WITHIN weeks after war broke out in Marawi last year between our soldiers and ISIS-inspired rebels, Mocha Uson posted on Facebook a photo of soldiers who were kneeling in apparent prayer and captioned it:
“Let’s pray for our army. Panalangin din po natin ang mga pamilyang naiwan at nababahala sa kalagayan ng kanilang asawa at tatay. (Let us also pray for the families left behind who are worried about the situation of their husband and father.)”
The picture turned out to be that of Honduran, not Filipino, soldiers and the former sexy dancer who is now a top official of the Malacañang communications team quickly drew flak mostly from netizens for her alleged attempt at deception. Uson, however, reasoned out that she never said that the soldiers were Filipinos and that she used the picture only for “symbolism.”
Uson has been tagged, rightly or wrongly and kindly or otherwise, as the queen of fake news in the Philippines. Try “Mocha Uson and fake news” in your browser and you’ll find a rich supply of stories in which the DDS (Diehard Duterte Supporter) stalwart is supposed to have peddled half-truths or outright lies.
But her enemies who think that Uson is the world’s disinformation champion have obviously not been introduced to Alex Jones, the American radio show host and right-wing conspiracy theorist, to borrow the language of the New York Times. The other day, the parents of two victims in the Sandy Hook massacre sued him for defamation.
On Dec. 14, 2012, twenty-year-old Adam Lanza, who was allegedly suffering from depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder, attacked the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, USA, firing indiscriminately at everyone he saw before shooting himself on the head. He had earlier killed his mother at home.
A total of 26 people died in what was described at that time as the deadliest mass shooting in a grade or high school in U.S. history. Only six of the victims were adults. The rest were children with ages between six and seven.
In spite of this, however, Jones maintained and continued to maintain that the attack never took place and that the shooting was “completely fake” and a “giant hoax.” The parents, he claimed, were actors in an elaborate scheme to enact stricter gun control laws, again to quote the Times.
It is tempting to say that Jones is unhinged and lives in his own world. But he is a very popular radio host in America and he has thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of Americans, who believe him. If he is mentally challenged, what does that say about his followers?
It’s the same question I ask about the people who lap up everything that they read on Facebook and other social media sites without bothering to make even a perfunctory fact-check.