Online dating in Canada can be genuinely effective, but only if you approach it like a simple process instead of a high-stress hobby. Ontario is a good place to date online because the population density (especially around the GTA) creates more active pools, while smaller cities still have enough users if you set your filters intelligently.

This guide gives you a practical Ontario-focused playbook: how to start dating online, what to set up, how to message, how to move to an actual date, and how to protect your time and safety.

Quick-start plan for Ontario singles

Step	What to do	Ontario-specific example	Common mistake to avoid
1. Pick your lane	Choose 1–2 platforms based on your goal	Toronto: nearly any major app is active; smaller towns: broaden radius to nearby cities	Downloading 6 apps and burning out fast
2. Build a “real” profile	4–6 photos + short bio + 2 prompts	Add a local hook: “Best coffee spot in Ottawa?” or “Best weekend day trip from the GTA?”	Only selfies, no bio, or “ask me”
3. Message with intent	1 specific question + 1 next step	“Coffee or a walk this week?”	“Hey” and waiting for magic
4. Move to a date quickly	Suggest a public, simple meet	“30–60 minutes at a cafe near Union Station”	Texting for 3 weeks, never meeting
5. Use safety rules	Public first date, own transport, tell a friend	Share date location + time with a friend	First meeting at someone’s home
6. Filter hard, stay kind	End mismatches early and politely	“I’m looking for something more serious—wishing you the best.”	Debating obvious red flags

1) Choose apps based on what you want (not what’s trendy)

Before you pick anything, decide your “dating intention” for the next 30 days:

• Serious relationship-focused: choose platforms where profiles have prompts, values, and more context. These tend to produce better conversations and clearer intentions.
  
  
• Casual dating / exploring: faster, swipe-heavy apps can work if you’re direct and you don’t take it personally when people vanish.
  
  
• International or broader discovery: consider platforms that make cross-border matching and messaging easy, especially if your local pool feels repetitive.
  
  
  

Ontario tip: if you’re outside Toronto or Ottawa, don’t assume “online dating doesn’t work.” Often it’s a settings problem. Increase your radius to include a nearby hub (for example, Hamilton, Kitchener-Waterloo, London, or the GTA), and be open to meeting halfway.

2) Build a profile that feels human (and gets better matches)

Your profile isn’t a résumé. It’s a conversation starter. The best profiles do two things:

1. show what you look like, clearly
   
   
2. show what it might feel like to date you
   
   
   

Photos: a simple set that works

Aim for 4–6 photos:

• One clear face photo (good lighting, no sunglasses).
  
  
• One full-body photo (normal setting, not a bathroom mirror).
  
  
• One lifestyle photo (hobby, cooking, gym, hiking, reading, music).
  
  
• One “social proof” photo (with friends is fine, but make it obvious who you are).
  
  
• Optional: a photo that shows your vibe (casual, dressed up, outdoorsy, artsy).
  
  
  

Avoid extremes: all selfies, all group shots, all travel photos, or filters that change your face. You’re not advertising perfection. You’re signaling honesty.

Bio: a 3-line formula that converts

Use this structure:

• Who you are: one sentence
  
  
• What you want: one sentence
  
  
• Local hook: one sentence
  
  
  

Example bios (Ontario-ready):

• “Ontario-based, equal parts ambitious and laid-back. Looking for a real connection with someone emotionally mature. Tell me your go-to comfort food or your favorite hidden spot in your city.”
  
  
• “New-ish to the area and building a life I’m proud of. I’m dating with intention, but I like things to unfold naturally. Coffee dates and good conversation beat endless texting.”
  
  
• “I’m the type who plans a day trip and packs snacks. Looking for someone kind, consistent, and curious. Bonus points if you like markets, walks, and laughing at dumb jokes.”
  
  
  

3) Messaging that doesn’t sound like a bot

Most conversations die because people write low-effort openings. Your first message should be:

• specific
  
  
• easy to answer
  
  
• slightly playful or warm
  
  
• connected to their profile
  
  
  

Openers you can copy

• “You seem like someone with good taste—what’s a perfect Saturday for you?”
  
  
• “Quick question: coffee first date or a walk first date?”
  
  
• “You mentioned hiking—are you more ‘short scenic trail’ or ‘full-day mission’?”
  
  
• “What’s the most underrated place in your city for a chill date?”
  
  
• “Two truths and a lie—go.”
  
  
  

A realistic mini-script to move toward a date

• You: “I’m enjoying this chat. Want to keep it simple and do coffee this week?”
  
  
• Them: “Sure.”
  
  
• You: “Great. I’m free Thursday evening or Sunday afternoon. Which works?”
  
  
  

In Ontario, many people appreciate directness because schedules fill up quickly (commutes, hybrid work, family obligations). Clarity reads as confidence, not pressure.

4) First date ideas that work in Ontario year-round

Plan dates that survive weather and keep pressure low.

Best first-date formats:

• coffee/tea (60 minutes is perfect)
  
  
• casual lunch
  
  
• market + snack
  
  
• walk in a busy, public area (only if weather is decent)
  
  
• museum/gallery (good for conversation breaks)
  
  
  

Ontario-specific practical tip: keep the first meet short and public. If it’s going well, you can extend it. If it’s not, you can leave politely without feeling trapped.

5) Safety and boundaries (the non-negotiables)

Online dating is normal. Basic safety habits should be normal too.

Do this every time:

• meet in public for the first date
  
  
• use your own transportation
  
  
• tell a friend where you’re going and when you expect to be done
  
  
• keep personal details (address, workplace specifics) private until trust is earned
  
  
  

Watch for pressure signals:

• pushing to meet at their home immediately
  
  
• refusing a simple video call but demanding quick trust
  
  
• love-bombing (intense affection very early)
  
  
• turning the conversation toward money, “business,” or investments
  
  
  

If someone reacts badly to your boundaries, that’s useful information. It means your boundaries are working.

6) Ontario realities: age and alcohol

If you’re dating in Ontario, it’s also helpful to know common legal basics: the age of majority is 18, and the legal drinking age is 19. If you’re unsure or you’re traveling within Canada, double-check local rules, but those are the typical Ontario standards people plan around (especially when choosing bars or venues).

7) A simple 2-week routine that prevents burnout

If you want progress without turning dating into a second job:

Week 1

• build a solid profile (one evening)
  
  
• swipe/message 15–20 minutes per day
  
  
• aim for 5–10 quality conversations, not 100 matches
  
  
• propose 1–2 simple dates
  
  
  

Week 2

• go on those dates
  
  
• adjust your profile based on who you actually liked
  
  
• tighten filters (age range, distance, intentions) to reduce noise
  
  
  

Online dating improves fast when you treat it like an experiment: test, learn, refine. You don’t need more apps—you need better signals, clearer messaging, and consistent boundaries.

If you want, tell me your approximate age range and whether you’re aiming for serious, casual, or international dating, and I’ll tailor the examples (bio + openers + first-date ideas) specifically for Ontario in the same format.

Review by BERNIE BELLAN As the former publisher of The Jewish Post & News, but still publisher of a popular website – jewishpostandnews.ca, I’ve long been inundated with requests to review books.

I tend to ignore almost all those requests – simply because I don’t have other reviewers available who are willing to review books – unlike years past when there were a few different individuals who would be willing to review books for the paper, so it falls on me to do all the reviewing.

Something else that’s happened more and more often in recent years is that authors become their own publicists and can be quite good at drawing attention to their books.

So it was that when I was contacted a month ago by a writer by the name of Amelia Doyle, who asked me whether I’d be interested in reading a book she’d written titled “Two Weeks in Toronto,” the name of that book was familiar to me as Amelia had contacted me last year to ask me whether I’d like to review her book back then.

I did take her up on her offer at that time – and began to read “Two Weeks in Toronto” but, if truth, be told, I lost interest in it. The book had some major flaws – and as romantic fiction I thought it lacked any real spark.

But, when Amelia contacted me again, this time her email noted that the book was a finalist in something called the Canadian Book Club Awards.

Really? I thought. Maybe I was too quick to put that book down – or to turn off my Kindle – as the case may be.

So, I began to read “Two Weeks in Toronto” all over again – with a promise to myself to finish it this time.

I should also add that of the many emails I’ve been receiving in recent years, many have been either from publicists for books or from the authors themselves, and many of the books I’ve been asked to review have been self-published.

It’s not all that difficult to publish a book nowadays and, in fact, many self-published books that I have read have been quite good.

In the case of “Two Weeks in Toronto,” after opening the book again many months after I had first taken a look at it though, I saw that it was published by something called “BRINKLEY Verlag.” I did some research on BRINKLEY Verlag and saw that it’s an Austrian publishing house, but with no information on its website whether it simply publishes books for a fee or whether it actually accepts manuscripts and publishes them without charging the author.

Also, on the title page of “Two Weeks in Toronto,” it says that the book was edited by someone by the name of Kelly McErlean.

Okay – the book had been published by some sort of publishing house and apparently, it had also been edited. I regarded both those things as pluses.

One more thing: I did do some research on Amelia Doyle and saw that she has authored at least a couple of other books: “A Dublin Love Story” and “The Rabbi’s Wife,” so she must have had at least some practice writing novels, I thought. By the way, if you Google Amelia Doyle and see what books she’s written, you can see they’re all described as “sweet romance.”

What does this have to do with my reviewing the book? you must be wondering.

Well, I’ve been in correspondence with Amelia Doyle and she seems such a nice person that I told myself I have to find something good to say about “Two Weeks in Toronto.”

But honestly, I tend to look at the novels my wife likes to read for guidance as to what women like when it comes to romance and many of the titles I see have a mystery element to them – or some rip roaring sex!

Here’s what AI says when you ask it what kind of romance novels women like to read: “Most women enjoy diverse romance novels, from steamy contemporary/spicy reads and funny rom-coms (like Emily Henry) to emotional historical sagas (like Outlander) or ‘romantasy,’ but popular choices often feature strong emotional connection, relatable characters, satisfying happily ever afters’ (HEA), and tropes like enemies-to-lovers or billionaire romance, with recent trends favoring diverse voices and escapism.”

So where does “Two Weeks in Toronto” fit into any of those descriptions, if any?

Well, it does have a romance at the centre of it, but the romance is so predictable that it hardly whets the appetite.

What it does have though, and which might make it of particular interest to Jewish readers, is a female Jewish protagonist by the name of Ciara Walsh. (Ciara, I had to look up, is an Irish name, and is pronounced Kee-ara. What a nice name!)

The person with whom you just know from the outset Ciara is going to fall in love is her dreamy Irish dentist, Ethan O’Leary, tall and blue-eyed – and strange as it may seem: unattached.

At a certain point we find out that Ciara is Jewish – when Ethan comments on the mezuzah on her door, but as to how Jewish she is – well, that was something I began to wonder about as the book went on.

Now, it’s important to note that the book is set right around Christmas – and Chanukah, and the juxtaposition of those two holidays enters into the plot time and time again. There seemed to be so little distinction between the atmosphere pervading both holidays – wintertime, gift giving, family get-togethers, that I wondered whether Amelia Doyle might not be Jewish, but was trying to attract a Jewish audience by injecting some Jewish notes into her book – so I asked her this question: “Are you Jewish in any way, e.g., have some Jewish family?”

Amelia answered: I’m halachically Jewish. “Both my parents come from observant Jewish families and I grew up in a Conservative home. 

“Generally speaking, you can find anything from ultra-orthodox to atheist Jews in my family. As you can imagine, living in Europe is not easy as a Jewish person.  (I should note that, after further researching Amelia, I discovered that she lives in Dublin.)

“The characters in ‘Two Weeks in Toronto’ were written on purpose in a matter that is more on the liberal side as many of my friends are Reform or in interfaith marriages. This is where the inspiration for this specific book came from.”

In the same email in which I asked Amelia whether she was indeed Jewish, I also noted that I thought the way she intermingled Christmas and Chanukah was deliberately intended to “resonate” with non-Jewish readers.

Amelia responded: “I’m Jewish and there are many ways of practicing Judaism. In this book I decided to write about a non-orthodox Jewish family.”

A “non-orthodox Jewish family?” There’s not much Jewish about them, other than the fact that Ciara’s father, Ian, decided to convert to Judaism when he was younger – for reasons that are totally unexplained. Ciara’s mother, Giuliana (which, apparently, is the Italian spelling for Juliana), is definitely not Jewish, although she doesn’t seem to have much religious orientation either way.

But, let’s not get lost in what is, in essence, a discussion totally irrelevant to this book.

My qualms with “Two Weeks in Toronto” have to do with the writing style – which could have used some good editing. I mentioned that in an email to the author when I was just getting into the book. I suggested that the dialogue could have been much improved had the characters used contractions when speaking, so that for instance, instead of a character saying “I am just stepping out” they could have said, “I’m just stepping out” – which sounds so much more authentic.

Another aspect of this book that drove me crazy is there no explanation for the behaviour of Ciara’s mother, Giuliana, or her sister, Gabriella. Cinderella’s stepmother comes across as kindly compared to Giuliana and, as for Gabriella, who is occasionally referred to as “Bridezilla” by others, well – to use the Cinderella comparison again, she is beyond detestable.

But why? What on earth could sweet, loving Ciara ever have done to provoke such unbridled hatred from her mother and sister? I kept waiting to read an answer – you know, like Ciara was so beautiful that her sister despised her or Giuliana was her stepmother – but no, it’s never explained.

And then there’s Ciara’s relationship with Ethan. Yes, it’s cute how they end up going to Toronto together – to attend Gabriella’s wedding, and they end up sleeping in the same bed together – but without having sex!

So, again, I had to ask Amelia why that was? Here’s what she answered: “In my opinion, most romance books these days are far too explicit. ‘Sweet Romances’ (also known as ‘Clean Romance’) are on the rise again at the moment and this is what my publisher asked me to write.

“Personally, I prefer to have the focus on the relationship and not any sexual relations.

“Not sure about how it is in Canada, but many publishers in Europe as well as the US started publishing ‘clean’ versions of steamier books, not to alienate readers who don’t want to read sexually explicit scenes.”

I’m shattered! “Clean romances” are “on the rise again?” (There’s almost a phallic pun in there, but we won’t go there.)

But hey, it’s almost Chanukah – and Christmas. “Two Weeks in Toronto” is set right around this time of year, so maybe this review is timely. As it’s referred to in the book, this is a book that might make a good read for “Chrismuakkah.”

“Two Weeks in Toronto”

By Amelia Doyle

Published by BRINKLY Vertag, 2024

179 pages

Available on Amazon

By HENRY SREBRNIK For centuries, Jews have been portrayed, by both religious and secular movements, as obstacles to universal order. Christian theology turned Judaism into the emblem of stubborn particularity. Modern ideologies secularized the script, making Jews stand for capitalism, communism, cosmopolitanism, or cultural decay. In the twentieth century, this logic reached its most lethal form in the fantasy of human renewal through the erasure of Jews, culminating in the Holocaust. 
The twenty-first-century iteration recycles the same template in overlapping ways. Islamist movements merge “Jew,” “Zionist,” and “Israeli” into a demonic category whose elimination is a sacred duty. Parts of the Western left have reduced Israel to the very symbol of colonial domination.
What North American Jews are experiencing today, as the ideology of anti-Zionism spreads in left-of-centre spaces, looks eerily familiar to anyone who came of age in the 1970s Soviet Union. Just like antisemites battle against a fantasy of “the Jews” that exists in their own heads, the new anti-Zionists battle a “Zionism” that is conjured up by their own fevered imaginations.
Following the June 1967 war, with Israel’s victory over its Arab neighbours, who were intent on destroying the small Jewish state, anti-Zionism became a central tenet of Soviet propaganda, where “Zionism” was usually equated with self-conscious expressions of Jewishness. It was then that the antisemitic notion of Israel as an heir to Nazism and Fascism was popularized in the Soviet media. 
It depicted Israel as the outpost of colonial oppression, Jews as betrayers of socialist internationalism. Soviet propagandists distorted the history of Zionism to underscore its supposedly inherent evil nature, ripping its founders and theorists out of historical context and, absurdly, presenting Zionists as the Jewish people’s greatest enemy. These “rootless cosmopolitans” were accused of corrupting socialism from within. By redefining Jews as racists, Zionism as colonialism, the Soviets handed progressives a vocabulary of virtue through which to disguise an old hatred. 
In political cartoons and Soviet propaganda art, swastikas were routinely intertwined with Stars of David, and the Israeli military portrayed as resembling Nazi — and specifically SS — troops. If there is a Soviet propaganda subtext that highlights its ideological and propagandistic roots, it would be “Fascism Under a Blue Star,” the 1971 book by Evgeny Evseev, who had served as an Arabic interpreter for both Soviet leaders Nikita Khrushchev and Leonid Brezhnev. By the late 1970s, he had became one of the principal brains of the ultranationalist antisemitic movement in the USSR, know as the “Russian Party.” 
Evseev’s book carried a subtitle redolent of Marxist clichés: “Truth about contemporary Zionism: Its ideology, practice, and the organizational system of major Jewish bourgeoisie.” On the illustration printed next to the title page, there was a black spider with both a swastika and a Star of David on top of its body; the spider’s web was spread over the West, from the United States to Britain, France and Italy. 
Perhaps the vilest of all these tracts was “Caution: Zionism! Essays on the Ideology, Organisation and Practice of Zionism,” a 1970 attack by Yuri Ivanov. (By the way, it was republished by a left-wing group, The November 8th Publishing House, in Toronto in 2024.) The book’s singular achievement was to fit classic antisemitic conspiracy theory into the only philosophical framework permitted in the USSR — the Marxist-Leninist one — and rewrite it as anti-Zionist critique. 
“Ivanov managed to supply a strong theoretical foundation for openly criticizing Zionism with the help of Marx’s and Lenin’s works, which no one could argue against,” Vladimir Bolshakov, another prominent “Zionologist,” recalled in his memoirs. I remember coming across it in the late 1970s while writing my PhD dissertation on Jews and Communists, and was shocked by its vituperative language and tone, not to mention falsehoods, worthy of the worst Nazi propaganda. 
All of this bore terrible political fruit. On November 10, 1975, the United Nations passed General Assembly Resolution 3379, equating Zionism with racism. It remains the foundation stone of antisemitic anti-Zionism. It cast Israel, the collective Jew, as committing today’s ultimate crime. Despite being mass-murdered by Nazi racists, Jews became racists. And despite enduring history’s largest genocide, Jews are now accused of “genocide.”
Communist propagandists enjoyed manipulating words to trigger “Pavlovian” responses, the Princeton Kremlinologist Robert Tucker observed; their “ultimate weapon of political control would be the dictionary.”
Much has been written of late about the deep Soviet roots of today’s virulent anti-Zionism in the West. Some thirty-five years after the fall of the Soviet empire, the Soviet corpse continues to emit its infectious gases and poisons people’s minds and imaginations. After 7 October, parts of the Western Left responded not with horror but with slogans lifted from Soviet propaganda: Israel as colonial, Zionism as apartheid, Jews as global oppressors.
Today’s anti-Zionism is not actually concerned with the relationship Jews have with Israel. It is a project centered on producing villains. In this, it follows its predecessors: antisemitism and anti-Judaism. Antisemites were never concerned with the authenticity of Jewish identity, practice, or behaviour; they sought to construct “the Jew” as a monster. 
Anti-Zionism repeats this mechanism, simply substituting “the Zionist” for “the Jew,” while inheriting the same foundational hatred. Failing to recognize that anti-Zionism, whose Soviet and Nazi genealogy reveals that it has nothing to do with Jews and their right to self-determination, is fundamentally a project of constructing fiends. 
Antisemitism functions not merely as a prejudice but as a moral language, a grammar that shapes how societies explain disorder and assign blame. It provides simplicity where reality is complex and coherence where the world feels incoherent. For such people, it becomes a battle against a uniquely devious and implacable foe – something that cannot be resolved by elections or arguments, but only by confrontation. The logic points beyond persuasion to elimination.
The only way to be anti-Zionist without being an antisemite is to reject the legitimacy of all nation-states equally. The loudest supporters of Palestinian statehood are not doing that. No one should mistake it, or be taken in by those espousing it, for what it is. We should call it, along with antisemitism and anti-Judaism, as “Jew-hatred.” It is nothing more – or less.
Henry Srebrnik is a professor of political science at the University of Prince Edward Island.