Online dating - such BAD photos!!

[PinkGlitter17]

Just a lighthearted post.

I'm splitting up with H and was browsing (just for fun - I'm not up for dating any time soon) on match.com. I was surprised to see the men's profile photos. It seems to be a mixture of good photos of good-looking men, really bad photos of average guys, really bad photos of unattractive (imo) guys, and, frankly, photos that belong on Crimewatch (don't have nightmares 😉).

Why do people use such bloody awful pictures in their online dating profiles? Makes no sense.

Perhaps that is the intention, to convey that he is an honest genuine what you see is what you get sort of bloke
Maybe feels that an overly contrived photo would make him look like a player?
Or trying too hard with the profile makes him look needy or desperate?

I feel a bit sorry for the men who arent as naturally good looking who will just be skimmed over. At the end of the day us women can do our make up and make ourselves look much better they cant.

Men can still be well groomed, fit healthy etc and thereby look more attractive
There are many ways that they can improve themselves without doing things which are seen as the preserve of women

Spot on peaceout

I don't swipe based on how good looking a man is anyway because that's not what makes me attracted to a man. Ok I'll swipe left on some types, very overweight, bad teeth and super tall and skinny are off putting but I find photos with personality and spark to be attractive regardless of how ripped and groomed a man may be

Very true but you can be all those things and still not very attractive. I wouldn't say I was fit or healthy or particularly well groomed to be quite honest but when I put my face on I can brush up 10x more attractive than without it. I dont know a single woman who'd disagree.

I think them looking too groomed can actually be really offputting. Poor blokes cant win

I aggree Lesis
Make up does do things that other interventions cant!

This is one of the reasons I don't do OLD. I am attractive - am told it and can see it in the mirror. I don't mean I up there with Gisele but I'm not bad and I scrub up well.

However, I am very unphotogenic. Even my mother says so. There are no good photos of me in existence and when someone tries to take a photo (usually against my wishes ) to prove me wrong, they always pull this face when they see the evidence.

It's a shame as I'm lovely and would like to meet someone but it's unlikely in this day and age of OLD.

I think the pictures almost seem to be worst on the paying sites which is a bit bizarre. Some of the men look really quite strange, but I guess folks are! One reason why I'm a bit putting much personal stuff about myself, when all these weird strangers can read ... but if I don't you don't really get a flavour of who I am. Maybe you have to write in some kind of code e.g. by your interests ...

Yes, the pictures men put on seem pretty uninspiring! But I guess (my age group) not alot of men are great looking or age well, so agree with Peace its a bit of what you see is what you get, which is fair enough I s'ppose. But I think the worst things IMO are the profiles. A good profile is like a light in a tunnel!! Note to self to improve profile!

Yh Single my son says I look much better in real life! Maybe its something about vitality, which doesn't come across in photos. In fact the more flat and dead the profile/expression (which models often have) maybe the better looking it seems photographically? I think maybe you just have to persevere and take lots of photos to find one thats flattering !!!

Next time I do internet dating that is ... the whole experience usually puts me off after a few weeks ... I think its better to do it kamakazi like and then leave for a while!

It's also to do with lighting, the way that a camera uses light as compared to the way that the light works when you see yourself in the mirror
You could try shooting a bit of filmof yoursef and going through it selecting the most flattering frames

Come on though, expectations of men's appearance are so much lower than women that make up isn't an advantage at all. Women are considered gross if they have body hair, lazy and unkempt if they don't wear make up or have visible grey roots, scruffy if they wear loose clothing etc etc...when being made up is the norm/expectation for women and not men it's not an advantage over men.

I would still consider a man unkempt and therefore not attractive if ate badly and didn't exercise, or if his clothes were unflattering, ditto hairstyle

Yes sure but men in jeans and loose t shirts can be considered hot when a woman probably wouldn't - men can have salt and pepper hair and weather beaten faces and still look groomed and stylish whereas women would be judged as looking scruffy or old. You can't pretend there aren't different standards for men and women. Otherwise why don't women go to work in comfortable trouser suits, flat shoes and no makeup where the men do exactly that? Doesn't happen.

I think Gallavich has a point. A man who at 50 is clean, dresses reasonable, has a haircut of some kind, and not overweight is a practically James Bond! (until he writes something stupid in his profile )

Anyway, this thread has made me check out some female profiles. And quite a few are not really that great to my surprise, even the photos.

Yes you are right Gallavich

Although imo women can wear comfortable clothes and flat shoes and still be considered attractive, well I do and I manged to pull a good few times😆😊

Yes I know - personally I never wear heels myself but I'm talking about general grooming/beauty standards for men and women. I don't subscribe to those standards but I don't pretend they don't exist.

When I was online dating back in the day (10 years+ ago) there were three types of profile photos for men:

• The moody/seedy bathroom selfie, often with top off and really unflattering fluorescent lighting
• The macho/active shot with some kind of sports equipment or large vehicle in the background
• The 'look how much fun I am' shot, drinking, usually wearing a St Patrick's Day hat, red faced and often out of focus

I was amazed at how predictable it was!

Good luck OP. You need a thick skin for online dating but although I didn't meet the love of my life, I had some great experiences, met a few fantastic men I'm still in touch with and gathered several highly cringy date stories I still entertain my friends with years later!

I was struck on Tinder (as opposed to POF or Match) how probably 50% of women had a photo of them with their kids or just their kids among their 4 or 5 shots. I think it's important to let people know you are a parent, but put that in words in the little profile bit rather than chuck photos on there for anyone to see (in this day and age, I just don't think it's sensible). Mind you, they need to just say "I have kids" and not use the god-awful expression "full-time mummy".

Of the remaining 50%, around a third of those would have just one photo, where they were clearly on holiday but were so far away from whoever was taking the photo that you couldn't actually see what they looked like, or it only showed their feet while they were lying on a beach or on a hammock.

gathered several highly cringy date stories I still entertain my friends with years later!

That's the best part of OLD. I might even give it another go over the summer just to gather some new horror stories

I saw one guy that had a few photos on his profile of him in various locations, the thing is they were clearly photo shopped backgrounds, was quite disturbing. Then another guy hugging his daughter, she looked really uncomfortable, why the hell would a man put a photo of his daughter on a online dating site, horrible.

*The moody/seedy bathroom selfie, often with top off and really unflattering fluorescent lighting

• The macho/active shot with some kind of sports equipment or large vehicle in the background
• The 'look how much fun I am' shot, drinking, usually wearing a St Patrick's Day hat, red faced and often out of focus*

Brilliant analysis Imogen. So true!