Tinder Class Action Lawsuit Alleges Transgender Discrimination

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A trans woman is suing Tinder for allegedly discriminating against her and banning her account based on her gender identity.

Tinder is an online dating app touted as the “world’s hottest app.” On the Tinder app, the user can swipe either right to “like” someone or left to “pass.” If two individuals swipe right on each other, Tinder establishes a “match” and the two people can start chatting.

Lead plaintiff Ariel Hawkins is a trans woman who has previously used the Tinder app and dating service. In early March 2018, Hawkins edited her account to include that she was a preop trans woman. Shortly after, Tinder allegedly deleted her account.

Hawkins argues that her account was deleted because she disclosed the fact that she was a trans woman. Tinder allegedly sent Hawkins an email which stated that her account was deleted for violating its terms of service but refused to explain which terms of service she violated.

The plaintiff claims that she did not violate any of Tinder’s terms of service. She did not post any links or content that was hate speech, threatening, sexually explicit, or pornographic. She also says she didn’t post any content that incited violence, contained nudity, or solicited money from users.

Hawkins believes that, despite their public attempts to welcome transgender and gender non-conforming individuals, Tinder still systematically bans users whose accounts are reported by intolerant individuals for being non-cisgender.

Many other trans individuals are allegedly experiencing the same issue. The Tinder class action points to one twitter user who tweeted “Still waiting on @Tinder to unban me since I got banned after being reported for being trans. So much for ‘trans friendly.’ Yalls 30 gender options don’t mean [censored] when trans people still get banned automatically because of how often cis straight men report us.” Hawkins argues that Tinder systematically and intentionally discriminates against transgender individuals.

After being previously accused of being transphobic, the app rolled out 37 gender-identity options including transgender, agender, gender fluid, gender non-conforming, nonbinary, two-spirit, and more. In a blog post by Tinder in 2016, they stated the following: “No one will ever be banned from Tinder because of their gender. […] We are learning to be a better ally to transgender and gender non-conforming communities by allocating additional resources to our support team, which includes educating our staff about the challenges facing these communities.”

The Tinder class action lawsuit accuses the dating app of discrimination under Oregon statute 659A.403 which prohibits discrimination in a place of public accommodation.

Hawkins seeks to represent a Class of Oregon non-cisgender Tinder users who suffered discrimination by having their Tinder profiles deleted within the past year. The Tinder class action lawsuit seeks an injunction prohibiting further discrimination, as well as reimbursement for court costs, and attorneys’ fees.

The plaintiff is represented by Michael Fuller of OlsenDaines; Kelly Jones of The Law Office of Kelly Jones; Mark Geragos, Ben Meiselas, and Lori Feldman of Geragos & Geragos.

The Tinder Trans Discrimination Class Action Lawsuit is Hawkins v. IAC/InteractiveCorp d/b/a Tinder, Case No. 18-cv-09778, in the Circuit Court for the State of Oregon, for Multnomah County.