she had multitudes of proposals every day and a mere 7 week single run before we dated.

Still can't believe she's mine sometimes lol



Enigma32 said:


> Ladies DEFINITELY have better responses. Don't take my word for it though, try making a fake profile using a very average girl's pics and see what happens. Over the years, I made just about any kind of OLD profile you could imagine just to see what happened.


Lol I believe it too hence my post, but you know... studies and whatever


----------



## Enigma32

Lila said:


> I disagree. It's called normalizing data. It's a commonly used scientific method to compare data.
> 
> They rank all the women based on interest they get.
> 
> They rank all the men based on the interest they get.
> 
> Then they compare the ranking of the women showing interest to the ranking of the men and vice versa. Easy peezy.


Do they compare the amount of interest women get vs men on average or do they leave that part out? I know what normalizing data is, but if you try to reach conclusions without including all relevant data then you're either not being scientific or being outright misleading. That's literally statistics 101. I even wrote my thesis on this very thing. 

It's pretty common knowledge that men simply aren't getting the same amount of interest or messages online that ladies do. Even the most basic OLD advice you'll find on sites like this one takes that into account. That's why men are constantly told to use better pictures and send out the wittiest of witty messages and ladies just sort through the mess. 

For this study to be even slightly accurate, they would have to take the average of how much attention men and women get and then adjust for that before coming to any conclusion. For example, if your average guy gets 25 messages per week and your average female gets 100 messages per week, then that should become your basline for comparison. In that case, if women are only reaching out to guys who get 25% more attention than they do online, that 125 messages guy is not 25% more desirable than she is, that guy is actually 500% more desirable since he gets 5x the attention online that the average guy gets.


----------



## RandomDude

DownByTheRiver said:


> Nah. Only the top tier physically attractive percent of men and women get a lot of responses.


Makes sense I guess, but who cares about the study based on the successes of the divine 1%? 



> And they get more unwanted ones by far than wanted ones. And of course, that group could easily date offline and stay busy, and it would be better dates and less of a gamble. There's really nothing to envy in the hot woman who gets unwanted "opportunities" all day long, or the man either.


Hahaha my partner gets unwanted attempts all day long. She pokes her head out and it's like turning on a light amidst a swarm of flies. Don't even get me started on her social media, can only imagine if she made a dating profile LOL!
Never encountered this as I am mere mortal lol, and I'm still learning how to deal with men repeatedly making advances on my partner whenever I'm not there. The engagement ring helps a bit though!



> All but the most naive of women know men are firstly looking for sex online or off. Many of them may still have this fairytale where they believe their prince will come, but that bubble gets burst pretty quickly online and maybe not quickly enough offline. I don't know what the answer is.
> Men are just as bad as women with deluding themselves and thinking they're entitled to, like Lila's posted study says, women way more attractive than they themselves are, and men are even worse about overestimating their attractiveness. What straight men think is attractive in a man and what women do are often two very different things, as you can easily tell over the history of television and movies, where unattractive goofballs are paired with women who in real life probably have modeling in their background.
> Men put such a priority on women's bodies that they assume women do the same with men and just want someone buff and that that should qualify them for a superhot thin stacked woman, but that couldn't be further from the truth. All the women I've known liked face and hair, overall silhouette shape, and style more than muscles, which is more for special tastes, (though muscular men certainly have their fans.)
> Likewise, few women understand how much focus a lot of men put on extreme thinness paired with big boobs, which is not a natural phenomenon, but on the rare occasion they encounter one, they all drop their forks.


Well, hate to say it but I have always been shallow too lol. But I say that beauty is indeed in the beholder. In the past I have found women absolutely beautiful although not everyone would have agreed, my fiancee now just happens to be the first (annoyingly) _universally_ attractive one. I now also have a chubby round belly and wrinkles. Yet my partner, who is beyond my league, likes me chubby, even fed me to fatten me up in our earlier days. Like, ok lol - with muscles her condition is simply if I am strong enough to carry her lol


----------



## Lila

Enigma32 said:


> Do they compare the amount of interest women get vs men on average or do they leave that part out? I know what normalizing data is, but if you try to reach conclusions without including all relevant data then you're either not being scientific or being outright misleading. That's literally statistics 101. I even wrote my thesis on this very thing.
> 
> It's pretty common knowledge that men simply aren't getting the same amount of interest or messages online that ladies do. Even the most basic OLD advice you'll find on sites like this one takes that into account. That's why men are constantly told to use better pictures and send out the wittiest of witty messages and ladies just sort through the mess.
> 
> For this study to be even slightly accurate, they would have to take the average of how much attention men and women get and then adjust for that before coming to any conclusion. For example, if your average guy gets 25 messages per week and your average female gets 100 messages per week, then that should become your basline for comparison. In that case, if women are only reaching out to guys who get 25% more attention than they do online, that 125 messages guy is not 25% more desirable than she is, that guy is actually 500% more desirable since he gets 5x the attention online that the average guy gets.


Two words. Swipe apps. No need to measure messages just right swipes. If these women want to actually match, then they need to swipe.

But the general idea stands. People (men and women) using online dating are punching above their weight class.... By quite a bit.

Eta:. Read the study if you want to see how they calculated these numbers. It goes into detail.


----------



## Enigma32

Lila said:


> Two words. Swipe apps. No need to measure messages just right swipes. If these women want to actually match, then they need to swipe.
> 
> But the general idea stands. People (men and women) using online dating are punching above their weight class.... By quite a bit.


Did you see RandomDude's post? A lot of men swipe right on literally everyone. I know I did, as did most of the men I know in person. It's just what we do. So ladies still generate more interest online. In which case the study should calculate how many matches the random man gets vs how many matches the random woman gets, and then factor that in. The study can't really be taken seriously if they don't even do that much. And honestly, from what I have seen, a lot of OLD is guys actually punching far BELOW their weight class so they can get laid easy and then ghost. It's why so many ladies have voiced that very complaint when they talk about OLD.


----------



## Lila

Enigma32 said:


> Did you see RandomDude's post? A lot of men swipe right on literally everyone. I know I did, as did most of the men I know in person. It's just what we do. So ladies still generate more interest online. In which case the study should calculate how many matches the random man gets vs how many matches the random woman gets, and then factor that in. The study can't really be taken seriously if they don't even do that much. And honestly, from what I have seen, a lot of OLD is guys actually punching far BELOW their weight class so they can get laid easy and then ghost. It's why so many ladies have voiced that very complaint when they talk about OLD.


Read the study and then participate in the discussion..... Or don't and keep bringing up anecdotal evidence that has nothing to do with the topic of this thread.


----------



## Enigma32

Lila said:


> Read the study and then participate in the discussion..... Or don't and keep bringing up anecdotal evidence that has nothing to do with the topic of this thread.


I did. I just criticized their methods since they left out relevant date when coming to their conclusions. I can tell that's not what you want to hear though, so I will bow out.


----------



## RandomDude

Lila said:


> I thought to share the article to help single people who, like me, struggle with online dating. It helps to know that the vast majority of online users, consciously or unconsciously, pursue people 25% more desirable (as defined by the study) than themselves. It helps at least in part to understand why most are unsuccessful at online dating.


Well then, the solution would be, to go offline 

Like if I saw my partner on OLD, assuming she's not already swarmed by dates within the first few minutes - if I sent my partner a message it would be ignored, my profile would already be filtered out in her search results lol (age difference, divorced + kid) , let alone read  

I don't think it's a problem of punching above your weight, I punched above my weight and won. I just think OLD doesn't really let you bring your A game to the market, and all the things we tell ourselves we want may not be important in the end when we find someone actually compatible.


----------



## Diana7

Enigma32 said:


> Ladies DEFINITELY have better responses. Don't take my word for it though, try making a fake profile using a very average girl's pics and see what happens. Over the years, I made just about any kind of OLD profile you could imagine just to see what happened.


Did you try using different men's pics?


----------



## Lila

Enigma32 said:


> I did. I just criticized their methods since they left out relevant date when coming to their conclusions. I can tell that's not what you want to hear though, so I will bow out.


I don't think you actually read anything but wanted to remind us how difficult it is for men; how unfair life is for men; and how horrid dating is for men. And yet again you want to take something as simple as online dating sucks for everyone and make it " but it's worse for men". 

Jeez, let it go @Enigma32. Really. Life isn't fair for anyone regardless of sex. Trust me, no, women don't have better. It's just a different kind of suck.


----------



## Lila

RandomDude said:


> Well then, the solution would be, to go offline
> 
> Like if I saw my partner on OLD, assuming she's not already swarmed by dates within the first few minutes - if I sent my partner a message it would be ignored, my profile would already be filtered out in her search results lol (age difference, divorced + kid) , let alone read
> 
> I don't think it's a problem of punching above your weight, I punched above my weight and won. I just think OLD doesn't really let you bring your A game to the market, and all the things we tell ourselves we want may not be important in the end when we find someone actually compatible.


I agree 100%. I highly, highly dislike online dating. Unfortunately it seems to be the way people do dating these days. It's gaining popularity every day to the detriment of society. That's my opinion anyways. 

Thankfully, 60% of couples still meet the old fashioned way.... Through friends or school/work.


----------



## DownByTheRiver

RandomDude said:


> Makes sense I guess, but who cares about the study based on the successes of the divine 1%?
> 
> 
> 
> Hahaha my partner gets unwanted attempts all day long. She pokes her head out and it's like turning on a light amidst a swarm of flies. Don't even get me started on her social media, can only imagine if she made a dating profile LOL!
> Never encountered this as I am mere mortal lol, and I'm still learning how to deal with men repeatedly making advances on my partner whenever I'm not there. The engagement ring helps a bit though!
> 
> 
> 
> Well, hate to say it but I have always been shallow too lol. But I say that beauty is indeed in the beholder. In the past I have found women absolutely beautiful although not everyone would have agreed, my fiancee now just happens to be the first (annoyingly) _universally_ attractive one. I now also have a chubby round belly and wrinkles. Yet my partner, who is beyond my league, likes me chubby, even fed me to fatten me up in our earlier days. Like, ok lol - with muscles her condition is simply if I am strong enough to carry her lol


That's true love! I'm shallow about looks too but what I think is attractive is not at all conventional. And I'm obviously beyond jaded.


----------



## Enigma32

Diana7 said:


> Did you try using different men's pics?


Yup. I made a profile with pics of an ugly dude and a couple profiles with pics of really good looking dudes. With the good looking guy, I could describe the most basic douchebag ever in my profile and send out pretty insulting messages to ladies and still get a ton of responses. The ugly guy basically got nothing. No messages, no views, not many replies. Plus, when I started using OLD a few years back, 2 of my friends were also starting up. My old roommate was a good looking guy and the amount of messages he got was crazy compared to me and our other friend (who basically gets nothing despite using OLD for years). 

OLD was pretty useless to me as I found that the calber of ladies I was used to dating and could date offline were far above the ones showing interest online. I stopped using OLD because I was having far better luck meeting people in person. Online, I think that the dating marketplace value of your average girl far outstrips your average man, but that difference basically disappears in the real world.


----------



## RandomDude

Lila said:


> I agree 100%. I highly, highly dislike online dating. Unfortunately it seems to be the way people do dating these days. It's gaining popularity every day to the detriment of society. That's my opinion anyways.
> 
> Thankfully, 60% of couples still meet the old fashioned way.... Through friends or school/work.


I thought that too, because I was in the same boat after divorce. I still dated offline but everyone kept talking about online so I dabbled. And then I met my partner who gets hit on all the time offline (I thought I was special!* 🤦‍♂️) and now I'm not quite so sure it's dead anymore. Or maybe it's just her that makes men into husks (myself included) throwing themselves at her who knows 🤷‍♂️

*The approach I tried on my partner was the 4th time she received a love note on that day, that's how alive the offline competition was.


----------



## Lila

RandomDude said:


> I thought that too, because I was in the same boat after divorce. I still dated offline but everyone kept talking about online so I dabbled. And then I met my partner who gets hit on all the time offline (I thought I was special!* 🤦‍♂️) and now I'm not quite so sure it's dead anymore. Or maybe it's just her that makes men into husks (myself included) throwing themselves at her who knows 🤷‍♂️
> 
> *The approach I tried on my partner was the 4th time she received a love note on that day, that's how alive the offline competition was.


Congrats @RandomDude. This sounds like a serendipitous event. Many good wishes.


----------



## RandomDude

Enigma32 said:


> Yup. I made a profile with pics of an ugly dude and a couple profiles with pics of really good looking dudes. With the good looking guy, I could describe the most basic douchebag ever in my profile and send out pretty insulting messages to ladies and still get a ton of responses. The ugly guy basically got nothing. No messages, no views, not many replies. Plus, when I started using OLD a few years back, 2 of my friends were also starting up. My old roommate was a good looking guy and the amount of messages he got was crazy compared to me and our other friend (who basically gets nothing despite using OLD for years).


Curious, did you raise the money bar on your ugly profile?  



DownByTheRiver said:


> That's true love! I'm shallow about looks too but what I think is attractive is not at all conventional. And I'm obviously beyond jaded.


Aye! Not to mention hell I didn't even go down on one knee for ex-wife, my partner truly humbled and matured me over the last 3 years.


----------



## RandomDude

Lila said:


> Congrats @RandomDude. This sounds like a serendipitous event. Many good wishes.


Thanks I like to think of it as a story of hope! 
I'm sure some people here remember how dark my story has been years ago with my messed up head that carried on from my past marriage and beyond.

Stars do align even when you lost all hope it would lol


----------



## Enigma32

RandomDude said:


> Curious, did you raise the money bar on your ugly profile?


You know, I can't remember now. It's been a few years since I did all this. I probably never thought of it. I did make my good looking guy broke though, as my way of trying to make him as unattractive as I could from every angle aside from the most shallow. So, my good looking guy was a part time waiter and student with no major picked. Honestly, I got really bored with the ugly profile since it was basically just crickets every day. No views, no messages, no nothing. Ever. And that dude wasn't really TOO ugly, IMO. Just probably a bit below average and chubby.


----------



## RandomDude

Enigma32 said:


> You know, I can't remember now. It's been a few years since I did all this. I probably never thought of it. I did make my good looking guy broke though, as my way of trying to make him as unattractive as I could from every angle aside from the most shallow. So, my good looking guy was a part time waiter and student with no major picked. Honestly, I got really bored with the ugly profile since it was basically just crickets every day. No views, no messages, no nothing. Ever. And that dude wasn't really TOO ugly, IMO. Just probably a bit below average and chubby.


Lol you should have obeyed this matrix for more conclusive results:












You needed the money bar bro!
Your ugly guy would never get picked without one, and your good looker is still in the fun zone without his wallet lol


----------



## Diana7

Enigma32 said:


> Yup. I made a profile with pics of an ugly dude and a couple profiles with pics of really good looking dudes. With the good looking guy, I could describe the most basic douchebag ever in my profile and send out pretty insulting messages to ladies and still get a ton of responses. The ugly guy basically got nothing. No messages, no views, not many replies. Plus, when I started using OLD a few years back, 2 of my friends were also starting up. My old roommate was a good looking guy and the amount of messages he got was crazy compared to me and our other friend (who basically gets nothing despite using OLD for years).
> 
> OLD was pretty useless to me as I found that the calber of ladies I was used to dating and could date offline were far above the ones showing interest online. I stopped using OLD because I was having far better luck meeting people in person. Online, I think that the dating marketplace value of your average girl far outstrips your average man, but that difference basically disappears in the real world.


The more good looking, male and female, will always get more interest.
I don't agree that it's harder for men, it's different maybe but each sex has it's issues.
I actually found OLD suited me, not because I had much interest because on Christian sites the women greatly outnumbered the men, by 3-1 in the age group I was in then, but because chatting to people and getting to know them on line first enabled me to weed out the guys who I knew were wrong for me without having to go out on dates all the time. As I had children and the distances were often quite big it was very impractical.
I did meet a few in person, including my now husband.
Coming off OLD wasn't an option for me, available Christian men in the population here are very rare. Even in Church available men are rare.


----------



## NTA

When I was in my 40s, I noticed that men become sexy to me based on the behavior /personality. And having dated Mr. InBetweenMarriages, who was tall and muscular physically, but whiny and needy in personality , well just sealed the deal for me to admire guys less on looks and more on personality.


----------



## Enigma32

RandomDude said:


> Lol you should have obeyed this matrix for more conclusive results:
> 
> View attachment 76028
> 
> 
> 
> 
> You needed the money bar bro!
> Your ugly guy would never get picked without one, and your good looker is still in the fun zone without his wallet lol


Man, I only went through all of that crap because I was completely taken by surprise at my lack of results online. I was in great shape from working out all the time, I looked younger than my age, I basically have my life together, etc. I really thought dating online would at least have yielded SOME kind of results for me but I got almost nothing. I was in college at the time, and while online was dead for me, I had pretty, and decent ladies hitting on me in college that were far above anyone I could hope to talk to on the dating sites. I started lurking on forums like this one and found a lot of other guys had the same issue. I like to know what I am getting into, so I started making all the fake profiles to see what was going on. Now that I figured it out, I usually encourage men to stay away from OLD altogether. Take yourself for example, do you think your current lady would have messaged you online or replied to you based on the sort of attention you were getting?


----------



## RandomDude

Diana7 said:


> The more good looking, male and female, will always get more interest.
> I don't agree that it's harder for men, it's different maybe but each sex has it's issues.
> I actually found OLD suited me, not because I had much interest because on Christian sites the women greatly outnumbered the men, by 3-1 in the age group I was in then, but because chatting to people and getting to know them on line first enabled me to weed out the guys who I knew were wrong for me without having to go out on dates all the time. As I had children and the distances were often quite big it was very impractical.
> I did meet a few in person, including my now husband.
> Coming off OLD wasn't an option for me, available Christian men in the population here are very rare. Even in Church available men are rare.


I think your circumstances and similar ones make it quite favorable for some folks to use OLD, though yeah, I don't really recommend it myself for the majority.

I've also seen it drag people down and the criteria we put on our shortlists, whether we think we deserve them or whether we think we are good enough for them, can be detrimental as I mentioned. I use my own relationship as an example that would *NEVER* happen through OLD. 

Hence those who find themselves effected by all the punching up, focusing on offline opportunities would be a better investment than online IMO


----------



## RandomDude

Enigma32 said:


> Man, I only went through all of that crap because I was completely taken by surprise at my lack of results online. I was in great shape from working out all the time, I looked younger than my age, I basically have my life together, etc. I really thought dating online would at least have yielded SOME kind of results for me but I got almost nothing. I was in college at the time, and while online was dead for me, I had pretty, and decent ladies hitting on me in college that were far above anyone I could hope to talk to on the dating sites. I started lurking on forums like this one and found a lot of other guys had the same issue. I like to know what I am getting into, so I started making all the fake profiles to see what was going on. Now that I figured it out, I usually encourage men to stay away from OLD altogether.


Yes and I do believe it's because the more important aspects of you are being advertised in person rather than the superficial, I don't mean just looks, interests, wealth, or the *words* you choose. Your posture, your walk, your gaze, your language, how you see and treat people, how you say things not just *what* you say, etc all these are part of your game and none of it can ever be translated online.



> Take yourself for example, do you think your current lady would have messaged you online or replied to you based on the sort of attention you were getting?


As I mentioned I would have been filtered out let alone even noticed


----------



## hamadryad

coquille said:


> Yeah, a woman friend of mine who is 57 had a hard time finding a partner around her age. She said men her age are looking for much younger women. She was receiving messages from guys in their 70s only. We know this trend is already happening in real life, but online dating aggravated it.


Like it or not, they are looking because they are out there...For all guys? probably not...but a good percentage can play in that sandbox..

Most "good" guys her age can easily attract women in their 30's and 40's....Heck even a lot of the "duds" can...lol

I know nothing of OLD..Nor would I ever do it...As a guy, it's effing embarrassing...Sorry, no disrespect to anyone, just my personal opinion.. No decent guy should ever have to do it.. Available women are everywhere, especially at this age.. I don't really understand what's so hard about this.

A buddy of mine is about the age of your friend.. After he got out of his marriage, he did OLD.. He has a decent personality and probably considered "fun" by some women's measure, but he's not good looking, not fit, etc,...picture a biker type with a gut and no money.. Anyway, he was pumping and dumping at a rate of like 2 a month for almost a year and a half...He'd show me pics of these women...most younger, some...meh...others not too bad...All on "legitimate" sites like Match, etc..He eventually found someone that he seems happy with...woman in her early 40's, size 2/4, and not bad looking at all..I am not excusing or glorifying what he did, I would never do it, but the point being, if he could do it, what would a guy that age, with a good body, intellect, and some financial security be worth?

Problem as I see it, is that for better or worse, women are still judged primarily by looks/body...If you are a woman at that age, it's tough to maintain that and guys that age may not be much better in the physical sense, but they get extra points for other stuff and women aren't as particular in those areas..

Women get the edge when younger, men get the edge later...It all balances out, really...


----------



## DownByTheRiver

Well you know they're not even reading the profile of the unattractive guys because they're not interested already.


----------



## sokillme

Lila said:


> The debate on what exactly it means to be "desirable" will go on forever.
> 
> I thought to share the article to help single people who, like me, struggle with online dating. It helps to know that the vast majority of online users, consciously or unconsciously, pursue people 25% more desirable (as defined by the study) than themselves. It helps at least in part to understand why most are unsuccessful at online dating.
> 
> For reference, the study defined desirability based on the number of likes/messages a profile user received. The more likes/messages, the more desirable. Notice they did not discuss subjective variables such as personality or physical attractiveness. They only discuss quantifiable variables such as age and level of education.


Maybe you are struggling because you are getting bogged down with what you think is desirable, meaning you are holding yourself back because you are only choosing people based on a set of criteria that won't really help you pick someone you will fit with? Just a thought.

Anyway my critique of the article wasn't one of your post.


----------



## Lila

sokillme said:


> Maybe you are struggling because you are getting bogged down with what you think is desirable, meaning you are holding yourself back because you are only choosing people based on a set of criteria that won't really help you pick someone you will fit with? Just a thought.
> 
> Anyway my critique of the article wasn't one of your post.


i think the reason I'm struggling is that I don't have the patience for it. My system is to screen out the non negotiables (not necessarily on appearance but on life stage) and if they can carry a conversation, ask to meet face-to-face in a public place asap. Only if there's mutual interest following the face to face do I invest time in getting to know them. It's a slow, tedious, and time consuming process but I've tried it the other way around (spending weeks getting to know someone via text or messaging) only to find out there was no chemistry upon meeting. It's stressful when I don't feel it and they do, and heartbreaking when I do and they don't.


----------



## joannacroc

Lila said:


> i think the reason I'm struggling is that I don't have the patience for it. My system is to screen out the non negotiables (not necessarily on appearance but on life stage) and if they can carry a conversation, ask to meet face-to-face in a public place asap. Only if there's mutual interest following the face to face do I invest time in getting to know them. It's a slow, tedious, and time consuming process but I've tried it the other way around (spending weeks getting to know someone via text or messaging) only to find out there was no chemistry upon meeting. It's stressful when I don't feel it and they do, and heartbreaking when I do and they don't.


Yeah I hear ya. I'm not ready to date again. The whole OLD experience is just draining and I'm not looking forward to it. If I ever feel ready to date again I think I'll see if nature takes its course and available, attractive, men who fit my personality just conveniently fall out of the sky. Seems plausible, right?


----------



## NTA

This is why I stopped OLD and just went out and did things. Thanks to groups like meetup. If a guy is going to find me attractive on the other side of the room, well, he's not going to worry about how old I am.


----------



## Diana7

Lila said:


> i think the reason I'm struggling is that I don't have the patience for it. My system is to screen out the non negotiables (not necessarily on appearance but on life stage) and if they can carry a conversation, ask to meet face-to-face in a public place asap. Only if there's mutual interest following the face to face do I invest time in getting to know them. It's a slow, tedious, and time consuming process but I've tried it the other way around (spending weeks getting to know someone via text or messaging) only to find out there was no chemistry upon meeting. It's stressful when I don't feel it and they do, and heartbreaking when I do and they don't.


I would definitely agree with you on meeting asap if you think the guy seems ok. 
The only time I messaged a guy for longer was if he lived a fair way away. 
My husband and I met 5 days after first contact. Mind you we had emailed loads of times in that 5 days and also spoken in the phone. The thing is that on paper and in messaging someone they can seem right, but unless that chemistry is there it's not going anywhere.


----------



## Diana7

joannacroc said:


> Yeah I hear ya. I'm not ready to date again. The whole OLD experience is just draining and I'm not looking forward to it. If I ever feel ready to date again I think I'll see if nature takes its course and available, attractive, men who fit my personality just conveniently fall out of the sky. Seems plausible, right?


Or knock on your door 😂


----------



## Diana7

hamadryad said:


> Like it or not, they are looking because they are out there...For all guys? probably not...but a good percentage can play in that sandbox..
> 
> Most "good" guys her age can easily attract women in their 30's and 40's....Heck even a lot of the "duds" can...lol
> 
> I know nothing of OLD..Nor would I ever do it...As a guy, it's effing embarrassing...Sorry, no disrespect to anyone, just my personal opinion.. No decent guy should ever have to do it.. Available women are everywhere, especially at this age.. I don't really understand what's so hard about this.
> 
> A buddy of mine is about the age of your friend.. After he got out of his marriage, he did OLD.. He has a decent personality and probably considered "fun" by some women's measure, but he's not good looking, not fit, etc,...picture a biker type with a gut and no money.. Anyway, he was pumping and dumping at a rate of like 2 a month for almost a year and a half...He'd show me pics of these women...most younger, some...meh...others not too bad...All on "legitimate" sites like Match, etc..He eventually found someone that he seems happy with...woman in her early 40's, size 2/4, and not bad looking at all..I am not excusing or glorifying what he did, I would never do it, but the point being, if he could do it, what would a guy that age, with a good body, intellect, and some financial security be worth?
> 
> Problem as I see it, is that for better or worse, women are still judged primarily by looks/body...If you are a woman at that age, it's tough to maintain that and guys that age may not be much better in the physical sense, but they get extra points for other stuff and women aren't as particular in those areas..
> 
> Women get the edge when younger, men get the edge later...It all balances out, really...


Why do you see it as embarrassing? I never felt that at all. I just saw it as expanding my horizons to include men who I would never have met in my day to day life.
Most have a fairly limited amount of people they meet, work, maybe a gym, sports or whatever. OLD expands that massively. I even know a British guy who met and married a lady from the USA.


----------



## ccpowerslave

joannacroc said:


> Yeah I hear ya. I'm not ready to date again. The whole OLD experience is just draining and I'm not looking forward to it. If I ever feel ready to date again I think I'll see if nature takes its course and available, attractive, men who fit my personality just conveniently fall out of the sky. Seems plausible, right?


I think the fall from the sky plan isn’t actually that bad.


----------



## Lila

joannacroc said:


> Yeah I hear ya. I'm not ready to date again. The whole OLD experience is just draining and I'm not looking forward to it. If I ever feel ready to date again I think I'll see if nature takes its course and available, attractive, men who fit my personality just conveniently fall out of the sky. Seems plausible, right?


Lol. I'm cheering you on. I hear the grocery store is a happening place. 😜


----------



## Lila

NTA said:


> This is why I stopped OLD and just went out and did things. Thanks to groups like meetup. If a guy is going to find me attractive on the other side of the room, well, he's not going to worry about how old I am.


I mentioned this on another thread but where I live there is void of eligible men between the ages of 40-55. I belong to a few meetups that I enjoy but there is never any men on those age ranges. I'm either the youngest one or oldest in the group.


----------



## joannacroc

Lila said:


> Lol. I'm cheering you on. I hear the grocery store is a happening place. 😜


I'll be in the produce section, by the melons. According to sitcom lore, you have to test the melons and make suggestive comments about how juicy they might or might not be. I anticipate a roaring success.


----------



## joannacroc

Diana7 said:


> Or knock on your door 😂


"My goodness ma'am, I have never see someone look so alluring in running clothes and doghair. Be mine?"


----------



## joannacroc

Lila said:


> I mentioned this on another thread but where I live there is void of eligible men between the ages of 40-55. I belong to a few meetups that I enjoy but there is never any men on those age ranges. I'm either the youngest one or oldest in the group.


Yeah, I see what you mean. I joined a few meetups just to make friends and get out a bit and my issue was that a lot of folks were either WAY older than me or younger than me (20s). It felt awkward. Do they have age-related groups maybe? Like a going out 40s something group?


----------



## hamadryad

Diana7 said:


> *Why do you see it as embarrassing?* I never felt that at all. I just saw it as expanding my horizons to include men who I would never have met in my day to day life.
> Most have a fairly limited amount of people they meet, work, maybe a gym, sports or whatever. OLD expands that massively. I even know a British guy who met and married a lady from the USA.



I dunno....it just does...(shrug)

When my brother got divorced, I didn't ask nor care what he was doing in his personal life...When I saw one of my single female cousins at a funeral she mentioned that she saw my brother on the dating site she was on...When I saw my brother I mentioned the story, not to break his balls, but just a matter of conversation.. His face turned red, and he deleted the profile immediately...

So I guess I am not the only one? 

I'm not knocking it, it just would never be something id ever do...Also, there is a lot of "intangibles" that I think guys probably get cheated of on OLD...You can't ever see a guys confidence and self assuredness on a dating profile...You would have to see them in action and in person..That aura could never be shown and many guys who aren't particularly good looking do very well with women based on that...


----------



## Lila

Diana7 said:


> I would definitely agree with you on meeting asap if you think the guy seems ok.
> The only time I messaged a guy for longer was if he lived a fair way away.
> My husband and I met 5 days after first contact. Mind you we had emailed loads of times in that 5 days and also spoken in the phone. The thing is that on paper and in messaging someone they can seem right, but unless that chemistry is there it's not going anywhere.


When there is mutual interest to meet, I try to make it happen within 48 hours and keep the texting/messaging to a minimum so as not to get excited about a man I have not met in person. It's much easier for me to reject and be rejected when I haven't painted a picture in my mind of what I think this person is like in real life. I wait to start building anticipation and excitement until after that initial meeting.


----------



## Girl_power

It’s kind of depressing that we all basically think we are more desirable than we actually are.


----------



## Diana7

RandomDude said:


> Yes and I do believe it's because the more important aspects of you are being advertised in person rather than the superficial, I don't mean just looks, interests, wealth, or the *words* you choose. Your posture, your walk, your gaze, your language, how you see and treat people, how you say things not just *what* you say, etc all these are part of your game and none of it can ever be translated online.
> 
> 
> 
> As I mentioned I would have been filtered out let alone even noticed


Thats why its important to meet up asap.


----------



## Diana7

hamadryad said:


> I dunno....it just does...(shrug)
> 
> When my brother got divorced, I didn't ask nor care what he was doing in his personal life...When I saw one of my single female cousins at a funeral she mentioned that she saw my brother on the dating site she was on...When I saw my brother I mentioned the story, not to break his balls, but just a matter of conversation.. His face turned red, and he deleted the profile immediately...
> 
> So I guess I am not the only one?
> 
> I'm not knocking it, it just would never be something id ever do...Also, there is a lot of "intangibles" that I think guys probably get cheated of on OLD...You can't ever see a guys confidence and self assuredness on a dating profile...You would have to see them in action and in person..That aura could never be shown and many guys who aren't particularly good looking do very well with women based on that...


Yes same as the other way around, thats why its good to met up asap. OLD is merely something that introduces you initially, after that its exactly the same as if you met in person.


----------



## Diana7

Lila said:


> When there is mutual interest to meet, I try to make it happen within 48 hours and keep the texting/messaging to a minimum so as not to get excited about a man I have not met in person. It's much easier for me to reject and be rejected when I haven't painted a picture in my mind of what I think this person is like in real life. I wait to start building anticipation and excitement until after that initial meeting.


Yes and thats a good thing to do. With my now husband I knew immeditatly before we even met that he was special, so I had no issues with exchanging lots of emails in those 5 days. It does also depend where they live, its not always easy to met up so soon unless they are fairly local. We managed it after 5 days as he only lived 40 mins drive away.


----------



## Diana7

joannacroc said:


> "My goodness ma'am, I have never see someone look so alluring in running clothes and doghair. Be mine?"


I do know a couple who met at a bus stop.


----------



## Diana7

Girl_power said:


> It’s kind of depressing that we all basically think we are more desirable than we actually are.


I may be the opposite as I tended to think back in my OLD days that I was less rather than more. After all a single mum of three children in her late 40's who didnt earn much?


----------



## joannacroc

Girl_power said:


> It’s kind of depressing that we all basically think we are more desirable than we actually are.


I think it's also funny that we go for someone that much more objectively desirable than us when online.


----------



## Lila

joannacroc said:


> Yeah, I see what you mean. I joined a few meetups just to make friends and get out a bit and my issue was that a lot of folks were either WAY older than me or younger than me (20s). It felt awkward. Do they have age-related groups maybe? Like a going out 40s something group?


The age related groups in my area are usually the ones where I'm the youngest on there. 40+ singles groups are made up predominantly by people over 55. 

Even my church's singles social groups are broken up by weird age groups. It's <24, 25-35, 36-45, and over 45. At 46, I have attended events where most, if not all, the men in attendance were retirement age. Those conversations were laughable. 

Me:I have a teenager at home
Them:. Let me show you pics of my teenage grandson. 
🤣🤣🤣🤣 Gotta laugh or I'd cry.


----------



## Girl_power

I wish there was something built in the APP that we can see a list of people that MATCH our desirability… I think that will humble a lot of people and be good for everyone all around.


----------



## Lila

Girl_power said:


> It’s kind of depressing that we all basically think we are more desirable than we actually are.


I think self actualization is something that's missing from society in general. It's not easy to do and sometimes an incredibly painful process. But i also think that as a society we (general we) have our priorities all screwed up.


----------



## Girl_power

Diana7 said:


> I may be the opposite as I tended to think back in my OLD days that I was less rather than more. After all a single mum of three children in her late 40's who didnt earn much?


I also think that many women suffer from low self esteem. It’s like men who apply for jobs that they aren’t even qualified for way more than women do. 

From my OLD experience there are men wayyyyyy “less desirable” than me trying to match with me. And I mean way less.


----------



## Girl_power

Lila said:


> I think self actualization is something that's missing from society in general. It's not easy to do and sometimes an incredibly painful process. But i also think that as a society we (general we) have our priorities all screwed up.


I agree with you. But at this point it’s almost like feelings in that we can’t help how we feel about certain things because they are so ingrained in our heads. And then on top of that, we think it says something about ourselves when we are with desirable/undesirable people.


----------



## ccpowerslave

One interesting thing to consider are the motives of the people who make the applications.

Usually when you work on software of this nature you have KPIs that you would select; an example would be something like swipes per day or swipes per session. Typically these days you would collect tons of analytics data on what the users are doing and feed it into a life cycle marketing tool to do A/B testing.

Ultimately you have machine learning trying to optimize your KPI metrics by experimenting on different segments of your users and seeing what makes those numbers go up.

If the apps are “working” and people match out of them into LTRs what do you think that would do to the KPI metrics?

It seems like that can’t be the point of them from the standpoint of the businesses.


----------



## ccpowerslave

Girl_power said:


> I agree with you. But at this point it’s almost like feelings in that we can’t help how we feel about certain things because they are so ingrained in our heads. And then on top of that, we think it says something about ourselves when we are with desirable/undesirable people.


Could maybe be a generalized version of this or just a different application of the same effect. 









Dunning–Kruger effect - Wikipedia







en.m.wikipedia.org





As a friend of mine says, “You gotta know where you’re at.”


----------



## Lila

Girl_power said:


> I wish there was something built in the APP that we can see a list of people that MATCH our desirability… I think that will humble a lot of people and be good for everyone all around.


I think there is. Pay to see the people who liked your profile. That's how the study determined Online Dating desirability.


----------



## joannacroc

ccpowerslave said:


> Could maybe be a generalized version of this or just a different application of the same effect.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Dunning–Kruger effect - Wikipedia
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> en.m.wikipedia.org
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> As a friend of mine says, “You gotta know where you’re at.”


So, like, the Dunning Kruger effect, but where you overestimate your attractiveness if you're unattractive? That's interesting, and possible I guess.


----------



## ccpowerslave

joannacroc said:


> So, like, the Dunning Kruger effect, but where you overestimate your attractiveness if you're unattractive? That's interesting, and possible I guess.


Possibly. I was also thinking maybe dumb people also think they’re more attractive than they actually are.


----------



## Lila

Girl_power said:


> I agree with you. But at this point it’s almost like feelings in that we can’t help how we feel about certain things because they are so ingrained in our heads. And then on top of that, we think it says something about ourselves when we are with desirable/undesirable people.


I'm not sure I understand your point about things being ingrained in our heads. Can you give an example? 

I try not to let any of this get to me because at the end of the day people are going to match up with other's who meet their priorities. Whether I agree with them or not is moot. 

As @hamadryad pointed out. Many, many men in my age range and in a similar life stage are seeking "young and hot". Most of those men will never be a part of my dating pool for reasons. Nothing I can do to change that. As much as I would love to have a committed relationship with one man, right now my only choice is to employ other options to meet my needs. 

I'm not closing the door to meeting that special someone and neither should you. But in the meantime, enjoy going out and meeting new people even if they may not be your ideal. Nothing wrong with sharpening your dating skills.


----------



## joannacroc

ccpowerslave said:


> One interesting thing to consider are the motives of the people who make the applications.
> 
> Usually when you work on software of this nature you have KPIs that you would select; an example would be something like swipes per day or swipes per session. Typically these days you would collect tons of analytics data on what the users are doing and feed it into a life cycle marketing tool to do A/B testing.
> 
> Ultimately you have machine learning trying to optimize your KPI metrics by experimenting on different segments of your users and seeing what makes those numbers go up.
> 
> If the apps are “working” and people match out of them into LTRs what do you think that would do to the KPI metrics?
> 
> It seems like that can’t be the point of them from the standpoint of the businesses.


Only got about half of that. Can you put in layman's terms?


----------



## ccpowerslave

I saw someone on Reddit a couple weeks ago lamenting their OLD failure and they had mentioned they used face rating software to try and figure out what their deal was and it gave them the result that they were ugly.

So of course I immediately searched for software like this and then tried the face and full body on myself just for science, because I believe the science. Anyway I had a certain result on it. So then I grabbed good shots of the Rock because I’m pretty sure my wife likes him and then I tried that out as a control because let’s face it he is a good looking dude.

Anyway, using something like this it would be trivial to integrate it into something like Tinder and have it juice the potential matches it presents to you in markets with large numbers of people using the app.


----------



## Diana7

Girl_power said:


> I also think that many women suffer from low self esteem. It’s like men who apply for jobs that they aren’t even qualified for way more than women do.
> 
> From my OLD experience there are men wayyyyyy “less desirable” than me trying to match with me. And I mean way less.


I certainly did have a lower self-esteem back then that's for sure.


----------



## minimalME

Girl_power said:


> It’s kind of depressing that we all basically think we are more desirable than we actually are.





joannacroc said:


> I think it's also funny that we go for someone that much more objectively desirable than us when online.





Lila said:


> I think self actualization is something that's missing from society in general. It's not easy to do and sometimes an incredibly painful process. But i also think that as a society we (general we) have our priorities all screwed up.


During my phase of being an antiquarian bookseller, I found two things related to this to be interesting.

The first was seeing this cover of Life in a batch of old magazines I bought. To me, the wives are mostly average, and although I don't know what the current astronaut's wives look like, if the men are married at all, I bet their spouses are attractive.










The second thing was noticing how, after spending so much time alone (viewing mainly beautiful people on the news and through entertainment), most folks walking around in front of me at bookshows were just normal looking. It took me by surprise.

Lastly, during all of covid, I hardly wore make-up, and now that we can go out without masks, I don't want to be bothered. So, for the first time in my adult life, I've been grocery shopping and going to doctor's appointments with a natural face. I'm comfortable with it now, and it’s nice cause I genuinely don't care - and no one else does either. 😂


----------



## Girl_power

Lila said:


> I'm not sure I understand your point about things being ingrained in our heads. Can you give an example?
> 
> I try not to let any of this get to me because at the end of the day people are going to match up with other's who meet their priorities. Whether I agree with them or not is moot.
> 
> As @hamadryad pointed out. Many, many men in my age range and in a similar life stage are seeking "young and hot". Most of those men will never be a part of my dating pool for reasons. Nothing I can do to change that. As much as I would love to have a committed relationship with one man, right now my only choice is to employ other options to meet my needs.
> 
> I'm not closing the door to meeting that special someone and neither should you. But in the meantime, enjoy going out and meeting new people even if they may not be your ideal. Nothing wrong with sharpening your dating skills.


I’m just saying that we can’t help how we feel. We have control over our actions but if I feel sad today or whatever, it’s not something I can easily control. 
So we are brought up in a certain environment and a certain society that brain washes us and engrains certain things in our head. For example, women with a lot of sexual partners are easy, or slutty or something negative. I obviously don’t believe this, but there are some men and women who have this engrained in their head that it’s second nature to judge women based on their # of partners. My point is that to those people, it’s almost like feelings in that we obviously know that the number of partners isn’t important in the grand scheme of things, but we can’t help but FEEL a certain way about it, and that judgement affects who we swipe right and left on. 

You were saying before that as a society we have our priorities mixed up. I agree with you. There are things that we think are important that really aren’t and vice versa. But sometimes these trivial judgements are so engrained in our heads that we can’t help it, that we can’t control it( like feelings) to a certain extent.


----------



## ccpowerslave

joannacroc said:


> Only got about half of that. Can you put in layman's terms?


Let’s say I was going to develop a dating app. My reason for making the app is to make money.

The way you make money with an app is usually one of these ways:

Collect data on users and sell it
Collect data on users and use it to sell ads
Serve ads from other vendors (google)
Direct in app purchases or subscriptions

All of these except for the first one are improved by a user continuing to use the app over time. In fact the more they interact with it generally the more money you make.

So if I was designing a dating app to make money I would string the people in the app along just up until the point they get fed up with it and then feed them a nice tidbit.

Practically the way you do this is by collecting massive amounts of data and then you use machine learning to optimize a set of parameters you allow it to change.

With as much data as they have now they can probably predict the likelihood of a mutual swipe pairing, the number of messages exchanged, etc... So now you pick “time in days until good interaction” or even “amount of clicks in the app until good interaction” and then you group users and start changing those variables and see what changes result in the most money from ads, the most in app purchases, etc...


----------



## DownButNotOut

Lila said:


> I think there is. Pay to see the people who liked your profile. That's how the study determined Online Dating desirability.


That's not my understanding of their data. They didn't use a 'swipe' based app for their study. They used a 'message' based app. So probably something more like Match, or Zoosk where you can message before matching, than something like Tinder or ******* where you must match to unlock messaging.

They gloss over some of the well know OLD trends that their data reflects, but that don't fit their primary thesis. For example:

Men send far more initial contact messages than women do
Consequently women receive far more messages than men do
Women receive responses to their initial messages at a higher rate than men do. (e.g. Top desirability receive responses 50% of the time, top men only 20%)
The message curves for men fall off much more rapidly than for women. Men below around the top 10% receive almost no messages. For women, the shallower curve approaches the median before it reaches male <90%ile levels.

Interestingly, I wonder if their entire study is really only measuring skill in online profile creation and brand management.


----------



## Diana7

minimalME said:


> During my phase of being an antiquarian bookseller, I found two things related to this to be interesting.
> 
> The first was seeing this cover of Life in a batch of old magazines I bought. To me, the wives are mostly average, and although I don't know what the current astronaut's wives look like, if the men are married at all, I bet their spouses are attractive.
> 
> View attachment 76029
> 
> 
> The second thing was noticing how, after spending so much time alone (viewing mainly beautiful people on the news and through entertainment), most folks walking around in front of me at bookshows were just normal looking. It took me by surprise.
> 
> Lastly, during all of covid, I hardly wore make-up, and now that we can go out without masks, I don't want to be bothered. So, for the first time in my adult life, I've been grocery shopping and going to doctor's appointments with a natural face. I'm comfortable with it now, and it nice cause I genuinely don't care - and no one else does either. 😂


So true. I don't wear make up, as you say no one cares.


----------



## Lila

DownButNotOut said:


> That's not my understanding of their data. They didn't use a 'swipe' based app for their study. They used a 'message' based app. So probably something more like Match, or Zoosk where you can message before matching, than something like Tinder or ***** where you must match to unlock messaging.
> 
> They gloss over some of the well know OLD trends that their data reflects, but that don't fit their primary thesis. For example:
> 
> Men send far more initial contact messages than women do
> Consequently women receive far more messages than men do
> Women receive responses to their initial messages at a higher rate than men do. (e.g. Top desirability receive responses 50% of the time, top men only 20%)
> The message curves for men fall off much more rapidly than for women. Men below around the top 10% receive almost no messages. For women, the shallower curve approaches the median before it reaches male <90%ile levels.
> 
> Interestingly, I wonder if their entire study is really only measuring skill in online profile creation and brand management.



Match is a swipe based app these days. When you send a message it shows up as a like with a little bubble showing the first few words of their message. Tinder is similar. You don't have to be a match to know they messaged. 

You could be right about men and their response rates but if I understand the study, it really doesn't matter the number of responses each person gets. The study does not compare men against women. They rank users based on the number of likes/messages received and the number of responses received amongst their gender group. So those men who get all of the attention are rated higher in the study's desirability ranking than those who get little to no attention (messages/likes). Same with women. Those who get most of the attention are ranked higher than the women who get little or none. They then studied who the high, middle, and low ranked people within each gender group selected from the other gender group. Even if women never initiate messages, we can rank the men's desirability by way of their response rates to messages, no?

And while I do think men send out way more initial messages than women, those messages tend to be focused on a particular subset of available women (young and/or beautiful). So consequently THESE women receive far more messages than men do

Yes SOME women (the young and/or the beautiful) receive responses to their initial messages at a higher rate than men do. That makes those women (young and beautiful) more desirable than say me, an average looking middle aged woman. 

As far as branding and marketing of online profiles, we are entering an age where professional profile writers and photographers are in demand.


----------



## Lila

Girl_power said:


> You were saying before that as a society we have our priorities mixed up. I agree with you. There are things that we think are important that really aren’t and vice versa. But sometimes these trivial judgements are so engrained in our heads that we can’t help it, that we can’t control it( like feelings) to a certain extent.


I see what you're saying. I like to think that my generation is ****ed but hopefully my son's generation will have a better time of it. Only time tells.


----------



## Lila

Girl_power said:


> You were saying before that as a society we have our priorities mixed up. I agree with you. There are things that we think are important that really aren’t and vice versa. But sometimes these trivial judgements are so engrained in our heads that we can’t help it, that we can’t control it( like feelings) to a certain extent.



I was at the gym and couldn't respond properly to your post @Girl_power . I think you need to live your life in accordance to YOUR values regardless of how everyone is living theirs. The best way I know to determine if your values are truly yours and not something ingrained by others is to identify if living that way brings you joy and happiness. If not, then delve deeper to identify why and make the decision to fix it.

I am older than you and have my own set of values based on my life experience but have found that doing things purposefully helps me sleep well at night. The goal is no guilt and no regrets because I am living life in accordance to MY values. I take judgemental people with a grain of salt. We all live in glass houses after all.


----------



## DownButNotOut

Lila said:


> Match is a swipe based app these days. When you send a message it shows up as a like with a little bubble showing the first few words of their message. Tinder is similar. You don't have to be a match to know they messaged.


You may be right. But I've never found a way to message on Tinder without the other party first liking my profile. On Match, I've found that easily possible. In any event all of the description of the study's methodology refers to 'messages'. I infer from that, that it is referring to actual messaging, not the simple swipe mechanic.



Lila said:


> You could be right about men and their response rates but if I understand the study, it really doesn't matter the number of responses each person gets. The study does not compare men against women. They rank users based on the number of likes/messages received and the number of responses received amongst their gender group. So those men who get all of the attention are rated higher in the study's desirability ranking than those who get little to no attention (messages/likes). Same with women. Those who get most of the attention are ranked higher than the women who get little or none. They then studied who the high, middle, and low ranked people within each gender group selected from the other gender group. Even if women never initiate messages, we can rank the men's desirability by way of their response rates to messages, no?
> 
> And while I do think men send out way more initial messages than women, those messages tend to be focused on a particular subset of available women (young and/or beautiful). So consequently THESE women receive far more messages than men do
> 
> Yes SOME women (the young and/or the beautiful) receive responses to their initial messages at a higher rate than men do. That makes those women (young and beautiful) more desirable than say me, an average looking middle aged woman.
> 
> As far as branding and marketing of online profiles, we are entering an age where professional profile writers and photographers are in demand.


I was referring to the data presented in the study. If you look at the provided tables you can see what I mean. It is even clearer in the supplemental information. For instance, in New York the reply rate for men is 15%, while for women it is 34%. This is clear evidence that when women send an initial message, they are in general more successful than men in garnering replies. Likewise in New York the mean value of messages sent for men is 23.3, and for women 9.4. Extrapolating from that, both men an women receive a similar number of replies based on the mean (3.4 vs 3.1), but men are working harder for that number of replies by needing to send more initial messages. If you go past the table, into the text you find: "Overall [men] are responsible for 81% of initial contacts on the site, but men have a lower chance than women of receiving replies to their messages."

In any event, it makes absolutely no sense that the study was based on a 'swipe' contact method. There are extensive analyses of message lengths, and conent and how that affected the response frequency.


----------



## coquille

hamadryad said:


> Like it or not, they are looking because they are out there...For all guys? probably not...but a good percentage can play in that sandbox..
> 
> Most "good" guys her age can easily attract women in their 30's and 40's....Heck even a lot of the "duds" can...lol
> 
> I know nothing of OLD..Nor would I ever do it...As a guy, it's effing embarrassing...Sorry, no disrespect to anyone, just my personal opinion.. No decent guy should ever have to do it.. Available women are everywhere, especially at this age.. I don't really understand what's so hard about this.
> 
> A buddy of mine is about the age of your friend.. After he got out of his marriage, he did OLD.. He has a decent personality and probably considered "fun" by some women's measure, but he's not good looking, not fit, etc,...picture a biker type with a gut and no money.. Anyway, he was pumping and dumping at a rate of like 2 a month for almost a year and a half...He'd show me pics of these women...most younger, some...meh...others not too bad...All on "legitimate" sites like Match, etc..He eventually found someone that he seems happy with...woman in her early 40's, size 2/4, and not bad looking at all..I am not excusing or glorifying what he did, I would never do it, but the point being, if he could do it, what would a guy that age, with a good body, intellect, and some financial security be worth?
> 
> Problem as I see it, is that for better or worse, women are still judged primarily by looks/body...If you are a woman at that age, it's tough to maintain that and guys that age may not be much better in the physical sense, but they get extra points for other stuff and women aren't as particular in those areas..
> 
> Women get the edge when younger, men get the edge later...It all balances out, really...


I understand your skepticism regarding OLD. Everyone does it for a different reason. It might be a lack of time to meet new people IRL. It could be to expand one's options that might be scarce around a person in real life. I have a busy life and I don't have a lot of time for social gatherings, and I also live in an area where material display of wealth is important and attractive to most people, but it repulses me. Most of my values do not correspond to those living in my area or in my professional circle, so I thought OLD would allow me to meet someone whose values are closer to mine. 

The study is not telling us something we don't know already. It is quantifying this information and finding that a lot of what we see is in fact a quantifiable pattern. It doesn't go into the sustainability of a relationship that starts off these sites, as this would require a longer study in terms of years. I see that what we already experience in real life is taken to more extremes in OLD because the OLD world is more carefully constructed than real life, and it gets more artificial as it has become the norm. People treat their profile as a facade that hides a lot of red flags, and reading a profile requires a lot of close reading skills and reading between the lines that we do socially anyway, but it is to me exhausting as I have to go through so many profiles on OLD. I don't see myself going back to OLD any time soon.


----------



## Lila

DownButNotOut said:


> You may be right. But I've never found a way to message on Tinder without the other party first liking my profile. On Match, I've found that easily possible. In any event all of the description of the study's methodology refers to 'messages'. I infer from that, that it is referring to actual messaging, not the simple swipe mechanic.
> 
> 
> I was referring to the data presented in the study. If you look at the provided tables you can see what I mean. It is even clearer in the supplemental information. For instance, in New York the reply rate for men is 15%, while for women it is 34%. This is clear evidence that when women send an initial message, they are in general more successful than men in garnering replies. Likewise in New York the mean value of messages sent for men is 23.3, and for women 9.4. Extrapolating from that, both men an women receive a similar number of replies based on the mean (3.4 vs 3.1), but men are working harder for that number of replies by needing to send more initial messages. If you go past the table, into the text you find: "Overall [men] are responsible for 81% of initial contacts on the site, but men have a lower chance than women of receiving replies to their messages."
> 
> In any event, it makes absolutely no sense that the study was based on a 'swipe' contact method. There are extensive analyses of message lengths, and conent and how that affected the response frequency.


I think we're each discussing different things. The part I find interesting is that heterosexual men and women who use online dating pursue those of the opposite sex who are 25% more desirable than they, as calculated by the study. Lots of passing ships in the night.


----------



## farsidejunky

Girl_power said:


> It’s kind of depressing that we all basically think we are more desirable than we actually are.


Maybe, or maybe it is just that some of it does not translate in the format we choose, eg. OLD.

I can't imagine I would have a ton of success on OLD now. I know I didn't when I was single using Yahoo Personals (I'm going back a ways here...lol).

But then again, I can't count how many times I went to parties, or other social gatherings, and felt like a ghost...until I started talking to people. Following that, I got the following more times than I can count:

"How did I miss you?"

As RD said further upthread, some aspects of game simply do not become apparent through the two-dimensional world of OLD.

Sent from my Pixel 3 XL using Tapatalk


----------



## lifeistooshort

Lila said:


> Lol. I'm cheering you on. I hear the grocery store is a happening place. 😜


I had a cute guy chat me up in the grocery store recently.

Upper 40's to early 50's, cute New Zealand accent...but alas I'm not available 😁


----------



## Diana7

Lila said:


> I was at the gym and couldn't respond properly to your post @Girl_power . I think you need to live your life in accordance to YOUR values regardless of how everyone is living theirs. The best way I know to determine if your values are truly yours and not something ingrained by others is to identify if living that way brings you joy and happiness. If not, then delve deeper to identify why and make the decision to fix it.
> 
> I am older than you and have my own set of values based on my life experience but have found that doing things purposefully helps me sleep well at night. The goal is no guilt and no regrets because I am living life in accordance to MY values. I take judgemental people with a grain of salt. We all live in glass houses after all.


I agree with this. By the time my long first marriage had ended and I had let a few years past, I was in my mid/ late 40's and I had far different and stricter criteria than I had had first time round. Ok this did exclude the vast majority of men, but we should stick to our values and not compromise.


----------



## Al_Bundy

Lila said:


> I mentioned this on another thread but where I live there is void of eligible men between the ages of 40-55. I belong to a few meetups that I enjoy but there is never any men on those age ranges. I'm either the youngest one or oldest in the group.


Just curious, what kind of meetups? Like ones where you just meet and mingle or where you are doing some activity or for business interests?


----------



## Diana7

I know a dating site in the UK where only the women can contact the men.


----------



## Lila

Al_Bundy said:


> Just curious, what kind of meetups? Like ones where you just meet and mingle or where you are doing some activity or for business interests?


Some are activity based like dancing or dining. Some are singles groups where different people plan activities (sporting events, bars, concerts, festivals, bowling, axe throwing, you get the idea).


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## Al_Bundy

Lila said:


> Some are activity based like dancing or dining. Some are singles groups where different people plan activities (sporting events, bars, concerts, festivals, bowling, axe throwing, you get the idea).


I've always had the idea (based off nothing) that singles events would just be a sausage fest with one bearded lady in the back of the room.


----------



## Diana7

Al_Bundy said:


> I've always had the idea (based off nothing) that singles events would just be a sausage fest with one bearded lady in the back of the room.


Singles events or speed dating say were never something that appealed to me. 
Not that there were any church singles groups that I knew of in my area.


----------



## Lila

Al_Bundy said:


> I've always had the idea (based off nothing) that singles events would just be a sausage fest with one bearded lady in the back of the room.


Far from it, at least where I live. There are usually just as many if not more women in attendance than men. 

I have mentioned this one before but I used to belong to a hiking over 40 singles group. One of the hikes there were about 20 people and only the leader and another person were men. The rest were women.


----------



## Diana7

Lila said:


> Far from it, at least where I live. There are usually just as many if not more women in attendance than men.
> 
> I have mentioned this one before but I used to belong to a hiking over 40 singles group. One of the hikes there were about 20 people and only the leader and another person were men. The rest were women.


One man I chatted to on line when I was on OLD had been on a Christian singles holiday abroad. He said he was the only man there and they were all pretty much within about 10 years of his age. He clearly didn't meet anyone despite that.


----------



## Enigma32

farsidejunky said:


> Maybe, or maybe it is just that some of it does not translate in the format we choose, eg. OLD.
> 
> I can't imagine I would have a ton of success on OLD now. I know I didn't when I was single using Yahoo Personals (I'm going back a ways here...lol).


I used to use Yahoo personals back in the day. Believe it or not, OLD was better back then. There were vastly fewer people to meet up with but there weren't nearly as many games being played. At least not from my limited perspective back then.


----------



## coquille

Lila said:


> Some are activity based like dancing or dining. Some are singles groups where different people plan activities (sporting events, bars, concerts, festivals, bowling, axe throwing, you get the idea).


I joined different meetup groups in my area, one hiking group and it was mainly women with an older guy (the organizer) and another relatively younger one lost in a group of women. I joined a movie watching group where we had people of different age brackets, married and single, and the movie screening was usually followed by dinner where we can meet and discuss the movie. We always had interesting discussions and I met nice people in that group. I got invited by twice by guys my age who wanted to meet me. We exchanged phones numbers but I didn't respond to their invitations for a second night out (movie and dinner without the group); they're single (never married, no kids) in their late forties. Needless to say that all movie screenings and dinners stopped after the pandemic.


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## hamadryad

I am sorry if this comes off as a gigantic wet blanket for some of you ladies, but hear me out...If anything, it will confirm that it's really just a matter of circumstances, rather than something being wrong with you..

I know a lot of men...most in the age range of 40-65...

Here is what they comprise of...

-Good guys that are in bad marriages and just aren't bothering to leave...its just not worth the aggravation and the financial downgrade, so they just ignore their wives and trudge on...The one's that still want to get laid are either using sex workers or getting something going on the side...I know, how can they be good if they are doing this? Well...They are just using this as a coping mechanism...Nothing more...If they were happily married they wouldn't probably do it, but these guys worked this out and weighed the options...Most of the time, the sex ship sailed in their marriages decades ago, so I don't even think the wives give a crap about it...They have their own dysfunctional reasons for staying....Forget them..

-Guys that were once good guys and are now broken...Mostly by bad divorces and bad settlements..These guys were once prime marriage and father material...but that was a long time ago...If they still want to get laid, they are out there on OLD taking advantage of weak and desperate women for sex..Almost for revenge sake ...If they don't have any drive any more or just hate the entire female species, they sit around and cry in their beer....Either way, forget them...

-Good guys that are desirable and not bitter after divorce....These are the unicorns..They have all the cards...They can find younger women, super hot women their age, rich women, you name it...They are the one's that can be super choosy...They aren't on OLD, because every woman on the street is after them...Forget these guys as well, unless you bring a whole lot to the table(including the table) and can wear a two piece at the beach like Liz Hurley or something...probably won't have a chance with these guys...

So what's left you ask??

The guys that are/were perpetually terrible with women, just older now...The Peter Pans,(just like the guys that coquille says she met at the meetup group) the career orbiters with Hall of Fame honors....No women wanted them when they were in their "prime" and now it's even worse...They show up on dates with a comb over, in the Old Spice aftershave their dad thought was cool in 1978...Them plus a mixed bag of guys that are cynical, angry, delusional, etc...Some looking for mommies to take care of them, or even pay their bills, the trolling players looking for nothing more than sex, because they heard that women are horny at this age and they are generally desperate because desirable guys are so hard to find..

Despite the numbers that get bandied about, there are far more desirable women than men at this stage, the problem is that there aren't enough good men to satisfy the demand...That's why a lot of women seem to struggle so much.


----------



## Enigma32

hamadryad said:


> Despite the numbers that get bandied about, there are far more desirable women than men at this stage, the problem is that there aren't enough good men to satisfy the demand...That's why a lot of women seem to struggle so much.


I think your appraisal of the available men is pretty spot on. What I disagree with is the idea that there are a ton of good ladies out there....there isn't. Most of the ladies are just as broken and messed up as the men are, just in different ways.


----------



## hamadryad

Enigma32 said:


> I think your appraisal of the available men is pretty spot on. What I disagree with is the idea that there are a ton of good ladies out there....there isn't. Most of the ladies are just as broken and messed up as the men are, just in different ways.



Fair point....

But consider this aspect....

Most women I know would love a nice relationship at any age (unless they already have one)...heck I know a lot of available women my age that still want a fancy wedding(even if not their first) a shore house, a Labrador Retriever and a Range Rover....Most guys are NOT thinking along these lines at this life stage...They are more like "what's hers is her's and what's mine is mine" and no way in hell do they want to do all that fancy stuff and spend that kind of money any more..

The other thing, and this is big...is that once a guy at this stage loses his sexual appetite and or can't get it up, then they most likely bow out of the dating pool....A lot of these guys are good prospects, but without that element, then there is no longer any reason to chase women anymore...I don't think women view this the same..,.In fact a lot of women out there at this age want relationships with men where sex isn't a priority....Its the total opposite thinking of many guys...


----------



## Enigma32

hamadryad said:


> Most women I know would love a nice relationship at any age (unless they already have one)...heck I know a lot of available women my age that still want a fancy wedding(even if not their first) a shore house, a Labrador Retriever and a Range Rover....Most guys are NOT thinking along these lines at this life stage...They are more like "what's hers is her's and what's mine is mine" and no way in hell do they want to do all that fancy stuff and spend that kind of money any more..


I think they look for relationships true, but can they sustain one? Are their expectations grounded anywhere near reality? Most of the perpetually single ladies I have met are the chemistry chasers. They're always looking for that guy with the most chemistry. Not the best guy, or the most loyal guy, none of that, always the chemistry guy. When that chemistry fades, what's left? Time to find another guy that gives ya that chemistry.


----------



## Diana7

Enigma32 said:


> I think they look for relationships true, but can they sustain one? Are their expectations grounded anywhere near reality? Most of the perpetually single ladies I have met are the chemistry chasers. They're always looking for that guy with the most chemistry. Not the best guy, or the most loyal guy, none of that, always the chemistry guy. When that chemistry fades, what's left? Time to find another guy that gives ya that chemistry.


To me chemistry means that you really click. That you are on the same page, that you feel as if you have known each other for a long time and can talk like good friends when you have only just met. That often doesnt fade. Looks may fade, that initial excitement of a new relationship may fade, but the chemistry often doesnt, that's why it's so important to have that with each other. Without that connection I don't think you will get very far.


----------



## coquille

I do agree with both Enigma and Hamadryad, and I see just small parts of me in every category of women you have been discussing. But in our 50's we have a lot going on in our lives and it is hard to find a partner whose vision aligns with ours. Having gone through 22 years of marriage, I know that you either work on sustaining chemistry, or it is bound to fade and die; it is not something that lives on its own forever. I also don't expect a guy to spoil me financially and I'm not attracted by displays of wealth. I can meet my own expenses, but at the same time I don't want a partner who wants to spend his money on me in exchange of me becoming financially dependent on him. Men I have met, good men looking for a long term relationship, have a different understanding of relationship than the one I have. They ask me to give up on something that sustains me every day but they are not ready to give up on anything or at least they don't show any willingness to compromise. 
Yes, more men than women on the dating pool are not looking for, or able to sustain, a LTR, and I see more men who suffer financially because of divorce. There are also a lot of women who want to have a good and nice companion to spend the rest of their lives with, but they don't want someone looking over their shoulder and controlling many aspects of their lives.


----------



## Diana7

hamadryad said:


> I am sorry if this comes off as a gigantic wet blanket for some of you ladies, but hear me out...If anything, it will confirm that it's really just a matter of circumstances, rather than something being wrong with you..
> 
> I know a lot of men...most in the age range of 40-65...
> 
> Here is what they comprise of...
> 
> -Good guys that are in bad marriages and just aren't bothering to leave...its just not worth the aggravation and the financial downgrade, so they just ignore their wives and trudge on...The one's that still want to get laid are either using sex workers or getting something going on the side...I know, how can they be good if they are doing this? Well...They are just using this as a coping mechanism...Nothing more...If they were happily married they wouldn't probably do it, but these guys worked this out and weighed the options...Most of the time, the sex ship sailed in their marriages decades ago, so I don't even think the wives give a crap about it...They have their own dysfunctional reasons for staying....Forget them..
> 
> -Guys that were once good guys and are now broken...Mostly by bad divorces and bad settlements..These guys were once prime marriage and father material...but that was a long time ago...If they still want to get laid, they are out there on OLD taking advantage of weak and desperate women for sex..Almost for revenge sake ...If they don't have any drive any more or just hate the entire female species, they sit around and cry in their beer....Either way, forget them...
> 
> -Good guys that are desirable and not bitter after divorce....These are the unicorns..They have all the cards...They can find younger women, super hot women their age, rich women, you name it...They are the one's that can be super choosy...They aren't on OLD, because every woman on the street is after them...Forget these guys as well, unless you bring a whole lot to the table(including the table) and can wear a two piece at the beach like Liz Hurley or something...probably won't have a chance with these guys...
> 
> So what's left you ask??
> 
> The guys that are/were perpetually terrible with women, just older now...The Peter Pans,(just like the guys that coquille says she met at the meetup group) the career orbiters with Hall of Fame honors....No women wanted them when they were in their "prime" and now it's even worse...They show up on dates with a comb over, in the Old Spice aftershave their dad thought was cool in 1978...Them plus a mixed bag of guys that are cynical, angry, delusional, etc...Some looking for mommies to take care of them, or even pay their bills, the trolling players looking for nothing more than sex, because they heard that women are horny at this age and they are generally desperate because desirable guys are so hard to find..
> 
> Despite the numbers that get bandied about, there are far more desirable women than men at this stage, the problem is that there aren't enough good men to satisfy the demand...That's why a lot of women seem to struggle so much.


Not sure the guys I got to know really fitted into those groups. I am not sure it's always helpful to put people into groups because most of us are just our own unique person who would just overlap in groups like that. 
Most were pretty nice guys, some divorced, some unmarried, but most just wanting to meet a nice lady to be happy with.


----------



## Enigma32

Diana7 said:


> To me chemistry means that you really click. That you are on the same page, that you feel as if you have known each other for a long time and can talk like good friends when you have only just met. That often doesnt fade. Looks may fade, that initial excitement of a new relationship may fade, but the chemistry often doesnt, that's why it's so important to have that with each other. Without that connection I don't think you will get very far.


Any guy with a little bit of charm can pull that off on date 1. I know I can and it's probably why I always get a 2nd date. So, maybe we can talk like good friends right away, but is that all-important? More so than finding a guy with integrity, honesty, someone who is a dedicated partner? Someone that would be a good father if you have kids? That's my point. The ladies I see struggling, they NEED that chemistry, which I can honestly bullcrap for you EASILY if I want to, and then you HOPE maybe he will have those other good qualities? Why not instead find a guy with the qualities required to have a lasting relationship and then try to build that chemistry together over time? That to me at least is more much meaningful than just building a relationship with a dude based on the fact that he's good at interacting with women above all else.


----------



## coquille

Enigma32 said:


> Any guy with a little bit of charm can pull that off on date 1. I know I can and it's probably why I always get a 2nd date. So, maybe we can talk like good friends right away, but is that all-important? More so than finding a guy with integrity, honesty, someone who is a dedicated partner? Someone that would be a good father if you have kids? That's my point. The ladies I see struggling, they NEED that chemistry, which I can honestly bullcrap for you EASILY if I want to, and then you HOPE maybe he will have those other good qualities? Why not instead find a guy with the qualities required to have a lasting relationship and then try to build that chemistry together over time? That to me at least is more much meaningful than just building a relationship with a dude based on the fact that he's good at interacting with women above all else.


Preach! I think chemistry is fetishized in many circles. It doesn't have to be there at the beginning, and it can be cultivated.


----------



## Diana7

Enigma32 said:


> Any guy with a little bit of charm can pull that off on date 1. I know I can and it's probably why I always get a 2nd date. So, maybe we can talk like good friends right away, but is that all-important? More so than finding a guy with integrity, honesty, someone who is a dedicated partner? Someone that would be a good father if you have kids? That's my point. The ladies I see struggling, they NEED that chemistry, which I can honestly bullcrap for you EASILY if I want to, and then you HOPE maybe he will have those other good qualities? Why not instead find a guy with the qualities required to have a lasting relationship and then try to build that chemistry together over time? That to me at least is more much meaningful than just building a relationship with a dude based on the fact that he's good at interacting with women above all else.


I don't think you get what I am meaning.
Part of that chemistry is finding a person who has what you are looking for. Who shares your values and outlook on life. It's very different to charm, it's a sort of knowing that you are on the same path, the same page.
For me it was nothing to with how good a man was at interaction, but that we clicked, we shared so much and just really enjoyed being together. He had and has all the very important qualities of integrity and honesty, faithfulness and decency, for me that was very much part of that chemistry and attraction.
A man's character is paramount to me. I have little interest in earnings, possessions, or how tall a man may be, the shallow things.
Without that initial chemistry I don't think it will last. It's not just attraction it's more than that.
The men I met before were perfectly nice men, but there was no chemistry. No desire to meet again.
The chemistry has never gone after 16 years.


----------



## ccpowerslave

Diana7 said:


> Who shares your values and outlook on life. It's very different to charm, it's a sort of knowing that you are on the same path, the same page.


You couldn’t find this out without wanting to talk with them in the first place. Unless people blurt out their life plans and such straight out of the gate.


----------



## heartsbeating

Lila said:


> Lol. I'm cheering you on. I hear the grocery store is a happening place. 😜


Might mean being less ‘ninja’ in your shopping approach though 😉


----------



## heartsbeating

ccpowerslave said:


> I saw someone on Reddit a couple weeks ago lamenting their OLD failure and they had mentioned they used face rating software to try and figure out what their deal was and it gave them the result that they were ugly.
> 
> So of course I immediately searched for software like this and then tried the face and full body on myself just for science, because I believe the science.


🤣 Despite science, why do that to yourself?! 

I’m kidding with ya.

However, that would be a for kicks n giggles experiment that I personally wouldn’t want to do. ‘The software called me ugly..’ haha. Not that you got that result, @ccpowerslave.


----------



## Tasorundo

I did not read the study, but did they account for the stat padding that goes on OLD as well? I posted something a while ago that showed how the average height of men in OLD is skewed from the actual height statistics.


----------



## Lila

hamadryad said:


> I am sorry if this comes off as a gigantic wet blanket for some of you ladies, but hear me out...If anything, it will confirm that it's really just a matter of circumstances, rather than something being wrong with you..
> 
> I know a lot of men...most in the age range of 40-65...
> 
> Here is what they comprise of...
> 
> -Good guys that are in bad marriages and just aren't bothering to leave...its just not worth the aggravation and the financial downgrade, so they just ignore their wives and trudge on...The one's that still want to get laid are either using sex workers or getting something going on the side...I know, how can they be good if they are doing this? Well...They are just using this as a coping mechanism...Nothing more...If they were happily married they wouldn't probably do it, but these guys worked this out and weighed the options...Most of the time, the sex ship sailed in their marriages decades ago, so I don't even think the wives give a crap about it...They have their own dysfunctional reasons for staying....Forget them..
> 
> -Guys that were once good guys and are now broken...Mostly by bad divorces and bad settlements..These guys were once prime marriage and father material...but that was a long time ago...If they still want to get laid, they are out there on OLD taking advantage of weak and desperate women for sex..Almost for revenge sake ...If they don't have any drive any more or just hate the entire female species, they sit around and cry in their beer....Either way, forget them...
> 
> -Good guys that are desirable and not bitter after divorce....These are the unicorns..They have all the cards...They can find younger women, super hot women their age, rich women, you name it...They are the one's that can be super choosy...They aren't on OLD, because every woman on the street is after them...Forget these guys as well, unless you bring a whole lot to the table(including the table) and can wear a two piece at the beach like Liz Hurley or something...probably won't have a chance with these guys...
> 
> So what's left you ask??
> 
> The guys that are/were perpetually terrible with women, just older now...The Peter Pans,(just like the guys that coquille says she met at the meetup group) the career orbiters with Hall of Fame honors....No women wanted them when they were in their "prime" and now it's even worse...They show up on dates with a comb over, in the Old Spice aftershave their dad thought was cool in 1978...Them plus a mixed bag of guys that are cynical, angry, delusional, etc...Some looking for mommies to take care of them, or even pay their bills, the trolling players looking for nothing more than sex, because they heard that women are horny at this age and they are generally desperate because desirable guys are so hard to find..
> 
> Despite the numbers that get bandied about, there are far more desirable women than men at this stage, the problem is that there aren't enough good men to satisfy the demand...That's why a lot of women seem to struggle so much.


I agree with you completely. In the United States we have a loneliness epidemic across the board. It's even worse in the over 65 age groups and it is only going to get worse with time. Senior living neighborhoods (55+) designed for single people (designs for 1 instead of 2 people) are becoming more and more popular. I can totally see a country where the vast majority of people over 50 are single and stay so until death. But that's just me. 

As to women not finding suitable single men over 40 to meet, you are very right. Many are finding other ways to cope with the struggle. There is a growing trend (which I am sure has always existed but was less taboo) for single women in this age group to become mistresses rather than girlfriends. There's also the bi-sexual ones choosing to enter into lesbian relationships. There is also the sad truth that for women (not to take anything away from the very sad suicidal rate for men), the over 40 female age group has one of the fastest growing rates for suicide. 

It's really a shame about your #2s though. They could be enjoying life with someone who brings happiness into it but they choose (and yes I've met them) to hold on to grief and misguided anger.


----------



## ccpowerslave

heartsbeating said:


> 🤣 Despite science, why do that to yourself?!
> 
> I’m kidding with ya.
> 
> However, that would be a for kicks n giggles experiment that I personally wouldn’t want to do. ‘The software called me ugly..’ haha. Not that you got that result, @ccpowerslave.


I couldn’t help it. It said I was “good looking” and gave me a 65% rating, the Rock’s head shot got a 75% from the same algorithm. I forget what it said but his text was better. So it kind of works. I probably should have tried Justin Timberlake or something. Would be good to see what a 90% looks like.


----------



## Lila

Enigma32 said:


> I think they look for relationships true, but can they sustain one? Are their expectations grounded anywhere near reality? Most of the perpetually single ladies I have met are the chemistry chasers. They're always looking for that guy with the most chemistry. Not the best guy, or the most loyal guy, none of that, always the chemistry guy. When that chemistry fades, what's left? Time to find another guy that gives ya that chemistry.


I disagree with you on the chemistry. There is so much more to it than charm. I have been on dates with super charming men but have felt zero chemistry for them. On the other hand, my ex husband was as charming as dry-wall and we made a go of it for 23 years. He never did learn charm but I was still attracted to him until the day we divorced (and probably after). 

Chemistry is not quantifiable and personally, I don't think it's something that will grow. It's either there (hidden away for a short while) or not.


----------



## Lila

Tasorundo said:


> I did not read the study, but did they account for the stat padding that goes on OLD as well? I posted something a while ago that showed how the average height of men in OLD is skewed from the actual height statistics.


With the exception of age, race, and education level, the study didn't make any conclusions as to why a particular profile was found more "desirable" (got messaged or liked more compared to others in the same gender group). It might have been because the apps they used to do the statistical analysis did not include height as a filter feature.


----------



## RandomDude

Enigma32 said:


> That's my point. The ladies I see struggling, they NEED that chemistry, which I can honestly bullcrap for you EASILY if I want to, and then you HOPE maybe he will have those other good qualities? Why not instead find a guy with the qualities required to have a lasting relationship and then try to build that chemistry together over time? That to me at least is more much meaningful than just building a relationship with a dude based on the fact that he's good at interacting with women above all else.


Ah! But the acting is not sustainable 
Real chemistry lasts! 

Also I've never seen chemistry grow over time, if it did I would have fell in love sooner in life.


----------



## RandomDude

Ooo thread idea actually... think we are going OT


----------



## coquille

RandomDude said:


> Ah! But the acting is not sustainable
> Real chemistry lasts!
> 
> Also I've never seen chemistry grow over time, if it did I would have fell in love sooner in life.


I think that chemistry does happen when two people click as they feel that they have some things in common or they are on the same page, but you can know so much about a person during the first date, so a lot of chemistry is intuitive. On the other hand, if you don't feel that there is chemistry between you and the other person on a first date, it doesn't mean you should not give this person a chance for another date if you see that there are things about this person you like and you are looking for. In this sense, you can feel the chemistry later, as you meet this person again and you find that your goals and values align with this person. I think also the older you are the more patient you become with chemistry.


----------



## joannacroc

We see quite a few spouses on here who have either married someone they were never attracted to, or married someone who has never been attracted to them. 

I agree with others that chemistry is not the only thing there is, but to my mind it needs to include sexual chemistry AND compatibility of values. Someone can become really unattractive if they have certain personality traits, like a lot of vanity or negativity, and someone average looking can become more attractive to you for example if they are particularly kind or giving. But I think there has to be some kind of base level attraction there in order for it to work.


----------



## Enigma32

joannacroc said:


> We see quite a few spouses on here who have either married someone they were never attracted to, or married someone who has never been attracted to them.
> 
> I agree with others that chemistry is not the only thing there is, but to my mind it needs to include sexual chemistry AND compatibility of values. Someone can become really unattractive if they have certain personality traits, like a lot of vanity or negativity, and someone average looking can become more attractive to you for example if they are particularly kind or giving. But I think there has to be some kind of base level attraction there in order for it to work.


Therein lies the problem with OLD. People make snap judgements based on pictures alone, maybe go on a date or two, and then decide if someone is worth spending more time with. A lot of people really don't get the chance to show much of themselves in that time so it all becomes as shallow as possoble.


----------



## Diana7

ccpowerslave said:


> You couldn’t find this out without wanting to talk with them in the first place. Unless people blurt out their life plans and such straight out of the gate.


We did talk about a lot of stuff on line in those first few days. Deep and important things. Sometimes though it's just a sort of 'knowing' that the person is just right.


----------



## Diana7

Enigma32 said:


> Therein lies the problem with OLD. People make snap judgements based on pictures alone, maybe go on a date or two, and then decide if someone is worth spending more time with. A lot of people really don't get the chance to show much of themselves in that time so it all becomes as shallow as possoble.


I think that most people would be able to tell after a date or two if there is anything worth persuing.


----------



## Al_Bundy

Tasorundo said:


> I did not read the study, but did they account for the stat padding that goes on OLD as well? I posted something a while ago that showed how the average height of men in OLD is skewed from the actual height statistics.


I'm sure weight gets skewed as well by both sides. Not to mention out of date pictures.


----------



## coquille

Enigma32 said:


> Most of the perpetually single ladies I have met are the chemistry chasers. They're always looking for that guy with the most chemistry.


I think here you seem to think that chemistry is something a person can or cannot have. It's not. There is no such a thing as a man with the most chemistry. It's something in common that both parties feel they share and it is hard to pinpoint. People just feel it, and imho I wouldn't despair if I don't feel it at first with somebody if this somebody looks like a decent person and shows potentials of being a decent partner. I would give him a chance. 
So chemistry is not the charm that a man has. There are men who can charm any woman, like the old friend you mentioned in another post, and he would be called a charmer or a seducer, but he is not a man with the most chemistry. There is no such a thing. To be seduced by someone like him is not exactly the same as feeling that there is chemistry between the two.


----------



## joannacroc

Enigma32 said:


> Therein lies the problem with OLD. People make snap judgements based on pictures alone, maybe go on a date or two, and then decide if someone is worth spending more time with. A lot of people really don't get the chance to show much of themselves in that time so it all becomes as shallow as possoble.


But...you don't think people made snap judgements about each other based on appearance across a crowded bar or club or wherever else people met before online dating?


----------



## lifeistooshort

DownByTheRiver said:


> Men will often fall for women they are actually around on a regular basis. That was my strength.
> 
> I have trouble believing men peak at 50, and I think that would be restricted only to the online dating, and only because there are so many divorced women in their 30s and 40s out there online who probably wouldn't be "out there" at all hanging out at the places young people frequent to meet people. There's this demographic who are basically confined to online for social or practical (kids) reasons.
> 
> The comment in the original post that women are more likely to respond to less desirables is because women are so much more afraid of hurting someone's feelings, I think, and a lot of them also think, Well, I'd be happy to just be friends, something the man rarely does.



Yeah, I don't believe men peak at 50 either. That's something men tell themselves to feel good.

I suppose it could be true among a certain demographic of women that are looking for money because I can believe that men are topping out their earning potential around that age. But that's only going to create a business deal where she takes his money and looks at men her own age.

Don't get me wrong....I love 50 something year old men who tale care of themselves....but that's because I'm 47. My bf is 55 and he's adorable, but let's not pretend any of us are peaking at this age.

It's true women don't like to hurt feelings but I also think many women like the idea of being the more desirable partner....it's good for their self esteem.

I have a cousin like this. She married a guy who was extremely obese (she's not). Beyond the weight he's a nice looking guy and neat to talk to. He's 14 years older then her but 4 years older then me.

I've chatted with him and I can see why one would enjoy his company, but the weight would be a deal breaker for me. He absolutely adores her.

Well he had weight loss surgery and she kept cooking him all of the crap he's not supposed to have. I think she's very conflicted because while I do believe she loves him and wants him healthy she also doesn't want other women looking. If he gets to a healthy weight he's going to have options and she knows it.

Not saying he'd take them...he seems devoted to her....but i think she felt secure knowing he didn't have any other options.


----------



## ccpowerslave

lifeistooshort said:


> Yeah, I don't believe men peak at 50 either. That's something men tell themselves to feel good


But the article!!!



lifeistooshort said:


> Don't get me wrong....I love 50 something year old men who tale care of themselves....but that's because I'm 47. My bf is 55 and he's adorable, but let's not pretend any of us are peaking at this age.


😭


----------



## DownByTheRiver

lifeistooshort said:


> Yeah, I don't believe men peak at 50 either. That's something men tell themselves to feel good.
> 
> I suppose it could be true among a certain demographic of women that are looking for money because I can believe that men are topping out their earning potential around that age. But that's only going to create a business deal where she takes his money and looks at men her own age.
> 
> Don't get me wrong....I love 50 something year old men who tale care of themselves....but that's because I'm 47. My bf is 55 and he's adorable, but let's not pretend any of us are peaking at this age.
> 
> It's true women don't like to hurt feelings but I also think many women like the idea of being the more desirable partner....it's good for their self esteem.
> 
> I have a cousin like this. She married a guy who was extremely obese (she's not). Beyond the weight he's a nice looking guy and neat to talk to. He's 14 years older then her but 4 years older then me.
> 
> I've chatted with him and I can see why one would enjoy his company, but the weight would be a deal breaker for me. He absolutely adores her.
> 
> Well he had weight loss surgery and she kept cooking him all of the crap he's not supposed to have. I think she's very conflicted because while I do believe she loves him and wants him healthy she also doesn't want other women looking. If he gets to a healthy weight he's going to have options and she knows it.
> 
> Not saying he'd take them...he seems devoted to her....but i think she felt secure knowing he didn't have any other options.


I've heard of women who want to be adored that bad but I've never met one. But there's no accounting for taste. One of my friends genuinely thinks her husband is attractive and there is literally nothing attractive about him either looks wise or personality wise. And he's been completely useless for sex. 

Her deal is she just always has to have someone around. It's certainly not because she needs someone to adore her because he has always been very hands off and not in a manly way. There's no accounting for taste. She was abandoned by her father and I'm sure that's formed everything she's done since then.


----------



## Jamieboy

DownByTheRiver said:


> I've heard of women who want to be adored that bad but I've never met one. But there's no accounting for taste. One of my friends genuinely thinks her husband is attractive and there is literally nothing attractive about him either looks wise or personality wise. And he's been completely useless for sex.
> 
> Her deal is she just always has to have someone around. It's certainly not because she needs someone to adore her because he has always been very hands off and not in a manly way. There's no accounting for taste. She was abandoned by her father and I'm sure that's formed everything she's done since then.


While I was OLD, my experience was I needed to graft, I was 40, successful, and im not bad looking, plus Iook after myself, 6 pack for a few months a year lol. 

My experience was that women get so many messages they rule you out for being honest in your profile. So I stripped it down to what I did for a living and my age and pictures. Whabam! insta success, they were prepared to at least go on a date so they could compare me to their mental check list. Anyone who wanted chapter and verse on the first date I knew I wouldn't hear from them again because the wish list was huge. Due the amount of offers incoming they think oh well just try another. 

I had fun, but the level of expectation was so huge it was exhausting.


----------



## DownByTheRiver

Jamieboy said:


> While I was OLD, my experience was I needed to graft, I was 40, successful, and im not bad looking, plus Iook after myself, 6 pack for a few months a year lol.
> 
> My experience was that women get so many messages they rule you out for being honest in your profile. So I stripped it down to what I did for a living and my age and pictures. Whabam! insta success, they were prepared to at least go on a date so they could compare me to their mental check list. Anyone who wanted chapter and verse on the first date I knew I wouldn't hear from them again because the wish list was huge. Due the amount of offers incoming they think oh well just try another.
> 
> I had fun, but the level of expectation was so huge it was exhausting.


Well, and it's also hard to tell if anyone is being honest in their profile because so many lie. I think on OLD they are just all mostly going on looks and the women who are seriously looking for longterm try to be find someone looking for a relationship, but that's super easy to lie about and it happens.


----------



## hamadryad

lifeistooshort said:


> Yeah, I don't believe men peak at 50 either. That's something men tell themselves to feel good.
> 
> I suppose it could be true among a certain demographic of women that are looking for money because I can believe that men are topping out their earning potential around that age. But that's only going to create a business deal where she takes his money and looks at men her own age.
> 
> Don't get me wrong....I love 50 something year old men who tale care of themselves....but that's because I'm 47. My bf is 55 and he's adorable, but let's not pretend any of us are peaking at this age.
> 
> It's true women don't like to hurt feelings but I also think many women like the idea of being the more desirable partner....it's good for their self esteem.
> 
> I have a cousin like this. She married a guy who was extremely obese (she's not). Beyond the weight he's a nice looking guy and neat to talk to. He's 14 years older then her but 4 years older then me.
> 
> I've chatted with him and I can see why one would enjoy his company, but the weight would be a deal breaker for me. He absolutely adores her.
> 
> Well he had weight loss surgery and she kept cooking him all of the crap he's not supposed to have. I think she's very conflicted because while I do believe she loves him and wants him healthy she also doesn't want other women looking. If he gets to a healthy weight he's going to have options and she knows it.
> 
> Not saying he'd take them...he seems devoted to her....but i think she felt secure knowing he didn't have any other options.



It may or may not be true, but I can only speak from experience...

I don't pretend to be anything really special, and while i've always been able to attract _some_ women, when I hit around 45 or so, the interest went off the chart.. Married women, single/divorced, etc.. I am in very good shape and take care of myself., I am sure that is a factor, but it's not like I was out of shape, and then changed,...Nothing changed really, and I never was out there looking, either.. I wasn't even available anyway... I have heard a lot of the same for a lot of my peers...A guy I know that is a contractor, early 50's tells me practically every woman that hires him, hits on him...

I guess my feeling is, I am not all that much different from when I was younger, physically...Still wear same size jeans, etc...But I am just a lot wiser and a lot more experienced and secure....I can't speak for all men, but if you reach this stage, have accomplished anything in life, then you can tell the world to eff off(not literally)...No one can touch you or affect you in any way...This attitude I think is what attracts a lot of women as well.. Perhaps that is also a factor, but I don't know..

All this talk about women going for these guys because of their money is pretty laughable as well...I say this, because most of us have worked hard to get to this point and have spent enormous sums on families, kids, exes, etc...If you think these guys now are going to do that with another woman later in life,I can only say, again from experience, it's gonna be more of "what's yours is yours and what's mine is mine" ..In other words, no guy wants to continue to be a donkey...BTDT,,, It may happen with some, but a lot of men aren't keen on sharing with women they meet the second(third, etc) go round.. Plus with kids and potentially grand kids there is plenty already in his pocket..

I think when people say that "men peak at this age", it may not be that they actually peaked in the physical sense, but that their options of available women goes up substantially...

Your or anyone's mileage may vary...


----------



## RandomDude

coquille said:


> I think here you seem to think that chemistry is something a person can or cannot have. It's not. There is no such a thing as a man with the most chemistry. It's something in common that both parties feel they share and it is hard to pinpoint. People just feel it, and imho I wouldn't despair if I don't feel it at first with somebody if this somebody looks like a decent person and shows potentials of being a decent partner. I would give him a chance.
> So chemistry is not the charm that a man has. There are men who can charm any woman, like the old friend you mentioned in another post, and he would be called a charmer or a seducer, but he is not a man with the most chemistry. There is no such a thing. To be seduced by someone like him is not exactly the same as feeling that there is chemistry between the two.


Exactly!



joannacroc said:


> But...you don't think people made snap judgements about each other based on appearance across a crowded bar or club or wherever else people met before online dating?


Well, I know I do  
But I trust what I'm able to discern within 7 seconds in person than an online dating profile.


----------



## lifeistooshort

hamadryad said:


> It may or may not be true, but I can only speak from experience...
> 
> I don't pretend to be anything really special, and while i've always been able to attract _some_ women, when I hit around 45 or so, the interest went off the chart.. Married women, single/divorced, etc.. I am in very good shape and take care of myself., I am sure that is a factor, but it's not like I was out of shape, and then changed,...Nothing changed really, and I never was out there looking, either.. I wasn't even available anyway... I have heard a lot of the same for a lot of my peers...A guy I know that is a contractor, early 50's tells me practically every woman that hires him, hits on him...
> 
> I guess my feeling is, I am not all that much different from when I was younger, physically...Still wear same size jeans, etc...But I am just a lot wiser and a lot more experienced and secure....I can't speak for all men, but if you reach this stage, have accomplished anything in life, then you can tell the world to eff off(not literally)...No one can touch you or affect you in any way...This attitude I think is what attracts a lot of women as well.. Perhaps that is also a factor, but I don't know..
> 
> All this talk about women going for these guys because of their money is pretty laughable as well...I say this, because most of us have worked hard to get to this point and have spent enormous sums on families, kids, exes, etc...If you think these guys now are going to do that with another woman later in life,I can only say, again from experience, it's gonna be more of "what's yours is yours and what's mine is mine" ..In other words, no guy wants to continue to be a donkey...BTDT,,, It may happen with some, but a lot of men aren't keen on sharing with women they meet the second(third, etc) go round.. Plus with kids and potentially grand kids there is plenty already in his pocket..
> 
> I think when people say that "men peak at this age", it may not be that they actually peaked in the physical sense, but that their options of available women goes up substantially...
> 
> Your or anyone's mileage may vary...


That's true, but women who are interested in money are stupid this way. They look at what a guy has, not what he might be willing to spend.

FWIW, when I divorced at 44 I had a lot of men start showing up so apparently a 40 something women can in fact be popular. My current bf just got to me right away and we hit it off, but I had men I'd known for a long time show interest. I had no idea they'd ever noticed me.

It's probably because I spend a lot of time in athletic circles...it's an enclosed community in many ways. If we split up I could have another guy quickly if I wanted.

That's why I keep recommending that single women hit athletic clubs.

Did I have more options as a younger woman? I honestly don't remember, but I cam say there's not been a time in my adult life that I've had trouble finding interested men. I don't look for them....they find me.

Besides...I only need one at a time.


----------



## Al_Bundy

lifeistooshort said:


> That's true, but women who are interested in money are stupid this way. They look at what a guy has, not what he might be willing to spend.
> 
> FWIW, when I divorced at 44 I had a lot of men start showing up so apparently a 40 something women can in fact be popular. My current bf just got to me right away and we hit it off, but I had men I'd known for a long time show interest. I had no idea they'd ever noticed me.
> 
> It's probably because I spend a lot of time in athletic circles...it's an enclosed community in many ways. If we split up I could have another guy quickly if I wanted.
> 
> That's why I keep recommending that single women hit athletic clubs.
> 
> Did I have more options as a younger woman? I honestly don't remember, but I cam say there's not been a time in my adult life that I've had trouble finding interested men. I don't look for them....they find me.
> 
> Besides...I only need one at a time.


Just taking care of yourself and being athletic helps set you apart too. For men and women. You can't buy a nice body so that says something about the person without them even opening their mouth.


----------



## Diana7

ccpowerslave said:


> But the article!!!
> 
> 
> 
> 😭


😂


----------



## joannacroc

lifeistooshort said:


> Yeah, I don't believe men peak at 50 either. That's something men tell themselves to feel good.
> 
> I suppose it could be true among a certain demographic of women that are looking for money because I can believe that men are topping out their earning potential around that age. But that's only going to create a business deal where she takes his money and looks at men her own age.
> 
> Don't get me wrong....I love 50 something year old men who tale care of themselves....but that's because I'm 47. My bf is 55 and he's adorable, but let's not pretend any of us are peaking at this age.
> 
> It's true women don't like to hurt feelings but I also think many women like the idea of being the more desirable partner....it's good for their self esteem.
> 
> I have a cousin like this. She married a guy who was extremely obese (she's not). Beyond the weight he's a nice looking guy and neat to talk to. He's 14 years older then her but 4 years older then me.
> 
> I've chatted with him and I can see why one would enjoy his company, but the weight would be a deal breaker for me. He absolutely adores her.
> 
> *Well he had weight loss surgery and she kept cooking him all of the crap he's not supposed to have. I think she's very conflicted because while I do believe she loves him and wants him healthy she also doesn't want other women looking. If he gets to a healthy weight he's going to have options and she knows it.
> 
> Not saying he'd take them...he seems devoted to her....but i think she felt secure knowing he didn't have any other options.*


I thought my xbf loved me and I don't know if he was doing it subsconsciously but I now believe he was trying to make me less attractive to other men. He kept buying donuts and stuff like every week and I would ask him not to get them because I eat them and then gain weight. He bought me clothes that were uniquely unflattering, tried to get me to let him cut my hair and persuaded me to stop wearing makeup. It may be love of a sort, but some people don't want their partner to be a viable option for others. Maybe on some level they first picked them because they thought they were "safe" and it makes them feel insecure if they are attractive others...


----------



## Al_Bundy

joannacroc said:


> I thought my xbf loved me and I don't know if he was doing it subsconsciously but I now believe he was trying to make me less attractive to other men. He kept buying donuts and stuff like every week and I would ask him not to get them because I eat them and then gain weight. He bought me clothes that were uniquely unflattering, tried to get me to let him cut my hair and persuaded me to stop wearing makeup. It may be love of a sort, but some people don't want their partner to be a viable option for others. Maybe on some level they first picked them because they thought they were "safe" and it makes them feel insecure if they are attractive others...


I've experienced that where they start to interfere with the very things they found attractive in the first place. Why do you go to the gym so much? Do you have to work this weekend?


----------



## joannacroc

Al_Bundy said:


> I've experienced that where they start to interfere with the very things they found attractive in the first place. Why do you go to the gym so much? Do you have to work this weekend?


I don't go to the gym, I run outside. Yeah, a little. It's running up to the end of the schoolyear so there's always tons to do. How about you?


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## Jamieboy

My wife buys so much chocolate when she knows I can't resist 😋😫


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## Hiner112

hamadryad said:


> Like it or not, they are looking because they are out there...For all guys? probably not...but a good percentage can play in that sandbox..
> 
> Most "good" guys her age can easily attract women in their 30's and 40's....Heck even a lot of the "duds" can...lol
> 
> I know nothing of OLD..Nor would I ever do it...As a guy, it's effing embarrassing...Sorry, no disrespect to anyone, just my personal opinion.. No decent guy should ever have to do it.. Available women are everywhere, especially at this age.. I don't really understand what's so hard about this.
> 
> A buddy of mine is about the age of your friend.. After he got out of his marriage, he did OLD.. He has a decent personality and probably considered "fun" by some women's measure, but he's not good looking, not fit, etc,...picture a biker type with a gut and no money.. Anyway, he was pumping and dumping at a rate of like 2 a month for almost a year and a half...He'd show me pics of these women...most younger, some...meh...others not too bad...All on "legitimate" sites like Match, etc..He eventually found someone that he seems happy with...woman in her early 40's, size 2/4, and not bad looking at all..I am not excusing or glorifying what he did, I would never do it, but the point being, if he could do it, what would a guy that age, with a good body, intellect, and some financial security be worth?
> 
> Problem as I see it, is that for better or worse, women are still judged primarily by looks/body...If you are a woman at that age, it's tough to maintain that and guys that age may not be much better in the physical sense, but they get extra points for other stuff and women aren't as particular in those areas..
> 
> Women get the edge when younger, men get the edge later...It all balances out, really...


Kind of judgey. Which is ironic considering the next quote which tries to make it seem like you wouldn't judge your brother for being on OLD.



hamadryad said:


> I dunno....it just does...(shrug)
> 
> When my brother got divorced, I didn't ask nor care what he was doing in his personal life...When I saw one of my single female cousins at a funeral she mentioned that she saw my brother on the dating site she was on...When I saw my brother I mentioned the story, not to break his balls, but just a matter of conversation.. His face turned red, and he deleted the profile immediately...
> 
> So I guess I am not the only one?
> 
> I'm not knocking it, it just would never be something id ever do...Also, there is a lot of "intangibles" that I think guys probably get cheated of on OLD...You can't ever see a guys confidence and self assuredness on a dating profile...You would have to see them in action and in person..That aura could never be shown and many guys who aren't particularly good looking do very well with women based on that...


On some level online dating feels like desperation or failure. It is an admission that you can't or haven't been able to find someone in real life. There's no one that was waiting on your relationship to fail or just heard you were now available and contacted you.




Girl_power said:


> I wish there was something built in the APP that we can see a list of people that MATCH our desirability… I think that will humble a lot of people and be good for everyone all around.


Maybe when you're left swiping on someone slightly more desirable or right swiping on someone way, way more desirable, it would ask if you were sure. It would also alienate way too many of the people using the app because they know "I can do better".



Lila said:


> I see what you're saying. I like to think that my generation is ****ed but hopefully my son's generation will have a better time of it. Only time tells.


I'm pretty convinced that the shopping and abundance of choice mentality is going to get worse.



hamadryad said:


> Fair point....
> 
> But consider this aspect....
> 
> Most women I know would love a nice relationship at any age (unless they already have one)...heck I know a lot of available women my age that still want a fancy wedding(even if not their first) a shore house, a Labrador Retriever and a Range Rover....Most guys are NOT thinking along these lines at this life stage...They are more like "what's hers is her's and what's mine is mine" and no way in hell do they want to do all that fancy stuff and spend that kind of money any more..
> 
> The other thing, and this is big...is that once a guy at this stage loses his sexual appetite and or can't get it up, then they most likely bow out of the dating pool....A lot of these guys are good prospects, but without that element, then there is no longer any reason to chase women anymore...I don't think women view this the same..,.In fact a lot of women out there at this age want relationships with men where sex isn't a priority....Its the total opposite thinking of many guys...


If I was looking for a roommate or just someone to hang out with, I would probably look for another guy to be honest. I would expect the relationship to be a lot less effort and less likely to involve conflict.


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## Gomezaddams51

I found my second wife on a dating site. I was on there for a few years and I think she was on there for about 5 years before we met online. She lived in Sacramento and I lived in Las Vegas so we commuted for quite a while. She was taking care of her parents and after 3 years both had died so she moved down to be with me. She is legally blind and 5 years younger than me (She is 65 I am 70 presently. She was 55 and I was 60 then.) We were both perfectly happy not getting married, but then she had some health problems and didn't have any medical insurance so I married her so she could use my insurance. 

Back in my 40's I had a number of younger girlfriends, ranging from a 19 year old Goth Bi-Sexual Witch to other women who were at least 10 to 20 years younger than me. When I hit my 50's I noticed that my options were starting to get harder to find although I did have one heck of a fling with a married 33 year old who had 4 kids. She kept wanting us to ride off into the sunset on my Harley. She said she would leave her kids and husband for me. After we split up, she found another younger guy and took off with him. As I neared 60 I went to all the typical meeting places, groups, hobby groups, Meet-ups, Singles Groups, etc. Signed up on a dating site, etc. and had no luck. I made a lot of female friends who all lived clear across the country but got nothing locally. Finally my present wife "winked" at me and we started talking online and then I went to visit her. She was the closest female to me so I grabbed her so to speak. Since she is blind, (she can see a little bit) I was probably her last options....

One of the problems I had was I like things that way younger guys and way younger females like mostly due to the 19 year old who took me to Gay Clubs and Goth Clubs and introduced me to WICCA. I love Goth music, Pagan religions, bands that are nowhere near the 60's & 70's bands (or country) that most women my age like such as metal bands and foreign bands that most people have never heard of. When I let women my age know my likes they drop me like a hot potato. I did go on a websites for what is called "Elder Goths" (Where old Goths go to die) but most of them are in Europe so no luck there. 

That is why I chose my present wife. She is still stuck in the 1960's music wise but I have gotten her to like a few of the bands I like like LORDI and Voltaire and got her to go to a Goth club a few times. Her birthday is two days before mine on the 12th, mine is the 14th so we got married on the 13th. For the most part we get along pretty well, oh we have our fusses and fights and I get aggravated she will not listen to my music or watch my TV shows and movies I like, (she is into the Ghost TV shows and Space Aliens) but we haven't killed each other yet LOL.


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## Gomezaddams51

Oh forgot to add to my post, when I was doing the online dating, there was a section for people looking to "hook up". I looked at it and there were like 4 or 5 females and I quit counting the guys when I got over 100. That kind of tells you something there....


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## hamadryad

Hiner112 said:


> *Kind of judgey. * Which is ironic considering the next quote which tries to make it seem like you wouldn't judge your brother for being on OLD.
> 
> 
> 
> On some level online dating feels like desperation or failure. It is an admission that you can't or haven't been able to find someone in real life. There's no one that was waiting on your relationship to fail or just heard you were now available and contacted you.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Maybe when you're left swiping on someone slightly more desirable or right swiping on someone way, way more desirable, it would ask if you were sure. It would also alienate way too many of the people using the app because they know "I can do better".
> 
> 
> 
> I'm pretty convinced that the shopping and abundance of choice mentality is going to get worse.
> 
> 
> 
> If I was looking for a roommate or just someone to hang out with, I would probably look for another guy to be honest. I would expect the relationship to be a lot less effort and less likely to involve conflict.


I clearly stated that I am not knocking it...I don't like onions or coffee either, and can have a strongly negative opinion about it, but I don't "judge" anyone that does...If they take it as such, well...I don't know what to tell them...(shrug)..

I dunno....I guess one thing that has me thinking is that there are probably a lot of people out there that don't really interact all that much with other people in their daily lives...So they don't get those opportunities that others may have...Other people, myself included, interact with a ton of people in work and business endeavors...This definitely puts those at an advantage...They are meeting people that already kind of "know them" and may have already established a platonic/business relationship...A lot easier to break the ice and pre qualify in those cases..


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## Elizabeth001

hamadryad said:


> I clearly stated that I am not knocking it...I don't like onions or coffee either, and can have a strongly negative opinion about it, but I don't "judge" anyone that does...If they take it as such, well...I don't know what to tell them...(shrug)..
> 
> I dunno....I guess one thing that has me thinking is that there are probably a lot of people out there that don't really interact all that much with other people in their daily lives...So they don't get those opportunities that others may have...Other people, myself included, interact with a ton of people in work and business endeavors...This definitely puts those at an advantage...They are meeting people that already kind of "know them" and may have already established a platonic/business relationship...A lot easier to break the ice and pre qualify in those cases..


I just want to say that I absolutely LOVE onions…I’ll eat them on almost anything! If it gets any worse, I’ll be able to eat one like an apple! I also drink coffee all day until  



I am also super introverted and am pretty much stuck in a basement all day at a university so I definitely do not get the opportunity to meet anyone organically. 

That being said, OLD sucks ASS. I can only take it for so long and then I go dark. I’ve been on this time for about 4 months and it’s more of a joke and a diversion from the boredom of work just clearing the notifications. My take is that it’s too superficial with the swiping and also to akin to online shopping (such has been discussed to death).

HAYYYYYY… perhaps there should be an option for leaving date reviews! 

True to height/weight
Current photos
Activity scale 1-10
etc….




Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


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## ccpowerslave

Lol dating Yelp. That would be brutal.

I can’t imagine how many one star “small package” reviews there would be on it.


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## Elizabeth001

ccpowerslave said:


> Lol dating Yelp. That would be brutal.
> 
> I can’t imagine how many one star “small package” reviews there would be on it.


Go start the app now! Just remember where you heard it and don’t forget me! lol 


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


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## ccpowerslave

Elizabeth001 said:


> Go start the app now! Just remember where you heard it and don’t forget me! lol
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


I think I could probably make a decent one in a couple weeks if I worked on it full time. I wonder if that would be popular.


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## Diana7

Elizabeth001 said:


> I just want to say that I absolutely LOVE onions…I’ll eat them on almost anything! If it gets any worse, I’ll be able to eat one like an apple! I also drink coffee all day until
> 
> 
> 
> I am also super introverted and am pretty much stuck in a basement all day at a university so I definitely do not get the opportunity to meet anyone organically.
> 
> That being said, OLD sucks ASS. I can only take it for so long and then I go dark. I’ve been on this time for about 4 months and it’s more of a joke and a diversion from the boredom of work just clearing the notifications. My take is that it’s too superficial with the swiping and also to akin to online shopping (such has been discussed to death).
> 
> HAYYYYYY… perhaps there should be an option for leaving date reviews!
> 
> True to height/weight
> Current photos
> Activity scale 1-10
> etc….
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk


Must admit that when I was on OLD, there were none of these awful sites where you just swipe based on photos etc.
I guess you have to be very choosey about the sites you go on.
I didn't go on any international ones nor free ones.
Like you I was limited in who I met in my day to day life, especially as a single mum.


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## heartsbeating

ccpowerslave said:


> Lol dating Yelp. That would be brutal.
> 
> I can’t imagine how many one star “small package” reviews there would be on it.


Brutal indeed... kinda made me think of that episode of Black Mirror where everyone ranks each other.

What's it like too (without really knowing anything about online dating) if someone 'swipes' quite regularly with others (as in wants to connect... gawd I don't know what I'm talking about) but receives few connections back? I'd imagine one needs to have a pretty relaxed attitude to not end up feeling like crap. Or am I missing how this works entirely  . Or maybe does that in a way translate to if one was approaching another in a physical space aka offline and just accepting of hits and misses?


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## ccpowerslave

heartsbeating said:


> Brutal indeed... kinda made me think of that episode of Black Mirror where everyone ranks each other.


The most Black Mirror moment I have had is “remote controlling” my Instacart shopper on my phone where they’re taking pictures of two salsas and I tell them first one or second one. I was doing it without even noticing and then thinking...geez this is a bit off.


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## Enigma32

heartsbeating said:


> What's it like too (without really knowing anything about online dating) if someone 'swipes' quite regularly with others (as in wants to connect... gawd I don't know what I'm talking about) but receives few connections back? I'd imagine one needs to have a pretty relaxed attitude to not end up feeling like crap. Or am I missing how this works entirely  . Or maybe does that in a way translate to if one was approaching another in a physical space aka offline and just accepting of hits and misses?


The Tinder experience for most regular guys is as you describe right here and yeah, it does make a man feel some kinda way about himself. The popular advice given to men on the swiping sites is to literally swipe right on every single female (which means you like her) and then just see who swipes right on you, thus making a match. I am not even a bad looking guy, pretty average I'd say, and I had only a handful of matches on Tinder when I used it last, and that's after swiping right on hundreds of women.


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## Lila

Elizabeth001 said:


> HAYYYYYY… perhaps there should be an option for leaving date reviews!
> 
> True to height/weight
> Current photos
> Activity scale 1-10
> etc….
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk





ccpowerslave said:


> Lol dating Yelp. That would be brutal.
> 
> I can’t imagine how many one star “small package” reviews there would be on it.


I vaguely recall an app a while back that had a similar reviews system. Unfortunately, it didn't last long. Everyone had really low ratings not because they were particularly unattractive or bad people, but because most left negative reviews if there was no connection (even if there was nothing particularly "wrong" with the person).


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## Lila

heartsbeating said:


> Brutal indeed... kinda made me think of that episode of Black Mirror where everyone ranks each other.
> 
> What's it like too (without really knowing anything about online dating) if someone 'swipes' quite regularly with others (as in wants to connect... gawd I don't know what I'm talking about) but receives few connections back? I'd imagine one needs to have a pretty relaxed attitude to not end up feeling like crap. Or am I missing how this works entirely  . Or maybe does that in a way translate to if one was approaching another in a physical space aka offline and just accepting of hits and misses?


Did you ever watch an American competition series called "Are You Hot?". It lasted all of 6 episodes before being cancelled. It was American Idol for physical attractiveness. 

I remember watching part of the first episode where thousands of people across the country "tried out" to be on this show. That episode was online dating if online dating were a tv show.


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## heartsbeating

Lila said:


> I vaguely recall an app a while back that had a similar reviews system. Unfortunately, it didn't last long. Everyone had really low ratings not because they were particularly unattractive or bad people, but because most left negative reviews if there was no connection (even if there was nothing particularly "wrong" with the person).


Well, if dates were being ‘positively reviewed’ then I’d imagine most would want to keep dating one another rather than leaving a positive review and on to the next person? Unless a completely casual set up was at play.


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## heartsbeating

Lila said:


> Did you ever watch an American competition series called "Are You Hot?". It lasted all of 6 episodes before being cancelled. It was American Idol for physical attractiveness.
> 
> I remember watching part of the first episode where thousands of people across the country "tried out" to be on this show. That episode was online dating if online dating were a tv show.


I don’t think I did… sounds awful though!


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## heartsbeating

Enigma32 said:


> The Tinder experience for most regular guys is as you describe right here and yeah, it does make a man feel some kinda way about himself. The popular advice given to men on the swiping sites is to literally swipe right on every single female (which means you like her) and then just see who swipes right on you, thus making a match. I am not even a bad looking guy, pretty average I'd say, and I had only a handful of matches on Tinder when I used it last, and that's after swiping right on hundreds of women.


Initially I read this and thought it sounds quite brutal and off-putting …however I do know a number of women who met their now husbands / LTR through online dating. I guess an advantage with the approach you mentioned is this couldn’t be an offline approach in that I’d imagine it unlikely for a woman to be receptive to a man whom she physically sees approaching woman after woman in one sitting at a bar or hobby group.

Anyway, for those who utilise online dating as an avenue that suits them then props to ya, as I’ll be honest, if I found myself in an alternate universe, I couldn’t even imagine having to select a couple of photos of self (despite that I can kinda scrub up okay) and writing a profile. I know it’s a normalised path these days, and which some peers have undertaken, however, I can only imagine how it must feel to take that first step and hit ‘upload’ (or whatever button is pressed haha). Yeah, props to you if you took that step and navigated it as a way to secure a date.


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