Sexy Time: A Social Experiment

January 6, 2011 9:00 am     Posted in Relationships, Sex  Ness g+ page

I have confession to make: I was a member of an online dating site for about 12 hours last summer. The reason I only lasted half a day wasn’t just the stigma attached to “having to meet someone online,” but also having my profile on a site that was accessed by far too many people I didn’t know (many of which who were freaks of nature) kind of freaked me out. That said, I’m not knocking it entirely– I got a couple of good dates with a friend-of-a-friend that I bumped into on the site — but the constant bombardment of sleazy messages from men (and a couple of women) who were solely looking for anonymous hook-ups just wasn’t my thing.


By Ness

It’s been months since this whole thing happened, and after hearing one-too-many friends complain about not being able to find anybody, I wondered if the online dating scene was still acting as a far-too-easy place to find a stranger to have sex with.

So I decided to do a little social experiment. I started out making a pretty tame profile; I used a fake name, an old picture, and listed a few interests. I became the friendly girl-next-door type with a killer taste in movies– something I thought would be appealing, and after getting the nod from my real-life boyfriend, I had the profile of a well-rounded woman who would generally be labeled as a “good catch.”

So there it was, a profile of a wholesome, fun-loving, Kevin Smith fan named Hailey. And I waited. After about three hours, I had received about four messages – all of which were mostly uncreative, uninspired, and frankly – quite disappointing. Many of the people on this site were listed as looking for a serious relationship, but I wasn’t getting any bites, so I tried a new tactic.

I replaced my photo with two fairly risqué body shots of lingerie (face not included, anonymity FTW), changed my headline to “I’m Hailey and I like to party ;) ” (Hot Rod reference, anyone?), and deleted everything from my profile that had any semblance of depth whatsoever. I was left with some skanky photos, and a small description of how I liked to “go with the flow.”

Within five minutes I had received messages from twelve different people. Within twenty minutes I hit close to thirty messages, as well as the constant annoying “ping” I was sent every time someone tried to strike up an instant chat.

Suddenly, pictures of my hot body and no mention of any substance made me desirable to a whole lot of people. The messages were equally as uncreative, but I found that men suddenly felt much more confident to strike up a conversation with someone who had little to no personality. I got everything from “let’s watch movies,” and “you seem like such a nice person,” to some guy asking me if I was a prostitute.

I’m not one to be of the sexist belief that men are animals who can’t control their sexual urges, but I can’t say I’m surprised at the outcome of my second (and certainly final) night on a “dating” site. While many people have found love on sites much like the one I immersed myself in tonight, I think those looking for a deep and meaningful connection should approach such sites cautiously.

As far as anonymous sex goes, the internet made it incredibly easy for me to find a slew of men (the site I used only allowed me to be “interested in” either “men” or “women,” not both) willing to go to bed with me if it’s what I really wanted. That said, finding random strangers on the internet to have sex with is both unwise and incredibly dangerous. I feel skeeved out even after having a completely fake identity.

Basically, what I’m getting at here is that yes, the internet is still full of sex-hungry people who are arguably attracted to women of little substance. Disappointing, I know. But if you’re looking for something long-term and lasting, I’d say you’ve got better odds finding your soul mate at the bar. Because if Hailey the Wonder Girl can’t find a serious match on the internet, I think we’re all sh*t out of luck.

14 Comments on "Sexy Time: A Social Experiment"

  1. Charlotte- University of Birmingham says:
    Thu, 6th Jan 20119:14 am 

    This was really interesting to read. What a fascinating experiment.
    I've never used a dating site but there were times when I thought, oh god, maybe I should.
    I'm glad I've met someone now because it sounds like a bit of a scary world out there!!

    Charlotte http://www.girlnextdoorfashion.net

  2. Amanda says:
    Thu, 6th Jan 201110:26 am 

    I joined OKCupid after reading one of the blogs on this website after being exhausted with meaningless hookups at frat parties and constantly meeting guys that just wanted to sleep with me. After only two days, and sifting through several wackos out there, I actually started to enjoy having conversations with some real down-to-earth people. I was surprised to find out that a lot of guys were just like me in that they were tired of meaningless hookups. It might be too early to tell (I haven't met anyone in person yet), but I think dating sites are not as useless as you portray it. Yes, it seems as if most of the guys are only looking for sex, but it takes time to find guys that are truly worthwhile–this is true both in real life and online. Maybe it's too early to judge a site after just a short period of time or maybe sites vary? I don't know but you are definitely right about having to be cautious with meeting these people.

  3. Jenna says:
    Thu, 6th Jan 20113:00 pm 

    This article is inane in the extreme. Your "study" proved that it's easier on online dating sites to find random sex than a lasting relationship. That's clearly not unique to online dating! Go into a bar wearing a skimpy outfit and flirt outrageously and compare that experience to the reaction you get at the same bar engaging guys in interesting conversation about films. No doubt the results will be fairly similiar to the one you got online.

  4. Ashley says:
    Thu, 6th Jan 20114:21 pm 

    my friend got really into online dating after a bad break up…she was using the skeezy free dating websites. From her stories it seems that the free websites are just a more sexual facebook because people know you are there for a "relationship." Also, since the websites are free (rather than paying to use chemistry or eharmony) any weirdo in the world can make a profile whether they just want sex or a serious relationship. She has been doing the online dating thing for over a year now and has yet to meet anyone who wanted to be in a "serious relationship" even if there profiles stated otherwise. She would start dating guys and fooling around with them but they would never want to commit despite the fact that they had met on a dating website. Most of the time the people were real weirdos or just wanted to fool around……

  5. Adam says:
    Thu, 6th Jan 20119:13 pm 

    I have to agree, the only difference is that in a bar, you may have 30 or so people, so you may not notice it too much, but online, you have thousands of people from around the world looking at you.

  6. guest says:
    Mon, 10th Jan 201112:19 am 

    Wow. You waited all of three hours?

  7. Ness - Sheridan says:
    Mon, 10th Jan 20112:39 am 

    Three hours of next to no messages for actually having a personality versus three minutes of complete bombardment for a few sexy photos and little else. It was a pretty jarring difference.

  8. Kevin says:
    Tue, 11th Jan 201110:47 pm 

    I think your problem is you were using a free site. If you use some of the "pay" sites you weed out some of the people looking for a cheap hook-up. And then even amongst the pay sites, different sites have different audiences. Some are aimed more for casual relationships. Others are aimed more for serious relationships. The casual ones take very little work to get started. The others take progressively more work. So by virtue of having to pay and all the groundwork someone has to do to get a profile active, you're weeding out the ones looking for a cheap thrill.

    I'd call your study less than accurate.

  9. Natalie says:
    Fri, 14th Jan 201111:27 pm 

    I found my boyfriend of 2 years now on a online dating site. I think that, just like with anything else, if you put the time and effort into it, it is worth while. You also get what you're looking for, ie someone who puts up pictures of themselves in lingerie is most likely looking for a hook-up. Where as if you make a genuine profile and attempt, you might find a genuine relationship.

  10. GoPackGo12 says:
    Mon, 17th Jan 20116:50 pm 

    the reason you got so many messages wasn't because men don't like women with "depth". It's because by posting revealing pictures, it makes you look like an easy score and that seems to be the intent of most men on dating websites anyways.

  11. AnneMarie says:
    Fri, 21st Jan 201111:14 am 

    I joined a dating site about a month ago. No sleezy pics of myself at all. Just normal pretty pics of me. Within a couple of days I've received messages from dozens of guys. To my surprise, most of them were nice to me, but there was only one guy I was interested in the most. We talked to each other on the phone for a couple of days. I thought this guy would be a great boyfriend for sure until he stopped calling me at some point. I didn't know why. Either he wasn't looking for a relationship as he said he was or he wasn't into me. I'll never know. After that, I deleted my account and never looked back.

    Lesson learned: Dating sucks.

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