If you’re on a dating app, you’ll know all too well the perils that come with using them to peruse for potential matches.
People that use apps are up to 16.2% more likely to have an eating disorder, are more likely to experience social anxiety, and one third of women on apps have been called an abusive name.
That’s not to mention the fact that if you do meet someone, telling friends you met on a dating app doesn’t exactly feel like the stuff of great romance novels.
A recent survey by Eventbrite found that 64% of UK singles would prefer to meet their partner in person, compared with 36% in 2019 – proving that we’re getting increasingly sick of swiping.
Well know, there’s an alternative that let’s the world know you’re single – without having to pick up your phone.
The opposite of an engagement ring, the Pear Ring is designed to show strangers that you’re available.
For a one-off payment of £19.99 members will receive their official pear ring which can be worn whenever and wherever they like, to show others that they are open to being chatted up in real life.
It’s giving university traffic light parties.
The aim is to render dating apps redundant and help people forge organic connections.
Membership also includes an invite to PearFest (the world’s biggest singles festival) and exclusive free singles events in your city.
Sounds like an ideal solution right? Well, the internet isn’t convinced just yet.
Social media is concerned about the risks involved for women, suggesting that men will use the ring to push boundaries.
One Instagram user commented: ‘It’s hard for me to imagine a lot of women wearing this. It’d just be an invite for MORE solicitation. Men probably wouldn’t buy it either, just look for women wearing it…unique idea but I don’t see it.’
Another said: ‘Only dudes be wearing these. Women don’t need an extra reason to be solicited.’
While one user wrote: ‘I fear some men taking that ring as a green light to be weirder than we already are. Y’all ladies wear these with caution.’
‘Immediate first thought: This is dangerous for women,’ wrote another.
Others didn’t like the idea, not because of the safety aspect, but because they found it sad that we’re not being encouraged to simply ‘just ask’ people out IRL – without the need for a ring.
One Instagram user wrote: ‘You always could just actually say hi and chat. Surely if they were single or not – you’d find out.’
Another agreed writing: ‘Or you could go outside and talk to someone that you’re interested in?’
Another took a more comedic approach commenting, saying: ‘I don’t know how we populated the earth before technology man’.
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