Left. Left. Left. Left. Right. Left. Left. No, those aren’t dance steps. That is someone judging pictures of people on a dating app. In a tweet from August 2015, Tinder claimed that there had been 8 billion matches made via the app. That number has only risen over the past year and a half. As social media usage has exponentially grown, people have turned towards mobile apps to find hookups, friends, love, etc.

I first downloaded Tinder in high school as a joke to see who I could find from my hometown. And by the way, if anyone from my old school is reading this… HA! I actually found quite a few of you. Anyways, then I got bored and deleted the app because I wasn't quite comfortable with the idea yet. I thought meeting up with someone from an app was sketchy and it scared me.

When I moved to Los Angeles, I realized that I was surrounded by a lot of females. This is due to the unfortunate fact that I go to a fashion school. My roommates and I downloaded the app in the hopes that we could find more parties, make friends outside of school and meet guys. Side note: It’s really hard to create friendships in Los Angeles because almost everyone has been consumed by the lifestyle. Finding genuine people is like finding a needle in a haystack. Thankfully, I've settled in and found my solid friends.

Because of Tinder and Bumble, we went to some really odd kickbacks and hangouts at USC, ended up at a few "famous YouTuber/Viner parties" that my 15-year-old self would've been jealous of and made new friends. But aside from that (and arguing with Dodgers fans), a large majority of the time on the app was spent being disgusted at the things that guys said. In addition, the hookup culture with people my age seems to be growing more and more each day. That's just not really my thing, ESPECIALLY when the only words you've spoken to me are, "Hey, let's f*ck!" If that's how you start a conversation, you can expect to be unmatched right away. 

This frustration led to me deleting my Tinder account because it became saturated with way too many gross messages. Instead, I used a different app called Bumble. On Bumble, the female has to message the male first and it has to be sent within 24 hours of matching. The guy then has to respond within 24 hours of that message. This gets the conversation started right away, rather than just waiting on someone to say something. In addition, the likelihood of getting somewhat disturbing messages is greatly lowered. But that doesn’t mean that it eliminates them entirely. There's still an “unmatch” button for a reason! :-) 

Here is an example of a message that I got on Bumble:

And here are just a few more of the conversations that I screenshot and saved for this moment:

Keep in mind that these are actually mild compared to the others ones I've received. I just don't want the others online because they truly disgust me.

I’m disappointed that society has gotten to this point. I think it’s incredibly sad that people can hide behind a screen and say degrading things that they'd never say in person. What makes it okay to say through a mobile app? Nothing. This is one of the downfalls of the Internet and I'm completely over it. I think we need to be more aware of how easy it is to disrespect someone online. 

Respect is something that we can all benefit from and give to others more.

There are success stories from online dating apps so I'm not going to write them off completely. It's pretty cool that we can meet other people that we otherwise would've never known. And if you're into the hookup culture, then by all means have fun. There's nothing wrong with that. However, NO ONE should send messages such as the ones I screenshot. Did any of those guys sincerely think that I'd respond to them or want to meet them? What exactly went through their minds when they pressed send?

Not only did I receive those messages on the apps, but they went as far as going into my Instagram DMs. One guy even emailed my business email. I'm not quite sure what part of "business inquiries only" he didn't understand, but I guess it wasn't clear enough for him. You might think that I was "asking for" those messages by being on these apps. I disagree. No one should be subjected to being sexualized online. I don't care what that person is wearing in their pictures or if they're on Tinder or Bumble.

If you've received numerous messages like the ones I've gotten and are fed up, I suggest deleting the apps and taking a break. Trust me, you'll enjoy your time away. I definitely am. I hope that you learned a thing or two from this post and please comment below if you have any Tinder or Bumble stories. I want to hear what you think about the app and your experiences!