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Loading ...eHarmony settles gay discrimination suit
11.19.2008 2:33pm EST
(Trenton, New Jersey) Online dating service eHarmony has agreed to stop discriminating against gays and lesbians. The company has long refused to provide services to gays.
In 2005 New Jersey resident Eric McKinley filed a formal complaint with the state Division on Civil Rights. For more than three years, eHarmony vigorously contested the allegations of the complaint.On July 23, 2007, however, the Director of the DCR issued a Finding of Probable Cause that eHarmony had violated New Jersey’s Law Against Discrimination.
The company then filed a Motion for Reconsideration of the finding.
Although the state has not issued a ruling on the motion, eHarmony said Tuesday it had reached a settlement with the Attorney General’s Office.
Under the settlement in which eHarmony admits no wrongdoing the company agrees to create a new service for same-sex matching by March 31, 2009.
The company said it would call the new service Compatible Partners.
It also agreed to pay the Division on Civil Rights $50,000 to cover administrative costs and to pay McKinley $5,000 plus give him a free one-year membership to its new service.
eHarmony uses a computerized matching algorithm to put people together. It claims that among its opposite-sex matchings more than 236 members are married each day in the US. It does not say how long those marriages last.
Under the settlement agreement, the company said it reserves the right to inform those using the new same-sex matching service that the Compatibility Matching System it developed is solely based on research involving married heterosexual couples.
“Even though we believed that the complaint resulted from an unfair characterization of our business, we ultimately decided it was best to settle this case with the Attorney General since litigation outcomes can be unpredictable,” said eHarmony, Inc. legal counsel Theodore B. Olson in a statement.
The company said that the two sites will maintain their own matching pools, registration information, and subscriptions. The separate matching pools are based on whether the user chooses to seek an opposite- or same-sex relationship. As a result, users of the Compatible Partners site and eHarmony.com cannot be matched with each other.
I don’t like this decision. Leave these people alone!
It’s about time someone files a law suit against eHarmony.
Why would we flock to a site that plain out said no to us. There are enough gay owned and operated sites we can use. NormalGay.com comes to mind.
No, what’s RIDICULOUS is suggesting GLBT inclusive anti-discrimination laws are just fine..as long as WE DON’T USE THEM.
Perhaps you should educate yourself as to the reason these laws were necessary in the first place!
IDIOT
This lawsuit was ridiculous. It’s this type of stuff that the straight community uses against the glbt community, saying if they give us an inch, we’ll start suing their organizations (businesses, churches, whatever) to force our community on them.
If a private company doesn’t want my business, I’m happy to take it elsewhere. What kind of service could we expect a straight matchmaker to provide? What level of expertise do they have?
Nice job, lawsuit guy. You won $5000, a year subscription to a crappy service, and provided a wealth of fodder to pissed off straight people, who will point to this and claim that the “gay agenda” to change gayify American society is real. Way to go.
I would never, ever use them.
A straight friend of mine found a
real [jerk] thru them. A real white
trash republican. I hope she dumps
him soon!
Is this supposed to save face? I wouldn’t ever trust that bigoted company
Not sure a lawsuit was the best idea. Do we really want to see homely straight fat chicks suing to get on adam4adam and manhunt? We have our exclusive matching, dating and hookup services based on our sexual orientation — let them have theirs.
I think this was an incredibly stupid lawsuit. The site’s founder has over 35 years of working with hetero couples and that’s what he based his questionaire on, and the algorithim is based on that. Next up some homos will be whinning when the new site doesn’t work for them (because he had to use his hetero data cause that’s all he knows).
Also, for the idiot who sued, is it ok with him if straight people start suing gay dating sites? I bet not. Frankie in the comments here has started a gay dating site (guys/girls?) and I wonder who he would feel if heteros came calling with a lawsuit. And should gay girls sue dating sites that are only for gay guys, and should gay guys sue dating sites only for gay girls?
This is REALLY stupid. The founder may or may not be unthrilled with gay people, but he has NO experience dealing with that sort of matching. His entire 35+ marriage counselling career was spent dealing with hetero couples, and soon enough the wannabe homo couples are going to be whining that the algorithims don’t work for them. By the way, does the stupid gay who sued this company believe that gay dating companies should provide services to heteros? I bet not. What a loser.
Hey! I’m plain and dumpy looking… especially for a gay man and I gots someone in my life.
That out of the way, why give our business to a company who was in no way interested in dealing with us before?
And I find it interesting that they decided to settle out of court rather than have their day.
Perhaps they, or their lawyers weren’t quite so sure about their lack of culpability as they would hope.
This is REALLY stupid. The founder may or may not be unthrilled with gay people, but he has NO experience dealing with that sort of matching. His entire 35+ marriage counselling career was spent dealing with hetero couples, and soon enough the wannabe homo couples are going to be whining that the algorithims don’t work for them. By the way, does the ass who sued this company believe that gay dating companies should provide services to heteros? I bet not. What a loser.
Hello Qweerty Community.
There already is a gay and lesbian eHarmony-like site called oneGoodLove.com. As Founder & President, I launched the website for this very reason in 2007.
I used to work at Match.com and they along with Chemistry.com do nothing but window-dress their websites for our Community. Nothing changes after the first few pages on the site. Now eHarmony will do the same exact thing…. “window dress”.
Check out the article on The Advocate at http://www.advocate.com/news_detail_ektid66529.asp where you can find out more information on the real story.
Good luck in your search for your OneGoodLove!
Hugs, Frankie
Ya, forget about e-harmony. Did you notice the so-called “real couples” featured in the advertising were invariably dumpy or plain looking? Apparently they did too, because they started hiring actors (or better looking actors, anyway) for their commercials.
Fuck EHarmony. I wouldnt give them my business since they have shown their true colors. There other services out there that welcome our gay community.
Screw EHarmony!