"Strangers on the Internet" Podcast Ep. 18: Exclusive Interview with Bestselling Author Nancy Jo Sales

The social critic known for going viral when calling out the "dawn of the dating apocalypse" in Vanity Fair is back for more

On this special first episode of season 2, (Apple Podcasts link here and Spotify link here) of Strangers on the Internet with co-host and psychologist Michelle Lange, we welcome bestselling author, award-winning journalist, filmmaker and producer Nancy Jo Sales. A long-time critic of online dating and social media--her viral piece on how Tinder destroyed dating is here--Nancy Jo talks in part 1 of this interview about why dating app operators consider her such a thorn in their side, how dating apps are intentionally addictive, and why we see so much victim-blaming when apps lead to nefarious encounters. What does evolutionary biology have to do with dating apps? And why does Nancy Jo think that these apps have deep cultural effects such as turning men callous? Come listen to one of the most distinctive voices on all matters dating apps - things are about to get salty!

Nancy Jo's book "Nothing Personal: My Secret Life in the Dating App Inferno" is available here and her book "American Girls: Social Media and the Secret Lives of Teenagers" is available here. Her documentary "Swiped: Hooking up in the Digital Age" can be found here. Her latest piece in the Guardian about how women have started calling out toxic online dates in social media groups is here.

Some helpful previous podcast episodes to check out are our review of ten years of Tinder and our exclusive interview with Tinder Swindler victim Cecilie Fjellhøy (part 1 and part 2).

Don't forget to hit "Follow" here so you can automatically get part 2 of our Nancy Jo Sales interview and our future episodes on your preferred platform!

Nancy Jo Sales

Comments

[The Margrave of Azilia]

So, will there be a class-action suit against some of the dating apps? Are there intellectual-property issues involved?

When does the legal discussion commence?

And what advice about online dating can you get here that Grandma and Grandpa wouldn't have freely offered you?

[Dr. Ed 2]

"And what advice about online dating can you get here that Grandma and Grandpa wouldn’t have freely offered you? "

They don't want *that* advice....

[John F. Carr]

No class action. Individual cases with an arbitrator who says, "if you didn't want to be raped, murdered, and dismembered you shouldn't have worn that hat."

[Dr. Ed 2]

I once had an undergrad state that she had the right to walk stark naked into a frat house and expect nothing bad to happen to her "because rape is illegal."

I asked her if she left her car parked unlocked and with the keys in it -- "of course not", she replied.

"But isn't auto theft also illegal?", I asked....

[John F. Carr]

Leaving your keys in an unlocked car in a public place may be illegal.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Isn't it more an issue of the liability?

[Dr. Ed 2]

I have long said that the Lord created women to protect men from ourselves....

The feminist movement forgot that -- or perhaps never understood it -- and three generations later, women don't know the primary reason why men ever wanted them in their lives -- the nurturing....

[A nerdy Fred]

Oh, dating. My wife and I have a recurring dialog:
"Thank you for saving me from dating."
"No, thank you for saving me from dating."

[The Margrave of Azilia]

Aww, how cute. /not sarc

[Dan Schiavetta]

STOP these posts, Ms. Manta. Just stop them!

Lightweight Cosmo-type posts with “fashion sense — does this make me look fat??” photos of the interviewees are bad news for this otherwise all-male site.

It’s almost as if the VC’ers are trying to make women look trivial. Male bloggers here, even when I disagree with them, at least act like they’re going to court. You act like you’re going to lunch.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Women aren't trivial?

[Frank Drackman]

I love those Redheads, allrite allrite allrite....

[Ed Grinberg]

Her latest piece in the Guardian about how women have started calling out toxic online dates in social media groups

Since it was published in the Guardian, I’ll venture a guess: the author thinks this is an entirely positive, “empowering” development!
I can only imagine what the author (and the Guardian) would say about men publicly discussing their dates in social-media groups… (They’d probably advocate for laws against it!)

[John F. Carr]

A song lyric that came to mind: "Everyone went out with her. Everyone knew why. No one ever stayed around. No one even tried."

[Social Justice is neither]

And to Irina and the rest of her target audience, that is misogny.

[Dr. Ed 2]

And the sad thing is that the irony is lost on them.

[Nige]

'I’ll venture a guess: the author thinks this is an entirely positive, “empowering” development!'

Why wouldn't it be?

'I can only imagine'

Well quite.

[Frank Drackman]

Does the carpet match the drapes?? (There! no Capitalization mistakes!)

[Number 2]

“A long-time critic of online dating and social media–her viral piece on how Tinder destroyed dating is here..And why does Nancy Jo think that these apps have deep cultural effects such as turning men callous?”

This is curious. I could’ve sworn that in her first blog post on her podcast, Irina Manta Told us at “dating standards” were “increasing” and that men would be forced to “up their game” in the dating arena. Now we are being told that dating has been destroyed, and that men have become more callous. Which is it?

[John F. Carr]

What are dating standards? First things that come to mind can't easily be changed except by lying. You're as old and unattractive and underemployed as you are.

[Dr. Ed 2]

And that's why they are single.
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0060520620/reasonmagazinea-20/

[santamonica811]

Ed,
PLEASE, stop trying to help men by attempting to defend/justify men's bad behavior. You're not doing a particularly good job of it.

[Dr. Ed 2]

I'm not...

[Dr. Ed 2]

What Queen Almathea doesn't realize is the number of -- and extent to which -- men have decided that "[s]ingle's a feature not a bug.",

As the sexbots become cheaper....

[Dr. Ed 2]

I'll go further -- three generations of women treating men badly has consequences which I'm viewing with Schadenfreude...

[Dr. Ed 2]

No, what Ed is counting on is the decent men instantly deciding that it was time to leave and getting the heck out of there damn fast. Same thing when a girl passes out on the floor.

In an earlier era, some guy would have put his coat around the (almost certainly) intoxicated naked woman and gotten her out of there. Fraternities all had housemothers in residence, and he'd have woken her up and left her with the housemother. Or with the Dean of Women (which colleges had back then)

But that was then and this is now -- Boy Scouts are not respected.

And what Ed is really saying is that women have driven away the men who would have protected them if they did something imprudent and *that* is their fault.

[Dr. Ed 2]

A true story from a few decades back: Two of my female student employees are going to a movie on a Friday night when they observe another female student passed out drunk, laying face-down in a snowbank, in the rain.

They somehow get her up three flights of stairs (she weighed more than the two of them combined), get her to her room, get her into dry clothes and then go to their movie. (Which, back then, were shown in buildings called "theaters.")

The intoxicated young lady remembers none of this, but subsequently realizes that her underwear is on backwards, or something -- and concludes that *I* had put it on her. And the only way I can defend myself against this allegation is to quickly find out what had actually happened -- an incident that hadn't been reported because the employees only happened to find her because they were taking a shortcut out a door they weren't supposed to use.

[Nige]

'And what Ed is really saying is that women have driven away the men who would have protected them if they did something imprudent and *that* is their fault.'

Men: either cowards or rapists, and it's women's fault.

[Dr. Ed 2]

And then there is Camile Paglia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-Zj-buRsvA

The quote I couldn't find is something to the effect of a drunken woman makes a very imprudent decision and gets into her own car -- she's a criminal. But if she makes an equally imprudent decision and gets into someone else's car -- she's a victim.

[John F. Carr]

At one school students were afraid to call for help if another student was passed out drunk. The callers would get the blame.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Vcel....

Remember the OP was about women who can't find men.

[Dr. Ed 2]

You are co-mingling two things.

[Nige]

Is your conception women treating men badly comparable to the stats of men inflicting DV on women? Does ‘protecting men from themselves’ basically mean ‘being subject to violence and abuse’ because hey, she’s basically there for him to vent his violence and agression in a safe space, but now, can you beleieve it, it’s seen as a bad thing? Is your schadenfreude aimed at women who've decided to stay single rather than risk being subjected to dv?

[Nige]

Well, it seems like the pool of men who don't view women's role as saving men from themselves is quite small, but that's hardly women's fault.

[John F. Carr]

It was largely fratboys being fratboys. I didn't get in.. I mean I didn't go to those parties so I can't speak to the male:female ratio.

[Dr. Ed 2]

Sorry -- the data suggests that WOMEN are more likely to swing first.