I would thought that filtering out smoker/non-smoker candidates would have been a basic selection property. Or at least have a choice field that says smoker only/non-smoker only/don’t care.
Atheists are by definition not religious at all, in any way.
I took e-Harmony’s questionnaire a few years back and was rejected. Then I heard about them rejecting atheists. Later I heard they rejected depressed people. As a depressed atheist, it could have been either one.
A few years ago, a site called Chemistry.com was explicitly advertising itself to people who had been rejected by eHarmony. No idea if it’s still around.
They do. You say if you smoke not at all/a few times a month/a few times a week/every day, or something like that, and then you check which boxes you would accept in a match. They also do that for drinking and religion and self-assessed level of physical attractiveness, etc.
I’m a depressed agnostic and I was accepted. So who knows. eHarmony works in mysterious ways.
I was accepted, I suppose and I kept getting all these emails about “Come back and check out all your magnificent MATCHES!”
And there was never a single match. Probably because I answered the questions as such to indicate that any mainstream Judeo-Christian religious beliefs whatsoever are an instant dealbreaker. I didn’t actually expect to be matched up on a Christian singles site, in the deep South Bible Belt, but I just wanted to see if there were any other atheists using eH in my area.
And, apparently not. 
So I went to OKCupid and have had much better luck. Haven’t met the love of my life, but at least I’ve made some friends and am dating around a bit.
I’m saying fundamentally the way most human relationships tend to work is that one person is dominant. This varies in degree - obviously not every relationship has someone wearing burqas and someone else getting beaten. But if you had to identify who was the one who was ultimately in charge in the relationship, you could do so in the vast majority of relationships. It’s relatively uncommon as far as I can see for relationships to be truly equal.
Which isn’t to say that anyone is necesarily oppressing anyone else - as I said, some people want to be the boss and some don’t. And e-harmony is trying to figure out where you stand.
That sounds like a whole other thread in itself:
“Who’s the Boss <in YOUR relationship>?”
If that is true, I would really like to know which one of us was which with the guy I met on there. We seemed to be very similar about that kind of thing.
The rejection email I received stated that “no religious beliefs” goes against their requirement, or something along those lines.
Whattya expect from a southern baptist sponsor who isn’t even a real therapist?
Me too-I honestly thought that egalitarian relationships were the norm nowadays.
Or, both partners have aspects in which they’re “dominant.” I mean, the one that takes the riding crop to bed is not necessarily the breadwinner.
This actually makes some sense from a business point of view. By narrowing the spectrum of applicants they accept, they can achieve – and advertise – a higher percentage of successful matches.
Sure, they can take your money now, but their reputation may be harmed in the long term if there are large numbers of users not getting dates.
So look at it this way, Mdcastleman: You’re not bland enough for eHarmony! Hooray!
My roommate was rejected after I recommended it to her. I felt really bad about it. But I assumed it was because she had literally eliminated every elligible match because her standards were ridiculous. “must be over 6’3”, must be WASP, must be catholic, must be steelers fan, must be fit, must have advanced degree, etc, etc…" And she was no Georgia peach to boot.
Doesn’t the P in WASP stand for Protestant? No wonder they couldn’t find any matches!
I and many of my matches said no religious beliefs. They don’t have that requirement.
I question the accuracy because I think the way they changed the phrasing actually changed the meaning of the questions. I’m not questioning the validity of the technique, but the accuracy of this specific test. I noticed it, knew what they were trying to do and knew that I was answering “inconsistently,” but I was answering honestly. The meaning of the questions changed enough to change my answer more than once. To use your example, maybe I enjoy sunbathing and fishing. I’d say yes to the outdoors question, but no to hiking and maybe no to any question about being active or athletic.
This isn’t quite what I’m talking about, but it works as an example. I wish I could give you an actual example, but it’s been years. Most people’s answers probably are consistent, and they likely wouldn’t notice or care, but if the questions aren’t carefully worded, you’re going to end up with some false positives for deception. I suspect I was one of them. That’s pretty annoying when you’ve spent that much time answering questions honestly.
I agree that at some point many people are going to just start clicking. That’s a result of the length of the test. If you’re giving a two hour test to weed out inconsistent responders, you’re actually creating inconsistent responders by wearing down people who would otherwise be honest. I don’t see the value in that.