Online Dating = Insecurities?

On the subject of technology, personally technology enables me communicate with friends and family that aren’t a short distance away. Technology enables society to live lives easier by communication with one-another without physical contact. This paves the way for sites such as americansingles.com, an online match-making industry. Online dating has become the thing of the present thanks to websites such as americansingles.com. Using their interface, I was able to simply connect to an extensive database of singles with only a few clicks of the mouse. From using this medium, I have been able to relate this website by means of “media” and “technology”. This website takes advantage of what technology has to offer as it provides users an easy-interactive layout where American’s can search to find anything ranging from their “true love” to a mere fling. Their services include hot-listing individuals, flirting, and exchanging personal information, all at the comfort of one’s computer. Through the website, I was able to learn about an individual without actually meeting them at all.

As an example, several members in our group made fake profiles on Americansingles.com and attempted to flirt with complete strangers in hopes of acquiring information about this topic. My character was very snobby, materialistic, and irresponsible. Within five minutes after signing up for an account, I received a message from Hism, who lives in South San Francisco. He requested a chat-room, thus, our conversation began. In order to stay in character, I tried to be rude, but flirty at the same time. Eventually, he revealed that the reason why he attempted to talk to me was because of my picture; I picked it out of Hotornot.com. He said he’s on the site often and would like to know if I would like to chat on a separate application, such as msn or yahoo. I talked to him a bit more and he told me that he would prefer not to meet up until he’s “comfortable” with our “relationship.” I found that to be surprising, assuming this is a dating site; many people would love to meet up and get serious. After chatting to him some more, I realized he’s really insecure. He responded to some of my questions, but ignored or changed the subject many things when he wouldn’t feel comfortable. For example, I asked him why did he choose americansingles.com, and his response was he just wanted a couple more friends, but refused to say why.

Technology has made our lives easier, but it has made some lives “virtual”. Many things can be avoided now. Why go see someone when one could just use the webcam? Why meet up by the coffee shop to talk while when one can chat online? Why go out and meet new people when one can sign up on a free dating site and choose one’s preferences? Technology is good to the extent that it is convenient, but not when it’s disrupting social lives.
The media plays a large portion in online dating. Americans wouldn’t be aware of online personals if it weren’t for billboards of ads across the highways, or countless commercials of singles moping about how they couldn’t find a companion until they became exposed to the online match-making industry. The media plays on the emotions of consumers such as Hism. They know that these people have a hard time socializing, thus, lacking in the dating department. An online dating site would allow them to pick and choose who they want to talk to. In addition, they can slowly warm-up to the person and it would not be as intimidating like it would in person. I’m not saying all dating sites are bad but it is wrong for advertisers to take advantage of their insecurity. Hopefully, people like Hism can meet someone who can teach them how to get rid of their insecurities.

In the online dating world, ideology was another term that came to mind when I went about my daily rituals of finding a relationship. Ideology is defined as the body of doctrine and beliefs that guides an individual or group of people. On americansingles.com, one of the main ideologies that existed was the importance of image over anything else. Through my experience, I soon discovered that no matter how ill-mannered one is, if they are physically attractive, then nothing else matters.

I spoke with Stewart from Florida last night. He informed me that he's currently in LA for the summer. Stewart revealed that the reason why he spoke to me in the first place was because of my appearance. "Because you're hot, I'd like that." After a couple minutes, he asked for my phone number so we can "chat it up" later. I refused but Stewart did not give up. I rudely told him off and he just laughed it off.

The ideology that image was valued more than anything else led me to another term to discuss, image. Americans today are obsessed with what they wear, how much they weigh, and how to make themselves stand out in a crowd. Americansingles.com encourages this ideology and emphasizes the importance of image to promote their services. Even in the media, viewers only see attractive people promoting the online dating scene. From my experience, my looks alone were enough to get me hot-listed 10 times, more than enough profile visits, and many message requests. The ideology here is that the more attractive one is the better chances they are going to have of success within this industry.

IDEA-ology 101

Ideology, a subject we discussed extensively in class yesterday. [btw, i still have yet to see minority report] Ideology is supposedly a "collection of ideas" that shapes the way you perceive things. It's constantly changing, evolving, and developing. So then, who can tell which ideology is wrong versus the other.

David Hawkes said that "ideology is a false consciousness." In other words, we come to see a person the way he/she present themselves. According to Hawkes, most often this representation is insincere. He argues that people act a certain way to meet a certain requirement or to gain something in return.

So then if ideology is "false," then no one is right. If one's ideology about cellular phones are just one's own ideas and bias or a false representation of one's self, then that ideology is "false."

My co-worker just said that ideology is only "false" when we don't or choose not to see why we believe or act in a certain way. When we construct ourselves a false image for economic gains or social advances or when we choose to believe in a faith that we have no idea why we believe, is a false ideology. So then, how can an ideology becomes real?

I personally believe that all ideology is real because whether you're believing in something just because someone told you so or you're dressed a certain way to fit in, you still believe and act towards an ideology. Thus, it is real, because it's reality. However, I believe, that the ideology of thinking that this is the only way we can act, or this is the only thing I believe in, that there is no other ways to construct an idea or thinking, then this ideology is false. [I hope I made sense there]

Ideology by itself is a very complex topic and I am still struggling to understand it. I think I reached the conclusion that someone might think this is totally false and my ideology of ideology is all wrong. But whose to say whose wrong? I think the awareness of one's own ideology and acknowledging that it can be false is the realest or most genuine ideology I can think of.

To be or not to be

For anything to be popular, it must give up the notion to be label as "elite" or "special." According to Wikipedia, the term "elite" is a fairly small, central group within a larger society. Its status is above the lower and middle class making it a privilege to possess membership in the elite class. Recently, Cartier, a diamond company, decides to advertise their products on Myspace. Cartier representatives argued that Myspace has the ability to reach thousands of people through their advertisements. Cartier already has 3,800 friends with hopes of achieving more through the social network. Although some may see that Cartier is taking a step forward in advertisement, objections such as the audience of Myspace are too young, can pose as a problem. Other diamond companies that are refusing to advertise on Myspace ask the same question: How can these young people afford the luxury items from Cartier? Thus, some of them switch over to sites such as ASmallWorld.com, a site dedicated to wealthy consumers. Cleary, wealthy people see MySpace’s media as a place to reach low to middle class people. In a sense, their theory is that luxurious items are reserved for the best. Thus, if diamonds are rare, then they are for the wealthiest. If diamonds are made available to everyone, then it would not consider a rare item, thus, losing it's face value. Or like someone [sorry i can't remember] said in class today, "perception of value." Items that are perceive to be popular, that are available to the majority of the population, and easily accessible are not rare. Meaning, they are not for the elite. The same theory can be apply to Cartier's advertisements on Myspace. Due to the perception that Myspace is a non-sophisticated medium with an audience consisting of "lawn mowers," the items they choose to advertise are essentially in the same category as the website's status.
The way I think of items or fashion that are "elite" or "special" are that they can be just as easily accessible and popular the next day. The way that the society catches up on news and technology, anything new today is old tomorrow. Surely, diamond companies can keep their prices on diamond at a certain amount to maintain its perception of rareness. I didn’t' mean to say that anything can suddenly gain popularity and loses its perception value but given that diamonds are suddenly in great demand [more than what it is now], a lot of people will have possession of that diamond. Thus, if it's popular, it's ultimately, doesn’t belong in the elite class. I personally don’t' care about items or fashion that are consider special or elite, but I find that there is a classification for these sort of things interesting. The fact that there is a site dedicated to serving wealthy consumers and the mentality to maintain a sense of eliteness, is just intriguing as it is ridiculous.

My relationship with blogging

When I think of blogging, I think of a diary. My blogs usually consists of my emotions, train of thoughts, feelings, activities, etc. Most of the time, I just blog what was on the top of my mind. Other times, I blog what is bothering me at the time or what’s making me happy. Once in a awhile, I look at my blogs throughout a period of time to see how much I’ve changed. However, my relationship with blogging has not always been this way. I started out blogging on xanga when I was 14. My friends and I decided that this would be a fun way for us update each other with our lives. Eventually, everyone stopped blogging but I continued. At first, the posts were mainly the same as before, updates. As time passed, I began blogging deeper, emotional thoughts. Xanga became an outlet for me to record what I was thinking without everyone knowing. Thus, I made my blogs private providing the password only to a select few. Despite knowing my blogs are not public, I sometimes hold back from what I truly want to say. Sometimes, I reread my blogs after posting them, only to realize that this felt too vulnerable, even if its private.