Celebrity Matches on Dating App Raya Lead to Controversy
Contributed by: kellyseal on Monday, May 24 2021 @ 09:47 am
Last modified on Monday, May 24 2021 @ 10:14 am
Celebrities are making their way onto dating apps, but lately it isn’t going so well. Actors Ben Affleck and Matthew Perry were matched with young female users of Raya, who outed them on social media.
According to The Los Angeles Times[*1] , Affleck was matched with podcaster and actress Nivine Jay, who thought his profile was a fake account and posted a TikTok saying so, but then added a video Affleck sent her over Instagram saying, “Nivine, why did you unmatch me? It’s me.” She poked fun at herself for not recognizing his account as real, but over 8 million people saw her TikTok and went after the actor, making fun of his private plea.
Jay told media outlets that she’d meant to make fun of herself for not believing Affleck could be on Raya, and that she didn’t think he should have been shamed for it. She told E! “l was making fun of myself for thinking he was a catfish and it was just supposed to be funny.”
Perry was also matched with a user on Raya, twenty-year-old personal assistant Kate Haralson, who captured a video call she had with Perry and posted a clip from it on her TikTok account. Perry was shamed for asking about the gap in their ages, which Haralson had pointed out to Page Six: “I feel like a lot of guys in Hollywood are talking to all these young girls and it’s something that I think a lot of people should be aware of.”
Haralson later deleted the video because of the backlash against Perry, but was consequently removed from Raya’s platform for violating its policy of “respect, trust and privacy.”
Many on social media came to the actors’ defense, as Perry and Affleck did not expect their private messages and video calls to be posted for public consumption. Raya has staked its reputation on being exclusive and respecting the privacy of its high-profile users. However, recent events might give celebrities pause before they decide to engage with matches.
As the Times noted, one user tweeted that it was “far creepier to release the private videos” than for Affleck and Perry to be on the apps and reaching out to matches, who requested to meet men around their ages.
Bill Gates also made headlines after announcing his divorce from his wife of twenty-seven years, but it wasn’t long before Tinder users began posting several fake profile of the billionaire, which made the rounds on social media. Newsweek pointed out that one even offered “an exclusive third dose” of the coronavirus vaccine.