I actually have tried the meetup app and I will share a little bit about my experience using it

The hanging out at events thing (ive been to well over a dozen different events , some geared around meeting friends, some geared around hikes, some geared around museum or historical building events, some geared towards other things...) is questionable as a methid to find people to treat touch starvation with . (it is also a route I have tried beforr and Ive had mixed or even negative results but I wont get into that unless you want me to elaborate) There are a notable number of people out there at these events whjo will befriend you but will think that youre 'too weird' or 'being too much of a creep' or 'being too much of a softie' if you ask them to help you with your touch starvatiom just as you will help tjem with theirs is one thing I have found . There are also people there who arent looking to befriend anyone at all, theyre just there for the event...and nothing else. Sometimes you meet a person who based on the way they treat you or certain other people at the event you already know that they need therapy or theyll end up on one of those true crime channell videos 👀😳. Sometimes youll meet people there who are very bigoted and theyll hate you or others for your gender expression or for your ethnicity or for your left-leaning politics, as I have before (and Im a straight Black male in Canada so I cant even imagine what a queer East Indian or Indigenous AFAB person would go through here. I was able to defend myself or scare off some of those bigots being nearly the same size as them. An AFAB doesnt have that luxiry typically and sadly... and also bro the people in canada are some of the best at hiding their racism.... ) . You really dont kniw what youre gonna get with the people at different events...

But Ive come to realize that meeting friends at events is surprisingly the only consistent way that a lonely childfree adult can meet ANY friends or ANY partners to meet long term, and its kind of shocking to me that we have a world with so many lonely adults and THIS is our most consistent option... Its a questionable way of going about it because of all the reasons for failures Ive listed .... but its the most consistent way. Try to think of other ways.... They dont really exist.

Sometimes a parent gets lucky with their kid and they end up meeting the parent(s) of other children at like a karate event or a track meet or a halloween outing for their kids or even at an event at their kid(s) schools ...but if youre childfree like us you have to find ways make friends organically without using the crutch of 'Oh ! Hey! My kid(s) like your kid(s) ! And theyre in the same extracurriculars! we should get together sometime. maybe one day we'll treat each other's touch starvations ome day if we get close enough 🤷🏿‍♂️'

So ya Ill go to more events because I have no ither choice. . Hopefully I meet people love me as much as I love them and who dont ghost me again or call me or others the 'Hard -ER' to other people in that group behind my back.

Thanks for the suggestion.