Lyft is introducing a new feature that lets women and non-binary riders choose a preference to match with drivers of the same gender.
The ride-hailing company said it was a “highly requested feature” in a blog post Tuesday, saying the new feature allows women and non-binary people to “feel that much more confident” in using Lyft and also hopefully encourage more women to sign up to be drivers to access its “flexible earning opportunities.”
The service, called “Women+ Connect,” is rolling out in the coming months. Riders can turn on the option in the Lyft app, however the company warns that it’s not a guarantee that they’ll be matched with a women or non-binary person if one of those people aren’t nearby. Both the riders and drivers will need to opt-in to the feature for it work and riders must chose a gender for it to work.
So it’s reasonable to think that if your driver is a male, you will be harassed (and that if your driver is a female, you will not)? That doesn’t enable misandric bigotry in any way whatsoever. I mean, everybody knows that men are the ones who cause problems and women are the ones who suffer them.
My guess is that women don’t prefer to pay a higher price to get home safely but that’s just reality they live in. Also it’s an inconvenience to wait longer for a ride so why would they choose that just to spite men?
Also they (women) can probably decide from experience if they usually get harassed by men or someone else and choose to opt in to this program based on that. If it’s nonsense then they won’t do it because why would they.
Also only 23% of Lyft’s driver are women (based on a super fast search) so this actually happens to also help that issue as well indirectly as their demand grows.