re: #111 Nyet

In the big stuff the right are uncontested champions.

The Iraqi WMDs alone are worth all the things you listed there.

(In the immediate context it was clear I was talking about fake quotes and screenshots on the web, and I stand by it. :)

I have no idea how to track who manufactures or accepts fakes, or how to ascertain intent. I really can’t tell the satirical from the sincere anymore. On one hand “everybody does it” seems likely just given Human Nature on the Internet, but that doesn’t seem to encapsulate what I experience.

There’s a difference in intensity and commitment to presenting fakes as real. This is anecdotal, but my mother gets wingnut memes sent to her through email, and she gets very ugly responses when she contradicts a claim…which she does because she’s a well-honed bullshit detector (her words, not mine), not out of political convictions. It’s actually really fascinating, since my parents were Republicans for fiscal reasons, and now Mom is being teased (both companionably and more vituperatively) about being a super-leftist, mostly because she debunks Internet stuff.

It’s a personal variant of the more general “Snopes is liberal-biased and therefore all its debunking are invalid” assertion.