The Big Four

Grindr for Equality is our company's social justice program, aimed at advancing LGBTQ safety, health, and human rights around the world. We serve a variety of functions – from helping to build features in the app that protect Grindr users in dangerous environments, to collaborating with global public health agencies to get the word out on emerging sexual health issues like Monkeypox – it’s all in a day’s grind.

The four key laws‍

Through years of working with LGBTQ activists and organizers, we’ve developed a way of thinking about the future that we believe can be a north star for helping us create a safer, more inclusive world for people of all sexual orientations and gender identities. We’ve distilled that thinking into the four key laws we must enact in every country to ensure equitability for all:

Decriminalization

Decriminalization means getting rid of the laws that make it illegal for us to be who we are and love who we love. Currently, sex between men is illegal in about seventy countries, sex between women in about forty countries, and “crossdressing” is illegal in about fourteen. Removing these laws is fundamental to recognizing the basic humanity of all people.

Legal Gender Recognition

Trans people deserve the right to be recognized by their governments as the gender they truly are. In many countries, this is administered at the national level with documents like national ID cards and passports. In the US, it’s a bit more complicated because various IDs are handled at the federal and state governments, each of which may have different requirements. Nevertheless, it is a key goal of our movement to ensure that trans people have access to legal gender recognition in all facets of their life and without unnecessary barriers – like requirements that individuals go through surgeries that may be unaffordable or unwanted.

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Non-Discrimination or Anti-Discrimination

These laws make it illegal to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity, and they create pathways for legal recourse when discrimination does take place. They can cover a range of circumstances in which discrimination might take place, from employment to education, housing, and something called “public accommodations,” which refers to generally accessible places such as stores, restaurants, hotels, and transportation.  

Relationship Recognition

“Relationship recognition” is often more specifically referred to as marriage equality, but it can include other forms of recognition like domestic partnerships. So far, we’ve achieved full equality in terms of relationship recognition in only thirty-three countries worldwide.

Beyond

We have another job to do too – in many countries, our LGBTQ movements are forced to fight back against newly proposed laws that would harm us, rather than guaranteeing our rights. In the U.S., we are currently experiencing a backward trend of laws banning drag and criminalizing care for transgender youth, a phenomenon that is part of a larger attack on the LGBTQ community to label us as “dangerous.”

And, of course, the work doesn’t stop with fighting back bad laws or trying to establish these four legal pillars. But, these efforts are key to focusing our efforts as we continue to fight for equality and use our platform to facilitate joy, connection, and liberation for all of those in our community.