A satire article from The Onion is saying that officials with Malaysia Airlines is expanding its search of the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 a week ago to “the overarching scope of space, time, and humankind’s place in the universe.”
A number of people were confused by the satire and some said it was insensitive. More than 40,000 people shared it on Facebook on Thursday and Friday.
“Additionally, the airline confirmed it had expanded its active search area to include a several-hundred-square-mile zone in the Indian Ocean as well as each of the seven or 22 additional spatial dimensions posited by string theory,” the Onion satire reads.
According to its disclaimer, The Onion notes that nothing it publishes is real.
“The Onion is a satirical weekly publication published 52 times a year on Thursdays,” the disclaimer reads, adding: “The Onion uses invented names in all its stories, except in cases where public figures are being satirized. Any other use of real names is accidental and coincidental.”
On the Onion’s Facebook page, a number of people were confused by the satire, or they said it was not tasteful, given the gravity of the plane’s disappearance.
Not everyone shared the same sentiment.
“I think the joke is lost on people. It’s not saying ‘How funny is it that people died’. It is saying ‘How stupid is this investigation,’” one person wrote on the Onion’s Facebook page.
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