Post misusing photo of singer Conchita Wurst falsely claims to show US ambassador's wife
- Published on August 2, 2023 at 16:52
- 3 min read
- By Fikayo OWOEYE, AFP Nigeria
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“This is the new US ambassador to Jamaica and his wife (sic),” reads a message posted on July 28, 2023, on Twitter, which is being rebranded as ‘X’.
The message, published by an account with 25,000 followers, has been reposted more than 300 times.
The post was shared alongside a photo showing a bearded person in a ball gown holding the hand of a man in a black suit as they climb up a red-carpeted staircase.
“Jamaica is in a rage over this but the US says they will cut off all aid to Jamaica if they do not let him and his wife go there to do their job,” reads another part of the message.
LGBTQ people face discrimination in Jamaica, where sexual acts between people of the same sex are criminalised (archived here).
But the claim that the picture shows the US ambassador to Jamaica is false.
Austrian singer
Using reverse image searches, AFP Fact Check found the original photo attached to news articles from 2013 which shows Conchita Wurst, an Austrian singer and drag queen.
The photo was published by the Austrian newspaper Kurier (archived here) on February 28, 2019. The article’s headline translates as: “Opera Ball: Conchita in a white dress and with a bald head”.
The article reports that the photo was taken at Austria's annual Vienna Opera Ball by Kurier photographer Jeff Mangione.
An advanced search shows that Wurst posted the photo on her verified Instagram account on February 28, 2019 (archived here), where she can be seen in the same outfit. “Honoured to be at #wieneropernball2019 tonight,” she wrote.
The other person in the photo is André Karsai, Wurst’s business manager.
Karsai posted another photo of himself and Wurst at the Vienna ball on Instagram on February 28, 2019 (archived here).
The US ambassador to Jamaica is Nickolas Perry, who bears no resemblance (archive here) to anyone in the post. His appointment was confirmed by the US Senate on March 10, 2022.
Other false claims about the same photo have also been debunked by AFP Fact Check in English here, Serbian here, Portuguese here and Spanish here.
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