Like many women around the world, Madonna took to Twitter and Instagram on International Women's Day to post an inspirational feminist quote, which was attributed to Clinton. 

Repost! Thank you Hilary Clinton! Happy International Womens Day! ❤️ #rebelheart pic.twitter.com/pPBCrK4fon — Madonna (@Madonna) March 8, 2015

The quote read: "You may not agree with a woman, but to criticize her appearance — as opposed to her ideas or actions — isn't doing anyone any favors, least of all you. Insulting a woman's looks when they have nothing to do with the issue at hand implies a lack of comprehension on your part, an inability to engage in high-level thinking. You may think she's ugly, but everyone else thinks you're an idiot."

The quote seemed to resonate with her followers, and seemed a good fit for both Clinton and Madonna, two powerful women frequently subjected to sexist and ageist criticism about their appearance.

But the quote was not by Clinton at all. She never said or wrote that. Erin Gloria Ryan, a writer at the feminist website Jezebel was the one who wrote those words, in an article in 2012 about the appalling sexism that Clinton was subjected to after doing a press conference wearing minimal make-up.

In an article headlined "Dear Madonna: I Am Not 'Hilary Clinton,' and Hillary Didn't Write That" Ryan writes: "Almost immediately (according to Google, the same day that I wrote the piece), the internet decided that Hillary Clinton had said those lines. In the ensuing months, Tumblr, Instagram, and Pinterest jumped aboard. Even women's rights organisations, who you'd think would know enough to Google stuff—joined the chorus. And before you know it (and despite the efforts of several eagle-eyed internet fact-checkers and the fact that the piece I wrote is the second highest result when you search for the quote), I became Hillary Clinton's unwitting ghostwriter."

Ryan writes that despite her best attempts to point out the mistake to some people online, it continued to be repeated as a Clinton quote, right up to Sunday, when the pop star shared it with the world.

The ease with which picture quote memes can be created, and the ease with which words and images can go viral online, with just the click of a button, means mistakes like this can happen easily.

Coupled with people's desire to display their own goodness or wisdom by sharing a bite-sized nugget of someone else's, it's easy to see how something like this could happen. So easy that it serves as a little warning to the rest of us to check what we're sharing before we share it.

It takes less than two minutes to make something like this:

Or this:

Not that misattribution of stirring words makes the words themselves any less meaningful. The quote shared by Madonna isn't any less relevant because it came from a journalist and not the woman most likely to become the first female president of the US.

But it does reveal how we project sentiments on to people we admire and the value placed on celebrity. Would so many people, Madonna included, have shared the awesome quote if they knew it came from a relative unknown as opposed to a famous person? Do we even care about the facts, or just the #feels, when we share stuff online?