The Atlantic took the unusual step of actively debunking a fake headline attributed to the magazine that began circulating this week, stating plainly that “no such article has ever been published.” They further rebuked the “increasing frequency” with which the progressive magazine has been the platform for fabricated news items designed to stir outrage.
The supposed headline in question, “To Save Democracy Harris May Need To Steal An Election,” was a distortion of an Oct. 6 article, the Atlantic said in a Tuesday statement. The actual headline was “Kamala Harris Might Have to Stop the Steal.”
In the days that followed, a screenshot of the doctored headline began circulating widely on social media. The 166-year-old magazine, which endorsed a presidential candidate for only the third time when it backed Hillary Clinton in 2016 and refashioned its brand around bashing Donald Trump, has quietly endured countless such distortions – but that ended Tuesday.
“The Atlantic did not publish an article with the headline ‘To Save Democracy Harris May Need To Steal An Election,’” the magazine wrote in a press release posted to its site. “This headline is fabricated. No such article has ever been published by The Atlantic.”
The magazine went on to say that “images of fabricated Atlantic headlines have been circulating on social media with increasing frequency. Many of these images are crudely faked, with grainy resolution, and some of them use hateful language. They misinform and manipulate people who encounter them. Many of these posts have been shared widely by individuals with large followings, including elected officials.”
The magazine also had a site traffic-boosting suggestion for Internet sleuths who might want to fact-check whether a headline they’ve read is real: “Anyone encountering these images can quickly verify whether something is real – or not – by visiting The Atlantic and searching our site.”
Leave a Reply