Ask somebody sitting close to you if they have a Tinder horror story. You may be terrified by what you hear. Unlike other dating apps which are centered on dating, Tinder has developed a strange sexual emphasis.
Matty Cripps is a St. Thomas student who uses the app.
“I mainly use Tinder as a confidence booster,” said Cripps. “I’ll swipe a girl right and if we match I’m like, ‘Huh, she’s hot’. I feel good about myself.”
Cripps told me about a Facebook and Twitter page called “Tinderfessions.” App users post strange, funny and often sexually charged things they find on Tinder.
This seems to be a common theme with many Tinder horror stories.
“I had a friend who had to push off a guy she met up with because he was, you know, going for it,” said Cripps. “Crazy how some guys would do that on their first time meeting someone.”
Cripps thinks app users believe when someone swipes right on a person’s profile, indicating interest, they want sex.
“I don’t think it means, ‘Let’s go on a date’. I think it means that there is a hook-up that’s going to happen.”
One resident in Harrington Hall recounted stories that sounded like cheesy pickup lines you might hear at the twenty/20.
“A guy on Tinder said to me huge sale at my place all clothes 100 per cent off,” said one resident. “Some guy said you’re like my baby toe, eventually I’m going to bang you on my kitchen table,” said another.
But Tinder has a much darker side than relatively harmless cyber catcalling.
One student, who refused to go on the record, invited a guy over for coffee in 2013. She wanted to get to know the fellow better because he seemed like a nice guy. The night was great and the conversation flowed. When it came time for him to leave, he refused. He was set on staying the night in her bed. He forced his stay. She went to the hospital the next morning.
In Tinder horror stories, it’s scary how many similar scenarios play out. Not all horror stories are like this though.
A 20-year-old St. Thomas student has had a slew of misadventures on the app. One night in particular was terrifying. Megan Arsenault had gone on a date with a guy.
“You could tell something was off about him,” said Arsenault. Her friends wanted to meet him and so a second date was planned. “I went out front to meet him and I saw the hardest looking bunch of men I’d ever seen,” she said.
Her date had brought friends. There were four in total. One was four feet wide, short with no teeth. Another was seven feet tall, ginger and also toothless. “Then there was the guy I had invited over and the brother. The other guys, I don’t know where he got them,” said Arsenault.
The guys brought a 60 of vodka. It had already been opened but the girls didn’t mind because, hey, free liquor.
Arsenault said that there was tension in the room. “The guy I invited over started banging his head as hard as he could on the other guy’s knee,” said Arsenault. “The other guy closes his fists and starts shaking.”
The tall one was shaking back and forth when he started to say, “Chicken fried.” It was quiet at first and crescendoed. The girls played the song to calm him down. The other guys threw their drinks around the room. Arsenault said she thinks the vodka was spiked because the girls were feeling it after about a shot, poured and mixed in a glass.
“The guy I invited over looked at me with a super serious face and said ‘I’m going to spit on your face with my semen’,” said Arsenault. “So it was time for them to go.”
She didn’t get all the guys out before they were able to pour their 60 of vodka all down the hallway and almost break the glass of the front door.
Be safe and swipe carefully.
