Sign for “whites-only” moms and tots group in Metro Vancouver sparks outrage
stopthatgirl7@kbin.social to 
dailyhive.com
A sign hung in Port Coquitlam advertising a “whites-only” moms and tots group is causing outrage online after photos of a poster were shared on social media.
It's wild to me that after the last six years or so, people are still happy to conclude this must be a troll or fake. Like damn, what is it going to take to convince you that racists are fucking brazen?
I’d say it’s also that a lot of folks are very invested in making other people second guess if something like this is actually real or if it’s just Black folks with ulterior motives. It makes it easier for more people to dismiss overt racism when it happens.
Maybe some investigation Journalism that actually checks if this is real, or not? Because yes, a lot of these posts have turned out to be bullshit from trolls
Call me crazy but I don't typically associate racist trash mom and tot groups with the sort of people who make very clean and legible flyers with fully formed clear english and even properly used apostrophes, as well as a QR code (centered too!), a telegram group, and a proton email
The deeper you look into all the context surrounding the flyer, the faker and faker it looks.
It's amazing how well the average white supremacist can blend into society.
Please stop being so closedminded. These people want you to think since they aren't toothless rednecks in a Maga hat that they can't possibly be racist. This shit comes in a sizes and flavours.
Sorry but I go with Occam's Razor on this one. The possibility of some racist going through all the necessary motions to make this scenario occur are incredibly specific and incredibly unlikely.
The facts don't add up to this being real. It's a narrative that just doesn't make sense and seems so deeply unlikely that I can't even imagine it happening. There's way way too many coincidences and holes and unlikely occurrences.
Whereas the scenario of "a person wanted their social media to get a huge boost, so they made a fake flyer, a fake telegram, a fake email all within a couple hours, took a picture of it, made a post on their social media, and then shared those posts minutes later with the local news to gain a bunch of traction", is way more common and doesn't have any holes in it.
Of the possibilities, the latter is astronomically more likely and requires no mental gymnastics to arrive at, so I assume it's the case. It's that simple.
They also apparently put the fakeflyer out there.
And populated the telegram channel with fake messages.
I'm not sure how you wiekd Occam's razor but it's becoming a pretty elaborate con for just some internet clout.
Not sure what you are talking about. The City itself was told that the flyer existed, they dont have to be "in on it" to respond like that.
If you post up a fake flyer, the city will take it down and respond the way you said. It's not that complicated.
Indeed, theres a whopping two whole messages on the telegram, posted minutes apart, and both of them were posted about an hour before the post of the flyer was put up on instagram/twitter, and no further messages have been posted to the channel since then, no members added, etc. It appears to be effectively abandoned minutes after it was made.
It literally only has those 2 messages and thats it, and they come out to a grand total of like, 4 lines of text total.
Do you think that sounds like a totally legit telegram account chat group? Cuz that sure sounds fake as fuck to me lol
I don't really think you're applying that razor quite right. And there's not really any mental gymnastics involved in "racists exist."
That is not what the question is, nor the conclusion.
The question is, "Who put this flyer up?"
And of the answers:
Option 1: Genuine Racist
Option 2: Someone fostering fake outrage to boost their social media
Note how the first option requires enormous mental gymnastics to make sense, whereas the latter largely fits within its own context and doesnt require any stretching to conclude. All the "unlikely coincidences" in scenario 1 become expected results in scenario 2.
Thus... Occam's Razor concludes that situation 2 is way way more likely, and is the one to default to.
If you can come up with an even more likely scenario than situation 2 though, by all means, lets hear it. But I don't see anyway this narrative fits some random racist mom and tot group founder without having to make numerous extremely unlikely assumptions.
The real investigative journalism was here in the comments it seems. /jk
You say /jk, but it's true...
It's jk for its not actually investigation or at least not on ground, but it's at the very least more journalism than the article, you're right about that. I just don't know the tag for half joking
I wouldn't be surprised if it was a trolling of sorts.
We can hate racism and still call bullshit on liberal upvote and outrage pandering.
Every accusation is a confession.
Every. Time.
What does that even mean. I'm not sure why recognizing local news click bait meant to trigger my liberal sensibilities outs me as a conservative somehow. This headline and post isn't meant to trigger conservative outrage, it's liberal outrage. (Also the OP tagline says the news is about sparking outrage.)
Gotta say the investigative journalism on this one left a lot to be desired, like investigating and journalism. Anyone can write "hey I saw this thing on Instagram, might be real might not thanks for the click."
no time to investigate, gotta post rage bait ASAP
Yeah I was going to say this is like big Poe's law. Could be real. Could be satire. Could be just made up for trolling.
The telegram has only 2 posts by the creator, conveniently only an hour or two before the picture was posted onto Twitter.
The telegram picture is also conveniently a picture of the exact same piece of paper featured in the twitter post...
Whats the odds that someone made the Telegram account with a picture of the paper on what looks to be a table, then took it outside, hung it up, and in under an hour or two it already was posted up onto twitter and being reported by, coincidently?
Moreover, why was the telegram created first, and yet also has zero members? Who does that and when does that happen? Typically such groups would already have a circle of individuals participating and the telegram would be created for them to chat easier, so the telegram would have users added asap.
But instead the telegram was made, zero members ever added, the photo uploaded asap of the already printed off paper, then only an hour or two later this twitter account happened to see it so fast and snap a pic, and didnt even bother to edit out the URLs, and uploaded it to twitter?
Would have been more believable if they had edited out the URLs, but nope, leaving them up like that is something someone trying to make it look legit would do.
It took me literally like, 30 seconds to just look that telegram up and see what was going on, and yeah lo and behold it looks fake as fuck.
The deluge of people believing this shit at face value and not even checking out how legit it looks is concerning. Like come on, it wasn't that hard to check.
Not everyone operates in typical ways. Isn’t it also possible that someone started the telegram in hopes like-minded folks would join?
If a fire alarm is pulled, assume there’s a fire.
It's the internet.. we should question everything. That's not to say this is false or that racists don't exist. Just that being skeptical should be the default position.
Sorry but you aren't going to convince me to just trust random strangers on the internet with a vested financial interest in gaining clicks/likes/shares/subs about random stuff they say, especially when its something so brazen.
The whole thing clearly looks fake as fuck. People need a healthy dose of skepticism when it comes to shit like instagram/twitter/tiktok and whatnot, which was the medium this was shared over.
Nothing about that picture remotely looks like what it claims to be, the fuck kind of "moms and tots" group posts and shares that way, come on, use your head for a second and imagine the scenario playing out.
Even going with the absolute maximum benefit of the doubt, whatever way you try and frame it you still end up painting an incredibly bizarre nonsensical scenario that just. doesnt. make. sense.
The only scenarios that make sense based on the way it was shared, the way it was setup, and the way it has been followed up on are:
A: It was manufactured upset by the person who posted it. They created it all as a hoax to gain further subscriptions to their platform, which they have a vested financial interest in expanding.
B: It was created by a troll, who thought it would be funny to see it spread virally
Ask yourself some simple questions here:
How come the paper for the telegram post was the exact same one that got caught and put up on twitter? What are the odds?
How come there has only been one of these posted and shared anywhere, and how come only once? Surely there must have been other pictures of these flyers by other citizens?
The only conclusion you can make is... there was only one flyer taped up? And that one got taken down as soon as the picture was taken? Who goes to all that length to make the telegram, make the group, get a QR code, setup a (supposedly real) email, make a flyer all typed up... and then just only posts up one solitary flyer?
And what are the odds that that one solitary flyer gets found moments afterwards by, coincidentally, the owner of "BlackVancouver", a twitter/instagram that is pretty much entirely all about spreading around posts about trying to find racial injustices, and has recently been trying to get more subs/likes?
And despite all that, the telegram still today has no members/new posts.
And the email is a proton one? The fuck? What mom and tot group have you ever met that seriously uses fucking proton mail as their provider?
And jesus look at the chosen email and the chosen telegram name. It's twenty eight characters long. No normal person, especially one looking to share the group via flyer, ever makes something like that
I mean come on, this isn't sherlock holmes here, the thing is riddled with so many goddamn holes, a sieve would hold water better.
People like to be outraged. It makes them feel correct for not being the racist one and confirm how they already want to feel about others.
It's also easier for a brain to confirm what it already wants to believe. Good write up but I am unsure how good it would do of convincing those that need it that sometimes people just make rage bait to get people to think alike with them or because they are edgelords that think it's funny.
But you know as a wise Republican white commissioner in PA once said "I'm a black gay guy"
Theres tonnes of actual racist shit out there that gets dumped onto social media constantly.
It's wild to look at this and even remotely think "aw yeah this one definitely happened, looks super legit"
You have to live under a rock and never have actually encountered racist trash to think anything about this sign looks like it was made by such a person.
There's something about it that makes me think it a "to catch a predator" type meeting to out a bunch of white supremacists. Are they really trying to fish for contact information or get them to actually meet in a room? On the telegram link: "Hello everybody, we are encouraged by the response already and hope you can hang in there until we are all comfortable going in person."
The thing is that post was made almost as soon as the group was made, which doesnt even make sense, as no members were added yet.
Smells like fish.
Also curious if there have been other sightings of this flyer, or if it was the only one? If you only post one flyer in an obscure place, it's a lot easier to be the main source of documenting a flyer was posted on social media.
I looked around and all I could find was that one single solitary post/source, uploaded once, and literally zero other sightings/info indicating actual flyers were distributed.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/whites-only-mother-tots-group-condemned-british-columbia-1.6977449
That's more responsible journalism with due diligence. Weird thing is both social media links are basically the same post. The X comment is just someone reposing a screenshot from the Black Vancouver instagram.
On one hand: "CBC News located some of the signs, which had been partially removed, at the Coquitlam Centre, a shopping mall in the Vancouver suburb of Coquitlam, B.C."
On the other: "As soon as it was brought to our attention, bylaw officers immediately searched the area and all bus stops, but no signs were present. Perhaps being removed by someone else," said a joint statement from the city and Mayor Brad West."
The article does have a pic of a difference poster than the black vancouver instagram though. Curious if there's CTV footage to figure out who did this if it was at a shopping mall basically.
This article refers to multiple signs, in two municipalities. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/whites-only-mother-tots-group-condemned-british-columbia-1.6977449
Why is having a telegram with no members suspicious?
Cope snd seethe harder
I dont have anything to gain and I think you're a fucking knob. You wrote a whole ass essay on why you think a racist action isn't real. How about spending five minutes with some country folk? You'll shut the fuck up real quick.
Ah yes, the type of people who will make a well formatted and very clearly legible flyer, complete with a qr code, telegram group, and proton email.
That definitely sounds like the sort of thing "country folk" are so well known for doing all the time.
You are out to lunch if you think this solitary piece of paper looks real, lol
There are definitely smart, tech capable racist people. I know. I'm related to a lot of them.
Eh, walk around with a Nazi flag and see how long it takes before you're on social media...
The person would have created the telegram group so others who wanted to take part would have somewhere to communicate after seeing the advert?
Honestly this kind of attitude is only diminishing a problem that's very real, i.e. the rise of racism and bigotry.
Thanks for posting this. You are showing what people SHOULD be doing instead of immediately going into some race-baited tirade. The problem is that these days, people seem to WANT to get baited into some race argument. Lots of blue-haired, black nail-polish zoomers with nothing better to do started fuming before before they should jump into the comments and read a post like yours which shows that this is probably some total bullshit. Either a joke or something posted to purposefully cause controversy.
Ya I am one of those types of folks still, I just took the 30 seconds to look into what I was reading.
When you make statements like the above, you just shove yourself over to the other end of the problem. You do realize that blanket referring to a large group of people as all behaving the same way is bigotry right?
Like, you realize you can critique a post without resorting to bigoted ad hominem attacks on a massive group of people?
Please don't associate with me, lol. You aren't behaving much better. Literally everything you wrote here was unnecessary and you're post would have been much better without it included:
Literally all of that was totally unneeded, and makes you sound extremely bigoted.
Jesus this sounds like something straight out of a nazi poster in Germany 1933
Legal antisemitism didn't really happen in Nazi Germany until about 1935 with the first Nuremburg Laws. In 1933, the Nazis were more concerned about consolidating and holding power than they were with the Jews. The antisemitism really wasn't a popular policy of the early Nazis, either, and it took a few years of brainwashing through state media to get to that point. If this poster was in 1933 Germany, it would probably read "No Communists," if anything.
(Sorry for ruining the fun)
Damn that's interesting. Thanks a lot for the insights
NPCs reading about history: >:[
first thought it was just a troll, but really, that's not much better
It's definitely a troll.
It doesn't really matter. Give it a pass as a bad joke and people will eventually start doing it for real.
I think that's the question. If trolling, was it someone on the right trying to spout some vitriol to make people of color of leftists uncomfortable? Or was it someone on the left trying to stir up outrage among like minded people.
Considering the context the most likely and simplest scenario is just the instagram/twitter account(s) that posted it are trying to farm more subscriptions/likes/etc, to gain following.
If it's that, I'm afraid it might backfire
Unlikely, they already got the engagement they wanted and you can literally see everyone its been posted the ratio of "oh my god racism aaah" responses vastly overwhelm the small handful of folks going "yo this looks fake as fuck lol"
I meant backfire for people in real life through some people feeling less safe about possible existence of racists and some racists feeling more secure about their thoughts but maybe the clout seekers don't care about that at all in which case it's not backfire I guess
Nobody should be surprised that there's fascists in Canada. They're everywhere.
This is totally shit (assuming it is real and either not a joke or not some planted sign to stir controversy), but if the sign said any other race, there would be a whole lot less outrage. Or no outrage at all.
What's that? A sign that can be placed by literally anyone? And it's obscenely racist? Must be real. Why wouldn't somebody proudly advertise a thing people would be angry about in a public place.
If you don't think that there's white supremists in Canada, or that they aren't this brazen, you're dead wrong.
So there's lots of brazen white supremacists in Canada? You must have a ton of similarly-brazen examples then?\
This is noteworthy enough that I've seen it more than once already, on Reddit and here, in a world news community. That suggests that this is pretty frickin rare, which kinda undermines your argument.
If a fire alarm is pulled, assume there’s a fire.
It really kind of doesn't matter. Joke or serious, it could have an oppressive effect on minorities wanting to use the park. It sows doubt and mistrust whether it's one person's idea of a joke or serious idea.