[IgorPartola]

Sharing a common interest is the best way to meet lots of new people. It creates low stakes interaction opportunities and removes the creep factor (if you are at a meetup for fans of model trains along with like a dozen other people, it’s not weird that you are talking to some of them).

Better than any app, go get a hobby in person and get out there to meet people who are into it. Chances are you present yourself way better in the real world vs online. Online dating, especially the Tinder variety, really skews to work for some demographics and not others (I am not talking about gender here so much as age, location, etc.).

[Trasmatta]

This is the common advice, but it's also resulted in many of these hobby based events being overrun by people who are primarily there looking to find a date. It can be a weird dynamic.

My suggestion is get a hobby that you explicitly are interested in, but don't go in with an expectation that you'll find someone, or make that your primary goal.

> Chances are you present yourself way better in the real world vs online

For many of us I don't think this is true

[bradlys]

> My suggestion is get a hobby that you explicitly are interested in, but don't go in with an expectation that you'll find someone, or make that your primary goal.

The issue here is that you need to have hobbies that are explicitly good for finding partners. For instance, I love riding motorcycles. I am happy to do group oriented aspects of the hobby like track days or group rides, etc. The amount of women in that activity is near zero. The same is true for cars. It's almost entirely men. Even if you say there's 10% women showing up - that's still a horrific 9:1 ratio.

I find it super annoying because my hobbies are so masculine and male dominated. I have to actually go out and do things that I'm not really that passionate about or interested in as a way to meet women - and then I have to be really good at said hobbies.

Fortunately, I am someone who is able and willing to suffer through things that I don't enjoy for a goal but it is going to contradict all the most popular advice out there of "do what you love and love will follow". It's just simply not true. All the women I've met were through activities or hobbies that I had no real interest in doing. I was simply doing them to improve my odds in regards to dating women.

Who cares if you're interested. Just do the fucking work.

[__turbobrew__]

What I find interesting is that it seems like the vast majority of hobbies are male dominated, maybe this is not true and a bias of my world view. All sports are male dominated to the point where female only activities are sanctioned, anything around collecting, games (board games and video games), cars/motorsports, woodworking, metalworking.

The only hobbies I know of that are female dominated is Yoga and crafts. All the others are more evenly spilt between the genders (like book clubs, dancing, cooking, gardening). If you are looking to find a romantic partner the majority of people who are into crafts are married.

I don’t know if there is any evidence to support or refute my claims, but that is how I see things.

I do agree with you that if you want to find a romantic partner of the other sex you should optimize your activities. Unless you are gay or a woman you will never meet a romantic partner at the local car meetup or magic the gathering tournament.

[8f2ab37a-ed6c]

That's been my experience as well, glad I wasn't the only one to notice.

[dragonwriter]

> it seems like the vast majority of hobbies are male dominated, maybe this is not true and a bias of my world view.

I think it is pretty strongly the latter.

> All sports are male dominated to the point where female only activities are sanctioned

No, they aren't, and gender-specific sporting activites are not because the activities are, as hobbies, male dominated.

> The only hobbies I know of that are female dominated is Yoga and crafts. All the others are more evenly spilt between the genders (like book clubs, dancing, cooking, gardening).

Pretty sure that most of the things you list as "more evenly split" are pretty female heavy. Dancing certainly is, ranging between female-heavy in the forms which would ideally be balanced (most partner dancing -- particularly things like amateur ballroom competition; male amateur comp partners are always in high demand), to wildly female dominated where balance matters less, to, well, pole.

[werid]

curious how that works out. you start dating, stop doing the hobby you're not really interested in, but she continues, and finds out you were only in it to find a date?

[bradlys]

Super common. Seen this happen a lot with some hobbies that I've pursued. The men will show back up when/if said relationship dies (after all - it worked the first time). A lot of women do this too. They might've had a genuine interest but it wasn't sufficient to keep them going.

For some of the hobbies I have, you'll find that there's very few single women but a massive amount of single men.

[katamarimambo]

And even for those with better intentions, the low stakes interaction will become high stakes as attraction and expectations increase. When rejection almost inevitably happens at some point, bringing feelings of innability and jealousy, it will be tougher to deal, specially for the less experienced following this path.

In this sense hookup culture can relieve such pressure and allows for decoupling the sexual needs, and romantic ones even - personal note: I think it's weird how people online talk as if it's mandatory to mistreat/abandon the people you hook up with. I build a small but nice network of "friends with benefits" which for me are simply friends who enjoy a specific activity. Like, exactly the inverse of what everyone is recomending and it worked for me.

[Der_Einzige]

Let’s be honest, the kinds of people who are usually looking for this advice are actual incels who are seething with rage about the fact that they haven’t, and can”t hook up and have wild casual sex.

[cardanome]

For me a hobby group is for doing that hobby. I want to focus on that and not on building potential romantic relationships. If it is something I am really passionate about I am basically in asexual mode and don't even "see them that way".

I am sure many people's brain are wired differently and things "just happen" for them but I need to be more explicit to make anything happen. It also feels boundary crossing, especially with activities where there is physical contact. And even if you take a rejection well, I imagine it doesn't feel great for the other side to get unwanted romantic attraction. It has so much potential to create unnecessary drama.

I wish there were places you could just got to find romantic partners. Not like speed dating but where you can casually hang out. Sure bars and clubs do work for a certain crowd but are not that great if you are not into the "party scene" and lots of people there don't really want to meet other people but just party with friends.

[michaelt]

> For many of us I don't think this is true

Probably depends on the details of the online communication.

A video call, a synchronous one on one text chat, an asynchronous one on one text chat, and a public broadcast like HN or Twitter all create very different experiences.

HN’s format makes it easy to show aloof, professional detachment and conceals my age and looks. For dating, though? That ain’t an advantage.

[Trasmatta]

All very different experiences, and the quality of the communication depend on the people in question.

Some people are great communicators over text but really struggle with in person communication. And vice versa.

[nemo44x]

This is why clubs exist and have for centuries. Country clubs, rotary club, computer club, Masonic, etc. There’s a ton of them but you don’t see younger people joining them as much today.

[falcolas]

> There’s a ton of them but you don’t see younger people joining them as much today.

That's because they're primarily filled with old people, with "old" interests. Short of a coordinated visit, you'll always be in the minority. Heck, I'm in the minority, and I'm in my 40's the few times I accept an invitation to go to one of these places.

There's also the occasional left-over haughtiness about the value of being let into the club. Left over from when they were exceptionally popular. This can push people away too.

[aleph_minus_one]

> Chances are you present yourself way better in the real world vs online.

This depends a lot on the person.