If you're a “Star Trek” geek looking to meet your mate, you no longer have to wait for the annual convention to find the man or woman of your dreams. Intergalactic love is now just a click away at the dating site TrekPassions.com.
Online dating web sites are increasingly popular, of course, and as one can tell, they're also becoming increasingly esoteric.
Jim Tracy, publisher of joined Tucker Carlson on 'Situation’ to discuss the new phenomenon.
TUCKER CARLSON, HOST, 'SITUATION’: Just how specific are these sites?
JIM TRACY, PUBLISHER, “ONLINE DATING MAGAZINE”: Well, the sites get extremely specific. I mean, you could find sites even like women who want to date men who wear orange bow ties.
CARLSON: Really? That's probably a small such subset of an already pretty small subset, I would think?
TRACY: Yes. Well, you know, in all seriousness, there's sites for Democrats who want to date Democrats, Republicans who want to date Republicans, Republicans who want to date Democrats. The realm just goes all over the place.
CARLSON: Then the “Star Trek” people.
TRACY: Oh, yes. These “Star Trek” people. I mean, you know, these are serious, devoted fans. And you know, there's people who own pets, and the pets are like a son or daughter to them. And the pet must love another person. So you know, AnimalAttraction.com. There they are.
CARLSON: Is this good for the gene pool? I mean, is it good for us to be facilitating meetings between these people? Or should we fling open the genetic windows and let some fresh air in?
TRACY: Let's do both.
CARLSON: Let's do both. I mean, look, if one Trekkie can very easily find another Trekkie, the odds they'll produce a further generation of Trekkies is very high, and is that in the national interest, I guess, is my question?
TRACY: Very good question there. We'll have to leave that up to the Federation.
CARLSON: Good point. So let's say you're got a Trekkie, you're just an ordinary person who works a lot and isn't married and wants to be. Are you likely to find—are you even at all likely to find a potential spouse on one of these online sites?
TRACY: Oh, my word, absolutely. We estimate that over 100,000 people get married a year as a result of meeting on an online dating service. And eHarmony has actually released numbers of a study that shows that 33,000 of their members in one year got married as a result.
CARLSON: Do you think that's true?
TRACY: Oh, yes. Oh yes, definitely. It's phenomenal. But we're hearing about this all the time. This is the way to meet people. This is the way to find the love of your life.
CARLSON: Is it also the way to get kidnapped?
TRACY: Well, hey, you know, it's very important to think about safety when you're online and not give out too much information initially.
CARLSON: Yes. So you don't give out too much information, but you also hope to convince a person to marry you. That's kind of—that's kind of a tricky set of criteria to balance, isn't it?
TRACY: Well, I mean, yes. You just take things slowly and when you meet for the first time, you're going to meet in a public place. You're going to take separate transportation. You're going to use a cell phone. You're not going to give out your home phone number. Because you know, with the Internet these things are easily traceable to a person.
CARLSON: So do most people tell the truth? Actually, I was on a site today, preparing for this segment, for people who are asexual. I was surprised. I'm not mocking anyone. But I was surprised that asexuals were also looking for love of a sort, I guess?
TRACY: Oh, yes. I mean, they're everywhere. CelibatePassions.com is an example of people who want to be in platonic—platonic relationships.
CARLSON: Boy, that was sad. Are the people you see on the site accurate representations of the people as they really are?
TRACY: Pretty much so. You're going to find that some people do lie a bit, and that's really unfortunate.
CARLSON: Lie? Like how? Like give me an example.
TRACY: One of the big problems that we see is people putting up a photo from seven years ago.
CARLSON: Yes.
TRACY: And then you meet in person and the guy's, like, seven years older. We got a couple of complaints today about that, of people who submitted experiences.
CARLSON: Is there a Better Business Bureau you can call if your date turns out to be older and chunkier than advertised?
TRACY: Actually, there is. There's a new generation of web sites being developed, web sites like RelationshipSlip.com, which allow you to rate the profiles of people that you've gone on a date with, judge their honesty, were they honest and so forth.
CARLSON: Boy, you're just making me thank God that I'm married. Jim Tracy, you are doing a great service, though, for
To read an excerpt from their conversation, continue to the text below. To watch the video, click on the "Launch" button to the right.