He ain’t gonna let you on the Ark, either!
The popular online dating service eHarmony was sued on Thursday for refusing to offer its services to gays, lesbians and bisexuals.
A lawsuit alleging discrimination based on sexual orientation was filed in Los Angeles Superior Court on behalf of Linda Carlson, who was denied access to eHarmony because she is gay.
eHarmony was founded in 2000 by evangelical Christian Dr. Neil Clark Warren and had strong early ties with the influential religious conservative group Focus on the Family.
“This lawsuit is about changing the landscape and making a statement out there that gay people, just like heterosexuals, have the right and desire to meet other people with whom they can fall in love,” said Carlson lawyer Todd Schneider.
Sounds like a question that will go to class action status, real soon.
#2 – All those groups should have to be accepted everywhere, except the Tin Foil Hatters. Those people are just too weird, except the ones who use properly quilted tin foil like me.
#37 – Good for you! Hope you gave some of that penalty money to civil liberties organizations. ACLU, Libertarian candidates, DP Alliance, MPP, even the NRA – jeez, there are a lot of them, and they even seem to be doing some good in places. The last few years have been a real problem for a lot of them, though.
The biggest hit for charity came from the attorney who handled the case. The circumstances had him receiving half the entire settlement – which he promptly gave away to local charities. But, that was his style. Ab’t a third of everything he handled was free.
He was so damned smart. He arranged the trial of the Telcom to be first. When they rolled over – as he knew they would – they asked how much of a dollar settlement was wanted. He negotiated a really simple bargain.
They were required to pay for the balance of the case against the city and the Feds. Blank check. Ha ha.
There sure seems to be a lot of weak arguments out there to condone discrimination. I think we have heard most of them before. Such as, a businessman doesn’t have to sell to someone he doesn’t want to. That led to a lot of “white only” signs less then 50 years ago. Or sure, “they” can always have their own clubs, services, schools, …, as long as “I” don’t have to associate with “them”.
In short, you effen bigots never change.
I did a profile on eharm for fun. I indicated I was atheist and guess what? I didn’t get a hit! Oh well, I guess i better sue. Now what’s that number 1800suesomeone…
#31 It is funny you bring up gluten and McDonald’s. McDonald’s lied about putting gluten in their french fries. Someone with celiac’s disease ate the fries got terrible sick and McDonald’s got sued and deservedly so. I am not against lawsuits; I just am against stupid lawsuits.
OFTLO, if lawsuits are about people/corporation being assholes and not money, name me one rich corporation that has not been sued.
Furthemore, this is from Wikpedia, “Non-Political Terrorism – Terrorism that is not aimed at political purposes but which exhibits “conscious design to create and maintain high degree of fear for coercive purposes, but the end is individual or collective gain rather than the achievement of a political objective.”
FWIW, a group of Christian doctors in California refused to artifically inseminate a lesbian woman. The woman sued the doctors and lost. See he link:http://www.onenewsnow.com/2007/04/court_battle_pits_religious_fr.php
I am not sure how these doctors could be found to not be breaking the law but Eharmony is.
#45, Lauren, Because the purpose of a business is decided by the person or persons who have chosen to invest their time, money and effort into it.
Well, that’ll never fly, it just makes way too much common sense. So now in addition to astronomical research, I’m supposed to sell astrological predictions, too? OK, here’s my horoscope for today prepared just for me: Taurus: you’re an opinionated guy who types too much. Quit for the day in order not to infuriate other bloggers with facts and insight.
And you gotta watch out for those sneaky white guys watching movies, they might have a good time and intelligently discuss the directing afterward. You just can never tell about us guys named Bubba 🙂
This isn’t a run-of-the-mill business discrimination suit, and I think eHarmony has a valid enough reason for rejecting Ms. Carlson. They’re not just a meeting site, they advertise themselves as a matching site (if I remember their TV ads somewhat correctly). They have a list of characteristics that are used to find a match based on what they claim is a significant body of research indicating how those criteria predict successful personal relationships.
There’s no reason to believe that their hetero-based research will necessarily apply to homosexual relationships. But the good news for the plaintiff is that all of her potential matches will have to look elsewhere also, and she may meet them on one of those other sites. It’s not like her soul mate is a current client of eHarmony — she was rejected also.
Ms. Carlson would know the true definition for the phrase “waste of money” if the eHarmony computer matched her up with a man. Unfortunately, that’s the only type of match that it’s programmed to find for her. Forcing eHarmony to further research how homosexual relationships can be successfully predicted is an unreasonable burden to be inflicted by a non-discrimination law that surely wasn’t intended to be applied to this type of social engineering business.
Well, I’m off now to take my wheelchair-bound sister to work. She’s a pole-dancer at the local strip club, ever since we won a lawsuit that forced the club owner to provide wheelchair access to the stage so she can perform. Now, that demand was totally reasonable, but this thing with eHarmony is maybe a little over the top 😉
Cheers to the well-intentioned among you.
#48, Gary
I wish your sister the best. It must be so nice for her to have a brother that would go out of his way to try and make her life just a little bit better. You’re a good man.
Plus I liked your arguments.
Gosh darn you, Mr. Fusion. You’re going out of your way to make me feel guilty for lying about my sister, and you know exactly the right buttons to push.
I prefer to think of my sister as “mythic,” much like my alleged goodness 😉
#42….anyone who cares to read your posty, and can objectively understand English….will agree, you called everyone with an opinion different than Moss or yourself or Ms Carelson a bigot.
As usual, you’ve been caught name calling, again. Your answer to everything you disagree with.
While I don’t care for Lauren’s name calling (though knowing the history between the 2 of them, I’m not surprised), Lauren makes what is the right argument. Ms. Carelson will lose this suit, and as someone said above, it’s a shame she won’t be held responsible for ALL expenses.
Lets keep sexism and racism out of our corporations and put them where they belong: in our society. And sanctioned by government in the form of marriage mainly between persons of the opposite sex and same race. (Or is that just an amazing statistical coincidence?)
RBG
Has anyone tracked the success rate of marriages from eHarmony? It’s based on the premise that similarity is what makes marriages last.
I know it’s generally assumed but it’s in my nature to question stuff like this.
#51, Gary
Truth be told, I agree with your position in #48. And I have faith that you would drive your sister to work if needed.
#52, #42….anyone who cares to read your posty, and can objectively understand English….will agree, you called everyone with an opinion different than Moss or yourself or Ms Carelson a bigot.
Really. Then maybe you should read my posty again. I criticized those who use the same arguments against homosexuals as were used less then 50 years ago against Blacks. They were bad arguments then and they haven’t gotten any better with age.
Nowhere in that post #42 did I claim that those who merely disagree with Ms Carlson is a bigot. Personally, I don’t know the merits of her case as it is being pursued under California law. Maybe she has a case, maybe she doesn’t, I don’t know. On principle though, I do support removing all forms of bigotry and artificial discrimination.
So once again, your own bigotry is showing. Yes, you decried my condemnation of bigotry so therefore, logically, you support bigotry. That makes you a bigot. No, not name calling, just using your own position to demonstrate your own vile attitude.
You can’t defend a position without inventing attributions. Don’t research anything, just make it up. Is that what they taught you back in Home School?
#47 You’re kidding right? So are you saying that PIzza Hut should be sued into selling hamburgers?
Maybe eHarmony doesn’t want to get into the business of writing algorythms to help gays find gays, as I’m sure it’s different. You know, they also don’t have a dog and pet section, what if Fido (or in your case, Butch) wants some lovin…now they have to write up matching software for that as well.
The reason it’s a frivalous lawsuit is because there are MANY gay-gay sites she could have gone to, but she’s just looking for free money.
#57, No, I’m saying you’re an idiot with the reading comprehension of
warm pukea failing second grade student. Try reading the post again and find where I suggested that Pizza Hut should be sued into selling hamburgers.FYI, if Pizza Hut refused to do business with a certain class of people, be they Blacks, Muslims, women, short people, or everyone named Michael, then yes they could be sued. What they sell is something of a totally different argument. In this case, eHarm is discriminating against an identifiable group, homosexuals. If California law does not allow discrimination against homosexuals then they have a case.
Well, if anyone is still reading this:
48. “She’s a pole-dancer at the local strip club, ever since we won a lawsuit that forced the club owner to provide wheelchair access to the stage so she can perform. ”
“The city of Bellevue, Wash., is trying to force the strip club Papagayo’s Cantina to make its stage wheelchair accessible so that disabled dancers can reach the stage…”
http://www.thisistrue.com/pop_a_wheelie_4454.html
(Why wouldn’t I be surprised to discover this was once posted on DU.)
RBG