“You’re in a ‘situationship?’ Which one are you: the one with commitment issues or the one with no self-worth?”

Prolific on TikTok, this viral meme perfectly captures the stress of dating in the digital age. Zoomers, and to a lesser extent millennials, are so traumatized by the impersonal nature of app-based dating that they’ve become collectively unable to form or accept healthy attachments. At least, that’s what they tell us.

But it seems “the apps” are only part of the problem. The discourse surrounding them is just as much a cause of dating fatigue as it is a symptom.

Dating in the 18-34 demographic is tough—perhaps even exceptionally so. Listening to younger friends talk, it is difficult not to feel like I got on the last chopper out of ’Nam before apps like Tinder, Bumble, and Hinge made real-life “meet-cutes” feel unattainable. While I did meet my wife a decade ago on Tinder, the app then still functioned as a complement to the dating experience rather than an outright replacement.

Many social and technological changes have occurred in the interim. From dating to grocery shopping, we’ve come to rely on our phones as a crutch for handling or replacing everyday interactions; Zoomers, who know no other way, often have anxiety about simple real-life tasks. COVID was a major factor in this development. Forced isolation and digital communication during such a critical period of their lives helped it come to feel like the norm to them. Likewise, #MeToo solidified the cultural shift, especially for young men. Approaching young women who may not be interested is now thoroughly conditioned as something taboo, while the apps offer a sanctioned “safe space” for approach. After cornering the market, the app experience became increasingly gameified: Scroll through Hinge to find endless premium add-ons, flashing lights, and superficial icebreakers—all designed to keep you scrolling forever like a Boomer on a cruise ship slot machine.

If you ask Zoomers how all of this is all going for them, you’re likely to hear about a lhost of“situationships” that end in heartbreak or disgust.

The “situationship” is exactly what it sounds like: an ostensible relationship between two interested but artificially connected romantic partners, but one so ill-defined that it can only be deemed a “situation.” Sometimes, the situation arises from a fear of commitment—a person who fears attachment and eventual let down, and who finds an excuse to catch “the ick” at their partner’s slightest infraction. Other times, it arises from the opposite insecurity: a desperate need for attachment, so much so that it causes overwhelming neediness and affection (“love bombing”).

Both kinds of awkwardness make it hard to foster a healthy, organic connection. And the apps, with their superficiality and conditioning for the expectation of disappointment, are often cited as the root cause.

There’s no shortage of discourse arriving at this conclusion. To find it, merely type “situationship” into the search feature of Instagram and scroll through endless reels about diagnosing, navigating, and escaping the cycle. They’re entirely gender neutral—as girls and boys are just as likely to be deemed manipulators as they are to complain that  about feeling manipulated. A cottage industry of clickbait psychologists has popped up to add a patina of scientific legitimacy to the toxic dynamic.

Of course, the human pathologies surrounding love and sex are far more complicated than what one finds in the internet discourse. But that discourse, perhaps even more than actual experiences on the apps, encourages people to think in these narrow boxes and set their expectations accordingly. In fact, well over 50 percent of heterosexual couples now meet on dating apps—but you would never know that if your reality comes from social media. The expectation of failure and emotional damage becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

For those who see nothing but romantic misery in their future, the apps become a crutch, even a coping mechanism. In just a few swipes, you can numb the sting of past rejection by proving that you are still desirable—even if this confidence is short-lived.

Is it more difficult to date today than it was 20 years ago? Probably. But is this generation more emotionally damaged by this difficulty than previous ones were?

The sting of not getting a call back to your parents’ landline wore off quickly, while a pattern of getting “ghosted” online certainly adds up. It’s probably more painful to see your ex’s every move on social media today than it was to hear about it occasionally from friends while still wondering why you were spurned. But whether it was 20 years ago or 200 years ago, the phenomenon of heartbreak was still heartbreak; add a little context to your postmodern brain rot by reading poems about the situationships of Yeats, Blake, or Tennyson.

The apps are only as damaging as you allow them to be. The solution, while easier said than done, is simply to stop thinking of yourself as damaged. Stop thinking of the apps as a unique torture device designed to inflict as much pain on you as possible, and instead try using them to your advantage as the tool they were meant to be. Cultivate the cool confidence of someone who knows romance always has its ups and downs.

Heartbreak is unavoidable in life, whether you expect it or not. The only thing you can really change is how you react to it.