Kanye misleads, but he’s not alone

LOS ANGELES — Looking to back up his deeply dubious declaration this week that slavery was a “choice,” Kanye West tweeted a Harriet Tubman quote that was flat-out false.

“I freed a thousand slaves. I could have freed a thousand more if only they knew they were slaves,” Tubman didn’t say, though West said she did.

It was the latest in a long series of bold-but-baseless statements from West that includes the claim, in lyrics and interviews a dozen years ago, that AIDS is a man-made disease deliberately planted in Africa.

If West has become the crown prince of celebrity wrongheadedness, he’s far from alone. He leads a legion of similar stars who spread myths and misinformation daily. And while much of it is goofy and laughable, experts say the phenomenon can be pernicious in its effects. A sampling:

• Roseanne Barr’s Twitter feed has included retweets of baseless claims that millions of illegal votes were cast in November’s presidential elections, and mentions of “pizzagate,” the conspiracy theory that prominent Democrats are operating a child sex ring in the basement of a pizzeria.

• Boston Celtics star Kyrie Irving says the Earth is flat, urging people to do their own research. Some of his fellow NBA players, and rapper B.o.B., have said they feel the same.

• Kylie Jenner used her wildly popular Instagram account to share a meme promoting the conspiracy theory popular in the 1990s that airplane contrails are in fact poisonous “chemtrails” doing great harm.