27-year-old YouTuber Riyadh Khalaf is best known for his 2015 viral video in which he shared his Grindr messages with his mother, but the process of coming out to his dad was very difficult.
Speaking to Brendan O’Connor on Cutting Edge on RTE One on Wednesday night, Riyadh said he came out to his Irish mother first but they kept the news from his Iraqi father for a further nine months.
“He was brought up Muslim and in Islamic culture and in that world, as many of us know, it’s not okay to be gay most of the time. It’s full of shame, it’s full of fear. It’s seen as a sickness. It’s just not good.”
He said his father took it “incredibly difficultly” and revealed that his mother’s “main fear” was how to break the news to her husband. And their worst fears came true when Riyadh’s father attempted suicide. But things changed dramatically since. Watch the short video below :)