About a year ago I signed up for a free online dating site called Plenty of Fish, also known as POF. While searching through the profiles that all women age 20 – 36 within the greater Los Angeles area made for themselves, I started to notice an alarming number of similarities or recuring themes. The following is my list of peeves.
1. The Interests
Everybody likes music, and art, and traveling, and the outdoors, and sunshine, and having fun. These are not things that give any insight as to who you are as an individual. I wouldn’t even really describe them as interests but more just standard features that come with any human being. It’d be like shopping for a used car and coming across an ad that says “Great vehicle, runs on gasoline, tires are round, has matter and density.” I still don’t know the make, model, year, milage, accident history, horse power etc. If anything I view the vaugness as a trap into buying a lemon.
2. I’m shy but I’m not shy
A lot of girls can’t decide on what they are. “I’m shy but I can also be very outgoing.” “I’m just a jeans and t-shirt kinda girl that loves to get dressed up and go out too.” “I’m a realist but I have a bit of a hopeless romantic side. . .” When filling out your “about me” section you should use a “Which of the following best describes me?” approach. Like an SAT question, choose the letter that best answers the problem, don’t fill in every bubble.
3. The Nerd
Some girls like to pick out one non-airhead thing they do and then call themselves a nerd. The degree they give themselves can vary from: full on nerd, half nerd, a bit of a nerd. It’s always juxtaposed with some characteristic indicating that they are still attractive. For example: “I’m a nerd that likes to play scrabble and do crossword puzzles, but I also love doing girly things like getting my hair and nails done. . so I guess that makes me 1/2 nerd and 1/2 beauty. . . .” For the record, the occasional board game does not qualify you as a nerd, or as you are really trying to imply, smart. This would be like me playing a game of HORSE and then calling myself a jock.
4. “My friends describe me as . . . ”
A jackass? There is nothing cute about having your friend write your profile for you. You are not being modest you are being pathetic. These always end up reading like a eulogy in the present tense. “Sarah is a fun loving, good spirited person who can always put a smile on everyones face.”
5. The List
Many girls think they are being clever by making one word lists of arbitrary things they like. It usually comes in the format of : trivial, trivial, trivial, serious (repeat) . . . Might look something like this: “I love rainy days, pringles, blue jeans, my family, Leonardo Di Caprio movies, orange tic tacs, diet pepsi, feeding the homeless . . . ”
6. The Art Chic
Her taste is far more sophisticated than yours. She would list her favorite bands but you’ve probably never heard of them. She’s looking for a guy that can go on long rhetorical rants about how fucked up the system is. You can tell she is artistic and creative because she has art that other people created tattooed on herself.
7. “I like a guy that can make me laugh. . .”
really?
8. “No Drama, No Bullshit”
I have come up with an easy way to find out who the biggest slut is in a group of girls without running the risk of contracting herpes. It’s whoever uses the word “slut” the most often. This algorithm can be applied to many other things. You feeling the need to address the issue of not wanting “drama” or “bullshit” leads me to believe that you are in fact a drama queen full of bull fucking shit.
9. The Smokin Hot Friend
Does not need to be in all the pictures you post on your dating profile. This is essentially shooting yourself in the foot. Your caption could say “Thats me on the left, next to the girl that looks like she could be a model.” Beauty is relative and when guys see a 6 standing next to an 8 we’re going to go with the 8. Find yourself some uglier friends to take pictures with or learn how to work a little photoshop magic.
10 . All the aforementioned girls that never wrote me back!
Well have fun doing that. Im actually a colledge graduate and I majored in english and am currently working on a poetry collection I simply dont give a rats ass what you think and therefor do not take the time to edit and/or spell check for a stupid and incredibly pointlesss BLOG!!! By the way just curious… How old are you?
Anonymous,
If you think this blog is so “stupid and incredibly pointless,” why the hell are you on here? That makes no sense whatsoever. I’m 26.
Well ay first it was just a glance, But you very un-endearing responces have me hooked. I enjoy debate and though this seems more like an arguement, I simply cannot allow myself to look away. So I suppose I should thank you for keeping me entertained.
Really your only 26? Huh, I would have thought you older… much older. Funny thing is as much as we dissagree, you seem like the time of guy I would date. of course it would be like other short steemy (yet still a failure) romances…
sorry meant to say “at” first…
Hey anonymous,
Long time no talk. Nope, my “romances” haven’t been a failure. I wouldn’t exactly characterize staring at my dates buttocks and thinking about how I’m going to give it a nice rodgering later as having anything remotely to do with romance. I’ve had great sex with very attractive women from Newport Beach to Buckhead, Atlanta, Georgia, and many other places in between, as well as North and South. Keep trying to bring me down, though, LOL. “I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.” You’re like the little engine that COULDN’T.
Im not trying to bring you down, Im simply pointing out your flaws as you have done to me…
kidding! but seriously Im not trying to offend you…(anymore)
While also trying to anylize your personality. If you dont like it, my appologies. I took a few phychology classes in junior colledge in order to help me get a better understanding of the human phyche. (It will be helpful when I finish my other infamous project, a novel two years in the making)…
let me guess you collect commics and live in your mothers basement right?…
Anonymous,
Nope, I live in a 5718 square foot Georgian style home with my two dogs. The 14th fairway of the golf course is roughly 15 feet from my driveway. Sage advice for you regarding your aspirations of becoming a novelist: I’d strongly consider hitting the spell check button, say 350,000 times before you even consider bringing a draft to an editor for publishing. Your spelling is atrocious. Not trying to be a dick here, but sometimes you just need to be blunt. Forgive me, guess it’s just the Yankee in me.
LOL… My daughter would like you. She is also 26, can spell, hates dating sites and is in Law school… can moms still fix up?
Or maybe your just a dick…
And yes I am a bid spoiled by spell-check these days, as I do all of my work on a computer. Not much I can say there. But your obvious need to point out others flaws in order to feel superior show a lot about your personality. My guess would be that you are an over-achiever and have been since childhood. That usually comes from parental issues. Is it your mom? No. let me guess your father had a busy job? Didn’t have much time for you? You just couldn’t get his attention? No matter how much awards you got, no matter how well you did in school…? Am I right? If not ill apologize, but if I am… than maybe you’re not a dick, maybe your just a trouble boy with deep seated emotional damage….
Nope, my parents have been happily married for 43 years. They got married right after my father got his masters at Cornell. I grew up in a traditional and upper middle class household, and I had a great childhood. Now you’re just reaching, and it’s pathetic, to be frank. LOL to me pointing out your flaws. Um, they are pretty obvious as you stated you are writing a novel yet you cannot spell. The difference is that your flaws are readily apparent, while you are just trying to make up shit with me, when you really have don’t have a clue. I could care less if you think I’m a dick, but I’m having fun making you my bitch with these posts.
Okay so maybe I was wrong, you are just a spoiled little boy! And honey there are many ways I would willingly be your “bitch”, unfortunately this blog isn’t one of them.
Toots you’ve been wrong about 1,000 times, don’t understate it. Nope again, I went to Duke law school, and am a hard working attorney. I’ve worked hard to maintain the same lifestyle I had growing up.
What no response oh wise one?
oh
Well congrats on that love you should be proud, but sorry you’re not the first asswhole to go to law school. But that does explain a lot!
Not sure which is more entertaining – the blog or the comments! Definitely seeing some bitterness and defensiveness going on here.
Anonymous,
I didn’t go to law school. I lied. Ha, ha. I went to the Fuqua school of business at Duke. So “FUQUA YOU,” biotch. I’m a financial advisor.
oooh baby, is that a legitimate offer?
Trudi,
Im not bitter, he’s just rude
Dave your a dick head! I cant belive I have been arguing with you for the past three fucking days! What an incredible waste of time!!
anonymous, you shouldn’t assume I was referring to you. I am seeing the huge polarity between men and women and what they want from dating. Face it, we’re vastly different on so many levels, not sure how we are meant to fall in love and live together. That said, the original article was pretty dang funny and hit the nail on the head on quite a few points. Not everything but a lot. Always interesting to get a man’s perspective.
oh right sorry i guess i am defensive… I was so wrapped up in my arguement I forgot about the origional article…. hahaha yea it was great… but thats what you get with brian, hes amazing
Hey Dina, hook me up!
Cat fight, saucer for two…..Why don’t you two go ahead and just bone each other already and get it over with. I wanna get back to making generalized, uninformed and broad statements about women and dating. Just messing with ya Dave…give it up Dude. Your probably arguing with some 250 pound mustached lesbian.
Steve,
Dude, it sent 12 messages to my 3 yesterday. I began to ignore it, and it still kept on posting. I can’t control this mutant. It probably has a bigger cock and Adam’s apple than either one of us. Hopefully, it’s given up.
Dave….”it must put lotion on it’s skin”….name that movie.
Silence of the Lambs. One of the best lines I recently heard was from Miles in Sideways- “I AM NOT DRINKING ANY FUCKING MERLOT.” One of the best movies of all time. Unbelievable acting from Giammati and Haden Church.
thanks dave and steve for that creepy bit of randomness lol. man i was wondering if the writer was a girl, i guess not i can think of 100′s of things i hate about online dating that are probably more revelant than that top 10.
1. the fake profiles and obvious fake profiles of either gay or straight men trying to scam porn from bi females or men.
2. the females with the mustache pictures and arent lesbians or cross dressers, they just think its funny. personaly i wonder if its a secret code for “my profiles faked” along with the females with the “uploaded from my iphone” pictures that look like generic fake profiles lol.
3. the females with the profiles that are way more flipped out than men. an example would be the women with the zombiemakeup pics, gas mask photos, evil clown pics etc. ok if a dude did that he would be getting flagged and 911′d lolol. why is it that chicks profiles on dating sites can be way more flipped out than mens?
4. the females with the “im 27 looking for a man 27-30″ ok we know why your single lololol, unfortunately thats 90% of sites like okstupid. Thiers no way you can tell a 2-5 year difference in someone, its difficult even 10-15 with some people. Its sad especialy in ca its like people are trying to make the world for only 20-30 year olds and excluding a whole range of people and experiences.
5. the females that are bisexual yet “not looking for sex, not looking for threesomes, etc”. When guys hear a woman say shes bisexual on her dating profile they think “3somes + hoe”, when a female puts it on her profile she means shes lesbian leaning.
6. the walking contradiction mean spirited females that are sexaphobic and ranking out men yet looking to date.ok your either here to find a prospective mate or your not here to date and need to be on facebook or myspace. or worse the women with the skantily dressed photos ranking on guys hitting them up. one I saw had a picture of herself over her bed with a profile heading of “I wish dumbass men stop objectifying me”.
Its pretty sad online, I’m tempted to make a t-shirt that says “i hate online dating” just to see how many millions Id make off it. Income I can understand but majorly its agephobia and sexaphobia that makes me just want to not date anymore and be content with nerddome.
Id want to blame women but I cant as im bright enough to realize that 9 out of 10 women online are actualy men so lol.
as im in my 30s looking I’m tempted now just to date 30+ year olds and give it a few more years and just completely throw in the towel. I dont think im alone though looking around and you arent either so dont fret, its all being a part of the human race.
Hey Johnny,
I don’t touch women in their 30′s anymore- it’s a bad age range to be dating. Single women in their 30′s are either going through or have just gone through a divorce from when they were in their 20′s, and many are bitter towards men. Second, you have to wonder about a woman in her 30′s who appears to be attractive and appears to have her shit together. She probably has issues not seen on the surface, because the ratios of single men to women in most places are very good for women. Certainly, if a woman was that great she would be made an “honest woman.”
I tend to date women in their 20′s and have had much more fun doing it. They don’t seem to be anywhere near as bitter towards men, are much more positive, open minded, and thus are much more pleasant to date. It seems like the older that single women get the more picky and judgmental they become, which isn’t a good combo when you also put into play the fact that people’s looks fade, both women and men, as they get older. Younger is better. They are more fresh, and tend not to be less polluted from many past experiences.
Hey Johnny, I can see how one might be confused as to the gender of this author, given that all the complaints were about girls and it was posted under an ambiguous name like Brian. Great list. Much more “revelant” than mine. Thanks for specifying before each number that you are talking about females. I suffer from a sever short term memory loss, as I’m sure many others reading this do, and needed to be reminded every five seconds that we were still talking about women.
Your thing about mustache pictures was interesting, it reminded me of a complaint someone else made in a similar list posted online, here is the link.
http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/sex/10-things-women-include-in-their-online-dating-profiles-but-shouldnt-2061022/
As you can see #1 is titled “LOVE ME, LOVE MY MUSTACHE” and even includes a picture of a woman using a chili pepper as a fake mustache. Quite a coincidence, I guess great minds think alike. Of course yours was much more eloquently written.
I like how you restated again in your #2 that you hate profiles that are fake. Nothing wrong with a little redundancy, I enjoyed reading the same thing over again in different words.
I couldn’t agree more with your # 3. It totally pisses me off when I get flagged for posting my evil clown pictures and my gas mask photos. It upsets me when I see the hundreds of thousands of women’s profiles where they are posting their evil clown and gas mask photos and not getting flagged.
#4 is classic. Women wanting to date men within their age!?? What the fuck is up with that!?
I see your list stops at 6, you must have forgotten to post the other 94 things . .
Brian, your horrible!!! You should be ashamed of yourself taking advantage of the handicapped. That was freaking hilarious.
my way of sayin kiss my ass!!
Anonymous,
Rest assured, no one here wants to kiss your hairy man ass, except maybe Jonny.
fuck off
Anonymous,
You’re back? You’re like a hemhroid. Get me some Preparation H please.
for the last time dave, FUCK YOU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Anonymous,
Grow up. You’re acting like a scorned teeny bopper and embarrassing yourself. Just take your medicine and stop replying to me.
Haha!
I haven’t laughed so hard in ages, the articles good but the comments are genius!
I can only echo the sentiments about online dating. I’ve tried a few sites, subscribed a couple of times and it’s just a joke.
There’s nothing like paying to have your self esteem shat on! The xxx versions of dating sites are even more retarded, just unbeleivable.
On match.com, on a leisurely, humid Friday afternoon, this 23 year-old girl named “Stormie” im’s me. Pretty cute, so I go along with it. Get her number. Wait a few days to call. Just called her an hour ago fully expecting Barry White’s voice, or a fake number. Nope, I get her vm and her name really is Stormie. What the fuck? Should I leave a voice mail? Quickly decided against it, I’m not sure I could date a chick named Stormie. Don’t care if Affleck’s daughter is hot one day either and wants to date me- I’m not going out with a Violet, and that goes for Coldplay’s and Paltrow’s daughter Apple, or Pretty Woman’s Phineus. What’s with these fuckin names? Just call your kid fuckin Sarah, or Stephanie, or Michelle. Christ, imagine the ridicule these poor kids will face. Last names are the worst though, because you can’t control that. I was friend’s with a Mike Lackamacker and a Kevin Crotchfelt in grade school, and they were tormented every day beyond belief.
online dating is a horrible and mean joke on the lonely masses. I tried match.com in Los Angeles after getting divorced. Getting dates was tragically easy with 30-somethings, even easier with 40-somethings, but a total waste of time. 20-somethings were harder to date. The amount of communication required to actually meet somebody who is somebody you’d actually never look at twice in real life is just outrageous. It’s a significant investment of time to just get to a first date. I never slept with any of them. I’ve never such a bunch of jaded, cynical, and boring group of women in my life.
The problem for me is the profiles don’t tell you anything you need to know, and the photos are hit and miss. Some are better looking and most worst than the photos would suggest. You won’t know until you meet and then you’re probably stuck in having lunch with somebody you wouldn’t touch with a sterilized 10 foot barge pool, never mind your cock.
What worked for me was clubs. At least, I can check the women out to see if there’s any chemistry. If there is chemistry, a 1 minute conversation and maybe a dance too will probably tell me all I need about compatibility. If there’s nothing going on there, I can move on.
I could rant forever, but I think dating sites are for lazy women would can’t or won’t go outdoors to meet in regular venues. I met all my long term partners in bars or discos. I never met anybody worthwhile on dating sites. If you must meet somebody online than try social networking sites, like myspace, facebook or clubbing sites.
Martin F,
Of course people don’t tell you everything, such as my hot ex-fiance being bi-polar. I met her on-line. Just imagine a real headline she would have had: “I’m bi-polar, and I rarely give up my vagina for penetration. Also, I hate giving head. Please contact me, you won’t be sorry.” People are selling themselves everywhere, in any venue which they feel necessary, it’s no different at a bar. Two other hot chicks I dated told me they had gone through bouts of depression, and they were women I met at bars. Being on-line is no different than going to a bar and seeing a bunch of undesireables. Each can be a waste of time for certain people. Furthermore, you probably spend more at one bar visit than a monthly subscription to match.com
Just a quick note to those on-line dating in the L.A. or OC area. If you are having issues meeting women, you should talk to me. I’m moving to Newport Beach in less than a month, and just put my profile up yesterday on match.com for that area. I had 15 real messages from women in my inbox 12 hours later (that were real), and 11 of them were very good looking women. Where I currently live in Greensboro, North Carolina, there are 0 out of 10 single women that are desireable. Based on my time spent in the area before there are probably 6.5 out of a hypothetical 10 desireable in the LA/OC area. Yeah SoCal is very superficial, dating isn’t always ideal, but there are so many people in the area that there are still tons and tons of women out there that ARE desireable. Let me know how I can help.
Hi I’m Balula, I also like orange tic tacs.. mant, that’s so weird that you met someone else who likes them too! Because you know, the white ones are too minty, the green ones are too limey.. the orange ones are juuuust right.
Oh FFS! Some girls are so retarded. If I wrote a profile it would say:
Hi, I’m Money Shot. Call me
Hi I’m Balula, I also like orange tic tacs.. man, that’s so weird that you met someone else who likes them too! Because you know, the white ones are too minty, the green ones are too limey.. the orange ones are juuuust right.
Oh FFS! Some girls are so retarded. If I wrote a profile it would say:
Hi, I’m Money Shot. Call me