United States

Woman Tearing Down OkCupid Ad

Image: Twitter

Dating app OkCupid has responded to a viral video showing a woman tearing down posters of its new LGBTQ+ ad campaign “Every Single Person” from a subway train in New York. Two other passengers joined her in the effort, and one filmed and posted the rant.

The notably unmasked woman was reacting to the campaign’s bold images, featuring queer people, pansexuality, and people who identify as non-binary. As she tore down the signs, she claimed to be concerned about children seeing the images, saying that the ads were “affecting the next generation” and calling them “propaganda.”

She also called the images “disgusting” and said that it’s “not about equality, you guys…it’s about communism” with no additional context.

Image: OkCupid

OkCupid has introduced a new “pro-choice” badge for users to add to their profiles, a signal to let others know they oppose the new Texas law restricting abortions in the lone star state. The company also said they would donate a dollar per badge to Planned Parenthood, up to $50,000 total on behalf of users who add the badge.

The badge is similar to other politically inspired badges OkCupid has rolled out over the years, including ones for Black Lives Matter, Voting and Vaccination status. It will appear directly below the bio (name, age, location) making it visible to anyone who’s swiping.

According to The New York Times, the new badge was created in response to the passage of Senate Bill 8 in Texas, which has essentially outlawed all abortions past six weeks, before most women even know they are pregnant. The new legislation won’t be enforced by public officials, however. Rather, it empowers anyone, in or outside the state, to sue a person who is getting an abortion or who is involved or considering helping someone get an abortion, including doctors, nurses, family members, or even the person who drives the patient to the clinic. Critics have likened it to a vigilante state, aimed at targeting vulnerable women.

Tinder CEO Renate Nyborg

Tinder announced that Renate Nyborg will be taking over as the company’s CEO as Jim Lanzone departs to serve as Yahoo’s new chief executive officer.

The news, announced Friday September 10th, means that Nyborg will be the first female executive to head the popular dating platform. She joined Tinder in 2020 as the general manager of Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

Nyborg’s background is in growing mobile and subscription business, according to the company’s press release. She previously worked for Headspace, where she built the company’s first international product and marketing divisions.

Shares for dating conglomerate Match Group soared in early September, following the company’s new listing to the S&P 500. As of September 20th, Match Group will replace Perrigo Company, according to an announcement by the Dow Jones Indices.

Stocks tend to rise after being added to the S&P 500, as they become a “must-buy” for index funds, which track stocks on the benchmark index. Shares of Match Group are up more than 50 percent since this time last year with after-hour gains according to CNBC. This is more than a year after the separation from its former parent company IAC in July of 2020.

News of the Match Group’s rising share price also follows Apple’s announcement that it will relax its app store rules, which Match Group, Spotify and a number of other companies have been fighting for over a year. Apple agreed that the companies can provide a link to their websites from the apps for users to sign up for subscriptions, allowing the developer to bypass Apple’s cut, which was anywhere from 15 to 30 percent of sales. 

Match Group and Bumble CEOs

The CEOs of dating companies Match Group and Bumble have created relief funds for people in Texas affected by the new abortion ban.

The new law, also known as SB8, prevents women from having abortions after six weeks, long before most women know they are pregnant and effectively banning them altogether. In addition, citizens have been empowered and incentivized to bring civil lawsuits against anyone involved in assisting a woman getting an abortion, including doctors, family members, and even rideshare drivers. As a result, the female CEOs of two dating companies based in Texas – Match Group and Bumble – are fighting back on behalf of women by setting up funds to help people receive care out of state.

According to CNBC, Match Group’s CEO Shar Dubey announced that she will personally finance and help the company’s Texas-based employees receive out of state care if they need it. Bumble’s Whitney Wolfe Herd announced the company will create a fund for people in Texas who need access to care and send the money to organizations that support reproductive rights. 

The Vatican and Catholic Churches in the U.S. are bracing for more of its clergy members to be outed for using gay dating app Grindr.

The Pillar published a report that based on “legally obtained” data there seem to be “at least 16 mobile devices [that] emitted signals from the hookup app Grindr on at least four days between March to October 2018 within the non-public areas of the Vatican City State, while 16 other devices showed use of other location-based hookup or dating apps, both heterosexual and homosexual, on four or more days in the same time period.”

The Pillar maintains that this information was obtained through commercially available app signal data, not through hacking, and that it pulled data from rectories and other clerical housing from 2018 through 2020.