The Internet Isn’t Vegas

People who only spend as much time online as it takes to order something from Amazon.com like to think that what happens online, stays online. But they’re as wrong headed in this belief as anyone who believes the Vegas Tourism ads. Let’s get this straight: nothing that happens anywhere stays anywhere, anymore.

I was thinking about this while reading an article about a recent study looking at sexual safety issues among women who are dating on line. The study, which was published in Sexuality Research and Social Policy: Journal of NSRC, surveyed 740 women over a five month period, asking them about their on line dating practices and what methods they use to protect their safety (things such as googling prospective dates, using third party security companies to run background checks, etc…).

Among the findings

• women go to great lengths, and use a variety of methods to check out prospective dates
• when women chose to meet someone face to face, almost 30% of them reported having sex on the first date
• 75% of women who did have sex on the first date didn’t use condoms

Much is made in the article about the apparent disconnect between “being safe” by trying to make sure a potential partner is who he says he is (they only included women dating men) and “being safe” by using protection from pregnancy and STDs when having sex. The article points out that off line dating behavior differs from the study findings (the journalist refers to research suggesting that 50% of women under thirty use condoms the first time they have sex, and that 17% of women have sex on the first date).

While I haven’t read the study yet, the reporting on it seems to be so much of the same old “things-aren’t-the-way-they-used-to-be” reporting on online sexual behaviors. The article quotes the study author who hypothesizes that that women are developing “virtual intimacy” with the men they meet on line, and this is clouding their judgment once they meet face to face and end up having sex. The implication here is that “virtual intimacy” is, by its nature, not just artificial but artifice, not as real or authentic as intimacy experienced face to face.

I would argue that the concept of “virtual intimacy” is antiquated. There is a growing body of research and writing that points to the very real physiological, psychological, and emotional experiences humans have when interacting online. And all you have to do is ask someone who has tried online dating and they’ll tell you about at least one experience that “felt real”. Given this, can there still be any reasonable argument for privileging intimacy that takes place in person.

The logic, if anyone bothered to follow it, doesn’t hold. After all, people make bad judgments based on face-to-face encounters all the time. And where is the line here? Is it that we need to see people in order to judge them (in which case I guess blind people are out of luck!) Do we need to share a physical space? And for how long, or how often? Also, if so-called virtual intimacy isn’t to be trusted, what about couples who have been together in real time and are then separated for a long period of time? Should I immediately mistrust my partner’s claim to love me via video-Skype? Now that you mention it, my partner did look a little time-shifty during our last conversation…

My long winded point is that when we ignore the value of online interactions we shut the door to wonderful new experiences of connection. Maybe we do this because most of us are so hungry for intimacy and having a new means of getting it confuses us. Maybe we do this because it allows us to feel superior about our experience of intimacy. Maybe we do it because what’s new is always scary.

Or maybe we want to pretend that what happens online stays online because so often, we want it to.

Read more - Houston Chronicle: Study finds caution with dates online, but not in person (via Petra Boynton)