There’s nothing worse than being left out of a joke. At News24, though, they didn’t get it in the first place. The presenter James Macpherson kicked an own goal this week, presenting a satirical video as an authentic Seven News segment while hosting The Bolt Report.

The video was created by the sports comedy group Kick it Forward, joking that one of the members of the group, Josh Garlepp, had quit social media after copping abuse for posting about Fremantle’s finals loss on X.

“There were 220 comments targeting me physically, mentally, my mum, my dad, my dog,” he said in the clip, which was presented as a mock Seven News report, adding that he had received insults including “baby flog dick” and “tall lanky freak”.

Unfortunately, News24 failed to pick up that it was a work of comedy, with Macpherson playing a section of the clip during Tuesday’s program, credited to “Seven News”.

“I have to warn you, the abuse was shocking,” Macpherson grimly declared. “According to the Seven News report, he was called every derogatory name under the sun … He was called a flog, a cuck, he was called woke, he was called a baby penis, and he was called … Albo!”

Macpherson suggested the clip showed that it was now a “common online slur” to be called an “Albo”. He also used it to illustrate his anger at the federal government’s proposed reforms to social media algorithms, which he claimed were trying to “restrict the flow of information” and shut down dissent.

Garlepp was quick to pick up on the plug, posting to X that he didn’t expect News24 to be “as gullible and digitally illiterate as their target audience”.

“Not only missing the joke but repurposing for their own agenda,” he wrote. “The story was parody, made by me and then used against the algorithm legislation. How dumb are these people?”

On Thursday, News24 issued a correction noting that the clip was “not a genuine news report”.

“News24 apologises for the error. The segment was removed from all online versions of the episode,” it read.

A ‘truffle hound’ for fake news

It’s not the first correction News24 has issued since Macpherson took the........

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