Hacker News Reader

Comment by reureu | Hacker News Reader

As a gay man, I hate grindr and many of my friends do too. We still may use it because it's ubiquitous, honest to a fault, and it's easy to confuse solutions to horniness with solutions to loneliness. But I know it often takes a toll on self-esteem, particularly in areas where you don't match the dominant "type" (e.g., a nerdy guy living in LA or OC). There aren't better options and many of the guys on hinge or tinder are also on grindr -- so, I think grindr gets used often despite it not really delivering on the users' hopes. So, I wouldn't confuse use with satisfaction, and I'd really love to see data on how many gay men actually are satisfied with grindr.

View on HN

I'm in the kinky community and I visit gay clubs sometimes because they have way bigger and better venues (their community is just a lot bigger) and often have all-orientations nights and many popular gay themes overlap strongly with ours (eg submission, pet play, leather)

But one thing I notice is that there's a subset of the gay community that seems shallow and very physical in their sexuality. When you speak of 'satisfaction' in this sense it seems to be purely the physical side and nothing else counts. For me that doesn't work at all. Good for them of course (and I do really think they are truly fulfilled by this so power to them!). But it's a phenomenon that seems pretty unique, I have not heard of this in the lesbian scene for example (my friends are very diverse and open about their sexuality)

Of course this subset is highly represented in those clubs and on Grindr because that is where they find their partners easily.

In these clubs I don't feel so comfortable because they take consent for granted while in the kinky community we always confirm consent before doing anything. Even as much as touching someone's arm.

But I also know a lot of gay people that are more sensual and careful like me. You just don't find them much in those places because they are similarly put off by the attitudes.

I think you're totally right, and I think that's the tragedy of apps like grindr. I was on gay websites as a teenager in the late 90s/early 00s, and it was only tech savvy guys. You could chat with someone for weeks without exchanging photos. The horny, shallow guys somewhat weeded themselves out because there wasn't a large enough population to sustain that.

But as the internet became more popular, dating sites became more mainstream, and then the location-based ones matured, it almost became a race to the bottom (so to speak).

If someone is horny right now, why chat with person A (with a text-based profile) when person B has photos? Why chat with person B when person C has shirtless photos? Why chat with person C when person D sends dick pics right away? Why chat with person D when person E sends dick pics and will drive to your house in 10 minutes? So a subset of users start pushing this towards being hyper efficiency, but that comes at the expense of the other subset of users who don't necessarily want that.

My experience has been you can't ever escape that. That mentality has permeated the system, and now we're conditioned to "meet up within 3 messages", "send pics in first message", "no fats, no fems, no flakes", etc. And if you don't like that and want something slower then you get told "it's just grindr, what do you expect?" (which eventually morphs into "it's just tinder what do you expect?", "it's just hinge, what do you expect?"). But even the people saying "it's just grindr" also complain that after they have sex, they just feel lonely again and that they feel trapped or addicted to grindr.

Obviously I'm painting with really broad strokes. Some people do find relationships on grindr. Some people are satisfied with their interactions. But, I think like the original article describes, it feels soul destroying. And by the time you're in your 30s, I think a lot of gay men realize that easy sex doesn't necessarily mean good sex and it often doesn't mean feeling satisfied or content afterwards. But it's difficult when you have a heterogenous population, with a vocal faction of the population that keeps pushing the limits of efficiency, and the rest of the population is just sorta dragged along.

You see I totally agree with you, but I am not sure if grindr is solely to blame for this. It is a fair generalisation to say that men struggle far more with emotions and open communication. This is clearly demonstrable by looking at the male suicide rates: in my country (UK) they are roughly 3 times that of women. I have no doubt that is common across western countries.

So really to me the problem is that men, on average, struggle with expressing their emotions more. Asking those men to form healthy, loving relationships with other men is then a challenge. Not impossible, but certainly more difficult.

To me, Grindr is a symptom not the cause. If you are taught from a young age that men don't cry, toughen up and be a man etc, then sex is reduced to the physical act. Add in some emotional truama, which is again very common in the gay community, and the problem is exacerbated. Of course Grindr doesn't help and makes it all worse, but really they're just making money off the damage which is already done.

With suicides, it is kinda. Gender rates of suicides wary between countries.

But what is also happening is that men tend to pick more violent ways of killing themselves - shooting themselves and alike. Women tend to go for poisons and such. So, the suicide attempts are much more closer between genders - but men more successful at it.

The flip side is that men are failures at crying for help.

Not all. I'm not. Though years of psychotherapy did have a hand in that.

I see what you mean though. I'm used to being the token guy at self help workshops lol.

> To me, Grindr is a symptom not the cause. If you are taught from a young age that men don't cry, toughen up and be a man etc, then sex is reduced to the physical act.

I agree Grindr is a symptom not the cause. There were rough gay clubs for decades before apps ever appeared.

I don't think this toughening up thing is really the issue though. Many gay friends like this kind of sex and are plenty emotional. And for young people this toughening up bullshit isn't really a thing anymore anyway. When I grew up in the 80s the traditionalists were still like that and there was this (in my opinion) fascist thing in Holland with pretty much all men still being forced into the military and be primed into obedience, following orders and stuff. But since the 90s it's a different world for young people. These things aren't expected and part of their lives anymore. Unless they actually decide they want to be told what to do and join the army voluntarily.

Well I have to say it’s very primal and instinctive. As cavemen I’m doubtful there was much chat going on we probably did it like many other animals do it today and strongest man got to have it’s way. So I don’t think it is all that weird people just want instant sex we probably had that for hundreds of thousands of years. In my experience though a lot of the apps you can specify what you are looking for. Set your profile to long term and you will meet people that chat first and get to know each other. I’m week on into chatting a girl. It’s going to be 2 more weeks before we can hang out. Our profiles are set to long term so no expectation of sex right away.

Yeah I think so too. It's more instinctive for men to like this.

I (as a cis hetero man) consider many such things toxic masculinity in today's society but I'm very emo (and proud of it nowadays). But if it's consensual it's fine, it's more that consent is often overlooked by the people who are into this kind of sex.

> But it's difficult when you have a heterogenous population, with a vocal faction of the population that keeps pushing the limits of efficiency, and the rest of the population is just sorta dragged along.

I don't mean to digress, but this statement of yours could easily apply to technology or any cultural change.

This is the impression I've gotten from my gay male friends as well. One in particular seems to get better luck from going to small-medium themed events that are thin excuses for meeting potential partners.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com