Tinder CEO Sean Rad might want to keep a low profile for a while, following a disastrous interview with the London Evening Standard.
With Tinder’s owners The Match Group set to float on the Stock Exchange on Thursday, the app’s founder came across like a complete tool in his interview.
As well as claiming that pictures of penises are “not who I am,” he told the story of a supermodel who can’t stop begging him to sleep with her.
Oh, and there’s never a good time to drop the word ‘sodomy’ into an interview with a mainstream newspaper.
The segment begins…
He’s desperate to impress on me how gallant he is, citing the fact that a “supermodel, someone really, really famous” has been “begging” him for sex “and I’ve been like, no.” She’s “taunted” him, he says, and “called me a prude.”
“She’s one of the most beautiful women I’ve ever seen but it doesn’t mean that I want to rip her clothes off and have sex with her. Attraction is nuanced. I’ve been attracted to women who are …” he pauses “… well, who my friends might think are ugly. I don’t care if someone is a model. Really. It sounds clichéd and almost totally unbelievable for a guy to say this, but it’s true. I need an intellectual challenge.”
He continues: “Apparently there’s a term for someone who gets turned on by intellectual stuff. You know, just talking. What’s the word?” His face creases with the effort of trying to remember. “I want to say ‘sodomy’?”
Rosette [Pambakian, Tinder’s VP of communications and branding] shrieks: “That’s it! We’re going to be fired!” and Rad looks confused. “What? Why?”
I tell him it means something else and he thumbs his phone for a definition. “What? No, not that. That’s definitely not me. Oh, my God.”
When he recovers he explains that Tinder is launching an education and workplace add-on that will help users identify their intellectual equals.
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