"The dating game is rigged but play along anyway": Black Women's Dating App Stories, Digital Sexual Racism, and Shifting Religious Norms

How do new digital dating practices and technologies challenge, entrench, or reanimate religious norms and values, offering insights into the evolving relationship between faith, sexuality, and digital culture among black women? In this paper, I explore dating story videos of black women content creators on social media, focusing on their experiences navigating dating apps, dating interactions in physical and digital sites, and their resulting dating advice. This study stands out by integrating digital womanist ethics to understand the sexual racism and gendered harassment that black women encounter online. By examining popular videos under the hashtags #blackwomendating and #singleblackfemale, this study examines how black women express their sexual and gender identities in digital spaces. These videos bring to light the challenges of digital-sexual racism, interracial dating dynamics, opaque algorithms, and socio-religious pressures of “dating down”, accepting “struggle love”, and remaining “humble” while dating.