Revenge+... love?

WHAT can you really read on someone's dating profile (where I am sure people tend to wax just a little lyrical about themselves) that will put you off meeting strangers alone at night and inviting them home? For some, I found out to my surprise, it would have to be something very obvious like:  

• Age: Sexy Age (check) 
• Gender: Sexy Gender (check)
• Occupation: Rapist Man of your dreams (mmmmm - revert to facebook for clarification. Ahhh good it says he is a plumber, check)

If you are the sort of person who likes reading juicy bits of trivia about other people’s personal lives, you’re in for a treat. Bring out the popcorn ladies, Landers has a bit of soap-opera for you on this fine Friday afternoon.

This tale starts with my best friend looking for love. Being a classic nerd (I say this with love in my heart) he immediately filled in a profile on an online dating site (and that was the extent of his search). When he gets a response, the young lady has similar interests and it all seems pretty good. He went out with her a total of three times and then he let her know that he doesn’t see it going anywhere or feel it working out. He had his reasons, which I will discuss (while praying furiously to all the gods that he doesn’t read this blog).

She took it well at first, saying she completely understands where he is coming from and that she will walk away and leave it at that. Then the text messages started. She wasn’t happy, she felt this thing could work… (all of this directed at a boy from the internet that she has met three times in total). As bad as he felt about it, he proceeded to delete her as a contact off all social media and also delete his dating profile from the site.

Now, my mate isn’t much of a talker so I had to literally remove these small benign growths of information surgically over several daunting procedures. It started with, ‘well you saw her three times, surely you were a little into the whole thing’. ‘No, actually it just felt weird.’

Here is some background: my mate has zero social skills due to the aforementioned nerdsmanship. To him bridging this topic with her civilly has two possible outcomes. 1) escalates into raised voices or other forms of confrontation. 2) tears and remorse followed by him feeling wretched. For these reasons, every time he saw her he felt too bad or was slightly too inebriated to say ‘no’ to meeting her again. This lead to the three-date scenario. Also he was creeped out by the fact that she had confessed to meeting other men off the web numerous times, and yet she was happy to escalate the relationship into something more intimate on the third date. She has probably had a string of romantic encounters from the internet and that isn’t the sort of lady he wants to be with. In short, he is a prude – though a perfect gentleman. And I assure you that if she had postponed her advances by a month or two while dating him she would have had better luck.

 All of this aside, this young girl spends her time meeting men off the internet in a third world country in a city that is infamous for its staggering crime rates and boasts a rape every seven minutes. She meets these men and almost immediately invites them to her home. This is so dangerous and illogical that it has sat with me all week. I properly worry about girls such as this one, who act so outrageously irresponsibly with their lives, their reputations and their sexual health. The only thing higher than our crime rate is probably our HIV/Aids infection rate – which has escalated to epidemic proportions. We are encouraged by government through the vehicle of the media and through other health-conscious publications to have ourselves tested for HIV/Aids regularly and especially before becoming sexually active in a new relationship. What is even worse is the attitude that a middle-class white girl who meets men of the same background is somehow impervious to the ravages of sexually-transmitted diseases or will never be assaulted or endangered. It is a short-sighted, racist malaise that will only shatter once the unspeakable happens. For her, meeting men online probably has two possible outcomes. 1) Meet the man of my dreams 2) Meet the man of my dreams.

As for me, I’m proud of my friend – a young man with beer in his veins who said ‘no, thanks’. I am more proud of the fact that he used his reasoning and thought it through before leaping headlong into a relationship with someone who he doesn’t want to be with, only to break her heart at a later stage. I am proud that he felt upset over it, and guilty about possibly having hurt her feelings. 

Take care of your daughters, teach them about health and self-respect because beauty and happiness follow naturally from here. You will not regret it.