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Are you lonely and horny? Join the Irish Google gang...
Friday, July 04, 2008
If the explosion in PC ownership was one of the iconic symbols of the Ireland's Celtic Tiger economy, what would you expect to be among the most searched words on Google.ie?
Would they be 'Mercedes', 'property', 'decking'?
Eh, no. It is, in fact, 'lonely' and 'horny'.
And now what exactly does that say about the excess of the past 10 years?
While more searches for 'lonely' came from Dublin than any other city in the world, it was a similar case with the word 'horny' -- which was only googled more in South Africa!
The Irish interest in these two words on the popular search engine would seem to belie the claim that money brings happiness, for sure.
Instead, it appears to have generated thirst for knowledge about isolation and frustration.
While there is no doubt what people typing in 'lonely' are looking for, surely the thousands of people looking up 'horny' are not all trying to find the lyrics to the Mousse T hit of a few years back, or information on Horny, the character in the online game, Dungeon Maker.
When combined, the two words suggest a very unhappy nation altogether. Instead of a shamrock as Ireland's national emblem, should it instead be replaced with a unicorn -- the ultimate horny, symbol of isolation -- the loner forgotten by Noah as everyone else sailed happily off into the sunset?
In light of Ireland's new recession, the unicorn symbol seems even more appropriate today. Is Ireland destined to forever be a country of lonely saints and sinners, about to be left behind again, as everyone marches on happily without us?
Not so, says Shauna Perry of lonely.ie . The Celtic Tiger meant we matured and embraced our feelings enough to no longer be embarrassed about being either lonely or sexually frustrated.
"We actually set up the site as a direct response to the Google research about most-searched words," marketing executive Shauna pointed out, adding that people obviously no longer feel there is any stigma attached to admission of isolation.
"It's obvious that people don't have any problem with the word. We have over 5,000 registered users now," she says, "and the site was only launched before last Christmas. People don't think of it as being 'lonely' -- they think of it as a way of not being lonely ever again!"
Due to its success, there are now plans to launch a lonely.co.uk site in Britain next month -- as the word also topped the UK's searches, too.
The site is set up as more of a 'portal', though, rather than a strictly dating site, because it provides access to other Irish singles sites such as getout.ie and winedaters.ie.
But the demographics are interesting -- 60pc of members are male, reinforcing the theory that Irish men suffer from feelings of loneliness more than women.
And while the women might be a bit slower to get involved online, Shauna has noticed that they are better at committing to going to the organised events first, while men need more of an incentive to get up and leave the computer.
"I think women are more organised and the men are very laid-back about it, which is why they like the availability of online dating," she says.
"I think the revelation that 'lonely' was so widely searched in Dublin speaks volumes about the needs of people today," says Shauna, before joking there are no plans to set up a horny.ie website.
Instead, she has cleverly added a 'Get a Room' link, playing on the popular phrase used by singles when a particularly amorous couple are invading their space.
"Yes, it definitely makes people curious to see what it leads to," says Shauna, but reveals that it is nothing cheekier than a link to an above-board hotels reservation site, which is useful for some of the members organising weekends away or social outings for groups.
And what do you get if you search out these words anyway? Well, you of course get a selection of dating options, but you also get a little bit of light at the end of the broadband tunnel -- the knowledge that there is always someone worse-off than you.
How about www.meet-an-inmate.com -- the site where you can 'make a lonely inmate smile' today. The site is helpfully set up with a selection of male and female inmates on the very first page, categorised by age. The site, we are told, has been "serving inmates since 1998".
Or, if that doesn't jangle your chains, then you can post your homemade (one man show?) videos on thelonelyisland.com , or perhaps you would like to wallow while reading some 'lonely poems' on poemhunter.com.
Of course, searching for 'horny' is altogether more obvious -- you get all the expected X-rated sites, and a few odd ones, too, like a link to Hornytoad Outdoor Clothing, a restaurant of the same name in Arizona, and links to the natural cure for poor libido (horny goat weed).
If you type in both words, you can find a Russian wife, have an affair, or log onto isitnormal.com and vote on a variety of people's problems, in a very weird psychological take on the popular HotorNot website -- a melting pot of options on one page.
'People who rely on chat rooms and email can get isolated'
Addiction counsellor Colin O'Driscoll says he is not at all surprised that 'lonely' was so widely googled by the Irish.
"In most therapy sessions I do, the term 'loneliness' surfaces in one form or another," says Colin, who manages the Forest Clinic in Co Wicklow.
"It is particularly related to addiction.
"And if the problem is alcohol, and people feel less secure in a pub when they have a problem with drink, then the internet is a very obvious option for them."
But he adds that while some supporters of the internet as a 'social networking' tool may claim it helps people who feel isolated, it can very often have the opposite effect.
"People who rely on chat rooms and email can often find themselves getting even more isolated from society and end up integrating even less," he says.
"But loneliness can also be at its most acute when someone is in a big group, too," he adds.
On a very serious note, feelings of isolation can often lead to suicide, which would probably account for the greater number of men registering an interest in sites associated with the 'L' word.
Statistics released last year showed the rate of suicide among males has steadily outgrown female suicides, since 1960.
In 2004, there were five times as many male suicides as female ones in Ireland, according to the Republic's National Office for Suicide Prevention.
