Normal girls do not stay on online dating for long. After being flooded with graphic photos and insulting messages they tend to hang it up. That leaves the other 90-95% who are 1) frauds, 2) women who just enjoy/need the attention (narcissists), or 3) sociopaths who get a kick out of running pity plays and provoking you into reacting while never being forthcoming about themselves, never answering your questions honestly, and never honoring commitments. Or 4) absolutely socially inept for any of various reasons. Or 5) nuts.
The pure level of apparent "choice" also does lure both sides into thinking there are always more and always someone better. The sheer volume of mail girls receive fools them into thinking they are more perfect and more desirable than they actually are in any objective analysis in real life. The appalling lack of responses guys receive prompts them to flood girls with messages just hoping for a response. The sheer volume of mail girls receive...The appalling lack of responses guys receive...Endless cycle of suffering for both, or for the well-intentioned ones.
If you must do online dating, remember that there are still some real, normal, well-intentioned people there and be willing to give someone the benefit of the doubt two or three times, but not too much more than that unless you want to waste time and life energy. The ones who want to take it offline immediately tend to be the ones who will behave badly enough (scam, sociopath, etc.) that they don't want to chance the platform employees seeing their messages to you, recognizing what they are doing (not just to you), and booting them from the site, ending their supply of chumps. Keep 'em on the platform until YOU want to move to whatsapp. The gorgeous models who contact normal guys out of the blue are scammers. Gorgeous models get enough mail already; they don't need to contact you. They don't.
Girls, if you really want to find Mr. Right, don't pass him by while looking for Mr. Perfect. Mr. Right is out there, but waiting for Mr. Perfect will be a long, long wait.
Guys, Miss Right may be online, but not usually for long. The good ones either give up the online thing quickly (they have enough options offline maybe) or they find their Mr. Right after not too many months once they start looking for him and not Mr. Perfect in every single (no pun) one of 100 ways.
The way to navigate the haystack is to not devote too much of your thought, time, or energy on the ones that are not worth your time or that are wasting it (see above). What you are looking for is compatibility, of course, but also sincerity and reciprocity (not as in perfectly 50-50 all the time, but it has to be there often enough; if not, stop wasting your time and go find it).
Also, don't be too quick to judge before you have tried. My success in finding Miss Right, after years of Miss Wongs, Ph.D., I almost missed entirely! She sent me an e-mail that just said "Hi." I was thinking, just hi?, no effort to read my profile?, no effort to write a real message?? But then I thought, well if she can take the time and effort to say "hi" to me, I can take the time and effort to say "hello" to her. And that is how the whole wonderful thing started.
Her strategy, in her first days back online, she told me later, was to just send "Hi" to all the guys whose pictures she thought seemed O.K. If they responded to her (and guys are far more likely to respond than girls are), only then would she read their profile and decide whether to keep talking. Very smart girl. Very efficient process. Very little of her time wasted.
The same process may not work quite as well for guys, but it does demonstrate the value of quickly finding the needles in the haystack and not devoting/wasting time on the hay, the filler, the ones who are not worth your time or energy.
December 3, 2018.