The Death of Connection: From 2010 Era Dating to Modern Humans as 'Content'

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You probably didn’t even know that there was a dating scene in Second Life. At least, it’s never been as prominent as it is now, thanks to a developer releasing the “Thundr” dating app. I believe I’ve written about it once before in passing—mentioning how dead and silent Second Life was feeling at the time. Heck, it still feels that way, and I’m beginning to wonder if my time would be better spent trying to make friends and meet people online elsewhere.

In real life, dating apps are basically just a trap designed to keep you swiping and single in hopes that you’ll eventually pay to see matches, only to engage in conversations that die after the first “hello” while your match moves on to someone else. Ad infinitum; a forever spiral. Second Life’s “Thundr” app isn’t all that much different, although people seem at least a little bit more inclined to actually talk to you for more than thirty seconds.

Like real life, there are tons of people using Thundr for self-validation or “just friends,” rather than the main purpose of the app (dating). And then—still just like real life—there are married people looking for unicorns. Every once in a while, you’ll land on someone who’s actually looking to make a connection.

Which is more than I can say for Tinder, Bumble, etc. (Match Group must die).

But even that isn’t all that successful in most scenarios.

Just recently, I matched with someone whom I spoke to for about fifteen minutes. Upon trying to add her to my friend list so that I could contact her again later when I was logged on, she exploded. She said something along the lines of it being “too early” to add me.

Meeting people has never felt like more of an uphill battle full of nails and grenades than it does now. The saving grace is that showing people your red flags early gives them a better chance to bounce as quickly as possible.

Red flags, such as the oodles and oodles of profiles that read things like, “I don’t check this app” or “I’m never here, contact me at such and such.” Because making some sort of effort to meet people should only ever be on the party interested in you, and never yourself. Responsibility for even basic human interaction is just too much. I get it. You should be able to just set up a profile on an app, never open it, and have people come to you at your court, because you’re a Royal, or something.

But what am I really doing here on this post? Complaining? Yeah, mostly, I guess.

Dating, whether in real life or in a virtual world, has never been as hard, and difficult, and impossible as it is now.

Back in 2010, or “back in my day,” all you needed was a PC and the ability to create an account on a website, and you could meet people. No money required, no predatory matching algorithms, no emotionally dead people who view you as a commodity being served to them on a silver platter that they can shoo away the second you’re not entertaining enough for them. Because people are content, now. We’re consumable, or not consumable.

Maybe it sounds like I just hate people, but I don’t! I desperately want to meet someone who’s actually interested in speaking, in talking, in getting to know me, and vice versa! I’d love to get to know someone who has a mutual interest in participating in conversation and connection, instead of someone who flips off their brain the second we move past “How’re you today?”

“I hate small talk,” you say, as I pivot to talking to you about whatever I’m fixated on so that you can go, “Oh cool, nice.” End conversation. Delete chat. Close window.