Have fun and be good to each other. Your core values are aligned and the difference between leftist tendencies in daily life is very minimal. You both believe in abolishing capitalism, returning power to the workers, and intersectional liberation.
I apparently can't respond over DMs on a new account, so posting a reply here:
Hi there! Thanks for reaching out and asking about whether I have openings. I'm mostly locale based in my practice, especially with matchmaking. I'm also hesitant to dox myself as I take OpSec pretty seriously online.
With that in mind, I unfortunately am not looking for any clients through the site right now. If that changes, I'll absolutely let you know.
A recommendation I do have is to check out the Savage Love podcast. The host is a progressive lib, but has a great perspective on dating and sex. Here's a link to check it out: https://www.savagelovecast.com/episodes
I'd also recommend therapy if you haven't done so yet. It can be incredibly helpful for getting yourself into a better headspace as a partner and a person!
As I mentioned, the dating scene is very much a numbers game and something that kind of requires grinding out dates. I've heard from clients this can be pretty overwhelming at first when coming back into things following a LTR. There's definitely an adjustment period and Covid has also really thrown everyone off.
Hopefully these tips help and I apologize that we can't work together. I'm definitely surprised with how much my AMA took off. Good luck out there and hope things work out for the best, you can do it!
Getting them away from that mindset is less difficult than you'd suspect, but it takes time and you have to be okay with the possibility they may never change their views.
Still, dating a Progressive who shares most of your core values is definitely worth a shot.
I've let this one sit here a bit because I wanted to consider it. First, this is not healthcare advice and I am not a mental health professional. The main thing I'd say is that I'm reading a lot of self loathing in your comment.
If asking your family for help is an option, I would recommend seeing a therapist to help process your feelings of self worth and getting into a more stable headspace if you're feeling especially anxious or depressed.
If that really isn't an option, then buy a book on CBT and learning some skills from that. I recommend this one. This is not a replacement for a therapist and closer to frontier medicine. Your results will vary, but that book has helped me.
As I've said in other replies, it's completely normal to be bad at dating at first. Everyone pretty much bombs their first couple of dates. That says nothing about you as a person, it's just a skill and social situation you need to learn and adjust to.
I do recommend getting to a place where you feel good about yourself before dating. This doesn't mean getting a new job or anything status related, just that you like yourself as a person. I've had plenty of working class clients who were able to have a healthy dating life. It takes a bit more work to date on a budget, but it's doable.
Exercising is good! Incorporating more of that can help a ton with mental health in addition to therapy and in some cases medication. I'm not a mental health expert, so I'm not qualified to speak beyond that. Things definitely get better though, I promise!
i’m a mostly unironic stalinist in a city that’s so republican we literally never even get democrats running in local elections.
Okay definitely don't lead with that if you live in a conservative area. Pretend you're a DemSoc or something for a while and be open to dating Progressives.
Great question! So this really does depend. I tend to pair both coaching and matchmaking for my clients.
First, I give lessons on how they can improve the way they connect with others and communicate on a date. I want them to be successful! This can take anywhere from a couple weeks to a couple months. If needed, I also refer them to a therapist. Sometimes folks have some very real challenges they need to work through for a bit that I'm not trained to help them with.
Once I feel they're ready for a direct match, then I might pair them with another client. Both clients have to opt into this. I provide them both with a general summary of the other person so they're not going in blind. If they're interested, I then provide them with each other's contact info and create a group text to introduce them. They take it from there, but I'm available to help field any questions. What one client shares with me about any dates is kept confidential and not shared with the other client.
This process varies some depending on circumstances and the client. I also know some other matchmakers in my city and we occasionally match our clients together if one of us doesn't have a great match at that time.
How do I signal disinterest to guys who I think are attracted to me? How do I turn down men? Both with an eye toward safety. I feel like I’m groping in the dark.
Alright, this is a tough one. For rejecting guys you really have to be direct and kinda blunt about it. This doesn't mean that you have to be cruel for no reason, but men have been taught by our society that if someone rejects them and levels even a little ambiguity that means that they need to peruse you harder. It's fucked, misogynistic, and men need to do better, but it's what we're working with right now.
The only way to short circuit that is to be direct about your feelings. Having that ambiguity to try and make them more comfortable can often end up making you more uncomfortable because they don't respect the boundary you've laid down. Even if you're being direct the uncomfortable fact is that some men will continue to hit on you and make advances. For those men, I unironically recommend mace.
I put “polyam” on tinder. And people in the kink scene know our deal. But how do I go about doing that in real life, to potential hook ups?
For how polyam stuff relates to hookups, I personal find that being direct about it from the earliest appropriate point is best. That's not saying you need to say "I have people I'm dating" as an opener, but that should be something you address early on.
Some people are not a fan of it for a variety of reasons, but in my experience if you make it clear you're not cheating on your partners and that this is a dynamic everyone on your end is comfortable with, most people won't care. If you're looking to find people to have group dates / sex with things definitely get a bit clunkier, but again that open communication is the best way to play it.
Outright saying "hi my partners would all like to fuck you with me here's what we're looking for" will probably intimidate people outside of kink communities, but if you approach it by establishing a connection and then mentioning that goal people are more comfortable.
What I usually do with anything "atypical" with romance and sex is stating needs/boundaries broadly up front. From there, you can answer questions that someone has to give them a more specific understanding.
Too much information all at once is uncomfortable. Allow someone time to process a dynamic they might not have been expecting at a pace they're more comfortable. This isn't to say that you can't do this at a bar with someone you just met either, but it is the difference between a giant information dump and a 10-15 minute conversation over drinks.
say one is going down the dating app route, how should profiles, initial interactions be structured?
What I'm about to tell you is a cheat code that works really well for dating apps:
If you're really stressing over your profile, create a fake account of the type of person you're into. From there, you can then pay attention to the types of profiles you match with and what works.
That shows you:
the social norms for that app
how to construct your profile
who else is on there and how you can stand out (in a good way)
When you're done, delete the account. Don't lead people on or anything, you're not there to catfish, just understand the vibes better so you don't waste time.
You can also do this after seeing a couple profiles of people you're into on your main account if you really want it to seem more legit.
Initial interactions kind of depend on the app. Low stakes / shitposty messages work well. If you're interested in women, they do get a lot of weird spam, so anything normal and not pressuring will stand out.
The messaging is a numbers game, don't be afraid to suck at it first. Even when you get good at it, you'll be randomly ghosted. Once you've built up rapport, suggest a short coffee date and see what they say.
i don’t want to feel like a piece of meat attempting to sell myself?
I hear you on this, dating app profiles can feel weird at first. Unfortunately, you kind of do need to market yourself a little. I generally tell my clients to view it as putting their best foot forward.
Dating apps definitely surface the reality that capitalist society has commodified all of us. My take is that it is better to role with that dynamic in a non-sleazy way since that's the game we're all playing.
Would you recommend one dating app over the others for people looking for LTRs?
At this point, no one app is really far and away the best for LTRs. I've had clients who have had success with Coffee Meets Bagel, but being on there is not a guarantee that the person is looking for an LTR. A lot of folks start with casual hook ups and then build from there over time as they get a feel for the person. This is the path my partner and I took and I tend to recommend it.
The quality between apps can very much differ between cities, so I generally recommend starting off by downloading 3 or so of them that you like and then getting a feel for them in your city. Examples include Tinder, Hinge, OkCupid, Bumble, Match, and CMB.
Have you seen Indian Matchmaking on Netflix what are your thoughts about their practices and methods?
I haven't seen that show on Netflix, but will need to check it out this weekend. I have a lot of respect for cultures that have a more formal tradition of matchmaking. Not particularly well read on those cultures, but I always appreciate when I see intention and structure built around the ways humans help one another.
What are your thoughts on the depictions of matchmakers in media?
I think in general depictions of matchmakers tend to be a reflection of the misogyny and classism in our culture, so not great. There are some relationship advice columnists I do recommend such as Dan Savage. He's politically a liberal, so doesn't always have great takes there, but is very sex positive and straight to the point.
It took a while to build up, but the pay is now great. I charge on a sliding scale, so the clients I have who have a higher income pay more. At this point have built things up to where I'm making ~80k / year before taxes, health insurance, etc. I live in an area with a fairly high cost of living. I'm self-employed so own the full value of my labor and I do not employee anyone.
Do you think there’d be room in the space for an open source worker-owned online dating platform where the matchmaking is done by humans?
Interesting! I love worker-owned tech. Haven't looked into the numbers of what that would be like, but the biggest thing with dating apps is just making sure you have a ton of people on them. They really depend on marketing / the network effect.
Well the good news here is that this very much sounds like it has more to do with things they're going through right now than with you. This might just be a temporary thing where they're focusing on self-improvement for a while.
Part of romance is learning when you might have had a window with a person and becoming more confident about trying things out when they show up in the future.
Everyone has at least a couple of those "what could have been" people in their life. That's a good sign; it means people were interested in you!
Feeling afraid of taking a risk like that is completely healthy and normal. A big part of dating is about learning to go for it even though you're a little scared. You get to that point with practice, but that practice is worth it!
:cyber-lenin: