Blued and Finka, China’s two most popular LGBTQ+ dating apps, were abruptly disappeared from both the Apple app store and the localized version of the Android platform on Tuesday, with Apple confirming that “Based on an order from the Cyberspace Administration of China, we have removed these two apps from the China storefront only. We follow the laws in the countries where we operate,” CNN reports without carrying any similar statement from Xinnie the Pooh’s commie regime.
There was none issued because the authoritarian state is unaccountable to its citizens. Same-sex relations were decriminalized in 1997 but that hasn’t stopped Xi’s goons from cracking down on Pride parades, erasing LGBTQ+ accounts from domestic social media apps like WeChat and Weibo.
If irony were not dead it’d be noting the Xi regime’s ties to global gay dating app Grindr, banned by Beijing in 2022, but still in business globally and almost definitely a crucial resource for blackmail on members of a certain political party in a certain rival country. Particularly its elected officials.