I’m the last one to want to defend David Hogg, but there’s been postings on social media in the last hour or two on what appeared to be a contradiction in David Hogg’s story, whether he was at the school during the shooting or at home.
The video below explains:
Anti-gun Parkland student David Hogg first claimed he was at school during the shooting but now he says he was NOT at school during the shooting.
Make up your mind @davidhogg111.
Were you at school the day of the shooting or not? pic.twitter.com/Z0dNvXRPcW
— Makada 🇺🇸 (@_Makada_) March 27, 2018
According to a Time transcript, here’s what David Hogg said in February (h/t: Redstate)
David Hogg, a senior at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, knows what gunshots sound like: His father worked in law enforcement, and taught him about weapons and how to handle them. So when Hogg heard a “pop” while sitting in an AP environmental science class around 2:30 p.m. Wednesday, he told his teacher it sounded strangely like a gunshot. But there had been a fire drill that very morning and talk of a “Code Red” exercise to prepare for an active shooter. This must just be a surprise drill, he reasoned.
And then the fire alarm sounded. Dutifully acting on it, Hogg and other students tried to exit the building. A janitor—Hogg doesn’t know his name but calls him an angel—knew where the shots were coming from and sent the students back. Then a culinary arts teacher, Ashley Kurth, pulled Hogg and others inside, locked the door, and made them hide in a closet. Checking Twitter and Instagram, Hogg—who’s an editor at the school’s TV station—found the news that the shooting was real and ongoing.
But in the CBS documentary, Hogg says this:
DAVID HOGG: On the day of the shooting, I got my camera and got on my bike and road as fast as I could three miles from my house to the school to get as much video and to get as many interviews as I could because I knew that this could not be another mass shooting.
This has understandably created confusion. But what’s missing here is context. Here is what he told Vox on February 20:
Jen Kirby
The activism of you and your fellow students has created the sense that, in the wake of this mass shooting, there’s a chance things might be different. Why do you think that is?
David Hogg
Because of timing. At 6 pm after the shooting, I took my camera, got on my bike. I rode in basically twilight. And I ride my bike three miles down winding sidewalks and find my way to the school, as I’ve done in previous years. All the while, I was making sure my camera bag didn’t rip open, because if you zip it a certain way, the camera falls out, and it would be destroyed.
I start shooting B-roll, and I see Fox News over there. I knew I wanted to talk on the news and make sure there was advocacy, especially with so many people from the [National Rifle Association] and different gun-toting Americans who watch Fox News. I went on the day of [the shooting], and said, “There cannot be another mass shooting,” and I think that’s partially why. But also other people started saying that at the same time.
I’m looking at the school right now. You can see bullet holes in the windows. It’s insane, and the fact that there’s more bullet holes in those windows than bills that have been proposed and passed to save these kids’ lives is disgusting.
Clearly he’s not contradicting himself as it appeared. So there is no story here other than him being an insufferable leftwing zealot, but then you already knew that.
SooperMexican contributed to this post so please send him tacos (not fake exploding tacos, that would be rude).