Grindr is an application that if you told a homosexual in the 1950s would one day exist, would probably fall over and die of a heart attack. Unlock your phone, click an icon, Grindr finds your location, and then shows you where other Grindr users around you. The purpose of the application? For gay, bi sexual, and curious men to get together and … I’ll let you fill in the details.
Turns out that in Vancouver a 54 year old guy, and a 15 year old kid, got together via the application and things didn’t quite turn out so well. Police don’t exactly go into details, but the older gentleman was apprehended and charged with sexual interference, invitation to sexual touching and sexual assault.
“Advances in technology and social networking make it easier for our children to come into contact with individuals who may try to harm them or take advantage of them.” — Sex Crimes Unit Sargent Jeanette Theisen
The 15 year old knew what he was doing. The application isn’t exactly shy about what it’s supposed to be used for. “Start chatting with local guys in seconds. The go-to place for gay, bi, and curious guys to meet, the location-based Grindr is free, fast, and fun. Simply launch Grindr to see local guys (the closest appear first) and view pictures, stats, and map locations at a tap.”
That being said, when you’re 54 years old you should kind of know better than to attempt to get into the pants of a random 15 year old boy you meet off the internet. You’d have a much better chance at getting your fix of chocolate starfish by joining the Catholic Church.
Update: Just got this statement from Grindr:
Grindr has a very strict 18 years -and-over terms of use policy that all users of our service must agree to, additionally we actively monitor for potential violations of this policy and bar anyone who violates its terms. We voluntarily have this policy in place to help protect the safety of minors. Unfortunately, as with any Web technology, people can find ways to bypass even the most robust control mechanisms.
As an added protection, we encourage parents to add Apple’s parental controls to their children’s iPod touches, iPhones and iPads to help ensure that their children cannot access 17-and-over sites and apps (please visit: http://www.apple.com/iphone/how-to/#settings.restrictions for more information).
Grindr strongly condemns the inappropriate and criminal use of our service and actively cooperates with local authorities on any alleged illegal activity on our service.
[Via: The Vancouver Sun, Textually]