Removing Apps in the Morning Is Like Brushing Your Teeth for Gay People

Why in some countries in the Middle East, gay people can’t take selfies.

I woke up like this.

You must have seen it a million times, followed by #nofilter, #feelingblessed, and some random hashtags.

Selfie is the new way to express ourselves on social media ever since our phones had cameras. Instagram is filled with selfies, and it was supposed to be for everyone unless you are from Egypt, Tunisia, or Lebanon.

Meet Omar

Though, Omar isn’t his real name. It is a name to protect his real identity. Omar is from Egypt and in an interview with Reuters, he said every day he had to delete the mobile apps on his phones, specifically Whatsapp, Grindr, and Facebook.

To him it is like brushing his teeth, deleting apps is part of his ‘daily hygiene.’ The same reason we brush our teeth is to cleanse, and as a gay man, he has to cleanse his phone from apps that can lead to harm, or worse, death.

You see in Egypt, Tunisia, and Lebanon, gay people are targeted and most of the time it is the authorities who would confiscate someone’s phone and check if they have ‘selfies’ enough to incriminate a gay person and be prosecuted under laws banning “debauchery” and “prostitution.”

“It’s like brushing my teeth,” Omar said.

Anti-queer surveillance.

Everything you do online is in the cloud, your data is in some server across the globe. It is what we call digital footprints.

In countries like Egypt, authorities are looking for digital evidence that could implicate any suspect queer person of ‘deviant’ behavior.

It can include selfies, online text messages, phone calls, and dating apps. What most of us consider ubiquitous can be one step to be behind bars for gay people in these countries.

Not only can authorities confiscate your phones, but police in Egypt use sting operations to entrap people via dating apps.

In these countries technology is weaponized by the authorities to prosecute queerness. Not only the LGBTQIA community are at risk, but also marginalized people such as refugees and sex workers.

Authorities treat people’s phones as a virtual scene of the crime, and with cyber laws that require low evidence and high penalties, the manhunt for gay people is an open field in these countries.

Cybercrime laws are the new anti-gay laws

In these countries, cyber laws are used to prosecute gay people accused of ‘debauchery.’ While there are laws in these countries that criminalize unnatural sex acts and sodomy, authorities usually prosecute people using cybercrime laws and online offenses.

In Egpyt, police can arrest based on their looks, confiscate their phone and look for selfies that can be construed as ‘being gay.’

While most of us use mobile apps to find joy and our tribe, in these countries mobile apps can be used as evidence against you.

“I have to live like a spy” — Omar

Omar ends the interview by saying nobody knows who he is, and lives as a ‘spy’ in Egypt because that is the only way for him to survive.

Leave nothing on your phone

Lawyers representing gay people in these countries have this advice, ‘leave nothing on your phone.’

And a common tactic they use in defense of their clients is a loophole in the case, the lack of warrant when police search phones for incriminating evidence.

In conclusion, the next time you’re brushing your teeth think of that gay person who on the other side of the world, has to cleanse his phone the same way he cleans his teeth.

Digital hygiene is a daily habit gay people have to do to survive in Egypt, Tunisia, and Lebanon.

There are still parts of the world where being gay can lead to persecution and death. As long as there are laws that say that being gay is being a scourge of humanity, gay people in these countries can only do one thing, delete apps every day and live a double life.

Sources: Digital Crime Scenes, Sentenced for a selfie: Middle East police target LGBTQ phones