Updated: Manchester: Gay paramedic says he was refused entry to a mosque to treat heart attack patient

From the Daily Star. This was from a Radio talk show, therefore not corroborated evidence given under oath. But what distinguishes anecdote from evidence?  This is one man’s ‘lived experience’. Updated below. 

A gay paramedic from Manchester has claimed he was refused entry to a mosque to treat a heart attack patient because of homophobia. Speaking on TalkRadio, Tom claimed he has also received threats of beheading and, while most Muslims don’t discriminate against him for his sexuality, he alleged some areas of Oldham are “strict” and “no go” areas.

He says: “They took one look at me, because I’ve got piercings – I’m an openly gay man and I’ve got no problem with it whatsoever – and as soon as I got up to the door with my crew member one of the guys turned around to me and said, ‘Excuse me, what’s your sex?'”

Tom says he was baffled by the question and responded: “I’m a male.”

He added: “He turned and said to me, ‘You look funny.’ I said, ‘Do you mean I look gay?’ And he said, ‘Yes that’s what I mean,’ and I said, ‘Well I am gay.’

At that point, he claims the man told him: “No, you can’t come in my mosque.”

Tom says he and his crew member had to tell the controllers that they could not treat the heart attack patient and another paramedic was called to the scene in a car. He claimed: “They even questioned him if he was a heterosexual male.”

Tom didn’t name the mosque where he alleged this took place but said he had complained and North West Ambulance Service had spoken to the Imam.

He also alleged to have experienced discrimination and violent threats in previous incidents.

“I’ve been requested to leave properties, I’ve been threatened, I’ve even had emails sent to work saying they would quite happily decapitate me on the side of the road…There’s certain areas I won’t go without a police presence,” he said.

Tom says he has been on “hundreds” of calls to Muslim homes that have been free of incidents and the homophobia he experiences is in a minority of cases.

Daily Star has contacted North West Ambulance Service NHS Trust for comment.

Muslim website 5 Pillarz says this story is ‘fake’. Their justification is that  North West Ambulance Service have confirmed that no such person works for them and when talkRADIO tried to get back in touch with “Tom” he didn’t return their calls.

Talk Radio reply that while they have removed the audio clip (mindful of that poor teacher in Batley I expect) they took the call  “in good faith.

Cristo said: “We couldn’t get in touch with him (Tom)…. Now that could be that we’ve been duped. It could be that his story was an absolute load of rubbish and that the trust I have when people call this show was broken and that my team were duped by that call. And we were I’m really sorry. It could also be …. perhaps he wasn’t using his real name and he doesn’t want to be contacted because of the fact that he was essentially telling us about an aspect of his work, and as you know I’m passionate about challenging homophobia, and that could be the reason why we couldn’t get in touch with him.”

So I’m keeping the story up. I don’t believe that nobody named Thomas works for such a large organisation as North West Ambulance Service NHS Trust, that no gay men work  for such a large organisation as North West Ambulance Service NHS Trust, or no man with a piercing works for such a large organisation as North West Ambulance Service NHS Trust. I suspect he used a ‘nom de chat’ for his own protection. 

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One Response

  1. Oh, yes. This story is fake news.
    You should remove this ‘news’ article.
    If Islam is false, why do people have to lie to prove it’s false?

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