No, it does not "say something about society" if you fall for fake screenshots. It just means you're gullible.

Let's talk about confirmation bias.

Yesterday, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis's spokesperson, Christina Pushaw, best known for her smearing opponents of Florida’s anti-LGBTQ “Don’t Say Gay” law as being “pro-grooming,” tweeted out a screenshot of what she claimed was an article from The Washington Post.

“More cutting edge journalism from the 49-year-old Washington Post activist infamous for showing up masked on random people’s doorsteps and sliding into the DMs of TikTok teenagers,” tweeted Pushaw, referencing the screenshot containing the headline, “This dog is the new face of online homophobia,” and referring to journalist Taylor Lorenz. Unfortunately for Pushaw, not only is Lorenz not 49 years old, but the article itself is not real. It’s a total fabrication.

Christina Pushaw on Twitter: “More cutting edge journalism from the 49 year old Washington Post activist infamous for showing up masked on random people’s doorsteps & sliding into the DMs of tiktok teenagers.” The image features the headline “This dog is the new face of online homophobia,” includes the subheadline “Internet trolls have turned a dachshund into a viral homophobic meme — and her gay owners don’t know what to do.” This article does not exist.

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Countless people pointed out that the article was not real, which inevitably brought out the most “I’m not owned” response possible from Pushaw’s defenders: But doesn’t it speak more about the media and the current state of the world that people can no longer differentiate between satire and reality? And the fact that the writer is Taylor Lorenz, who might actually write something like this.”

*sigh*

No. It does not actually “speak more about the media and the current blah blah blah.” It speaks to how gullible people are.

But first, just because it’s a little bit of fun, here’s a little bit about the dog from the nonexistent article!

Who's Afraid of Taylor Lorenz?

This dog, whose real name is Whitney Chewston, has become a meme. Basically, in March 2021, someone thought it would be funny to take this picture of the dog sitting next to a glass of red wine, and added the caption “not too fond of gay people” to it. Since then, people have added other anti-gay captions to photos of the dog, meant to be something of a satire of judgmental homophobes.

In March, Lil Nas X tweeted a request for more pictures of the dog:

MONTERO @LilNasX

can u guys send me more pictures of that homophobic dog

And he got responses:

AKA Mack 🦖 @cubano_sucio

@LilNasX

The joke is funny because every LGBTQ person has absolutely met someone like the dog meme. The whole thing is a joke.

“Homophobic Dog” has its own Know Your Meme page, and the actual dog’s owners (who happen to be two gay men) did an interview with them, taking the joke in stride:

But back to the point at hand: no, being duped into believing something fake “doesn’t say something” about society. It “says something” about your willingness to believe anything that supports your own worldview.

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Another example of this can be seen in this clip of Joe Rogan inventing a story, getting really upset about it, and… then learning that it’s fake.

KnowNothing @KnowNothingTV

joe rogan having a normal one (watch until the end)

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There’s a really good Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal comic by Zach Weinersmith on this topic.

Here’s a portion of it below. Go see the full version here.

Comic: Person 1: Anyway, I couldn’t believe it when I saw that news.” Person 2: “That’s because the article you read was false, and here is the evidence that it’s false.” Person 1: “Well, even so, the fact that I could believe it tells you something about the current state of affairs.”

This is such a tired trope that it’s been immortalized in comic form! And Weinersmith’s follow-up nails it as well:

Zach Weinersmith @ZachWeiner

Thinking about this more, I think what really rankles is it's the exact OPPOSITE of the correct response. If you believe something is true and it's not, you should re-evaluate your basis for believing, not confirm it.

Why, when we’re confronted with our own mistakes and gullibility do we retreat into a place where we excuse ourselves rather than asking, “How can I avoid getting fooled again?” This isn’t even a partisan issue, as there have been countless memes and faked screenshots of things Donald Trump supposedly said (but didn’t actually). Just today, I saw people sharing a fake Fox News tweet.

A screenshot of a fake tweet from Candace Owens quote tweeting a fake tweet from Fox News saying that Ivermectin causes “long-term bowel and urinary incontinence.” Again, this is fake.

Confirmation bias causes us to let our guns down. Whether it’s because you want The Washington Post to have run an article about Whitney Chewston (which, honestly, wouldn’t be a terrible article if it were framed around the life of pets that go viral as memes, taking on a life of their own) by a writer you don’t like, or if it’s just some schadenfreude about the idea of your political opponents pooping themselves, it’s easy to get fooled. The best advice I can give people when it comes to verifying stuff on the internet is that if it elicits a powerful emotion (happiness, anger, laughter, etc.), take a deep breath and do a quick search before sharing it. Especially if it falls into the “too good to be true” category. If you still fall for it, then that says something about you, not society.

Today’s tunes:

“What A Fool Believes” by The Doobie Brothers