The Lulu Craze: Is Social Media Ruining Relationships?

By Catherine Pinyot | gargoyle@flagler.edu

“Review a guy anonymously”—sounds tempting for any woman. In a dream world, heartache wouldn’t exist because girls would know right off the bat if a guy was “cheaper than a Big Mac” or a “trust fund baby.”

Lulu, the first ever female-only app that allows women to anonymously review men, hit the app store at the beginning of February. Women can now log in through their Facebook accounts (which confirms their gender) and review the men in their lives on a scale of 1-10. The categories range from “looks” and “sense of humor” to “willingness to commit to women” and “best and worst qualities.”

Alexandra Chong, creator of the app, told Huffington Post, “Lulu is a place you can talk about the good and the bad,” and negative reviews are an incentive for men to make changes.

“Should a guy not do well in a particular category, they can change their behavior,” Chong said.

Lulu has become especially popular on college campuses, where relationships come and go.

“It doesn’t bother me, because I have good reviews,” says Flagler college student Jake Cryan. “However, if my reviews were low, then that would be a problem.”

Both guys and girls have mixed feelings about the app. Gracie Stackhouse, a sophomore at Flagler, admits to subscribing to Lulu and reviewing a few guys, just for fun.

“It’s entertaining for us because it turns the tables for guys who are used to rating girls,” says Stackhouse.

Yet when asked how she would feel if an app to rate girls was created, Stackhouse said, “Feelings would get hurt and drama would start.”

The social networking world continues to grow exponentially. The days of just MySpace and Facebook are a thing of the past. Twitter, Pinterest, and Instagram are everyday vocabulary words. And now there’s Lulu.

Americans spent 121 billion minutes on social networking sites between July 2011 and July 2012, up from 88 billion the previous year, according to Nielson’s 2012 Social Media Report.

It’s no secret that this obsession with social media is taking a toll on real, face-to-face relationships. A study by Psychology Today shows that people who spend more time interacting via the internet experience feelings of isolation. They forget how to communicate interpersonally.

“I think technology is ruining our generation,” says Cryan. “It consumes our lives and causes drama.”

Cryan claims that, though Lulu is all in good fun, its effects on relationships could be detrimental.

Flagler College sophomore Ryley Venables agrees that Lulu is a step in the wrong direction. Though Venables confesses to checking his ratings and finding it humorous that he is known for his “baby blues,” he doesn’t see the point.

“People already can’t go out to dinner without Instagramming a picture their food,” says Venables.

Will people not be able to go out to dinner with someone without checking their ratings on Lulu first?