Speaker 1: I'm Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the Thing.
Speaker 1: Writers Caitlin Tiffany and Ashley Featers maybe the country's most
Speaker 1: astute observers of modern romance. For the past few years,
Speaker 1: together and apart, they've been publishing one article after another
Speaker 1: in The Atlantic documenting how Americans are thinking about pairing up,
Speaker 1: particularly online. Their pieces, from the history of Tinder to
Speaker 1: the dues and don'ts of social distancing, are sharp, carefully researched,
Speaker 1: and funny. But the one that really caught my attention
Speaker 1: was something they wrote together in February called the Dating
Speaker 1: Market is getting Worse. Their analysis coincided with an observation
Speaker 1: I've been making for years. When people let concepts like
Speaker 1: market value and supply and demand guide their love life,
Speaker 1: they end up with the wrong person or with no
Speaker 1: one at all. My interview with Fetters and Tiffany was
Speaker 1: first scheduled for the week in March when the world
Speaker 1: came to a screeching halt, so we were forced to
Speaker 1: resort to zoom. Hence the audio quirks throughout this episode.
Speaker 1: But none of those quirks are Ashley's fault. She saw
Speaker 1: to that I do want people to know Ashley, who
Speaker 1: is this really super smart writer, is in a closet
Speaker 1: and it's so plainly a closet. It's just it's so
Speaker 1: clearly down different kinds of women's clothes draping down around her.
Speaker 1: I hope the sound is worth it. I hope the
Speaker 1: acoustics are are as good as I've heard. Once everyone
Speaker 1: got settled in their home studios, we got down to business.
Speaker 1: Caitlin situated the dating market problem in a broader national context.
Speaker 1: In our American capitalist context, we are trying to think
Speaker 1: that markets are inherently fair. So if you start thinking
Speaker 1: about dating as a as a marketplace, um, I think
Speaker 1: that leads you to kind of dangerous thoughts about, well,
Speaker 1: the market is not being fair to me, this is
Speaker 1: what I deserve from others, like and then you start
Speaker 1: to blame people when things aren't aren't going the way
Speaker 1: that you'd like it to do. Is that something that
Speaker 1: you saw that during your research and your writing of
Speaker 1: these articles. Sure, yeah, I think you see it in
Speaker 1: really extreme ways on like sub credits, where there are
Speaker 1: you know, men who think the government should assign them
Speaker 1: a girlfriend. That's like the extremist end. But I think
Speaker 1: you see it. Like in a lot of conversations about
Speaker 1: the conversations I have with my friends about dating, we
Speaker 1: would definitely say like, oh, it's not fair that you
Speaker 1: are like you can't find someone of your caliber, or like,
Speaker 1: it's not fair that this guy who is not on
Speaker 1: your level is treating you poorly. Like I think we
Speaker 1: definitely use that language without even thinking about it. When
Speaker 1: I got married the first time, I was at a
Speaker 1: pretty good place in my career, and I thought, well,
Speaker 1: I'm the captain of the football team, who's the head
Speaker 1: cheerleader here on the campus. That's who I should be
Speaker 1: married to, like, and they're going to kind of market
Speaker 1: value world of it. I thought, well, there's a woman
Speaker 1: I need to be with. I need to be with
Speaker 1: that kind of woman. My question for you, Ashley is
Speaker 1: the same. Do you think that thinking about dating as
Speaker 1: a marketplace is ill advised? I do. Um, I think
Speaker 1: I've got, you know, another couple of reasons. I can
Speaker 1: mention that that built on top of what Caitlin said, Um,
Speaker 1: you know, for starters, when you're shopping for something at
Speaker 1: a in a literal market, shopping for a material good.
Speaker 1: I mean to put it very plainly, you don't have
Speaker 1: to consider how that material good feels about you. So
Speaker 1: for starters, it's a little bit of an incomplete way
Speaker 1: to think of it. Also, it's sort of assumed that
Speaker 1: if you're literally shopping for something, you know, address or
Speaker 1: a pair of headphones or something, you will stop shopping
Speaker 1: once you have it. And dating is different obviously, like
Speaker 1: you might meet someone that you like but then keep
Speaker 1: going on dates, or you might have multiple people that
Speaker 1: you sort of keep in our rotation and never you know,
Speaker 1: pick one and pare down the others. Right. Um. So
Speaker 1: it like if it works anywhere the market metaphor works
Speaker 1: better for marriage that does for dating, because that's at
Speaker 1: least assumed in most people's mind to be a one
Speaker 1: to one and you know, more permanent transaction or more
Speaker 1: permanent match. Um. But I think the biggest flaw in
Speaker 1: understanding dating to be kind of a shopping or a
Speaker 1: market or an economic transaction, um is that, you know,
Speaker 1: thinking of humans as materials as material goods fails to
Speaker 1: account for like the fact that what you want, what
Speaker 1: you really want, might not be at all what you're
Speaker 1: looking for. I think you kind of you know you
Speaker 1: you mentioned this, um, you know there's this concept that
Speaker 1: like the dating coach Logan Uri, who I talked to
Speaker 1: for um this story that KITL and I wrote together, Um,
Speaker 1: she calls it relations shopping, which I think is what
Speaker 1: you were mentioning a little bit right. You you you start
Speaker 1: to think like, oh, here's the parameters of what I want.
Speaker 1: Here are my preferences, so I'm only going to look
Speaker 1: within these margins, And of course that sort of fails
Speaker 1: to account for the fact that humans are like chaotic, interrational,
Speaker 1: and what we want is influenced by how we see ourselves,
Speaker 1: and how we see ourselves is influenced just as much
Speaker 1: by how we were brought up as what our morning
Speaker 1: was like. So you know, thinking of um, of dating
Speaker 1: as a transact in or something that you shopped for
Speaker 1: a partner or something you shopped for really, um, it
Speaker 1: really just fails to account for the chaos and kind
Speaker 1: of the magic of finding a partner. You talk about
Speaker 1: how dating outside of your social network began at the
Speaker 1: end of the nineteenth century, where people are going to
Speaker 1: places specifically to meet other people beyond arranged marriages and
Speaker 1: beyond your hometown or what have you. And I'm wondering
Speaker 1: have social apps have these dating apps proven that that's
Speaker 1: a good thing? And I always laugh when someone would
Speaker 1: show me these apps that it would say I want
Speaker 1: someone within twenty miles fifty miles of my zip code.
Speaker 1: I always found that very humorous, and I'm wondering, but
Speaker 1: is it working? I have found that, Um, you know,
Speaker 1: lots of people I've talked to have said, you know,
Speaker 1: this person lived in my neighborhood and we never would
Speaker 1: have met. This person lived one town over, and we
Speaker 1: never would have met if it weren't for Tinder, if
Speaker 1: it weren't for Bumble, if it weren't for you know,
Speaker 1: all these myriad of dating apps that we have at
Speaker 1: our fingertips. Now, UM, I mean I think you know,
Speaker 1: there's there's a well a well publicized, well traad argument
Speaker 1: that the endlessness of options is paralyzing in itself, and
Speaker 1: that's its own problem, I think. But UM, I do
Speaker 1: think that there are you know, tangible cases and like
Speaker 1: observable cases where you know, people met met partners and
Speaker 1: met you know, the love of their lives that they
Speaker 1: would not have found, um if they'd only been looking
Speaker 1: in their own immediate obvious social circle. Yeah, we're far
Speaker 1: enough along at this point where there's pretty good survey
Speaker 1: data and people say that they have started relationships, have
Speaker 1: started marriages because of dating apps. I think this the
Speaker 1: stigma has been largely removed to meeting on dating apps
Speaker 1: as well. Like um Pete Buddha Judge has that he
Speaker 1: met his husband un hinge in his New York Times
Speaker 1: wedding announcement, so like it's pretty much accepted at this
Speaker 1: point that people do meet that way. And I guess,
Speaker 1: just in my personal experience, most of my real sationships
Speaker 1: have started because of dating apps um and with people
Speaker 1: that I would never have met in another way. Uh. Now, Caitlin,
Speaker 1: you're the oldest of four sisters. Correct, yes, And when
Speaker 1: you grew up did your parents remain together your entire childhood? Oh? Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're still together. My mom still has crushed feelings. Now
Speaker 1: you now, with that in mind, did your mother or
Speaker 1: father or both offer you any advice about dating and
Speaker 1: your love life? And well, my parents met in high
Speaker 1: school when they were fifteen, So I think most of
Speaker 1: my adulthood has been spent being frustrated with them that
Speaker 1: they have like no relevant experiences to share whatsoever. Every
Speaker 1: time I had a bad breakup, I was like, you,
Speaker 1: guys don't understand, this has never happened to you, don't
Speaker 1: talk to me. UM. I mean they try though, sure
Speaker 1: they try. And you have three sisters, where do you
Speaker 1: fall in line in that order? I'm the oldest. What
Speaker 1: kind of advice have you and your siblings given each
Speaker 1: other about dating? My youngest sister is eighteen, so she
Speaker 1: doesn't factor in that much, UM yet. But um, the
Speaker 1: other two are one and and they're they're much better
Speaker 1: at dating than I am. So if anything, I feel
Speaker 1: like they give me advice. What do you attribute that to? Um,
Speaker 1: I'm just like a bookish personality. UM, I was very
Speaker 1: judgmental of boys in college. I thought they were very
Speaker 1: stupid and like not worth engaging with. I would say
Speaker 1: my sisters are more compassionate, empathetic individuals, so they just
Speaker 1: have an easier time connecting with people. For you, Ashley,
Speaker 1: When people using these apps swipe right, what's usually among
Speaker 1: the first criteria? Is it purely physical? That's a great question.
Speaker 1: What I will say is like, I I think it's
Speaker 1: it's very tailored to individual people. I know some people
Speaker 1: are on their purely looking at what does this person
Speaker 1: look like? And that then making you know, decisions swipe
Speaker 1: left or swipe right based on just that. Um. I
Speaker 1: know other people are kind of like, oh, i'd like
Speaker 1: to know, you know, how much education this person has.
Speaker 1: I'd like to know, you know, what religion this person practices.
Speaker 1: I'd like to know how tall this person is? Is
Speaker 1: a really big one. It's a really big one, I
Speaker 1: think for both genders. But um, yeah, I mean I'm
Speaker 1: five eleven, and so when I was you know, in
Speaker 1: the brief time that I was ever using apps, that
Speaker 1: was a big priority of mine was how tall is
Speaker 1: this person? Um? But I think you know, that's one
Speaker 1: thing that that app developers have noticed too. And then
Speaker 1: so I think you know, when you're looking at individual apps,
Speaker 1: you'll see that they've answered that question of like how
Speaker 1: much do people want to know about each other? Um,
Speaker 1: you know, when they're just swiping in different ways, I
Speaker 1: think you'll find, you know, Tinder is kind of the
Speaker 1: the bare minimum of like, Okay, here's everybody in your
Speaker 1: radius who you know, and there's a here's a picture
Speaker 1: that's kind of the first thing you see about them,
Speaker 1: and you know, here's their name in their age, and
Speaker 1: you know, there's not much more than that, Whereas you know,
Speaker 1: if you look at something like coffee meats, bagel or
Speaker 1: hinge nowadays, like they'll they'll have many more props for
Speaker 1: like how would you answer this question? Or like what's
Speaker 1: your favorite x y z um. So, I think you
Speaker 1: know people are looking for different dating experiences, and I
Speaker 1: think you know, to the credit of app developers, they
Speaker 1: have um have met those needs or met those desires.
Speaker 1: I had a friend who was older, and he said
Speaker 1: these dating apps minimize serendipity and fate in people's lives.
Speaker 1: He said, people today are never going to be staring
Speaker 1: into each other's eyes, having a cheap Italian meal with
Speaker 1: a candle jammed into a bottle of Mattuse rose and
Speaker 1: getting to know each other in real time, and you're
Speaker 1: discovering even though that person might not be your fantasy,
Speaker 1: you get to know them and you become really attracted
Speaker 1: to them. He said. The thing he hated most of
Speaker 1: all was GPS, because getting lost might be the greatest
Speaker 1: thing that ever happened to you. Um, I would say
Speaker 1: first of all that I think dating apps still do
Speaker 1: allow for a lot of serendipity and definitely still out
Speaker 1: for romance because you know, Um, just like the odds
Speaker 1: of being on the app at the same time as
Speaker 1: someone else, and then I think are pretty slim. And
Speaker 1: then a lot like most of the dates that I've
Speaker 1: gone on have been sort of impulsive, like let's go
Speaker 1: get a drink tonight, um, and most of them are bad. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like them are terrible. But then once have you ever
Speaker 1: walked out? Oh? Yeah? Actually, just a couple of months ago,
Speaker 1: I went on a date with somebody who asked me
Speaker 1: how many people I had had sex with, like pretty
Speaker 1: much ten minutes after we sat down. So I left
Speaker 1: that date. Um, you talk about me? I mean, do
Speaker 1: you still think? I'm asking? Do you still use these apps? Now?
Speaker 1: Are you still on these apps? Now? Well? I actually
Speaker 1: just deleted the apps a few weeks ago because I
Speaker 1: met somebody on Tinder, like in March, right before the pandemic.
Speaker 1: But I met him on Tinder, so so so you
Speaker 1: literally felt I guess the question is, did you feel
Speaker 1: that once I met whatever his name is, it's time
Speaker 1: I can just retire my apps now? Sure? Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think the pandemic really pushed up the timeline for that.
Speaker 1: Normally I wouldn't delete the apps until there was like
Speaker 1: an official conversation about exclusivity. But during the pandemic, you
Speaker 1: know that conversation becomes a little irrelevant. Um, you know
Speaker 1: you already have to be like, well, if you're coming
Speaker 1: over here in my house, you better not be going
Speaker 1: over into other people's houses too. That was Caitlin Tiffany
Speaker 1: alongside co author Ashley Fetters, discussing their Atlantic magazine article
Speaker 1: the Dating Market is Getting Worse. Two other super smart
Speaker 1: women with a lot to say about modern love or
Speaker 1: Erica Jong and her daughter Molly Jong Fast, speaking here
Speaker 1: about her mom's second marriage. We knew that you couldn't
Speaker 1: be married and fool around. You couldn't be married. And
Speaker 1: secrets to their marriage. They have different bathrooms, right, They
Speaker 1: each of their own bath and they're tired. They're too
Speaker 1: tired to do new curtains and bookshelves. The reason why
Speaker 1: we got married rather than lived together was because he
Speaker 1: said to me, if we just lived together, one day,
Speaker 1: we'll have a fight and you'll say I'm leaving or
Speaker 1: I will we have a bad record. If we get married,
Speaker 1: we know we're going to make it work. For my
Speaker 1: full conversation with Erica Jong and Molly Jong Fast text
Speaker 1: Jong's to seven zero one. That's j O n g
Speaker 1: s to seven zero one, and we'll send you a link.
Speaker 1: If you're looking on iTunes, you'll get the interview packaged
Speaker 1: with Lorne Michael's that's quite a two fer more with
Speaker 1: Ashley and Caitlin in a moment, I'm at like Baldwin
Speaker 1: and this is here's the thing. It surprised me the
Speaker 1: degree to which Ashley Fetters and Caitlin Tiffany defended online
Speaker 1: dating as we spoke, given their frequent written critiques. So
Speaker 1: I asked Caitlin to focus for a moment on the pitfalls.
Speaker 1: Because there are so many profiles to go through, you
Speaker 1: can sort of start sorting people into broad categories pretty quickly,
Speaker 1: which is just the way your brain works, like it
Speaker 1: needs to come up with a sorting heuristic otherwise you're
Speaker 1: going to be completely overwhelmed. So after you know, years
Speaker 1: of being on Tinder, I definitely felt like I was
Speaker 1: getting jaded and not really um treating people as people
Speaker 1: all the time, just being like, well, okay, um that
Speaker 1: I used to feel bad about leaving a date early
Speaker 1: if I got there and I immediately knew I wasn't
Speaker 1: attracted to someone I would still sit and try to
Speaker 1: talk to them for at least an hour, and because
Speaker 1: I didn't want to hurt their feelings. But in the
Speaker 1: last year, for sure, I would down my glass of
Speaker 1: wine in fifteen minutes then be like, Okay, I'm not
Speaker 1: really feeling this, like have a good night by which
Speaker 1: I feel like it is kind of I don't know,
Speaker 1: it's my prerogative to do, but it's also not super kind. Um.
Speaker 1: I would say that is the downfall up dating apps
Speaker 1: is that it becomes too efficient. No, Ashley, what about you?
Speaker 1: What do you think the I mean, there are strengths
Speaker 1: to it, which obviously, what do you think of the drawbacks? M? Yeah, totally. Well,
Speaker 1: I I'm a little bit older than Caitlin. I'm thirty,
Speaker 1: and I am old enough to remember, you know, the
Speaker 1: time before dating apps, and I remember what it was
Speaker 1: like to just not go on a date for a
Speaker 1: while and not be able to find anybody to go
Speaker 1: on a date with. And um, you know, I think
Speaker 1: you know, I remember, you know, going on a date
Speaker 1: and being like, Wow, I'm not that wild about this guy,
Speaker 1: but maybe I'll go on another date, you know, maybe
Speaker 1: I'll stick it out and see you of things that
Speaker 1: you know, it's a spark, materialize this, and I would,
Speaker 1: you know, give things a longer time to prove me
Speaker 1: wrong initially, you know, I give things some time to
Speaker 1: blossom if they were going to. Whereas I feel like,
Speaker 1: did that, what did that work? Did you did you
Speaker 1: give people a chance and it turned out that that
Speaker 1: was a smart move? It's not really, But I'm in
Speaker 1: a long term relationship with someone that I feel like
Speaker 1: I pretty much knew instantly that uh that so I
Speaker 1: am now yeah, yeah, so I have to say that
Speaker 1: approach did not really served me the way I intended
Speaker 1: it to. But yeah, no, I think I think dating
Speaker 1: ap to really solved a scarcity problem, but they created
Speaker 1: a problem of like, you know, endless options right where
Speaker 1: you're you're, you know, on a first date with someone.
Speaker 1: It's not going perfectly, so you might be more inclined
Speaker 1: to say, like next and you're trading up. If you're
Speaker 1: trading up, you are, yeah, and it makes you feel like,
Speaker 1: you know, if this person is not the one, then
Speaker 1: the one is probably the next person you're going to
Speaker 1: go out with. Whereas, you know, when there was a
Speaker 1: scarcity of dates that made you sort of sit down
Speaker 1: and give a longer period of consideration. Do you think
Speaker 1: actually that these apps are the interruption of a natural process,
Speaker 1: that the path towards finding somebody is something that involves
Speaker 1: a serious expenditure of time. Is it an interruption? I
Speaker 1: don't think so actually. Um. I think what's important to
Speaker 1: remember about dating apps is that all they do is
Speaker 1: connect humans to each other, right, and whether those humans
Speaker 1: are compatible or not compatible, or interested in each other
Speaker 1: or not. Um. I think those facts will be the
Speaker 1: same whether you meet over a dating app or not, right,
Speaker 1: And so you know, it's it's so important to remember
Speaker 1: that there's a human element here and once you're once
Speaker 1: you have matched on the app, and the app you know,
Speaker 1: puts you in touch and then you can say, like, hey,
Speaker 1: let's meet face to face. Like it reverts right back
Speaker 1: to the old formula I think of dating and of um,
Speaker 1: you know, partner searching. Right, it's your your back at
Speaker 1: your back at like kind of the old school um,
Speaker 1: the old school question of like is this the person
Speaker 1: I want or not? Um? So I think, you know,
Speaker 1: I think it gives it an interesting different prelude, like
Speaker 1: you might encounter this person in a different way, or
Speaker 1: might you know, encounter this person who is outside the
Speaker 1: range of people you might have otherwise met without a
Speaker 1: dating app. But I think once you once you're in
Speaker 1: that stage of like I am on a date with
Speaker 1: a person I met, most things look the same. You know,
Speaker 1: when I met my wife, Laria, and I met her
Speaker 1: in a in a restaurant and she walked by and
Speaker 1: I said some preposterously stupid line to get her to
Speaker 1: sit down with me. The sense I got of her,
Speaker 1: you know, there was a warmth and a generosity to
Speaker 1: her and a humanity to her that just came off
Speaker 1: of her very very quickly. I mean, do you think
Speaker 1: if you saw your wife's picture on a dating app,
Speaker 1: do you think you'd swipe right on her? And do
Speaker 1: you think you'd still feel that same energy that you
Speaker 1: felt when you met up with there? Well, I don't
Speaker 1: know about the energy question. I I don't know. She
Speaker 1: was this gorgeous woman. I mean, she was my feminine ideal,
Speaker 1: you know, in terms of what she looked like. But
Speaker 1: I'm not quite sure that I would have let that
Speaker 1: govern me. The one story I will tell you was
Speaker 1: when I did make a connection to somebody on the
Speaker 1: dating app, when I was single, and I had masked
Speaker 1: who I was. What I stumbled into was this absolutely
Speaker 1: hilarious scenario. The woman said to me, I want you
Speaker 1: to know I'm married. And she lived in southern California,
Speaker 1: and she said, but I want you to know my
Speaker 1: husband is gay. Uh. And my husband uh, he we
Speaker 1: were friends and we got married and we've been together
Speaker 1: and he was always fighting that he was gay, and
Speaker 1: finally he's decided to live his life as a gay man.
Speaker 1: We're and we're still friends and we have a child together.
Speaker 1: We have a son. And she said, so you come
Speaker 1: down to my house. My husband's a huge fan of yours.
Speaker 1: He loves you. We think you're great. Like not at
Speaker 1: all what I had dreamed dating would lead me to,
Speaker 1: you know. It was like you wind up getting an
Speaker 1: entree in people's lives. And if you don't mind my asking,
Speaker 1: did you meet your current partner on a nap? I
Speaker 1: didn't know the people who didn't meet on that, but
Speaker 1: we met in two thousand and sixteen at a birthday party.
Speaker 1: How tall is he's about six foot three. My daughter,
Speaker 1: my older daughter, Ireland, had these boyfriends. She did. She's
Speaker 1: six too, that's and she would date these guys. You know,
Speaker 1: they would walk ahead of me, and the guy kind
Speaker 1: of came up to her shoulder, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: And I thought, I wonder how long this is gonna
Speaker 1: last when you know, and the guy she's with now
Speaker 1: is like six four, and I go, this is the
Speaker 1: first real shot she's got. Yeah. Yeah, there's a thing
Speaker 1: that happens where, you know, if you're the tallest people
Speaker 1: at a party, you know, you make I contact over
Speaker 1: everyone else's head, and you know, I want to swerve
Speaker 1: here towards the COVID thing. Are these dating apps now
Speaker 1: exploding in the age of the virus? Usage is up? Um?
Speaker 1: I think you know it's that's probably a function of
Speaker 1: people being stuck at home kind of board 'm not
Speaker 1: sure what else to do with their time. Um. And
Speaker 1: you know, it's a familiar activity that you might lead somewhere.
Speaker 1: It might lead you to a fun, flirtatious conversation. UM.
Speaker 1: So I can see why, you know, even though people
Speaker 1: can't meet up, they might still be UM browsing. But
Speaker 1: I'd love to know what Caitlin says about that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like major dating apps have been adding new features that
Speaker 1: are specifically for pandemic dating. So like, yeah, like Tinder
Speaker 1: has video chat an app now which I can only
Speaker 1: imagine what kind of moderation challenge that is. Um But
Speaker 1: most of the major dating apps have have added video
Speaker 1: calls directly in the app so that you don't have
Speaker 1: to like schedule a separate FaceTime call or whatever else.
Speaker 1: And I think Bumble as well has like a badge
Speaker 1: you can add to your profile that basically says like
Speaker 1: I'm open to mote dates. And you know, I've also
Speaker 1: been reading anecdotal stuff and there was an essay in
Speaker 1: the Paris Review about um like sexting with people out
Speaker 1: of dating apps. So I think if it's up there
Speaker 1: in the in the Paris Review, and then it's pretty common.
Speaker 1: What a perfect resource for that observation. The Paris Review
Speaker 1: George Plimpton is going to give us the update on
Speaker 1: how people are video sexting, which brings me to another
Speaker 1: question I had, which is that a friend of mine
Speaker 1: who shall remain nameless, told me he became aware of
Speaker 1: a video sexting gathering where ultimately a hundred and fifty
Speaker 1: men were all servicing themselves live in real time in
Speaker 1: the auto erotic tradition, and fifty of them at the
Speaker 1: same time, and I'm wondering, are we on the verge
Speaker 1: because of the pandemic of flat out sexuality played out
Speaker 1: in dating apps. Caitlyn oh me, Um, Well, while I
Speaker 1: can't really imagine myself personally stumbling into like a hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty person virtual orgy, and I think that will
Speaker 1: probably remain like a you know, like a special occasion,
Speaker 1: once in a while type thing. Um, I do actually
Speaker 1: think the pandemic maybe is making people more frank about
Speaker 1: their sexuality and about like their desire for intimacy. I've
Speaker 1: seen a lot of people on Twitter and Instagram who
Speaker 1: I follow professionally who are being pretty frank about like,
Speaker 1: you know, this sucks. It sucks that nobody's having sex,
Speaker 1: Like they just say that. I saw like a woman
Speaker 1: that I interviewed for a story, Um a while back,
Speaker 1: she tweeted yesterday like, am I toold to post a
Speaker 1: picture of my butt on Instagram? Like? People are just
Speaker 1: going for it? Which I think is kind of fun.
Speaker 1: You know, I don't, I mean, I'm for it. I
Speaker 1: think what Caitlin said is is spot on. You know,
Speaker 1: people are being much more frank about how lonely they are.
Speaker 1: People are being more frank about you how much they
Speaker 1: would like to be having sex when they're not um
Speaker 1: and I think you know, on the other on the
Speaker 1: other end of that, like the pandemic has really normalized
Speaker 1: a lot of virtual interactions that weren't part of our
Speaker 1: daily lives before. But I don't know that I necessarily
Speaker 1: see a lasting overlap between those two. Like, if you
Speaker 1: think about a one and fifty person orgy taking place
Speaker 1: over zoom, it's like all of the fun parts of
Speaker 1: an orgy are absent from that transaction, right, Like, I
Speaker 1: would imagine the real life counterpart to that is much
Speaker 1: more satisfying than the zoom version, you know. I I'll
Speaker 1: be honest here, I'm not in the in the habit
Speaker 1: of going to orgies, but I would imagine that part
Speaker 1: of the the appeal is the closeness and the touch
Speaker 1: and the smell, right, and you lose all those things
Speaker 1: you busted me there. I just wasn't the same as
Speaker 1: the real orgies I've been to. Mean, a hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty guys in a room together, now that's thrilling, but
Speaker 1: online it's not the same. I mean, I think Caitlin
Speaker 1: and I have talked about this before, just kind of
Speaker 1: on our own time. We both have seen a lot
Speaker 1: of people on Twitter and on Instagram and social media, UM,
Speaker 1: just talking about how much they can't wait to go
Speaker 1: to a bar, can't wait to go to a wedding,
Speaker 1: can't wait to hug their friends, can't wait to, like
Speaker 1: you said, you know, go to a party in the
Speaker 1: Bronx even though they live in Brooklyn. UM, you know,
Speaker 1: go out of their way to attend a birthday party
Speaker 1: for someone that they might not otherwise make the effort for. UM.
Speaker 1: I think you're absolutely right that we are going to
Speaker 1: see a larger social effort than what we've seen in
Speaker 1: you know, years past. UM. I was reminded by Adam
Speaker 1: by producer these apps are used by people in college,
Speaker 1: and I thought, how weird because you're at college there
Speaker 1: to meet people and to congregate with them and to
Speaker 1: interact with them, and they're right down the hallway in
Speaker 1: a dorm. You know, why do you think so many
Speaker 1: people in college are using dating apps. Tinder came out
Speaker 1: in I believe, so I was in college, but it
Speaker 1: was still considered like a weird thing to do at
Speaker 1: the time, So I didn't really know anybody who was
Speaker 1: using a dating app when I was in college, but
Speaker 1: my younger sister, Um, definitely, who's in college now, definitely
Speaker 1: uses them, I think because it removes a lot of
Speaker 1: the awkwardness of having to, you know, approach someone that
Speaker 1: you're friends with, who's in your friend group and be like,
Speaker 1: maybe I want to be romantic with you, because that
Speaker 1: is really like fraud, especially in college when all of
Speaker 1: your friend circles overlap. But isn't that what everyone was
Speaker 1: doing prior to these apps? Yeah, for sure. But I
Speaker 1: think also, I mean when I was in college, I
Speaker 1: was just afraid of everyone, so that's why I barely
Speaker 1: dated it all in college. So dating apps might have
Speaker 1: made things easier for me, especially since I went to
Speaker 1: such a large school like um, I think there was
Speaker 1: like four thousand kids in my class, so it would
Speaker 1: have been probably beneficial. I mean, I probably would have
Speaker 1: met people outside my social circle. Um. What would you say, Caitlin?
Speaker 1: Is your advice a caution, some kind of suggestion you
Speaker 1: have for people when they use apps? What? What's What's
Speaker 1: something they should try to keep in mind or avoid
Speaker 1: all together? My advice is not to rack up matches,
Speaker 1: just to rack up matches once you get to a
Speaker 1: number like seven eight, maybe you should send messages and
Speaker 1: start conversations and play all of those matches out before
Speaker 1: you go back and look for more um, just because
Speaker 1: otherwise people become like completely interchangeable baseball cards to you
Speaker 1: and Ashley, UM, I would say, just go on a
Speaker 1: date before you lose the momentum of you know, we've
Speaker 1: talked for a week on this on this app, and
Speaker 1: now we don't really know what happens next. I think
Speaker 1: just go for it. If it's someone that you're talking
Speaker 1: to that you like, meet them in person. I want
Speaker 1: to thank you both. Ashley. I'm assuming your boyfriend is
Speaker 1: in the pantry hiding among the pasta. I gave him
Speaker 1: the apartment. I'm in the closet, so you know, he
Speaker 1: owes me one no time, but listen, stay safe and
Speaker 1: thank you both for your time. I appreciate him. Thanks all.
Speaker 1: This was great. Yeah, thank you for having us. It's fun.
Speaker 1: Ashley Feathers and Caitlin Tiffany, co authors of the Dating
Speaker 1: Market is getting worse on the Atlantic dot com. At
Speaker 1: the time of our conversation, both women were staff writers
Speaker 1: at The Atlantic, but pandemic era adds sales and the
Speaker 1: end of live events had taken their toll at that
Speaker 1: devenorable institution. Ashley was among the victims whom the magazine
Speaker 1: praised as exceptional and beloved even as it let them go.
Speaker 1: It was Ashley's second stint at the magazine, where she
Speaker 1: had started her career eight years ago. That's right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: my first my first job out of college was actually
Speaker 1: at The Atlantic. Was coming back to the Atlantic. Always
Speaker 1: the plan is that what you wanted? Um, you know,
Speaker 1: I turned out to have too much of a plan
Speaker 1: in terms of, you know, what I want my whole
Speaker 1: career to look like. I don't want to be disappointed
Speaker 1: at the end of all of this. But um, I
Speaker 1: would say, it really felt like a homecoming to come
Speaker 1: back to The Atlantic. Um, you know, it had grown
Speaker 1: a lot since I was there last, but I had
Speaker 1: to so it really felt like a welcome return. If
Speaker 1: you're looking to hire a brilliant writer, check out at
Speaker 1: Ashley Fetters on Twitter. That's f E T T E R. S. Caitlin,
Speaker 1: who covers technology as well as love and romance, remains
Speaker 1: on the staff. I'm Ale Baldwin and this is Here's
Speaker 1: the thing.