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Viral Misinformation
Target 'Satanic' Coordinated Campaign: How Viral Claims Misrepresented Products
Viral claims that Target sold 'satanic' Pride merchandise conflated a designer's unrelated personal catalog with AI-generated fake product photos — and the 'stock price proves the boycott worked' narrative doesn't survive a look at Target's own earnings report.
FILED OCT 6, 2026 · UPDATED OCT 6, 2026 · 4 SOURCES
The 'Satanic' Claims: What Was Actually Said
Beginning in May 2023, social media posts and a conservative influencer's video accused Target of selling "satanic" merchandise designed by "a satanist," pointing to designer Erik Carnell, whose brand Abprallen had items in Target's 2023 Pride collection [1].
A separate, later wave of viral photos literally showing satanic-themed clothing on Target shelves turned out to be entirely fake. PolitiFact traced them to AI images generated with Midjourney by a creator who said he made them to mock people boycotting the store [2].
What Target Actually Sold
Carnell designed three real products that Target sold: a sweatshirt, a tote bag, and a messenger bag reading "Cure transphobia, not trans people," "We belong everywhere," and "Too queer for here" [1].
Target had told Carnell early on that his separate "Satan respects pronouns" design — from his own personal Abprallen line, sold only on his own site — "would not be a good fit," and it was never stocked at Target [1].
Threats, Removal, and a Coordinated Push
The backlash included hundreds of hateful messages and death threats directed at Carnell, and Target cited "threats impacting our team members' sense of safety and wellbeing while at work" when it pulled some Pride items from shelves [1][3].
Right-wing commentator Matt Walsh promoted the campaign explicitly as strategy, saying the goal was "to make 'pride' toxic for brands" so that companies "pay a price" [1]. Separately, misleading videos falsely claimed Target's "tuck-friendly" swimsuits were marketed to children; they were sold only in adult sizes [3].
The Stock Price Myth
Target's stock did fall sharply in late May and early June 2023, and the Pride backlash is widely cited as the cause. But Newsweek's review found that explanation doesn't hold up: shares actually rose slightly during the first days of the boycott, from $155.21 on May 10 to $157.28 on May 16, before the decline began [4].
The timing points to Target's May 17 earnings report, not the Pride backlash, as the real driver — the report showed flat sales, a 5.8% drop in net earnings, and a projected $500 million hit from theft and retail shrink. Analyst Jeremy Bowman called the boycott's effect on the stock "probably negligible" [4].
Conclusion
The "satanic merchandise" claim conflated three different things: a handful of inoffensive Pride items Target actually sold, a designer's personal (non-Target) catalog that does reference Satan, and outright AI-generated fake product photos [1][2]. None of it means Target sold satanic products.
The backlash caused real harm — death threats against a designer and confrontations that led Target to pull merchandise — but it did not cause Target's stock slide, which the company's own earnings report explains far better than any boycott.
SOURCES · 4
- [1]KSL: LGBTQ brand creator 'relieved' after Target pulls his items off shelves due to backlash — ksl.com
72/100 · ksl.com
- [2]PolitiFact: Target is not selling children's clothes featuring satanic images — politifact.com
90/100 · politifact.com
- [3]KTVZ: Target removes some LGBTQ+ Pride merchandise over threats to employees — ktvz.com
72/100 · ktvz.com
- [4]Newsweek: Target Losing Billions in Value Is Unlikely About Boycotts — newsweek.com
76/100 · newsweek.com
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