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Editor’s note: This article contains references to racial and ethnic slurs.
By David Tuller SAN FRANCISCO – Corey Baker, a gay man in Columbus, Ohio, has seen many dating app profiles that include phrases like “Blacks — don’t apply.” Sometimes when he declines invitations, he said, men lash out with insults like “you’re an ugly Black person anyway.” And some of his friends have been slammed with the N-word in similar situations.
Many of these events occurred “when I didn’t think I was attractive or deserving of love,” he said. And they took an emotional toll. “If you’re experiencing a wall of people saying they’re not attracted to you, I think that does impact your mental health,” said Baker, who is 35 and a school librarian.
The notion of kinder, gentler rejections on hookup sites might seem like an oxymoron. Yet experts in sexual health — as well as users of gay meeting apps, like Baker — say the harshness of much online behavior can exacerbate low self-esteem and feelings of depression or anxiety. That toxic combination can also lead to impulsive and potentially unsafe sexual choices.
In response, Building Healthy Online Communities, or BHOC, an organization in the San Francisco Bay Area focused on HIV and STD prevention, has launched an effort to boost niceness on apps designed for men who have sex with men. “People in the LGBTQ community face discrimination externally, but we also have to acknowledge that there is discrimination within the community,” said BHOC director Jen Hecht.
Through surveys and focus groups, BHOC asked more than 5,000 users of nine gay apps how the sites could support better online behavior related to race, appearance, HIV status, age, disability, gender identity and other factors. It also sought advice on technical improvements the apps could make, such as offering users greater flexibility in conducting searches for contacts.
“If I can filter out people who wrote ‘no fats, no fems, no black people,’ I don’t even have to deal with seeing it,” wrote one respondent quoted in BHOC’s report on the data gathered from app users. Representatives for some of the participating apps said they welcomed the collaboration. “We’ve had a non-bullying policy since day one,” said David Lesage, marketing and social media director for Adam4Adam.
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Mean online behavior is, of course, not limited to apps for men. When asked last month by email whether meeting sites that cater to the general population should also be trying to address the issue, Evan Bonnstetter, Tinder’s director of product policy, responded that the company was “unable to participate in this opportunity.” (Bonnstetter has since left Tinder.) Bumble, another site popular with heterosexuals, did not respond to a request for comment.
Gay and bisexual men, like other groups that face discrimination, have higher rates of depression, substance misuse and related mental health concerns. But John Pachankis, an associate professor at the Yale School of Public Health who studies gay men’s health, said his research has identified aggressiveness within the gay community as a major problem.
“I was initially quite surprised that gay men were consistently noting their treatment at the hands of other gay men as being a predominant stressor,” Pachankis said. Apps, he added, “are a site of a lot of potential rejection in a short amount of time in a way that is particularly anonymous and efficient and can be really detrimental.”
In one study, Pachankis and his colleagues simulated a gay app environment in which some research participants were exposed to dismissive comments and others to approving comments. (The comments were all computer-generated.)
In subsequent responses on questionnaires, the men exposed to the dismissive comments reported greater emotional distress and expressed more skepticism about the benefits of condoms. They were also more likely to choose riskier options in a card-playing game.
Given that the app environment is the source of stress, Pachankis said, it makes sense for BHOC and other public health organizations to try to influence it
Some respondents quoted in the BHOC report dismissed the initiative as silly or unwarranted. “If someone does not meet the preferences specified by the user for being ‘fat,’ ‘too old,’ or not the right ‘race,’ then too bad,” wrote one. “I find this overreach in striving to be PC as offensive and ridiculous.”
But most respondents recognized that apps could support better online behavior and reduce unnecessary pain, Hecht said.
“It’s a society-wide problem, and I do agree that gay men’s dating apps are not going to single-handedly address it, but that doesn’t mean they can’t play a role,” she said. “To the extent that the users get to control and customize, that will increase their positive experiences on the apps and decrease the likelihood that they’ll have these negative experiences.”
One popular recommendation from respondents was to allow all users, and not just paying customers, to block anyone they feel is being abusive. Another was to allow users to restrict who can see profile fields with potentially sensitive information, such as HIV status or gender identity. Respondents also believed apps could help diminish the pain of rejection by providing neutral, pre-written messages for users to send, such as “sorry, it’s not a match.”
Grindr, one of the participating apps, does not include standard rejection statements but is exploring this option to help users on both sides of what is inevitably a “high-intensity moment,” said Jack Harrison-Quintana, the company’s director of equality.
“It’s very easy to feel very rejected because you are getting rejected,” Harrison-Quintana said. “People experience a lot of hurt from things that are said to them online, and that is what we are trying to address.”
Jehangeer Ali Syed, an international development consultant in Washington, D.C., said he has been disturbed by being treated as an “exotic element” in online exchanges. Although he is not from the Middle East, some men “sexually objectify me as an ‘Arab stallion,’” said the 36-year-old Pakistani. “I have been called a ‘sand-[N-word],’” he added.
This sort of encounter, he said, “makes you doubt yourself, makes you feel insecure and makes you question if I’m doing anything wrong.”
BHOC noted in its report that many respondents were unaware of existing app features that could help them customize and control their experiences. The report called for apps to expand their educational efforts about these possibilities.
That suggestion resonated with Grindr’s Harrison-Quintana. Grindr already includes some of the options recommended in the report, he said, but it could do a better job of communicating with customers. “It’s not just about implementing features, it’s also about maybe letting users know those features are available to them,” he said.
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David Tuller is a senior fellow in public health and journalism at UC Berkeley’s Center for Global Public Health, which is part of the School of Public Health.
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This story was produced by KHN, which publishes California Healthline, an editorially independent service of the California Health Care Foundation, and is republished with permission.
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Online Culture
Blevins says he was blessed with affirming parents said the overwhelming response his TikTok received inspired him to start the group
LA Blade file photoEASTERN TENNESSEE – The Facebook group TikTok Stand In Families is helping LGBTQ+ people with unaccepting families by giving them love, comfort and family – even if it’s just for one day.
USA Today reports that the group, which has nearly 30,000 queer people and allies, started with a TikTok video that showed a stranger offering to stand with same-sex couples whose parents didn’t support them.
“There’s parents that want to be there for you on your big day, and we’ll be your biggest fans,” Daniel Blevins said in the video.
Blevins, the group’s co-founder who says he was blessed with affirming parents, told the newspaper that the overwhelming response his TikTok received inspired him to start the group with his friend Rae Otto.
“For me, it’s kind of a way of giving them what I had,” said Blevins, an Eastern Tennessee dad.
According to the newspaper, it fills a void for LGBTQ+ people with unaccepting families and “sends a message: You are enough, and you are not alone.”
The two choose to keep the group private, especially for those who are not out. According to USA Today, they also moderate posts to ensure that their group is a safe place.
Bec Mueffelmann – a Durham, North Carolina, resident who uses they/them pronouns – was scrolling through their “For You” page one day when they saw Blevins’ video.
“This group provides a point of connection online, if they just need somebody to listen like in a private message, but it also does a good job of connecting people physically,” Mueffelmann, 32, told the paper.
Mueffelmann is married and lives with members of their “chosen family,” but is no longer in contact with their biological family, according to the newspaper.
“My parents, particularly, were not making much of an effort with my pronouns,” they said. “So I got to a place of realizing I needed a break to evaluate and to tell them what was up and give myself some space to heal.”
Mueffelmann and their husband joined the Facebook group in October, a few weeks shy of their birthday, after connecting with another member, Sarah Beth Craven, who would later tell the group that this Thanksgiving would be her first without her family.
Otto, the group’s other founder, told the newspaper, “I’m not an emotional person, but for me, it’s been emotional.”
“I’ve even found family through the group myself,” she added. “I went out to Atlanta this year to go visit somebody who I consider my chosen mother and spent the week with her … and Dan, he’s my chosen brother. I consider him blood.”
Online Culture
The company explained that “certain kinds of videos can sometimes inadvertently reinforce a negative personal experience for some viewers
Graphic by Molly Butler for Media MattersCULVER CITY, Ca. – TikTok, the Chinese owned video-sharing app that allows users to create and share 15-second videos, on any topic, announced this week that the company was altering its ‘For You’ recommendation system (feed) algorithm.
TikTok with its 1 billion plus users is one of the biggest social media networks globally. The company explained that “certain kinds of videos can sometimes inadvertently reinforce a negative personal experience for some viewers, like if someone who’s recently ended a relationship comes across a breakup video.”
The goal according to a company spokesperson is to prevent harmful “content holes,” whereby the system may inadvertently be recommending only very limited types of content that, though not violative of TikTok’s policies, could have a negative effect if that’s the majority of what someone watches such as content about loneliness.
Dr. Eiji Aramaki, a professor at the Nara Institute of Science and Technology, (NAIST), located in Ikoma, Osaka Prefecture, Japan, whose background is working on information science, explained that content holes are created when in community-type content such as those created on a social media platform exploits the user’s unawareness of information.
Then as the user seeks more similar content, the feed algorithm manipulation creates a “content hole search.”
According to TikTok’s explanation of how its ‘For You’ feed works, recommendations are based on a number of factors, including things like:
User interactions such as the videos you like or share, accounts you follow, comments you post, and content you create.
Video information, which might include details like captions, sounds, and hashtags.
Device and account settings like your language preference, country setting, and device type. These factors are included to make sure the system is optimized for performance, but they receive lower weight in the recommendation system relative to other data points we measure since users don’t actively express these as preferences.
The company is insisting that its recommendation system is also designed with safety as a consideration, ensuring that; “In addition to removing content that violates our Community Guidelines, we try not to recommend certain categories of content that may not be appropriate for a general audience.”
Social media companies, especially those with a younger user base such as TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram are under increasing pressure to implement greater safeguards to stave off harmful content.
Last week, Instagram’s Head Adam Mosseri testifying before the Senate Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, was grilled by senators angered over public revelations of how the photo-sharing platform can harm some young users.
This past September in a report by The Wall Street Journal, based on internal research leaked by a whistleblower at Facebook, it was revealed that for some of the Instagram-devoted teens, the peer pressure generated by the visually focused app led to mental-health and body-image problems, and in some cases, eating disorders and suicidal thoughts.
It was Facebook’s own researchers who alerted the social network giant’s executives to Instagram’s destructive potential.
In July, Media Matters conducted independent research into TikTok’s “For You” page recommendation algorithm that circulated videos promoting hate and violence targeting the LGBTQ community during Pride Month, while the company celebrated the month with its #ForYourPride campaign.
The active spread of explicitly anti-LGBTQ videos isn’t a new problem for TikTok, but it appears that the platform has yet to stop it — even though the company claims to prohibit discriminatory and hateful content targeting sexual orientation and gender identity. TikTok also posted an update in early June celebrating Pride Month and promising to “foster a welcoming environment” and “remove hateful, anti-LGBTQ+ content or accounts that attempt to bully or harass people on our platform.” Given the content being circulated by the algorithm once a user begins interacting with anti-LGBTQ videos, it is clear that TikTok has yet to fulfill these promises.
This week’s announcement by TikTok is seen by some tech/online web industry observers as an effort by the company to change the system from within avoiding the public outcry and resulting reactions from lawmakers that could lead to more restrictive oversight and regulation.
Online Culture
Chris has a lot of love in his life and is happy where he is in life: having fun and taking his camera along with him for everyone to see
Photo courtesy of StanChrisNEW HAMPSHIRE – At first glance, YouTuber StanChris is no different than every other 21-year-old gay man. He loves watching anime, longboarding and longs for a boyfriend. The difference is Chris grabs a ring light and heads to his bedroom to tell his over 50,000 subscribers about his everyday life.
Chris’ content is all over the place. In one video, his religious mom reacts to an ad for Norway’s postal service Posten Norge that depicts a gay Santa. In another, he answers questions with his straight younger brother. He also doesn’t shy away from a musical parody – some sweet, others silly, but all very gay.
In a Zoom interview, he told the Los Angeles Blade that he didn’t always think that he would have the confidence to put himself out in the world as he does now. In fact, it wasn’t until the Vlogger graduated high school until he finally said, “Now, I don’t care anymore.”
For many young LGBTQ+ people, high school can be a unique sort of torture, especially for those who grow up in a small Northeastern town like the one where Chris grew up. “I hated high school after I came out,” he said, adding that so many people were “d**ks.”
But he always found an escape in YouTube videos. As he started to reckon with his sexuality, he began watching “every single” coming out video, where users turn on their camera, point it towards themselves and reveal the secret that has been weighing them down for so long – liberating not only for the creators but the viewers, as well.
He remembers one video, in particular, that made him realize he couldn’t hide any longer: YouTuber Joey Graceffa’s music video for “DON’T WAIT.” In the video, Graceffa – who is also known for an appearance on “The Amazing Race” and a New York Times best-selling memoir titled “In Real Life: My Journey to a Pixelated World” – dresses like a prince and kisses a male co-star. Days later, he would confirm on YouTube that he is gay. The video, released in May of 2015, has amassed over 42,000,000 views.
Chris would film his coming out video, in which he details being outed in high school. He explained that he came out slowly, gradually revealing his sexuality to more and more people, getting increasingly comfortable. But when another student overheard his conversation and began to spread what he had just heard around the school, what Chris feared the most came true.
But he doesn’t look back in anger. In fact, in a later video titled “Gay High School Experience,” he explained in the description that “there were some really bad experiences but some really heartwarming ones as well.”
Now, Chris is just trying to keep his growing list of subscribers happy with the content he is producing, always searching for the next new idea for a video. Of course, the videos are for him, but the YouTuber has big aspirations. For now, he wants to make it to that elusive 100,000 subscribers, but he said that one day he would love to be at 1,000,000.
In addition to YouTube, Chris is also on TikTok, with over 600,000 followers and 19 million likes. But, like many LBGTQ+ TikTokers, he has noticed homophobic undertones on the app.
“I haven’t liked TikTok because they always strike my videos and I always see a ton of other gay creators for minor safety, when it’s not,” he said. “They’re just being homophobic and stupid. So, I’m like, ‘OK, Can we move on from TikTok?’ But at the same time, it’s such a good platform to go viral on because it’s so easy. So, we all just keep using it.”
Media watchdog Media Matters for America has documented much of the homophobia and transphobia on the app. In July, the outlet reported that TikTok’s “For You” page algorithm promoted hateful anti-LGBTQ+ content, some violent, even as the app celebrated “#ForYourPride.”
“It is difficult to explain in words just how many videos targeting the LGBTQ community were — and continue to be — promoted by TikTok’s recommendation algorithm,” it read.
TikTok has defended itself, telling Business Insider, “We work to create a welcoming community environment by removing anti-LGBTQ+ videos and accounts that attempt to spread hateful ideas on our platform.”
Chris doesn’t consider himself an activist, but he did use his YouTube platform to voice his frustration to TikTok. In the video, he showed viewers TikTok’s of his that were removed for “minor safety,” “hate speech” or “sexual activity.” Though some of the videos include sexual innuendo, he compared his videos to one’s of straight creators – finding time and time again, his videos were removed, while its straight counterpart was not.
“Obviously, everyone already knew TikTok was slightly homophobic,” he said in the video. “But lately, it’s been getting out of hand.”
Still, Chris is mainly focused on creating content and growing his base of subscribers on YouTube. To some, that may sound selfish and vain, but that would erase the impact his videos have on those who watch them.
“I do like seeing the comments of how people are like, ‘Oh, I love this.’ ‘This helped me so much’ or like, ‘I needed this today,’” he said, adding that those comments make the experience “rewarding.”
Another unique aspect of Chris’ videos is the involvement of his family. From his mother to his younger brother, his family is often featured on his channel – exposing them not only his experiences as a gay man but also queer culture, in general.
“I thought it would be good because for anyone who doesn’t have an accepting family, or they’re scared to come out – they can see that maybe their family will be accepting,” he said.
In the aforementioned video of Chris’ mom reacting to the “gay Santa” ad, she takes it in stride with some of her trademark humor.
Recently, the Blade reported on the Posten Norge ad as some critics called the video “creepy,” accusing it of “sexualizing” Santa. Yet, others hailed the ad for its gay representation.
“OK I’m breaking my no Xmas before December rule to thank Posten Norge for this strong and moving message of inclusion celebrating 50 years since the decriminalization of homosexuality in Norway,” tweeted Canadian Member of Parliament Randall Garrison.
In another family video, he sits down with his younger brother and his friend to answer questions about their childhoods.
Chris has a lot of love in his life, but he still longs for a romantic connection in his life. “I want to finally have a boyfriend,” he said. “And if he was comfortable with it, we could be a YouTube couple.”
Until then, Chris is happy where he is in life: having fun and taking his camera along with him for everyone to see.