From WhatPort80

In the old days, a fact used to be something real, existing IRL and documented with evidence. Since the advent of the internets, however, the term "fact" has lost much of its linguistic coherency; now, facts are often simply opinions, with the phrase "It's a fact!" doing little more than indicating strong belief on the part of the poster. Be prepared to deliver some hard evidence (read: not frickin' Wikipedia) when labelling something as fact.

Contents 1 Factual Inaccuracy 1.1 How to Identify Factual Inaccuracies 1.2 List of People who Rely on Factual Inaccuracies 2 See Also

Factual Inaccuracy

A highfalutin' term for lying. Throwing one of those around could land yourself in Internet court.

How to Identify Factual Inaccuracies

Any statement that:

• Begins or ends with "At least 100 years ago."
• Begins or ends with "Over nine thousand."
• Begins with "Studies show."
• Begins with "My fellow Americans"
• Begins with "My client is clearly."
• Begins with "I'm not a (racist, sexist, homophobe, lawyer, doctor, but." (See: dubious disclaimer)
• Begins with or contains the phrase "it's obvious that."
• Begins with "Trust me, I know."

List of People who Rely on Factual Inaccuracies

• Old media
• New media
• Wikipedia
• Fox News
• Fundamentalists
• Jack Thompson

See Also

• Strawman
• Lie