The Scoop: MyTransgenderDate is creating a safe, inclusive, and fun way for trans women to date online. We talked to the app’s founder, Maki Gingoyon, about the platform that’s creating a simpler avenue for trans women to find committed partners.
We all deserve empowering dating experiences. What that looks like is different for everybody, but a few things never come with empowered dating. Disrespect, discrimination, and violence are never an acceptable part of the dating experience.
We deserve experiences that respect and celebrate our identities, especially the identities that influence our dating lives directly. Heartbreakingly, it’s not uncommon for LGBTQ+ daters to be met with discrimination, harassment, and violence as they navigate dating.
This is why it’s absolutely crucial for platforms to foster safe environments for all users, especially the apps and sites that cater to queer daters. You want platforms created by people who understand your experience, in dating and beyond.
My Transgender Date is bringing an empowered dating experience to trans women looking for relationships with men. We talked to Maki Gingoyon, the site’s co-founder, about the platform, the nuances of trans dating, and why she founded the site with her partner.
Maki created My Transgender Date with a French entrepreneur, Cyril Mazur, while they were in a relationship. They wanted to offer trans women a safe and fun place to find authentic connections with men.
Before founding My Transgender Date, Maki, like many trans women, had negative experiences in the online dating scene. The sites she used weren’t geared toward serious dating, rather they fetishized and oversexualized the trans women on the platform.
Despite being platforms that were attempting to cater to the trans community, it was clear these platforms weren’t created by people who understood the trans experience. They weren’t fostering spaces where trans women could safely and effectively find genuine connections.
Maki and Cyril are supported by a team of moderators, writers, translators, and software developers, most of whom are trans women.
“It’s so difficult to find a platform where you don’t feel you’re being sexually fetishized,” Maki said. “I kept on encountering men who were only looking for casual actions online who always see trans women as sexual objects.”
Made for Trans Women, by Trans Women
In 2013, Maki and Cyril realized there was a big problem in the trans dating scene. They would talk about their experiences in dating and discovered that they both experienced similar obstacles.
“Especially as a trans woman, and him being attracted to trans women, it was difficult,” Maki said. “I would say it was more difficult for trans women because back then, it was almost impossible to find a good platform.”
Both Maki and Cyril wished they had a better place to go online to find potential partners. The sites available to them back in 2013 were lacking. Besides fake profiles, inappropriate behavior from men on the site became an expectation for Maki.
For Cyril, finding a way on a platform whose atmosphere was consistently oversexualized felt impossible. “He noticed it was very difficult for men to find serious trans women since most of the websites back then were more focused on sexualizing trans women.”
The state of these sites made for an unfortunate situation. The only sites available to trans women and their potential partners were riddled with issues that — even when possible — made serious, commitment-minded dating frustrating.
“So many of the sites were catered to people for casual sex and cam shows,” Maki said. “That’s what some daters want, but an overwhelming majority don’t. It was just the sad reality of the platforms back then.”
My Transgender Date started as a Facebook page created by Cyril in 2012 to connect trans women and their potential partners. As the group grew, they asked the members about their experiences and what they were looking for in an online dating platform. They wanted to build the site based on their users’ needs.
They heard the same story again and again, and it was nearly identical to Maki and Cyril’s own.
“As we looked at the experiences of trans women and trans-oriented men, it wasn’t surprising the stories were the same,” Maki said. “So I just thought, why don’t we make one? Why don’t we make something more serious, something that’s lacking and that the community needs.”
Cyril already has the idea in his mind, and asked Maki if she wanted to make it a reality together.
Maki and Cyril wanted to serve their Facebook community and daters like them with My Transgender Date. “It’s been such a learning process,” Maki said. “The site became live in 2013, and it just flourished from there.”
Emphasizing an Equitable Dating Experience
Fetishization is an issue that many trans people face in their dating experiences. Fetishization is when a person who’s sexually attracted to a trans person doesn’t see them as a whole person– they reduce them to aspects of their body and identity that arouse them.
Fetishization strips a relationship of intimate connection, and it doesn’t have a place in an environment where people are looking for serious relationships.
To Maki, building an equitable platform for trans women and trans-oriented men started with building an equitable team.
“I’m so proud to say my company is based here in the Philippines, and we really focus on hiring trans women,” Maki said. “We hire trans women for a reason. It’s easy for us to understand what trans women go through and for us to keep the platform safe.”
Maki is always looking to her colleagues for support and advice. Trans women aren’t a monolith. Users on the platform are going to encounter situations Maki hasn’t found herself in, and that’s when the wisdom of her team comes in. She said the team is driven by their shared experiences with many women on the site.
They also work hard to keep the platform free from fake profiles. The site is exclusively for trans women and trans-oriented men, and it’s free to use for trans women. Every profile is moderated and verified by a team member– that’s as hands-on as it gets in the online dating world.
“There’s a meticulous process with a touch of a human approach to verify if the profile is legit and following community guidelines,” Maki told us. “It’s important for us to make sure that we are not presenting men or women in a sexual way. Some members may find it strict, but it’s filling a huge need.”
Maki said on top of verifying profiles manually, they’re also launching a bolster verification system that users can complete themselves. This system is similar to the one you might find on another dating app, and it verifies your profile through a few selfies.
My Transgender Date is focusing on bringing the best possible dating experience to trans women.
“I can’t speak for every trans woman, so I have to ask other trans women about how we’re doing and how to deal with situations that are new,” Maki said. “It’s a collective effort and we’re growing. There’s so much compassion on the team.”
Real-Life Trans Love Stories
My Transgender Date has a track record of more than 10 years connecting people for amazing relationships. Just this month, Maki’s gotten three messages from users announcing engagements.
It was clear one of Maki’s favorite things about her journey with My Transgender Date was the real-life stories of users.
“You can probably see just how happy I am,” she said. “It’s just so amazing, because the first message I received was from this girl who I was constantly communicating with and she would give me updates about her experiences with this man she met on our app.”
Maki didn’t know this woman, she was simply a user on the other side of a screen. But Maki was paying attention to her feedback and stories, and when she got a message after a period of inactivity, she checked her phone in anticipation.
The user was engaged to the man she had met on the platform, and she couldn’t be more excited. “She sent me a video of the proposal,” Maki smiled. It doesn’t end there.
“Just last week, a friend of mine who I haven’t seen for a long time, told me she had to meet me right now,” Maki said. Maki had a busy schedule and asked her friend for a different date, but she insisted: You have to come over now.
“When I met her, there was a guy sitting right beside her, and they both looked so happy,” Maki said. “And I was so happy! They told me they met on the site, and I didn’t even know she was on the site.”
My Transgender Date doesn’t just say it’s about serious dating– it’s proved it.
“The response has been overwhelming,” Maki said. “Especially when I hear the stories about people getting engaged. That’s just beyond a success story for me. It’s a testimony that truly we are making a positive impact on this community.”
