Gay man ‘tortured’ in Qatar for his sexuality returns home after 'deeply disappointing' sentence

jeffw@lemmy.world to World News@lemmy.world – 142 points –
Gay man ‘tortured’ in Qatar for his sexuality returns home after 'deeply disappointing' sentence
advocate.com
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Not everyone can afford to not take work. Queer people are more likely to be fired and refused jobs because they're queer, and that frequently means needing to take horrible jobs in horrible places just to survive.

but does he really think

I don't mean this in a snarky way, try waterboarding yourself for 5 seconds and then consider if you would be in any way rational after sustained torture. Torture fucks you up in horrible ways, and I don't think we should be criticizing this man for how he reacted to the injustice he faced.

He's British-Mexican. I am sure he had several choices before Qatar to go get a job. I understand most of us can't afford to not take work, but work shouldn't come at the expense of your life. And in shitholes like Qatar, that is a possibility too plausible to just ignore.

Lastly, I understand that right after torture you're never rational. But he tried to appeal the case, and he's disappointed that they ignored the appeal. I doubt he made these declarations right after the torture. He probably made them days or weeks later, I'd assume he regained his sanity by then.

You're spending a lot of time scrutinizing the actions of a man who was just tortured for being gay. What are you trying to argue?

Nothing. I just explained my position. Which I thought needed clarification after your comment about it.

I think that's a pretty fucked up position to hold I'm not gonna lie.

I don't see why. I'm not saying what happened to him was deserved. I'm just saying that expecting a country like Qatar, with a not short list of human rights violations (among the things) , accepts they violated human rights of a gay foreigner (and yeah, this is relevant for a country that hates both gays and foreigners) is unreasonable.

You're hyperfocusing on criticizing the man who was just tortured for being gay instead of looking at the broader context of what happened, or trying to consider how you would react in that situation. Being victimised in this way is absolutely fucking horrible, and it fucks you up forever. I reacted very similarly to situations where I was victimised for being queer, and those were nothing like what this man has been through.

It's impossible to imagine what this man has been through in any meaningful way, but you should take a bit to just think about what this man went through, how badly he's been hurt to need to go to Qatar to find work, and the defeat he must feel knowing that he is forever changed by an experience that nobody will recognize or do anything about.

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Likewise I think your blind ignorance of how stupid it is to go to a country like Qatar while gay is pretty fucked up and gonna cost other people the same fate.

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