CAN ONE FIND TRUE LOVE ON
Or is the dating app just for sex hook-ups? HELEN GRANGE chats to South African Tinder users to find out
INDER, the dating app on everyone’s lips, has been gathering a massive following in South Africa, but is it a platform dominated primarily by people looking for sex hook-ups, or dodgy characters preying on vulnerable women?
Tinder works by downloading the app on your phone, then scanning through a sea of faces and short profiles of people looking for connection, be it love, friendship, marriage or sex. You swipe left for reject and right if you like. If it is a match of right swipes, you take it from there.
Like other offerings in the digital-dating space, Tinder has produced some heart-warming results – “after meeting two no-nos, I met my soul- and lovemate by swiping right. We’ve been together 18 months, and have now bought a house together,” says author Melinda Ferguson, who relocated to the Western Cape to be with her Tinder match.
But for each happy ending, there seems to be an avalanche of disappointments. For women in middle age especially, Tinder seems to strike more wrong chords than right.
Says Lavelle, a communications consultant in her 50s: “My experience is the guys very quickly get your email or WhatsApp and from there they harass you. I ‘met’ a guy in the US who set his alarm to say good morning to me at 8am here. It was tough getting rid of him as he wanted to tell me all day that he lives for my words and smile and whatever. Another guy said he was 60 on his profile, and when we met he turned out to be 71. Another guy, a former professor at Yale – and this checked out on Google – wanted to get in the car with me within the hour to ‘make out’. I was horrified,” she says.
This echoes the experience of Jill, a single mother in her early 40s, who confides that she used Tinder for hook-ups “for a while, until I came to my senses”.
She says that even though she’s not averse to no-strings-attached sex, she was surprised by how brazen some of her dates were.
“One of the guys, good looking and a big deal in the corporate world, chatted with me for a couple of days, then on the third day became pretty persistent about hooking up. I’d Googled him by now, and he was erudite in the texts, so I stupidly agreed to have him over at my place. He was devouring me even before we walked through the door, and within an hour of us having sex, he was gone. It was quite aggressive, and kinky, and it scared me off Tinder,” she says.
Other women, even if they’ve avoided the sex prowlers on Tinder, agree that it’s not an ideal platform to find a companion.
Says Hannelie from Cape Town, a communications consultant: “I was on it for about six months. I was convinced by other ladies to use it, and one woman found her partner on Tinder, so I thought to give it a go. I had one coffee session and two dinners with three different guys. Two of the guys were okay, but then just stopped communicating, no reason given. The other dinner guy was very strange and I had a real battle getting through dinner, and ended up blocking him from WhatsApp.”
Clinical psychologist Dorianne Weil (“Dr D”) says that from conversations with her clients, she has surmised that Tinder is regarded as a place to arrange hookups – “and there is nothing wrong with that, if that’s what floats your boat”. “Tinder is different to other dating forums that screen their members and ask for a fee, which means you need to be far more vigilant, because yes, there are plenty of people – men and women – out there who are seeking just a sexual experience. This has always been the case, but technology has made it easier. And of course, there are scammers in the mix,” she says.
Lavelle says scammers on Tinder often use a sob story about losing their families. “Many of the men seem to have lost their wives and children in car accidents. Funny that,” she says.
Cindy, an attractive owner of her own gym and a Tinder veteran, says she’s familiar with this ruse.
“If a guy is a widower who says he lost his family to an accident or disease, it’s usually not long before he is asking you to help get to his money by sharing your banking details. I have chatted to scammers for days knowing they’re scammers. Their stories are very similar, and they prey on single, divorced or widowed women,” she says.
Kristy, in her 50s, adds: “You discover that quite a number of men are not who they say they are, and their pictures are fake. One of the red flags is they can’t spell. There’s this assumption that if you’re single, you’re also desperate and gullible. It’s a shame, because there are also genuine, lovely people on Tinder but you have to wade through so many dodgy and unsuitable people to find them. I haven’t had much luck.”
Some Tinder users have hit the jackpot. “I met my partner on Tinder. We’ve been together about 10 months and it’s a fairytale,” says Palesa, in her early 30s, from Durban.
Also, men who’ve used Tinder seem to fare far better. “I used Tinder and met a lovely girl through it. We dated for over a year. I found it a good way to find single people my own age, because the days of going to bars with a mate and meeting someone of the opposite sex is a distant memory,” says Jason, a security manager in his early 50s.
Greg, a restaurant manager in his 30s, says he met his girlfriend on Tinder. “She’s the best. Apparently she went through a lot of dudes looking just for hook-ups, but she was the first person I swiped right for, and I’m glad I did.
“I think it’s harder for decent women to meet decent men than it is for decent men to meet decent women,” he adds.
The bottom line, says “Dr D”, is you need a “huge degree of awareness and some scepticism” when you venture onto Tinder.
“If you’re looking for a deeper relationship then I’m not sure Tinder is the best conduit for that. On the whole, women more than men tend to use these sites in the hope of finding something more meaningful than a sex hook-up, so my advice to them is to rather try other dating sites which screen their members more thoroughly, and match you more accurately, so at least part of the work has been done for you,” she says.
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