A former Pakistani High Commissioner to India has fallen for some rather egregious fake news trolling this week, posting an image from a porn movie which he believed was actually a shooting victim in Kashmir.
When an online prankster posted the still image of pornstar Johnny Sins, alleging he was the victim of brutality at the hands of Indian military forces, who had blinded him with pellet guns, Abdul Basit couldn’t resist the too-good-to-be-true tale.
Former Pakistani high commissioner to India Abdul Basit, mistakes Johnny Sins for a Kashmiri man who lost vision from pellet. Unreal times these, really. pic.twitter.com/9h1X8V8TKF
“Yousuf from Ananthnag lost vision from pellet… pls raise your voice,” the now-deleted post which fooled the former diplomat read.
Though the tweet’s time online was short-lived, it was more than enough time for the collective digital consciousness to unleash a stream of memes deriding the former politician for taking the bawdy bait, trying to outdo each other, but all seemingly failing to top the original lampoon.
Some used stills of former pornstar Mia Khalifa, whom they portrayed as a crying Kasmiri girl. “Can’t the media see tears of this Kashmiri girl,” one joker wrote.
Sins has graced the sides of buses in India before, which might explain how people online recognised him so quickly.
The incident comes mere days after a Pakistani senator tagged the popular card game UNO instead of the United Nations in a tweet criticising Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.