The Bullshit Asymmetry Principle
Misinformation in Tucson’s backyard … Save City Hall … And a thorough investigation!
We’ve been thinking a lot this week about an obscure concept from an Italian programmer known as Brandolini’s Law, which has to do with fighting misinformation.
It’s better known as the Bullshit Asymmetry Principle.
“The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than that needed to produce it,” Alberto Brandolini said in 2012 when he coined the phrase.
That principle came into play twice this week when Tucson became the epicenter of viral stories.
On the day after Halloween, Turning Point USA spokesman Andrew Kolvet accused Vail math teachers of celebrating Charlie Kirk’s death by wearing bloodstained shirts reading “problem solved.” Kolvet later deleted the tweet after the district explained the shirts had nothing to do with Kirk, but he continued to fan the flames, writing, “Who’s buying this explanation?”
On Election Day, right-wing Twitter influencer WallStreetApes went viral with a video suggesting that election workers who were emptying a ballot drop box were stealing ballots. It got millions of views.
Both claims were bullshit. And officials quickly responded in both incidents, offering facts, photographs and on-the-record statements to the press and the public to correct the record.
But it did little to stop the doxxing and death threats against teachers and election workers.
The teachers wore the same shirts last year, a Vail Unified School District board member pointed out on social media, and the county recorder had to put out a statement saying the video showed members of her staff emptying a ballot box because it was full — you know, their job.
Even Elon Musk’s AI bot Grok called bullshit on the ballot-box claim, noting that the video shows election workers “following established protocols with tamper-evident bins and chain-of-custody requirements.”
It doesn’t take long to poke holes in these inflammatory social-media posts. Ask yourself: How long have these shirts been commercially available? (Several years.) How would you properly empty a ballot box? (Like that — with two people, from different political parties, and a third person observing.)
But it’s easier to drop another hot take in the comments.
And whether it’s true or not doesn’t matter much to the craven political operators who stir up insanity to burnish their online reputations as provocateurs and then, like locusts, move on to the next thing.
It’s all just an exhausting, childish trick: I’ll make a claim without any evidence. If you disagree with me, it’s your responsibility to prove me wrong.
What if a different obscure concept was the Law of the Internet?
When it comes to misinformation, Hitchens’ Razor might serve everybody better. It says, “What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence.”
Between covering local elections and trying to push back on misinformation on social media this week, we missed a few things going on in Tucson and Pima County.
The county news we missed
A federal judge issued a preliminary injunction prohibiting the Department of Homeland Security from freezing about $9.5 million in grant funding meant to reimburse Pima County for operating a shelter for legal asylum seekers during the Biden administration. The keyword here is preliminary — the court case continues.
Pima County is considering its own ordinance on “camping” on county-owned land. This isn’t an apples-to-apples comparison to the City of Tucson’s controversial ban on sleeping in washes, but it follows a national trend of passing restrictive laws on living on government-owned property after the 2024 Supreme Court decision in Grants Pass, Ore. v. Johnson. A formal policy — which could include simply applying for a permit — is expected next spring.
The consultant studying the Pima County Jail needs two more months to finalize their report. The assessment, once public, will re-ignite discussion on how to address issues with the aging 40-year-old building. Last year, the county estimated a new jail could cost up to $858 million, while renovating the current facility would cost around $623 million.
Supporting local news is much cheaper than renovating jails.
The county has begun studying new locations to relocate its skeet-shooting facility on the 290-acre parcel it’s selling to the developers of Project Blue. The cost of moving the facility will be covered by one of Amazon Web Services’ proxies, but what stood out to us is the $6.5 million price tag. This is the upper limit of what Project Blue could pay to move the facility to another county-owned parcel, but it could cost significantly less once a site has been selected.
The city news we missed
The Tucson City Council signed off on two appeals for planned apartment complexes on the west side that will reduce the required number of parking spaces. It’s an effort to reduce the overall cost of the projects — which Oz Development says will allow them to keep rents low.
Residents in the nearby neighborhoods worry that the reduced parking spaces will bleed into parking in the adjacent neighborhoods. One 65-unit development will only need to provide 17 parking spaces.
Vice Mayor Lane Santa Cruz, who was running Wednesday’s meeting, said the city has to take some risks to find ways to build more affordable housing.
“We won’t know unless we try it,” Santa Cruz said.
While the Council signed off on the reduced parking for Congress Apartments and Linda Apartments, it still could be a while before building permits are issued. A lawsuit over access to a private road could hold up both projects.
The Council signed off on a new agreement with the Tucson Police Officers Association earlier this week, renewing and slightly modifying the agreement, making TPOA the officially recognized union representing Tucson Police Department officers. At least one local group, the Tucson Protective League, touts itself as a labor union but isn’t recognized by the city.
The Council is starting the process of getting historic landmark status for Tucson City Hall. The city wrapped up construction on the 10-story Brutalist-style building back in 1966. And yeah, the 59-year-old building is starting to show its age, but the council says landmark status would help protect it — even if someday the city decides to move somewhere else (no one’s saying that out loud yet).
If it does get landmark status, it could still be redeveloped — maybe even turned into housing down the line.
We wish the future developer luck in figuring out parking.
Remember when we were talking about Brandolini’s Law? Check out what state Rep. Rachel Keshel wrote in her newsletter this week:
“I am in the process of completing a thorough investigation of the incident widely reported last week involving the Vail School District and am awaiting a few more exhibits to feel confident enough to put out a comprehensive statement so we can move forward and learn all necessary lessons,” Keshel wrote.
It sounds so official! A thorough investigation! Widely reported! Exhibits! Hold on, let me grab my popcorn!
The shorter, more honest way to deal with it would be to write: “Whoops! I screwed up. It turned out to be nothing. My fault. I’ll be more careful next time.”
Thanks for focusing on misinformation. It does require more energy to correct misinformation than it does to produce it. The ADS demonstrated this fact when it devoted space and time to documenting and correcting Trump's lies after he became president in 2017. The task proved to large and was abandoned. Let's not forget that we now have a Vice President who publically stated that he was not opposed to making things up if doing so advanced the agenda. He said this soon after disparaging Haitian refugees by claiming that they were eating their neighbor's cats and dogs. Misinformation is a dangerous problem and explains why those who depend on spreading misinformation dislike a free and independent press.
It’s especially hard to disprove BS because people earnestly want to believe the BS. It’s emotional, it probably fires up several parts of the brain, and it’s oh-so-boring to research facts and find out one is wrong. Keshel is doing a good job of proving this Law. How many exhibits, proofs, pictures, sworn statements, and testimonies does she even need? I sure hope at the conclusion of her witch trial, she makes a big ‘ol apology. But something tells me that will either not happen, or it’ll be some waffling statement that’s difficult to parse.