Has Social Media Made It Easier To Be A High School Virgin?

Adam:

If you were in high school today, and had access to all of the current technology (e.g., texting, social media), do you think you would be better or worse at picking up girls?

It's not really a matter of better or worse, it's strictly a matter of expanding your prospects. When I was in school and the Internet didn't exist, I had to make do with the women in my immediate vicinity. And if they didn't care for me (they didn't), well then I was shit out of luck. I had a very limited amount of realistic prospects, and I blew it with all of them because OH GOD MY YOUTH WAS SUCH A WASTE.

Awkward high school boys will always be awkward. They'll always be overeager to get laid and inevitably end up saying, emailing, texting, or posting the EXACT wrong thing, driving women away and causing them to say to all their best friends OMG, ADAM IS SOOOO SKEEVY. And then the well is poisoned for you and you want to kill yourself.

HOWEVAH, social media has made the pool infinitely larger. You can connect with girls who don't live nearby, don't go to your school, and may not even exist. And the best part is... those girl don't know each other. You can fuck up with one and not have another one learn about it. (Unless they post your shitty text and it goes viral and then you're a national laughingstock, which is fun!) Frankly, even getting catfished is beneficial because you at least THINK you have a girlfriend, which gives you the confidence boost you need to go out and find an ACTUAL girl to hook up with (provided you never find out you're being catfished, of course).

Also, the fact that you don't have to necessarily establish a relationship in person right off the bat means that you can take time in crafting what you say. You have all day to write an email. You're not standing right in front of the girl, shitting your pants because you know you only have one shot. I used to CALL girls I liked. I had a shitty phone and I'd go into the bathroom and try to chat them up and be besties with them, praying the conversation would go super deep and they'd tell me all their innermost thoughts and grow to adore me, which is just fucking pathetic.

I remember sitting by that phone waiting for it to ring. Just that one phone line. With the Internet, you have a million lines. You have a much better chance of connecting, of finding a social circle that makes you comfortable, secure, and more confident. I'd like to think that boys today have better odds of succeeding with girls than they used to. I don't want any of them to go through the fucking endless parade of rejection that I went through. It sucks.

Now, to the Funbag below!

Drew Magary writes for Deadspin and Gawker. He's also a correspondent for . Follow him on Twitter @drewmagary and email him at [email protected]. You can also buy Drew's book, Someone Could Get Hurt, through his homepage.

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