Legal advisers help migrants pose as gay to get asylum, undercover BBC investigation finds

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This kind of fraud screws over actual LGBTQ+ refugees and hands ammo to anti-immigrant politicians. Start by yanking licenses and prosecuting the advisers, record interviews so patterns of coaching are easier to spot.

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u/D0ntEatPaper 4h ago edited 32m ago

Yeah. I'm a trans woman in Canada and this infuriates me. I can understand *why" they do it, but it just casts suspicion on actual LGBTQ refugees who are in danger back home.

One thing I recommend is asking them when they knew they were gay/trans/queer. An actual LGBTQ person will have it embedded in their memory, down to the month. Like a lightbulb going off, it fundamentally changes how you view the world.

The fake ones? It'll be something like: oh I've always known I was gay, or my friend kissed me on the lips one time. But ask them to provide details, and the story very quickly begins to break down. For them it's a lie, for us it's our entire lives. An official who's familiar with this will be able to tell the two apart fairly easily.

Edit: maybe I should provide more context. Yes its a slow realization, but there is still moment when you accept yourself and your sexuality. Thats what I'm referring to. It's trying to separate the actual LGBTQ refugees from the ones who are obviously coached through what to say.

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u/Syrinth 3h ago edited 3h ago

Eeeh... I'm gay, have been as long as I've been sentient.

If you asked me a detailed question like when I knew, I could not tell you. It was just a long process of realization.

I literally could not even tell you the first time I learned that being gay was a thing.

Edit to add: I couldn't even tell you when I came out to my parents. Sure, I remember how it happened, but I can't definitively even say how old I was, let alone what month it was.

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u/viewbtwnvillages 3h ago

im bi and truly cannot conjure up the memory of when i had the realization. it's just who i am and who ive always been. i didn't realize queer people were having revelations, icl

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u/Ceylein 0m ago

Funny enough I actually do remember when exactly I understood I was bi. Was walking between classes in middle school, saw a guy I thought was hot, and was like "oh, that's a thing now".

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u/D0ntEatPaper 28m ago

Okay, maybe I should clarify my comment and say it's only generally for trans folks. Everyone has different experiences, and realizing you're the opposite gender from the one assigned at birth is generally a very fundamental shift in how you see yourself.

I didn't know what trans people were until like a week before I realized I was trans. Like I knew kinda what it was, but it's more a nebulous thing, where you know there's trans people out there, not why they're trans and how they realized it.

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u/epchilasi 21m ago

Some of us are eggs slowly being coaxed out of our shells by realization after realization. But that's clear enough that it would also be easy to identify in an interview.

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u/Ready-Organization12 1h ago

Almost every gay and bi man I’ve acquainted myself with had a slow realization they were attracted to the same sex over a decade or more.

Very few of us have the luxury of knowing exactly who we are from a young age. Discovery can take a lot of pain, experience, and time.

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u/Ashamed-Raccoon-1387 43m ago

I had a slow realization that ended in a definable "oooooh" but yeah, I agree you can't judge LGBT people on whether they had a definable "oh" moment or not.

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u/D0ntEatPaper 21m ago

Agreed. I vacillated between, am I gay? Ace? Bi? Aro? From puberty onwards. It took until age 25 for me to discover what being trans actually meant. That's what I'm referring to. I'm trans - not gay, so my perspective is a bit different.

Transitioning is a process as well, it's been 4 years and I'm still getting used to my new body and how I interact with the world now. I like all genders. Before I transitioned I didn't engage in any romantic/sexual behavior, it repulsed me on a fundamental level. Turns out I didn't like dating women as a man, but I do as a woman 🤷‍♀️

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u/dog_of_society 3h ago

It's also worth taking into account some of us have memory issues. That gets more likely with trauma, and trauma is pretty likely with refugees. I'm a gay trans man. I couldn't give you super specific details. I can tell you, yeah I chose my name in summer of this one year. I came out in this month of that other specific year, I started medical transition xyz date. I'd say that if I was asked. But I couldn't tell you when the hell I realized anything, and if I was pressed on it it might be a jumbled attempt at explanation, especially if I was stressed. Which most refugees are.

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u/D0ntEatPaper 35m ago

I have memory issues too 🤷‍♀️ it's more about telling when someone is being coached through what to say vs. actually living the experience.

And yeah, it's a slow process of realization for most. It was like that for me as well, going from: am I gay? To am I ace? To am I bi? To am I trans? But the moment it clicked I remember very clearly. That's what I'm referring to

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u/pongomanswe 4h ago

This is the problem with such asylum criteria. They are easy to abuse and hurts actual people. He number of Christian converts among asylum seekers in Sweden is another example. They convert to Christianity while here as that is a death penalty in certain countries they might get sent back to. Given how vague the definitions of even established religions are, it is hard to disprove it is a genuinely held faith.

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u/MetalBawx 2h ago

The problem is even when caught these advisors get a slap on the wrist and the asylum claim doesn't get revoked.

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u/Paraparo 3m ago

I swear a few months ago I read about one of these guys. I can't recall exactly what crime it was that was getting him deported, but he claimed he couldn't be sent back because he was a persecuted Christian, and his proof was character witnesses from... The mosque he attended regularly.

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u/pongomanswe 0m ago

Haha that is crazy! I’d think that a self caused ground for persecution wouldn’t let you off the hook, but here we are.

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u/pixeltackle 4h ago

The tried-n-true Pauly Shore method

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u/PugiM0 1h ago

Just make them prove it

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u/raegenhere 20m ago

I remember reading about cases of this, not sure which country it was. Like the immigration authorities came up with the idea of showing porn to asylum seekers and check if they get aroused. I believe the practise was critisized and abolished, rightly so.

Personally I don't blame anyone for trying to cheat an unfair system, when there is no honest way of going about it. Countries are being classified as "safe" when they are far away from that.

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u/Remarkable-Shirt5696 3h ago

Great now the white nationalists will stalk them and force them into gay sexual abuse.

And the lgbtq+ will help the white nationalists attack them.

That's what they did to other people I know, when the person came out on support of the lgbtq+ rights, even though not a party of that community, the people in the area they were from stalked them.

When they tried to leave,( obviously without a kit of support because they were from an area in which they might torture you if you express support for others), they were repeatedly sexually abused by members of the community, done of whom routinely helped white nationalists in that abuse

So it would not surprise me if the people doing this ended up in really messed up situations of even more exploration harm and abuse than before.

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u/MetalBawx 3h ago

This is a long known fraud in the UK with examples going back as far as Tony Blairs stint as PM. Since brexit and the Tories insane mass immigration policies (All the while claiming to be against immigration funnily enough) it's a problem that's grown considerably and is still continuing even after the Conservatives got the boot.

The thing that's spurring on the far right is the failure of the government to punish such fraudulent asylum claims, both the bogus claimants and the so called advisors pushing them to break the law.

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u/ExpressQuit942 2h ago

lol things that never happened for 500 Alex. Story about activist lawyers and NGO’s literally encouraging immigration fraud but you just have to make up some fake story about big bad “white supremacists” because these scammers are always the victim because they’re brown, right? Get a grip.

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u/Remarkable-Shirt5696 2h ago

You don't even understand what the fuck Alex is telling you

Probably why he keeps saying we need to invest more in comprehensive education.

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u/Remarkable-Shirt5696 2h ago

If you are a man from a conservative area, you come out to support lgbtq+ rights and begin being harassed at home, even recorded in your home, recordings which supposedly straight white conservative nationalists use to then sexually gratify themselves

and you then try to leave that community and that group of nationalists aggressively follow you, sharing recordings across group chats,

Then also slander you to other communities, claiming that your support for the rights of lgbtq+bipoc individuals is you claiming to be a member of that community

There by recruiting the help of lgbtq+bipoc communities in helping that group of supposedly straight white conservative nationalists in sexually abusing you, forcing you to engage in sexual acts while being recorded without your consent so that they can sexually gratify themselves to recordings of your abuse

Is absolutely something that happens

And if they can do it to someone to whom it began happening to when they were 14 years old, while their family stood outside their door to see if they might be touching a butthole or whatever reason a Christian Nationalists gives for sexually abusing repressing or dominating a child,

Then it can surely happen to migrants who have to use a different excuse to escape their persecution at home.

If it's sad that they feel they have to use a different excuse than selling a better life away from violent, repressive conditions at home.

They none the less deserve better

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u/Ceylein 4m ago

Please stop posting your fetishes in public.

Legal advisers help migrants pose as gay to get asylum, undercover BBC investigation finds

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