Abstract:
In the past, opportunities for meeting sexual or marital partners were limited. However, with the advent of online dating, people have an almost endless number of partners to choose from, people can reject potential partners in a split second without getting to know them, and people make the first cut - or not - based on physical attractiveness. Online dating has a very skewed sex-ratio also where men outnumber women. Because of these features in modern dating, there is a challenge to justice, or so I claim. I paint a devastating picture, the Grim View of Online Dating, and argue that online dating apps, such as Tinder, are a problem for justice. They are problem for justice since from the perspective of men a few individuals get all the opportunities, while the majority get none. The inequality in sex is already striking: the distribution of sex partners among people is more unjust than the distribution of wealth among the most unequal countries. Tinder does not make this better, if anything it makes it worse. While online dating is bad for most men, things are not much better for women either. Women struggle to find long-term relationship prospects online, since men who are successful on Tinder are constantly presented with attractive potential sexual partners. Since having sexual and romantic relationships is considered to be an important part of human life, well-being and flourishing, online dating is a serious challenge to justice. Therefore, we should take measures to correct the inequalities in online dating.