Fake News Archives - Front Page Confidential

Backpage, Censorship, Fake News, First Amendment, Freedom of Speech, Jim Larkin, Michael Lacey, News, Opinion, Opinion/Analysis, Sex Work, U.S. v. Lacey & Larkin

Government, Carl Ferrer Mislead Jury about Michael Lacey, Village Voice Media, Backpage

Stephen Lemons/September 14, 2023September 14, 2023 /Leave a comment

Ex-Backpage owner Carl Ferrer’s testimony continued in Phoenix’s federal courthouse on Sept. 13, as did the government’s misinformation, half-truths, spin, and bad faith regarding its number one target: veteran newspaperman Michael Lacey, who co-owned the classified listings site Backpage.com from…

Fake News, First Amendment, News, Opinion/Analysis, Sex Trafficking, Sex Work, Super Bowl

Arizona Republic Misreported Basic Facts about Sex Trafficking and the Super Bowl

Stephen Lemons/February 16, 2023February 18, 2023 /Leave a comment

How did Phoenix’s paper of record, the Arizona Republic, get so many things wrong about the Super Bowl/sex trafficking panic in its recent reporting on the topic? In the days leading up to Super Bowl LVII, the paper casually conflated…

Fake News, Opinion, Sex Trafficking, Sex Work

NewsNation Now’s Dan Abrams Promotes the ‘Super Bowl Sex Trafficking’ Panic, w/Help from Maggy Krell

Stephen Lemons/January 20, 2022January 21, 2022 /Leave a comment

If you think humanity is far from the days of burning witches and examining animal innards for omens, check out the Jan. 14 edition of cable news show Dan Abrams Live, in which veteran TV reporter Dan Abrams interviews former California…

Censorship, Donald Trump, Fake News, First Amendment, Freedom of Speech, News

‘Kingsman’ Parody of POTUS Stirs Fake Outrage

Stephen Lemons/October 17, 2019February 21, 2023 /Leave a comment

Nothing quite makes the point about “fake news” like the MSM’s recent eruption over a crudely-crafted parody video showing President Trump on a bloody rampage against various media outlets and political enemies. Everyone from the president of the White House…

screenshot of Cindy McCain during an interview with CBS This Morning co-host John Dickerson that aired on November 16, 2018

Fake News, News, Sex Trafficking

Cindy McCain Said She Saw Human Trafficking at Phoenix Sky Harbor Airport. Phoenix Cops Say Otherwise.

Stephen Lemons/February 6, 2019April 5, 2023 /Leave a comment

Cindy McCain, the widow of the late Arizona Senator John McCain and now board chair of the McCain Institute for International Leadership, recently claimed she’d intervened in a human-trafficking incident at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. The Phoenix Police Department promptly…

color image of a neon sign that reads 'Georgia's NOT BUYING IT,' surrounded by neon tubing in the shape of the state of Georgia

Fake News, News, Sex Trafficking, Sex Work, Super Bowl

Sex Trafficking Conspiracy Theorists Peddle Same Old Lies in the Lead-Up to Super Bowl LIII

Stephen Lemons/January 30, 2019January 19, 2022 /Leave a comment

Harder to kill than Jason Voorhees. More persistent than the Babadook. It is the lie that will not die, one that’s awakened each year at this time by activists, law enforcement, and the gullible journalists who hang on their every…

Fish swimming in a barrel on what appears to be the deck of a smallish vessel, photographed from directly overhead

Fake News, News, Sex Trafficking, Sex Work

’Tis the Season for the Myth About Sex Traffickers Who Scout Malls In Search of Teen Girls

Stephen Lemons/December 3, 2018January 2, 2019 /1 Comment

Calling b.s. on fake news stories that hype the nonexistent epidemic of sex trafficking may be like shooting fish in a barrel. But sometimes those scaly swimmers need to be shot. Take “Holiday shopping is prime time for human trafficking…

b&w street scene, Times Square, New York, circa 1981-82; photo by Vaticanus via Flickr

Fake News, First Amendment, Freedom of Speech, Media, Sex Work

Ohio Town Gets Religion, Officially Proclaims ‘Pornography Awareness Week’

Tom Finkel/November 8, 2018November 8, 2018 /Leave a comment

If you’re like most Americans, the holiday you most closely associate with the end of October is Halloween. Not so the purity-minded folks at the National Center on Sexual Exploitation, who faithfully commemorate Pornography Awareness Week. And this year, the…

Screenshot of a bespectacled young woman in an office

Backpage, Fake News, News, Sex Trafficking, Sex Work

Police Investigate ‘Physical Threat’ Against Hawaii Sex-Trafficking Study Co-Author and Find…No Physical Threat

Stephen Lemons/October 23, 2018October 25, 2018 /2 Comments

The recent publication of a hyperbolic study that purported to show an “astronomical” level of demand for sex workers in the Hawaii was punctuated by an odd incident that prompted two law-enforcement agencies to investigate. On Friday, September 21, officers…

Color photo of Lucian Wintrich in jacket and tie in a library, holding a martini

Campus Speech, Fake News, Required Reading

UConn Brouhaha Lands Gateway Pundit Troll Lucian Wintrich in Handcuffs

Stephen Lemons/November 30, 2017November 21, 2020 /Leave a comment

He came, he triggered, he tussled. So went Lucian Wintrich’s evening at the University of Connecticut on Tuesday, where campus cops handcuffed and arrested him after a melee broke out during a speech he was attempting to deliver. The UConn College Republicans…