Contributed by: kellyseal on Wednesday, July 12 2023 @ 07:35 am
Last modified on Wednesday, July 12 2023 @ 07:47 am
Dating app Bumble has launched Healthy Queer Dating Guide for its users to promote kindness and encourage an inclusive dating experience on the app.
The Guide covers a range of relevant topics, including how to start an online conversation with someone new when you are feeling nervous, and how to set clear boundaries when you connect. According to Hindustan Times, the Guide also offers advice for how to communicate that a match has misgendered you in the early stages of dating.
First date advice (and navigating to a second date), kindness in conversations, and how to approach dating when you prioritize your own emotional needs are included among other topics, according to Indulge Express[*1] . The Guide also offers important advice on how to deal with rejection, something every dater experiences.
Personal insights and experiences from the LGBTQIA+ community when it comes to dating are also sprinkled throughout the Guide.
Bumble includes relevant features of its app in the Guide, such as Incognito Mode, which allows you to have control over who can see your profile. Private Detector is mentioned as well, which blurs nudity or other revealing photos so you don’t have to see them. The Guide also discusses Photo Verification, and how to UnMatch, Block, or Report certain users for inappropriate behavior.
Other safety measures Bumble offers and has included in the Guide are how the company moderates the platform for harassment, fetishization, homophobic and body-shaming language, and more. People can also easily access a Safety and Wellbeing Centre resource hub within the app.
“As a company rooted in kindness, respect, and online accountability, we aim to foster a diverse and inclusive community on Bumble where everyone can authentically express themselves. We are thrilled to partner with experts, thought leaders and organizations in India, who do such important work for LGBTQ+ communities, to develop this healthy queer dating guide,” said Samarpita Samaddar, India Communications Director, Bumble in a statement.
Bumble developed the Guide[*2] in response to its State of the Nation study released earlier this year, where the company found that 69 percent of LGBTQIA+ respondents said that they were nervous talking to new people when dating, compared to only 56 percent of heterosexual daters. Forty percent of LGBTQIA+ users also admitted to not feeling confident about being themselves on dates, compared to only 30 percent of heterosexual daters.
The new guide was developed in partnership with Social Media Matters, and is supported by Rangeen Khidki, Sappho for Equality, and Official Humans of Queer, according to Indulge Express. The company also consulted with equal rights activists Harish Iyer and Manak Matiyani.