eHarmony caves, will start gay dating service
For the life of me I have no idea why they would to be perfectly honest, here's the story from cnn
http://www.cnn.com/2008/LIVING/11/19/eharmony.same.sex.matches/index.html
NEW YORK (CNN) -- Online dating site eHarmony will create a service for same-sex matching in a settlement of a 2005 complaint that the company's failure to offer such a service was discriminatory. The new same-sex matching service from eHarmony, Compatible Partners, is set to debut by March 31. Under terms of the agreement with the New Jersey attorney general's office, eHarmony Inc. will start the service, called Compatible Partners, by March 31. "With the launch of the Compatible Partners site, our policy is to welcome all single individuals who are genuinely seeking long-term relationships," said Antone Johnson, eHarmony vice president of legal affairs.
So here's the deal, at least for me.... I think gay people absolutely deserve to have dating websites. There's no question about that, after all I do think that they are people like any others with rights just like the rest of us. That's all fine, but here's what I see.
A private organization decides to develop a product. This product is a dating website, which is tailored to cater to and promote Christian/(religious) ideals while facilitating a means for people to meet, get together and presumably fall in love and get married. With this website came a matching system oriented on matching straight couples for the best possible chance of resulting in a long lasting, committed relationship and hopefully marriage.
Now in comes the problem, in this case the gay community. Apparently they felt like a website oriented towards a religious/straight demographic was some how discriminatory. I'm sorry but here's my question, how is this even a issue of discrimination or a violation of rights in any way? You see, eHarmony isn't a public website, it's a product. Yes folks, that's right believe it or not it is actually a product, developed by a company which employs real people who make their living maintaining and selling this product. This product is a dating website, which was designed to cater to the needs of a specific demographic, being straight religious people. Perhaps religion wasn't stressed to the point where they won't let you in, but hey I've been on that site. If there's anything I've learned, religion is important there. So how is this discriminatory? Perhaps if it was a free, public website I might actually see their point, but that's not what this is. It-is-a-product. In my opinion this makes this a classic example of the tyranny of the minority. The gay community is just about literally inventing new rights to ensure the straight religious community can't have a product like this tailored to their needs. It really makes me wonder how they would feel if I were to find a random gay dating website and sue it for the exact same reasons.
posted by Carlo at
12:42 AM
9 Comments:
so how does this actually cause you any harm? how does it harm the website itself? can't religous people still find dates? can't gay people who are religous join in and find dates too?
i just don't see why any straight person cares. including gay folks isn't going to have an effect on the straight folks looking for dates, is it?
also, i have a real problem with eharmony being "religous". when i joined a few years back, i had no idea it was a christian dating service. they went out of their way to not advertise that fact.
as an atheist, i decided to cancel my membership. my choice.
if i wanted to join, as an atheist, should i have been banned?
which would bother you more: a straight atheist joinging this online dating site, or a christian gay person?
would you sue a random gay dating website to allow christians, or to allow heterosexuals?
(i guess the opposite of eharmony would be a dating service catering to gay atheists....)
i ask these questions to try and understand your reaction to the news story. and to understand how allowing gays folks to particpate would cause harm to any of the heterosexuals using the dating service.
ok, you know i love a good political/religious debate! :)
and now i'm wondering about catholic transexuals, bisexual agnotics, sexually confused buddhists.... how am i ever going to get any work done thinking about this???
LOL
Here's my problem, it now becomes problematic to run a website which targets a demographic. Ironically, this is BAD for the gay community! They are now at risk of being sued for trying to start a website for and promoting the gay community, the same thing can be said about any such websystem.
Does eHarmony allowing gay users to be matched harm anyone? Of course not, and if this was a choice made BY EHARMONY then I wouldn't have a problem with it at all. The problem I have is that now we have the US court system telling ALL Americans that you CAN NOT spend your own money, to develop a web based service as a product which targets a demographic. This is bad for everyone, it makes online communities very difficult to run, it makes business models such as eharmony impossible to run.
Perhaps the biggest problem I have with this is that it wasn't a civil liberties issue to begin with until this decision came down. eHarmony wasn't conspiring with the online dating industry to prevent gay people from being able to find matches online, and in fact there are equivalent competing products available on the market which allow access to the gay community. This is *NOT* a case of separate but equal, this is a case of a business finding a niche in the market and developing a product which meets that need.
More over, I really don't see how the gay community was being harmed by not having access to eharmony. We're talking about a dating website based on a moral value (christian conservative) which frown upon their sexual orientation. Why in the world would they want access to this online dating community? I've faced situations where I had to make a choice between buying a desirable product from a company with whom I have serious moral and or business disagreements with, usually I decide simply to buy a product from a competing vendor instead when possible.
Having said all that, we haven't even yet touched on the idea of so called exclusive clubs and other businesses like that. Last October I visited my brother in Ft. Lauderdale. While I was there, we were walking around a club district and my brother decided he wanted to go into a club where one of his friends from high school was going to be performing. As it turns out I put on sandals that morning and was still wearing them when we tried to enter the club. Guess what, I was denied entry, why? I was wearing sandals. So I have to ask the question, should I sue for discrimination? Or should I just accept the fact that this is a business promoting its self to a certain demographic, and those people wouldn't be wearing sandals out to the clubs at night. That simple, no hard feelings it's just business.
I agree that eHarmony, if they truly have a religious/moral objection to gays, as a private entity they should be able to cater to a certain demographic. Perhaps they should be a little bit clearer that theirs is a conservative Christian oriented service...I didn't really know that myself until recently. I really think they rolled over way too fast. Litigation outcomes may be "uncertain", but they were apparently standing on pretty solid legal ground, you would think they would fight a little harder for principles they supposedly hold so dear.
That all being said, I disagree that this is about the gay community inventing new rights or tyranny of the minority. IMO this is mostly about the almighty dollar, probably some attorneys saw an opportunity to make some money. Many companies these days, even when they're on pretty solid legal ground, will settle a lawsuit just to avoid potential negative press or the chance of a sympathetic jury awarding ridiculous punitive damages. There are probably about a million gay people going "oh for chrissake" just like a lot of atheists did about the Michael Newdow thing.
Whether or not it was the intention of the plaintiff to invent a new legal right really doesn't matter at this point. The fact is, that was the effect. A new legal precedence has been set, it may not be firm but now there is a legal basis for a member of a minority (or even majority) community to sue a service such as on online dating service which caters to a specific demographic on the basis of discrimination.
I'd be interesting in getting some comments here from the gay community on this subject. I would certainly hope that no community at large, gay, straight, black, white, purple would see this type of law suite as being desirable. This puts all of our online communities at risk, it's bad for us all.
Also I feel the need to comment that I really do find it bewildering that our society has managed to reconcile the idea of protecting hate speech while at the same time disagreeing with it but for some reason we can't protect a businesses right to cater to a demographic. This is absolutely perplexing to me, it's not like eHarmony excluding gay people harmed anyone, or promoted the idea's of harming someone. All it did was give people who share conservative family values a venue to meet others who share their same values. From where I sit, whether you agree or disagree with the principals of the site, its hard to argue that it was run on a sound business model.
Carlo says "Whether or not it was the intention of the plaintiff to invent a new legal right really doesn't matter at this point. The fact is, that was the effect. A new legal precedence has been set, it may not be firm but now there is a legal basis for a member of a minority (or even majority) community to sue a service such as on online dating service which caters to a specific demographic on the basis of discrimination."
Actually there is no legal precedent formed by this case, because eHarmony settled, i.e. volunteered, caved in, whatever, as opposed to being ruled against (though I still think they would've ultimately won). The parties involved came to an agreement together rather than the court making a decision for them. Had the court ruled that eHarmony had to cater to gays, then yes, there would be a bad legal precedent, but that's not what happened. eHarmony deciding to settle the suit out of court doesn't really have any bearing on whether Jdate may be sued someday to accomodate Muslims or wealthysingles.com or whatever it is will be sued to accept welfare recipients, or plentyoffish.com will be sued to accept "undesireables", whatever they are. What eHarmony DID do by settling was potentially open up these other businesses as targets for similar ridiculous lawsuits on the hope that the companies will settle rather than defend their rights.
very interesting debate. and it's got me thinking back to my eharmony experience in more detail.
i didn't know it was christian based when i joined. i wouldn't have joined if i knew. no biggie, it was free...
i remember filling out the questionnaire, and getting the results. i got a few matches. so i started looking around the website, and that's when i noticed it was only "men seeking women" or "women seeking men".
that's when i dug around more and found, after much digging, that eharmony was christian and didn't include options for gay folks to participate. it pissed me off, and i was unhappy that i wasted a good hour of my time.
now that i've had all day to ponder this, i remember a few gays friends trying to join eharmony and not realizing there was no gay dating. they were pissed about the waste of time as well.
i am willing to bet the lawsuit was a little more complicated then the CNN story. if i had the feeling of wasting an hour of my time, and know gay folks who felt the same, maybe that's what got the lawsuit started.
maybe it came down to eharmony telling people upfront that they are christian and don't include gay dating? they might have opted to include gay dating options to avoid looking too conservative.
think about it. why were they not more upfront about being christian & conservative? because they would have lost customers if they advertised more blatantly as christian-based.
gosh, i just remember being so pissed when, after a good hour filling out the application, i found out it was so conservative!
but hey, interesting blog post and you've got me ranting & raving, which is more fun then worrying about the economy.
so good work!
:)
Well I certainly try my best to entertain, glad to hear it's working out!
Anyway what I'm seeing form here is a culture of entitlement. It really feels a lot like for some reason people feel like they're just owed well, the world. Why can't people just accept eharmony for what it is? I can understand you made that personal choice to ditch eharm give how you feel.
But here's the question, why sue? Why sue on a basis of discrimination? eHarmony doesn't owe it to us to conform to our own individual sense's of morality? We have the power to spend our money there or not, that's what it comes down too. So you spent an hour filling out their questioner, I understand that would frustrate particularly if you didn't get anything out of it. But still, eharmony is what it is, and there are competitors. Eventually you found one of them and found your soul mate which is great.
I'll be honest though, I'm equally angry with eharmony for not fighting this case. They should have, I think this is something worth fighting. They're christian conservative, your religious principals in my opinion should be worth fighting for, I certainly feel like mine are. I also feel like this is wroth fighting for in terms of our civil liberties. It should be our right to start a business, to create a product with the standards set by the creators and market it with out fear of lawsuit as long as that product isn't unsafe to the general public.
Yeah. I too tried eHarmony without realizing that it was a Christian conservative website (i'm neither). Honestly, I thought the quality of the matches it made were really no better or worse than match.com or americansingles.com, and I sort of resented spending loads of time on their questionnaire. But I don't think I'd sue over it. :-)
I still strongly believe this case says a lot more about the individuals who brought the suit than the gay community as a whole. You find extremists in every demographic: gays who sue to make a privately owned dating service cater to homosexuals, blacks who think they should have a free ride through life because their ancestors were slaves, Christians who want to impose Christian (and ONLY Christian) prayer in public schools and at the beginning of legislative sessions, and atheists who shit bricks if they sneeze and someone says "God bless you". My guess is that most of the gay community, upon discovering that eHarmony is not set up to cater to gays, grumbled a bit and then moved on to another website, and this frivolous lawsuit which eHarm unfortunately bent over on, is not reflective of the community as a whole.
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