Are you looking for a smoldering hot date tonight? Perhaps a little kindling with hopes of starting a fire in someone’s pants?

Thankfully, this task is now as easy as swiping left or right. And while I may have found my wonderful loving partner on Tinder, not everyone will be so lucky. 

This is because more times than not, the results from dating apps never seem as good as advertised.

It’s the Internet: we all understand truth gets stretched, lies will be told and the self will be misrepresented, but pick a trait that is a bit less obvious to tell your little white lie.

What becomes apparent after a few weeks of using the app is the thought of “oh god, how many frogs do I have to kiss to find my prince” and “is such a person even out there?”

The term “Tinderella” has surfaced to explain the phenomenon, though it is little more than a fable in most cases.

Many problems arise from the concept of ordering hookups and dates like you can a Domino’s pizza, but I suppose that is the price of progress—body commodification.

Another serious problem with this is the whole idea is that a person can be tossed aside the next morning like an old crusty pizza box. The only thing is pizza boxes won’t give you herpes, chlamydia, gonorrhea, HIV, syphilis or hepatitis, but people can.

So as you rub your dry bloodshot eyes the morning after a Tinder date, you have to ask yourself, “Did the person I slept with leave me a special gift that can only be cured with a Zpac, a shot of penicillin or maybe cream and a special comb?”

Generally, if protection fell through or simply didn’t happen, it’s time to blaze up that hotline to your primary care physician like they are giving away a free vacation to the next caller.

Why? Well consider this: Tinder over the last few months has come under fire for encouraging people to ‘hookup’ and promote unsafe sex practices, often with the use of drugs and alcohol, essentially boosting the spread of common – and not-so-common – STDs.

The Los Angeles Times, on Sept. 28, reported a controversial billboard featuring silhouettes of people with the words, “Tinder, Chlamydia, Grindr, Gonorrhea,” accompanied by an ad for free STD testing.

This showed some serious brass from the AIDS Healthcare Foundation, especially given the fact that the billboard is located a few blocks from Tinder headquarters.

Obviously, the ad wasn’t up long before the owners of it were slapped with a ‘cease and desist’ letter. But, amid the controversy the AIDs Healthcare Foundation division director Whitney Engeran-Cordova said, “In many ways, location-based mobile dating apps are becoming a digital bathhouse for millennials wherein the next sexual encounter can literally just be a few feet away—as well as the next STD.”

Chances are the college campus populations are at high risk too.

The takeaway here, folks, is to be safe.

Use a condom if you don’t know the person or their sexual history. Get tested on a regular basis. I know this one is hard, but stop sexual activity if you are experiencing symptoms until you can consult with a doctor.

Have your fun, but do it safely.

And before you decide to start a relationship with someone you met off the Internet, consider getting STD/STI tested together, and remember trust builds one encounter at a time.

Jorden Wilson is a senior psychology major from Seattle. She can be contacted at 335-2290 or by [email protected]. The opinions expressed in this column are not necessarily those of the staff of The Daily Evergreen or those of the Office of Student Media.