A recent episode of MTV’s Decoded did an admirable job breaking down how sexual “preferences” based on race are, well, racist.
But the problems men of color face on dating apps go so far beyond “not into _____.”
Rapper Le1f has put one particularly repulsive Grindr user on blast after an unprovoked dose of hate greeted him in his messages.
Related: If you still don’t understand why your “preferences” are racist, this video might help explain
How about we take this to the next level?
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And the icing on the ugh cake is that the man initially hit him up to chat and potentially flirt.
Le1f didn’t respond to the message. Anyone who’s used a dating app knows how common it is for messages to go unanswered.
But that was apparently enough to induce a racist temper tantrum.
Here’s what Le1f shared, along with a photo from the man’s profile (not pictured here because the post was later removed, but in case you’re wondering, he’s white):
jd.cali
I’m wondering what history will say about Grindr …. overall it seems toxic to the soul
ddevine
I totally agree with you. I got rid of it about 4 or 5 years ago. It became dehumanizing. Instead of “hello” as an intro, it became “Stats?” or “hung?” and “into”? That’s sad. I began to feel pressure instead of any desire. And what it did to romance? It killed it. Completely. Our once really fun venues, half empty.
The final straw was when I realized the new thing is “never see the same person twice.” That’s ugly. I got rid of it. Felt better immediately.
tham
Who thought it was a good idea to hook up with your neighbors?
I mean, what a colossally bad idea. If you’re going to do a NSA, you better drive.
Kangol
So telling that the racist troll-creep reached out to him and when Le1f ignored it, the troll-creep lashed out with racist garbage. So often the flipside of hate is barely suppressed desire and obsession. Also great the Le1f didn’t just let this pass, but put the racist troll-creep MF on blast.
Vince
That’s exactly how I feel when I get attacked on here.
Paco
I’ll never understand how guys can fetishize the types of people they apparently hate. The white guy obviously has no respect or interest in black men, as fellow humans, beyond just using them to get off.
How dare he not respond to a message from whitey. /sarcasm
CastleSF
It’s apparently a love hate struggle. You have an inexplicably deep-rooted attraction to something or someone from a different background. For whatever reason you hate yourself for the attraction so you attack the object of your desire in an attempt to make yourself fee better.
Apolodorus
I had an almost boyfriend once who told me that what he really liked about me was that I had all of the “danger of being black” but didn’t “speak like a black person”. I politely asked for clarifications of on what he meant on both instances and, despite being an English teacher and fairly articulate, lhe was a bit stumped. He kept repeating that it was a praise and I should be flattered.
Ther wasn’t another date after that.
Brian
I see the problem here. You politely asked for clarification, when you should have said “what you talkin about Willis”. Of course he was confused.
Vince
@Apolodorus. Asshole thing to say. However, allot of porn I see the black guys are all like… Yeah, (retracted). Suck my (retracted) cock. Over and over but it’s kind of hot I have to say. The only time I got uncomfortable was there’s video of this white and black dude and the white dude was going all master with his slave. I get it. It’s just another fetish but it still made me cringe. Lol
just now
Cylest Brooks
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ChrisK
We’re still talking about Grindr right?
Donston
You cool Paco, but you don’t seem to have a great understanding of what gets certain people off or some of the types of people who frequently use these kind of apps.
Megalomania, nyphomania, sado-masochism, being a sociopath/psychopath, self-hatred/self-resentment, lack of self-esteem, extreme contradictions in sexual instincts, etc. can all lead to people wanting to persistently sexually engage with folks they have little respect for, little passion towards, little romantic feelings towards and/or little to no genuine attraction to. The human mind can be an, um, odd place.
My2Cents
You make an excellent point Donston. We’ve seen similar behavior in straight men who actually hate women. If they feel rejected then they begin to denigrate the very women with they were trying to get with. Basically saying anything they can think of to hurt them. I’m sure there are gay men who have been called “fucking f****ts” after a rejection.
Vince
Oh noes. First the sexual discrimination. Those crackers just want the BBC. Now their resorting to saying mean things. I mean really folks. Grindr of all places:*-(
gregory_phillips
Trying grasps what is more racist – just putting out there that you only date the same race – or fetishizing people of different races ? I think they are both equally racist positions…..
Danny595
Everything and everyone is racist!
Creamsicle
Both of those unhealthy attitudes are racist because you are not judging someone based on the content of their character, you are judging them by the color of their skin and the stereotypes you have been raised to associate with it. It doesn’t matter whether those stereotypes are good or bad.
There’s nothing wrong with liking black bodies. There’s nothing wrong with liking white bodies. There’s nothing wrong with like Asian bodies. It’s when the attraction expects someone to behave a certain way that it becomes unhealthy. You’re not looking for a real person any more at that point. You’re looking for someone to fulfill a fantasy, and that’s never been the basis of a quality relationship.
It would be super shitty of me to date a white guy and then berate him for being able to dance, or not being into Dungeons and Dragons, or because his dick is bigger than I expected. It would be shitty of me because I’m not seeing him as an individual about whom I can learn, I’m just trying to belittle him for everything he’s not and that I expected.
Danny595
You don’t get to sign up on a dehumanizing app in order to participate in dehumanizing behavior, and then complain that you aren’t treated nicely. You should expect to be treated like an object on Grindr because that is it’s purpose and function.
CastleSF
Danny, many gay guys are drawn to these hookup apps because they are just bored. The boredom eventually descends into obsession with anonymous hookups and then sex addiction. It must be in their genes to act that way.
Creamsicle
I met my boyfriend on grindr. We have a relationship that is not solely based on sex. He shares a lot of my geeky interests and I share a lot of his. Grindr is what ypu make of it and who you choose to let affect you, much like life in general.
Bob LaBlah
Folks, I know this is a silly ass question to ask but since you guys are the city slickers and me the dumb ass country hick I must ask it. If Grindr is THAT racist and horrific for people of color then wouldn’t it be better to simply suggest they not go to it? I mean really. I know from personal experience in the big cities I’ve lived in (Los Angeles, Washington, DC, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York City) many of ya’ll (race, creed, sexual orientation be damned) tend to view life WAY differently than we do down here but to me I think we have a more practical, sensible approach to this obvious “problem” for those who are too sensitive to send the same mentality BACK to sob’s that do those kinds of things. And one last STUPID question. Hasn’t the thought gone thru anyone’s mind to block people who appear deranged, histrionic or, to be more precise, some one whom you simply have NO interest in but keeps on coming back to your page? Surely there has to be a block button, or so I assume. I’m white but I accept a while back that those sites are NOT for me but it seems rather silly to go on and on complaining about people whom you know damn well you are never going to meet anyway.
My2Cents
To answer your question, yes you would block these racist trolls. But first you have to find out they are racist trolls. Not all interactions on Grindr are negative otherwise no one would be on it. But suggesting that POC should just leave the app because of the racist who occasionally rear their ugly head… well let’s think about that for a second. The same thing is said when gays want bigots to bake their wedding cakes, when blacks wanted to eat at the Woolworth lunch counters. I don’t know if you’ve come across bigots in your small town (I’m assuming you are gay), but I would bet that you have had a friend or two wonder why you would move to a place with a higher likelihood of such bigotry. I hardly think making Grindr all white is the solution either.
Blackceo
Its not racism. Its a “preference”, remember? :rolls eyes: I’m so glad I got a ring on it and bypassed mostly the whole gay dating app era because its a hot ass mess.
ddevine
Reading that made me CRINGE. Disgusting. Very, very sorry that happened to him. A sickening shame coming from a group of people marginalized, maligned and hated for hundreds of years. We should know better than that.
Notright
Seriously grindr is toxic. Using grindr chips away at one’s soul. It’s like meth. You get pleasure from a good fuck but the continued use of it leaves you a shell of a person…
surreal33
RACISM is the foundation of America. Grindr is a cesspool of deceit and self-destruction. Therefore, you should not be surprised to find racists and assorted miscreants.
Aires the Ram
@surreal33, Racism is NOT the “foundation of America”, as you state. Perhaps if you read a bit of American and European history, you’d find this out also.
Kangol
@Aires the Ram, yes, “racism” IS the “foundation of America.” What on earth do you think European settler-colonialism is? It wiped out millions of Native people. It enslaved–and wrote into law, in the US, and other countries–millions of first Native and later African people. After Bacon’s Rebellion, white supremacy took hold throughout the South, and even in the northern states, in which slavery existed (yes–MA, CT, RI, NY, NJ, PA, NH, DE, MD, etc. all allowed chattel slavery), various laws preventing Black and Native people from full citizenship took hold. The United States even fought the worst war on its soil to quash the monstrous slave system *and* defeat the slave power, whose foundational creed was white supremacy (cf. Confederate President Jefferson Davis’s statements on white power and Confederate VP Alexander Stephens’ infamously racist “Cornerstone Speech”). The US even went to so far, after the end of Reconstruction, to institute a racial apartheid system that provided a model for South Africa and Nazi Germany, among other countries. So please, perhaps you should read a bit of “American and European history” first, before you urge others to do so.
gymmuscleboy
@surreal33 No offence but you are a parasite. Given your reductive perspective on the country, go and try to find a better one elsewhere, as there are a million others dying to take your place.
Aires the Ram
All this talk about the way guys treat each other on “apps” on their phone……….Wasn’t that long ago really, when we didn’t have cell phones. Jeez, I wonder what guys did “WAY BACK THEN” to meet one-another??? Perhaps they actually had to take a shower, put some clothes on, get off their ass and go out and meet other guys face to face?? Can you even imagine that?? Must’ve been horrible.
StupidBoy
The boy is cute AF, in my opinion.
I have been attracted to darker-skinned men since before puberty. Before it was a sexual thing. I dunno why. I can’t pinpoint a reason in my life that I find it more attractive.
I find some Asian men, Middle Eastern men, South and Central American men, and white men attractive. But because I can look at a Black man and say, “He’s Black and handsome. I’d like to get to know him better,” (or sometimes, “God, I’d like to trace every tattoo with my tongue), I feel like I’m racist and prejudiced and fetishizing Black men.
On the bus in elementary school, I knew that brown-skinned Brad was nicer to look at than white-skinned Jason. I wasn’t whacking it to either of them, I just found one caught my attention more than the other.
Now, forty years later, I find it easier not to try to deal with any of it. I have become an introverted hermit. I’m not on dating websites. I don’t go out to bars. I became celibate years ago.
For someone attracted to darker-skin, I don’t know how to walk the razor’s edge between fetishism and attraction.
As humans, the first things we notice is if you are the same race or a different race. If you are male or female. If you are tall or short or slim or fat. We categorize people as part of our evolution.
I wish people the best on dating apps or websites, but I don’t find that I can be a part of it.
StupidBoy
I just re-read my comment and realized I forgot to stress that I DON’T condone people on dating apps saying nasty, horrible, racist things to other people because they aren’t interested. A simple “No thanks” or nothing at all will do. I don’t understand attacking someone become of his race or skin color. I’ve seen other articles about the racism on Grindr and I’m glad I’m not on there. My sympathies go out to anyone who has been the victim of online attacks or bullying for just being who they are. You don’t deserve it.
gymmuscleboy
Judging by his overreaction to not getting a response, this is a crazy person, not an example of systemic racism. Our culture is obsessed with saying how poorly minorities are treated. Yet where else on the planet would they be treated better?
gymmuscleboy
Look at the comment in the screenshot “Thank you for sharing. I’m sorry that this is happening…” What is happening? A crazy person is going off at you on Grindr? Maybe this is nothing to do with the guy being black. He would have been personally attacked regardless of his identity. American=fat. Female=slut. Gay=f*g. Black=n***r. It doesn’t matter what his identity was, it would have been attacked. It’s like we’re desperate to tell a story that all our little minorities are so uniquely oppressed. Maybe there is racism in this person’s life – I don’t know – but this is clearly not an example of it.