Sometimes I get a sudden influx of inspiration about a new post in random situations (usually in a bathroom for some obscure reason). And here it came last night at 1 am.
I remember my parents, teachers and all sorts of wise people of this world telling me in the past never to meet up with anyone "met" online. And yet we live in a digital age when online seems more real than offline. And also, I don't like being told what not to do.
My confession for today is that I used to have an account on one of the social/chat websites and... somehow I survived, despite all the worries of the older generation, visions of rape and other rather grim things. There was quite a few awkward conversations (but I have enough of them in real life to be in any way surprised), I was offered a one night stand and asked about my sexual preferences (pretty standard, there's an awful lot of weird characters out there), but apart from that nothing bad happened. I had quite a few lovely conversations about life, music and so on (nothing about God though). Nothing bad happened even when I've actually met up with one of the guys I've been chatting with. He turned out to be lovely, even bought me a flower and had awfully loads of fun together (no love story came out of it though, sorry for the disappointment).
I used to think that online dating, for instance, is a bit too much, that it;s for people who were somehow incapable of making friendships, but I've changed my mind.
Given the amount of time we spend in front of a screen there's little chance that we'll be lucky enough to literally walk into our second half on the street (unless you're one of those people with extraordinary luck). I've heard many stories of married couples who met on a train or in some similar circumstances, but these are usually people in their 40s or 50s. It does not happen that often now. People don't talk to strangers, not usually anyway. So the internet seems like a natural place to meet and have conversations.And the extent to which you can customize what sort of people is amazing. 6"2 blond guy with green eyes, who likes sailing and is passionate about Plato? No problem at all, a few ticks in appropriate boxes and here they all are. A Catholic girl fixated about Yorkshire terriers and indie music festivals? As you please.
Honestly, there is no way I would be able to find all the guys living nearby who potentially fit my preferences. There's too many to go through, too many questions that would have needed to be asked (and answered) and no time for that. An appropriate website does it all for me. And voila! Church bells ringing and a cart with a pair of white horses ready...
Hold on. This went out of control a bit now.
My point is that the internet has longed ceased to be a place for lonely, socially-awkward computer geeks- or maybe we all became lonely socially-awkward computer geeks? In any case, when I hear people talking about yet another dating site that has happened to be particularly popular at a time I think 'why not?' If we have online banking, online shopping, online volunteering and online whatever why not online dating or online coffeeing-with-friends? True, we lose something from a face-to-face interaction, but maybe this should be seen as a chance to explore new ways of living. The world has moved on. And the society moved on. It moved on into the online world. Like it or not, we will all follow to a greater or lesser extent.
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