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IPFS News Link • Misinformation

Do You Trust Snopes? You Won't After Reading This.

• Foodbabe

To improve their public image, they are attempting to manipulate everything we see and hear about GMO crops and pesticides in the media and on TV, the internet and print articles – using propaganda-laden commercials, "mommy-blogger" articles, farmer endorsements, hired operatives to change Wikipedia, and front group websites. The biotech industry is feeling threatened, and their profits hang in the balance. They are trying to silence the truth

We now have evidence that the website Snopes.com is being manipulated by the industry too. But first, let's examine what Snopes really is…

A lot of people trust the website Snopes.com and use it to fact-check things they hear on the internet. For no reason whatsoever, this mom-and-pop website has been put on a pedestal as if they are the be-all and end-all of truth on the internet.

Facebook recently teamed up with Snopes, allowing them become an arbitrator of fake news circulating on their network, essentially elevating them as an authoritative source of information. I find this development alarming on many levels:

While there is some fake news on the internet, this opens up the possibility that op-ed's and independent journalism will get labeled as "fake news" if Snopes doesn't agree with an opinion.

Articles can be deemed "false" if Snopes conducts sloppy fact checking. When it comes to the topic of food, it is imperative that everyone understands that this field is rampant with corrupt paid-off scientists and front groups that are working to protect profits of corporations at the expense of our health. You can not always trust information coming from self-proclaimed independent experts, and sources must be vetted extensively. 

We all have the ability to use critical thinking skills while reading news on Facebook or any other online platform – and should determine for ourselves what is false and what is the truth – instead of relying on the work of websites like Snopes to do that for us.

Everyone should feel empowered to seek out the truth on their own. Especially when it comes to our health, we need to be our own advocates and investigate the food that we are eating. 

This is treading too close to the line of censorship and can stifle our freedoms to express our ideas. 

Is Snopes a credible and authoritative source of information? 

Snopes is now 50% owned by an ad agency (Proper Media) and they make money by generating millions of views on the 3rd-party advertisements on their website. It simply makes sense for them to seek out articles that are viral to "debunk", so that they can piggy-back on that traffic and generate more advertising revenue. 

Snopes was founded by a husband and wife team who are now in the middle of a contentious divorce in which founder David Mikkelsen has been accused of embezzling $98,000 of company money to spend on "himself and prostitutes".

Snopes now has a hired team of suspect fact checkers who collaborate to debunk falsehoods that are trending on the internet.

These fact checkers reportedly have no editorial oversight and do not follow standard journalistic procedures such as interviewing the authors of articles they are trying to debunk to get all sides of the story. 

Snopes doesn't have a formal screening process for hiring fact checkers and for evaluating applicants for any potential conflicts of interest. Without such standards, it is very easy for them to be infiltrated by those who work with the industry and who have a hidden agenda.

The recent series of events below demonstrates how Snopes has been influenced by Monsanto into manipulating the public opinion about the dangers of their bestselling product, Roundup weedkiller (aka glyphosate).

can-you-trust-snopes

Monsanto has made BILLIONS off of the weedkiller Roundup (aka glyphosate) along with their Roundup-Ready GMO seeds, but sales have been plummeting since the truth about this toxic product is coming out. They are doing everything they can to keep those profits coming in! 

Food Democracy Now! and The Detox Project conducted a report showing how this popular weedkiller is present in many popular American foods and when my blog post went viral (Millions of views!), Snopes came out with an article claiming that it was a "MIXTURE" of truth and fiction. 

snopes

Snopes suddenly changed their assessment to FALSE about 24 hours later:

snopes-false

Did the facts really change? Why would they call this information FALSE?

When you compare both versions of Snopes' article, you see that they edited it to suit a narrative that fits Monsanto's agenda – it's outrageous!

It's as if Monsanto edited it themselves and sent it off to Snopes for publication. Entire sentences and paragraphs were removed that were hurtful to Monsanto. Important data was removed entirely. The wording was changed to make the findings of an independent FDA-registered laboratory seem less scientific or credible…

snopes-comparison-1

The data about how Cheerios and Stacy's Pita Chips were found to have MORE glyphosate than the level permitted by the U.S. government in drinking water (700 ppb) was completely removed! Apparently Snopes believes it's not factual or important to mention that some foods were found to have more weedkiller in them than even our lax regulations allow…

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