by Newsweek
Adapted by Daffyd ap Morgen
- The entire Hogg family is connected to the CIA, FBI and CNN
- Like many conspiracy theories, these likely started with a tiny kernel of truth:
- Hogg’s father is a retired FBI agent-information that the teen volunteered offhand during a television interview.
- Hogg or his mother is a CNN VIP who is "pimping" her son
- This developed after a photo surfaced of Hogg and his sister, Lauren, touring the studios as children.
- According to Snopes, the family was actually on a $35 VIP tour.
- Rebecca Boldrick, the mother of the Hogg siblings, works as a school teacher, which the Broward County School confirmed.
- Hogg didn’t attend Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School
- A picture from a different yearbook with another student named David Hogg is used,
- Others circulate a mugshot from a 26-year-old California man named David Hogg as proof.
- The two don’t have same eye color or look alike.
- Hogg wasn't at the school when the shooting took place
- Conservative blog Red State falsely claimed Hogg wasn’t on the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School campus during the February 14 shooting.
- As evidence, the article pointed to an interview in which Hogg said he arrived on campus at 6 p.m. on the day of the shooting, which was hours after the suspected shooter was captured by police occurred.
- Hogg actually spoke about returning to the campus at 6 p.m.
- Hogg actually documented hiding with other students while the school was on lockdown.
- Gonzalez ripped up the Constitution
- In fact, the picture was a doctored image of from a photoshoot Gonzalez and a few other students did for Teen Vogue.
- Gonzalez admitted to bullying suspected shooter Nikolas Cruz
- It uses an out-of-context snippet from a speech Gonzalez gave in Florida on February 17, in which she responded to President Donald Trump's suggestion that the shooting could have been prevented with adequate mental health care.
- Her full remarks are as follows:
- "There is one tweet I would like to call attention to.
- ‘So many signs that the Florida shooter was mentally disturbed, even expelled for bad and erratic behavior. Neighbors and classmates knew he was a big problem. Must always report such instances to authorities again and again.’
- We did, time and time again.
- Since he was in middle school, it was no surprise to anyone who knew him to hear that he was the shooter.
- Those talking about how we should not have ostracized him, you didn't know this kid!
- OK, we did.
- We know that they are claiming mental health issues, and I am not a psychologist, but we need to pay attention to the fact that this was not just a mental health issue.
- He would not have harmed that many students with a knife."
- 18-year-old Gonzalez attacked a Second Amendment supporter's truck at a March for Our Lives rally
- C'mon. It's literally Britney, b*tch.
- This meme was most assuredly created to mock conspiracy theorists, particularly ones born before 1981.
- Whether jokes or not, the conspiracy theories have serious consequences—from harassment to stalking to physical violence.
- Erica Lafferty, whose mother, Dawn Lafferty Hochsprung was shot and killed at Sandy Hook, said conspiracy theories are part of a “new normal” for victims caught in the crosshairs of politically charged debates.
- "I cannot count the number of times that I've been called a 'crisis actor,” Lafferty, who now works for Everytown For Gun Safety, told Newsweek.
- “Unfortunately, this is the new normal for survivors of national tragedies—we're told that our loved ones never existed and that our grief is just pretend."