It’s the read dread.
Read receipts — little digital notifications that someone’s opened up a message you’ve sent them — are a huge source of stress for young singles.
This phenomenon was recently highlighted in a viral Twitter thread by New Yorker Eric Dimitratos. The 33-year-old, who works in digital marketing, received a text from a recent date asking for a favor.
“Yeah, what do you need?” Dimitratos writes.
“Click on my contact. Press the ‘I.’ Then turn on read receipts,” writes the date — suggesting that he wanted to know if Dimitratos was reading and ignoring his texts.
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Dimitratos posted a screenshot of the text conversation to Twitter. It’s been retweeted over 21,100 times, eliciting impassioned reactions from the Twitterazzi.
“Run,” several commenters write.
Millennials tell The Post that there are two camps of thought on read receipts in the dating world. Some agree with Dimitratos’ date, and say the receipts provide clarity.
“I like other people to have read receipts on,” says Steven Bucsok, 28, from Bed Stuy. He says he uses them to “gauge people’s interest” and manage his own emotional investment to the textee.
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“After sending a text, I usually check in a few times to see if the other person’s read it, how quickly they are to respond,” he says. “I time my responses accordingly. I don’t want to be putting more into a relationship or friendship than the other person.”
On the other side, read receipt haters argue that the message confirmations them unnecessarily anxious to respond quickly when they might be busy.
“You should be able to trust that somebody will get back to you when they can,” senior Twitter producer Sarah Hanson tells The Post.
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Kevin Kasch, a 44-year-old EMT, thinks read receipts ultimately hurt communication.
“I think it takes the agency away from people to just exercise their social skills,” says Kasch.
And some just think it’s creepy.
“It’s an invasion of privacy,” says Marie Dozier, a nurse from Ocean Shores, Washington. “I don’t think it’s healthy for society and I don’t think it’s healthy for relationships either.”
While Dozier says she doesn’t judge others for using read receipts, she wouldn’t turn them on if asked — even by a partner. “I don’t like to be on call,” she says.
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Moral of the story? If you’re single, turn read receipts on at your own risk, says Hanson.
“You’re inviting people to judge you or ridicule you for not replying quick enough.”