Dating Apps, Detachment, and the Illusion of Connection
After a long relationship of nearly five years, I felt like I had failed — as if life no longer wanted to align with my plan to get married and start my own family.
I wanted to take action, and even though I had always told myself I would never do it, I decided to join a dating app.
Not in a dramatic way.
I just didn’t like the idea of reducing people to profiles and decisions to swipes.
The First Step Felt Wrong
At first, it was very uncomfortable.
I saw people who knew me and whom I knew:
- Friends
- Coworkers
- People I respected
Then I thought, maybe this is the new and modern way of getting to know someone — and that seeing someone cute and asking them out on the street is simply an outdated approach.
So I tried it.
And I wasn’t prepared for how bad it was.
The First Shock: How Easy It Is to Disappear
As a teenager, I never had issues with girls.
I was that romantic, emotional kid — singing, playing guitar, being friendly, and generally understanding what to do and when.
That version of dating no longer existed.
When I joined a dating app, I realized something unsettling:
You enter an app filled with faces you don’t know, and it becomes even worse when people write nothing about themselves — as if they have no identity at all.
There’s nothing to start from.
OkCupid: Hope With a Catchy Name
The first app I tried was OkCupid.
It sounds promising.
Like some modern Cupid is about to match you with the love of your life based on an absurd number of questions.
The opposite turned out to be true.
The app is built in a way that can easily drive people insane.
- Messages don’t always notify you reliably
- You find yourself constantly refreshing the app
- Ghosting and impulsive unmatches are everywhere
When you first join, you get an extreme boost. People start liking you.
What nobody tells you:
- A. It’s temporary
- B. Many of those likes aren’t even from your country (Passport users)
At some point, you start feeling desperate.
You can’t find the people who supposedly liked you.
So you start liking almost everyone — just to see who might like you back.
That shattered the experience for me.
I took a break.
Returning With Doubt: Bumble
After some time, I returned and tried again — this time with Bumble.
The experience felt different.
- You’re encouraged to build more character into your profile
- You’re required to upload more photos
- Women message first (or at least, that was the idea)
At first, it felt refreshing.
But reality kicked in quickly.
I had:
- Matches where women never messaged at all
- Matches that expired silently
- Instant unmatches with no explanation
- Conversations that started with “Hi” and ended nowhere
Later in 2024, Bumble introduced “Opening Moves”, effectively killing the only concept that made the platform unique by shifting initiation back to men.
But I want to be clear:
I’m not here to shame anyone.
I’m here to share what I discovered.
When Dating Turned Into Research
At some point, I realized something uncomfortable.
I had become dependent on dating apps and had almost completely stopped asking women out in real life — because apps felt “simpler.”
Still, the system felt rigged.
Most people seemed to be there for:
- Attention
- Validation
- Followers
I’ve been deeply interested in solving problems since I was around twelve years old, so I treated this like a system worth understanding.
I started analyzing patterns:
- How people respond to different tones
- How much information is “too much”
- Whether kindness is rewarded
- Whether confidence is misread as arrogance
Not to manipulate — but to understand.
Eventually, I realized most of it didn’t even matter.
Region matters.
Looks matter.
Culture matters.
In one country, you’re invisible.
In another, you suddenly have options.
And the system offers no transparency, no guidance, and no reassurance that you’re even playing the right game.
Then I Paid — and Things Made Less Sense
Eventually, I received a discounted offer for OkCupid Premium.
I asked myself: What does this actually give me?
I checked Reddit and found things like:
- “Premium slows down your exposure”
- “If your profile is bad, premium won’t help”
- “Super likes just make you look desperate”
So I tested it.
I bought Bumble Boost and OkCupid Premium.
I used:
- Super likes aggressively
- Constant right swipes
- Priority likes
The results were surprising.
On OkCupid, out of roughly 30 likes, 17 were from the Philippines — not remotely relevant matches.
Premium didn’t bring me closer to love.
What it did give me was:
- Constant FOMO
- The illusion of endless options
- Access to numbers without meaning
Ironically, paying for premium was when I had almost no relevant options at all.
Two Different Struggles, Same Result
I realized I was only seeing one side of the story.
So I started asking women about their experiences.
And yes — I did go on dates.
I wasn’t completely unsuccessful.
What I learned:
- Dating apps feel like a race for many men
- The gender ratio is skewed (roughly 60–70% men)
- Competition makes people feel replaceable
Women, on the other hand:
- Receive overwhelming attention
- Can’t realistically respond to everyone
- Leave many matches unanswered by necessity
I started seeing two dominant groups:
- Those afraid the neighbor’s grass is greener
- Those hoping to find one good match and leave the apps forever
The Bigger Problem: Dating Apps Don’t Feel Real
Many people don’t want to use dating apps — but feel they have no alternative.
Men rarely approach women face to face anymore.
People hesitate to open up to strangers.
Suddenly, things I would never obsess over in real life mattered:
- Filtered photos
- Tiny physical details
- One-line belief labels
- Profiles over presence
In real life, you meet someone and feel something.
Online, everything is:
- Pre-judged
- Labeled
- Filtered
- Abstracted
It feels like everyone is on dating apps — yet nobody truly wants to be there.
Connection starts to feel theoretical.
I Wanted to Fix It — Then I Realized I Don’t Have the Answer
At some point, I asked myself:
Can this be done better?
I explored ideas.
Rules.
Incentives.
Structures.
But the deeper I went, the clearer something became.
The problem might not just be dating apps.
The problem might be that we’re trying to digitize something deeply human — emotional, irrational, unpredictable — and then monetize the friction that comes with it.
So Here’s the Real Question
Do we need another dating app?
Or do we need to rethink what we’re even trying to solve?
Because what we have now doesn’t feel like it’s helping people connect.
It feels like it’s teaching them to detach.
And that might be the most concerning part of all.
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