Fri 12 Aug 2016 In: International News View at Wayback View at NDHA
A straight married male writer has attempted to lure gay closeted Olympians in the Olympic Village using apps such as Grindr in order to out them publicly. The writer, Nico Hines, for The Daily Beast, says he spent 60 minutes in the Olympic Village on a range of dating apps, including Tinder, but quickly abandoned these for Grindr. His identity as a journalist was not information on his profile and he only offered up the information if, in unlikely circumstances, someone asked. “For the record, I didn’t lie to anyone or pretend to be someone I wasn’t—unless you count being on Grindr in the first place—since I’m straight, with a wife and child. I used my own picture (just of my face…) and confessed to being a journalist as soon as anyone asked who I was,” he wrote in his highly criticised piece. Hines makes reference to a “competitor from Oceania” in his article and in a previous version of the article - it has now been edited after complaints - described at least five athletes, some of which live in “notorious homophobic” countries, putting the lives of those he has described at risk. In an Editor’s Note which now sits at the bottom of the article, Editor in Chief John Avlon explains the article has been amended following complaints, writing; “There was legitimate concern that the original version of this story might out gay male athletes, even by implication, or compromise their safety. This was never our reporter’s intention, of course.”
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Friday, 12th August 2016 - 10:05am