There is a burden on the LGBT community right now and it is Grindr screenshots. After years of leading gay men to believe that they are inherently funny and all of their social commentary is poignant and interesting, we have ended with the refuse of the dumb and unfunny. I would like to take this Sunday edition to detail all the different ways Grindr screenshots drive me crazy.
I understand the initial appeal. They're a little salacious. You’re on the app for gay sex. Every dating app that is one step removed from Grindr is more and more chaste. Tinder, where straight people admit to wanting casual sex, then Bumble, where they try to make casual sex feminist, then Hinge, which is where straight women go to find gay boyfriends. Grindr is the most explicit app we have where casual sex is the goal and by now most people have figured not to go boyfriend hunting there. A Grindr screenshot at the very least lets everyone know you have sex. Sometimes that’s all they are. The exchange between the two people in the screenshot is oftentimes unremarkable, just an excuse to let people know you use Grindr. I think we discount how much of this world, and the internet, specifically is proving to other people that you have sex. You have it the normal amount with the right people. It proves you’re hot and cool, if not necessarily to the people you’re trying to impress, but to someone. “Look at me!” I have value because there are people out in the world that want to have sex with me. That is the base thing all of them are communicating. If you find yourself wondering “Why would you post this? What are you trying to communicate?” about a Grindr screenshot, that is what OP wanted you to know. More than anything else, OP wants you to know they have sex.
The next level of Grindr screenshot is being rude to a stranger. The poster is the one who comes out on top (🤪). They are victorious is besting the anonymous person who dared hit them up for sex on the sex app. A good rule of internet etiquette is never post a text exchange where you’re the funny one. It’s just bragging. Look at how funny I am, even in private! I’m so funny I can’t not share it! Which makes us judge it all the harsher. Rarely does it hold up under that scrutiny.
The level beyond that is “Look at how this person treated me”. Usually this poster is a victim of the second level. They are the stranger someone is being rude to. They have the chance to post what everyone wants to tweet all the time which is the opposite of “Look at me and how good I am” but “Feel sorry for me! Every day there is someone new to feel sorry for and today it is me!” It is still “Look at me!” but it's usually easier to elicit pity than to prove to everyone that you are worthy of attention based on your own merit. This genre usually ends up being either too sad to engage with or not sad enough. It’s a difficult line to tow and no one has done it successfully.
This version has sparked the straight version which is girls screenshotting their various dating apps and saying “Look how this person treated me!” We’ve seen it in a thousand variations and they get less interesting as time goes on. Our experiences are not unique and the last thing anyone wants after spending hours on various dating apps fielding boring to offensive messages is to read someone elses. Especially if they are not that bad. What straight girls don’t understand about their bumble screenshots is that no one is surprised that men act like that. I’m not surprised that gay men act like that to each other but there is a bit of initial shock that people in the same community would treat each other like that. Or there should be.
There is a final level and this level is of course actually funny grindr screenshots. In my humble opinion there is one. It is the exception to the rule. It is memorable and genuinely funny. The original poster does have the last laugh in the end but I don’t care. They did us a favor and gave us an incredible phrase that I say to my friends to this day. This grindr screenshot is of course “You Discreet with a belly ring?”
Something about this one just really gets me. The way it combats delusions we have about ourselves. This whole genre of post is about delusion. Thinking that you are funnier and more worthy of attention than you are. This one gets straight to the point. An attack on another person but only after the first person refused to participate in the agreed upon way. A break in the social contract that required being knocked down a peg.
Beyond this beautiful screenshot and the beautiful phrase contained within it, I think if we lost all the other Grindr screenshots in some kind of Yesterday-esque scenario, the world would be a better place. No, not better. More like exactly the same. Better in terms of slightly less annoying but not better in any real measurable way. In most ways I would describe it as “not a loss”.
Grindr screenshots are the tamest examples of problems that persist in the gay community. They could be collected and studied to make some grander points about sociology but I think one could also do it without using them at all. For every grand sociological point you want to make with Grindr screenshots you could do it better with a handful of instagram posts, some tweets, and several subreddits devoted to gay porn. It's the gay community at their most problematic and most boring. Overall I give the concept of a funny grindr screenshot a big “who cares” as well as a “don’t waste my time”
Happy Pride!
“Hinge, which is where straight women go to find gay boyfriends,” “A good rule of internet etiquette is never post a text exchange where you’re the funny one”—CHEERING AND WHOOPING!!! Thank you!!!!