Marcus, from Tottenham, North London, had been enjoying a holiday with his parents when he met a fellow Brit at the same hotel. A holiday fling sparked and the pair spent time together until the girl, also from London, flew back to Britain.
In Dubai, if an adult has a sexual relationship with a person under 18, they can be prosecuted for having a sexual relationship with a minor. The relationship would be legal in the UK.
Marcus and his parents were set to fly back shortly after - but their plans were thrown into chaos when police knocked on their hotel room door. The “terrified” teenager was then reportedly hauled in for questioning without any explanation and held at the Al Barsha Police Station, DID said. He spent three days there, during which time he was not allowed to make a phone call or speak with his parents, it is claimed.
Hard to feel sorry about anyone travelling to Dubai.
You Europeans really gotta stop vacationing in fucking Dubai, there are way cooler places to fly to.
100%, I hated every minute of my layover wandering that shit-quality SimCity attempt, the bubble popped real fast once I talked to some locals.
I can’t wait for the sand to bury that cruel slave labor shitberg.
What did the locals have to say?
‘Please tell my family in Pakistan that I’m still alive’ probably
“The restaurants are mid.”
Like, you know, rest of the Europe
Fuck Dubai.
Signed me, who grew up there.
I will never understand why this place is idolized by so many people…
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Paris is too passé nowadays, you can’t be an asshole showoff when the place is full of peasants
Or why you’d even vacation there. How tf did they convince people to vacation in a desert?
A bit of an unwarranted answer, but many richer Pakistanis go there to buy stuff that isn’t easily available back home. Hence, they become cash cows for the ginormous malls over there (seriously. If you think American malls are big, you haven’t been to Dubai). It’s basically the closest foreign city we have direct flights to, due to our sanctions and all with India. For example, I got my Nintendo 3DS, and later the phone that I’m currently using (Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra), from malls in Dubai.
How much are plane tickets? Flying somewhere to buy things is weird to my brain.
Seriously, it’s like worse Vegas, and I don’t like Vegas at all
Really? I loved Vegas and can’t wait to go back. Full disclosure though I’m not really a gambler and we didn’t hit the casinos at all but there’s some really cool stuff in that area.
FOMO. makes it seem exclusive. For whatever reason at least 50% of humans are just wired to want to feel better than everyone else. The actual experience itself doesn’t matter as long as they can brag about it knowing that others weren’t able to achieve it. Dubai literally has ice shipped in from melting glaciers so that rich people can put it into their drink https://arcticice.ae/
If you are talking about social media it is likely that they aren’t allowed to post something negative about the country or else you can be fined. If you are working as an influncer in Dubai you’ll need to obtain an license which regulates what you can post but you basically pay no income taxes
The kind of Europeans who only go to Spain, Amsterdam, and Dubai
What’s with Spain?
Is the answer prostitution?
They have a pretty open love for western money. If you have the funds ($$$$$$$$), you can do pretty much whatever you want.
But if you aren’t extremely wealthy, you get to experience the oppressive true nature of the place.
Guess which group goes to Dubai and tells people about their experiences.
For the Middle East, it’s relatively progressive, from what I understand. That being said, that’s a low low bar.
I first thought you wrote “from the Middle East” yeah no. Dubai is Saudi Arabia with better PR.
💰 💵💰
I’m curious how the authorities were even aware of this occurring. The article says they were on holiday, so it’s not like there was much time. How did anyone notice their ages? Was it just fishing for a charge because of unrelated reasons?
Did you read the article?
The girls mother reported him to the Dubai police.
Hopefully her identity is revealed to the public and she faces some consequences for her actions. Maybe it’s already been leaked or released elsewhere, but it wasn’t in that article.
I don’t believe that detail was in the article when I read it, but I’m unable to find any copies from before the update. I can tell you the article now is very different from the original.
Either
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They’re always watching. I’m in tech and was taught in my security training - when traveling to countries with extremely strong surveillance, assume you are bugged. Family could be high valued and they wanted something from the parents. Probably a bit too tinfoil hat.
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Vengeance girl’s parents could be assholes/racist. As a dude, Ive had my share of “mommy & daddy doesn’t like me for taking their precious flower”. Multiplier in effect if they have a problem that I’m a PoC.
It was the mother of the girl. She got back to the UK found out about the boy and contacted the Dubai authorities. Apparently the girl was days off her 19th birthday too. It was in the news report when he was originally arrested.
Wrecked a young man’s life for some bullshit reason.
I think either of those are super plausible. There will be people where they stayed who are happy to snitch, no bugs required. On top of that, the UAE has one of the highest concentration of surveillance cameras in the world. Like 30,000 in Dubai. Throw in some facial recognition cross referenced with the list of folks on vacation or on business in the city and it’s real easy to find out who is spending time together, what their ages are, and what their kids will look like.
The second one happens all the time. Happened to me when I turned 18 before my then girlfriend. Her mom threatened me with jail and all kinds of shit even though it was perfectly legal and we were only a couple of months apart. She just didn’t like me or the fact that I was dating her daughter. Would have probably been worse if I had been a PoC.
You’ve left out the good old snitch, my understanding is they’re pretty darn strict with anything that involves women over there, so maybe someone from the hotel saw something and reported it.
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Dubai is a terrible place. People need to stop going there.
I even worry about transiting places like this.
We Pakistanis don’t have much of a choice… We often have to stop at Dubai or Doha if we want to fly to Europe or the Americas. (Although occasionally, you can choose Turkish Airlines and stop at Istanbul instead.) Though to be fair, Pakistan can’t be much more friendly than Dubai to a lotta people…
I won’t say I’ll never go to Dubai, but I will say I’ll do my best to never end up there.
As I’m reading this story I keep wondering…
How in the hell did the authorities even catch wind of this even happening?
Did someone report them?
Are all the rooms tapped and monitored Stasi-style?Mother of girl reported him after they had left and he was still there.
Teenagers in love are hardly subtle. Staff probably reported them.
What’s up with the breaks as if you’re writing poetry?
Just newline characters for formatting - it’s possible that whatever app you’re using doesn’t properly support the markdown. I had issues with that on Sync before switching to Thunder.
Poor Marcus - I have a feeling this wouldn’t be an issue if he was white.
If he was Arab
Fixed that for you. This is in the extremely oppressive Dubai/UAE where any kind of extramarital thing is very much illegal.
Yeah fairs
Backward degenerates.
“Wasn’t me.”
I really hope y’all ain’t defending his actions. The age of consent is the age of consent. That he couldn’t keep it in his pants is on him. It doesn’t matter what the AoC in UK is when you’re in another country.
The law not having a provision for such a situation is a completely separate issue. To criticise that is valid. It still doesn’t give him an excuse to break it.
The age difference is less than a year are you fucking insane, legality is not morality and we should always push back against unjust laws
Weird hill to die on but ok. Again, the law itself can be argued about, breaking it not really. No one made him jump in bed, nor is the law some violation of human rights. “Don’t shag people under 18” is not a tall ask.
The kid is 18. Were y’all assuming he was older for some reason?
It creates an few different odd possibilities though, in the UK you can be married before 18, let’s say an 18 year old wife and her 17 year old husband went on their honeymoon to Dubai, would they legally be allowed to consummate their marriage?
Would Dubai recognise their marriage?
Simply don’t visit Dubai then. Because “no”.
I too read every law of a foreign country before I visit them. /s
This arrest is shitty and the comment above you is stupid, but you should absolutely be aware of the laws of wherever you go. Being a visitor somewhere doesn’t bestow the right to ignore the law.
Yes, although I wouldn’t really expect a teenager to read up on age of consent laws, especially when traveling. They probably should, but I wouldn’t think them likely to.
