Tinder, kills 99.9% of online dating shame

If you haven’t already heard, straight Grindr has arrived. (Or at least a more successful version of Blendr. If you haven’t heard of it before, that explains why!) Its name is Tinder, and for the past few weeks has been serving as a vicarious source of entertainment in my life.

According to Tinder brand manager Joshua Metz, the app is downloaded more than 1000 times a day in Australia.

In a society where how you both met is still held to scrutiny, Tinder has managed to secure itself that sweet little territory between the social acceptance of meeting someone face-to-face, and the still lingering social embarrassment of online dating. That it all takes place on an app somehow makes it all okay.

Perhaps it’s the minimal effort (swipe left for no, swipe right for yes) that makes people so blasé about using it. Compared to the tediousness of subscribing to usually paid online dating sites and crafting the perfect profile, Tinder almost seems like an accidental slip of the finger to download.

"I don’t take it seriously, it’s just funny."

"I use it as a joke. I think it’s hilarious."

However, that people still find it necessary to defend their intentions exposes how some discomfort still remains when it comes to meeting people online. 

So despite anecdotal evidence that most people are only in it for a laugh, there are some brave customers actually using the product for its intended purpose. Like my friend, Laura*.

She’s 24, and has no qualms about telling her close friends where she met the guy she’s currently dating. He, on the other hand found it necessary to clarify on their first date that he doesn’t usually do things like ‘this’ i.e. meet up with randoms from Tinder for coffee. Despite them by now having gone on a few dates and talking everyday, none of his friends or family know how they really met.

Trying to see things from his end, I suggested that maybe his shame lay in the peculiarity of dating someone from an app stereotypically associated with booty calls. That some people assume a certain level of promiscuity of Tinder users might cause them to question the nature of any relationships that come out of it.

For my other friends, it’s a non-confronting way of easing back onto the dating scene. Tinder allows you to be as brutal as you want while you play God on who gets the honour of a possibility to message you (should they like you too). Plus, since those you rejected will never know you passed on them, and inversely the identities of those who rejected you – egos need only worry about what to do with all those mutual attractions.

The fact that I’ve chosen to enjoy Tinder vicariously rather than downloading the damn thing myself brings me to the issue of Tinder etiquette.

Is it wrong to actively use the app, albeit as a ‘joke,’ if you’re already in a relationship?

If you’re lucky enough to have reaped the product benefits of Tinder and managed to start dating someone (actual sex not withstanding), should you stop using the app?

For a hilarious yet useful list of Tinder Do’s and Don’ts, check out 10 tips on how to get a date using Tinder.

Will you join the growing number of Australians giving online dating stereotypes and expectations the Tinder Finger? Perhaps you already have? Any stories, share them below!

Love, Noeline

xox

Walk of Shame or Stride of Pride?

I made a friend in Spain who, at the end of every night would have up to three different guys fighting over who got to walk her home. Not kiss her. Not fuck her. But to simply be the guy responsible for getting her home safe.

In the meantime, the other girls walked home alone after one-night stands, or from repetitive sex with their fallback of an amante (Spanish for lover, but the connotations are that of a fuck buddy).

And that’s the thing. Sluts don’t get walked home. (I use the term slut loosely; and wow that pun was not intended).

It’s as if they’re a super species of female somehow less privy to the cold and less prone to danger. Some men couldn’t care less how the woman they just fucked gets home, as long as they get out. Sometimes they’re asleep before she’s even started collecting her things.

Then again, maybe the sexually liberated don’t want to be escorted home – accepting it a luxury forgone of sex with no strings attached.

Is taking a girl back to her home courtesy, or a step backwards for feminism?

And what then, if they’re your boyfriend? Rain, hail or shine, a five-minute taxi or an hour trip late at night on public transport – are we big enough to look after ourselves?

Is there a difference between needing to be looked after and wanting to feel looked out for?

Love, Noeline

xox

Yes, this is real. Read the story here.

Walk of Shame Kits, anyone?

Before Social Media

I wonder how the babies of today would react when they're grown up and realise that their entire infancy has been documented and uploaded to the Internet.

Would they feel thankful for the head start given them on their social media footprint in life?

Or, after all that posing, would they consider it normal and not even question it? 

Would they, at school, struggle to comprehend why their own peers don't already have a few hundred photos posted of themselves?

Or would they feel embarrassed, self-conscious and demand that they be deleted?

All this, before they're even eligible for their own social media accounts. 

We accept the love we think we deserve

If you want to know why I haven't been blogging much, this pretty much encapsulates it.

I wish I had the time to sit back and relax and take it all in by writing it all down. That last sentence could have probably done with a few commas - but then it would no longer be an accurate representation of how it all went down in my head.

For those who didn't click the link above, let me put it this way: life is good. I mean, really good.

But if there's one thing that's been hovering around my mind recently, it's the following. Taken from The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky, it goes:

It got me thinking about frienships and relationships. How we let people treat us is a reflection of our own self-worth. People who don't think they deserve better, stay. People who think they do, attract the kind of people who will.

Love, Noeline

xox

P.S. If I'm MIA on here I'm probably active on my tumblr - gathering inspiration from quotes by literary gods and hipster photos. So check it.

Makankosappo

I grew up watching Dragon Ball Z. So naturally I was elated at this next craze known as Makankosappo. Started by a group of Japanese school girls, it mimics a supernatural fighting attack popularised by the show.

Japan

USA

See it in action in Mexico here http://bit.ly/142RV2q

Love, Noeline
xox

Public Pottering

It's the new planking/owling/brooming/Gangnam Style/Harlem Shake. Introducing the next big thing in all things viral: Public Pottering. Get on it.

Follow the Facebook page for Public Pottering here.

Love, Noeline

xox

Public, it's the new private.

It's funny how different social media channels can call for different - if not completely opposite levels of humility.

It was probably a sad day when even self-exhibitionists went with the crowd and put their Facebook profiles on private. But these egoists are resilient creatures. They found other ways of thriving.

They began posting risque thumbnails of themselves wearing close to nothing (it's just a bikini for God's sake, the fact that it shows more skin than my everyday underwear is completely beside the point). Next, they put on their humility-hat and began posting status updates complaining about all the creepy guys poking them, sending them messages and trying to add them. Have pity on me, for life is hard being this good looking.

But if you really want to see some guy's six pack, or some girl's cleavage photo-bombing her duckface - and if you want to enjoy these things in somewhat higher definition than what the Facebook thumbnail allows - chances are it's on Instagram for all to see. They will never ask how you found them or who the hell you think you are. Just keep showing them a little #instalove and they'll keep posting, so you can keep stalking. They call it 'following' now.


Keeping it real.

Noeline X

So many harlem shakes, not enough time

The Harlem Shake - MEC Australia

I love my job. Spot me on the bottom left!

Gone viral. Back in 30 seconds.

I love me my viral videos. For anyone who hasn't yet seen the harlem shake, get on it! Here's a collection of my absolute faves. You are welcome!

Love, Noeline
xox

This full stop was brought to you by copy-paste

You know you need a new macbook when you've exhausted the full stop button. It was a good run, though. We've been through a lot.

I drafted my essays for the HSC on this thing. It was so long ago that they don't even call it the HSC anymore. It went with me to Spain and back, and processed every single university assignment I ever did.

Since my last blog I've shopped in Singapore, snorkeled in Koh Phangnan, rode an elephant in Phuket, and consumed a crocodile pie during a road trip to Byron Bay. This was shortly followed by force feeding myself an emu pie. 

It was one of those instances where you do something for the satisfaction of your future self, rather than scolding your past self for not just having done it. Because really, when's the next time you'll get to eat an emu pie? Exactly.

Today was also my first day at my new job. So say hello to the Strategy & Insight Analyst at one of the world's leading media agencies! 

After all the heartache and drama of job hunting, after waves of renewed hope, followed by relapses of self doubt - it all made sense. God was saving me from positions I was settling for, so that I could have my dream role later. The kind of role I was prepared to work at for years before branching off and getting promoted into.  

I feel truly blessed now I can invest most of my energy doing something I'm passionate about; instead of going home tired from work, and waking up exhausted from all nighters just so I could keep up with uni work.

I feel blessed because I turned down a promotion from my old job - the salary of which would have been substantially more than what I make now. I had the luxury of choosing happiness over money, and I feel blessed for having the mind to choose the former.

I hope 2013 is as good to everyone else as it has been for me. Even if it means going through a few rough patches first.

Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and good night!

Love, Noeline
xox