Why I'm Telling High-Value Men to Quit the Apps
I think high value men should generally stay off dating apps, not because the dating apps don't work and not because I'm judging men who use them, but because if you really value your time, if you do well with women in person, if you already have a real life that's worth living and a lot of things to do, dating apps are an inefficient game that puts you in heavy competition for a small pool of women, especially compared with real life. Life, this is my experience after using dating apps and I'm saying this even though I met my first wife on match com, that was 15 years ago and things weren't nearly as skewed as then.
So I'm gonna go through and explain this because so many of us guys use dating apps because it feels like it's so easy. But the key thing that bothers me is the inefficient use of time and I always say this, already do well with women in real life. So if you're a high value man, a 3 man, a man that thinks his life is something he's proud of, that makes clear conscious choices with where you put your energy, who has things like me with YouTube, my kids, my health, my community in St. Pete that I'm very passionate about, the main problem is the efficiency problem.
If I'm gonna spend a bunch of time on a screen, does it make sense for me to be like, taking girls' profiles and then trying to convert these messages to dates? Does it make sense for me to put all this time and money into optimizing my profile and getting pictures? But here's another thing. If you love your fellow men out of brotherly love, I look at it that I can out compete a lot of men on a dating app. But is that a game that's worth playing for me? There's often two or three times as many men on dating apps today compared to women and there's generally a lot of men on dating apps that don't use dating apps for a very long time.
And if women use dating apps, they tend to not use them for very long and delete them quickly because dating apps just don't feel good for most women. And women are about like, feeling good and being out socially in person. Whereas a lot of guys, we're happy to just sit at home, play video games and swipe on apps. So for me, if you value your time and to me being a high value man is about, I value my time. And it just bothers me then to be swiping on dating apps because that's evidence I don't value my time. My website says that I do value my time, but if I'm on a dating app, that says I don't value my time. If you'd rather pour that time into real life and a community of people building something worth living for, you can join Jerry Banfield Family and build a life you don't need to escape from.
Avoid the Competitive Environment
I also think generally in life, you want to avoid a competitive environment. The environment itself is set up right now in dating apps where men are in a position of, we, we're just putting out all this work and we're lucky to even get back a few likes. Now there are a small subset of men that just get a ton of matches and a ton of likes. And if you can do that on a dating app, in most cases, you will do better in person. If you'd actually go out and do a yoga class or an aesthetic dance or be out meeting women, often in, I've found like I went to these aesthetic dance and kirtan events, they were the opposite of a dating app.
I counted at this one aesthetic dance, there were two or three women for every man there. And many of the men there already were dating girls that were there. There were probably four or five single women at this aesthetic dance for every one single man there. And sure enough, I got a very attractive girl who is very interested in me, who is making eye contact, who is trying to get me to notice her. And then I talked to her and killed the attraction. And I talked about that in my last video saying how being a YouTuber is ruining my dating life. So you, if you've had a struggle with things like that in person as a guy, often you'll think, well, I should just hop on dating apps so I'll have more choices.
But here's what I've noticed.
My Best Traits Don't Translate to a Profile
My best traits as a man that I label as high value, I don't have my best traits show up successfully on an app. And yes, you can communicate these things but you can't communicate these things with having your photos and just the right backgrounds and like confidence and presence. But still, what I notice is that on a dating app, I am not like a man that actually gets the very most attractive women on dating apps. But in person, I can get about the most attractive woman in a room in person. And I'm confident to walk up and talk to the most attractive woman in a room or at a grocery store or wherever.
But on a dating app, there's so many guys out there who are like, and there's guys that have professional pictures and have bigger muscles and are taller and don't have kids or whatever women are filtering on that are younger. And I'm not getting a chance to talk to the same girls on dating apps that if they saw me in person, they not only would talk to me, but in my experience with like the ecstatic dances, they would talk to me for hours. They would give me their phone number. And if I didn't tell them I was a YouTuber, they would be very excited. They would be very excited to go out with me.
I've had girls in person tell me that you just have this kind, calm, mature energy, but you can't communicate stuff like that on a dating app. You can't communicate, your presence. Like to me, I stand out in person, but on a dating app, I don't stand out because the qualities I have that women tend to find very attractive in person do not translate well to a dating app. And for me, me putting myself on a dating app is intense. I'm intentionally putting myself in an environment where I'm not in a position to emphasize my best qualities. The things that women are often very attracted to in real life barely matter or are difficult to communicate on a profile.
If you do better with women in person, then it's ideal to not put any time and energy into dating apps because dating apps also take the edge off of going to do stuff in person. For example, there was an ecstatic dance that I could go to, a sober event that I've said that, often has two or three times as many women and four or five times as many single women compared to single men. But I didn't go to that on Saturday because I was on dating apps and I actually did get a date with a girl on a dating app that was actually attractive in person.
And I told her I was a YouTuber. But just even there, like a girl, I could have easily met probably three or four girls like her by going to the ecstatic dance. And I probably could have got a girl that was, even more into me than this girl was. And I wouldn't have, if I told her I was a YouTuber, she'd have had no way to look me up in person because she wouldn't have had my last name or my photo. If you are any kind of public figure or somebody that can be searched online, as a man, you don't want to ruin the mystery with a woman unless like you've got an Instagram profile that's carefully curated and is going to make a woman actually more attractive.
But if you have any kind of stuff that's like out there for the boys, that just is there to make your guy friends laugh or something, you're often going to turn women off when they find that stuff, at least if you're like me. And therefore, you don't have to, in person, you can give a woman a chance to really get to know you first without being able, do you realize that these women can just take a picture of your dating profile, like screenshot it, and then they can put you in Google Images, search, and they can find anything else you have online easily from there.
Thus, for me, that's not a good environment for me to be in when girls can find my dating videos, my crypto videos, and spend hours and hours ruining the mystery of who I am.
Real Life Is the Opposite of a Dating App
Real life, too, tends to be the opposite of dating apps. I was using a dating app the other night, even though I know I'm better off not doing it. And the only reason I'm glad I did go back to dating apps again and now I deleted Hinge this morning and I'm done with dating apps for good, is I'm glad I've had a chance to now teach this information on YouTube because a lot of the guys that are talking to men and talking about masculinity are still encouraging guys to get on dating apps, and they're encouraging guys to go dominate other men on dating apps, to make a better profile, get professional pictures, use AI to edit the filters, think about everything in your background, go to the gym, work out, get bigger muscles so you can attract them.
And to me, the thing to do is to be present in real life. Now, again, these guys do often say that you should be out, you should be social, but they also encourage using dating apps simultaneously, and I disagree because if I'm on dating apps, I'm less likely to get out in real life. It's just pure laziness. Like, okay, if I sit at home and film videos and play video games, I'm not going to go out and meet anybody. But if I use dating apps, I can sit at home and play video games, then just take some time on a dating app and I might meet someone.
Removing that possibility means that I'm motivated to go out and meet people. And just a couple nights ago, I was talking to ChatGPT, and I said, dating apps suck. There's so many men on them compared to women. What's the opposite of a dating app? And ChatGPT's like, going out in person is the opposite of a dating app. I was at this yoga class the other day. There were 20 or 30 women there, most of them more attractive than would ever talk to me on a dating app. And most of them, easily women I could talk to and potentially, have a connection with in person. There was not one other guy in this class.
If you want more of my thinking on meeting women without the apps, I keep all of it together in my my Dating playlist.
I was literally in a class of almost all beautiful women, not one guy there. There's probably in there five or 10 single attractive women and just me. That's the environment that to me, a high value man would be in those environments where high value women would be. And then I could run into them naturally. Now it is, so the thing with real life though, and why guys tend to slide back to dating apps is because real life often is much less certain and doesn't look like anything's happening lots of times.
Why Real Life Takes More Patience
Real life often takes more patience and can be much more annoying than the certainty you're getting on dating apps. Because when you're on a dating app, hitting like or swiping, you feel like you're doing something. And going to a yoga class where nobody talks to me and I don't see anybody that even is like looking friendly, it can look like nothing's happening. But this is what's tricky is lots of times in real life, things are happening, you just can't see it. For example, when I was married, there was this gorgeous girl at the yoga studio and I saw her there for months and there was so much emotional tension between the two of us.
It was crazy. And one day I put my mat down next to her and she started talking to me first. And she was very interested. And she was very interested in me. I'd built a huge level of attraction and emotional tension with her. And of course I did when I'm married. And then this girl is getting attracted to me. She also had a girlfriend herself. But this is a perfect example of like, I never, well, 15 years ago, my wife, I did get her on a dating app and her and this girl were just as hot. But this girl is 29 years old, absolutely drop dead gorgeous.
Like everything I love about, about a woman and how a woman could be beautiful. There's no way on a dating app I'm able to get a woman like that because she has way too many options and I don't stand out that much. But when I'm at the yoga studio and she's seen me there 10 times and we've had our mats next to each other two, three, four times and I've never said anything to her any of those times. She's taken an interest in me. She's wondering who I am. She started fantasizing about me. She breaks the ice and starts talking with me first. And this happens.
This happens at yoga, dance community events where you're in the environment where women are competing with each other. Women are in these environments. Multiple women are often picking out one man and trying to compete for him. I have a friend, she met a very attractive guy and this guy had women circling all over him. He was dating one. He had another woman that had fell in love with him. And then my friend, she decides that she's gonna push all these other women. And that this is gonna be her man. She started talking to him first. He wasn't even interested. She persisted. She made sure he noticed her.
And now that's her boyfriend. That's the kind of environment you get in when you're in like community events, yoga, dance, social spaces. Now, sure, not everywhere you go. Some, if you go to an AA meeting, that's gonna be mostly guys. And if you go to a pickleball, that's usually gonna be mostly guys. Tennis, mostly guys. I'm not saying everywhere you go, but if you go to a gym, but there's a lot of communities where it'll feel like you're the hot girl on a dating app. And that's such a great feeling. Like these ecstatic dances. And I talked myself out of going to an ecstatic dance because I got a date with a girl on a dating app.
But then that didn't go well. And I'm really grateful it didn't because if I didn't want to go to that ecstatic dance, I might get two or three dates out of one ecstatic dance instead of spending hours swiping and getting one date with one girl who's not interested in me because she found me. I found out too much because I'm online.
The Women You Meet in Person Are Different
Then when you meet women on these dating apps too, women on dating apps versus women in person, to me, the women you're meeting in person are generally gonna have stronger social circles, be more engaged in life, and be easier to connect with naturally. Whereas the women you're meeting on the dating apps, to me, are not generally going to be as high quality as the woman you're, the woman you're meeting on the dating apps. So I'm not gonna be able to meet in person that have friends and are out with their girlfriends. Like I just went out with this girl. And she said she doesn't have much of an active social life or community or circle.
She mostly works and hangs out with her family. Whereas I do have a very active social circle and community. And to me, for me to be on dating apps is signaling that I don't. Because if I'm the kind of man who can be out at an ecstatic dance, and have girls coming on to me there, if I'm the kind of guy that can go to a speed dating event in person and have most of the girls, put a little bead in my pouch and express interest in me, if I'm the kind of guy that can afford a high, price matchmaking service, and the girls there tend to be very attracted and happy to meet me, if I've got all that going for me, being on a dating app is a signal in the opposite direction that, well, either I have this like sickness that nothing's ever enough for me, or that I don't trust all the other stuff I'm doing, or that I'm getting lazy and not doing that other stuff, or that I'm willing to put myself in a position where there's heavy competition for no reason. If you're weighing whether the apps or real life make more sense for your own situation, you can join me in Jerry Banfield Family and we'll talk it through together.
So I'm not saying no man should use a dating app, but these days, way too many men are on dating apps. Either we need to get more women using dating apps, or we need to get more guys off of dating apps. Because dating apps would be a lot better if there were the same number of men and women, the same kinds of men and women on the dating apps. And I have a lot of experience with dating apps, and I understand lots of men meet their wife on dating apps, just like I did. But these days, it seems men especially, we are wasting our time and energy on dating apps, and women really want us to be out doing stuff in person.
And dating apps, you gotta have an angle on a dating app also. My only angle I can even think to work on a dating app is being a YouTuber, but, and that's why I deleted my Hinge profile, my second Hinge profile this morning, is because being a YouTuber on a dating app means I'm guaranteed to remove the mystery for a woman, which means I'm not going to have any luck on a dating app. Even if I can get a girl to go out with me once, soon as she searches me using my picture from a dating app, it's gonna be over, just like this morning.
Thus, for a lot of guys, if you don't have a specific angle as to why you're different from the men, whether that's, you can post these lifestyle photos that other guys can't, or you're a doctor, or something, like, if you don't have something that really sets you apart from the masses of other men, there's absolutely no point in using a dating app. And the attraction also, you don't want to just immediately jump into a situation, ship off a dating app either. Women in real life often will tend to move a bit slower, and will feel a bit safer, and sometimes, especially from the guys I'm talking to, and my previous experiences online dating, having a woman come over and immediately go out, going all the way with her, is not a good way to usually establish a long term relationship.
The women on dating apps often, like the one I went out with, like, she was ready, like, she looked like she was ready, like, make out with me right at the end of the date, and it's like, we just met. Like, I shouldn't be jumping into something physically that quick. And that's why being with people in person first in a community environment is a lot more natural, and helps you take things a bit slower, and puts things in perspective. Like, hey, I just met you, off of website, like, we shouldn't be jumping into anything, we don't even know each other.
Let the Other Guys Have the Apps
So my thought is, if you're truly a high value man that can win on dating apps, you probably are much better off winning in real life instead, and letting the other guys use the dating apps out of brotherly love, and saying, hey, my brothers, y 'all wanna use these dating apps? I'm gonna go win in real life, y 'all can have the women on the dating apps. And like, if you can hold conversations, and get dates, and all that stuff, then you can do that in person as well. Thus, I, and the women would really like you to be doing that in person, because women are often very social, they want to go out, they want to meet guys when they go out.
And I've heard women complaining that they go out, and they struggle to meet guys, and they have to settle for guys, because they don't wanna use dating apps, and they have a hard time meeting high quality men when they're out, because a lot of men are just not out, they're on dating apps. So what I'm doing instead, is I'm meeting women organically, and I'm using, I'm using a matchmaking service, I'm being social and present. And if I'm going to be at home on a screen, I'm gonna be working, or I'm gonna be playing video games. I'm not gonna be, like I missed hours of playing video games that I've wanted to play, because I was on a dating app.
And I missed time doing YouTube videos, because I was on dating apps. And I'm looking in the mirror like, bro, you're not a high value man behaving like that. Warm introductions are also really nice. Like one of my friends introduced me to this girl, and she was so warm. Meeting me for the first time, because her friend had already said all these nice things. But letting things develop naturally is often difficult for men, because dating apps are so concrete, you can see it's immediate. But letting things develop naturally is usually where you get women that are much more attracted to you. I've, meeting women out in person, it feels so validating when I have a woman that's clearly attracted and interested in me.
That's worth a lot of matches and likes on a dating profile, and then things tend to develop much better from there, as long as you don't kill it by giving them your book or sending them to your YouTube channel. So I'd really like to hear your experience. And yes, I realize that dating apps are useless. I know that they can work. I know they've worked for me in the past. But these days, the returns are diminishing for most men. Most men would be better off not using dating apps. Especially men who value their time, have real lives, and do well in person, they're a bad deal.
I went back and forth on this question myself, and I worked through it out loud in Should I Go Back on Dating Apps?
I Want a Better Story Than 'We Met Online'
So if you have options in real life like I do, I'd rather meet women in real life and surrender this idea that I'm going to find this perfect girl on a dating app because that seems to be a mirage. And I'd like a different story. I already met an amazing first wife, a beautiful woman. We got wonderful kids. I've already done that. And I want my second wife to be someone I met in a different way. I don't want my story and most women don't want their story either to be, well, how'd you meet your husband? Well, we met online. Most women want a more engaging, interesting story.
Like we ran into each other at the grocery store. We were at an ecstatic dance together. Like women want a better story than being like, well, I was online. And women often really judge each other these days being like, oh, you're just on dating apps to hook up with guys. Like that's, I've talked to several girls and they're like, yeah, my girlfriends just use dating apps when they want to hook up with guys. But if they want real relationships, like they stop, they stop using dating apps and look for men in person. And if this has been helpful for you, I would love to hear your feedback on the video.
If you do decide to keep using the apps, I also shared a leaner approach in Less Matches Is More: A Better Way to Use Dating Apps.