The internet has made
our world very small. In many ways that’s a very good thing – we have access to
information and research that only 30 years ago was not freely available. We
can keep in touch with friends and family who live in other locations. Through
internet dating sites and groups like Meetup we can meet new people and maybe
even form new relationships.
But with the ease of
communication, scammers have become prolific. There are often stories
circulating of another person – often a lonely woman - who has been scammed of
thousands of dollars by someone in Nigeria or Eastern Europe or just about
anywhere, posing as a nice, respectable person even locally. They have their
stories down pat, and are obviously convincing enough that many of their
targets are completely taken in. What they don’t have is a face you can touch.
I met my ex-husband
on-line. He was local so we were able to meet in person and put the real human side
– sight, sound, touch – to our subsequent 9 year relationship. I made friends in other
cities, but I was able to meet them and know they were real people. It has been
a rule which I have only broken a couple of times on my Facebook network, and
then only because the contact was a friend of a friend of a friend or something
similar. LinkedIn and Twitter are slightly different because it would be near
impossible for me to meet all the people in those networks, given that they are
spread across the world. It has sometimes concerned me how much of a public
profile I have on those sites, but I have had no issues with anyone yet and
most of my contacts are also contacts with many others in the network.
Early in 2013 I joined
Meetup to meet new people in my local area and wider Brisbane. Meetup says
about itself that it “helps groups of people with shared
interests plan meetings and form offline clubs in local communities around the
world.” I joined a
range of groups associated with my interests, have met many people in person, made
some wonderful new friends and know they are real people. So it was a bit unusual
last night to receive a message from a person who had only just signed up to
one of the Meetup groups that I am a member of who appeared to be there
specifically, according to his profile, to “find his better half”. I do not use Meetup as a dating tool, and I
have not, until now, had any issues with Meetup because everyone I have met is local, and I can meet them in person. I responded to this gentleman
suggesting that a coffee would be in order.
His response was a long one, giving me what was I assume was meant to be
a more in depth look at him, including photos. I found many little warnings in
what he wrote.
He claimed to be an
architect and construction engineer, yet he could not make time for a simple
coffee on a Sunday just after New Year with someone he opened the conversation with, when most other companies that
someone in his industry would work with would be closed. He said that he would
have to “check his schedule” to see when he could fit me in. If he is real, the
fact that he has so little time available would not auger well for any future
relationship.
He claimed to have a
20 year old daughter who lives in Sydney with her “Mom”. Immediate alarm bells –
that is not a term widely used in Aus, except perhaps by immigrants from North
America, yet this chap claimed to have been in Aus since childhood.
His email read like a
cut-and-paste from a few different dating sites, trying to fulfil all the
things he believed a woman my age would be looking for. In some places he did
not use capitals (e.g. ‘i’ instead of ‘I’) but this was inconsistent throughout;
he repeated himself a number of times but with different words; and in some
places his spelling, grammar and English usage was excellent but in others it
was atrocious.
If this guy is real,
good luck to him, but perhaps Meetup is not the place to go looking for life
partners. I can understand why, though, since the dating sites available are
expensive and run from outside of Aus. However, I am tempted to believe that
this is a scammer who has accessed the profile photos of some genuine bloke,
probably not from Aus, and is using Meetup as a new platform for trying to get
mature aged women to part with their money.
I’m not that
desperate. I’m not interested in an email relationship, especially when I am
getting those alarm bells in my head. It’s one reason why I don’t respond to
men even from other cities within Aus – I can never know if they are real or genuine until I meet them in
person. If someone truly is interested in meeting me, then they meet me. In person. And if they
initiated the contact I would expect them to have time available to meet me
within, at the very least, a day or two.
So thank you, whatever
you name really is, but no thank you.
I hope other women you contact also have enough sense to say no, unless you are
prepared to front up and show you are a real person. Maybe that is the only way
scammers will finally get the message.
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