Interactive Singles Map shows you where the ladies at

September 10, 2008 12:38 PM

Remember that disheartening map that cataloged the ratio of unmarried men to women per city, wherein the East coast was Single Lady Central and the West coast was a Boystown? Now there's an interactive version where you can adjust for age range, which dramatically affects the results. [VIA PROJECTS]
posted by zoomorphic (68 comments total)

hello, New Orleans!
posted by mrgrimm at 12:45 PM on September 10, 2008

AH HA! I fucking KNEW it! Get the eff out there and flirt, anonymous!
posted by Greg Nog at 12:46 PM on September 10, 2008

Wow, adjusting the sliders to the 20-30 bracket indicate clearly why I CAN'T FIND ANYONE TO LOVE.

::wracking sob, grabs another beer::
posted by FatherDagon at 12:46 PM on September 10, 2008 [4 favorites]

I'm liking the 18-24 range. Now, is there a map that shows me where the nearest single guy is in regards to my immediate position? Is that too desperate?
posted by Solon and Thanks at 12:46 PM on September 10, 2008 [1 favorite]

Well, it appears that being a single and straight male in your twenties sucks just about everywhere...

It would be really nice to see the total population of an age range in a city.
posted by PhillC at 12:50 PM on September 10, 2008

As the age range gets older, it looks like the number of single women gets significantly higher. There are a lot of single grannies out there, from the looks of things.

This is good news for Skwisgaar Skwigelf.
posted by Parasite Unseen at 12:52 PM on September 10, 2008 [1 favorite]

Well, poo. That explains why I'm so alone. So... alone...

On the other hand, maybe the ladies will be impressed with my now-informed statistical explanation of their dating lives. Optimism!
posted by Tomorrowful at 12:52 PM on September 10, 2008 [1 favorite]

This is pretty fantastic. Now if only there were a way to factor in sexual orientation...
posted by piratebowling at 12:53 PM on September 10, 2008 [1 favorite]

Solon: I'm sure you could write some code to combine MeFi's "users near me" with a gender filter.
posted by phrontist at 12:54 PM on September 10, 2008

So the west coast doesn't attract young men at all... they just murder their seniors!
posted by Krrrlson at 12:54 PM on September 10, 2008

Shit. I knew it. It's like prison!
posted by cowbellemoo at 12:57 PM on September 10, 2008

I really just needed a statistical explanation for not going to the meetup last week.
posted by soma lkzx at 1:03 PM on September 10, 2008

I really just needed a statistical explanation for not going to the meetup last week.

Made all the more poignant by the fact that we technically crashed a wedding party that was happening at the same bar.
posted by zoomorphic at 1:05 PM on September 10, 2008

Damn. Manchester, NH is calling my name. Or would be, if my husband and I hadn't already removed each other from the map.
posted by DarlingBri at 1:06 PM on September 10, 2008 [1 favorite]

Ok, Ok, so America is out of the running. Is there another map, one of the world? Lots of girls my age in Mozambique? Taiwan? Sri Lanka?

Please? Someone? I'd go anywhere.
posted by Rinku at 1:09 PM on September 10, 2008

From 45 up, the number of women rapidly begins to outpace the number of men. When you get to 60 through 65, the number of single women really dominates.

Man, do I love getting older. Hello, ladies.
posted by Astro Zombie at 1:12 PM on September 10, 2008 [1 favorite]

Pretty nifty... phoenix is a total sausage fest!
posted by ph00dz at 1:21 PM on September 10, 2008

No way, Astro Zombie. You don't deserve 2+ women. Okay, well maybe you do with your posting history, but c'mon, man!
posted by cowbellemoo at 1:28 PM on September 10, 2008

This is really nice work. Thanks, Soma.
posted by fake at 1:31 PM on September 10, 2008

....Much as I hate to admit it, this makes me feel a little better.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 1:34 PM on September 10, 2008

Either:

A- We have a policy like China's, and everyone has been killing off their female babies for the past few decades

or

B- There is a lot more polygamy going on in this country than previously thought

or

C- That entire map is just full of shit
posted by eas98 at 1:37 PM on September 10, 2008

If I'd known I was going to live this long there were more women available the older I got I would have taken better care of myself.
posted by vapidave at 1:38 PM on September 10, 2008

Well. Apparently I'm going to have to cultivate a taste for cougar.
posted by mullingitover at 1:43 PM on September 10, 2008

It's doubly depressing when you factor in the evidence that male sexuality peaks in the late teens and women don't peak until they hit their 40s. No one has any fun.
posted by zoomorphic at 1:44 PM on September 10, 2008 [1 favorite]

"Inter - active", you say..?? BOW CHICA-BOWWOWWW.....
posted by LordSludge at 1:46 PM on September 10, 2008

That map is far from disheartening.
posted by Ironmouth at 1:48 PM on September 10, 2008

One word.

Oshit.
posted by vers at 1:49 PM on September 10, 2008

I was surprised by the excess of younger men -- but could it actually be immigration? The US immigration rate is more modest than somewhere like Australia, but still might be significant.
posted by jb at 1:51 PM on September 10, 2008

Keep in mind these stats are per thousand so the differences are still not that huge even at age 65 with 100 per 1000 difference (10%), versus age 18 at 20 per 1000 (2%), or about an 8% spread. Also in case it's not obvious, women get increasingly, er, large in their older years when the sins of the flesh tend to the dietary (although this phenomenon could be explained in part by this graph).
posted by stbalbach at 1:53 PM on September 10, 2008

Well. Apparently I'm going to have to cultivate a taste for cougar.

You don't really have to, all you need to do is run slowly....rawwwr!
posted by The Light Fantastic at 1:54 PM on September 10, 2008 [3 favorites]

It's doubly depressing when you factor in the evidence that male sexuality peaks in the late teens and women don't peak until they hit their 40s. No one has any fun.

Abstinence-only education wins again!
posted by soma lkzx at 1:57 PM on September 10, 2008

I was surprised by the excess of younger men -- but could it actually be immigration?

So, wait: not only are there a ton of single 25-to-34-year-old men everywhere, but a big chunk of them are probably hardworking Latin guys alone and far from home...and I'm still going to bed solo? Esto no me sirve.
posted by kittyprecious at 1:59 PM on September 10, 2008 [1 favorite]

Maybe I'm crazy, but it seems to me that we're principally talking about widows who have outlived their husbands, which is a statistic we've known about for decades. Other than that, it's tough going for guys everywhere in the country without exception, which we've also known about for centuries.

thus we find the utility in infidelity.
posted by shmegegge at 2:06 PM on September 10, 2008

What I'm getting from this map: I'm not thirsty because I can't find any water, I'm thirsty because I live in a friggin' desert.

Which, while on the one hand disheartening, on the other hand I hear a voice... "It's not your fault. It's not your fault."
posted by indiebass at 2:10 PM on September 10, 2008

Also in case it's not obvious, women get increasingly, er, large in their older years when the sins of the flesh tend to the dietary

Thanks for helpfully clarifying why so many men are still single.
posted by zoomorphic at 2:12 PM on September 10, 2008 [7 favorites]

Yeah, I had noticed that men outnumber women more than 2-1 on the personals site I used to frequent, especially in the 30-40-ish age range. Worked for me!
posted by medeine at 2:14 PM on September 10, 2008

Why are so many cities with 30somethings sausagefests?
posted by crapmatic at 2:17 PM on September 10, 2008

Also in case it's not obvious, women get increasingly, er, large in their older years when the sins of the flesh tend to the dietary

I haven't heard any complaints.
posted by The Light Fantastic at 2:27 PM on September 10, 2008

If you narrow the population down to 18-19, Fayetteville, NC becomes a huge blue planet of single men. No wonder--it's the home of an air force base, an army base, a special warfare museum, an infantry museum, and a museum dedicated to trains.
posted by zoomorphic at 2:35 PM on September 10, 2008

?! I can't think of a likely reason why are there so many more single men than single women in the 25-35 range unless the women in the survey are wont to say that they're in a relationship whether or not they really are and/or a *lot* of guys are pretending that they're not in a (n exclusive) relationship.

I'm starting to think that the only hope for me is to start randomly killing dudes I see on the streets, you know, shift the odds a bit... maybe just target the ones that are pretty. But not too pretty.
posted by porpoise at 2:35 PM on September 10, 2008

Doesn't work, won't let me adjust slider to anything over 20 years old or below 29. Less links to newfangled fancy Flash or AJAX interfaces, more to CGI forms that actually work, please.

Oh, and the "live preview" here is still at least O(n) for n = length of comment, feels more like O(n²) at least. That might be Firefox's fault for having a shitty String.length() or the JavaScript equivalent, but still somewhat Metafilter's for not testing.

How do I disable live preview? Thank goodness I have "It's All Text" at least.
posted by vsync at 2:48 PM on September 10, 2008

I can't think of a likely reason why are there so many more single men than single women in the 25-35 range

Women get married earlier, to (I suppose!) older men. By age 24, 50% more women are married than men (30% women vs 20% men), and this pretty much ruins the balance.
posted by soma lkzx at 2:48 PM on September 10, 2008

older ladies...hot AND available.
posted by camdan at 2:53 PM on September 10, 2008

Solon and Thanks : Now, is there a map that shows me where the nearest single guy is in regards to my immediate position?

I'm thinking that if Google incorporated this information into their mobile maps application, they could finally be worth some serious money:

*looking at phone* "Ooh, check it out, I've got satellite view, and I can see that there are three pizza places within a mile, a movie theater, a liquor store, and four single women in the 18 - 12 range."
posted by quin at 2:59 PM on September 10, 2008

Grain of salt: this map doesn't take into account couples who are living together, rather than being legally married.

Also in case it's not obvious, women get increasingly, er, large in their older years when the sins of the flesh tend to the dietary

Thanks for helpfully clarifying why so many men are still single.

Please tell me that you're joking here, otherwise I feel some rudeness coming on.
posted by jokeefe at 3:00 PM on September 10, 2008

18 - 24 that is. 18 - 12 might draw too much attention from the wrong kinds of law enforcement agencies.
posted by quin at 3:01 PM on September 10, 2008

Um, the second line I quoted is from zoomorphic, for some reason I messed up the bold tag.
posted by jokeefe at 3:02 PM on September 10, 2008

Correct me if I'm wrong, jokeffe, but I read stbalbach's comment as a suggestion that there are so many single women in their later years because they all got fat. No?
posted by zoomorphic at 3:06 PM on September 10, 2008

Thanks for helpfully clarifying why so many men are still single.

Please tell me that you're joking here, otherwise I feel some rudeness coming on.

I read that line as meaning "no wonder men with idiot Neanderthal attitudes like yours are single," which is certainly a reasonable reaction.
posted by languagehat at 3:06 PM on September 10, 2008 [1 favorite]

Sorry, it didn't occur to me that my sarcasm didn't translate at all. What languagehat said.
posted by zoomorphic at 3:12 PM on September 10, 2008

This map proves a sneaking suspicion that I've had for quite some time now. It's not that there aren't single guys in my area it's that they really are all Eagles and Flyers fans.
posted by weebil at 3:25 PM on September 10, 2008

Can't believe my little city is prominently featured on that map!

And it has a huge surplus of young men.

Good to know. I'm considering the pros and cons of cougardom.

In my case, I think the surplus may be a result of the job market here leaning toward engineering firms, which are still employing predominantly men these days (but actively looking for more women, if anyone wants to apply).
posted by misha at 3:27 PM on September 10, 2008

Now, if I l just start with my actual age, there are nine more single women than men, but I work out, so I bet I could take out the competition, no problem.

course I'm married, so I keed, I keed.
posted by misha at 3:34 PM on September 10, 2008

Colorado is apparently Cougarville. Lots of single men under 50, and lots of single women over 50.
posted by Eekacat at 3:45 PM on September 10, 2008

This data is incredible. It seems to imply that older men prefer younger women! This has the potential to completely reshape our understanding of human sexuality.
posted by dsword at 3:58 PM on September 10, 2008 [6 favorites]

There's worse places to be a mid-20s single guy than Portland OR.

I guess that's some comfort.
posted by Caduceus at 4:00 PM on September 10, 2008

Sorry, it didn't occur to me that my sarcasm didn't translate at all. What languagehat said.

Got it zoomorphic, I think my blood sugar was low or something. And thanks for your comment.
posted by jokeefe at 4:28 PM on September 10, 2008

From 45 up, the number of women rapidly begins to outpace the number of men. When you get to 60 through 65, the number of single women really dominates.

Man, do I love getting older. Hello, ladies.

I'd claim that I don't have the heart to tell you, but I'd be lying, so:
You're going to help create this gender disparity because, being male, you're going to have a heart attack and die at 50, whereas the women will live into their 70s.
posted by -harlequin- at 4:32 PM on September 10, 2008 [1 favorite]

This confirms everything I had ever feared.

It's hard being a nerd. You go to a tech school, the ratio of guys to girls is 5:1. Then you move out to the big city. Here, you think, there will be women who are cultured and intelligent, who enjoy the finer things in life... who are single.

I lived in a big apartment building when I first moved to Boston. Every woman that I met who lived there with me was either a) living with her boyfriend, or b) living with a female roommate, but their boyfriends visited constantly. I lived alone and could hear one of them down the hall when she was having sex. Very loudly.

I also do community theater, where all the freaks and geeks are supposed to hang out. Every show I've done here, every woman in the cast and crew has been in a relationship. I shit you not.

I got lucky and have found a very nice girl, but for awhile I was seriously considering getting a cat. Guy's gotta get pussy somehow.

I'm so sorry.
posted by backseatpilot at 4:44 PM on September 10, 2008 [1 favorite]

Fuck, I'm in DC, why am i not getting laid on the regular?

Sup ladies, holla.
posted by empath at 4:56 PM on September 10, 2008

*adjusts slider to my actual age*

Oh....
posted by empath at 4:59 PM on September 10, 2008

That's it, dammit. I don't really want to go, but I'm moving to Eugene, Oregon, tomorrow.
posted by D.C. at 5:06 PM on September 10, 2008

It's doubly depressing when you factor in the evidence that male sexuality peaks in the late teens and women don't peak until they hit their 40s. No one has any fun.

Except for lesbians in their 40s. WHEE!

Also, yeah, one reason there are more young men than young women on the East Coast of the US is because of resident aliens and international students, two groups in the 18-30 age bracket that skew very male. H1B visas, for instance, are crazy skewed toward men: the proportions are something like 65 to 35, if I recall correctly.
posted by Sidhedevil at 5:51 PM on September 10, 2008

dsword has got it right i think. The tendency he points out combined with the current divorce rate would seem to predict an increasing surplus of older single women. Shmegegge, I'm afraid your probably wrong on the widow thing. The map caps at age 64 which I think is below the age range where this effect would kick in. Plus it seems that the age range where the balance tilts for women is in the mid to late 30s.
posted by Hairy Lobster at 5:57 PM on September 10, 2008

I had not long ago read this article in Salon whose author makes the outrageous claim that there are seven men for every woman in NYC.

Well, she makes it then retracts it straight away:

There are more men in India than women, around 930 women to every 1,000 men according to recent census data, the vast discrepancy a disturbing result of infanticide and sex-segregated abortion. And yet, it would work to my advantage, comparing favorably, of course, with the proportion of women to men in New York, which is always cited as something obscene like seven to one. This last figure may be an urban myth, but certainly it bore itself out anecdotally. Most parties I attended in New York featured thirty women and two men.

Now, assuming she's roughly in the 18-30 age group, she's not only hugely wrong about the relative proportions, but wrong about the basic fact as well. There are more men than women in NYC, in her dating pool.

So what could possibly cause that perception? And what kind of parties is she going to?
posted by AmbroseChapel at 10:28 PM on September 10, 2008

So what could possibly cause that perception?

Rationalizing cognitive dissonance and/or broad generalization from anecdotal experience. Basically, she is unable to find a guy and blames it on competition and lack or resources instead of things like her own personality traits, physical traits, looking-for-a-guy strategy, and dumb luck.
posted by moonbiter at 11:31 PM on September 10, 2008 [1 favorite]

Well.


That was depressing.
posted by airways at 1:41 AM on September 11, 2008

You know, when you consider that most of you guys (admit it) have a fantasy about being not just with one woman but two or more at least once in your life, I have to say: I'm sorry, but it looks like you are all hosed.
posted by misha at 10:04 AM on September 11, 2008