In June 2023, reports appeared on social media that one of the main Parisian monuments was decorated with a six-color rainbow to mark Pride Month. The evidence was a video, which we checked for accuracy.
In early June, a 12-second video went viral on the Internet showing the Arc de Triomphe surrounded by a giant rainbow, as if emerging from an artificial cloud, with the inscription in French: “Marche Des Fiertes” (“March of Pride”). The video was shot from two different angles: as if from a moving car and from the side of the road. The authors of some Russian-language publications believe that in this way the French authorities disfigured the landmark, and remind, that it began to be built by order of Napoleon Bonaparte (it was completed only in 1836) and that the remains of an unknown soldier who died during the First World War are buried under the arch’s arches. In this regard, in posts you can find comments that “Napoleon is spinning in his grave” and that people should go to a rally against such “disgrace.”
Similar publications can be found in Telegram channels, including “Sanya in Florida"(359,000 views at the time of writing this analysis), "Ivan Utenkov"(110,000), "Special Operation Z"(89,000), "Skabeeva"(83,000), "Rhymes and trash" (70,000), "SRF" (50,000), "Russia now" (45,000) and "What's going on?"(36,000). On VKontakte, verified public pages of the magazine “TV program" and publications "Ukraine.ru", as well as numerous social network users (examples here, here And here), but the most popular was the public post “KB"(424,000 views). Similar posts can be found in Twitter, Facebook* And "Zene", some news sites and media, for example the Belarusian TV channel, also spoke about the unusual design of the Arc de Triomphe ONT And "Politicus"
Every year on June 1, Pride Month or Pride Month begins in many countries (Pride Month), during which various processions, festivals and educational events are held dedicated to the struggle of representatives of the LGBT community for their rights. For example, in Paris this year the above-mentioned Pride March will pass June 24.
“Verified” looked at the recordings of city surveillance cameras installed in Paris, which anyone can view and through the lens of which hits Arc de Triomphe. At least on June 7 and 8, there was no installation with a rainbow around the monument. Our colleagues from the project Les Observateurs France24 TV channel found out that there was no rainbow on June 1–2. In addition, the Center of National Monuments of France confirmed Newtral publication that the viral video is not true.
At the beginning of the video being distributed, a round logo with a six-color rainbow and the word Paint is visible on one of the arch supports. If you enter the query “Paint LGBT”, then the first search results will be media resources called Paint - it covers the problems of LGBT+ people.
The video with the Arc de Triomphe “Verified” was found on Paint’s Instagram* account, where the recording was published June 1, 2023. The publication was posted jointly with a user under the nickname origiful, who thanked Paint for their help in creating the video. According to the profile, the creator of the video is named Ian Padgham, and his page description reads: “Video artist from California, living in France. I love surrealism, travel and art history.”
French fact checkers we talked with Padgham, who confirmed his authorship and said that he himself contacted Paint and offered to collaborate. “This video was created in about three days using several different programs. I proceeded the same way as in all my videos: first I shot real footage on the street, and then added what came to my mind,” said the 3D artist. To the Associated Press he explained, that the real footage was recorded during a taxi ride, and the rainbow was added using After Effects and Cinema 4D. And in a conversation with Reuters, the artist clarifiedthat no one lobbied or sponsored his work.
There are other similar works on Padgham's Instagram page: for example, one video shows curved tower Big Ben, and in another of Louvre pyramid flies out lots of balloons.
In an interview with Les Observateurs Padgham told: “We are at an important moment in the history of digital content, with the rise of works created by artificial intelligence. And we live in an era where you can do more and more realistic things without leaving your home. I try to create positive emotions, but, unfortunately, I see that you can’t always completely control your message.” At the same time, in the comments under his video on Twitter, dialed 3 million views, author explained, which the AI itself did not use.
Thus, bloggers and Internet users, who were outraged by the appearance of an installation with a rainbow flag on the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, mistook the video created using computer graphics for real footage. At the same time, the author of the video did not hide the fact that the art object dedicated to Pride Month does not exist in reality.
*Russian authorities think Meta Platforms Inc., which owns the social networks Facebook and Instagram, is an extremist organization; its activities in Russia are prohibited.
Cover photo: @origiful / @paint.officiel
Not true
- Is it true that the German magazine Eulenspiegel published a cover dedicated to the influence of LGBT people and Ukraine on the upcoming Olympics?
- Is it true that Disney has promised to increase the proportion of LGBT characters in children's content to 50% by the end of 2022?
- Is it true that the plane carrying the German national football team was not allowed into Qatar because of LGBT symbols?
- Is it true that the colors of the Ukrainian flag were added to the LGBT+ flag?
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