Bumble’s new anti-celibacy ads are not going over as well as they hoped.
According to The Cut, the dating app rolled out a new commercial a few weeks ago in which a woman becomes a nun to “swear off dating.”
However, her plan is thwarted by a shirtless gardener and a phone with the Bumble app on it.
Bright yellow billboards also popped up featuring slogans like “You know full well a vow of celibacy is not the answer.”
The outlet reported that the new campaign seems to be a response to the trend of young women voluntarily remaining celibate due to toxic dating culture which is largely influenced by dating apps such as Bumble.
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The ads quickly went viral and faced backlash from many women online.
On one TikTok video criticizing the ads, actress and fashion star Julia Fox commented, “2.5 years celibate and never been happier.”
“I deleted Bumble, now they’re bitter,” someone else commented.
“And you wonder why they’re not on Bumble,” one TikTok creator said in a video discussing the reasons why women are straying away from controversial dating apps like Tinder, Bumble and Hinge.
“How do they not get it????” she wrote in the caption.
“I actually would rather be celibate and be a nun forever than get on Bumble,” one person tweeted about the controversial billboard ads.
Following the backlash, Bumble apologized for the ads and removed them.
“Women’s experiences are at the center of what we do at Bumble. As part of our recent marketing campaign, we included an ad with language around celibacy as a response to the frustrations of dating,” a spokesperson said, per PRWeek.
“This was not our intention and we are in the process of removing it from our marketing campaign, and will continue to listen to the feedback from our members,” they continued.
