A video of a man losing his temper in a Costco store is raising concerns over misinformation after popular Instagram accounts shared the video and claimed it was taken in Vancouver recently.
The video shows a man in a baseball hat arguing with a large group of customers before slamming his shopping cart into the crowd and walking away with his little dog in tow with a shocked employee chasing behind him.
Among those who claimed the video was taken in Vancouver was YVRWAVE, which captioned it, “Vancouver Costco getting hectic 😂,” on November 29.
With thousands of shares and likes and hundreds of comments, plenty of people made comments about Vancouver’s Costco location.
“People have no common sense these days and we are disgustingly overpopulated,” one Instagram user commented.
“Which location so I know which one not to go to 😂,” another asked.
“Vancouver Costco vibe is so real,” another expressed.
Except, in this case, it isn’t real. While Vancouver does have a Costco, this video wasn’t taken in that store.
The video was posted on Reddit with a very different caption.
“Thanksgiving shoppers are Wilding out there,” the poster shared, tagging the video as being from San Diego, California. Thanksgiving in the United States was on November 28. Another person posted the video on TikTok on November 26, and the video makes no mention of a Canadian connection either.
YVRWAVE isn’t the only account to share it and claim the video was in Vancouver. UrbaVancouver and NMGVancouver shared it on November 28. SafeStreetsVancouver posted it in December, but the timing is tricky for YVRWAVE due to recent allegations against the account.
The video comes as the account’s Edmonton handle has been defending itself against alarming accusations from users. YEGWAVE put out a statement last week about the increasing concerns raised by users slamming the account for disinformation in their comment section.
“As some of you may have noticed, certain defamatory posts have been circulating on social media, falsely accusing YEGWAVE of being “run by bots,” “operated by Russia,” and spreading additional false information,” it shared in a statement posted December 1.
— YEGWAVE (@yegwave) December 2, 2024
“We have never posted certain media to portray or push certain narratives. We strive to make everything we post objective in nature, providing just the bare facts and any surrounding context.”
Calling the accusations “baseless” and encouraging people to comment positive things and share their perspectives in the discussions thanks to free speech. Comments on the post are blocked by the user.
Daily Hive reached out to YVRWAVE for a comment but did not receive a response in time for publishing.
Fake news fight
In recent years, the issue of fake news and the spread of disinformation has been top of mind for many, and experts are studying how to ensure that users on these platforms are protected.
Among them is Abde Amr, an independent researcher who previously worked at Simon Fraser University’s The Disinformation Project. His past work on disinformation and misinformation examined Canadian media and social media, and he was able to share some tips with Daily Hive on how to tell if a video is fake.
One way Amr examined the video was to see what items people were shopping for and compare them to the Canadian products sold in stores.
“There were two big boxes that had Spanish on them in addition to English,” he said. “One of the boxes also had sweetener, like the splendid sweetener, [and] it had an American flag [on it],” Amr explained. Daily Hive was able to verify other products, such as the eggs, were not the ones sold in Canada.
Not to mention, everyone in the video is wearing warm-weather clothes, including shorts and no jackets.
“It was supposed to be November,” he said. The temperature in Vancouver at the end of November was a very chilly 5°C, according to Environment and Climate Change Canada’s reports.
Looking through the lens
A screen grab of a Google Lens search of a video shared on social media recently. (Google)
There are also some free tools to help sort through the source.
“A go-to tool, or go-to method to at least help you quickly find out about something, is the reverse image tool,” he said about Google Lens. “You can upload a screenshot of the video, and then it will go through the web and actually show you where this was posted elsewhere, whether it was posted before, whether it was posted by multiple people.”
“In a lot of cases, something that’s being promoted as content that just happened today would be content that was posted three years ago, which means immediately, like, either fake or misleading or out of context,” he said.
A growing concern
Amr said that while the video itself might be harmless, it does reflect a bigger problem.
“Maybe we’re looking at a video of an angry customer at Costco, and it’s not that important, so we move on. But when it comes to other issues, like political issues or health issues, vaccines, for example, stuff about voting, stuff related to climate, then it becomes an issue.
“The problem is maybe we’re seeing a lot of fake entertainment videos or entertainment content, but as time passes by, we get used to it, and we don’t have a critical angle, we don’t have that verification perspective. So then more important stuff will just, like, pass by, and we wouldn’t notice that it was fake,” he said.
Plus, those entertaining videos help gain followers, and engagement propels videos to more and more eyeballs.
Even as a researcher, he said it’s time-consuming and sometimes incredibly difficult to tell what’s real and what’s fake, and he wants these platforms to be held accountable.
One commenter seemed to be on the way to a critical thought when they noticed there was a dog in the store.
“I didn’t know you can bring dogs with you,” they said. A simple Google search confirms that Costco Canada does not allow dogs, except service animals, into their grocery stores.