Certifying couples on Swing Lifestyle

[Pensacolapair]

IMO the entire concept of certifications, validations, or whatever a particular site calls them has limited value. See, it's like any system - it works best when everyone uses it the way it was intended. There are soooo many inferences drawn from certifications that it gets seriously twisted. We have kicked this around with quite a few people, and have been seriously dumfounded by some of the views people have expressed and the paths said views led them down:

"They don't have any certs, so they are by default, either fakes or looky-loos, so we won't waste time on them"
"They have too many certs, we don't want to play with someone who has been around that much"
"They have a certification from so-and-so.. and so-and-so is an asshole so we wouldn't get along with them"
"They have a certification from a (insert anything you don't like .. bi-male, age, race etc here)...ewwww!"

The inference we draw from seeing a certification is that, in a Lifestyle full of 'Internet Swingers', these are people who actually meet others with a similar interest in the Lifestyle. Unless the wording of the certification is such that it's obvious that they played, we don't make any assumption that they did - really don't care. How 'play or no play' would be the basis for certifying someone is beyond me - what is it supposed to mean - "Hey Everyone, they played with us so they are gonna play with you too?" Personally, I feel the whole 'are they real swingers' thing is a bad mindset to even approach: as we know, some people don't consider soft-swingers to be 'real swingers'..and face it, there are many out there who figure the only 'real' swinger is one whose only prerequiste for playing is for you to have a pulse! How many bad experiences have began with the phrase, "You ain't a real man unless you __________"?

Of course, people are free to interpret things any way they want - but my point is that what one person thinks they are saying isn't necessarily going to be what another person thinks they are saying. I have never come across a site whose guidelines (what their intent is) for the certification process said anything about actually playing as a qualifier - as a matter of fact, most sites allow you to be certified by the Webmaster via webcam!

Sorry, but yes - if you enjoy the ability to factor in certs when making your decisions and don't allow others the same ability, it's a double standard... and arguably isn't much different a situation than those many people with no pictures on their profile that are glad to view someone else's when determining who they might be interested in. But just like pictureless profiles, it's up to the individual member as to what they are comfortable with.... so the band plays on.

[spamcatcher]

When we first started, we had quite a bit of trouble with people who didn't respond or wouldn't show up after we'd set up a meeting. At that point, I looked at certs as just being an indicator that others were "real" and wouldn't leave us sitting alone, wondering if we had a particularly serious strain of cooties. I've never relied on them to gauge the "quality" of a prospective sexual contact, because people are different. What may have been the greatest experience of the person who left the cert might be bland or ho-hum to me. I just wanted to make certain that people we were going to meet were courteous, decent, fun to be with, and had at least 3 teeth.

We generally leave certs as a courtesy to those who accept them. And I retracted one once, too. We had an MFM twice with the male half of a couple, and I immediately wrote a cert for him after the first time. He didn't reciprocate. Some months later, as we were setting up the second meeting, I casually mentioned that he hadn't certed us. His response was that we hadn't played with the female half and she writes all of their certs.

Well, he's played with my wife twice now, and hasn't bothered to take the hint. So I retracted the cert and don't think he'll be playing with us anymore.

[twoforone100]

Well we like them and it helps us know people are sane and if we know who left it we like it even better..


5 year old certs are a bit much. Lots could have changed. We have I think 6 and perhaps a few more on aff but chat room meet and greets add to that #.



they could help they could hurt.. who knows... it is the same as everything... coke or pepsi....

[MrkLin]

We have 3 certs, and I'll admit that I do check the certs of others - mainly to see if we have mutual friends. I've looked at certs and discovered that we've had mutual friends on more occasions than I can count. Several of those couples now come to our parties, though not necessarily all of them.

I don't think having a large number of certs means anything other than you've met and gotten to know a lot of people who took the time to certify you as genuine. Obviously not everyone we've met has certified us - and by the same token I doubt anyone here has certified everyone they've met.

To me a certification is just another tool at my disposal when I'm browsing through profiles.