Editorial: Tinder, reexamined

Tinder may not be ubiquitous, but it can feel that way. The rise of dating apps like Tinder, and Grindr before it, have changed the way many of us go about our lives amid the hook-up scene. A Tinder campus representative and junior at Tufts, interviewed by the Huffington Post in 2013, estimated that 40 percent of Tufts undergraduates had downloaded the app, and that 80 percent of the school’s Greek population used the service. Though his numbers were one person's estimation, the app is common enough. Rather than relying on parties or in-person social activities to meet potential "matches," users can have a fulfilling conversation with another person whom they swiped right on. For all of the controversy and tsk-tsking that seems to surround it, it certainly is functional — people sometimes find lasting relationships, and even on the rare occasion, marriage.

Tinder’s popularity stems from ease of use and convenience. That said, it is not without its drawbacks. Far from it, the app can bring out the worst in us, especially among people who spam or harass others to a drastically inappropriate degree, as is common among many on the Internet. Even the act of swiping left or right users' images on Tinder as a pastime encourages and rewards some of our most base instincts and prejudices of social and racial stereotyping, and rote objectification of other human beings. Unfortunately, none of this is new or only because of Tinder, but it brings out and accents the things we do that in the light we would disavow.

The app is also not as safe as it may seem. There is a lack of background and identity checking in the virtual dating scene, which makes pretending to be someone else, or "catfishing," very easy. Many women will tell that they often receive unsolicited, explicit messages that are at best creepy and at worst abusive and predatory. Catfishing, according to the Tufts Center for Awareness, Resources and Education, is a phenomenon in which “someone pretends to be someone they’re not, using social media to create false identities.” Recently, catfishers pretending to be Tufts students have met up with other students through dating apps such as Tinder searching for a hookup. While Tinder uses a Facebook verification system, people can easily make fake Facebook accounts to perpetuate predatory or inappropriate behavior, a tendency that is indicative of an Internet where harassment is all too common.

Tinder takes the idea of an "information superhighway" and turns that lens towards human connection, for good and for ill. As every rose has its thorns, dating apps facilitate the search for everything between the casual hookup and the intimate relationship. While Tinder and social media broadly are not the end of the world, as anyone who abuses the word "Millenial" will argue, it would benefit anyone using Tinder to remember not to get too swept up in swiping left and right as the sole means of connection.