Even drunk Dr. Ruth wants you to chill with all the sex talk.

“I like to sleep naked.”

“I’m looking for a guy who knows how to play rough.”

“My nipples are really sensitive.”

“I’m not all about sex, but I can’t usually sleep unless I’ve had it.”

“Tell me what turns you on.”

These are all lines I’ve read in Internet dating profiles. And not the super weird profiles where the woman has posted pictures of her wearing nothing but a pink Cherokee headdress, or holding a dagger in her mouth, or says that she’s a Republican – no, I’m talking about totally normal humans. She tells you what she does for a living, how much she likes laughter and friends, then interjects innocently that she likes it when you play with her nipples. And don’t get me wrong, I’m all for playing with nipples. I’m an activist for the cause. If Playing with Nipples was running for President, it would most certainly be getting my vote. But it’s not something you want to bring up on Match. Not unless your idea of the perfect man is one who writes “Yo, I’ll play those NIPS like Beethoven!!” in the subject line of his email. Because you’ll have plenty of those to choose from.

The height of male flirtation.

Here’s a good rule of thumb: treat your dating profile like an all-male prison. Don’t say anything on OKCupid that you wouldn’t march into the cafeteria at San Quentin and yell at the top of your lungs. If it’s not safe to whisper into the ear of guy who hasn’t seen a women in five years, then you probably shouldn’t write it online, because let’s be honest, there are plenty of dudes who haven’t seen a woman in a while there too. Guys who are dating online are hungry. Hungry for sex, obviously, because we’re alive and awake and on the computer, but hungry to move past the emailing. Hungry to get beyond the courting and the flirting and the blahblahblahing, and just figure out whether we actually like each other. We don’t really understand courtship. The best guys can really muster is copying the vague tone of something we saw in a Meg Ryan movie, then showing you our boner. That’s as flirty and romantic as we get. So if you start talking about sex right out of the gate, that’s an indication to us that we can skip the Sleepless in Seattle and go right to Bonertown. And we love Bonertown, believe me. We know exactly what to do there. So a woman talking sex before we even know them is just giving us exactly what we want. And trust me, you don’t want to give us what we want. We’re animals.

She can’t stop drinking!

I was out with a friend once who confessed that she was giving up Internet dating forever. “All the responses I get are totally juvenile. They’re just obsessed with one part of my profile, and never talk about anything else.” She was being vague, so I tossed some vague right back at her. “Yeah, Match can totally suck sometimes.” But she kept bringing it up, so eventually I asked. The problem, you see, is that all the emails she was getting talked about sex. I was fascinated, because I’ve probably written a thousand dating emails and never once did I even briefly consider bringing up sex. Was I doing something wrong? I mean, obviously I was doing something wrong, I had written a thousand dating emails — but was not talking about sex that specific something? “The problem is,” she eventually explained, “I really can’t climax without a little spanking. So I say in my profile – strictly for informational purposes – that I need my mate to be genuinely interested in spanking. And now that’s all these guys want to talk about!” You mean a bunch of single dudes didn’t accept the unspoken disclaimer that your declared love of spanking was strictly for informational purposes?! That’s a shocker. I mean, my friend was genuinely surprised and disappointed that men would stoop so low. I was genuinely surprised and disappointed that I had somehow acquired such a stupid friend. Talking about your spanking fetish on Match and expecting men to email you about ANYTHING ELSE is like a being in a desert and saying “You know what I’ve got a ton of? Water. But I don’t want to talk about that. Let’s talk about House Hunters!” What do you want them to ask about instead, your declared love of Radiohead? Erotic profile chatter not only suggests that sex is a big priority for you, but also that you have kinda poor judgement – as you’re revealing personal details long before it’s actually appropriate. And sleazy guys, they can smell a girl who’s into sex and has poor judgement coming from a while away.

It’s a little unfair, I guess. Men love women who are sexually progressive, but then when a lady declares herself as such online, they reward her by seeing her as nothing more than sex. But hey, when in Rome, expect to be hit on by Romans. There’s nothing wrong with a little randy conversation, just do it offline. Otherwise, you’re gonna end up buying an unwitting ticket to Bonertown, and trust me, it’s not too pleasant there this time of year.