From May to November, I would match with a total of 60 men across a wide conservative spectrum — self-proclaimed MAGA bros, ‘European’ guys looking for their submissive ‘European’ dream girls, white supremacists, conspiracy theorists — although most identified in some way with the alt-right. I’d scour profiles in an effort to figure out where these men were coming from, why they seemed to oppose the things I’d previously spent a career fighting for: women’s rights, social justice, reproductive freedoms, LGBTQIA+ equality. I tried to imagine that maybe we weren’t so different, maybe there was some chaotic internet-age misunderstanding at play.
And maybe I could answer another big question, one that seemed intimidatingly complex: as politics in the US (and beyond) grows more divisive, as the internet fuels hard-line cultural ideologies and social discord, as like-minded communities double down on rejecting anything different, is it possible for romantic connections between contrasting groups to even exist? Could dating be a way to help forge an understanding — of value systems, of experiences that drive beliefs — that could start to bridge the dissonance? Or at the very least, could it teach me about my own rules of attraction? Could I ever be physically enticed by (or even intimate with) someone with very different political views?
Everyone expects progressive people to reach out and understand conservatives. It’s weird, why would any woman want to date people who hate women?