5 Dangers The Media Blew Ridiculously Out Of Proportion

5

Outlets Spread Panic About An Online "Suicide Game" (Without A Single Confirmed Victim)

Three subjects that continually baffle the media are teenagers, games, and the internet in general. The "Blue Whale" panic was a combination of all three, so of course they got it three times as wrong. Supposedly, this online game led to the deaths of more than 130 teens in Russia alone. How? Simply by presenting daily challenges to them over the course of 50 days, ending with "and now, commit suicide." The implication seems to be that perfectly well-adjusted kids got to that point and went, "Oh well, I did the other 49 ..." The mastermind behind this alleged game was even arrested in May 2017 ... and August 2017, and June 2018.

Daily Mirror

Metro

The SunThese are three separate people, by the way, not one who keeps breaking out of jail.

Everyone from the venerable BBC to the non-venerable Daily Mail did multiple articles on "Blue Whale" -- a panic entirely created by the media itself. Out of those 130 deaths, not a single one has been conclusively linked to any online fads. The figure comes from an article by a Russian newspaper, which based their data on the apparent fact that many young suicide victims in Russia belonged to the same online groups, and some of those groups included some morbid games, so those games must have led teens to kill themselves. Because it's not like depressed people would naturally hang out in the same places or anything.

As for the supposed "masterminds," every subsequent report about the first one was sourced (read: lazily reworded) from the same two Russian websites. The Russian media has a, shall we say, "complicated" relationship with the truth, so it's not certain that guy ever bragged about making up a suicide game, or that he even existed. The others are unrelated suicide-enabling psychos being branded as "Blue Whale" masterminds for clicks ... though we guess there is a chance they were influenced by the initial "Blue Whale" coverage. Good job, media!

4

The GOP Didn't Try To Make Healthcare More Expensive For Sexual Assault Victims

Back in May 2017, you probably remember headlines telling you about the Republicans' latest cartoonishly evil plot: trying to turn sexual assault into a preexisting medical condition. This would let insurance providers punish people for committing the crime of having had a crime committed against them.

CNN

New York Magazine

The IndependentWhat would headline writers do without the word "could"?

3

Local News (And Cops) Fall For Fentanyl Hysteria

Local news stations would have you believe that there's some sort of evil Scooby-Doo gang going cross-country in a van, spreading pot laced with deadly doses of fentanyl.

NBC4i

New York Daily News

News Channel 5 NashvilleThey call it the "Misery Machine."

Wow, are there any doobies left in the country that don't contain deadly opioids? Probably, yeah, because no actual fentanyl-laced marijuana samples have been found. These reports are based on police warnings about these supposed dangers, which themselves are usually corrected for being inaccurate. Turns out you shouldn't trust a pothead when he swears he was totally smoking pot and nothing else, dude. The corrections don't stop more articles from being written on the subject, which in turn makes it more likely for other police departments to get it wrong.

2

A Guy Foresees The 2008 Crash, The Media Keeps Airing His Increasingly Wrong Predictions

Back in 2006 and 2007, Peter Shiff was trying to warn everyone about impending economic doom. We didn't listen. He was right.

1

The Independent Prints Proclamations From A "Psychic" Who Prophesied Trump's Victory

Most of the mainstream media was wrong about Donald Trump's odds of becoming president. One person who got it right was Craig Hamilton-Parker, who also correctly predicted Brexit, thus earning himself a lifetime spot in the headlines of England's most famous newspapers. For instance, in 2017, The Independent printed this:

The IndependentHis rival, Gary Sexton-Baker, who predicted "no turmoil in politics at all," stands corrected.

In the article, Hamilton-Parker predicted a North Korean revolution that would overthrow Kim Jong-un, a drone-related chemical weapons attack in a European city, and general political unrest triggered by climate change. Which complex sociopolitical factors went into consideration when making these predictions? Only one: Hamilton-Parker's own magical brain, because he claims to be a medium who can talk to the dead.