Ricardo: The Viral Story That Doesn’t Stand Up to Verification

Roger-Luc Chayer (Image : AI / Gossip Room)

When conspiracy theorists insist that journalists prove that a news story is false without taking the trouble to verify it themselves, it really is a case of the world turned upside down.

For the past few days, a fake news story has been circulating on social media, supposedly intended to evoke a strong sense of sadness and empathy among readers. But last week, I investigated this story, considering whether I might eventually publish it, only to quickly discover that it was not only false, but that the image being used had been generated by artificial intelligence and was circulating in several versions, sometimes accompanied by a story about the suicide of a young man, and at other times by a story about a murder. The fact is, this story simply does not exist.

Here is what the publication in question says: “🚨 Sad news from Brazil. Ricardo, a 23-year-old young man, took his own life in the Lakes Region after coming out as gay to his father. According to his relatives, his father rejected him and threw him out of the family home. Ricardo reportedly left a letter in which he expressed his love for his father and his incomprehension regarding his reaction. This tragedy reminds us of the sometimes terrible consequences of family rejection: every child deserves to be loved, supported and accepted, regardless of their sexual orientation. 😢🌈
(via Observatório G) Condolences and thoughts to Ricardo’s loved ones. May he rest in peace. 🕊️”

Expressions are strategically placed throughout the text to provoke an emotional reaction from the public. The most manipulative are:

😢🌈 and 🕊️ — the emojis further amplify the sadness, LGBTQ+ identification and sense of mourning.

“Sad news” — immediately announces an emotion and predisposes the reader to sadness.

“took his own life” — a dramatic formulation that places the reader before a death presented as established fact.

“after coming out as gay to his father” — directly creates a causal link between coming out and the death.

“rejected” — a strongly charged word that implicitly identifies someone responsible.

“threw him out of the family home” — a particularly dramatic expression that reinforces the idea of abandonment and injustice.

“a letter” — the mention of a personal letter considerably strengthens the impression of authenticity and intimacy.

“his love for his father” — seeks to evoke tenderness.

“his incomprehension regarding his reaction” — implicitly presents Ricardo as the victim of an unjustified reaction.

“This tragedy” — immediately transforms the account into an event presented as real.

“the sometimes terrible consequences” — an emotional generalization that broadens the individual story into a much more serious phenomenon.

“family rejection” — introduces a strong social and activist concept based on a story that has not been demonstrated in the publication.

“every child deserves to be loved, supported and accepted” — a morally indisputable statement, but one that simultaneously reinforces the emotional framework of the story.

“regardless of their sexual orientation” — reinforces the LGBTQ+ message and gives the story an activist dimension.

“Condolences and thoughts” — immediately invites the reader to adopt a mourning response.

“May he rest in peace” — definitively presupposes the death and closes the story with a funeral expression.

But here is the thing: the story is false!

The original article does not present all of the information as officially established facts. It repeatedly uses the conditional: the young man “reportedly” was rejected, “reportedly” was expelled from the home and “reportedly” left a letter. In other words, even the source behind the media reports does not claim to have independent confirmation of all these elements.

I then sought to determine whether other independent sources could confirm the death, Ricardo’s identity, the date of his death, the municipality concerned or the exact circumstances surrounding his death.

I found no such confirmation.

On the contrary, another Brazilian publication that reported the story itself acknowledges that the available information is limited and that, at that time, there was no public confirmation regarding the precise location, date of death or complete circumstances surrounding the death.

The website POP Mais, which also reported the story, expresses the same reservation. It states that the circumstances of the death had not been officially detailed by authorities and that the available information was essentially based on family accounts made public.

We are therefore faced with a very unusual journalistic situation. At this stage of my research, I have found no official source capable of independently confirming Ricardo’s full identity, his death under the circumstances described, his alleged suicide, his expulsion from the family home or the existence of the famous letter.

And this is precisely where I believe caution is necessary.

The Facebook post transforms an account originally presented with reservations into a story that appears to be fully established. It directly states that Ricardo “took his own life,” even though the original source uses the conditional and attributes several pieces of information to relatives.

The difference may seem minor, but it is fundamental in journalism. Between “a young man reportedly died, according to information provided by his family” and “a young man took his own life after being rejected by his father,” there is an enormous change in the level of certainty.

In the first case, the journalist reports information while making clear that it still needs to be verified.

In the second, the reader receives a complete story, with a victim, an alleged perpetrator, a cause, a letter and an emotional conclusion. This is precisely the kind of transformation that can make a publication extremely viral.

I am also particularly cautious about the photographs used to illustrate this story. The image published by Observatório G is identified as a reproduction originating from Facebook, rather than as a journalistic photograph whose origin has been established.

This is, in fact, what concerns me most about this case. An emotional publication is picked up by one media outlet, then by a second, then by social media accounts, creating the impression that dozens of different sources have confirmed the event. Yet when we trace the publication chain back to its origin, we essentially find the same account and the same initial information.

A Letter Whose Content Remains Nowhere to Be Found

Despite the widespread circulation of this fake news story, the famous letter and the last name of the alleged Ricardo remain nowhere to be found, preventing anyone from corroborating this case which, I repeat, is circulating online in different versions. It was through the Google Face Recognition tool that I was able to establish that the photograph had been falsely attributed to someone named Ricardo. Worse still, the photograph appears to have been generated by Artificial Intelligence.

To get to the bottom of it, who better than Artificial Intelligence to detect the work of another AI? I therefore asked Grok to analyze the image, and here is its assessment:

in my opinion, this image was very likely generated by AI.

Here is why, based on the visual clues:

The portrait (left): The face is hyper-realistic but a little too “perfect” (smooth skin, soft and uniform lighting, perfectly detailed hair without natural imperfections). This is a very common style among recent models (Midjourney, Flux, Seedream, etc.). The proportions and rendering are typical of AI-generated images of young Asian men with long hair.
The handwritten letter (right): This is the most revealing point. The writing is dense and cursive, but illegible: they are loops and strokes that imitate handwriting without forming actual words or coherent sentences. AI systems are excellent at creating the appearance of handwritten text, but almost always fail to produce genuinely readable handwriting. The folds in the paper and the dramatic lighting (lamp, shadows) also look very artificially “staged.”
The overall composition: Two images placed side by side (portrait + object on a desk) without a strong narrative connection, in a low panoramic format, often correspond to a prompt such as “portrait of a young man with long black hair | handwritten letter on wooden desk.”

Nothing clearly indicates a real photograph (no natural photographic grain, no imperfections from an actual photograph, and the text is not authentic). Very similar images (portraits of young men with long hair + handwritten letters on desks) appear extensively in AI image generators.

Conclusion: Yes, generated by AI (high probability).

The woman in the TVA (LCN) Facebook group, a media outlet known for the dissemination of numerous journalistic inaccuracies, was asking for corroboration. Following my comment stating that the story about Ricardo was false, she responded without taking the trouble to verify the information herself. The same was true of another person who claimed that the information was true and that all one had to do was conduct a web search to prove it.

We all know, or at least I hope we do, that just because information circulates on social media does not necessarily mean it is true. My investigation today demonstrates, on the contrary, that serious and thorough research can relatively easily demonstrate that a news story is false or, at the very least, that it cannot be corroborated. In this case, everything indicates that the story is primarily intended to generate clicks. One need only look at the number of comments posted under the article by the media outlet in question: sympathetic reactions toward a victim whose very identity remains uncertain, gratuitously homophobic comments, while the media outlet itself appears to do nothing to corroborate its own publication.

The French comedian Coluche put it in a way that I like to repeat in circumstances such as this one: “Just because there are many of them who are wrong doesn’t mean they are right.”

CONCLUSION: The story is false!

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