When it comes to the business of dating apps, the most relevant principle isn’t necessarily patriarchal, but inherently capitalist: celibate, app-less women are not lucrative, an issue that the entire industry is grappling with.

Online conversations about the “male loneliness epidemic” tend to rope in women as a potential solve, particularly on incel forums. Yes, male loneliness is a real problem: A 2021 American Perspectives survey found that the number of men who reported not having a single close friend had quintupled to 15% since 1990. For unmarried men under 30, 25%... See more

To exist on a dating app is to be constantly inundated by the pressure to meet up, regardless of your readiness. And for women, that pressure is reinforced by existing in a world that hates them for being single.

the dating industry at large is perpetually badgering single people to redownload, buy premium subscriptions, and remain in the romantic marketplace. This begs the question: Has a celibate woman become more threatening than a sexual one?

But in attempting to make light of a social climate in which, as they worded it in their apology, “a community” (read: women) “are frustrated by modern dating,” Bumble ended up, inadvertently or not, mirroring the language many women experience when they tell men they are not interested. The sexless, “crazy cat lady” trope is a tale as old as time,... See more