Who Holds the Power? Gendered Experiences of Involuntary Singlehood in the Age of Online Dating ^*

Although singlehood is a desired lifestyle for an increasing number of heterosexual women and men, many are involuntarily single, struggling to find a partner. Meanwhile, popular debates about dating are sharply polarized along gendered lines. While “incels” see themselves as victims on a dating market ruled by women, relatively mainstreamed feminist sensibilities frame heterosexuality as marked by men's power. This article investigates how Swedish heterosexual long‐term involuntary singles experience and make sense of the gendered conditions of contemporary dating. Addressing the tendency in online dating for women to receive significantly more attention and responses from men than men do from women, we reveal substantial tensions in how the participants understand this gendered dynamic, with the men tending to interpret it as a matter of women's power, while the women's experiences and perspectives complicate this notion considerably. By identifying some key mechanisms involved in producing these divergences in women's and men's perspectives, our analysis deepens understandings of contemporary gendered conflicts around love, while also shedding light on the antifeminist dynamics of the incel community.