5 ms·

Half of all U.S. conservatives do not think homosexuality should be accepted by society [1], which presumably includes accepting homosexuality in dating apps.

Half of all U.S. conservatives do not think homosexuality should be accepted by society [1], which presumably includes accepting homosexuality in dating apps. That's a pretty big segment of your target market to alienate. [1] https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2017/10/05/5-homosexuality-gender-and-religion/ https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2017/10/05/5-homosexual...

inglor_cz 5y ago
What about the age structure? I would expect that anti-gay conservatives are, on average, older and less likely to even consider using a dating app.
zdragnar 5y ago
Even if I accepted your "statistic" (which I don't), this line of logic would assume that half of conservatives also reject every other dating app. It would also call into question whether that segment the market would ever use a dating app in the first place. Not to mention the discrimination lawsuits which would be immediately filed forcing them to add options for same sex couples, as happened with eHarmony...
- bduerst 5y ago
  Not quite. New brands that advertise X feature tend to attract audiences that identify with it, meaning any behavior counter to X feature would alienate them. It's one of the reasons why mainstream dating apps avoid doing such politicization. For a case example, look at Voat [1] which advertised being a free speech platform but alienated their target market when their lawyers made them censor harassing speech. [1] https://www.vice.com/en/article/gy4gzy/founder-of-voat-the-censorship-free-reddit-begs-users-to-stop-making-death-threats https://www.vice.com/en/article/gy4gzy/founder-of-voat-the-c...
xyzzy21 5y ago
You are presuming conservatives think like progressives - where ideology is paramount - it's NOT and they DON'T. Read Jonathan Haidt's book about this.
- bduerst 5y ago
  >You are presuming conservatives think like progressives - where ideology is paramount - it's NOT and they DON'T. One has only to look at recent events [1][2][3] to see that is not true at all. I think the main difference is that conservatives do not consider their opinions to be ideological, but fact, as is evident with Covid vaccination statistics. [1] https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/us-organizers-plan-convoys-support-canadian-truckers-2022-02-11/ https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/us-organizers-plan-co... [2] https://www.npr.org/2021/12/06/1057344561/anti-vaccine-activists-political-conference-trump-republicans https://www.npr.org/2021/12/06/1057344561/anti-vaccine-activ... [3] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-sports/trump-urges-nfl-to-ban-players-kneeling-during-anthem-idUSKCN1C11LT https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-sports/trump-ur...
  - true_religion 5y ago
    I don’t think progressives consider themselves to be ideological either. On all the topics where progressive values have won out (abortion, trans and gay rights) progressives view themselves as being unbiased and damn near apathetic (e.g. the messaging of it doesn’t affect us, thus we don’t care to make laws against it).
seanmcdirmid 5y ago
That is probably just more related to conservatives being older on average than liberals. If you compared same aged conservatives to same aged liberals, acceptance, I bet the numbers would look more similar (the article does ideology and age, but not ideology and age together).
- bduerst 5y ago
  Sure, but GP's point was that conservatives are accepting of homosexuality, despite the stats otherwise. If you're going to say that older people tend to be conservative and tend to not to use dating apps, then that forces the question: Why even make this at all?
  - seanmcdirmid 5y ago
    They are making the app for young conservatives, who are more likely to have non-straight preferences. So while perhaps there are fewer young conservatives than young liberals, they still make up a market that can be served. I’m sure Thiel and company are smart enough to do appropriate demographic research, even if there are only half as many of them, they still make up a large enough market.

inglor_cz 5y ago

What about the age structure? I would expect that anti-gay conservatives are, on average, older and less likely to even consider using a dating app.

zdragnar 5y ago

Even if I accepted your "statistic" (which I don't), this line of logic would assume that half of conservatives also reject every other dating app. It would also call into question whether that segment the market would ever use a dating app in the first place. Not to mention the discrimination lawsuits which would be immediately filed forcing them to add options for same sex couples, as happened with eHarmony...

bduerst 5y ago
Not quite. New brands that advertise X feature tend to attract audiences that identify with it, meaning any behavior counter to X feature would alienate them. It's one of the reasons why mainstream dating apps avoid doing such politicization. For a case example, look at Voat [1] which advertised being a free speech platform but alienated their target market when their lawyers made them censor harassing speech. [1] https://www.vice.com/en/article/gy4gzy/founder-of-voat-the-censorship-free-reddit-begs-users-to-stop-making-death-threats https://www.vice.com/en/article/gy4gzy/founder-of-voat-the-c...

xyzzy21 5y ago

You are presuming conservatives think like progressives - where ideology is paramount - it's NOT and they DON'T. Read Jonathan Haidt's book about this.

bduerst 5y ago
>You are presuming conservatives think like progressives - where ideology is paramount - it's NOT and they DON'T. One has only to look at recent events [1][2][3] to see that is not true at all. I think the main difference is that conservatives do not consider their opinions to be ideological, but fact, as is evident with Covid vaccination statistics. [1] https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/us-organizers-plan-convoys-support-canadian-truckers-2022-02-11/ https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/us-organizers-plan-co... [2] https://www.npr.org/2021/12/06/1057344561/anti-vaccine-activists-political-conference-trump-republicans https://www.npr.org/2021/12/06/1057344561/anti-vaccine-activ... [3] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-sports/trump-urges-nfl-to-ban-players-kneeling-during-anthem-idUSKCN1C11LT https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-sports/trump-ur...
- true_religion 5y ago
  I don’t think progressives consider themselves to be ideological either. On all the topics where progressive values have won out (abortion, trans and gay rights) progressives view themselves as being unbiased and damn near apathetic (e.g. the messaging of it doesn’t affect us, thus we don’t care to make laws against it).

seanmcdirmid 5y ago

That is probably just more related to conservatives being older on average than liberals. If you compared same aged conservatives to same aged liberals, acceptance, I bet the numbers would look more similar (the article does ideology and age, but not ideology and age together).

bduerst 5y ago
Sure, but GP's point was that conservatives are accepting of homosexuality, despite the stats otherwise. If you're going to say that older people tend to be conservative and tend to not to use dating apps, then that forces the question: Why even make this at all?
- seanmcdirmid 5y ago
  They are making the app for young conservatives, who are more likely to have non-straight preferences. So while perhaps there are fewer young conservatives than young liberals, they still make up a market that can be served. I’m sure Thiel and company are smart enough to do appropriate demographic research, even if there are only half as many of them, they still make up a large enough market.