Just Stop It, Everyone: Internet Falls for Daily Currant Fake Story Once Again

Another day, another “Daily Currant” “satire” article that manages to fool a major media outlet and the subject of the story himself. This time it was a South African newspaper and rapper Kanye West, respectively.

In an article titled “Kanye West: ‘I Am The Next Nelson Mandela,'” the satire publication faux-interviews the rapper and writes him as saying he is a Mandela-like hero for liberating people with his music.

While it’s not entirely out of the realm of possibility for West to make such a comparison, it is still, nevertheless, a fake story. But a lot of people didn’t realize that:

Including South African newspaper Times Live [the article they wrote has since been deleted]:

After the newspaper legitimized a totally fake story, West took to Twitter to correct the record, indirectly legitimizing the “satire” site by a) Addressing it in the first place; and b) Lumping it in with “recent media reports”:

We’ve reported countless times on people being fooled by this C-grade Onion copycat’s “stories” on Bill O’Reilly punching a mall santa, Ann Coulter being upset about too many minorities in Star Trek, Glenn Beck calling 911 after ordering a pizza from a Muslim guy, and Sarah Palin heading to Al Jazeera English.

So because this is getting truly tiresome, let’s say it together several dozen times:

The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site. The Daily Currant is a fake news site.

— —
>> Follow Andrew Kirell (@AndrewKirell) on Twitter

This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.