With the invention of the internet, many communities were adopted by new media. This can be seen in online shopping. Similar to Constable’s piece on mail order brides, online shopping came from the desire to do things in a speedy fashion, and from the dislike of interacting with others. While the case of online shopping is much less intimate in comparison, it still requires the patience and dealing with the unknown of what is in stock. With the latter, it is comparable to compatible people.
As Constable states in the Chapter Feminism and Myths of Mail-Order Marriages, “Women I interviewed were usually aware of the larger context of structural inequality and of the risks involved in meeting people through correspondence, but they planned to navigate within this system.” It is pointed out that while the industry of mail-order brides is dominated more by the consumer (male), the producers (females) are not completely unaware when they opt-in and that they do in some cases have means to look into their potential consumers. Online shopping has a similarity, though it is in leans even more toward the consumer. The consumer has the ability to look into the details and specifications in more depth than in person in most cases and have reviews that are easily more accessible.
However, in both cases, the physical product can be much different to what was expected, which is the main downside. It can be a difficult prospect as the fault could be on either end through misinformation, misinterpretation, and/or assumption. It is very different beast compared to the way you would go to your local market. But it goes back to how and what you prioritize. This has in turn led to stores putting the information of their stock online as a way to counter act that issue. It gives back the option of testing out the product at the cost of more human interaction.
This overall show how much the real world and digital world differentiate from each other. Though online shopping has definitely shown its superiority to system of mail order given the information being greatly available.
