happy boxing day, r4rtoronto!

I've been posting on this subreddit for a while now (on different accounts over the years), for a plethora of reasons: platonic friendship, fwb, relationships, etc. I saw u/MainRadiance's post a couple months ago about her response breakdown and thought I'd keep track of the same from my post from the summer. I definitely won't go into as much depth as her, but I do think the findings were pretty interesting as I compared behaviours from pre-pandemic respondents to post-pandemic respondents.

Before I jump into the data portion, I do want to give some context to folks reading. I've been on r/r4rtoronto for a long time, and I've seen the community grow and evolve over the years. While the community previously used to be predominantly reddit users, the pandemic brought a huge slew of folks who were curious/lonely/needing a new avenue to meet folks. We've all undoubtedly noticed the amount of spam posters, bots, and pay-to-play folks rising on this subreddit. That phenomenon isn't exclusive to r4r, anyone who exists in an internet space such as a Discord server or forum also noticed a surge of newbies. With that, naturally, there are a lot more folks who don't really understand how to maneuver internet spaces or understand how they work. I've seen a lot of posts lately complaining about the quality of posts, or being upset that women aren't responding to their posts.

Every time I make a post, I do it with the intention of asking a community *if* there is anyone interested. Making a post isn't putting in an order at Wendy's and doesn't give you the right to get upset when it isn't fulfilled.

That aside, the obvious fact about how most internet spaces work is F posters will get a lot more attention than M posters. I'll say the same thing I tell every guy who asks for advice, that the numbers may seem skewed but really once you break them down, it's about all the same. An average good quality M4F post gets about 4-5 responses from women who actually meet what they are looking for, while the average F4M post gets an initial 100 . But once the F poster filters for what they're looking for (ie. age, location, hosting ability, etc.) they usually end up talking to only 4-5 people in the end as well. That's not withstanding the security, health and overall safety F posters have to consider as well.

Anyways, I'll move onto the data as promised. I made a post in early August 2023, looking for a fwb with the specific intention of going slow and integrating trust, exploration and friendship as core components of the relationship. I was looking for someone single, 27 , local to me (Toronto core), and bigger than me (I'm 5'2 and squishy).

To date, I received 180 chat requests, and 22 inbox messages from the post.

Out of the 202 responses,

• 59 sent "hi" messages. These were chat requests with just "hi" "hey" "hello" "sup". I declined all these requests outright. Pre-pandemic, these types of requests were much lower. I'm assuming more non-reddit users joining increased the frequency of these types of low-effort responses.

143 messages remaining.

• 55 did not read the post at all. These were either people who were out of my age range, not local to me, or propositioning something I was not interested in. Typically couples, married men, or fake Doms lol. I responded to most of the responses that had some effort in them to thank them for responding and the reason why I wasn't pursuing the conversation. I regret doing this unfortunately, because most respondents took the polite message as an opportunity to try to convince me otherwise. Uncomfortable as fuck.

88 messages remaining.

• 25 sent pictures of themselves with no info attached. This was wild to me. Please have more concern for sharing your pictures openly on the internet. Pre-pandemic users were definitely a lot more internet savvy. I declined all of these messages as well.

63 messages remaining.

• 11 were not a fit based upon post/comment history. Typically this meant you lied about what you were saying in your opener (said you were 27 when you were actually 21, lied about your marital status, or were just completely unhinged). I declined these messages as well.

52 messages remaining. I responded to all 52 messages and maintained a conversation until we felt comfortable enough to share pictures.

• 23 were not a fit based upon mutual attraction. I think roughly 3-4 respondents said I wasn't their type, and the rest was not a fit based upon my type (which I did mention in my post, preferring a partner who was taller or bigger than me).

29 messages remaining. At this point, I continued conversations with the remaining folks for a couple days.

• 24 were poor conversationalists or just weren't willing to have a conversation to actually determine mutual interest. I wasn't posting for a quick hookup, so I wasn't really sure what they expected of me.

5 messages remaining.

• 2 phone calls and 3 meetups. Just based upon our availability, I either set up a phone call or a meetup with the folks I felt passed the sanity test. Out of those interactions, I finally met someone I meshed really well with and continued to see him.

Some thoughts:

• Partnered individuals really need to respect when someone is seeking an unpartnered or monogamous situation.
• The same goes for most preferences. I think there is always room for compromise, but shooting your shot has really gone out of hand. I had 21 year olds responding to a post that asked for 27 and getting upset that I wasn't replying to them.
• If you decide to share your pictures, please make sure they are generic for your own safety! Sending a picture with your face covered is a great alternative too (think mirror selfie with your face covered by the phone). Don't do weird things like scratch it out afterwards or wear a mask or whatnot, please.
• I attempted to respond to every single person who had put in some effort in their response, at least to thank them for their response and wish them luck in their search. Jury's out whether I'll continue this practice. On one hand, I think it was polite to at least acknowledge someone's effort, but many of y'all saw it as an opportunity to try to convince me otherwise, which was super disrespectful.
• I only received 6 unsolicited dick pics! *audience cheers* This was a substantial difference from the past, where that number would definitely be in the double digits. I think everyone (but those 6 men) can pat themselves on the back for this one.
• Please put in a bit of effort in your responses! 2-3 sentences on your stats, how you match what they are looking for and what you're looking for is simple and ideal.

Final Summary:

202 responses

150 low effort/quality/sus responses

52 responses that received a response/received a picture from me

5 responses I continued speaking to and eventually met in person/had a phone call

1 success

I'll try to answer any questions but I just thought I'd share this breakdown for fun :)

Treat this place as a community made up of humans, not a vending machine. Be kind and respectful with yourself and others. Have fun and stay safe!

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