In a bid to be more inclusive and gender sensitive, popular dating app Tinder recently introduced 23 options under the gender category in India. In a blog post published on Monday, Tinder said, “everyone is welcome on Tinder” and announced the introduction of gender identities other than man and woman on its platform.
“Inclusion and acceptance drive this expansion, and we want Tinder to reflect the world that surrounds us every day,” Tinder said, in a section “More choices. More voices.” It emphasized that no one would be banned from the platform on the basis of their gender, and added that with the new feature, Tinder is learning to be a better ally to transgender and gender non-conforming communities. It also said that additional resources would be allocated to their support team and would include initiatives like educating their staff about hardships faced by these communities.
Tinder has previously rolled out similar features for countries like Australia, the UK, the US and France among other countries.
The company made the feature for India by collaborating with the Humsafar Trust, a NGO working towards issues of the LGBTQ community for over two decades, as well as other transgender and gender non-conforming users and consultants, and inclusion advocate Parmesh Shahani.
Tinder also said that if someone had been removed in the past due to their gender, they were now re-invited to the platform. “We know that we haven’t been perfect in the past. If you believe you were ever wrongfully removed from Tinder because another user reported you unfairly due to your gender, we want to invite you back to our platform,” it said.
Incidentally, Tinder’s move comes shortly after Supreme Court’s landmark verdict which read down section 377 that criminalised homosexuality and was frequently used to intimidate, criminalise and harass the LGBTQI+ community.