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5 tweets,
3 min read
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Earlier today, several prominent right-wing accounts commented on a case of a supposed "antifa" shooter shot and killed by police after firing a weapon on school grounds. Not all is as it seems. #AltWankers
(archived copy of article: archive.is/zev2J)
cc: @ZellaQuixote
(archived copy of article: archive.is/zev2J)
cc: @ZellaQuixote
The actual shooting happened two weeks ago and doesn't appear to be politically motivated (suspect was involved in left-wing activism, but event happened while picking up his kid from school). How'd it end up trending on Twitter as a story about violent "antifa"?
We downloaded English-language tweets containing "antifa" and any of "gun", "eugene", or "school". We then removed early off-topic tweets, resulting in 4413 tweets from 3582 accounts. The topic took off today (1/28) but emerged 1/24.
Retweet network for "antifa" + "gun"/"eugene"/"school". @JackPosobiec, @PrisonPlanet, @bigleaguepol, and @Cernovich are the major nodes, but who posted tweets connecting the shooting to "antifa" first?
Here are the first users with on-topic tweets linking the police-involved shooting in Eugene, Oregon with "antifa", as well as the tweets in question. There's some interesting variety as the story evolves into the form that eventually went viral.
