An image claiming to quote a passage from Mark Carney's 2021 book "Values: Building a Better World for All" spread on social media in April. While it's not clear where the image originated from, the quote it includes does not appear in the book. The quote attributed to Carney contains paraphrased or directly copied sentences from a 2021 ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø Post review.Â
THE CLAIM
"Western society is morally rotten, and it has been corrupted by capitalism, This requires rigid controls of personal freedoms …" reads the first part of a quote attributed to Liberal Leader Mark Carney.Â
The quote appears on an image that spread on social media in April.Â
The image includes a picture of Carney's 2021 book "Values: Building a Better World for All," and claims the quote came directly from the book.
Versions of the image appeared on , posted by former NHL player Theo Fleury, as well as on the , formerly Twitter.
Before the election was called, Conservative MP John Brassard attributed a similar quote to Carney in a March 15 but did not share the image.
RATING: Fake quoteÂ
ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø accessed a digital copy of Carney's book and searched for the phrases and key words that appear in the supposed quote from the image.Â
The terms "morally rotten," "rigid controls" and "corrupted by capitalism" do not appear in the book.Â
Neither does "temporarily worse," "less flying" or "less meat."
Searching part of the quote on Google led to a of Carney's book by Peter Foster in the ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø Post.Â
Sentences from the supposed Carney quote appear in Foster's review, but they do not quote directly from the book and instead represent Foster's own words and interpretation of the book, not Carney's.
"In his book Value(s): Building a Better World for All, Mark Carney, former governor both of the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England, claims that western society is morally rotten, and that it has been corrupted by capitalism, which has brought about a 'climate emergency' that threatens life on earth," Foster wrote.Â
His words bear resemblance to the first sentence of the fake quote, which appears to paraphrase and splice together various lines from Foster's review and present it as a direct quote from Carney's book.Â
It's unclear where the image containing the quote originated from.
The earliest version of the claim ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø found was from by Conservative MP Brassard, which includes a screenshot of the ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø Post review and attributes the quote about western society being "morally rotten" to Carney.Â
"Mark Carney...'Western society is morally rotten,'" his X caption reads.
However, in a the same day, Brassard made it clear the "morally rotten" remark came from the reviewer, and quoted Foster's words: "Mark Carney … claims (in his book) that western society is morally rotten."
Brassard later attributed Foster's words as coming from Carney in his March Facebook post.Â
SOURCES
Graphic posted to April 7, 2025 (), April 7, 2025 () and similar quote posted to March 15, 2025 ()
Peter Foster. Peter Foster: Mark Carney, man of destiny, wants to revolutionize society. It won't be pleasant. ºÚÁϳԹÏÍø Post . June 5, 2021 ()
John Brassard from Feb. 10, 2025 ()
John Brassard from Feb. 10, 2025 ()
Mark Carney. Values: Building a Better World for All. eBook edition published by Signal in 2022. Previously published in Canada in hardcover by Signal in 2021. Accessed April 9, 2025.
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