A woman had a hunch about her relationship after noticing that her boyfriend had a questionable way of looking for haircut inspirations.
When Redditor throwra5123—a 29-year-old female—confronted him about her concern, his explanation only confused her more.
So she turned to Reddit’s Relationship Advice column to see if anyone could offer some insight into the head-scratcher.
The Original Poster (OP) asked:
“Did my boyfriend really make a Tinder account to view men’s haircuts?””
The OP began her post by explaining their recent living situation.
“I’ve been with my BF [34 male] for a year now, and for the last 3 months we’ve been living together in quarantine.”
“He had a buzz cut since I first met him, except for the last 3 months hasn’t gone out to get a haircut for obvious reasons. A few weeks ago since things have opened back up he was talking about maybe making an appointment to get a haircut.”
“I asked if he was just going to get a buzz cut and he said yes, and I said that I thought his hair looked really good longer and that maybe he should just get a trim.”
A discovery threw her for a loop.
“A few days ago I went on to his phone to play Spotify and I notice that he had Tinder downloaded. I opened it up and saw that it was set up as a women’s account set to swipe on men.”
“It didn’t look like he had messaged anyone yet. When I confronted him about it he told me that he created the account to look at men’s haircuts.”
“I asked him why he didn’t just Google ‘men’s haircuts’ and he goes ‘When you search for ‘men’s haircuts’ it’s literally all just male models with undercuts. If you search for ‘man in his 30s’ it’s just stock photos.'”
Her boyfriend continued with his argument.
“Online dating is the easiest way to see pictures of few hundred real, random dudes in their 30s so I can find a picture to bring to the barber.”
When the OP suggested Facebook as an option for searches, he told her:
“So I’m just going to get an identical haircut to one of my real life friends so I look like I’m Single White Femaling him?”
The OP was somewhat convinced by his explanation, but a friend didn’t buy it.
“To me his reasoning sounded plausible but he’s pretty smart and good at making logical arguments.”
“When I told my best friend she goes ‘Do you really want to be one of those women who believes men’s ridiculous excuses for cheating?'”
“What do people think, could this actually be why he made a Tinder account?”
She opened the floor to strangers on the internet for a discussion.
Many Redditors were quick to call his bluff.
“This is the most pathetic excuse I’ve ever heard in my life. Damn I feel bad for you.” – -better-than-u-
“Please go get tested for every STD under the sun.”
“Oh an dump him.” – SomewhereinOregon
However, select men and women found validity to his story.
“I’m female, and I 100% believe him.”
“Here’s why: If he created a male account, with actual photos of him, his excuse would make no sense. He created a female account.”
“What he did is smart. Even looking for female haircuts it’s all models. Nothing real. My hair will never look like that. In fact, I now want to create a men’s tinder account to look at female hair.”
“He didn’t message anyone.”
“I don’t hear anything suspicious going on here.” – iamalsopizza
“I’m a man and this is something I’ve thought of doing.”
“You know how if you search anything like ‘best backpack’ or ‘best headphones’ all you get are sponsored posts or spam?”
“This is a way to see what actual regular men are doing instead of just seeing models. Instagram feels like spam in general, which is a whole other topic, but I wouldn’t even think to look there.”
“It seems like it’d be a lot of work to make this entire profile to cheat instead of just deleting the app.”
“Anyway, Tinder has an export data function that keeps all your previous matches and messages if you deleted them. If you don’t believe him you can always check there.” – PascLeRasc
“If he was trying to cheat, why tf would he have set up a fake account as a woman? Why would there be no messages in the history?”
“It was dumb of him to not mention anything to you but the people suggesting you’re a guillable idiot for even entertaining the idea that his story is true have either not bothered to properly read your post or are toxically overeager to believe the worst of him.”
“Not saying he definitely isn’t a cheat making up elaborate excuses, but if you’ve no other reason to be suspicious of him then his story is definitely more plausible than cheating to anyone who thinks about things for more than three seconds.” – Muscular_carp
This Redditor was still on the fence based on a number of comments indicating he’s cheating.
“The fact it was a women’s account searching men and he hasn’t messaged anyone gives backing to his explanation.”
“I’m not sure what to believe but there’s too many comments saying hes obviously lying and idk about that, I’d look into it more if I was you.” – Jdksjsj
Searching his activity history might reveal more clues.
“It sounds in the realm of possibility to me. Does he have matches?”
“Does he have a legit profile set up? If no tonboth then there realistically isn’t anything going on here. I’m surprised at all these comments saying he’s lying without anything else other than ‘omg tinder something bad is going on.'” – A1ienspacebats
This Redditor believed people insinuating her boyfriend was gay made no sense.
“Even if he was using the tinder account to find men they wont be straight men because they swiped on a women, or Bisexual men, but he would still have to explain why he was pretending to be a woman and would raise incredible suspicion that probably wouldnt result in anything happening if he was indeed gay.” – NetflixAndBill32
While many people were quick to be suspicious, it looks like a good majority of Redditors believed the boyfriend and were even impressed by his cleverness.