'Conspiracy Research Community' Declares VA Reporter Shooting a Hoax

This is making the rounds on social media right now:

The source is a website called Activist Post, which bills itself as “Alternative News for Enlightened Minds.”

Here’s how this bizarre conspiracy theory goes:

The latest reporter shooting hoax in Virginia is getting so easily torn apart by the conspiracy research community that the media’s emotional staging of actors is becoming absurd.

The latest discovery is that Alison Parker’s alleged fiancé Chris Hurst, who has only eight social media photos of him with Alison, is probably just her “TV” boyfriend. A guy named Daniel Wulz has been outed by facial recognition as her real-world boyfriend.

Try to keep up because it get’s a little tricky after this: A guy named Daniel Wulk (who in reality is likely an ex-boyfriend) has a bunch of pictures of himself with Alison Parker on his Facebook page. Chris Hurst, the “alleged” bereaved fiancé, has only a pathetic little scrapbook to show for his life with Parker. Also, and perhaps most damning in the eyes of the “conspiracy research community,” Hurst has some — gasp! — film-making experience. Therefore — everyone take a deep breath — it must logically follow that the shooting was a government-sponsored false flag operation involving professional actors who agreed to be complicit in a giant, secret gun-grabbing operation by participating in a staged shooting on live TV. Got that? (I might have missed a link somewhere along the way in this fantastical yarn, but you get the idea.)

Left unanswered? Where are the alleged actors who were involved in this elaborate ruse now? Is there some secret witness protection program for undercover government hoax actors? Or maybe there’s a remote exile island in the Pacific where they’re kept in seclusion for the rest of their lives!?!? Also unanswered: how did the government gun-grabbers get the families of the victims to believe their loved ones were in those caskets they buried? Oh, wait…sorry. Apparently they are in on the whole thing. They’re awaiting an airlift to Conspiracy Theory Island as I write this.

Seriously, what is wrong with these people? Do their readers actually believe this nonsense? I’m really wondering because the articles have been shared tens of thousands of times on social media (by some individuals I actually know in real life, I might add). I’d like to think that people are sharing them with messages like “This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen.” And you know what? I’m going to just go with that version because it’s preferable to believing that tens of thousands of people actually buy into these stupid hoaxes.