With Marie S'Infiltre, Dubai on angry camera - Liberation

Marie S'Infiltre, known for her narcissistic happenings on video, was the guest of Daily, Tuesday on TMC. The opportunity to discuss his series of videos on Dubai, viewed more than a million times on YouTube. The second and final episode, posted on April 7, even reached over 2 million views on Instagram. On the program, among other things: the dream life of influencers, tax exile, the exploitation of workers, prostitution, the fate of animals in luxury zoos, greenwashing. All in hidden camera, the people being filmed there without their knowledge, which since the release of the videos has led to many controversies on the form as on the substance.

"Striking Reality"

The youtuber's visit to Yann Barthès allowed her to detail the genesis of her triptych project on the United Arab Emirates. “It was December, I was extremely depressed in this confinement and I was jealous to see all these people who were going to have fun in Dubai”, says the actress before specifying: “When I arrived there, I was confronted with a reality that I suspected, but which was striking.”

She thus evokes the daily life of immigrant workers (mostly from the Indian subcontinent) who work mainly in construction and sleep crammed into unsanitary labor camps. The fate of these migrants, stranded in Dubai because of the confiscation of their passports by their employers, has been denounced for decades by NGOs including Amnesty International, which deplores their "overcrowded housing", "limited legal protection and limited access to preventive health care and treatment” in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic.

She also returns to the most commented passage of her videos: her hidden camera on the stars of reality TV. "I don't come across Jazz Correia and the other influencers by chance, I knew where to look for them. They put their lives on the networks so it's very easy to know where they are", she explains before specifying: "These are particularly approachable and friendly people with whom I had a fairly warm and nice." She claims to have “no news from them”. And yet, the controversies born of these interviews are numerous.

Lack of economic patriotism

First subject of debate: the remarks made by Jazz Correia (3.3 million subscribers on Instagram), the incarnation of the flashy Dubai prized by reality TV candidates who benefit from anonymity, do not pay tax and live a fastlife generalized – sometimes wrongly – to everyone living in the city-state. Marie S'Infiltre plays the exuberant fan in admiration of her and the other totems of express success such as Maeva Ghennam (3.1m subscribers), Fiji Ruiz (1.9m subscribers), Sarah Lopez (1.5m subscribers ) and Martika Caringella (1.1m subscribers). In a sardonic tone, she praises their beauty, their intelligence, their social usefulness. After a shower of compliments, Jazz Correia, not knowing that she was being filmed, delivers the price of a watch she has on her wrist and continues: "I earn 300,000 euros per month." The influencer lets go: “I don't pay taxes and I have absolutely nothing to do with it personally. No scruples about not paying taxes for people who, in the end, are the same people who come to rob us, to shit on us? No not at all !" and punctuates his tirade with virulent: “I hate France! Me very clearly, I hate it. The web is offended by such a lack of (economic) patriotism; Le Figaro, which nevertheless quenches the anti-taxes' thirst with lengthy articles and covers, is moved in its turn.

Second controversy: the method of Marie S'Infiltre. In the same sequence, the undercover continues to play her version of the Raven and the Fox 2.0, praising the plumage and ramage of Maeva Ghennam to obtain details on the cost of her plastic surgery operations. Once the video is published, the reality TV candidate feels cheated and explains herself in a story on Snapchat. “A madwoman came to see me. I thought she was a fan and since I'm nice to my fans, she sat down with me. And in fact, she made me a hidden camera! Except that it is forbidden to film a person without their knowledge, whether here or in France, you have to ask permission to broadcast the video. Something she did not do […]. She wanted to make a buzz, it's very serious what she did. I sent him a message, I attack him in France and Dubai because it is forbidden to publish the video without authorization. Asked about the complaint, Marie Benoliel, her real name, kicks in, saying that she has not received anything to date: "I take the risk of doing this, it's to show the system of influencers, a kind of collective responsibility: we have made these people into stars.”

The television interview and the series of videos arouse support and rejection on the networks. Some see it as a denunciation of a profit-hungry neoliberal system that uses venal personalities to promote itself. Others deplore the lack of nuance, contextualization, hindsight. People who have lived or are living in the Emirates believe that Dubai is not that.

Let us qualify in our turn: Dubai, it is not only that, certainly. But that's part of the packaging. And the territorial marketing campaign tied to reality TV stars is a political choice made by the petromonarchy.

“She is not a journalist”

Another point of tension: Marie S'Infiltre films "business lady", women who offer their sexual services for 600 or 700 euros a night. On the air, the YouTuber comments: “In Dubai, all women who are not Emirati or who do not work are seen as sexual objects: I met men who were flabbergasted to learn that I did not I was not a prostitute, it was an anomaly for them! Barthès then broadcasts a sequence showing a rich Lebanese man who tells the protagonist that another gentleman “will take care” of her. The infiltrator replies: "I hope he has a lot of money!" “Yes, I guarantee it,” says the interlocutor.

Many Internet users are indignant there again: in addition to choosing places known to be meeting places between wealthy people and "business lady", she maintains a vagueness about her identity and seems to affirm that in Dubai, all women are perceived as providing sexual services.

Women who live there insist that they feel safe in Dubai and do not face harassment in public places. Bonnie Garner, creator of the women's magazine BTY ALY, who has lived in Dubai since 2013, was indignant in an Instagram story. "Is it reasonable to invite Marie S'Infiltre [sur Quotidien]?" she wonders before continuing: “I saw and hated his ridiculous videos on Dubai. She's not a journalist. We have to stop the madness. I know where I live is far from perfect, but she keeps the fantasy factory running at full speed. There's more to Dubai than just a few dumb reality TV influencers."

Expatriates in the Emirates: "I do not recognize myself in the Dubai portrayed in the media and on social networks"

From these controversies that have not finished swelling emerge some lessons and a question. Marie S'Infiltre is indeed not a journalist. Despite the obvious deception and the questions it raises, the use of naïve fan subterfuge has allowed her to have conversations with people who refuse to talk to reporters. Should the use of the hidden camera, for the sake of revealing the truth, be reserved only for journalists? Problem which could be raised by justice if the complaint of Maeva Ghennam has been filed.