The Project hits out at racist ‘fake news’ article about Waleed Aly
Ten’s The Project has hit out at an article which is doing the rounds on social media.
The article titled ‘Waleed Aly applauds African gang who assaulted young girl at train station for ‘courageously standing up to white privilege’ has a small label of ‘satire’ on it, as well as ‘African gangs’ and ‘identity politics’.
Many across Facebook and Twitter, however, have taken the article at face value.
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Reacting to social media users who took the article seriously, The Project said it was fake news, which is “fraudulent”, “completely inaccurate” “disturbing” and has “no basis of truth”.
Aly’s wife Susan Carland said it astounded her “so many people believed something so obviously fake”.
The incident has reignited discussions around social media’s responsibilities in disseminating false news. Some have called for Facebook to intervene and stop the article from being shared or flag it as inaccurate.
The Project hosts: Peter Helliar, Waleed Aly, Carrie Bickmore and Lisa Wilkinson
Ten has been contacted for further comment.
UPDATE 23 June 8:02pm: A Facebook spokesperson told Mumbrella: “We have removed this page for repeatedly violating the policies within our community standards.”
