'Shovel girl' dead hoax: Miranda Fugate actually alive and well
Your support helps us to tell the story
As your White House correspondent, I ask the tough questions and seek the answers that matter.
Your support enables me to be in the room, pressing for transparency and accountability. Without your contributions, we wouldn't have the resources to challenge those in power.
Your donation makes it possible for us to keep doing this important work, keeping you informed every step of the way to the November election
Andrew Feinberg
White House Correspondent
A fictitious article claiming that a US teen died after being hit on the head with a shovel has been revealed as a hoax after the girl in question tweeted “I'm not dead.. Idk why there's rumors [sic] saying I am.”
A video of Miranda Fugate scrapping with a fellow Ohio-teen identified as Emily Powers went viral earlier this week after an eight minute video was uploaded online.
The clip has since been remixed various times with the footage spliced together with everything from Mortal Kombat sound effects to clips from children’s TV show Dora the Explorer.
Fugate, whose Twitter account features a bio reading “Weed <3 16 years old <3 Yes im the one who got hit with a shovel,” was reported as dead by a ‘viral’ website which describes itself as “a combination of real shocking news and satire news to keep its visitors in a state of disbelief.”
A report on the full video from the Huffington Post notes that the “full story is even dumber than [the shovel clip] implies,” and that the fight between the two teens was planned in advance.
Commenters on blogs and social media seem to have taken the video to heart though, praising the artful use of “foreshadowing in the opening frame” and dubbing the central implement “Chekhov’s shovel” after the Russian dramatist’s famous maxim:
“If you say in the first chapter that there is a rifle hanging on the wall, in the second or third chapter it absolutely must go off. If it's not going to be fired, it shouldn't be hanging there.” To paraphase some of the excited spectators in the video - it certainly went off.
Subscribe to Independent Premium to bookmark this article
Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? Start your Independent Premium subscription today.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments