Love and the New Hookups: Politics First!

Once upon a time, in a more innocent America, a shared fondness for a cloying cocktail and inclement weather could trigger a love affair:

If you like piña coladas
And gettin’ caught in the rain.

Romantic requirements were lenient. Politics was ignored. It was 1979, and the term “sane Republican” was not yet an oxymoron.

If you’re not into yoga
If you have half a brain,

True love and great sex were within reach:

If you like makin’ love at midnight
In the dunes on the cape,

With just a short letter:

Then I’m the love that you’ve looked for
Write to me and escape.

Today, romance, like everything else in America, is politicized. According to the dating site Match, 76 percent of singles believe it’s important for partners to share political beliefs. By the end of last year, mentions of Black Lives Matter on the hookup site Tinder exceeded mentions of the term “hookup.”

I recently surveyed select dating sites, and discovered that no one is looking for love. Everyone wants political validation. Who needs love, affection, and empathy when shared umbrage, common political enemies, and reciprocal moral smugness are now the foundation of a lasting relationship?

Here is an example from the dating site Bumble, where women send the first message:

If you like reparations
And defunding police 
If you’re not into tax cuts
And demand white privilege cease
If you like trigger warnings
And despise microaggression
Then I’m the love that you’ve looked for
Write me and deplore voter suppression.

On Tinder, one male aspiring hookupper poetically trolled for hookupees:

Big walls on borders and migrants deported,
Trans-only bathrooms and nothing imported,
Autocracy surpassing Xi Jinping’s —
Are these a few of your favorite things?

AK47s and cheating on taxes,
Blaming Antifa and refusing vaxxes,
Ignorant narcissists acting like Kings —
Are these a few of your favorite things?

Conspiracy detections in stolen elections,
Capitol patriots breeding insurrections,
The outrage and slurs that Tucker slings —
Are these a few of your favorite things?

When the Libs bite,
When BLM stings
Make us ill at ease —
We’ll simply remember our favorite things:
Write to me and jail LGBTs.

The first hookupee’s response:

Pro-gun and Pro-life are morally consistent
Abortion bans and murder are logically coexistent;
Let the progressives wallow in the mire —
Your favorite things light my fire.
Then we’ll deprecate the splendors
Of all fifty-seven genders
Let’s hookup when the Anointed is Reappointed.
The subsequent volume of responses crashed the website.