Grindr’s director of communications, Landen Rafe Zumwalt, resigned from his position after the app’s president said he believed marriage is between a man and woman, reported PinkNews.
Zumwalt, who is gay, published his departure from the gay dating app on Medium. The post appears to be in response to Grindr president Scott Chen’s comments on marriage.
INTO reported in late November that Chen wrote on Facebook, “There are people who believe that marriage is a holy matrimony between a man and a woman. I agree, but that’s none of our business.”
“There are also people who believe the purpose of marriage is to create children that carry their DNA,” the post continued. “That’s also none of our business. There are people whoa re simply different from you, who desperately want to get married. They have their own reasons. Getting married is a personal issue.”
He added his desire for people to not donate to anti-LGBTQ causes and to instead “donate your money to places which are in dire hunger, poverty, or suffering from war.”
“Why spend all that money to stop people who love each other from getting married? Aren’t there more important things in life,” Chen asked.
“As an out and proud gay man madly in love with a man I don’t deserve, I refused to compromise my own values or professional integrity to defend a statement that goes against everything I am and everything I believe,” Zumwalt wrote in the Medium post.
A Grindr spokesperson confirmed the statement with PinkNews: “As Landen shared in his Medium post, he has resigned from his position at Grindr. We wish him the best in his future endeavors and appreciate his contributions to the company and the Grindr community.”
Chen responded to the INTO article, denying he was against gay marriage. “The reason I said marriage is a holy matrimony between a man and a woman is based on my own personal experience,” he wrote in the comment section of the article.