Blogdaughter Tammi of Tammi's World mistakenly thought that a parody of this news story about a ham sandwich being a hate crime was real.

Which is understandable, since it was an excellent parody.

And she's in good company, because Fox News thought it was real, too.

Kudos to Nicholas Plagman and Associated Content for a fine bit of comedy.

And a big, fat BOO! HISS! to those f*ckheads at the AP who can't take a joke:

Lawyers for the AP are reviewing Plagman's story and will take legal action if they feel it is warranted, according to Larry Laughlin, bureau chief in Northern New England.

This pisses me off, because I've written parodies of news stories before that included fake quotes. I never realized I was begging for jail time in the process.

Meanwhile, I guess we should hold a bail money fundraiser for Scrappleface.

UPDATE 4-27-07: A couple things that need mentioning before people pick on Fox. The piece was not originally labelled as parody ("By Wednesday night, Associated Content had put a disclaimer above Plagman's story"), and, according to a statement issued by Associated Content, "This humor piece was misplaced on our site due to a filing error. It is now in the humor section of the site, where it belongs."

I mention this last especially for the benefit of Dr. Benway at HuffPo.

The Fox story appeared on Tuesday.

NOW who's not fact-checking?

Posted by: Harvey at 07:15 AM | Comments (8) | Add Comment
Post contains 258 words, total size 2 kb.

1 The AP is embarrassed... once again they didn't do due diligence on what they printed. This couldn't possibly be THEIR fault. It MUST be the fault of the parody writer. Yeah, that's it! It must be someone else who got it wrong. I hate those people. God forbid they actually like... do their job correctly and check facts before printing a story. Geeze!!!

Posted by: Teresa at April 26, 2007 09:17 AM (gsbs5)

2 the sad thing is that we live in a time that it is not inconceivable that a story like that could be true. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm taking my crucifix in a jar and going to take a pee break. That only offends Christians, and we don't matter.

Posted by: wRitErsbLock at April 26, 2007 02:23 PM (+MvHD)

3 I'm kinda suprised that you haven't been arrested or sued for shitty writing.

Posted by: That 1 Guy at April 26, 2007 06:40 PM (amJz2)

4 :-P

Posted by: Harvey at April 27, 2007 05:08 AM (L7a63)

5 To say I am embarrassed is an understatement. Damn, that's what I get for tryin' to sneak a read while on the phone at work. But the saddest part is, that it is almost believable. That it did make me think. That it was even the remotest of possibilities. But damn - I'm real embarrassed.........

Posted by: Tammi at April 27, 2007 07:43 AM (wbVY2)

6 Don't feel bad, Tammi. If I'd read that piece before they slapped the "this is a parody" label on it, I probably would've bought into it, too. Heck, I was only following the link to the story so that I could write a parody of it myself. I was thinking "you've GOT to be kidding", but I was *expecting* it to be real. So no, this does NOT reflect poorly on you at all.

Posted by: Harvey at April 27, 2007 07:49 AM (L7a63)

7 After having read both stories I gotta say with the exception of the foamming at the mouth, knee jerk reactionary liberal quotes in the spoof the FACTS are the same "Ham steak,muslim kids,offended religious beliefs, school officials running around with heads cut off telling everyone who will listen there sorry. Now as long as FOX stays away from here http://www.theonion.com/content/ Of course I'm sure they already use this site as a "trustworthy" source

Posted by: blogless brother at April 27, 2007 11:57 AM (H10kY)

8 I stand by my first comment. The AP just pulled the content from somewhere else and propagated. They NEVER CHECKED at the source. That's their job! That's what they're paid to do! They aren't supposed to just read something somewhere and say, "hey this looks good... let's send it out on the wire." This is a prime example of how so many false stories start circulating through the news media. Because once the AP picks it up - then EVERYONE and their brother starts printing it as fact! Yep - AP didn't do their job and now they're pissed because they've been caught with their pants down. Quick - shift the blame!

Posted by: Teresa at April 27, 2007 02:55 PM (gsbs5)

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