Earlier this week, The Daily Beast published an article in which one of it's journalists who had travelled to Rio for the Olympics talked about the hotbed of sexual activity to be found there.
The article - “The Other Olympic Sport In Rio: Swiping.” - has since been taken down after a tidal wave of negative feedback was given following it's publication.
In the article, the journalist talked about how he used dating and hook-up apps such as Bumble, Grindr, Jack'd, and Tinder to connect with other people at the games.
The writer then told how he had secured three dates within an hour, and while not naming the athletes, he did give detailed descriptions on their height, weight, nationality, and their profile pictures on the apps.
As homosexuality is still a criminal offence - up to and including being punishable by death in some cases - in more than 70 countries, the article was seen as putting gay and bisexual athletes in real danger.
As per the full statement released on The Daily Beast earlier today, the website's editor Noah Shachtman said: "As a newsroom, we succeed together and we fail together, and this was a failure on The Daily Beast as a whole, not a single individual. The article was not intended to do harm or degrade members of the LGBT community, but intent doesn’t matter, impact does. Our hope is that removing an article that is in conflict with both our values and what we aspire to as journalists will demonstrate how seriously we take our error."
Some gay athletes publicly attacked the article, too.
As an out gay athlete from a country that is still very homophobic, @thedailybeast ought to be ashamed #deplorable https://t.co/qzS9rDFJwx
— Amini Fonua (@AminiFonua) August 11, 2016
Imagine the one space you can feel safe, the one space you're able to be yourself, ruined by a straight person who thinks it's all a joke?
— Amini Fonua (@AminiFonua) August 11, 2016
No straight person will ever know the pain of revealing your truth, to take that away is just... I can't. It literally brings me to tears ðŸ˜ðŸ˜
— Amini Fonua (@AminiFonua) August 11, 2016
It is still illegal to be gay in Tonga, and while I'm strong enough to be me in front of the world, not everybody else is. Respect that.
— Amini Fonua (@AminiFonua) August 11, 2016
