Update: The Daily Beast pulled the piece after further criticism.
An apology, hosted where the article used to be, said:
The article was not intended to do harm or degrade members of the LGBT community, but intent doesn’t matter, impact does. Our hope is that removing an article that is in conflict with both our values and what we aspire to as journalists will demonstrate how seriously we take our error.
We were wrong. We will do better.
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A reporter has been savaged for “invading gay safe spaces” by firing up Grindr in Rio’s Olympic Village and writing about what he found.
Nico Hines, a Daily Beast reporter on assignment in Brazil, published an investigation into dating apps at the Olympic Village to see whether reports of horny athletes looking for sex were true.
Hines, a married man with a child, tried Bumble, Tinder and Grindr – and found that he received the most attention on the gay dating app, securing three dates in an hour.
He said he was up-front about being a journalist, but didn’t go out of his way to point out that he isn’t gay.
He was hit with an avalanche of criticism after the piece went live, being accused of mounting an “invasion” and being “unwelcome” on the app.
More troubling criticism pointed out that he may inadvertently have outed a competitor from Kazakhstan – where being openly gay is difficult – by describing his height and weight.
Hines noted that “it was not even 5.30 in the evening” before he was invited for dates or sex, highlighting the hyper-sexualised atmosphere in the village, where condoms have been ordered en masse to cope with demand.