Fake News – a History Lesson
DDonald Trump did not invent Fake News! Fake News was invented in Saskatchewan. Fake News is intended is to mislead. Saskatchewan folks describe Fake News with a colloquialism.
Fake News began in Hunter-Gatherer times and was invented by Saskatchewan’s own Bernie Grandgoof. Bernie was a wooly-mammoth hunter who roamed the great plains more than 10,000 years ago. Grandgoof (Archaeologist discovered his name in a cave near St. Victor, Saskatchewan) made Fake News an art form. It all began one week when Grandgoff was hunting wooly-mammoths with his rag-tag, fur wearing, stayup-all-night, luckless buddies. After the big spring hunt, they returned empty handed to their cave in what is now Southern Saskatchewan. The boys had no wooly-mammoth meat for the masses. Grandgoof didn’t want to be called a loser and came up with a brilliant idea. Grandgoof told his fellow Cave-dwellers that dirty-rotten, smelly Neanderthals chased away all the wooly-mammoths. The hunt failed because of the darn Neanderthals from the west. Had the gaunt, emaciated, starving cave-dwellers looked around they would have realized there were no Neanderthals in St. Victor or even Rockglen or even Val Marie. Grandgoof was feeding them Fake News. They never checked the facts. Grandgoof’s buddies, who had been on the hunt with him, liked the Fake News. It also kept them from being called lousy hunters. They too joined in with testimony claiming the Fake News was true. The hunt failed because of the pesky Neanderthals.
Having other Humanoids confirm the Fake News legitimized it. Fake News was now Fake Fact! Grandgoof was pondering his next idea when his wife, the former Miss Delectable Doris Seenurder defended her unsuccessful hunter husband. Delectable Doris was well respected. After all, she read the dirt scratches that were the source of local news and weather.
Fake Newsing was that easy. Grandgoof gave up hunting wooly-mammoth and became a spokesman for his community. He never lifted an atlatl gain.
His ides spread. Years later American leaders and newspaper owners decided a war with Spain would be nice. They liked the Cuban climate. The good-old-boys didn’t want to tell the American public directly about wanting a War so they used what Grandgoof had invented. They used Fake News. Newspapers were the Internet of the day. Editors spent the winter of 1897-98 filling their pages with Fake News. Even the people in Saskatchewan heard about the scandalous behavior of the Spaniards in Cuba. One news article showed a drawing of a naked young woman being searched by Spaniards. That, by the way, was a Fake Drawing – all part of Fake News.
The campaign was successful. The war took place between April and August 1898. The boys were home for the harvest. Cuba came under the influence of the United States and stayed that way until 1959, after which only Canadians could use Cuban beaches.
In World War Two Canada used Fake News against Japanese Canadians. The Government said they were dangerous and moved them from the West Coast to sugar beet farms in Alberta. The Government never checked the facts.
Recent Fake News out of Saskatchewan claimed pesky Albertans, another kind of Neanderthal, required Saskatchewan road-construction workers to re-register their vehicles in Alberta. Seems some Saskatchewan good-old-boys took advantage of working in Alberta to buy new vehicles and register them at their temporary Alberta address and not pay the new Saskatchewan 6% PST. The boys claimed mean Albertans made them buy new pickup trucks with Alberta plates without paying 6% PST. It was all Alberta’s fault. Nobody checked the facts.
In reality, most Saskatchewan folks recognize Fake News. They call it Bullshit.
Bullshit varies on a sliding scale between mild Bullshit and severe Bullshit. It also varies in thickness. As old Saskatchewan cowboys say, “Bullshit with lumps is the worst.”
Most of what people read, hear or see is Bullshit, not Fake News, so check the facts – and the thickness.