this post was submitted on 25 Sep 2023
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A sign hung in Port Coquitlam advertising a “whites-only” moms and tots group is causing outrage online after photos of a poster were shared on social media.

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[–] iAmTheTot@kbin.social 112 points 1 year ago (5 children)

It's wild to me that after the last six years or so, people are still happy to conclude this must be a troll or fake. Like damn, what is it going to take to convince you that racists are fucking brazen?

[–] stopthatgirl7@kbin.social 36 points 1 year ago

I’d say it’s also that a lot of folks are very invested in making other people second guess if something like this is actually real or if it’s just Black folks with ulterior motives. It makes it easier for more people to dismiss overt racism when it happens.

[–] phoenixz@lemmy.ca 24 points 1 year ago

Maybe some investigation Journalism that actually checks if this is real, or not? Because yes, a lot of these posts have turned out to be bullshit from trolls

[–] pixxelkick@lemmy.world 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Like damn, what is it going to take to convince you that racists are fucking brazen?

Call me crazy but I don't typically associate racist trash mom and tot groups with the sort of people who make very clean and legible flyers with fully formed clear english and even properly used apostrophes, as well as a QR code (centered too!), a telegram group, and a proton email

The deeper you look into all the context surrounding the flyer, the faker and faker it looks.

[–] Wilibus@lemmy.world 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's amazing how well the average white supremacist can blend into society.

Please stop being so closedminded. These people want you to think since they aren't toothless rednecks in a Maga hat that they can't possibly be racist. This shit comes in a sizes and flavours.

[–] pixxelkick@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Sorry but I go with Occam's Razor on this one. The possibility of some racist going through all the necessary motions to make this scenario occur are incredibly specific and incredibly unlikely.

The facts don't add up to this being real. It's a narrative that just doesn't make sense and seems so deeply unlikely that I can't even imagine it happening. There's way way too many coincidences and holes and unlikely occurrences.

Whereas the scenario of "a person wanted their social media to get a huge boost, so they made a fake flyer, a fake telegram, a fake email all within a couple hours, took a picture of it, made a post on their social media, and then shared those posts minutes later with the local news to gain a bunch of traction", is way more common and doesn't have any holes in it.

Of the possibilities, the latter is astronomically more likely and requires no mental gymnastics to arrive at, so I assume it's the case. It's that simple.

[–] Shapillon@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The City of Port Coquitlam also commented to say, “Thank you for bringing [the sign] to our attention earlier. Bylaw officers are out taking them down.”

They also apparently put the fakeflyer out there.

While the Telegram group is private, messages from the chat can be previewed. In the previewed messages, the administrator says they are “encouraged by the response” the group has gotten [...]

And populated the telegram channel with fake messages.

I'm not sure how you wiekd Occam's razor but it's becoming a pretty elaborate con for just some internet clout.

[–] pixxelkick@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago

They also apparently put the fakeflyer out there.

Not sure what you are talking about. The City itself was told that the flyer existed, they dont have to be "in on it" to respond like that.

If you post up a fake flyer, the city will take it down and respond the way you said. It's not that complicated.

And populated the telegram channel with fake messages.

Indeed, theres a whopping two whole messages on the telegram, posted minutes apart, and both of them were posted about an hour before the post of the flyer was put up on instagram/twitter, and no further messages have been posted to the channel since then, no members added, etc. It appears to be effectively abandoned minutes after it was made.

It literally only has those 2 messages and thats it, and they come out to a grand total of like, 4 lines of text total.

Do you think that sounds like a totally legit telegram account chat group? Cuz that sure sounds fake as fuck to me lol

[–] iAmTheTot@kbin.social 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I don't really think you're applying that razor quite right. And there's not really any mental gymnastics involved in "racists exist."

[–] pixxelkick@lemmy.world 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

And there’s not really any mental gymnastics involved in “racists exist.”

That is not what the question is, nor the conclusion.

The question is, "Who put this flyer up?"

And of the answers:

Option 1: Genuine Racist

  • They possessed the capacity to produce this fairly well made flyer, despite the fact the venn diagram of "person who can make a flyer of this quality" and "person who is openly racist" is a very thin sliver (unlikely occurrence #1)
  • They did not have any existing members of an "in group", and made the telegram "pre-emptively" (extremely uncommon, typically people of the group precede the creation of a chat room to chat in, unlikely occurrence #2)
  • They setup a proton email, an extremely uncommon tool typically only used by extremely tech savvy individuals, but didnt put in the extra work to make it have a real account name which is extremely uncommon (unlikely occurrence #3)
  • They telegram group has a photo of the exact same paper that was "discovered" shortly after, but on a table, and the photo was set only a short period of time before it was "discovered" and posted to social media. Which means the individual took the photo, set the picture of the telegram group, went outside to put the flyer up, and in under 1-2 hours it was already posted up to social media and shared with the news. (unlikely occurrence #4)
  • The group who discovered and shared this picture happened to be discovered by the owner of a social media group "BlackVancouver" who happens to also be a group specifically focused on spreading awareness about racist acts in the area. They were exactly in the right place at the right time to find this picture literally moments after it was put up? (extremely unlikely occurrence #5)
  • Despite this, no other pictures at all of these flyers have surfaced anywhere else, which seems to mean that one single flyer was posted and was taken down as soon as it was found. No one else has any info on this flyer except the couple pictures shared by BlackVancouver. It's very unlikely that a person who made flyers for their group would put all that effort into making the flyer and proceed to post up literally just one of them. (unlikely occurrence #6)
  • The telegram group has had no members added, and no posts made after the sharing of the flyer with the news outlet (unlikely occurrence #7)

Option 2: Someone fostering fake outrage to boost their social media

  • A person who manages a social media account is not that unlikely to possess the skills to make a fairly decent looking flyer
  • If they were making a fake telegram to add "face value" authenticity to their flyer, the lack of any members of the telegram group is not unexpected
  • A proton email would be not unheard of to be utilized by someone looking to setup a quick and dirty fake email to add further authenticity to their flyer
  • Wanting to quickly slap together the telegram group in as low effort as possible while still trying to create the appearance of being real at face value, using the flyer itself as the picture of their fake telegram group is a quick and dirty solution, and it would make sense that they would have taken the picture for it shortly before going outside to put the flyer up
  • The group discovering the flyer being the one who made it is self explanatory at this point, as that is the goal, no longer a coincidence but by design
  • The individual would not want to get in trouble, so they would have only made a single fake flyer, tacked it up, snapped a picture, then took it down asap, explaining why there aren't any other photos that have surfaced of the flyer and why it seems like only a single flyer ever got posted up.
  • The individual, once satisfied that everything looks legit and enough outrage has generated, locked the telegram group and abandoned it, as it has now served its purpose.

Note how the first option requires enormous mental gymnastics to make sense, whereas the latter largely fits within its own context and doesnt require any stretching to conclude. All the "unlikely coincidences" in scenario 1 become expected results in scenario 2.

Thus... Occam's Razor concludes that situation 2 is way way more likely, and is the one to default to.

If you can come up with an even more likely scenario than situation 2 though, by all means, lets hear it. But I don't see anyway this narrative fits some random racist mom and tot group founder without having to make numerous extremely unlikely assumptions.

[–] SnipingNinja 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

The real investigative journalism was here in the comments it seems. /jk

[–] Malfeasant@lemm.ee 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You say /jk, but it's true...

[–] SnipingNinja 1 points 1 year ago

It's jk for its not actually investigation or at least not on ground, but it's at the very least more journalism than the article, you're right about that. I just don't know the tag for half joking

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 8 points 1 year ago

I wouldn't be surprised if it was a trolling of sorts.