Webster’s Dictionary defines “catfishing” as… Just kidding. I’m not about to subject you to the most clichéd millennial graduation speech ever. But what is “catfishing”? Catfishing is a term popularized by the television show Catfished, in which a person is tricked by someone online, pretending to be someone they’re not, most often in online dating. Oftentimes the person catfishing isn’t confident that their appearance can attract a partner.
Oh, you’d like to hear my great, relevant, timely catfishing joke I tell at open mics? “I was catfished the other day. I thought I’d been talking to a 90-year-old man…turns out it was just a 25-year-old hot guy. He was perfectly mobile and everything. I was super disappointed.” Thank you, thank you.
Catfishing has been a topic of interest to me since I became aware of the show. What was my favorite episode, you ask? Obviously the one where a guy thinks he’s been talking to Katy Perry for 4 years. Like…how? But I’ve never been in the throws of it. I’m sure I’ve talked to someone who isn’t real before, but I haven’t planned a date with a catfisher. Until recently.
About 2 months ago I decided I was done with dating apps. I had been hurt and ghosted too many times! But then Facebook advertised an app I’d never heard of, so I joined that instead. I matched with “Matt” almost immediately. We chatted very infrequently over the next 2 months. He wasn’t asking me out, so I gave him my number and told him we should hang out. We made plans. We were going to go to a chill bar and talk. We planned a day, but never agreed on a time. The day of the date arrived (this past Saturday), and I texted him to make sure we still had plans. He didn’t respond. So I did what any good comedian would have done in my situation. I decided to mess with him.
This only lasted like 10 minutes before I told him I was just trying to be funny. But he didn’t respond. Until today. Now before I make the final reveal (spoiler alert: he was catfishing me), I want to say I do my research before dates. The thing with apps like Tinder, is that it’s connected to a Facebook account, and I can normally do some digging to find out if the person is legit. But I was using a new app, that doesn’t connect to the members’ Facebook profiles. I couldn’t find anything on Matt, which in hindsight should’ve tipped me off, but at the time, I found mysterious. A cute guy with no Facebook to show all of his friends how cute he is? That’s hot.
I thought he was the perfect combination of self-conscious and cute. Like he was cute, but not cocky about it.
Today he finally responded to my text, saying that he didn’t deserve to go on a date with me because he was crazy and a liar. So I said:
Now I wouldn’t say I’ve actually wanted to be a victim of catfishing. What I meant by this was, “This will be a great story for my blog”, but he didn’t have to know that. So I’m sorry if you’ve been hurt by a catfisher. But I’m mostly sorry that I didn’t draw this out longer so I could’ve maybe been on TV.
Filed under: Dating
