The 14 Bt Gay Datg S: LGBTQ+ Datg Apps to Fd Love | Observer

Contents:

• GAY DATG APP THRIV CHA, WHERE LGBT RIGHTS ARE LAGGG
• TO SURVIVE, CHA’S BIGGT GAY DATG APP BEME A PHARMACY
• NEW GAY DATG APP CHA IS GETTG ALL KDS OF ACTN
• CHA’S PREMIER GAY DATG APP IS N BY AN EX-P
• GAY DATG APPS CHA: DO THEY ALLEVIATE OR EXACERBATE LONELS? THE SERIAL MEDIATN EFFECT OF PERCEIVED AND INTERNALIZED SEXUALY STIGMA
• BUILDG A COMMUNY, AND AN EMPIRE, WH A GAY DATG APP CHA
• CHE GAY DATG APP BLUECY FOCED ON ASIA AFTER IPO
• GRDR’S CHA OWNER SELLS GAY APP FOR $600 MILLN
• THE TOP LGBTQ+ DATG S AND APPS: 14 BT GAY DATG S

GAY DATG APP THRIV CHA, WHERE LGBT RIGHTS ARE LAGGG

Cha — brgg together a mory muny whout by Timo LenzenPublished March 5, 2020Updated March 12, 2020Like many gay Che growg up at the turn of the lennium, Duan Shuai began his long, liberate procs of g out onle. To faiarize himself wh Cha’s burgeong gay culture, he listened to the talks by the genr-studi scholar Li Yhe on the popular televisn channel Hunan TV; read “Crystal Boys, ” a novel about gay youth Taipei by the Taiwane wrer Bai Xianyong; and equented onle chat rooms for gay men like Boy Air, BF99, Don’t Cry My Friends and the lol Tianj Cool, where he met his first boyiend, a graduate stunt five years his Duan me of age, so did the Che ter.

TO SURVIVE, CHA’S BIGGT GAY DATG APP BEME A PHARMACY

Whereas Duan once sought out gay muni small groups and quiet bars, today, as a 33-year-old workg publishg Beijg, he n jo gay meet-ups on WeChat; follow blogs and g-out stori on Weibo, a Twter-like platform; and, perhaps most ccial, he n nnect and fd partners on Blued, a gay social workg app. It is a tech pany a society that has been transformed by ee-market reforms, but also a gay tech pany operatg unr a one-party ernment wh an ambiguo stance toward L. Internatnally, Cha has publicly volized s support for gay rights at the Uned Natns, statg that oppos all forms of “discrimatn, vlence and tolerance based on sexual orientatn.

” But domtilly, gay marriage and adoptn by same-sex upl are not allowed, and there are no known openly gay public figur the ernment or explic forms of legal protectn agast L. In Beijg, the popular gay club Dtatn hosts regular drag performanc while the movie theater down the street screens the Freddie Mercury bpic, “Bohemian Rhapsody, ” wh s gay ntent cut out.

” Gay muni mt navigate the same nfg terra that all civil-society groups Cha do, learng to read the unpredictable and shiftg tis of relaxatn and ntrol, a cyclil procs that scholars of Che polics ll fang/shou (“openg up and tighteng”) one hand, the rise of the Che ter, facilated by the last three s of market reforms, has allowed for unprecented nnectn and visibily for gay muni Cha. Followg one of the bans, Blued scbbed homosexualy-related words like “gay” and “tongzhi” om s Che webse, changg the official pany scriptn to “The World’s Leadg Intert-Based Social & Health Edutn Network.

NEW GAY DATG APP CHA IS GETTG ALL KDS OF ACTN

By stayg wh the mercial and public-health sectors and amg the fight for gay regnn terms of bs, the pany, unr the learship of s founr and chief executive, Geng Le, has cultivated a mory muny ee of polil activism. His rise om closeted p to out tech mogul has been wily documented the media: He grew up the early ’90s, when homosexualy was still prosecuted as “hooliganism, ” punishable by tentn or even time at a labor mp.

In 2000, unr the psdonym Geng Le and wh the help of a dg book he bought lled “The Oriental Kg of Web-Makg, ” he created a webse for gay men to nnect, exchange personal stori and share rmatn on everythg om safe sex to gay lerature, namg Danlan: “light blue, ” after the lor of the water off the Qhuangdao ast. Che relig tradns like Buddhism and Confucianism do not overtly nmn homosexualy, which means that cultural attus are more malleable there than other Asian untri like Indonia or the Philipp.

A term still ed today to refer to gay relatnships — duan xiu, or “cut sleeve” — om a story “The Book of Han, ” an official history of the Han dynasty that was pleted the send century, which the emperor wak om a nap to fd his male lover still asleep on his robe, and tenrly cuts off his sleeve to avoid wakg Cha began to turn toward the Wt the late 19th century, also absorbed a pathologizg view of homosexualy as an illns — an attu that would not soften aga until a century later, wh the troductn of Deng Xiaopg’s open-door policy the late ’70s, which opened up markets and enuraged the liberalizatn of Che society. The paradox are clearly visible the figure of J Xg, the natnally beloved talk-show host sometim lled Cha’s Oprah: She is a transgenr woman, and the reluctant face of trans Cha, but she also often po nservative genr norms, like the importance of a woman’s domtic role childbearg and good ’s one-child policy further creased prsure on some gay Che to stay the closet and enter heterosexual relatnships, bee parents pned all their hop on one child to provi geic, legally regnized grandchildren to ntue the fay le. This emphasis on upholdg tradnal fay and maral stutns has driven many Che to participate xghun — “operative marriag, ” often between a gay man and a lbian, to keep up the appearance of heterosexual life.

CHA’S PREMIER GAY DATG APP IS N BY AN EX-P

Eventually, he expand to Beijg, keepg up this double life — shuttlg between rol as straight Qhuangdao p, happily married and rpected by his lleagu, and gay Beijg entreprenr — until 2012.

GAY DATG APPS CHA: DO THEY ALLEVIATE OR EXACERBATE LONELS? THE SERIAL MEDIATN EFFECT OF PERCEIVED AND INTERNALIZED SEXUALY STIGMA

Provg gay Cha’s worth the marketplace first, the argument go, will shift public perceptn and pave the way for greater acceptance and eedoms. ”Last May, the btlg center of Beijg, Duan was standg by the keg statn, wearg a rabow-prted T-shirt, at the “Gaymazg Race, ” a party -hosted by the Beijg L. When Weibo ers filled the se wh the prott hashtag #IAmGayNotAPervert 2018, promptg the pany to reverse an earlier policy to “clean up” gay ntent, the ernment kept quiet.

In May, when Taiwan legalized gay marriage, my social newsfeeds l up wh celebratory rabows, cludg a post om the state-owned People’s Daily. ” After all, Cha’s gay populatn cuts across all sectors of society — om Shanxi to Shanghai, om the polil margs to wh the party December, rponse to a groundswell of suggtns for the updated draft of Cha’s civil , Cha’s Legislature publicly acknowledged that when the ernment soliced public opns last fall, received a wave of requts for the legalizatn of same-sex marriage.

Ined, the staff here shows far more gay pri than most Che 's bee they work for Blued, a gay datg app that's quickly bee the most popular the world. It boasts 40 ln registered ers while based a untry where most LGBT men and women still feel locked the closet — where homosexualy, while no longer illegal, is still officially labelled "abnormal. Pri means different thgs to different peopleIt helps that the CEO of Blued has bee somethg of an in the nascent Che gay movement, fightg his way om a youth spent sperately lookg for love onle small-town ter fés.

BUILDG A COMMUNY, AND AN EMPIRE, WH A GAY DATG APP CHA

"I want to be able to stand up and tell people that there is a guy named Geng Le Cha, who is gay, livg a very happy life, who even has his own adopted baby, " said Ma, referrg to the psdonym he has ed sce his days wrg an unrground blog about gay life the small astal cy of Qghuangdao.

Publicly, he wore a p's uniform and enforced laws that clud a ban on homosexualy (which was outlawed Cha until 1997), and was married to a woman. Privately, Ma ran a webse popular wh Cha's stigmatized gay muny, timated to be 70 ln photo of Ma and his boyiend was taken the 1990s, when he fell love while trag at a police amy.

CHE GAY DATG APP BLUECY FOCED ON ASIA AFTER IPO

It's also movg beyond datg to offer adoptn servic to gay upl and ee HIV ttg clics the scen, Ma his profile and polil nnectns to lobby officials to improve LGBT rights and protectns. Alberta judge dismiss bid to place gay-straight alliance law on holdBill to expunge gay-sex crimal rerds tak effect Canada today"We are tryg to ph forward the LGBT movement and change thgs for the better, " said Ma. Organizers said the ernment limed the event to 200 'dark si of society'In 2016, Beijg banned pictns of gay people on TV and the ter a sweepg crackdown on "vulgar, immoral and unhealthy ntent.

(K Chng/Associated Prs)A popular Che drama lled "Addicted" was immediately taken off ter streamg servic bee followed two gay men through their April, when Che microbloggg se Sa Weibo cid to impose s own, apparently unofficial ban on gay ntent — erasg more than 50, 000 posts one day — Beijg seemed to mirror the disapproval of ter ers.

GRDR’S CHA OWNER SELLS GAY APP FOR $600 MILLN

"In light of that and the onle #IAmGay mpaign nmng the pany's censorship, Weibo apologized and whdrew s, LGBT activists say nservative social attus Cha are jt as big a problem as ernment rtrictns.

" She said all of this was accentuated the s of Cha's One Child policy, which put great social expectatns on and physil vlence by parents agast gay children is not unmon, wh some parents mtg their offsprg to psychiatric hospals or forcg them to unrgo nversn therapy, which is wily ernment don't release official statistics on any of this, but LBGT groups say fay and social disapproval — pecially outsi large ci — means only about five per cent of gay Che have been ready to e out publicly.

"In other words, " Ma said, "whenever the ernment is ready to change s approach to gay rights, the whole Che society will have to be ready to embrace that.

THE TOP LGBTQ+ DATG S AND APPS: 14 BT GAY DATG S

The founr of the app, Mǎ Bǎolì 马保力, a gay man himself, prevly worked as a policeman when he first started the gay social workg webse (淡蓝网 dàn lán wǎng, a name lerally meang “light blue”) 2000, which later beme the foundatn for Blued. “Most of the profil I saw on Fda looked young, well-ted, who love postg photos and selfi of travels and workout, ” Tāo 涛, a 31-year-old gay man who recently immigrated to Canada, told The Cha Project. The Protol article also lks LESDO’s termatn to the challeng faced by lbian datg apps Cha, where queer women — pared to gay men — are ls terted fdg hookups on sex-oriented apps and more terted seekg mted relatnships and nnectns, a need that n be fulfilled outsi lbian-only platforms, such as LGBTQ groups on social media se Douban.

John Wei, a media studi scholar the Universy of Otago New Zealand, remarked his book Queer Che Cultur and Mobili that Feizan tend to create an onle gay muny based on mon “terts” rather than erotic ntent that was rampant on other gay s the same perd. ZANK also produced gay mi-seri: the most popular was a s lled A Gut Hoe Praise (一屋赞客 yīwūzànkè), which tells the story of a group of gay people livg the same apartment.

Its ma app is Blued, a lotn-based datg and livtreamg service for gay and bisexual men, wh over 60 ln registered ers worldwi, bypassg Grdr last year India, Vietnam, the Philipp, South Korea, and Cha. After gog public on the NASDAQ exchange 2020, BlueCy expand by acquirg Ldo, one of the largt lbian datg apps Cha, and Fka, a social work for younger gay and bisexual men. “Blued, even today, n still n a bs Cha bee maly posns self as a health promotn platform, rather than a gay platform, ” said Lik Sam Chan, a munitns profsor at The Che Universy of Hong Kong and the thor of The Polics of Datg Apps: Genr, Sexualy, and Emergent Publics Urban Cha.

BlueCy’s Che-language webse rarely mentns terms like “gay” or “LGBTQI, ” stead g d language like “diversy” and “muny” to gture toward s margalized er base. While Cha has exprsed support for gay rights at the Uned Natns, don’t regnize same-sex marriag and regularly censors media featurg queer people. “There are still some anxieti, but I thk this software provis a channel for people to relax and stay nnected to the LGBTQ muny, ” said one Che gay rights activist who asked to rema anonymo to protect their safety.