A US woman who tried to set up a white women-only yoga group via Meetup says she did it to highlight the popular group-hosting app's "blatant racism".
The event was a hoax created by host Pat Brown — who later revealed she was not looking for a yoga group to join as she "does not particularly enjoy yoga" — to "allow space for white women to gather in the name of yoga".
In the event description, Ms Brown said attendees could expect to be "surrounded by the supportive community of white people, white yoga instructors, and all around safe white spaces".
Ms Brown said she created the Meetup after tweeting the group hosting app and complaining about being "locked out of many of dozens of groups in my area because the organisers label the groups as black, African-American, mahogany, people of colour, etc".
She added: "This seems to be a way of keeping white people from joining.
"These women's groups, travel groups, photography groups, etc. which should have no need to attach race to joining requirements.
"I'd like to know why Meetup is allowing this blatant racism, which is against policy."
The Meetup Support account responded: "Meetup fosters communities of people centred on shared interests or common identities.
"Meetup is a diverse community and group identities can be centred around gender, race, religion, political affiliations, or language, among many other things."
A spokesman for Meetup confirmed the event had been removed from the platform.
The spokesman told Insider: "Meetup takes the integrity and safety of our community very seriously.
"We expect that every Meetup group follow our Community Guidelines.
"This group was removed when we determined it did not adhere to these policies."
Prior to its removal, the event sparked a swift backlash on social media.
Ms Brown was criticised for failing to understand the point of safe spaces for minority groups, with other users questioning her alleged inability to find a yoga group she could join in Washington DC, where the hoax event was slated to go ahead.
According to a 2008 National Institute of Health study, 85 per cent of US yoga practitioners were white and 79 per cent were women.
