The LGBT magazine Identity has exposed a terrible sex-trafficking scheme involving male college students from Kenya that are duped into heading to the Middle East with the promise of jobs as flight attendants and administrative assistants.
After collaborating with corrupt immigration officials to secure their paperwork, though, the men are shipped off to the Persian Gulf and employed in abusive sex work in countries like Saudia Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
One of the victims, Paul, told Identity Magazine that he was promised a job with Qatar Airways but ended up suffering at the hands of these traffickers. “Most of them were sexual sadists. I was beaten, urinated on and even one time someone defecated on me. All this time I was being abused sexually and some even inserted hands and objects in my anus.”
The scam, said to be focused on Kenyatta University, is particularly attractive to gay men.
The high level of unemployment and desperation leads many gay men to seek greener pastures. Some are even told that they will be ‘international call boys earning millions by servicing rich men.’
The Middle East news site Al Bawaba notes that limited or non-existant sex-trafficking laws in countries like Qatar make stopping the practice “nearly impossible.”
How about we take this to the next level?
Our newsletter is like a refreshing cocktail (or mocktail) of LGBTQ+ entertainment and pop culture, served up with a side of eye-candy.
And Mark, a gay Canadian in the UAE, told Bikya Masr:
“We have seen a lot of the elite and super wealthy want to be gay, but that would go against their traditions, so instead they often marry and then hire or do this kind of thing, to have their real desires met. It is a problem of society not opening up to the gay lifestyle and forcing it to the background.”
Aiden
This is fucking insane.
TASTEY GOODIES
PEOPLE THAT R INVOLVED IN THIS TYPE OF “BUSINESS”- SEX SLAVERY R SOULLESS PARASITIC
OXYGEN-WASTING LIFEFORMS THAT ALLOW REPEATABLE, FORCIBLE RAPE ON HELPLESS VICTIMS-
REGARDLESS OF GENDER. THERE MUST BE WORLDWIDE LAWS THAT CRIMINALIZE ALL FORMS OF
SLAVERY IN ALL COUNTRIES. WE CAN DO OUR PART BY NOT PAYING FOR SEX W/ SOMEONE WHO MIGHT BE FORCED INTO A SITUATION LIKE THE VICTIM IN THIS ARTICLE. CONSENTUAL SEX IS FINE-
AS LONG BOTH PARTIES AGREE 2 SEX. EVEN IF IT MIGHT B GAY FOR PAY. NOT IF IT IS FORCED
ON THE GIVER.
Mykey
This is not new…
Kylew
omen and children have been suffering like this all over the world, so it’s no surprise that men are also falling victim. A small part of me says that if they thought that they were off to serve as male prostitutes (or what the article euphemistically calls “call boys”) then they perhaps deserve a little less sympathy than people who are literally kidnapped from the streets.
Not to make a moral judgement, but they knowingly put themselves in unknown harm’s way in a high risk business.
Furthermore, although religious society may put a higher price on those suffering under the sex trade, to me, this is not significantly worse than those who live lives abused as slave labour in sweat shops.
Nevertheless, I agree with the general sentiment that people who treat other humans as commodities like this, are scum. Now let’s recognise that politicians who treat us no better, are just as bad.
kia Jones
This is insane!! I pray that this behavior stops.
Kia
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/down-low-baller-kia-jones/1106278510?ean=2940013340978&itm=1&usri=down+low+baller
Aiden
@Kylew: What was the point of your comment. This isn’t a who’s had it worse story.
Kylew
@Aiden: If you find trouble understanding what I said, perhaps you can find someone to explain the long words to you.
Fitz
Think of these poor men the next time you see some ass from the suburbs
trivializing the human suffering by
dressing up “as a slave” for a Folsom parade.
jason
He was beaten and urinated on? Sounds like the dream resume of your typical Folsom Street folk.
shannon
WHAT IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE IN THESE “ARAB” NATIONS???? IT SEEMS THAT THEY ARE ALWAYS INVOLVED IN SOMETHING CRIMINAL…SCANDALOUS…NASTY….DEGRADING OF OTHER PEOPLE/RACES/GROUPS….GEEZ….I AM STARTING TO WAKE UP ABOUT THEM HERE…
Kylew
@shannon: Well, in fairness to them, there have been some pretty widespread child sex rings in the US, and the UK has had several kidnap for prostitution rings targetting Chinese women, and a recent one targetting Indian and muslim girls for arranged marriages.
Anywhere there are human beings, there will be slavery and trafficking. I don’t think it’s necessarily that the Arab countries have lower morals, but the geopolitical infrastructures may make it easier to operate such schemes.
Remember the Indian guy who killed 100 boys? The only reason they caught him was because he confessed. When there are millions of homeless people on the move, it makes it incredibly easy to abduct them without drawing attention. Most likely, the main reason this case came to light was because it was centred around a university, whose members are more likely to come from richer familes who would raise the alarm if their sns go missing.
Kylew
@Fitz: Oh Fitz, come on buddy! I’m a pretty uptight guy, and even by my standards, I think you need to lighten up! 🙂 A slave outfit is not glorifying modern day slavery – it’s a historical stereotype. Sure, the original concept it depicts was horrible in its own right, just like a frankenstein monster or celebrating halloween and the dead. But the costume is just a bit of scantily-clad fun – nothing more.
Fitz
@Kylew: I just really don’t agree. When a gay man calls himself a sub/slave/whatever, he is not calling himself an equal. So it’s either a light trivializing of human suffering, or it’s a heavy ass introjection of the negative self worth images he has been fed. Either way, it’s insulting both as a human being and as a gay man.
Kylew
@Fitz: Each person sees the world through the eyes of his own experience. Obviously, when you see a gay man dressed as a slave, you see some darker emotional or moral implication, and obviously, in a group that includes the whole sub/dom culture, there may well be esteem issues, just as there can be in being a top/bottom. However, as Freud himself said, “Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar”, and sometimes a costume is just a costume.
Or are you suggesting that people who dress as werewolvees secretly want to rip humans’ throats out, and those who go as zombies wish they were dead?
xtiaan
@Kylew: for someone who so obviously takes pride in the intelligence/logic of his comments, equating policticans you dont like with someone involved in human traffiking and forced rape shows quite a lack either…
Kylew
@xtiaan: So you’re telling me that a politician who takes 10 of the global population to war, endangering them all by proxy, over what oil? Access rights? Bruised ego? Is better than a sex trafficker? They are viewing human lives as disposable. Simply numbers on a balance sheet. To moralise because one is about – shock, horror – sex, whilst the other is simply politics is ridiculous. Whether you are bought and sold as cannon fodder or a rump for middle aged rich men, both leave you menatally scarred, and there’s a chance of death.
Kylew
10%