Darkside Rainbow

You may recall the suit against eHarmony claiming discrimination against gays, whose rejection from the site was implicit in the inability to choose “male seeking male” or “female seeking female” or specify an orientation and whose pleas to customer service were denied. Chemistry.com has capitalized on that with a clever series of “Rejected” ads, claiming that they welcome those rejected by eHarmony with open arms:

 
Chemistry.com’s tagline is “come as you are”, implying open acceptance not only of gays, but of anyone not suitable for eHarmony’s strict guidelines of what makes a good match. I first ran across the ads while glancing at No Style’s listing on OnlineComics.net, but on browsing Chemistry.com’s website found a full series of the simple but effective ads, appealing to all walks of life. It’s a fairly bold stab at eHarmony, to openly criticize their practices through advertising - and one that I’m sure other competitors wish they had thought of first. Chemistry.com looks to gain a significant market share from the gay dating community and others unsuited to sites like eHarmony, if the ad campaign succeeds. It certainly caught my attention, so they’ve done at least one thing right.

Gay? Lesbian? Rejected by others? Unhappy with yourself? Chemistry.com’s ad campaign proposes to offer safe haven to people who don’t fit the safe definition of happy, shiny singles looking for romance, and its home page touts novel views of marriage and dating in a modern culture. I do notice that the profile options on their site don’t allow one to choose TS/TV/TG as a gender option, but it does give you the option to choose “Male seeking Male” or “Female seeking Female”. No option for both, though. No love for the bisexuals or the trans community. Isn’t that always the case?

It’s a step in the right direction, and gets a few brownie points from my particular corner of gay life even if it’s about what I’ve come to expect from a dating site not specifically targeted towards the gay community. With the exception of fetish sites like Alt.com that cater to anyone’s desire for anything, Chemistry.com’s options are typical of mainstream dating sites that don’t specifically exclude same-sex pairings. The only difference I’ve seen is that other communities leave the option there and then seem to look the other way if users choose to exercise it, while Chemistry.com openly flaunts their availability to the gay and lesbian community.

So is Chemistry.com really doing something new? Not in the area of services offered, no - but they have taken advantage of an opportune situation to contrive an ad campaign perfectly suited for the moment.

Sometimes it’s not what you do, but when and how you do it that makes the difference.

gay dating, online dating, eHarmony lawsuit, chemistry.com, dating websites, dating communities, ad campaigns, anti-gay discrimination