1. How it Started
I'm a recently turned 16 year old girl who decided to entertain her boredom with a couple of friends by joining Tinder as a joke. I would swipe through, swiping left, right....
But I didn't realize how detrimental it could be to someone so young, even if it started out as a joke.
As I started matching up to people I started talking to them, curiosity getting the better of my intrigued thoughts on whether the stereotype of partners on dating apps were.
I wanted to find out if I could find any people with substance in my age group of 14-17 and with intellect.
2. During the Process
Truthfully, when I first started Tinder it was all fun and games!! However, when I started talking to people through the app and realized their true natures this 'game' suddenly turned sour. I was subjected to insane amounts of racism, typecasting, and stereotypes. Not only this, but I found myself APOLOGIZING to guys who were wheedling me to hand them nudes. Why was I apologizing??? It was MY OWN body and I had every right to firmly refuse and end the conversation by unmatching them. Instead, I found myself in an awkward position where I really didn't feel comfortable in giving out something so intimate to a stranger. And when they started furiously typing out insults and racist comments when I refused, I found myself apologizing again and again for something I really, really, should not feel sorry for.
That was my mistake.
3. Getting Too Far In
It came to a point to where I had felt like I had been leading on someone so badly, and I felt awful and guilty for everything I'd done up until this point. I made up a lie (I know, I know, you have to tell the truth and that's the best way to break it to them but I was so afraid for more intense backlash that I made up what I thought was a harmless lie out of this... 'relationship' that I had never even wanted.
I really didn't quite wrap my head around what was going on at this point. I had downloaded this app for some fun and jokes, but somehow got wrapped in a community where racist slurs, guilt tripping you, and with people going as far to threaten you if sexual content wasn't released. I was absolutely miserable and wanted to hide from the world if that's what people's true natures were. I had come on, again, to find smart people that I could perhaps connect to. I had made the assumption that since these people were in my age group, that they wouldn't be as 'creepy' and that maybe, I'd find someone kind to talk to.
My naivety had gotten the better of me.
4. Wrapping it up
So, after being super down in the dumps and upset with myself, I decided to finally delete the app. While I'm still living down the repercussions of my stupid actions (they follow my Instagram and I'm TOO SCARED TO BLOCK THEM), I can breathe a little easier knowing that whole ordeal was over. I've been subjected to my fair share of bullying, but as years passed I had forgotten how hurtful it is and how self conscious it makes you feel to hear all these slurs against you. To this day, I still unnecessarily feel guilty about 'letting these people down' by not giving them what they wanted but I know they could care less, and that it's just a severe character flaw of mine- to please everyone. And I'm not condemning Tinder at all- I'm just relaying my experience of the people I met there. I might not have expressed it in the best way IN THE SLIGHTEST- and there's still a lot more I would like to share of my experience- but I feel as if I've ranted far beyond what anyone would every like to read in one sitting. HOWEVER- I CAN wrap this up to say that I will NOT be using a dating app, not even for fun again, in a very, very, very long time.
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