Grindr is the world’s largest social networking app for gay, bi, trans, and queer people. The reality for gays in the Dominican Republic is that it can present major security risks for users. The president of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Trans (GLBT) Volunteers, Yimbert Feliz Telemín warns people to abstain from using the app.
As reported in Diario Libre, Feliz Telemín said the app that gay and bisexual men commonly use to locate and communicate with others with the same sexual orientations, is also being used by others to commit crimes and aggressions, ranging from robberies to death. He mentions the authorities point to a recent case of 32-year old Frederik Perez Ventura, whose body was found on 17 July 2022 in Pedro Brand as an example of the risks.
“Grindr certainly in Dominican Republic has been a trap for gay men; a trap to be mugged and murdered. What happens is that also the population of gay men when they are raped, mugged and so on through that application usually do not denounce,” Yimbert said.
“The GLBT volunteering makes a call to homosexuals not to use Grindr and to denounce if they are victims of muggings or any kind of abuse through the corresponding lines,” added the defender of the rights of that community.
On the cases of deaths of homosexuals in which the levels of violence lead to presume that these are hate crimes, he says that there are several facts that make you think that, but that the treatment given by the authorities does not allow to determine that it is so.
“When someone is killed, society sees it as a shame and even demands justice, but immediately it knows about the sexual orientation of the deceased the religious, social stigmas prevail and some justify the death, saying that it was a crime of passion, and that it was between homosexuals who killed each other,” he said. “We live in a hypocritical society that justifies the murders of homosexuals,” he said.
However, he understands that in recent times the authorities have become more sensitive about the issue due to the training efforts that have been made and are working the cases more rigorously.
Read more in Spanish:
Diario Libre
El Dia
Diario Libre
26 July 2022