“Everyone seems to have a convenient solution for single people who have fallen into a monumental dating slump: Look for love online! In the age of instant gratification and lightening-speed technology, the 21st-century meet-cute is about as romantic as browsing the cereal aisle in the grocery store. Looking for marriage? Fork over your cash and trust the algorithms perfected at Match.com or eHarmony. Looking for a hookup? Try Grindr or Tinder. There’s dozens of choices. Well, at least if you’re not a minority.

If you’re young, black and female, your identity might be a liability. Recent studies have proven that online dating can be tainted by racism. According to Kevin Lewis, a University of California-San Diego professor and sociologist, the average user of an online dating site is more likely to to contact someone who shares his/her racial background. Using OkCupid as his data pool, he gathered the following information about the racial breakdown of user interactions: “Most men (except Black men) are unlikely to initiate contact with Black women, all men (including Asian men) are unlikely to reply to Asian women, and although women from all racial backgrounds tend to initiate contact with men from the same background, women from all racial backgrounds also disproportionately reply to white men.”

Read the entire post from Vanessa Willoughby here: http://www.literallydarling.com/blog/2014/08/20/perils-dating-okcupid-black/

Ana Kasparian (http://www.twitter.com/anakasparian), Gina Grad (http://www.twitter.com/ginagrad), John Iadarola (http://www.twitter.com/jiadarola) and Brian Unger (http://www.twitter/iambrianunger) of The Young Turks. Have you ever used one of these online dating services, if so what was your experience? Tell us what you think in the comment.