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AIBU?

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Original poster

To think this has to be a hoax?

268 replies

Sashimimimi · 16/08/2021 13:06

British student went to Afghanistan on holiday Hmm Is now trapped in a safe house and has ‘accepted death’. He’s been live blogging about his situation on 4chan. Incel types hailing him as a legend.

AIBU to think this is has to be a windup?

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/brit-student-22-stuck-afghanistan-24768024.amp

OP posts:
gardeninggirl68 · 16/08/2021 14:20

@Qwerty789 its shit love,shit

pinkcircustop · 16/08/2021 14:21

I think you’re just being paranoid.

gardeninggirl68 · 16/08/2021 14:23

he'll be fine....he will get out.

FreeBritnee · 16/08/2021 14:26

Another Darwin’s award contender 🙄

ThatSunnyCorner · 16/08/2021 14:27

@PlanDeRaccordement

Lots of victim blaming here. Do we say this about murdered solo female travellers? That they’re idiots for being female and travelling alone to....well anywhere....and end up raped and dead on a beach? Or at a hotel?
But they are entirely different scenarios surely. Women are raped and murdered every day just because of their sex. Across the world, including in 'safe' countries.

This man is in danger because he travelled to an unstable violent country. The final US troop withdrawal began at the start of May, so it hardly came as a surprise to him surely.

Pedalpushers · 16/08/2021 14:30

Of course it is his own fault, but I find it pretty ghoulish that apparently loads of mumsnetters wouldn't care if he literally DIED for doing something stupid. Like, what he's done isn't a crime and yet people on here seem almost gleeful that he will get his comeuppance. Perhaps his dark tourism isn't so far removed from your own attitudes.

Tuscancat · 16/08/2021 14:32

He says in his Times interview that he likes risk. Also he couldn't get a refund on his flights so he decided to go anyway.
He is very silly and I hope he makes it out.

Tuscancat · 16/08/2021 14:33

Also his poor parents and family must be beside themselves

vegas888 · 16/08/2021 14:33

It was posted in the mail today that it was a hoax and he’s not really there

CuriousaboutSamphire · 16/08/2021 14:33

So many young people do such stupid things.

The Australian couple who were shocked to find they had no protection when backpacking through Iran spring to mind

The 10 English tourists arrested for 'pornographic dancing' in Cambodia

More recently those in Thailand who refused to abide by locl covd regulations because they were on holiday!

It's what leads many to decry the lack of common sense, or real world nous in some of them!

  • like the young drivers who learned their skills with SuperMario Smile
Againstmachine · 16/08/2021 14:34

Lots of victim blaming here.

If you travel to a unstable country, you aren't a victim you are a moron. Whilst we shouldn't blame victims guess what you go to somewhere like this something bad may happen, and you have gone in full knowledge that something bad might happen.

Whether it's victim blaming or not you don't put yourself in danger.

goodwinter · 16/08/2021 14:34

Lots of info in this Reddit comment including links and screenshots: www.reddit.com/r/unitedkingdom/comments/p4y6p3/-/h92cihy

Doesn't seem like a hoax to me unfortunately.

isthisareverse · 16/08/2021 14:34

@CorrBlimeyGG

I'm not sure some people understand how quickly this situation has escalated.
not that quickly that a "tourist" would be caught up. It must be a hoax.

Too quick for the people living there because it's their country and for whom it's not that easy to abandon everything, let's not be offensive towards them.

but a "tourist"?

RhonaRed · 16/08/2021 14:35

People will put their lives on the line to save this twerp.

Againstmachine · 16/08/2021 14:36

Of course it is his own fault, but I find it pretty ghoulish that apparently loads of mumsnetters wouldn't care if he literally DIED for doing something stupid. Like, what he's done isn't a crime and yet people on here seem almost gleeful that he will get his comeuppance. Perhaps his dark tourism isn't so far removed from your own attitudes.

I don't actually care if he died I really don't it's not nasty, I find my self worrying more about the afghans who are in a position through no fault of there own than some moron.

CuriousaboutSamphire · 16/08/2021 14:36

@vegas888

It was posted in the mail today that it was a hoax and he’s not really there
I can't find that, or anything like it!

Do you have a link?

isthisareverse · 16/08/2021 14:39

@Pedalpushers

Of course it is his own fault, but I find it pretty ghoulish that apparently loads of mumsnetters wouldn't care if he literally DIED for doing something stupid. Like, what he's done isn't a crime and yet people on here seem almost gleeful that he will get his comeuppance. Perhaps his dark tourism isn't so far removed from your own attitudes.
what I find ghoulish is the idea that someone will be killed trying to rescue such a moron, if that was a true story.

I would care more about him if no one else was going to suffer because of such stupidity.

DameAlyson · 16/08/2021 14:41

.....a trip to Chernobyl two years ago

You can visit Chernobyl on a properly organised guided tour; it's not like going to a warzone. A relative went some years ago, because he was seriously interested, not for thrills.

I don't know how or why this man went there, of course.

OhWhyNot · 16/08/2021 14:41

PinniGig that’s terrifying I wouldn’t have left the hotel after. We are mostly naive when we are young but I think there was an air of western arrogance with the people i was travelling with. I was on the first bus back to our resort!

Some people like danger and make stupid choices without thinking of the consequences for others

Tuscancat · 16/08/2021 14:42

He has posted selfies out there. I dont think it is a hoax. Although he also describes himself as a banker on the basis of doing some work experience at a wealth management firm.
So rather Walter Mitty...

NigellaSeed · 16/08/2021 14:44

Qwerty I agree. I don't want to hear that he's come to harm, but my first thoughts are for the safety of the people who have to rescue him and the people of Afghanistan.

EastWestWhosBest · 16/08/2021 14:44

@PlanDeRaccordement

Lots of victim blaming here. Do we say this about murdered solo female travellers? That they’re idiots for being female and travelling alone to....well anywhere....and end up raped and dead on a beach? Or at a hotel?
Victim blaming? Don’t be soft. Would it be victim blaming if he decided to stroll down the fast lane of the M1? Go into a burning building for shits and giggles?
Original poster
Sashimimimi · 16/08/2021 14:50

I find it pretty ghoulish that apparently loads of mumsnetters wouldn't care if he literally DIED for doing something stupid. Like, what he's done isn't a crime and yet people on here seem almost gleeful that he will get his comeuppance.

That’s not fair. Nobody has been gleeful about the prospect of him dying. Some people have expressed exasperation and disgust at his apparent recklessness and arrogance but that’s hardly the same thing as revelling in his misfortune.

OP posts:
EverybodyIsInteresting · 16/08/2021 14:51

Why is it relevant that he booked it in May?

Because there's a clear intention to go, he's not just jumping on the destination now that it's back in the news. He would have had to have done incredible insight if he was intending it as a hoax all along.

Of course it's possible that he didn't go. I've seen nothing tangible that supports that idea though.

RoyalCorgi · 16/08/2021 14:52

Here's the Mail article:

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9896377/British-student-claims-trapped-Afghanistan-going-warzone-HOLIDAY.html

Other newspapers have published the story as if true but the Mail seems more sceptical. And how often can you say that?