‘False flags’ and ‘crisis actors’: How America’s far-right lie machine smears school shooting victims

When young survivors of the Parkland school shooting spoke up, many around the world were inspired by their bravery in taking on America’s pro-gun establishment.

But on the fringes of America’s extreme right, a well-oiled machine sprang into action.

Were the children actually ‘crisis actors’ – put in place by the anti-gun lobby? Were they picked by anti-Trump forces within the government… the so-called ‘deep state’?

Or was the entire shooting a ‘false flag’ staged by government elements, to take away people’s guns?

All of these ideas were suggested, entirely seriously, by online outlets with tens of thousands of readers this week, and shared hundreds of thousands of times on social media.

Such conspiracy theories have now become so mainstream that YouTube’s top suggested video on the shooting was briefly a conspiracy video suggesting survivor David Hogg was an actor.

Even at time of writing, ‘David Hogg actor’ is among the top suggested searches on Google and Twitter.

Other top videos suggested that he had been co-opted by the FBI, or didn’t attend the school in the first place.

Hogg spoke out on CNN saying, ‘I’m not a crisis actor. I’m someone who had to witness this and live through this and I continue to be having to do that.’

Such smears have become a standard part of shooting incidents in America: here’s how the conspiracy machine works.

What is a crisis actor?

‘Crisis actors’ are a genuine thing: actors hired to play the part of victims in emergencies, for instance in police training exercises.

But the term has become widely used to smear victims of shootings, and suggest either that the shootings didn’t occur, or that the ‘victims’ are fakes.

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This week has seen multiple Facebook posts claiming that victim David Hogg was an actor recognisable from other footage.

An aide for Florida representative Shawn Harrison was fired for suggesting that the children might be ‘crisis actors.’

Such tactics have been widely used in previous school shootings to throw doubt on the testimony of victims.

Memes previously circulated showing ‘the same person’ at shootings such as the Sandy Hook massacre in 2012 and last year’s Manchester bombings.

Other outlets such as the right-wing blog Gateway Pundit took another angle: that Hogg and other students had been selected from the genuine students at the school to push an anti-gun agenda.

The Gateway Pundit published a post saying, ‘Exclusive: Soros-Linked Organizers of ‘Women’s March’ Selected Anti-Trump Kids to Be Face of Parkland Tragedy – And Excluded Pro-Trump Kids.’

What is a ‘False flag’?

The other angle taken by conspiracy sites was to suggest that the whole shooting was a ‘false flag’, a fake event staged by elements within the government.

It’s become a well-known and well-oiled tactic.

The 2012 Sandy Hook primary school shooting, in which Adam Lanza shot 26 people dead, was a pivotal moment in debates about American gun control.

With 20 of the victims aged six and seven years old, the shooting was a potent symbol of the destructive power of assault weaponry.

Gun control activists quickly began claiming the attack was a ‘false flag’: staged by the government to take away people’s right to bear arms.

It’s become a recurring theme in subsequent shootings, with far-right conspiracy site Infowars now claiming that the Parkland shooting may have been a ‘false flag’.

On 4Chan, users shared an image showing news stories about the Parkland shooting – dated days before the shooting happened.

But this was based on a known glitch in Google News, experts said.

Hoax debunking site Snopes said, ‘The “false flag” conspiracy theory is applied almost as a reflexive reaction to promote unfounded fears of a government takeover, which will be preceded by a forcible national gun grab.

‘There’s never any explanation offered for how a government entity might be clever enough to keep the same hoax with the same people going over and over again for years but too stupid to be able to orchestrate a full takeover.’