Earlier quoted context omitted.
That is the only way out on a local, personal level, since that's all we have much control over. But how is it not the app's fault? When Twitter and Facebook create social dynamics that encourage outrage and division, I blame them (or at least I blame the incentives and systems that cause them to do this). Ditto for the impact that these dating apps are having.
> But how is it not the app's fault? How is it? Like, okay, what's the alternative? I genuinely don't understand the criticism beyond "well, self-described low-status men are getting passed over because people have options ." Should they not be getting passed over? Should people be taking one for the team for these self-described low-status men and dating them despite themselves? There have always been lonely people,…
The criticism is similar in nature to the criticism of Twitter and Facebook. These apps play to and encourage the worst side of humans in the way that their social dynamics are designed, which distorts relations between people for the worse.
In the case of dating apps, it's because the "first meeting" is viewing someone's curated digital profile instead of getting to know their full self in the real world, they strongly encourage selection based on trivialities like height, hip to waist ratio, income and other signals. You also encourage the same narcissistic performance games that Instagram encourages. It's also the sheer deluge of profiles. Like, our dopamine system isn't designed for that, and nor is it a fully free choice when the app has exploited that evolved system to hook users. And what's going to be the impact of designing a system that makes it easy for people to self select into opposing political tribes?
Of course most of this stuff happened to an extent 15 years ago too. But as with Facebook and their tendency to stoke outrage and division, the problem is how the app has turbocharged our worse tendencies while also creating dilemma like incentives that make it tricky to opt out from.
My point about low status men is that they often aren't bad mates. They're low status through the prism of hyper gamified dating apps that magnify the importance of trivialities. There's no question that there's people who've had it worse in this regard in the pre-dating app era (various low-caste/untouchables types in different societies), my point isn't that we are at rock bottom, just that dating apps are a pretty large step in the wrong direction.