David Hogg, 17, went from Florida high school student to mass shooting survivor to telegenic advocate for gun-control laws in a few days. And just as quickly, online conspiracy theorists began spinning viral lies attacking the teenager’s credibility.
By Wednesday — a week after a gunman wielding a semiautomatic rifle killed 17 people at Hogg’s Parkland, Fla., school — online media sites including YouTube swelled with false Âallegations that Hogg was Âsecretly a “crisis actor” playing the part of a grieving student in local and national television news reports.