Tinder co-founder takes swipe at dating app’s sexist workplace

Tinder, the wildly popular dating app that started out as a location-based way to look for casual sex, has won the devotion of hookup and relationship seekers alike and incited a left- and right-swiping revolution.

But it may not be the best place to work if you’re of the female persuasion.

Whitney Wolfe, a former VP of marketing at Tinder, filed a sexual discrimination and harassment lawsuit against the company on Monday (PDF), accusing the Los Angeles-based company of taking away her co-founder title on the grounds that she was a “24-year-old girl.” She alleges that chief marketing officer and fellow co-founder and boss Justin Mateen said describing her as one of the co-founders would “devalue” the company and make it “seem like a joke.”

She alleged Mateen “tried to justify the situation by saying ‘Facebook and Snapchat don’t have girl founders, it just makes it look like Tinder was some accident,’” according to court documents.

Wolfe alleged in the suit (PDF) that Tinder CEO Sean Rad threatened to fire her if she didn’t go along with the change, that Mateen sent her racist and sexist text messages after they ended a brief romantic relationship and that he called her a “whore” in front of Rad at a company event.

She also accused Rad of dismissing her complaints about the messages as “annoying” and “dramatic” and alleged that Sam Yagan, CEO of Tinder co-owner Match.com, also failed to act on her complaints.

“Ms. Wolfe finally broke down the night that Mr. Mateen called her a ‘whore’ at a company event, and she offered to resign in consideration for modest severance and the vesting of her stock,” the court documents read. “Mr. Rad snidely rejected the offer and fired her.”

Match.com and IAC, which is Tinder’s parent company, were also named as defendants in Wolfe’s lawsuit.

“This case is about being forced out of a company I helped build because I would no longer tolerate the gender discrimination and harassment,” Wolfe said in a release. “I had hoped this would be resolved confidentially, but after months of failed attempts, I have decided to pursue this suit.”

“Immediately upon receipt of the allegations contained in Ms. Wolfe's complaint, Mr. Mateen was suspended pending an ongoing internal investigation,” IAC told USA Today in an emailed statement. “Through that process, it has become clear that Mr. Mateen sent private messages to Ms. Wolfe containing inappropriate content. We unequivocally condemn these messages but believe that Ms. Wolfe’s allegations with respect to Tinder and its management are unfounded.”

Aside from the oft noted Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg and Yahoo chief executive officer Marissa Mayer, many have complained that Silicon Valley and tech startups are sorely lacking in female power players.

That’s amid other recent harassment and discrimination lawsuits filed by women against technology top dogs, such as the complaint filed against venture capital kingpin Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers by former female partner Ellen Pao and another filed against popular social coding site GitHub by engineer and ex-employee Julie Ann Horvath.