“Zombie Dating”

by Zoë Pollock

Sam Biddle discovered that he's the OK Cupid asshole who is better at cyber flings than real-life dating:

OK Cupid (and the rest of the bunch) abstract the human element away from love and sex. And that's fine! Desirable at times, even. We're living in an abstracted age, where conversations are condensed and pictures are cropped and feelings often don't matter. The crevasse between someone's decent OK Cupid profile and caring about an actual human being is a wide one—and the simplicity of dating sites doesn't prepare you for the leap. … And they make it easier to hurt someone, because, truthfully, you never cared that much to begin with. When canceling a date is as easy as canceling an Amazon shipment, what are we to expect from each other?

One of his commenters puts it well:

If you don't have to work for it, put yourself out there, risk embarrassment (or in the dating world, heartbreak), the end result will always be boredom. That's the main problem online dating creates; people go on thinking they are going to be handed their perfect match and all they have to do is show up with the condoms. I consider it "zombie dating". It's like walking into a bar knowing everyone is single and looking to hook up. So what do you do, you jump from one to another never really embracing any individual beyond mild interest. The grass is always greener, there is always the "better" girl. You go on dates, but the entire time you're thinking about the other girls you have dates lined up with. You turn dating into a streamlined process, and in the end you lose all focus on what you're looking for.