While there are many obvious dangers associated with meeting someone on the internet, as outlined by Lox, there are more subtle traps too for those in Love with the idea of Romantic Love and the ideal Gentylle & Parfait Knight

A web site describing some of the dangers of on line relationships calls this
'the Love Illusion Trap' -
describing the, not uncommon, phenomenon of falling in love with someone who you have never met through chat room personas, emails etc

"Often times this is dismissed as being just silly folly, but the reality is, it is much more dangerous that other forms of escapism because it emotionally traps people.
That's right, because you are now 'in love' (and I believe that, speaking on a chemical and emotional level, what people feel in these situations is indeed 'real' love) with what can only be a phantom presence in your life, you cut out other in person possibilities"

In addition the person can start to become quite disdainful of the people they meet in reality as they can never match the class, the style, the charm of an online 'lover'

As I observed in a previous post .
'European and American culture constantly programs us to want 'romantic love'; our culture is preoccupied with it.
It's the most frequent theme in our music, literature, movies...even our fairy tales.'
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 07:31 AM

Furthermore, the example of this idealized Romantic Love often has to 'invent' obstacles where they don't already exist, distance being the most obvious one.


Sorry about the off topic meander but I thought it was as insightful as rants about groups of young women dressing up in 'sexy' fancy dress to celebrate marriages at hen parties.

The search for romantic love may also additionally explain why some immature young (and not so young) women unwittingly get themselves into situations with ambiguous signals.