By today’s standards, my millennial adventures in love and dating could not be more quaint. Mortifying and often regrettable? Sure. Primarily mediated through AI-enhanced smartphone apps and webcam livestreams? Not so much.
There was the high school boyfriend I met at a party. He was hot, dumb, and toast the minute I left for college. Which brings me to the vegan I fell for after listening to his pseudo-intellectual bullshit—Bad, Katie! Bad taste!—in a second-year philosophy class. Save for a few rounds on OkCupid during my early twenties—yes, they were all underemployed drummers with four roommates—that brings me to my husband. We met at work and fell in love in the most old-fashioned way of all: Over too much Jack Daniels and a few thrown punches at an office happy hour. Fifteen years, one kid, and two dogs later, and I’m relieved it all worked out before technology disrupted and dismantled sex and romance as we once knew it.
When WIRED set out to document the brave new frontiers of romance for our new Love Bytes series, it quickly became clear how much has changed since my dating heyday—and that I wouldn’t stand a chance at love in this new world order. Generative AI is wreaking havoc on dating apps—and might just kill them off entirely; AI companions, as our intrepid reporter found when she dated several of them, are completely lacking in boundaries, to say the least; drugs like Ozempic might be de rigueur among the image-conscious, but they’re accompanied by unexpected effects on libido; on top of it all, the loneliness epidemic is leading to a surge in online scams victimizing the most heartsick.
Amid all of that tech-infused turmoil, where are the single among us turning to find romance? Fitness clubs, at least according to a dispatch from WIRED photo editor Skye Battles, who dug into why the places where everybody is at their absolute ugliest are now go-to destinations to find somebody you want to have sex with. Ultimately, this suggests to me one of two things: It’s either the best evidence yet that humanity has fallen into a dystopian parallel dimension—which would be a good thing to confirm!—or it’s an indication that at least some segment of the dating population is realizing that all this tech might not be the romance panacea we once believed. You can follow the series all week on our Love Bytes landing page.
Maybe we’re reverting to a more analog pursuit of love and sex. Or maybe we’ll all be marrying AI in a few years. So whether your future dates are human or bot in nature, let me be the first to impart a little wisdom: If they quote Descartes on the first date? Girl, run.
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