I think people just have nowhere else to go. I’ve never downloaded a dating app (nor have I ever considered myself “on the dating market”) because I’ve either been content to remain single for a stretch, or met someone through my existing communities; a friend of a friend, someone on the periphery of my social network, or just someone I’ve been around a bunch and never gotten to know well.

Dating is hard and it sucks, and the context it creates around getting to know someone puts such an immense pressure on you to show up and make a good first impression. Deciding to be romantically involved with someone (not to mention everything on the implied relationship escalator) I just met or have hung out with a few times would be nearly impossible for me. The only reason I could imagine myself doing it is if I had not had the kinds of periphery connections I mentioned above. The more I go on the internet in this stage of my adulthood, the more I realize a lot of people don’t have the sort of community that enables these.

So many of the superficial heuristics that people use in the dating world (yes, including looks) become less relevant when you have the time to get to know someone organically, without any contextual direction, desperation, or pressure slapped on the connection. Then you come to realize that you really like each other’s company and are starting to have feelings and there’s a solid foundation for it to build from there. But of course capital has ripped through all our social tissue so I don’t really have an answer, other than I lucked out. I did meet my most recent partner through organizing, whatever that’s worth