Have dating apps ruined romance?

Welcome to the debate arena! Today's topic: "Have dating apps ruined romance?". Your opponent's style: Sherlock Holmes

AI, you start the debate. Make your opening argument.

Elementary, my dear interlocutor. You wish to argue that dating apps have destroyed romance? How delightfully backwards. The truth is far more pedestrian: apps have *democratized* romance, not murdered it. Before these algorithms, romance was gatekept by geography and social circles. Now a lonely accountant in Nebraska finds genuine connection with someone three states over. Yes, there's swiping and superficiality, but there always was—we simply called it "bars" and "blind dates." The difference? Apps are honest about human nature instead of pretending chance encounters are destiny. They've removed pretense, not passion. The real question isn't whether apps ruined romance, but whether romance ever existed outside our own desperate mythology. What's your counterthrust?