Joe Rogan spoke on his popular podcast about a school that supposedly offered litter boxes for students who call themselves “furries.” Now Rogan admits it didn’t happen.
It was all made up. That’s the admission from Joe Rogan, who spoke on his popular podcast about a school that supposedly offered litter boxes for students who call themselves “furries.” Now Rogan admits it didn’t happen.
"My friend, his wife is a school teacher and she works at a school that had to install litter boxes in the girls room because there's a girl who is a furry,” Rogan had said to former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard.
“Her mother badgered the school until they agreed to put a litter box in one of the stalls” Rogan said at the time. “So this girl goes into the litter room or to the girls’ room and urinates or whatever.”
He later acknowledged he shouldn't have said it.
"It doesn't appear there's proof that they put a litter box in there,” he said.
But that's hasn’t stopped other influential people, such as Donald Trump Jr., from spreading the fake story. Politicians running for office are also pushing the tall tale for votes and a Nebraska state senator has also spread the story.
Joan Donovan, research director for Harvard Kennedy’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy, told The Guardian that the fake story gained traction “because it allows [politicians] to dog-whistle their transphobia without having to say the quiet part out loud.”
“What was once a transphobic joke about ‘what’s next, kids identifying as cats?’ became a soft target for hoaxers who knew audiences were already primed to believe outrageous things,” she said.
