Listen to this articleA beauty influencer and “motivational speaker” from Tunisia recently took to Instagram to rail against gay people, calling them “perverts” and “mentally sick.”
The 23-minute video by @lady.samara was posted last week and has since sparked an outrage on social media.
In it, Samara describes homosexuality as “disgusting” and falsely claims that “gay people are trying to brainwash our children to become gay” and “corrupt our youth.”
“I do not respect homosexuality,” she continues. “This disgusting act [is something] I can’t stand seeing. I can’t see two men kissing. I can’t see two women having sex.”
Samara goes on to say she’ll never change her opinion on the matter and anytime someone brings it up “I catch fire.”
“The new generation is in grave danger because they see sassiness and homosexuality becoming normal,” she rants. “Stop this phenomenon!”
Lady Samara has nearly 500,000 Instagram followers, 250,000 YouTube subscribers, and over 200,000 Facebook fans.
Her homophobic outburst was not well-received by people on Twitter.
So this tunisian instagramer “Lady samara” said and i quote “i support human rights but not gay ones”.
Listen dear, human rights is ,and like we say in Tunisia; a whole hand and you cannot take or leave one finger of it.
Periodt.— Karim Ben Fadhel ? ? (@karim_bnfadhel) September 7, 2020
LADY SAMARA OUTTTTTT
— ? emotional machine ? (@scrpintp6w5) September 12, 2020
Lady Samara talking about the LGBTQ community and being disgusted like ma’am go educate yourself and stop speaking French as a matter of fact stop speaking at all??
— Mrs Bratchni ???? (@shaykarak) September 8, 2020
I hope a bird shits on lady samara today ?
— Nicolas Cage updates (@YassineIsDumb) September 14, 2020
After a change.org petition was launched calling for Samara to have her Instagram account deactivated, Samara attempted to walk back the remarks in a second video, saying she is “neither for … nor against” gay people.
“I am against homosexuality, but not against humanity,” she said. “I don’t like the sexual act itself, not the person.”
Then she tried playing the “I have gay friends!” card.
“I have lots of gay fans who actually do love Lady Samara,” she continued.
This isn’t the first time a beauty influencer has used their platform to disparage LGBTQ people.
Earlier this year, Sofia Taloni, a trans beauty influencer living in Turkey, encouraged her 650K followers to create fake Grindr profiles to identify and out gay men in their areas, resulting in one man committing suicide.
Related: Awful influencer encourages people to make fake Grindr profiles to out gay men
Queerty