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Impersonators who are paid to flirt on dating apps

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Re: Impersonators who are paid to flirt on dating apps

#231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Real stroke of genius would be making prostitution legal, and family a big deal. It'd solve men's natural urges, and women's constant insecurity that they're going to be abandoned, once they get wrinkles. It'd remove so much undisclosed resentment and tension within families and society. It'd free up people involved in billions upon billions of dollars worth of industry, to do something useful, instead of preying on…

Prostitution is legal in New Zealand and we have exactly the same problems with dating culture that people have been commenting about here.

I'm sure there are problems within dating culture - my point is 'dating culture' is itself the problem.

See my point about family values. Families are longterm. Dating is by definition short term.

People don't like short term human interactions - we want stability. We don't want new friends every few weeks, or a new job, or a new anything. We don't like change, we like change every now and again, in things that don't matter, like seeing a new movie or going to a new restaurant.

Modern societies are in a strange place where whatever is most profitable (except hard drugs), is what is 'good'. Candy? Good. Tinder? Good. Coffee? Good. 'Working hard'? Good.

It's a vector that has nothing to do with what people actually value longterm. Hence people have 'stuff' and companies have 'profit' (short term), neither have much integrity (longterm). Oh well :)

Re: Impersonators who are paid to flirt on dating apps

#232

Honestly if you're lazy enough to rely on the superficialness of online dating apps like Tinder, you're already in a gray area. If you're judging people purely by looks (which would be an inefficiency since in real life in person looks aren't as important), then someone else is justified in re-balancing that inefficiency by doing something like hiring a text writer.

> looks aren't as important That's not true for the majority. Looks are the first signal you notice of the other person. Unless you are after poets, artists or other people whose work reach other people without "the looks" then I don't see how - even subconsciously - it's not important. Pics are furthermore do indicate personality. I agree that Tinder is an industrial scale meat grinder, but the advantage is that wid…

The thing about Tinder that sucks is that you don't get a very good idea about a person from it, because all you get is a few pictures and if you're lucky, a very short free-form text session where hopefully they wrote something substantive about themselves.

However, the thing that makes Tinder great (and also Bumble, though I haven't tried that one yet) is that both parties must "like" each other for any messaging to occur. This still isn't the norm on "traditional" dating sites, for some reason. The traditional sites are bad for men, because they're encouraged to put forth a lot of effort to write meaningful messages to women, but almost all the effort is simply wasted because most of them go to women that have no interest in those men, and the man has no way of knowing this.

Tinder/Bumble fix this by forcing the woman to "like" a man's profile first, before he wastes any time and effort writing her a message. It also helps women by massively reducing the amount of unwanted messages they receive from men: if they get unwanted messages, it's partly their fault (and entirely under their control) for "liking" those men, and encourages them to be more selective with their right-swipes (so maybe they'll come up with some strategies for avoiding creeps, such as only right-swiping people with something meaningful written in their profile, and not just guys with gym selfies and backwards ball caps).

Re: Impersonators who are paid to flirt on dating apps

#233
post #56
post #26

I figured something like this would exist, but I don't think it's very useful. I've walked the dark path of trying to implement "pickup artist" material(can't imagine that'll be received well), and I can say that: A) an objective approach works (if you're humble and willing to recognize/adjust for failure) B) there's a torrent of snake oil out there C) you learn a lot when you try this stuff. A lot. A lot of that mat…

> C) you learn a lot when you try this stuff. A lot. It basically teaches you how to do sales and run a lead-to-conversion pipeline.

I knew a guy who ran his own personal CRM.

Re: Impersonators who are paid to flirt on dating apps

#234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I honestly feel that IRL, height is less important than a lot of people think. I'm a 5'5 man.

It is ultimately superficial once someone knows more about you, but that doesn't stop people from setting it as their pre-filter before they see what they truly want. You ask people to improve the carriage, they'll tell you to make a faster horse. If you ask a woman what they want, they'll tell you tall dark and handsome.

Dark?

Re: Impersonators who are paid to flirt on dating apps

#235

> As we grow accustomed to foisting more and more complicated emotional tasks onto digital butlers, we lose our ability to tolerate inelegance or find value in social failure. Moments of awkwardness and heartbreak are an inevitable part of the dating experience, and they are essential in our evolution into mature adults. That is a very recent, Western view of finding a partner. For much of history, and even now in la…

The main problem with the non-Western version (epitomized probably by how it's done in India) is that it enforces a very high degree of social conformity: everyone must have the same relationship model, and the same life goals (monogamous marriage, children, etc.), with very little room for variation.

It's impossible I think to say either one is "better", unless you can specify what exactly your goal as a society is. If your goal is a very stable society with everyone following the traditional monogamous marriage + kids path, and minimizing divorce, it seems that the Indian way probably produces better results. If you desire more freedom as an individual, it doesn't.

Re: Impersonators who are paid to flirt on dating apps

#236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's an interesting definition of "trying harder". I think the person employing that strategy would quickly find that it doesn't work as well as some other ways of trying harder. Those could include: Inhabiting different environments. E.g. a female friend suggested I take up yoga as yoga classes tend to be more/mostly female. Within a few classes I was dating a woman I met there. "Putting it out there" by which I m…

> That's an interesting definition of "trying harder". See also: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16898821 > I think the person employing that strategy would quickly find that it doesn't work as well as some other ways of trying harder. You'd think, but in practice, not always. Aren't humans amazing? I think if we're being prescriptive, I think working towards a culture where all parties involved do both choosing…

The population imbalance in China/India is a separate issue.

>Aren't humans amazing?

I wasn't suggesting it's not tried. Simply that it's unlikely to be successful and thus will find fewer adherents.

>working towards a culture where all parties involved do both choosing and trying

This happens already. Women pursue men all the time, they just don't have to expend as much energy as men do.

Re: Impersonators who are paid to flirt on dating apps

#237
post #218
post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you think that flirting can be mistaken as sexual harassment then that tells me you have no idea how to flirt.

Any sort of flirting in a workplace can backfire on your face. Just takes one person to take it the wrong way and you’re shown the door. That’s why there is a famous saying “Don’t shit where you eat”. Workplace relationships seldom end well.

Well, yeah, context is a thing.

Flirting in criminal court and at funerals are also probably bad ideas.

Re: Impersonators who are paid to flirt on dating apps

#238
post #218
post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you think that flirting can be mistaken as sexual harassment then that tells me you have no idea how to flirt.

Any sort of flirting in a workplace can backfire on your face. Just takes one person to take it the wrong way and you’re shown the door. That’s why there is a famous saying “Don’t shit where you eat”. Workplace relationships seldom end well.

Well, yes, you're right. Knowing when it's ok to flirt is part of knowing how to flirt. I'm not sure what your point is beyond the obvious: people go to work to get paid, not to find dates. Flirt elsewhere.

Re: Impersonators who are paid to flirt on dating apps

#239
post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I’ve long wondered is how women react in the real world now that they have all the power on dating apps. Why would they try to find a date in any other way? There were a few articles that came out a few years ago arguing that, no, dating apps were terrible for women because it makes men even more noncommittal with such easy access to dates. My hypothesis was that the women they interviewed for those pieces were…

No, it’s rather devastating for female sanity. It gives them the illusion of choice, and many women build false expectations, feeling that they could settle with any of those Don Juans, which is false. When they hit the wall at 30, they start noticing that the top 10% men keep dating the younger ones, and they’ll never be able to settle with a Perfect Man anymore. Enters depression and weight gain and they settle wit…

I get the impression you've never actually spoken to a woman in your life.

Re: Impersonators who are paid to flirt on dating apps

#240
post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It took me half a lifetime to realize this, but you are correct. It's the man's job to try, and it's the woman's job to choose. It's honestly changed the way I think about relationships.

with most animals, it is the male that pursues and the female that chooses. i honestly cannot think of an exception to this pattern.

Not really. This is old thinking. The theory of sexual selection has been evolving in the past few years.

BBC has a good intro on the subject: http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20160624-we-have-the-wrong-id...

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