It's easy to imagine that only losers look for love on the internet, but Ireland's dating websites are becoming ever more mainstream, writes Anna Carey
We don't really do the dating thing in Ireland. In the US it's perfectly normal to ask an attractive stran-ger on a casual date, an outing that may lead to romance or, if sparks fail to fly over dinner, just a polite kiss on the cheek. The basic rules of urban American romance are fairly straightforward. But not here. The Irish method of looking for love consists of going out, getting drunk, getting off with somebody and maybe, a few days later, finally going on a date with them. The drunken-snog method of finding love might never be consigned to the past, but things may be changing. The Irish are finally going out on let's-just-see-if-we-like-each-other dates, with the help of the internet.
When Bren McElroy, an American actress, moved to Ireland, a year ago, she was surprised by the rarity of US-style dating and by the fact that the search for romance was "smothered in alcohol". So she looked for love online. "The pub scene here was very disappointing, and some of my friends back home suggested that I try an online dating site," she says. She wasn't particularly keen on the idea at first. "But then my [ American] friends told me about all the people they knew who had done it and found partners and were really happy, so I thought I'd give it a try."
McElroy joined www.anotherfriend.com in January, since when she has gone on four dates. Although she hasn't found the love of her life, she has had a good time - and she's glad to be dating again. "These sites are introducing a dating scene to Ireland," says McElroy. "They mean I can meet men and have a proper date - dinner and a glass of wine - and then we can decide whether we want to see each other again."
Most sites encourage users to spend time e-mailing and instant messaging through the site before meeting, to give them a chance to get to know each other. A recent study of internet dating at the University of Bath found that 94 per cent of online daters decided to go for a second date after the initial meeting and that the subsequent relationships lasted for an average of seven months. Eighteen per cent lasted well over a year. In other words, online dating can work.
Quentin Doran-O'Reilly is the founder of www.perhapsmore.com, a relatively new Irish internet-dating site. He says the site has become almost too successful. "People are pairing off too quickly!" he laughs. "A lot of people drop out after a few months, and when they're cancelling their membership they tell us that they're leaving because they've actually met someone through the site and they aren't looking any more." And plenty of online romances end in marriage. According to Jill McGrath of www.maybefriends.ie, 40 couples who met through her site have tied the knot.
With success rates like this, why are people still a bit embarrassed to admit that they met online? Few internet daters were willing to be named in print, and many lie to their friends about how they met their new partners. Perhaps it's because of a fear of looking weird or nerdy, of appearing to be someone whose only way of communicating is through the internet. "People seem to think that people only go online because they're socially inept," says Doran-O'Reilly. "But it simply isn't true. And I think that as more and more people start using the internet that attitude will change."
In fact, as the acceptance of online dating in the US shows, most internet daters are people to whom the web is just another handy form of social interaction. "The telephone was seen as a bit suspicious 100 years ago," says Bren McElroy. "This is just another way of communicating. It's not my only way of meeting people, by a long shot, but it's a vehicle. I'd bet that, in a year or two, more and more people in Ireland will be doing it."
Some people find themselves doing it almost by accident, such as 29-year-old Dermot. He joined www.perhapsmore.com to earn extra points at the consumer website www.pigsback.com. "I had no intention of even looking at other people's profiles, but then I started getting a few messages from girls who were using the site, and curiosity got the better of me," he says. He exchanged a few e-mails with the first girl who messaged him. After about a month "it came to the point where you kind of had to suggest meeting up. So we decided we'd ask each other five personal questions by e-mail, and if we both liked the answers we'd meet up". They eventually met one Sunday evening.
"If it hadn't gone well I don't think I'd have ever done anything like that again," says Dermot. "It was just so nerve racking." Luckily, it went very well indeed. When I talked to Dermot, several months after that first meeting, he and the girl in question had just finished cooking dinner.
This instant messaging and e-mailing is all very well, say sceptics, but how do you know if someone online is telling the truth about who they are? The answer is that you don't. But nor do you know if the person you've just met at a concert or a party is being completely truthful, either. Some online daters suggest that people are more honest online because they've got nothing to lose. "This person doesn't know you, so you can just tell them the truth about yourself," says Dermot. "If they don't like you, so be it. You don't have to see them; you don't have to have anything to do with them again. You're not risking anything."
Of course, some people exaggerate - or lie. "Yeah, I've encountered people who'd tweaked the truth a bit," says McElroy. "But they were still nice people. They were just a bit insecure. The thing is, lying is very counterproductive. If you say you're something that you're not, you're always going to be disappointed. If you're honest and you stick to your guns, you'll actually attract people with mutual interests." This can work no matter how unusual the interests are. One online dater who listed only his love of Homer's Iliad recently paired off with a woman who had written her doctorate on it.
A lot of internet daters point out that arranging to meet in this way gives people an unusual level of control over their romantic situations. Most sites allow people to join and create a profile for free but charge a membership fee if they want to contact other users. This means they can choose whom they meet, control the pace of the budding relationship and choose how much contact to have. If you arrange a date through a website's messaging service you don't even have to exchange phone numbers until you have met your date and decided you want to get together again.
But despite these romantic advantages, the idea prevails that internet daters are losers. "There's a huge stigma attached to it," says Dermot. "That's why we decided to just tell our closest friends and our families how we met." Dermot admits that he used to have quite a low opinion of internet dating himself. "I would have been one of the people who looked down on it," he says. "I thought people who did it were a bit desperate."
But why do we think that people who admit they'd like a partner are desperate? And why is looking for one seen as more pathetic than hoping you'll somehow bump into Mr or Ms Right? "We do everything else with purpose," says McElroy. "We get ourselves educated, we put on stylish clothes, we go after things. And I've noticed that people don't openly go after finding the perfect mate; they just seem to let it happen. I mean, to hope that someone will just walk in the door is really romantic, but what if it doesn't happen?"
Well, there's always your computer. Tens of thousands of people have signed up to Irish dating sites - www.anotherfriend.com alone has more than 74,000 members. Users tend to be in their late 20s or early 30s, well educated and financially secure. "Quite a few of our users are people who've come back from travelling abroad and feel a bit out of the social loop," says Doran-O'Reilly. "Their old friends might be married or settled down with kids, so they're looking to expand their social circle."
Men tend to be more active users than women. Dr Jeff Gavin, who conducted the University of Bath survey, suggested that this was because "the anonymity of writing gives them a chance to express their emotions more readily than in real life". And those who think online dating is clinical and unromantic should consider the fact that it is reintroducing the love letter, that most romantic of communiques.
It's also just plain fun. "I don't know whether it'll work out for me," says McElroy. "But so far it certainly hasn't been heartbreaking. I'm meeting lovely people; I've had a great time on every date. Even though I haven't wanted to keep dating them, I think of the guys I've met as friends. I've even tried to set one up with another friend of mine."
It seems the matchmaking bug is contagious.
For more details, visit www.anotherfriend.com, www.perhapsmore.com and www.maybefriends.ie