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How to Spot a Media Hoax

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Media hoaxes are simple to spot once you reject the narrative and start thinking for yourself. The narrative is that Americans are hateful bigots. We hate gays, blacks, Jews, Mexicans, Muslims, women, and … well pretty much Americans hate everyone except white Christian men. (How many white Christian men are even left in America?)

This guide will help you avoid hoaxes while becoming a more critical thinker.

Step 1. Reject the narrative.

Step 2. Examine the process.

Step 3. Fact-check (if possible).

Step 1. Reject the narrative. 

If hate crimes are common in America, why are there so many hate crime hoaxes?

BlackLivesMatter is sending death threats to itself and other students.

Activist admits to sending racially threatening tweets at Kean University

ELIZABETH – A self-proclaimed activist has admitted to posting a series of racially threatening Twitter messages targeting students at Kean University last fall. Kayla McKelvey, 25, of Union Township, pleaded guilty to a charge of creating a false public alarm.

College professors are claiming they are victims of racist policing.

Dashcam video released showing arrest of Princeton professor who claimed on social media her ‘blackness is not incidental to this matter’

Dashcam video was released Thursday showing the cordial arrest of a black Princeton professor during a traffic stop, about which the academic took to social media to say that race was a factor in how she was treated by arresting officers.

Muslims are burning down their own mosques.

Houston Muslim Charged With Lighting His Own Mosque On Fire

Using surveillance video from other area businesses to identify the arsonist, Gary Nathaniel Moore, 37, was arrested and charged with starting the Christmas Day fire that devastated a Houston, Texas mosque. Moore is a devout Muslim who attended this same mosque for years, praying up to five times a day every day of the week.

Candid media pictures are actually being staged by activist groups and coordinated with the mainstream media.

Spontaneous-looking moment with girl, Pope Francis was stage-managed by advocacy group

WASHINGTON – Sophie Cruz’s brief encounter with Pope Francis during his parade in Washington this week appeared to be the kind of spontaneous moment that is so endearing about this pope: an initially hesitant young child wrapping an arm around his neck as he offers a kiss and a blessing.

But for 5-year-old Sophie, the moment unfolded as perfectly as it was scripted by members of a coalition of Los Angeles-based immigration rights groups.

UPDATE: Less than an hour later, this media hoax appears. This is a clear case of a media coordinating with someone to feed Obama “feel good stories.”

Feminists who lose debates claim they are receiving rape threats online.

Why Do Feminists Cook Up Stories About ‘Misogyny’ When They Lose Debates?

Of the 567 tweets we examined, many were supportive. Many, of course, challenge her and discuss her debate performance. We found no instances of outright misogyny, though there were of course plenty of boisterous comments and lots of criticism of Grossman’s arguments. There were a few obliging comments about her looks, as there were about mine, but I presume Grossman is mature and sensible enough to take compliments as intended.

Video game activists falsely accuse prosecutors not investigating death threats against them.

Ohio Attorney: Brianna Wu ‘Wasted Time and Resources’ over #GamerGate

The office of Ron O’Brien, prosecuting attorney for Columbus, Ohio, was deluged with emails and phonecalls that “wasted time and resources” following an online campaign whipped up by Brianna Wu, a controversial video game developer.

The same activist claimed to have a video of a GamerGate supporter showing up at one of her talks. Where is the video?

And there is of course mattress girl, Duke lacrosse, and the Rolling Stone/University of Virginia rape hoax.

Want more hoaxes?

If the narrative were true, we’d have enough real hate crime victims out there. People wouldn’t have to create hoaxes.

Step 2. Examine the process. Ask: How could this have happened?

Imagine you read an article that says, “This gay couple had a bigoted slur written on a receipt by their waiter.”

Examine what you know about human beings.

When is the last time a waiter said anything rude to you or anyone else? People are terrified of losing their jobs.

If the waiter wrote that message on the receipt, she’d be fired. Do people risk their jobs to insult someone?

Writing a slur on a person’s receipt (or on their Whole Foods cake) is a bit confrontational, isn’t it. What would happen if the person saw that hateful message? Do people – especially people who need to work a job as a waiter or server – want to start a fight at work?

Always look at the process behind what happens and you’ll see that the hate crime hoaxes make no sense.

Examine the process behind the gay whole Foods cake hoax.

  • You’re at your job making $12 an hour at Whole Foods, in Austin, Texas, which has one of the highest gay populations in the U.S.
  • A customer requests you to write, “Love wins,” on a cake.
  • In one of the gayest cities in the world, at one of the most gay-friendly stores in the world, you write, “Love wins, FAG.”

Are people ready to be fired from their jobs for starting a fight with a customer by calling them a slur? Where are these people?

Step 3. Fact check (if possible).

The next step is to fact check. People will say, “Oh man, Trump supporters have been calling me nasty names on Twitter!”

Run a search of their notifications on Twitter user the term they say others are using with to:username.

For example, wannabe news maker Montel Williams accused Donald Trump’s supporters of dropping n-bombs left and right. I ran a search. Hoax.

Bonus: Check your confirmation bias.

How badly do you want the story to be true?

If a story proves that your view of the world is righteous and true, step back for a second. Demand even more evidence that you might otherwise want to see.

Some Trump supporters fell for this hoax: “BREAKING: Black Trump supporter shot and killed by Chicago protesters.”

While no one wants a black Trump supporter to die, isn’t that story a bit much?

People want Trump to have black supporters, because that counters the media narrative that Trump is racist.

And while you don’t want anyone to die, boy it sure felt good to say, “LOOK! These are actually the bad guys.”

Mindset is critical thinking.

Spotting hoaxes is the product of my analytical mind

Start living life more consciously. Examine your biases about the world. Question the news, and even more, question yourself.

That’s Gorilla Mindset.

  • Daniel Freeman

    The human brain is a rationalization engine. You have to question everything you think.

    But you are not in a vacuum. There are people that want to push a Narrative, and it’s good to know how it works. There is a hierarchy of identity, and if you’re on the wrong side, then you’re screwed. Too bad, so sad, fellow cis-het white males.

    But hey, it speaks well of us that when people want to speak poorly of us, they make it up.

  • Yes. Yes. Yes! Excellent article, Mike. I wouldn’t say that I’m an expert at spotting hoaxes in any stretch of the imagination so when one does pop up and my radar goes off, you know it’s extremely sketchy. This gay pastor think had hoax all over it from the get-go. The fact that people just bought his story without any skepticism is pathetic. Listen and believe is alive and well…

    • Libby Stack

      From his post that said “this is not the cake I ordered” the pic shows the cake in a window box. Is that man so stupid he did not see it when picking up the cake? No one saw this when he was paying for the cake at the checkout? If this had really happened, he would have been somewhat justified in pitching a fit at one of these points of purchase.

      I wonder how many hours it took for this jerk to try and match the blue icing color and possibly look for someone to try to imitate the lettering. I used to do a lot of cake decorating. If you’re not used to doing writing with icing, It’s not exactly the simplest thing in the world to do.

    • Mike Cernovich

      It is, but we can change the culture by calling it out.

      • White Knight Leo

        Isn’t that the SJW line?

        • TrollingThunder

          The difference is that we use facts and sanity to call out lies and delusions.

          • White Knight Leo

            “It’s cool when we do it” is a dangerous line of reasoning to take.
            .
            I agree with you, but that doesn’t change the fact that we’re talking about using the tactics and weapons – and even the justifications – of the enemy.

  • codemonkey

    Im very sad about Montel. What a disillusionment.

  • o positive

    Mike, I know you don’t like “soliciting” for donations or w/e to help you fund DangerandPlay Media, but I think whenever you write about hoaxes and expose mainstream media, you really should post the link to how people can donate to you.
    I hope this particular post gets read by a lot more people than your usual followers.
    Everyone shouldn’t keep falling for the media’s hoaxes.

    • Mike Cernovich

      I do that for some of the posts that go big time viral.

  • Jose Fernandez

    Why does every movie i watch have an effiminate male sucker character who screws everything up and a female heroine, who kills every bad guy? Wtf? Who is in charge of the movie department? Gay transexuals? How do we fire them and get real people on charge?

    • Mindbody Medic

      Don’t ask awkward questions, you won’t like the answer . See if you can notice a pattern

  • TSK

    The purpose of media’s objective is to create overblown exaggeration, cause division and mistrust among the population. In order to make sure the division is there in long term effect, the media needs to create a sense of feeling that one group is getting shafted by other group (usually media plays this based on race, religion, politics, sexual orientation, etc). This results in finger pointing and blaming (it’s always someone’s fault or the system is keeping me down mentality). This cycle never ends and it creates distraction for people from focusing what really matters (job offshoring, economy). But since majority of people are riled up already and emotional, they will easily fall into the media trap.

  • Mastriani the Machiavellian

    There it is, thank you Mr. Cernovich. Well done on all counts.

    57, (so far studied), cognitive biases. The only one worse than confirmation bias – blind spot bias, the inability to even process that you are using cognitive bias to make a judgment.

    The “feelings over facts”, SJW, PC punditry crowd are dangerous, more dangerous than they are being recognized for, and their consequent effects on society, education, media, politics.

    Positive note: sales on fluffy bunnies and rainbow unicorns may save the economy!!!

  • Bryce Byerley

    >Some Trump supporters fell for this hoax: “BREAKING:
    >Black Trump supporter shot and killed by Chicago
    >protesters.”

    That’s true. I fell for it and passed it around. That required a quite a bit of self reflection on confirmation bias when I found out it was true.

  • White Knight Leo

    I was quite proud of myself for spotting the Clock Boy hoax when I first read the story. How did I spot it, you ask?
    .
    I said to myself (and others to whom I spoke), “Why is it that this story broke 12 hours ago, and yet no one has put up any pictures of the thing that was supposed to be a bomb?”
    .
    And then someone got pictures up, and it turns out that the thing actually did look like a bomb. I felt… well, to use a phrase I heard from a Youtuber I like, I felt like I suddenly grew a third dick.

    • ncgh

      Both sides went into confirmation bias on that one. The people ‘looking’ for Islamophobia and the people anxious to see a common electronic circuit board which exists in every home in America, as a a bomb.

      • White Knight Leo

        The device looked like a bomb. And Clock Boy was arrested because Texas has a law against hoax bombs specifically.
        .
        We also know this was a political stunt, because his elder sister was expelled for the same thing a while before he was arrested. And he father was a big-time ‘anti-Islamophobia’ political activist.

  • Char Jorgensen

    Wonderful, some don’t think that anyone would fake a racist or sexist attack, but it’s a tale as old as time. People will do anything to grab power and fame. Especially if they are absolutely incorrect and are determined to make themselves look morally superior.

  • hecramsey2

    or the Iraq war. Talk about a media hoax. Yikes.