THE DATING RESOURCE PAGE
ARTICLE OF THE DAY
~ ~ ~
Can You Trust Them?
Here's How to Tell Online
Juanita Chavez, Datelife.com
Going from "safe and anonymous email" to meeting someone who was until
recently, a total stranger, needs a look. It can be a cause for either
concern or excitement, depending on your choices.
We want to create a safe dating environment for everyone at
PremiumDating.com, so we provide a few tips here to help you steer clear
of the turkeys and steer towards the winners. Here's what I look for:
• Meet local singles
• Edit your free profile
• Live Chat now!
• Email Others
Can You Trust Them? Here's How to Tell
First off, let me start by saying I used to always give people the
benefit of the doubt. But, after finding out my latest infatuation was
really married (and keeping it secret!), I became more cautious. Be a
skeptic online, and here's some tips that can help you avoid the
problems I had:
The red flags to look for include:
a) Drug, Alcohol or Smoking Habits: Any of these can be relationship
disasters, you should carefully evaluate whether or not you want the
chaos that can go with someone who has a substance problem. Usually,
it's better to find someone else.
How to tell? There are usually symptoms that you can detect: unexplained
absences, excuses, missing money, they take too much time off from work
or are "sick" frequently as an excuse, there may even be obvious signs
like alcohol, smoke or drug materials around their living space (though
they typically hide these things). Mood changes, abrupt "nice
person/person from hell" switches are a big red flag, eg one day they're
nice, other days, they act withdrawn, resentful or angry.
b) Evasiveness, not providing phone number after a reasonable timeframe.
Some people may just want to keep the relationship on the internet,
that's fine as long as they tell you this upfront. Openness is
important. Otherwise, you may be communicated with a married person or
somebody with children that they haven't told you about.
c) Appearance different from what you expected. For some reason, people
online frequently use outdated 5-year old photos, or may even use
somebody else's photo, to misrepresent their appearance. It's bad to use
a photo of yourself without the wrinkles and extra pounds that were
added in recent years!
One of the first things you should ask for via email is a recent photo
that's been taken in the last year. If you are thinking of meeting
someone from out of state/country, you may want to request that they fax
you a copy of their current drivers' license (with address obscured) to
verify their age and appearance.
d) Unemployed people looking for support Realize that there's a lot of
people who need a meal ticket, and can try to exploit you and use you to
support them. Whether they want you to fall in love with them and have
them move in with you (for free rent) or obvious ploys like
"emergencies" that they want your money for, avoid these people at all
costs. Because it you don't, it will cost you.
These are not likely to be homeless grubby people, instead, they are
likely to be well educated and smart, with access to a pc, yet, they may
well be almost broke (or close to it, living off credit cards).
How to deal with it? I ask people what they're currently doing for a
living, and also subtly tell people upfront that I believe nobody should
need to give money or housing to another person for the first year or so
they're in a relationship. This is plenty of time to evaluate their
character (or lack thereof!).
d) Married people, or those already in relationships Many married guys
go online looking for excitement, to find mistresses. Don't become the
"other woman" in somebody's marriage (or guys, become that second
boyfriend in your girls' life). You should, after a few emails, ask who
else is in there life, if they're living alone or not, and when their
last relationship ended.
Once you exchange phone numbers, you should be able to call him or her
at home at, say, 9pm at night, without always getting an answering
machine. Be especially suspicious if they try to offer an excuse for not
giving you their home phone number ( again, after you've corresponded
online for awhile and are ready to talk, don't rush). What's to hide?
e) Working girls/pros, con men, ex-cons and others It's a great idea to
talk casually with a few of your city's local police officers to ask
their advice about avoiding trouble online. Be a skeptic, and don't give
out personal info, your phone number, place of employment, or other
identifying information, until you feel this person is trustworthy. Most
are not.
Guys need to be aware that on occasion, "working girls" may contact them
for paid sex. Women need to be aware that there are ex-cons who can't
(or don't want to) get jobs, that are looking for easy prey. Don't be a
victim. Be careful out there. See more notes in our Privacy policy.
Good luck out there - there's good people and bad. Assume the worst, til
they've earned and proven their trustworthiness. Don't accept gifts or
provide any (or especially, money) to others, til you've known them for
at least a year.
FOR THE BEST DATING RESOURCES ON THE NET
Everyone knows it's tough to find someone
you can really connect with on a personal level. And that's the reason
for all the Dating sites that have popped up over the last few years.
The Dating Resource page
is dedicated to making your dating experience as easy as possible, by giving you a
multitude of Dating Sites to choose from.
In the links below, you
will find thousands of dating sites, dating clubs and dating singles who
are dying to meet you in cyberspace, a safe environment for you to get
to know each other from a distance, before you decide whether or not to
meet in person and start dating for real!
There you'll find
literally THOUSANDS of Dating Links to choose from!
All arranged in easy to navigate
directories
Be Sure To Visit These Other Great Sites:
Merchant Account Resources
Healthy Lifestyle
Grandmas Search Page
Investment Resources
© 2004
DietingResourcePage.com
All trademarks are the property of their respective owners. All Rights Reserved.
