okCupid et al

[garote]

The range of sexual morality appears, in part, to be charted along the course of population growth. That is, the denser the population, the stronger the push towards sexual freedom.

For example, in 17th-century England, most people lived in rural communities of 100 persons or less, and if two unmarried people were caught having sex, they were whipped until bloody and cast permanently out of the area, isolated from their friends and family.

In 19th-century England, 200 years later, most people were collected in towns, and London was the largest city on earth. Urban residents did not have to take a personal interest in the social lives of their neighbors to ensure the stability of their own lives, and even if they wanted to, strict rules of sexual conduct were much more difficult to enforce.

Now we're on the edge of another leap in accessibility: Database-driven location-aware matchmaking sites.

How are these going to affect sexual morality?

Comments

[graue.livejournal.com]

Do you think they will at all? The impression I get is most people on OK Cupid, etc. are there because meeting someone at the local café/bar/anarchist bookfair the traditional way doesn't work for them - because they're introverted, aspie, OCD, super picky, nervous, weird, whatever (case in point, I'm on there.) Those folks are not exactly the vanguard of sexual freedom, so I don't see it having an effect.

[garote]

An interesting angle.

They're not the vanguard, as in, they're not the people who feel the most "free"?

[garote]

Well, it's not really a requirement that the "traditional" way not work for them, just that this new way work better for them. And even that relative comparison begs the question of what their goals are. Are they the same goals as people had fifty or a hundred years ago?

[graue.livejournal.com]

Well I just met someone really cool on OK Cupid so maybe I need to reconsider my opinion of it. We have not, however, transgressed the normal boundaries of sexual morality in any way thus far. I dunno. Even if you merely used such a website for random casual hookups, is it any more, um, liberating than going to a random meat market bar has been for ages?

I think we need a blog entry about what Garrett has been doing on OK Cupid – you know, for perspective.

[garote]

Well, I'll attempt to answer my own questions.

Human sexuality is remarkably plastic, but in general, I don't think there were very many "random meat market bars" 400 years ago, compared to today. Even with population growth factored in.

I think "meat markets" have increased in popularity because there are more patrons available with those desires. They don't necessarily want to get married, bear children, or form a household. They don't even necessarily want a steady companion. But what they do want, most definitely, is sex, and sooner rather than later. Why would they want this? Perhaps because those other things I've listed are incompatible with, or even destructive to, the structure of the rest of their daily lives.

Homesteading out on the prairie, with plenty of land to grow food if only you had the hands to work it, and most things constructed from scratch? Makes sense to have ten kids, and marry for life to give them a stable household. Living in a city, a few blocks from your extended family, with food, land, and time at a premium, plenty of hands for any job, and lots of your nephews running around? Why have more than a few kids? Why have any? Why get married, when you have endless variety around you and your specialized job can pay for so many different essential goods? (Why not spend an extra decade of your life canoodling with the ladies/guys, enjoying your freedom and career, before you "settle down"?)

[garote]

So how is okCupid different from a "meat market bar"?

Well, if you accept that a "meat market bar" is a place where people place prompt sexual gratification high on their list, and most other things lower, then the next question is: What about all the people who are looking for something different? Where do they go?

The common wisdom is that if you're looking for something steadier, something more in-depth, you're better off looking for romance in venues that are not centered around sex. The weekend pickup soccer game. The county fair or farmer's market. The university or library or cinema. The park. Dance classes, tour packages, community gardens, holiday celebrations. (I don't think it's any coincidence that a lot of these places have a barrier to entry that involves either money or a vague sense of cultural refinement.)

The problem with that approach is, the vast majority of the people you will find at those venues are not looking for a new romantic partner, or even available to become one. The window of availability and receptivity for a given two compatible people, looking for something meant to last longer than a fortnight, is quite small compared to the time they will spend either 1. in a relationship or 2. recovering from, preparing for, or simply "on break" from dating. The major consequence of this is, it's actually pretty hard to find someone you really like, when you are both fully available and actually ready to find each other.

I think one of okCupid's best features is its ability to separate out people who are just looking for meat from people who are looking for something more, while also allowing those who look for something more to describe the details of what that thing is. Then, people who feel ready for something can be paired with each other, instead of being lost in an ocean of unavailable people. In a big busy city where everyone works their ass off, that can be a real time saver.

[graue.livejournal.com]

That's a pretty neat justification for why dating sites exist, but seems entirely tangential to sexual morality. It goes back to what I said before - the people who don't put "prompt sexual gratification high on their list" aren't pushing those kinds of boundaries. No MTV watcher or internet user would be the least bit shocked about you and the girl you met at the community garden. Nor would scandal arise if you met the same girl through a profile where she mentioned growing vegetables. The questions of online vs. in-person meeting, and of societal approval vs. disapproval, are, as far as I can tell, orthogonal.

This is a very abstract discussion. How well would you say OK Cupid is working for you? Do you really have a problem with women who are "just looking for meat"?

[garote]

Believe me, those questions are not orthogonal. Online dating used to have considerable stigma attached to it, like taking out an ad in the personals except with more risk. It used to have a stink of desperation or failure about it.

And, sexual morality involves more than the degree to which society tolerates or endorses prompt sexual gratification. It involves what venues and outcomes are considered acceptable, and for what segments of society.

So from my point of view, these are very closely related.

[garote]

okCupid has worked amazingly well for me, both as a a resource for adjusting my perspective and learning about myself, and a resource for meeting hard-to-find people.

[graue.livejournal.com]

Fair enough. I guess even the quiet, solitary types need good lovin'.

[(Anonymous)]

"Now we're on the edge of another leap in accessibility: Database-driven location-aware matchmaking sites."

I think you guys are missing a key factor in Garote's idea. That shy people and individuals
avoiding low-availability:high-acceptable
and
high-availability:low-acceptable
populations isn't the 'next leap.'
They are the large number of people who constitute a market that makes " Database-driven location-aware matchmaking sites" profitable and therefore exist. While they themselves are more likely now to find good matches that will last in the more traditional sense is just an increase in efficiency of the previous system.

Neh, the next leap that such databases create a new world for is for people like me who desire to live far outside current memes. The chances of me finding other 'bisexual,' polyfidelic, republican-voting-communist, who none the less still believes in an Abrahamic God at the local dance halls or 'meat markets,' is essentially nill. While the change from 100 people villages to multi-million metropolitan cities means I probably won't be stoned to death and that there are various places I could go to increase similarity in my potential strangers to meet; ultimately I'd be destined to stay single or make several significant compromises. Such databases further 'specialization' of relationship/lifestyles so with places like okcupid, over time, more and more entirely different ways of life can be tried and if there is one thing that is good for a species long term is diversity be it biological or cultural.

[garote]

Of course it's also worth acknowledging, for our own pursuit of happiness, that whatever highly-specific labels and categories we demand in our romantic partners are our choice.

Sometimes the most helpful thing to do is work on oneself, to become more able to enjoy more kinds of people.

[ethan thompson (from livejournal.com)]

Entertainingly.