Konspiracy Korner!

Today I noticed two old photos, rebranded as new outrages , doing the rounds on social media and garnering the expected shock horror responses as they did so.
What really saddened me was the ease with which it could be discovered that the photos in question were actually old .
People seemed to prefer to be outraged and ill-informed.
I know that in this era of online mobs wielding virtual pitchforks , all announcements on social media must be taken with a pinch of salt .
It's almost too easy to be swept up in righteous indignation , so online fact-checking should always begin with the date of a post.

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I present Exhibit A:

It's a couple of days after an apparently quiet and well attended Midsummer Solstice at Stonehenge.
Suddenly, on Facebook:

Instant outrage. 

Cries of 'Ill-mannered scum, litterbugs, 'etc.

That particular thread descended into classist rants about overprivileged rich kids, blah blah.

The photo in question actually dates from 2012.

Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury, I present Exhibit B:

 Who is holding the old ladies arms?

Apparently a retired nurse who was arrested and taken to Paddington Green following the Anti-Austerity demo on Saturday 20th June 2015.
It's actually a photo from Feb 2012 of a protesting retired teacher (who was escorted to the pavement).

This kind of badly Photoshopped misinformation is surely damaging to the credibility of anyone who is against the current regime...so is it the product of a misguided activist attempting to raise the ire of the people ?
Or is this a double bluff designed to undermine the credibility of protestors ?

You see how easy it is to drift into the realms of the fabled  'Tin-Foil Helmet ' ?

Someone posted a lengthy piece on how spies spread misinformation online too - perhaps to reinforce a point: after all, it's hardly likely that our friends in GCHQ (or the NSA if you're Stateside) would actually tell us what they're doing, and how they do it
I mean, seriously...

I know this is a brief post, but I'm just going to put it out there before it is too late, and they surpress my wanton reality checks !
As if