Fact Check

'Stop the World, the Teabaggers Want Off' Is by Far the Most Accurate Page on Facebook?

Rumor: snopes.com has named the group 'Stop the World, the Teabaggers Want Off' as the 'Most Accurate Page on Facebook'.

Published April 18, 2015

Claim:

Claim:   snopes.com has deemed the Facebook group 'Stop the World, the Teabaggers Want Off' as the 'Most Accurate Page on Facebook.'


FALSE


Example: [Collected via the Internet, April 2015]


Is it true that snopes said Stop the World, the Teabaggers Want Off is the "most accurate page on Facebook"?


Origins:   While the staff here at snopes.com would rather spend our time investigating urban legends, we frequently receive requests to tackle fake news stories and satirical items, such as the fictitious-yet-plausible quotes from various politicians and other public figures posted on the Facebook group Stop the World, the Teabaggers Want Off.

Items from Stop the World, the Teabaggers Want Off have been the source of several snopes articles over the years — usually submitted by viewers who encountered them out of context and either weren't aware of their source or didn't understand its satirical nature — including debunkings of dubious diatribes from Sarah Palin, Mitt Romney and Phil Robertson.

Stop the World, the Teabaggers Want Off responded to this satire-debunking phenomenon with a form of meta-satire, sharing a meme claiming that snopes.com had labeled the group "100% accurate" and "the most credible" source on the Internet:

Predictably, a number of viewers have missed the point that this meme is also satirical in nature (a not uncommon phenomenon) and have asked us to verify it as well. What we can report is that after digging through our archives, interrogating past and present writers, and scanning years of company e-mails, we have found no record that anyone here at snopes issued the above-reference statement. In fact, when Stop the World, the Teabaggers Want Off has been mentioned within the pages and correspondence of snopes.com, the words "entertainment," "satire," "fake," and "hoax" are usually found in close proximity.

None of this should be news to either our readers of fans of Stop the World, the Teabaggers Want Off, as the group clearly labels itself as a satirical site in its "About" section:


This page is for entertainment purposes. It is NOT meant to be taken seriously. It is primarily satire and parody with a mix of political memes and messages.

While Stop the World, the Teabaggers Want Off may not be our "favorite" Facebook page (that honor would probably go to Benjyo Soujer, a page started to organize volunteers to clean public toilets in Japan), we did get a chuckle out of this particular fictitious quote from their pages.

Last updated:   18 April 2015

David Mikkelson founded the site now known as snopes.com back in 1994.