Queer Geosocial Networking and the 2012 Election
In class, we discussed how one can use different forms of social media to professionally market oneself. People can also use social media as a tool to market themselves on a personal level…in some cases extremely personal. For the queer community, this is where mobile apps like Grindr come in to play.
Grindr (and similar apps like ManHunt and Scruff) can be described as a gay dating website for the 21st century. Users download the app to their smartphone or iPad, create a personal profile, and scroll through grids of other gay men seeking encounters. Here’s the kicker: Grindr actually uses geolocation technology. This means it is able to display the exact distance other users are from you.
Say you’re in a bar looking to hook up. Log into Grindr on your Android, and it will display pictures of other Grindr users, arranged from nearest to you to farthest away. You see there are roughly five other Grindr users in the same bar. Choose the one that interests you the most, chat through the app for a bit, and then go meet up.
Calling it a “dating website” may be perhaps a bit too vanilla. Within the queer community, apps like Grindr are best known to facilitate casual sex and random encounters. Described as “geosocial networking” by some; the term sex-radar has also been tossed around.
My own personal opinions aside – I believe Grindr is anti-liberation and perpetuates queer oppression in the most Huxleyan sense – the app holds an extreme level of cultural popularity. Even young men still reeling from their leap from the closet know what Grindr is. This year, the company behind Grindr began using this popularity for somewhat less primitive purposes.
“Grindr for Equality” is social campaign in which the app will alert users about issues of equality and encourage members in swing states to register to vote. “All elections are won or lost on the local level,” says Grindr CEO Simkhai. “There is no election or town too small to have a gay voice. We’ll use Grindr to unite gay men across the country, make that voice grow louder and have a nationwide impact.”
What with President Obama’s evolution coming to a climax this year, the gay vote could have a determining factor in this presidential election. It is also undeniable that social media has played an integral role in recent efforts to mobilize the queer community, as exemplified by last March’s DC anti-violence protest and The Four 2012 campaign that began this month. However, with a skeptical eye, the blog SFist nails it on the head: “sex and politics have never gone that well together.”
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