What sort of dialogue around these ideas are you hoping for in the discussion following the shorts?
The programme showcases both the exciting aspects of online hookups, as well as the more challenging or dissatisfying ones. You might say online dating gives us more choice and freedom, but I fear this might just be the illusion of choice. For that reason, perhaps the age-old gay craving to be perfect and to over-compensate for shame is now more prominent than ever. The problem with selling is that flaws are thoroughly swept under the carpet (you’d never see an iPhone advert letting you in on the fact that the damn things smash so easily). And we have to sell ourselves like all good capitalist babies. By this I mean, online dating is very much just a service that offers a ‘product’.
I think gay dating, as with all dating, has now been updated to work with the rest of capitalism, and with an economy-based society. What do you think has changed in the experience of being a gay man with the development of online dating? We interviewed filmmaker Sean Lìonadh, whose short Tonight appears in SQIFF programme What Brings You On Here?, about being a gay man and online dating culture.
