Numerous Moroccan Queer Men 'Outed' by Trans Influencer
A social media campaign aimed to out Moroccan gay men has escalated into a crisis for them in a country where homosexuality is criminalized, the New York Times reports.
In the past two weeks, 50 to 100 men were outed, LGBTQ activists say, as they shelter at home. In three cases, activists say the men were kicked out of their homes.
"In interviews, many others in the country said they had been blackmailed and threatened, and thousands fear that their photos will be spread on social media," writes the Times. "In Morocco, a North African kingdom where homosexuality and sex outside marriage are crimes, gay people are painfully accustomed to the feelings of peril and rejection, and many keep their sexual identities under wraps."
One anonymous man said: "I am just waiting for my death sentence."
After photos of him were leaked online, a different anonymous man said: "I'm frustrated and scared."
The crisis was caused when Moroccan transgender Instagram personality Naoufal Moussa, or Sofia Talouni, was insulted about her sexual orientation. She then encouraged woman to download hook-up apps like Grindr and Planet Romeo to create fake accounts and gather pics of gay men, which were then posted on private and public Facebook pages.
"These apps will show you the people who are near to you. 100 meters, 200 meters, even just one meter, just next to you in the living room," Moussa said in a video. "Since everyone is together at home, it could show you your husband in your bedroom, it could show you your son who might be in the bathroom."
In another video, she said, "her aim was to reveal the hypocrisy of Moroccan society by showing her attackers how many gay men were living in their vicinity, perhaps even in their own homes," the Times writes.
In another of her numerous Instagram videos, Moussa says that homosexuality should be outlawed in Islamic countries.
"Personally, if I ever find Out that Morocco recognized Homosexuality, I'm the first one that's going to stand up. We shouldn't recognize homosexuality, we are an islamic Country," she said.
But Moussa's outing campaign has only led to putting queer mens' lives in danger.
While their privacy rights have been violated, in Morocco same-sex behavior is criminalized, "so the victims could find themselves trapped in a tragic catch-22 situation," Ahmed Benchemsi, the communications director for the Middle East and North Africa division of Human Rights Watch, told the Times.
LGBTQ activists, both in the U.S. and Morocco, succeeded in getting Moussa's Instagram account suspended.
"We don't allow people to out members of the L.G.B.T.Q.+ community because it puts them at risk," the spokesperson wrote in an email to the Times. "We've disabled Naoufal Moussa's Facebook and Instagram accounts, and we're taking proactive steps to find and remove other content like this."
Moussa's fame has grown in recent months when she used social media "to talk crudely about sex and to entertain her followers in an insolent and confrontational manner in vulgar Moroccan Arabic. That has made her an object of fascination and horror to her more than half-million followers," the Times writes.
She especially is said to loathe LGBTQ people who do not make their sexual orientation known.
Initially it was a conversation with another Instagram user (whom the Times identifies as Yassine, though not a real name) who went live with Moussa on the platform. She then compelled him to acknowledge he was gay by threatening to post revealing photos of Yassine with another man that Moussa had somehow obtained.
"I was shocked and then very scared. She destroyed my life," Yassine told the Times.
"Everybody is sending the video and saying bad things about me," he said. "My mom, also, she's very sad. She's not talking to me anymore. My friends at the gym, friends I went to school with — they all blocked me."
It was when shocked Instagram users responded negatively to Moussa's tactics in real time that she suggested followers download the gay hookup apps.
"My dating life in Morocco was somehow OK as long as my partner and I were being super discreet and cautious," said one gay man who asked to be identified only by his initials, N.A. He also told the Times that his family hasn't seen the photos and that he's staying with his grandmother and "waiting in fear for something bad to happen."
Both Grindr and Planet Romeo were contacted to see if they have posted anything on their sites warning Moroccan users of this security breach, the website Insider reports.
"We were shocked when we were contacted by the LGBT group in Morocco. We took immediate action by sending a security message to all our 41,000 users in Morocco, we blocked all profiles created from the time this person addressed her users, and contacted Facebook to have the group page taken offline," Jens Schmidt, the founder of Planet Romeo, told the website. "Through our work and our personal experience, we are aware that so many more people face similar threats in numerous countries."
A Grindr spokesperson told Insider in a statement that the company also took precautions to warn users in Morocco of the situation.
"We are saddened and disturbed to hear of those who would do us harm just because of who we love. We will never rest until the rights of LGTBQ+ people are universally accepted," the spokesperson said. "The safety and security of our users is a core value and as such we are deeply committed to creating a safe online environment for all of our users. As we learned of the troubling reports in Morocco, we responded quickly with warning messages in both the Moroccan dialect of Arabic and French to let our users know to take extra caution at this time."