Dating
Is Online Dating Just a Fantasy?
My single dad friend Alan — he’s the one man I quoted in my dating piece for MSN.com — just sent me this great commentary, “Don’t Dismiss Online Relationships as Fantasy,” by Regina Lynn in Wired.
Regina Lynn says:
Last month, three unrelated stories challenged the idea that internet relationships are just fantasy and therefore less important, less powerful and less real than offline relationships.
They aren’t.
She refers to the Wired magazine piece about Thomas Montgomery, a married father of two in New York state who invented two alternate identities and got both of them involved online with the 17-year-old girl persona of Mary, a forty-something married woman in West Virginia. (So creepy! I just read it.)
And the Houston Chronicle reported that one in three women who met partners through online dating sites had sex with them “on the first date” — and that 75 percent of those women didn’t use condoms.
I’ll come clean here: I wrote in my book, Single Mom Seeking, that “something about online dating seems so safe to me, with the computer serving as a chaperon, plenty of conversation but no touching.”
Very safe, indeed.
But how often did those pre-date e-mails and chats lead me quickly into the sack with some guy I barely knew?
Quite often.
I’d love to know from single parents out there who are dating online: Is online dating really just a fantasy? Do you think online dating can lead to a real relationship?
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- Are You Yourself Online?…. Is He? When my column about Jdate ran this summer in...
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4 comments for “Is Online Dating Just a Fantasy?”
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Rachel,
If it doesn’t or can’t — I’m screwed (figuratively), as it’s the only way I’ve met anyone in my almost 5 years of being a single mom. There are no singles in my area and it’s going to be a long time until I’m somewhere less geographically undesirable.
Unless of course you know of someone
I’ve actually had two good relationships from online dating (jdate) one for 10 months & my current just hit it’s 18 month mark.
I have heard LOTS of stories, of lots of players, but it was my experience that the players were more interested in the women who were NOT moms (much to my chagrin when I first started dating!)
I think you have to be careful, like anything - but it’s been good for me.
Thanks for the inspiration! Just maybe I’ll get back out there….
I’ve been trying online dating for a while now. I usually eliminate them quickly and have actually only met one in the flesh - no click there, but it felt just like a blind date a friend would have set me up on. So here’s the thing - what percentage of women sleep with men on the first date, regardless of where or how they met? I would bet the stats are the same if not a bit higher for the in-the-flesh connections made. Sure there are scary, crazy guys online but there are also scary, crazy guys in bars on the streets and in the grocery store. Just like in real life, when dating online, you have to trust your gut and watch out for red flags. Have a phone conversation first and then, like Rachel recommends, a nice coffee date in a public place.The bottom line - regardless of where you meet them the dating game is still going to be the same. It will take time and effort and there will be plenty of misses and really only a few hits. That’s why it’s so tiring!
I don’t think it’s a fantasy. These men are real - that’s for sure. But your odds of making a connection may not be higher than they are by meeting someone randomly. And being completely alone with my son gives me very few options to meet men. Dating online gives me hope that there are at least some available men out there still.