Babylon Bee – Tom's Blog

By John Nolte

**The far-left “fact check” outlet Snopes is using fake news to blacklist the Christian satire site the Babylon Bee.**

Although the Babylon Bee’s own name points to the fact it’s a satire site, although the Babylon Bee is widely known and recognized as a satire site, although the Babylon Bee clearly advertises itself as a satire and “fake news” site, Snopes has launched a fake news jihad to deplatform the Babylon Bee and put it out of business.

Everyone was laughing at Snopes when it started fact-checking the Babylon Bee’s satire pieces; we all howled as the self-serious Snopes labeled obvious satire as “false.” But now we know Snopes actually has an agenda here — and that is to abuse its power as a Facebook-recognized fact checker to blacklist the Babylon Bee, to get the openly Christian satire site algorithmically hidden and demonetized, which will effectively put it out of business.

The Babylon Bee is concerned enough — and rightfully so — that it has retained an attorney.

In a statement released Tuesday, the satire site writes:

Last week, Snopes fact-checked us again. We’re pretty used to that. But this time, instead of merely rating the article as “false,” they questioned whether our work qualifies as satire, and even went so far as to suggest that we were deliberately deceiving our readers. Basically, they treated us as a source of intentionally misleading fake news, rather than as the legitimate, well-known satire publication that we are. This is a big deal.

Yes, this is a big deal, because as we all now know, once the fascist left smears ideas and opinion they do not approve of as “fake news,” people and web sites start to disappear forever.

Although Snopes has been “fact-checking” the Babylon Bee since July of 2016, everyone took notice back in March when Snopes published a disingenuous fact check that resulted in Facebook threatening the Babylon Bee with “limitations and demonetization.”

“CNN Purchases Industrial-Sized Washing Machine to Spin News Before Publication” was the Bee’s title, but Snopes still pretended it needed to “fact check” a ridiculous satire piece.

Facebook eventually backed off, but it is likely no accident that the Snopes’ attack and Facebook’s subsequent blacklisting threat occurred just after CNN’s Brian Stelter — a rabid left-winger and conspiracy theorist — published a tweet accusing the Bee of being a “fake news site” disguising itself as satire. He eventually deleted it.

In April, Snopes again “fact-checked” another blatantly obvious piece of satire, this one aimed at Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY).

“Did U.S. Rep. Ocasio-Cortez Repeatedly Guess ‘Free’ on TV Show ‘The Price is Right?’” asked Snopes in its stupid “fact-checking” article.

Obviously, she didn’t. That’s the joke.

Things got a whole lot more serious last week, though, when Snopes openly accused the Babylon Bee of engaging in the spreading of fake news.

Snopes “fact checked” a July 22 Babylon Bee piece satirizing State Rep. Erica Thomas (D-GA), the lawmaker who was caught lying earlier this month about being told by a white man in a Publix grocery store to “go back where she came from.”

In the end, Thomas was forced to admit she lied. The man in question is not only Cuban, he’s a Democrat who probably voted for her. What’s more, witnesses claim she was the one screaming “go back,” not him.

Anyway, the Babylon Bee satire piece was titled: “Georgia Lawmaker Claims Chick-Fil-A Employee Told Her To Go Back To Her Country, Later Clarifies He Actually Said ‘My Pleasure.’”

But for its pedantic “fact check,” Snopes accused the Babylon Bee of deliberately misleading people.

“We’re not sure if fanning the flames of controversy and muddying the details of a news story classify an article as ‘satire,’” Snopes wrote as its sub-headline, adding:

The Babylon Bee has managed to fool readers with its brand of satire in the past. This particular story was especially confusing for some readers, however, as it closely mirrored the events of a genuine news story, with the exception of the website’s changing the location from “Publix” to the more controversial Chick-Fil-A.

Babylon Bee founder Adam Ford exposes Snopes in this must-read Twitter thread.

Over the past couple years, Snopes has “fact-checked” the Babylon Bee some 20 times! But if you look at the most recent “fact-checks,” the nine since June of last year, they are all in defense of leftists: Bernie Sanders. Ilhan Omar, CNN, Bill Clinton, California legislators, Ruth Bader Ginsberg, etc.

Although the Babylon Bee regularly satirizes President Trump, Republicans, and even Christians, it is quite telling that Snopes — which falsely identifies itself as non-partisan — never rushes in to save right-leaning targets from the Babylon Bee’s effort to mislead people.

Obviously, what we have here is CNN and Snopes manufacturing a “fake news” controversy as a means to blacklist a satire site — not because the satire site is effective at spreading fake news, but because it is effective at mocking the media, Democrat politicians, and their inane ideas; effective at using comedy to illuminate a truth the far-leftists at Snopes do not want illuminated.

Thankfully, the Babylon Bee sees this “latest smear from Snopes [as] both dishonest and disconcerting.”

“Snopes appears to be actively engaged in an effort to discredit and deplatform us. While we wish it wasn’t necessary, we have retained a law firm to retain us in this matter,” the statement reads.

Snopes Woody Bisexual

Tom Pappert

After years of fact checking the popular Christian conservative website Babylon Bee, the once-respected fact checker is now spending its resources fact checking NPC Daily.

NPC Daily, a viral new right wing satire website using the popular non-player character meme, recently published an article titled “Disney announces that Woody will be ‘openly bisexual’ in Toy Story 4”, which prompted Snopes to inform readers that the children’s movie character will not, in fact, discuss his sexuality on the big screen.

Snopes referenced a clearly fake tweet used in the NPC Daily article by Disney, and wrote that “This report was not a genuine news account, nor was such a tweet issued by Disney.”

Apparently unable to determine the difference between “satire” and “fake news”, Snopes condemned the article as “fake” in its article. In fact, Snopes only begrudgingly admits the article is satirical in nature twice, first in the subheading of its article, and again at the tail end.

“A niche genre of ‘satire’ sexualizes animated characters,” according to the Snopes article subheading. It then concludes, “This isn’t the first time that a piece of ‘satire’ has sexualized animated characters.”

Snopes has a habit of deriding conservative satire as “fake news”, and reached great acclaim when it condemned The Babylon Bee for a 2018 article claiming CNN purchased an “industrial sized washing machine” to spin the news before it could be broadcast. This was initially believed to be used against Babylon Bee’s Facebook rankings, and after a massive backlash, Facebook clarified that the so-called fact checkers’ article would not be used to punish Babylon Bee.

Big League Politics reported:

Now that the election is over, it seems that they have enough extra time on their hands to fact check Christian satire website, Babylon Bee. Any reasonable person who takes a cursory glance at the site will see the satire, but Snopes still finds it necessary to fact check them.

Perhaps their most ridiculous fact check was on an article where Babylon Bee claimed that CNN purchased an “industrial sized washing machine” so they could spin news. Most people would find the article hilarious, despite being fake, but Snopes instead found it important to make it known that the claim was false.

Snopes also fact checked an article where Babylon Bee claimed that Planned Parenthood defended Bill Cosby, because “sexual assault is only 3% of what he does.” The satirical article was obviously poking fun at Planned Parenthood, who claims that abortion is only 3% of what they do.

Snopes also fact checked Babylon Bee when it published another satirical article, this time suggesting the disgraced Jussie Smollett would be given a job at CNN after “fabricating a story out of thin air.” Smollett committed what is largely considered to be a hate crime hoax in which he is believed to have paid two brothers to attack him while wearing red hats in an attempt to secure better compensation for his work on “Empire” and stoke hate against supporters of President Donald Trump.

The formerly respected website does not stop at fact checking satirical articles. In April, Snopes fact checked a viral meme mocking Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, suggesting the freshman congresswoman appeared on “The Price Is Right” and guessed “free” as the price of every item.

Tag: Babylon Bee

MEDIASnopes Fact Checks Viral Satire Article About Woody From ‘Toy Story’ Being Bisexual The

After years of fact checking the popular Christian conservative website Babylon Bee, the once-respected fact checker is now spending its resources fact checking NPC Daily.