Internet Dating Advice: The Good, The Bad & The Stupid

Playboy Playmate Ciara Price Posing Next to a Victory Motorcycle
( This is the fantasy)

Ever click on Internet dating advice featured in the side column of whatever article you’re reading? If so, you’ve run the gamut of generic advice of dressing well because you might meet The One at the dry cleaners or while you were pumping gas.  I even read one column where the woman suggested giving out a Let’s Have Coffee card to any interested man you might meet while waiting for your espresso or shopping for groceries. She did explain you should get a prepaid cell phone with a number that is no way associated with your actual name or identity. This all sounded like too much work. It also smacked of a bad reality news story. How do you know the man you’re chatting up in the fast food line isn’t a douchebag or a serial killer?

Good question. It’s hard meeting people despite the census insisting that there are more single people than individuals involved in relationships. With this information, people think it should be easy to meet potential companions. When they don’t, they turn to the Internet, which mostly gives dubious advice.

A good example is a recent slide show that mentioned what men preferred. It included women faking an accent, preferably upper crust British. If she can’t handle this, the woman should go with a French accent.  How long is the woman supposed to pretend? One woman commenter summed it up by stating the guy should date a British chick.

The article went on to say fear turns men on. A woman who wants to make her man hot should scare him. I’m sure men threatened with a gun or machete by their current girlfriend don’t find it very attractive. The advice seems idiotic to most people, but not to those who are truly desperate.

One of my favorite ones was a woman who wants to up her desirability by riding a motorcycle. Apparently being perched on a bike would make her desirable. Seriously, this would involve a significant expenditure and would also endanger your safety. This rationale has sold thousands of motorcycles to men who believed they would be irresistible to women astride a crotch rocket. It also explains the upswing of sports cars sold to both men and women over forty.

If a man or a woman prefers someone who rides a motorcycle as opposed to anyone else, then it is more a fetish. The same people who will only date individuals of a certain height, race, or occupation, are objectifying their date. In other words, they don’t have that much invested in the relationship and can interchange people easily.

Odd things can attract people, but they don’t always keep people together. Do you want someone who you can’t be yourself around? Can you keep up a façade for the rest of your life? Probably not. Be careful taking advice that forces you to be someone you’re not.

Other columns will encourage a man to rent an expensive sports car to impress his date. This ranks up there with the accent. How long will this last? Many men practically spend themselves into the poorhouse by providing escort to expensive events and trips they can't afford. In the end, they only have a woman who will leave them once the spending stops.

Is all Internet advice bad? No.  Sometimes, it is based on who is giving the advice. Is the advice giver somewhat like you? A young, male blogger can’t give workable advice to middle-aged women. He hasn’t been there and is unaware of the issues these women face. Most men will read information from male bloggers and vice versa. Keep in mind; people write from their own viewpoint.

One slideshow about what men love featured thirty different men talking about what they liked about their significant other. It included a woman baby talking, one who loved video games, another one enjoyed his girl friend’s lisp, and still another liked the fact his wife could beat him in arm wrestling. As you can see, the traits were particular to each woman.

This list is both meaningless and meaningful. Something one man likes doesn’t transfer automatically to all men. All those lists that tell you to wear stiletto heels and talk dirty might scare off men who are long-term relationship material. Men who are faking a bad boy persona aren’t getting what they want either. They get dropped by women who want real bad boys and ignored by women who would have been good matches.

How do I know this? I tried faking a British accent. Couldn’t do it. It required too much thought and practice on my part. It didn’t really attract anyone. In the end, my sweetie enjoys my own accent, no matter how country hick I might sound.

As for my darling, he tried following Internet advice. Didn’t work. He even went for the sports car, but it did not result in women throwing themselves at him. As for me, I know so little about car models I couldn’t even identify it.

If it makes sense and doesn’t compromise who you are; go for it. Simple instructions such as smile more, get out more, try out things you’ve always wanted to do without waiting for a significant other to appear is all good advice. Decide what will work for you, but always be yourself.

When you try to form yourself into someone you’re not, all you end up with is someone who is not attracted to you, but to the image you created. No one wants that.

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