Earlier this month, we reluctantly told you about DaddyBear, a wildly unappetizing dating app that aims to connect “wealthy gay daddies” with so-called “healthy gay bears.”
Touting itself the “No.1 gay sugar-daddy dating app,” Daddybear was designed specifically with “older” gentlemen in mind — older than who, they don’t say.
Related: New dating app aims to connect ‘wealthy gay daddies’ with ‘healthy gay bears’
A tentative, vaguely nauseous glimpse at the About page says that daddies are “rich men who have more money and social wealth than you do.” Rude.
How about we take this to the next level?
Our newsletter is like a refreshing cocktail (or mocktail) of LGBTQ+ entertainment and pop culture, served up with a side of eye-candy.
And that’s where things go from inadvisable to wholly inhumane. The site claims “most mature gay daddies grew up under the macro environment of AIDS epidemic and scare, so they know how to protect themselves and you, and enjoy safe sex with you.”
Shortly after the article was published, a spokesperson for Daddybear wrote into Queerty‘s comments section to effectively double-down on the above claim, writing:
With the fact that most gay men care more about health than sex when seeking gay relationship, we create this gay dating app to meet their needs. If you are worried about meeting gay men who are living with HIV, then you can feel relieved with our App because we are trying our best to make sure that all users you meet will be healthy and without HIV, starting from adding a feature to allow users to verify their health condition.
As Unicorn Booty points out, Daddybear’s CEO has made his stance abundantly clear in an interview with INTO‘s Mathew Rodriquez:
No one would like to date people living with HIV unless he is living with it. Most gay sugar daddies are not living with HIV, so they don’t want to bring home any unwanted souvenirs. However, we support that gay men living with HIV have the right to date with other gays with HIV. But many rich and successful gay sugar daddies do not want to date with gay men living with HIV, which is the reason why we launched this app to meet their needs.
People are leaving reviews for the app to make their serophobic attitudes widely known, rightly calling the app “gross and cruel.”
Paco
Is Daddybear’s CEO going to require mandatory lab verified hiv tests for all of its users? Hope someone tries to sue them for leading them to believe that all the users are negative after they end up getting hiv from an untested hiv+ person with a viral load in the millions. Or was such a bareback slut that their testing schedule wasn’t often enough to keep up with their multiple exposures and transmissions to others.
Paco
Most of the positive reviews for the app are written by people with female names. Guessing they are fake reviews.
PinkoOfTheGange
one can always tell the hired bots.
jsmu
Vomitous, isn’t it, Paco? and yes, I’m sure the fake females are trollbots…..
DaddyBearApp
We decided to apologize for the idea we brought up in last month which is that our gay dating app DaddyBear is only for healthy and HIV negative gay men. We realized it was a wrong decision because lots of editors criticized our foolish attempt on some big gay news sites and many people wrote us to point out our mistake. In order to make it more sincere, we have published an official statement to explain why we would do that and apologize for our mistake. For more details, please check: http://www.prweb.com/releases/prweb14717196.htm
Jaxton
I would not want to date anybody with an STD. I am perfectly entitled to do tbis.
It’s not prejudice to decline a micro-organism carrier. It makes perfect srnse to me.
Jaxton
Keep your STD’s to yourself. I won’t date anyone with an STD. It’s my right.
Paco
I can’t imagine anyone dating you, Brian.
PinkoOfTheGange
It is your right true…just as it is ours to mock you as (most likely) a small minded little man of questionable character with a little ding-a-ling.
mhoffman953
@PinkOfTheGange
So you’re literally mocking someone who doesn’t want to have sex with someone who has a sexually transmitted disease…
Stache
This is Brian were talking about after all. Jaxton that is. The well known Queerty troll. Everyone knows he’s full of shit and should be mocked.
zoomlens
Your right not to date anyone with an STD, or anyone who doesn’t meet what ever other criteria you impose on romantic conquests, is not the issue here. The legal question is whether an online service can discriminate based on disability. Whether a website or mobile app is a place of public accommodation covered by the ADA is an unsettled question with lower courts having decided both ways. I think the public policy arguments weigh in favor of coverage and thus prohibiting websites from barring HIV+ users.
surreal33
Mr Jaxton I agree and you are right. Unfortunately, there is a scary number of gay men who are desperately trying to advance the narrative that there are no rules or precautions just sex.
jsmu
Brian, honey, it’s the right of all civilized humans to shun you. Sad little troll.
mhoffman953
@zoomlens
You’re actually suggesting that lower courts get involved in a dating website?
What about dating websites that are exclusively for black people? Should the court get involved there because it triggers you?
ftldaddybear
This is such a rude and tasteless ad, I can’t believe a gay man is talking about positive men in this fashion. Shame on you for your cruelty and I pray that you get all the success that you deserve…. None!
Jaxton
It’s not cruel to deny sexual consent to somebody with an STD. Not cruel at all.
It is cruel to deny friendship on that basis but not sexual consent. Consent is a privilege.
PinkoOfTheGange
@Jax,
dude that was a big jump for such a little man
PinkoOfTheGange
I am most likely within their target demo but it is up to me how to deal with serostatus not theirs, and I didn’t get here by trusting some idiot projecting their issues on me.
All this does is encourage lying and a false sense of security the app can’t guarantee.
n1spirit
Precisely.
(And as for Jaxton, well, he’s clearly just a little man of no substance who will grow old alone.)
JaredMacBride
Not really sure what would be wrong with asking guys to disclose their status and let the users judge what they want to do with the information.
BTW – what is a “healthy gay bar”?
Stache
Yeah, no problem but labeling them as sick and saying we will make sure to discriminate them out for you is a big problem.
jsmu
And you probably can’t figure out what’s wrong with national IDs, people being stopped and asked for their ‘papers,’ and registries of all Jews and queers, can you? MORON!
BriBri
The guy in the photo here is in his 30’s! Hardly a daddy. Daddybear types are usually over the hill and overweight.
Darrellx
Daddies self-identify. ‘Nuff said.
stevetalbert
Im confused by their ads as to whether those guys are the daddys or the guys looking for them. I guess im not their target market. Who would trust an app for their health???
Paco
“Who would trust an app for their health???”
——
People who are desperate for a false sense of security during unprotected sexual encounters.
SFHandyman
The guy in the ad is named “Daivd”
He is “22/12 miles” away.
He is “5′ 55”. That is 9 feet 7 inches.
His job is “Occupation”
Yeah, let’s all trust this app developer to screen all their users.
Heywood Jablowme
But he’s “Beauty Verified”!
dustychiffon
Checked this App out, and it was a total sketchy bore. I wouldn’t be surprised if this was some sick way of collecting gay men’s info disguised as an “app”
jkb
I am shocked that there are still gay men who think that every partner they’ll meet will either be honest about or aware of their status. You’d be better to play safe than risk your health by trusting a potential liar or unaware trick
Jaxton
If you have an STD, I’m not going to have sex with you. It’s my right to refuse.
Heywood Jablowme
But what if some guy tells you (honestly) that he hasn’t tested positive recently… but in reality he’s poz, untreated and very highly infectious???
Or what if some guy LIES to you, Brian? BWA-HA-HA.
surreal33
The hypocrisy of gay men is most amusing. It is perfectly okay to state I prefer in shape, twinks only but it is cruel to refuse to date a man who HIV positive? The sentiment has the distinct aroma of BULLSHIT!!! All sex sites should have MANDATORY proof of STD status!!! In addition, all sites should have a warning (much like cigarettes) of dangers of STDs, as well as the fact that there no way to confirm anything listed in a profile is truthful. Also, users should be bombarded with ads for condoms and home HIV tests. If HIV is “manageable”, “no big deal” why do men go to such extremes to keep their HIV status a secret? If a potential sex partner or relationship seeker cannot accept your HIV status
isn’t it better to know this up front?
Stache
What kind of drugs you doing Surreal? I don’t recall anyone pointing a gun at your head making you date anyone. No we don’t make it mandatory for anyone to have to submit hiv status in this country. That’s discrimination. Something you were just screaming your head off on another post about racial discrimination. I guess as long as you to pick and choose the discrimination you’re ok with it. Hypocrite and giant douchebag to boot.
Heywood Jablowme
You say, “All sex sites should have MANDATORY proof of STD status!!!” but in the very next sentence you say, “all sites should have a warning [of] the fact that there no way to confirm anything listed in a profile is truthful.” Uhhhh – see any contradiction there?
surreal33
Mr Stache I will give you discrimination argument if people were required to walk around in public releasing their HIV status that would be problematic. I am specifically referring to the internet and men
trolling for sexual partners. Please explain how when a man is online seeking sexual and/or relationship partners it is discriminatory to avoid HIV and other STDs? To be clear please explain how it is discriminatory to take every precaution to maintain health and well being? Also, you indicated “I don’t recall anyone pointing a gun at your head making you date anyone” yet your narrative of “discrimination” suggests I should utilize the honor system regarding HIV? Therefore, I would not be discriminating, however, isn’t that the same thing as “pointing a gun at my head” by being willfully ignorant regarding a life threatening disease? Finally reading between the lines usually people who protest as much yourself have something to hide? I wonder…
jsmu
surreal33 The hypocrisy of PUTAtrolls is most amusing. Their every post has the distinct stench of MANDRILL SHIT. that would be YOU, trollikins.
ChrisK
surreal33. Darling you’re already “woefully ignorant”.
Prax07
I wish more dating apps would weed out those with hiv and other diseases. I wouldn’t want to date someone with a disease, so an app doing this makes perfect sense.
Mkiel
& as an Hiv+ guy I would Not want to spend 5 mins in yr odious company.
Brian
So, you’d rather put your health in the hands of an app instead of making the appropriate inquiries yourself? And doesn’t an app allowing people to disclose their poz status make it easier for you to weed them out?
courthousedoc
Haven’t people learned that sero-sorting is one of the worst prevention ideas out there? Haven’t they heard of TasP and PrEP? This is all about shaming and stigma. It is vile and disgusting and ignorant.
Darrellx
Right on! Thank you!
genericbrand
Clearly not a US company, either, as eery single communication in the article from DaddyBear is in somewhat broken English. While reprehensible to me (personally, I’m happily living in a sero-discordent relationship), maybe the developer/CEO are bringing some other cultural misunderstanding into it?
Heywood Jablowme
Yes – they are a Chinese company.
alanballs
If you don’t like the APP, don’t use it. Fortunately, I’m in a long-term, loving, monogamous relationship, which perfectly fulfills my desires. Not everyone desires the same things; that’s why our world is diverse; like a buffet. Take and savor what you like, ignore what you don’t like.
anderson69
it sounds to me like the creators of this app are pretty ignorant about HIV I have been living with HIV for 15 years now and am in a committed relationship for over 25 years so I wouldn’t be using it anyway but I feel for them to discriminate against HIV + people is disgusting! do they not know how far treatments have come?!?!?! I was diagnosed in the early 2000’s and have been undetectable since! and especially with PrEP out there now I mean why not let them ask the question people can answer it and put in some kind of disclaimer stating “user claims this is his status however we cannot verify this.” But don’t just discriminate against them!
JamJewel
Am I the only one who finds the whole concept ludicrous? After all, the sugerdaddy age group is the one most likely, or just as likely, to be HIV+. So, what are they doing to prevent an HIV+ sugerdaddy from looking for a boyfriend on the site?
Luna1979
The idea of sleeping with an old man because he has money is worse than the HIV ban (to me)!
Okay… the whole entire thing is reprehensible and condescending. I can’t find its good side.
o.codone
oh JFC, this is exactly why I’m a drug addict and get bottomed when I want bc all you fa*gs do is deconstruct minutiae, and that just ruins the mood. stfu.