Most of you folks know that I’m fine with gay marriage. I’m not a huge fan of using the courts simply because I consider it to be moving too fast for much of society, and I think we’ve seen backlash against that tactic through ballot initiatives. I don’t see a reason to set their efforts back by decades and creating new legal barriers that wouldn’t be there if their lawyers simply waited 20 years for more of the electorate to be fine with it. The fact is that younger people are far more accepting, and we’re now just in a waiting game.  I accept that some people disagree with me, and I understand their feelings.  That’s why I’d rather have any changes happen through legislative branches which are least designed to represent the will of the people.

However, that does not mean that I am fine with this settlement eHarmony was forced into by a New Jersey man and California woman to offer a gay dating website.

Online dating service eHarmony has agreed to create a new website for gays and lesbians as part of a settlement with a gay man in New Jersey, the New Jersey Office of the Attorney General said on Wednesday.

The website will provide a dating service with “male seeking a male” or “female seeking a female” options, the Attorney General’s office said in a statement.

The settlement was the result of a discrimination complaint filed by Eric McKinley against eHarmony in 2005, which will be dismissed under the settlement agreement.

eHarmony was founded in 2000 by evangelical Christian Dr. Neil Clark Warren and had ties with the influential religious conservative group Focus on the Family. …

In March, lawyers in California brought a lawsuit against the company on behalf of San Francisco resident Linda Carlson, who was denied access to eHarmony because she is gay.

Here’s my beef purely in the name of economic freedom: There should be absolutely no obligation to provide a product for sale. And that’s exactly what the NJ AG is doing in this case. Let’s compare relationships to milkshakes.

On one hand, they are alike. Your local Dairy Queen sells milkshakes and eHarmony sells relationships (or rather, the potential for one). Personal taste will determine both what kind of milkshake you order and what kind of relationship you’re looking to find. No one would sue DQ for not offering 80 oz. Banana Wonderberry Drizzle shakes. It’s simply not a size or flavor they offer. In that spirit, eHarmony should not be sued for not offering the kind of dates you’d like.

On the other hand, milkshakes and relationships are different. It does not matter if you order a medium strawberry milkshake if you are GLBTS or A. To my knowledge, sexual orientation does not influence the kind of ice cream flavors we prefer. However, if the product is a relationship, sexual orientation of the customer does matter. But, much like ice cream, it’s a matter of customer preference. If DQ doesn’t sell 80 oz. Banana Wonderberry Drizzle shakes, a customer goes somewhere that does sell them. If eHarmony doesn’t have GLBT relationships to sell, then the customer should simply move on.

In fact, in this case, specialization would probably result in more happy relationships. First of all, the company founder doesn’t really believe in it. Do you honestly think that he’s going to put that much effort into the gay and lesbian site? It’s also my understanding that eHarmony has long considered that their methods, which are based in on studies by a Christian founder, are not likely to work for gay men and lesbians. It’s something the company does not believe they know much about. It would be like going to a psychiatrist for a vision problem. Sure, an optometrist and a psychiatrist might both be called Doctor, but they don’t fix the same things. With eHarmony’s perspective on the world and relationships, they do believe things would work differently and they don’t want to get involved in something they don’t feel they know about.

Second, in my Google search for gay dating website, there were 1.92 million results and every ad space on the side is full. It can hardly be said there’s a shortage of specialized offerings. I would think that they would tend to have more choices and better results.

Third, why isn’t the NJ AG pursuing suits against sites like Gay.com and Gay Friend Finder? I see no gender options on those sites. If every company must offer every product, then why can’t a straight girl go on to find a straight man? And, for that matter, why are fans of the 80 oz. Banana Wonderberry Drizzle shakes discriminated against in every ice cream shop I’ve ever visited in New Jersey? It’s outrageous that businesses are forbidden from specializing. it’s what makes our economy so wonderful. (For the record, specialization means that there’s this great little shop called Denville Dairy and sometimes they offer coconut chocolate chip ice cream that’s just to die for. See, specialization is cool.)

Now, does anyone want to take a bet that neither the NJ man nor the CA woman will actually sign up for the new site? I put money that they did this merely for attention.

In the meantime, the cost of running the new site will be passed on to users of the regular eHarmony site. And unlike most companies that can stop selling an unprofitable product, eHarmony will have to keep offering the product, regardless of how much it eats at their bottom line. That is not freedom, just like it wouldn’t be for any of the gay dating websites if they had to fund sites for straights, too.

No obviously related posts.