The Journal FactCheck
@TJ_FactCheck
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A project by @thejournal_ie | Tackling misinformation in Ireland | Heard something dodgy? Email [email protected] or WhatsApp us on +353 83 876 0971
Ireland
Joined June 2016
The Journal FactCheck is now on BlueSky, where you'll be able to stay up to date with our latest articles about fact-checking and misinformation. Follow us here:
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An image titled “Why You Should Skip the Flu Shot” falsely says that death is a side effect of the vaccine and has spread online despite containing verifiably false claims. https://t.co/YguK952lMl
thejournal.ie
Other side effects are misleadingly categories, such as fussiness in children which is called a “psychiatric disorder”.
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A shooting Sydney, Australia, on Sunday left 15 people dead. In the hours that followed, false claims were widely shared online about the suspects, a man who heroically intervened to stop the shooting, as well as numerous conspiracy theories. https://t.co/yg8zfoDWom
thejournal.ie
One claim about the identity of a hero who intervened to tackle a gunman was viewed more than 100 million times.
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Social media accounts filled with antisemitic posts are spreading false claims about historical figures online, including that Anne Frank's diaries were faked. https://t.co/NXCBTNZxa8
thejournal.ie
False Churchill quotes, along with claims he, FDR, and Stalin were Jewish, are included among the claims.
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Irish butter, and Kerrygold in particular, is popular with people in the US because of its high quality, high fat content and the fact that it's widely available in American supermarkets. https://t.co/qbDdD4lTs3
thejournal.ie
The figure was cited in a CNN article published last year.
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Irish government donations to Ukraine amount to hundreds of millions of Euro, including supplies of non-lethal equipment, but not “billions”, as a former political candidate has claimed. https://t.co/jg0pEIpmD8
thejournal.ie
The claim was made by Michelle Keane, who unsuccessfully ran in last year’s local elections.
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A video complaining about immigration into Ireland starts off by making the false claim that diagnoses of HIV are up 75 per cent this year in Ireland. https://t.co/bFGTAEyy7U
thejournal.ie
While diagnoses rose last year, preliminary data indicates a fall since.
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Claims that jailed former teacher Enoch Burke has been sentenced to “life” in prison for his beliefs have spread internationally, despite Burke being free to leave prison by simply affirming he will no longer illegally trespass at a school. https://t.co/w91gMsSnoT
thejournal.ie
The court has never ordered Burke to accept an ideology, or even address someone by a pronoun.
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It's been almost four years since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine but the steady stream of disinformation about President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has not dried up. https://t.co/jyPcVc5D3X
thejournal.ie
Many of the false claims have concerned purchases Zelenskyy never made.
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False claims about 15-minute cities, including that they are “concentration camps” have been reshared in the wake of a fatal fire in Hong Kong. https://t.co/vgN5Du2IWH
thejournal.ie
The blaze was also also said to be connected to ghost cities and concentration camps.
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A map that purports to show how many Muslims are living in large regions of the world uses figures that are not backed up by official data. This results in an overestimate of the number of Muslims in the world by hundreds of millions. https://t.co/v49IdFhQmd
thejournal.ie
Going through the citations largely led back to one source: Wikipedia.
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A court judgement about religious education in Northern Ireland has been described, falsely, as being a ban on Christianity in schools. https://t.co/ID4ijxhYdr
thejournal.ie
The court ruled that teaching religion without critical analysis amounted to “evangelism, proselytising, and indoctrination”.
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Elon Musk's Grokipedia pushes racist conspiracy theories and gets some basic facts wrong.
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In the wake of Enoch Burke’s latest arrest, an old and long-debunked claim suggested that his trouble with the law stems from his refusal to “endorse transgender ideology” or to refer to a trans student by their preferred pronouns. https://t.co/R3xZVnXiE3
thejournal.ie
Misleading claims about the arrest were shared in Spanish, French, and Polish, as well as by UK and US figures.
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Statements uttered by Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò, in which he endorses a number of conspiracy theories have been shared widely, despite containing verifiably false statements including that a German lawyer was put in jail to shut him up. https://t.co/6dztvH2RaI
thejournal.ie
Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò was excommunicated last year.
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A false claim that one in every ten people in Co Kerry is now Ukrainian has spread online since being posted by an anti-immigration activist. https://t.co/1oCppbGwOs
thejournal.ie
Small population sizes of local electoral areas mean that population changes can seem drastic.
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News of tragic deaths on Irish roads has been met by some who have mistakenly blamed fatalities on an unusual target: environmental policies. https://t.co/HjEVGpmRTS
thejournal.ie
The average car has grown heavier by more than the weight of an adult giant panda since the year 2020.
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Alongside biases shown in descriptions of racist conspiracy theories, Grokipedia contains some straightforward factual errors - including misnaming the alleged attacker in the Dublin city stabbing of 2023 that sparked a riot. https://t.co/jEZzBg9db7
thejournal.ie
Elon Musk has claimed Grokipedia is already better than Wikipedia.
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A video shared on social media appears to show a teacher leading a classroom full of schoolchildren, each kneeling on their own mat, in Islamic prayer during a class. The footage, however, is fake and created by Artificial Intelligence. https://t.co/PBDhLPk4ns
thejournal.ie
False claims about children being “indoctrinated into Islam” are a recurring theme.
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A video criticising benefits given to Ukrainians who fled the Russian invasion begins by saying that there are “over 100,000 Ukrainians in Ireland now”. This is not true. https://t.co/pIJm9eBssr
thejournal.ie
A video criticising benefits received by Beneficiaries of temporary Protection opened with a falsehood.
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