There seems to be a belief on this sub that dating for women isn't less difficult, they just have different challenges. I think this is simply cognitive dissonance. The post that spurred me to make this post was a post on the r/dating subreddit where a guy's sister lost a $100 bet to get him a single tinder date within a month, and was seemingly shocked by the experience.

My sister suggested "Why not just use Tinder? That will be easy to get you someone to talk to!"

She took a bunch of photos for me wearing some nice clothes, made a profile for me with some funny/charismatic content, and here we are 1 month later, still dateless.

She video chatted with me earlier saying that she couldn't believe how hard it was to get any matches, let alone get any of the girls to reply to me. She was also surprised at the rate at which some of the matches unmatched her once they received a nice message from her.

  1. While men place more value on looks (this is why you more commonly see relationships where the woman is more attractive than vice versa), women have a significantly higher looks threshold that a man has to meet. This is why the emphasis on personality from women comes across as pedantic gaslighting; the best tasting restaurant in the world won't get any customers if it looks like an abandoned building from the outside. According to the OKC study, women rated 80% of men as below average, a statistical improbability. Comparatively, men rated women's attractiveness like a standard bell curve. Link to the OKC study: https://archive.ph/ZJymw

It's not really that farfetched. Here are some of the comments from the r/dating subreddit in a post titled "any straight women who find most men unattractive?" from last week.

I'm a 23 year old straight woman and I find most men unattractive.

I feel the same as you. I rarely find guys attractive, and when I finally find one, I tend to develop a crush on him instantly, just because they are so rare to find. It’s not that I can’t find guys attractive, it’s just that I’m not attracted TO most of them.

Girl, I thought I was the only one. I am straight but I visually find women so much more attractive and men rare

I also find most men unattractive, Even the ones that’s are supposed to be “hot” It’s rare i find someone i like.

Link to the post: https://www.reddit.com/r/dating/comments/vnchnm/any_straight_women_who_find_most_men_unattractive/

Also, depending on the source you look at it, women swipe right ~14% of the time on tinder. Now, the average woman is like 5'4 and borderline obese in the US. Do you really think the average woman is hot enough to be excluding 86% of men based on pictures?

  1. The amount of men not having sex has increased exponentially in the last two decades. Nearly a third of younger men are not having sex at all, and of those that are I'd venture a guess that even fewer of them are having it consistently.

Looked at the sexual activity and number of partners of 18- to 44-year-olds in the U.S. from 2000 to 2018. During that time, the researchers found that sexual inactivity had increased from 19 percent to 31 percent among men age 18 to 24.

Link to study: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2767066?widget=personalizedcontent&previousarticle=2767063

Given how important sex is to men, this number is staggering. In Maslow's hierarchy of needs, sex is placed in the physiological needs category at the bottom of the pyramid. Is sex as important as food and breathing? Obviously not, but it's a significant part of living a fulfilling life. It's quite literally 100x easier for a woman to get sex. One of my fwbs from a few months ago posted one low quality selfie of her in the dark on tinder and reached the 99+ likes threshold in literally 24 hrs. And it's not like she was a model either, she was slightly above average when you factor in her being fit, but she didn't even have a full body pic in her profile.

Virtually any woman could do the same. And it doesn't have to be on a dating app either, any social venue like a bar or club would work. I concede that women carry more risk in regards to sex due to the possibility of pregnancy or getting sexually assaulted. They may also run into a guy who is selfish in bed. However, plenty of women can and do safely enjoy casual sex these days, and there are steps you can take to vet guys properly and alleviate these risks. Men also take risks when they have sex too: if contraception fails and you feel that you aren't prepared to have a child, you have no say in the matter and are on the hook financially. Women can (and do) in rare instances weaponize rape by making false allegations, which is the sort of thing that can *completely* ruin your life regardless of whether or not you are proven innocent.

People will automatically assume you're guilty, you'll lose friends, you'll get kicked out of your university and lose scholarships with no due process. Hell, people still don't believe that Amber Heard ever so much as laid a finger on Johnny Depp despite all of the evidence, testimony, and her previous arrest for hitting her girlfriend. Sex still carries significantly more risk for women, but the point I'm getting across is that it isn't without risk for men either.

  1. Women place a lot of emphasis on factors that men cannot control. Height, hair or lack therof, and race. According to studies, women overwhelmingly favor white men, while comparatively men have a more equal distribution where they respond favorably to white, asian, and latina women. In regards to height and race, we also have the infamous chicago study that quantifies the income you need to be on a level playing field. Asian men need to make additional $247K to be equally as attractive as otherwise similar white men. A man who is 5 feet 6 inches tall needs to earn an additional $175,000 per year to be as desirable as a man who is 6 feet tall.

Link to OKC Study Chart: https://i.huffpost.com/gen/2054870/original.jpg

Links to chicago study charts: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Eq-tlZyXIAEKPpP?format=png&name=large https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Eq_IqqvUwAE6Rcy?format=jpg&name=large

  1. Even if you do manage to successfully get interest as a man and have a consistent dating and sex life, there is a lot more effort required of you. Men are expected to initiate a conversation or approach, be witty/entertaining, plan out dates, pay for dates (or at least offer), decide when to escalate things physically while respecting boundaries ect... all of the rejection is outsourced to us as men. A man has to build his value to get to the point where he is successful in dating, while a woman simply has to be attractive. Here's an excerpt from a recently removed (I wonder why? lol) r/dating post about what dating is like for a man that I found to be really relatable.

I have to make her laugh, witty banter with her, ask her out on a date, logistically plan the date, pay for the date, ask her out on a second date and so on.

It feels like playing the first few levels of a video game over and over.

I have to break the touch barrier. That burden is on me. I have initiate the hugging, hand holding, kissing, making out and sex. If I fail to do so, in a limited window of time of usually a couple of dates, I 100 percent wake up to a text message saying "you're a great guy, but I'm just not feeling it is all."

Link to post: https://www.reddit.com/r/dating/comments/vqmkmi/ive_used_hinge_for_a_year_this_is_what_its_like/

Despite how bleak all of that seems, I firmly believe that the overwhelming majority of men can be successful in dating if they are willing to put the work in. That means taking concrete, actionable steps. Lifting weights consistently, get a well-suited haircut, striving to have a lucrative career, putting yourself in uncomfortable situations to improve your social skills, adopting an outcome independent mindset ect... it might be much harder depending on the hand you are dealt but such is life.

Now to address the inevitable "why do you care?" posts: for the same reason I am pro-choice despite abortion having essentially no impact on me. I think there is inherent value in recognizing challenges that people outside of the groups you identify with face, and recognizing truth. In my opinion the three biggest issues plaguing modern day dating are:

  1. Entitlement and unrealistic standards of modern day women (women avg and below want the same sort of dude: tall, handsome, successful) We need more accountability. Kevin Samuels had the right idea, his delivery was just a bit too extreme. Women contribute to this by gassing their friends up and not being realistic about the sort of man they can actually get. The existence of fds is unironically because there's a lot of women who aim for guys that wont date them.
  2. Modern day men lacking ambition and assertiveness and spending too much time on porn and video games
  3. Obesity. Barring an untreated medical condition nobody has an excuse to be obese. It's unattractive to anyone who doesn't have a fetish for it. All women have to do is look good and like 70% of them are still overweight. Body positivity is an issue. The average man is fat too but at least he ain't calling himself a big beautiful man.