Joshua Baize

Look, we’ve all been there: your extended family members half-read an article on NPR or something that mentions Tinder, and when you go home for Christmas they confront you about it and ask you if you’ve ever “done a Tinder” or “Tinded” or something like that. Luckily, the Yale Daily News is here to help you out. Here are ten super easy things you can tell your parents that Tinder is so they never ask you about it, or any other aspect of your personal life, ever again.

1) Tinder is kind of a metaphor for the whole Millenial experience, which I’m going to explain in a really condescending, vocal-fry-ish tone of voice using a bunch of words you don’t know if you don’t cut me off right now.

2) Tinder is a smartphone application that gives you a prize for just showing up.

3) Tinder is that kind of earring that kids these days have that stretches out their earlobe so big, it’s crazy, even though God gave them such beautiful ears. And did you know that once they’ve stretched out their ears like that, they can never get them back to normal, so they can never get a grown-up job? Isn’t that sad?

4) Tinder is a dictionary that teaches teenagers nowadays how to say filthy words that folks your age would never think about saying in polite company, no siree Bob.

5) Tinder is one of those doohickeys where if you renounce your faith in God, it gives you a prize just for showing up.

6) Okay, you know how it seems like today kids don’t even know how pretty the dadgum world is? Like, they’re always staring at those beep-boop machines they carry around in their pockets, doing goodness knows what on it, not really looking at things, you see? In my day, if we wanted to play a PlayStation — well, jeepers, the world was your PlayStation! See that fallen tree over yonder, near the old stream? We’d snap branches off of that thing, and they’d be our “controllers,” and those dead leaves floating down the river would be our “game!” Oh, we had such fun back then, let me tell ya. Didn’t need this electric nonsense to have a good time. But now, oh Lordy, these kids starin’ at their telephones, looking at pictures of famous ladies naked and doing Slenderman murders and whatnot? It’s probably ’cause none of ’em go to church any more. Anyway, that’s what Tinder is.

7) Tinder is kind of like whatever dabbing is.

8) Tinder is that new trend where teenagers dye their hair all those silly colors that don’t do ANYTHING for their beautiful eyes, and why don’t they wear those pretty dresses they used to?

9) Tinder is the powerhouse of the cell.

10) Tinder is interesting and all, Aunt Sophie, but did you know that you can watch all your favorite episodes of “Cheers” on YouTube these days? The quality’s not so bad, either, and you don’t have to rewind it like on VHS. Here, let me show you.

11) Tinder is part of the gig economy, which is like an on-fleek selfie for creatives that helps them make their personal brand as squad goals as possible.

12) Tinder, when you come right down to it, is the friends we made along the way.

13) You know that genre of music that all the mohawk kids at the mall seem to like these days, where it’s all loud bass and drums and it doesn’t even have lyrics and it’s extremely unpleasant to listen to? Tinder.

14) Tinder is a big crate full of human toenails that me and my friends found in a quarry while we were smoking drugs in there.

15) Tinder makes sure that all the prizes you get for just showing up use gender-neutral language.

16) Tinder is a newsletter that tells young people they’re entitled to free college and healthcare and they don’t have to have a good, strong work ethic the way people ought to.

17) Tinder is a detailed record of my entire sexual history in college, including a text record of my flirtation, infatuation and eventual disillusionment with every person whose genitalia have made contact with my genitalia. Often I don’t actually know the stranger with whom I’m having sexual intercourse in a more than superficial way, and I frankly don’t worry nearly as much as I should about using contraceptives while I’m having said sexual intercourse. While Tinder itself doesn’t contain that many naked photos of me posing suggestively for strangers in ways you definitely don’t want to think about, it’s probably got a few of ’em rattling around in there.

18) Tinder is a computer gizmo that tells impressionable young people how to win the war on Christmas.

Micah Osler | micah.osler@yale.edu