Apparently, the Internet isn't the Only Place Full of Suckers

I've ranted before about how gullible and eager to accept fiction as fact that people can be on the internet.  It seems one can read a story about how McDonald's is grinding up fat orphans named Mac to make their signature burgers and then suddenly put a petition on Facebook to stop the evil restaurant from its diabolical plan.  This isn't true by the way (it's Taco Bell).  It is frustrating how easily people will gobble up garbage, just because they read it somewhere and are too lazy to do any kind of fact checking.

At least, newspapers aren't like that.  Right?  They don't just get suckered into complete nonsense, and try to report the story as fact.  Oh no, this would never happen.  Reporters are professionals, and will always verify their facts.  Especially if something sounds really absurd, then they'll really try to make sure it is accurate and not some elaborate hoax.

Right?

Oh wait, if this was true, then this article about the five biggest front page hoaxes wouldn't exist.  It is kind of sad to see that papers bought most of these stories that really are too crazy to be true.  Usually if a story sounds like utter bullshit, then it probably means you better get the toilet paper out.  But hey, newspapers willingness to get suckered then allowed for this awesome article to exist.  It is always nice to know I live in a world where people once believed in man-bats from the moon.