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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Business
Tim Dowling

Jack Warner is not the first high-profile figure to fall for a spoof from the Onion

Screen grab of Jack Warner holding Onion piece.
Warner cites a spoof news report from satirical site the Onion. Photograph: Internet

Part of the appeal of satire is the implicit assumption that someone, somewhere is taking it at face value. It’s great when satire’s putative targets fail to see the funny side, but it’s even better when they don’t even realise it’s meant to be funny.

Former Fifa vice-president Jack Warner – currently facing corruption charges and extradition to the US – managed to make himself look extremely silly in a self-exculpatory video he posted on his Facebook page (it has since been removed, but you can still see it, like, everywhere). It’s rambling and logically inconsistent, but the undeniable highlight is when he cites, ostensibly in his defence, a printout of a news article headlined: “Fifa Frantically Announces 2015 Summer World Cup In United States”. “If Fifa is so bad,” Warner says, “why is it that the USA wants to keep the Fifa World Cup?”

Unfortunately for Warner, the article was from the satirical website the Onion. Even more unfortunately, he gave the impression that he had actually read it all the way through. It quoted Fifa chairman Sepp Blatter as saying: “We are thrilled to reveal that, for the first time in 21 years, the World Cup will finally return to America, with matches set to kick off today at 5pm local time in Los Angeles.”

The Onion's story on Kim Jong-un
The Onion’s story on North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un was picked up by China’s The People’s Daily. Photograph: The Onion

It’s not the first time someone who ought to know better has been fooled by a story from the Onion. In 2012, when the Onion named North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un the “sexiest man alive”, the online version of China’s The People’s Daily followed up with a 55-page photo gallery, and directly lifted quotes: “With his devastatingly handsome, round face, his boyish charm and his strong sturdy frame, this Pyongyang-based heartthrob is every woman’s dream come true.”

Two months before, Iran’s Fars news agency picked up an Onion story about a Gallup poll showing that Americans preferred Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to Barack Obama. Fars reprinted the story verbatim, including the line “60 per cent of rural whites said they at least respected that Ahmadinejad doesn’t try to hide the fact that he’s Muslim.”

In 2009, two Bangladeshi newspapers were obliged to print apologies after publishing reports – based on an Onion story – that astronaut Neil Armstrong had become convinced his moon landing was faked. It’s not just non-English language news outlets that get sucked in: four years ago, the New York Times had to issue a correction when an article about the teen fan magazine Tiger Beat reproduced a spoof cover – created by the Onion – featuring President Obama (“Barack: ‘I Sing in The Shower’”).

The Onion has been around, in print and then online, since 1988. It’s a testament to its consistency that there are still people out there who don’t get it.

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