Faux News

**Faux News** is a New West Indies Discord Station. It is a privately owned station by Celestiam and operated by them until July 1st 2020, when Karteria became the station's main operator.

Faux News is a satirical channel that promotes ostensibly fake conspiracy theories, as well as accidental errors and typos from Regional Officers. Faux frequently plays on hyperboles to make situations appear much more newsworthy than they actually are.

Opened on October 23rd 2019 by then-Secretary-General Karteria on Celestiam's request, the channel was originally called "Celest Jests", to be renamed Faux News a few hours later. The first broadcast was aired on October 24th, 2019. Though many channels predate Faux News, it is the oldest currently active private media channel, and the longest consecutive running private media channel in the New West Indies.

## History

### **Creation**

Faux News was created under the authority of Executive Decree 010. The Decree authorized the creation of a channel, effectively controlled by one citizen, for the purposes of expression in a variety of pursuits.

As Director of the Press Corps, Celestiam frequently jested about perverting the Public Media Institution into a fake news machine. One of such jests prompted Karteria to state:

> "*I know I'm being... very encouraging, but if you want to fuck around with a satirical news station, I'd be down. It would be fun*."
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This led to the creation of Faux News, originally named "Celest Jests."

### **Etymology**

"Faux" in English is defined by Merriam Webster as "not real or genuine." Larousse Dictionary for French defines "faux" in French as "contrary to the truth." This double meaning in the two languages the channel's founder speaks expresses the channel's objective as a provider of indisputably untrue news.

It is worth noting Faux is a homophone of "Fox." The Fox was the symbol of the Progressive Party, that was in existence and led by Celestiam at the time of the founding of the channel. Furthermore, it echoes with "Fox News" a right-wing US news provider.

"Faux News" may refer to the common expression "Fake News"; "Faux" is also similar to "Hoax".

### **Operation**

Faux News was operated by Celestiam between October 2019 and July 1st, 2020. During this time, Faux News had no co-host or other staff.

On July 1st, 2020, upon Celestiam's ascent to the Office of the Secretary-General, Karteria was appointed as a co-anchor in the following statement:

> "*Effective immediately, the Esteemed @Kartomayor is hired on the Board, technically as an anchor, though a more pompous title like Chief Satirist or Master of Fakes, or really anything else. I shall refrain from posting here during my tenure, so as to avoid being pegged by the deep state for conflicts of interest.*"
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Ever since, Karteria continued posting on faux news as its sole active anchor.

Anchoring on Faux News is, with the Office of the Region's Attorney, one of the two NWI jobs to have only been occupied by former or future Secretaries-General.

## Content

### **Featured Individuals**

The following table traces how often each individual was mocked by Faux News (accurate as of September 12,2020)

Faux News particularly frames individuals serving in public office. No Secretary, Secretary-General, President of the General Assembly, or Chief Justice has escaped scrutiny by Faux News so far. Frellor is the most featured individual not to have held elected office.

### **Conspiracies**

Faux News hs promoted numerous conspiracy theories, the most notable being:

* Karteria is an image played by five separate actors
* PotaTown's imminent appointment as Secretary of Internal Affairs (the prediction was partially correct: PotaTown was appointed as Secretary of Foreign Affairs a few weeks later)
* Reno using his position as Filibusters Barman to drug GA Members
* NSE planning to yell "Perkele!" on GA spammers

* Reno was a baby 20 years ago
* Karteria = Achipel (not originally a faux conspiracy; this is a regional thing)
* NUC is from Nebraska
* Cymiopolis is Alexis Tsipras
* Cymiopolis keeps being 2nd at everything
* Celestiam is Bernie Sanders in disguise
* Cymiopolis is corrupt

### **Other Content**

Faux News typically takes atypical positions on known events. Its first broadcast, congratulating then-President of the General Assembly Reno Sherrifs Department for their activity, instead took the perspectives of complaining inhabitants of the GA district. Under Celestiam, Faux News was partaking in fan-fiction, portraying nations as individuals living in a vast "NWI Capital" with anthropomorphic qualities.

Later in its development, Faux News started underlining missteps and errors from public officials, especially when Karteria took the news channel's helm. Achipel accidentally dismissing Secretaries and Cymiopolis posting empty announcements were featured.

## Reception

Faux News is generally well-received, with posts averaging 5-10 positive reactions, sometimes more. Futhermore, Faux has in many ways entered in popular culture, with individuals tagging #faux-news or imitating faux headlines every time they have ideas for potential conspiracies and mad stories.

Several channels attempted to portray themselves as competitors to faux news. The Discord Box Office was known for offering similar fan fiction material. Frellor, from the Daily-Aww, often compared the aww's booming activity with Faux News' renowned slower pace. The Deugaw Herald once posted a story inspired from one of faux's More recently, Austranisia opened Channel A news claiming it was "100% better than faux" and sought to "rival" faux news.

On March 1st, 2020, Faux News was featured by the Office of the Secretary-General during Celestiam's induction to the Order of Information. Then-Secretary-General Karteria said that "*Celestiam has produced high-quality comedy through his station Faux News, writing 'stories' on a variety of phenomena. Through this effort, he has greatly added to the culture of the community and lightened the load of life with comedic relief."* Faux News is the first station to be mentioned in the conferring of the Order of Information, and one of two overall with The Daily Aww.

## References and Notes

1. ↑ [1] Merriam Webster Definition on "Faux"
2. ↑ [2]Larousse Definition of Faux
3. ↑ [3] Examples of reactions
4. ↑ [4] Deugaw Herald Halloween Story
5. ↑ [5] Channel A News Introduction
6. ↑ [6] Celestiam's Induction to the OIF