A prospective date’s bizarre request for pictures of an unusual body part has generated fury, with many on social media urging the woman to cease all contact in light of the demand.
Online dating is common for a significant number of American adults. A 2020 study by the Pew Research Center found that around 30 percent of adults have engaged in online dating of some kind. Yet despite the popularity of the practice, it’s not always plain sailing. Of those who admitted to dating online, the Pew study found that 42 percent had endured a negative experience.
The internet is littered with online dating scare stories. From “judgmental” dating profiles to singletons dealing in brutal honesty, the harsh reality is that, for some, when online dating goes bad, it goes really bad.
However, the sorry tale shared to the U.K.-based online forum Mumsnet by one woman, posting as Raffety, is something altogether different but no less outrageous.
According to the post, she recently had been set to meet up with a man. She said he was “very chatty, extremely keen,” and she was looking forward to the date. Then something happened that left her “completely put off.”
Stock images show a woman on her phone and a dating app in the inset. fizkes/lacheev/Getty
She discovered he had taken a picture of her from her social media and sent it to one of his friends, saying, “This is the pretty woman I’m taking out next week.”
The friend had responded by telling him “she ain’t pretty” and asked to see a picture of her “without a filter on.” That left the woman furious. “There’s no filter on the picture in the first place,” she said.
The final straw came when her prospective date asked her to send “a picture of my teeth” to show to his friend. The woman discovered the picture was for his friend after her prospective date sent her a screenshot of their entire conversation.
“Who the f*** does that?” she wrote. “What that says to me is that he has a total disregard for boundaries, my privacy and decency in general.”
The woman subsequently canceled the date, outraged at what was asked of her. While that might have seemed like a drastic step, many commenters said it was the right thing to do.
Rochelle Peachey, a dating and relationship expert who runs the dating site I Love Your Accent, branded the man “vile with zero class.”
“Absolutely she was right to cancel. She’s already being judged by two men she does not know. Who needs that?” she told Newsweek.
“What an insensitive pig he is for sharing the messages from his mate,” Peachey continued. “No wonder he is single and probably will be this time next year. No one has to jump through hoops or pass a test for a stranger ever. Going on a date with this man would be like the hardest interview you ever encountered, and she should never put herself through that.”
Those sentiments were echoed on social media.
“Block him,” one wrote. “How has he even got access to your social media?”
Another said: “It’s all a bit creepy and weird. Let him know that if he wants to get to know someone romantically in the future this is definitely not the way to approach it.”
A third wrote: “He seems like the kind of guy that once you are in a relationship with him, you’ll have to deal with his toxic friends who are misogynistic and will constantly be poisoning him.”
Newsweek was not able to verify the details of the case.
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