The recent flareup in killings of nearly 60 gays and emos in Iraq has motivated the Iraqi Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP) to share this video and a number more on their YouTube channel.
Above, we hear the story of Ahmed, who has been escorted to safety in the United States by IRAP. In Iraq, he quietly dated a man for four years, but the relationship ended after the boyfriend was asking for too much money all the time.
The scorned ex blackmailed him by delivering pictures of them embracing (right) to Ahmed’s anti-gay uncles. After he fled to another country, he thought he was safe until the religious police came and arrested him while he was buying perfume. In jail, he tells the heartbreaking story of how he was raped by a police officer who he thought was a friend.
Not all folks are as lucky as Ahmed, who bought himself out of jail before being prosecuted. If you are fortunate enough to be able to donate to IRAP, please do. If not, tell a friend who is, or just raise awareness of the cause.
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EmmaMTF
He seems cute that is such a bummer. 🙁
CHIP1218
I am so happy to know that he is safe now. These religious police exist in almost every Muslim nation, and have even made attempts at capturing homosexuals in Canada and in Europe. They should be treated as terrorists and rounded up in Gitmo like al Qaida, or worse.
Alexi3
Let me get this straight; is this the Iraq that the United States sent its sons and daughters to liberate? I had to read it a couple of times, I thought surely they mean Iran, not Iraq. All those lives, all that treasure, and what we have to show for it is the “religous police” tract this man down in another country to arrest him and haul him off to jail. Just what sort of a “democracy” have we established? Thank God he is safe. I would like to know just what the President and Secretary Clinton have had to say on record about this anti-gay terror in Iraq.
Kayak
If the fundamentalists in the US had their way, they too would also install a reign of terror like that.
Andrew
Normally I don’t advocate anyone staying closeted but if you’re living in Iraq or Iran it would be perfectly fine to stay closeted if you’re lesbian, bisexual, or gay since otherwise you risk being killed by your family and by your own government.
Surprisingly many Fundamentalist Islamic countries are fine with Trans people and actually pay for them to get hormones and surgery, and they get a new ID and are considered the opposite gender by law.
Oh, ok
@Alexi3: This is why so many of us said war and killing is not the answer(which I must add that the current President did not start this war).
You kill one dictator and another possibly worse one takes his or her place.
Likewise there are people like this within our own country and we turn blind eyes or stick our heads in the sand. Our country feeds us distractions like television and shopping so we’ll ignore things going on at home.
To be honest we had no business messing around with other countries in the first place. Nothing is perfect in America, all those tax dollers could have gone to improving our country, but that doesn’t fit the plans of the upper crust who prints the paper we pretend has value.
Presidents are figure heads, mouth pieces, they are not running this country. The unseen old money that has been around since the nation began have kept their off-spring living like kings and queens while being smart enough not to claim the title or show their faces.
We didn’t go to Iraq to improve it, we went for oil, and as a show of power as an added benefit.
America now knows to keep it’s slaves happy and doesn’t call us slaves but gives us titles like “middle-class, upper-middle class, and poor”. So just know that there’s really no such thing as democracy there in Iraq or here in America. There are monarchies with no titles so we don’t rebel against Ceaser. Nothing has changed in centuries.
mikey
what a bitchie ass boyfriend!!!
Rooney
@Andrew:
Countries like Iran aren’t exactly trans-friendly. If they catch you, as a gay man, you are allowed to choose between getting the death penalty or getting an opperation to turn you into a woman. Iran has the second highest amount of those surgeries in the world, after Thailand-where it’s actual transsexuals who get the operation voluntarily, and not gay man who are forced to surrender their genitals and sexual identity.
Mike
Rooney actually yes countries like Iran are Trans friendly. Do some research and you’ll find this out, and yes actual Trans people in Iran get SRS voluntarily. Of course in Iran there are some queens who do get surgery so they can become a woman and marry a man but again this is their choice.
jerry2011
The video is listed as ‘private’ now. On topic, it is sad to see ex’s act so horrible for the person they once loved.
Jon2012
You can watch the video here:
http://vimeo.com/40236082
CBRad
Iraq sure aint the great world of the erotic Persian poets and Sufi mystics it once was.
jacknasty
@Kayak:
all too true. I’m sure if they could Santorum and Bachman would use it as a campaign slogan.
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