OKCupid Co-Founder Called 'Hypocrite' for Donation to Congressman Opposing Gay Marriage; Expresses Regret
Sam Yagan, co-founder of OKCupid, responded to hypocrisy claims after it was revealed that he donated money to a Republican congressman with a consistent history of opposing same-sex marriage. His company was behind the boycott of the Mozilla software company and its Firefox web browser over a donation made by its newly-appointed CEO, Brendan Eich, to California's Proposition 8 campaign. Eich has since resigned from his post.
Yagan released a statement to The Huffington Post on Tuesday clarifying that he was not aware of Rep. Chris Cannon's (R-Utah) position on same-sex marriage and had made the donation for political reasons.
"A decade ago, I made a contribution to Representative Chris Cannon because he was the ranking Republican on the House subcommittee that oversaw the Internet and Intellectual Property, matters important to my business and our industry. I accept responsibility for not knowing where he stood on gay rights in particular; I unequivocally support marriage equality and I would not make that contribution again today."
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"However, a contribution made to a candidate with views on hundreds of issues has no equivalence to a contribution supporting Prop 8, a single issue that has no purpose other than to affirmatively prohibit gay marriage, which I believe is a basic civil right," Yagan added.
Yagan, co-founder of OKCupid and the CEO of Match.com, OKCupid's parent company, received a rash of criticism after the tech blog UnCrunched revealed on Sunday that he made a $500 contribution to the political campaign of Rep. Cannon in 2004. While serving in the House of Representatives from 1999 to 2009, Cannon consistently voted conservatively on issues such as same-sex marriage, adoption and abortion.
As UnCrunched reports, during his time in office, Cannon supported a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage, opposed gay adoptions and opposed a ban on discrimination based on sexual orientation. He also had a strong pro-life record, including voting "yes" on a bill that barred the transportation of minors to get abortions in the state of Utah.
The OKCupid co-founder is now being accused of being a hypocrite and hatching an elaborate publicity stunt for his company that contributed to Eich's resignation from his CEO position at Mozilla.
When it was revealed earlier this month that Eich had donated $1,000 in defense of a state amendment defining marriage as between a man and a woman, OKCupid called for a boycott of the software company and its well-known web browser, Firefox. The dating website encouraged visitors of its homepage to use a web browser other than Firefox, writing that Eich is "an opponent of equal rights for gay couples" and adding that the company wishes people who oppose same-sex marriage "nothing but failure."
OKCupid's boycott of Mozilla gained widespread attention last week, and was coupled with several Mozilla employees taking to Twitter and other blog sites to call for Eich's resignation. On Friday of last week, Mozilla announced that Eich stepped down from his post.
Several critics are now calling foul on OKCupid for being hypocritical in its actions, accusing the dating website of using Eich's opposition to same-sex marriage as a publicity stunt for its company.
A blogger for UnCrunched wrote: "I believe that it was a PR stunt by OKCupid, that the company isn't really committed to gay rights at all, and that OkCupid co-founder Sam Yagan was particularly hypocritical in this.
"To go further, I think that a person and/or a company who deliberately destroy a man's reputation and career under false pretenses just to get a PR bump is being explicitly evil."
Others have sought to make a distinction between Eich's donation and Yagan's donation, with Jamelle Bouie of Slate arguing that while Yagan's donation was "ambiguous," Eich's was "completely clear."
"Support for a politician isn't the same as support for an issue … After all, most politicians have a wide array of interests and concerns, and a donation might be in support of any one of them."
Meanwhile, conservatives are appalled over the Mozilla incident. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich called it "the most open, blatant example of the new fascism, which says if you don't agree with us 100 percent, we have the right to punish you."
Dr. Richard Land, president of Southern Evangelical Seminary and executive editor of The Christian Post, also called out the LGBT community for marginalizing anyone who expresses dissent.
"A new spirit of McCarthyism is loose among us," he said. "The gay thought police are challenging anyone they suspect of ever opposing or having qualms about their sexual lifestyle: 'Are you now, or have you ever been, an opponent of same-sex marriage?' If the answer is anything other than the unequivocal no, then you are 'blacklisted,' with all the noxious consequences socially and economically that accompany it."
