As the country recovers from the devastating loss of 19 innocent children in the Texas school massacre, social media is taking center stage with users expressing their anger and resentment towards the weak gun control laws.
In the light of the same, the rise of misleading information is quickly becoming a matter of great concern. Just two days after the tragedy, a Twitter user claimed that Texas Governor Greg Abbott offered to pay a grieving family to 'stand with him' and oppose the stricter gun control laws.
The account @MyCancerJourne3 made the post on 26 May, below is a screenshot of the entire thread :
Within hours this thread managed to garner so much attention, with approximately 32,000 users retweeting the made-up story and gradually the thread spread across social media with more than 68,000 retweets and over 244,000 likes. While some users were convinced that the story is true and came down pretty hard on the Republican governor, others still believed it was a hoax.
According to Snopes.com, with serious doubts on the credibility of @MyCancerJourne3's tweets, a few users brought up some old tweets that further solidified the 'questionable nature' of his narratives. One user even pointed out that @MyCancerJourne3 "loves to claim a dead nephew occurred after a tragedy."
When one Twitter user suggested that the story should not be retweeted unless it is "independently verified" @MyCancerJourne3 responded, in part, by tweeting "F**k you."
The users further discovered that he claimed to have been a first responder on 9/11, a veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan wars, had been a prisoner of war for 31 days, was a recipient of the Purple Heart, was an Army Ranger as well as a hacker.
In addition to all this, he had also received two liver transplants since June 14, 2021, had suffered from colon cancer, ever so often is a black man, and has Cash App and GoFundMe accounts linked to the name of a white man who lives in Spokane, Washington, Lead Stories reported.
Upon further investigation by the Daily Beast, it was revealed that the Twitter user claimed that their account had been hacked and they were attempting to delete the post.
"It's got nothing to do with me or my family in any way," the user said. He reiterated that he has plans to press charges but refused to give the attorney's information. The privacy status of the account was later changed to "protected," which implies that only @MyCancerJourne3's followers could see their activity. Soon after that, the account was deleted.
The spokesperson for Abbott's office refused to elaborate on the fake claim and merely stated that it was false. "This is completely false, there is no truth to it whatsoever," the spokesperson told the Daily Beast.
