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Sandy Hook
Based on hundreds of hours of research, interviews, and access to exclusive sources and materials, Sandy Hook is Elizabeth Williamson’s landmark investigation of the aftermath of a school shooting, the work of Sandy Hook parents who fought to defend themselves, and the truth of their children’s fate against the frenzied distortions of online deniers and conspiracy theorists.
On December 14, 2012, a gunman killed twenty first-graders and six educators at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Ten years later, Sandy Hook has become a foundational story of how false conspiracy narratives and malicious misinformation have gained traction in society.
One of the nation’s most devastating mass shootings, Sandy Hook was used to create destructive and painful myths. Driven by ideology or profit, or for no sound reason at all, some people insisted it never occurred, or was staged by the federal government as a pretext for seizing Americans’ firearms. They tormented the victims’ relatives online, accosted them on the street and at memorial events, accusing them of faking their loved ones’ murders. Some family members have been stalked and forced into hiding. A gun was fired into the home of one parent.
Present at the creation of this terrible crusade was Alex Jones’s Infowars, a far-right outlet that aired noxious Sandy Hook theories to millions and raised money for the conspiracy theorists’ quest to “prove” the shooting didn’t happen. Enabled by Facebook, YouTube, and other social media companies’ failure to curb harmful content, the conspiracists’ questions grew into suspicion, suspicion grew into demands for more proof, and unanswered demands turned into rage. This pattern of denial and attack would come to characterize some Americans’ response to almost every major event, from mass shootings to the coronavirus pandemic to the 2020 presidential election, in which President Trump’s false claims of a rigged result prompted the January 6, 2021, assault on a bastion of democracy, the U.S. Capitol.
The Sandy Hook families, led by the father of the youngest victim, refused to accept this. Sandy Hook is the story of their battle to preserve their loved ones’ legacies even in the face of threats to their own lives. Through exhaustive reporting, narrative storytelling, and intimate portraits, Sandy Hook is the definitive book on one of the most shocking cultural ruptures of the internet era.
On December 14, 2012, a gunman killed twenty first-graders and six educators at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Ten years later, Sandy Hook has become a foundational story of how false conspiracy narratives and malicious misinformation have gained traction in society.
One of the nation’s most devastating mass shootings, Sandy Hook was used to create destructive and painful myths. Driven by ideology or profit, or for no sound reason at all, some people insisted it never occurred, or was staged by the federal government as a pretext for seizing Americans’ firearms. They tormented the victims’ relatives online, accosted them on the street and at memorial events, accusing them of faking their loved ones’ murders. Some family members have been stalked and forced into hiding. A gun was fired into the home of one parent.
Present at the creation of this terrible crusade was Alex Jones’s Infowars, a far-right outlet that aired noxious Sandy Hook theories to millions and raised money for the conspiracy theorists’ quest to “prove” the shooting didn’t happen. Enabled by Facebook, YouTube, and other social media companies’ failure to curb harmful content, the conspiracists’ questions grew into suspicion, suspicion grew into demands for more proof, and unanswered demands turned into rage. This pattern of denial and attack would come to characterize some Americans’ response to almost every major event, from mass shootings to the coronavirus pandemic to the 2020 presidential election, in which President Trump’s false claims of a rigged result prompted the January 6, 2021, assault on a bastion of democracy, the U.S. Capitol.
The Sandy Hook families, led by the father of the youngest victim, refused to accept this. Sandy Hook is the story of their battle to preserve their loved ones’ legacies even in the face of threats to their own lives. Through exhaustive reporting, narrative storytelling, and intimate portraits, Sandy Hook is the definitive book on one of the most shocking cultural ruptures of the internet era.
496 pages, Hardcover
First published March 8, 2022
515 people are currently reading
9276 people want to read
About the author
Elizabeth Williamson
1 book88 followersElizabeth Williamson is a feature writer in the Washington bureau of the New York Times, and a former member of the New York Times editorial board. She has worked at the Wall Street Journal and Washington Post, and spent a decade as a foreign correspondent in Eastern Europe. She is the author of “Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth,” published by Dutton (2022). Elizabeth was born in Chicago and resides in Washington with her family.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 596 reviews
November 11, 2022
“At [Noah Pozner’s] school, the high-pitched din of 350 children, kindergarten through fourth grade, excited about the coming holidays, filtered through the hallways and into the parking lot as [the shooter] parked his mother’s black Honda Civic precisely, then walked the few paces to the door. He wore sunglasses and a black bucket-style brimmed hat, a black polo-style shirt with a black T-shirt underneath. He also wore an olive-drab fishing-type vest, whose pockets he’d stuffed with ammunition. He carried a Glock 10 mm handgun in the pocket of his black cargo pants, cinched tightly with a web belt to hold them up on his skinny frame. He had strapped another gun, a Sig Sauer 9 mm to his leg. In his hands, sheathed in fingerless gloves, he carried a Bushmaster AR-15-style rifle, similar to the one he’d used an hour earlier to murder his mother…shooting her four times while she slept. [His mother] had bought the rifle her son used to kill her, along with the Bushmaster and the two handguns. Six feet tall, [the shooter] weighed only 112 pounds. In his mind, starvation equaled self-control and power. He wore earplugs…”
- Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
This one is about as tough as they come. It takes you to the darkest places the mind can go.
Imagine you are a parent, getting your child ready for school. It is the holiday season in mid-December. Imagine what they are wearing, their clothes emblazoned with Marvel superheroes and Disney princesses. Imagine dropping them off, telling them goodbye. What are the last words you say to them, without knowing they will be the last words you say?
Imagine getting a text later in the day: school is on lockdown. Imagine getting more texts, then phone calls, confused and panicked inquiries: have you heard? Imagine getting in your car and racing to the school. Imagine how long that drive takes.
Imagine what you see when you arrive. Dozens of police cars, ambulances, firetrucks. Imagine the large men in tac vests and assault rifles standing impotently on the perimeter. Imagine the kids running out in a single-file line, their hands on each other’s shoulders, their eyes closed because they have been told not to look at what the inside of their school has become.
Imagine searching for your child. Imagine being unable to find them. Imagine waiting for hours in a fire station, knowing the worst has happened, but still clinging to that last shred of faith that there is a just god somewhere in the infinity of the universe, a god that can run-back time and re-ravel the unspooled threads of your existence.
Imagine that they let you in the school – they would not, but imagine. Imagine the tacky squelching beneath your feet from the estimated 45-60 gallons of blood that has been exsanguinated. Imagine the smells. Imagine the bits of flesh, bone, and brain that have been spattered on the walls, ceiling, and floor, transported there by .223 caliber bullets traveling at around 3,200 feet per second. Imagine trying to find your child. It will be hard, not just because of the physical damage, but because of the tangled position of the bodies, which a medical examiner called “a dogpile of children.”
Imagine that first moment when you know your child has died before age eight. Imagine how long your own life might feel. Imagine that weight.
Imagine that shortly thereafter, a man on the internet says that your child didn’t die. Imagine, in fact, that he says your child never existed.
Imagine the phone calls you start to receive. The emails. Imagine the people who are physically stalking you, shouting at you, mocking you. Imagine being forced to switch phones, switch jobs, switch homes. Imagine having to move to another state. Imagine how they follow you.
Then imagine someone threatens to kill you.
That’s the infuriating, emotionally-draining, entirely necessary tale that Elizabeth Williamson tells in her magisterial, epically-reported Sandy Hook.
***
Sandy Hook is about a lot of things, but mainly it’s about the way the internet in general, and social media in particular, has created a system whereby a delusion can be turned into an opinion, an opinion transformed into fact, and the “fact” made into something that can be forced down another person’s throat, at the point of a gun if necessary.
***
This is a tough book to summarize because it contains so much. Broadly speaking, it follows a chronological arc that begins with a brief, subdued retelling of the shooting itself, follows some of the victims’ parents through the wrenching aftermath (one family shows Williamson a scarf with six holes in it; the seventh hole bored into their child), merges its narrative with the rise of the hoaxers, and ends with charlatan-in-chief Alex Jones being sued for defamation.
Between the first literal shot fired from the killer’s Bushmaster, to the first legal shots fired by the parents’ attorneys, Williamson takes many paths, following the Sandy Hook story as it splits like the limbs of a tree.
Three parents in particular are highlighted: Neil Heslin, Robbie Parker, and Lenny Pozner. Of the three, Pozner takes center stage, as he ultimately fought back against the hoaxers, using the Digital Millennium Copyright Act to take down copyrighted material, and founding the Honr Network to defend the targets of online abuse.
Williamson also spends a lot of time with the hoaxers themselves, delivering surprisingly restrained, even empathetic portraits of vicious liars. Chief among them is Jones himself, the founder of Infowars, a far-right website trafficking in fake news. An intrepid journalist, Williamson even managed to get an interview with the man (one of over 350 interviews upon which this book is based).
Along the way, Williamson talks about the psychology of hoaxers with experts, expounds on the First Amendment and defamation law, and discusses other conspiracy theories, including a thorough and chilling recounting of Pizzagate. If you are blessed not to have heard of this event, it involved a man taking an AR-15 to a family pizzeria, because he thought the owner was hiding sex-trafficked children for Hillary Clinton.
This section alone had me looking upwards to the heavens, asking for some benevolent intercession to destroy the internet and its many toxic byways.
***
One of the more disheartening aspects of a disheartening book is the unimaginable depth of the problem. This isn’t simply about correcting misinformation. The disease has spread far beyond the ability of Snopes to counter.
Hoaxers often say they’re “just asking questions.” In reality, they have settled on an unassailable truth that becomes inseparable from their identities. As such, they cannot be reasoned with.
In an actual criminal investigation, forensic evidence is gathered and tested in a lab; photographs are taken; eyewitness testimony is gathered and collated; and surveillance footage and body cam images are studied. For a hoaxer, though, “research” amounts to “anything I read online that I agree with.” This makes it hard to combat untruth with fact, though Williamson tries on occasion.
For example, one of the weird seams that hoaxers cling to is the allegedly-shrouded identity of the company that did the crime-scene cleanup. Williamson finds out the company’s name with a single phone call, and then interviews its owner. When she confronts a hoaxer with this simple act of Journalism 101, the hoaxer is unimpressed. This should not be surprising. The September 11, 2001 terror attacks were the most documented crime in all of human history. Despite the near-24-hour video coverage – the second plane that crashed in New York did so on live television – there are still people who scoff at the “official” story.
In other words, arguing with hoaxers is a waste of the energy it takes to tap a key.
***
The millions of digital pitchfork-wielders who listen to people like Alex Jones – shrill and shrieking basement dwellers who are obsessed with elaborate conspiracies and false flag operations – are motivated by many things, among them stunning ignorance, mental illness, and pure meanness. They seek to blame the state of their lives on issues like gun control, race, and gender. Going after them is next to impossible.
Instead, the Sandy Hook families rightly went after the people – such as Jones – who actually packaged and published the lies. While this can only ever make a dent, it sends the signal that there is at least the possibility of consequences. Perhaps the next time someone tries to follow in Jones’s footsteps, they will hesitate, knowing that they might be bankrupted.
***
While Jones’s followers believed him for a variety of pathological reasons, Jones himself was motivated by greed. He made a fortune in ad revenue, hocking a variety of boner pills and diet supplements (which tells you a lot about his audience, I suppose).
Money is also the big reason why the huge tech companies have been dragging their feet. They could be doing many things, such as vigorously deleting hate speech and falsehoods disguised as news; reducing anonymous postings; purging bots; verifying users; and simply turning off the comments section on news articles, since it’s entirely unnecessary, and serves only as a platform for propagandists. But these companies don’t want to do this, because any engagement – whether it’s positive or negative – means increased advertising profits.
Unable to affect any systemic change, the families went after wallets. They forged a strategy to confront a notorious liar in the courts of the law, made him recant his untruths, and forced him to literally pay for them. Sandy Hook ends before the massive judgments delivered against Alex Jones. Even if the families see only a fraction of the damages sought, there is some redemption there. Of course, it is a shallow consolation. The problem we face with misinformation goes well beyond Jones and the Sandy Hook massacre, to encompass an alternate reality that will challenge the very pillars of democracy in the years to come.
***
Imagine you had a child. Imagine that child was murdered in their school. Imagine someone told you that your child didn’t exist. Imagine that people you’ve never met harassed you, hounded you, tried to destroy a life that had already been gutted.
Imagine what you would do.
- Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
This one is about as tough as they come. It takes you to the darkest places the mind can go.
Imagine you are a parent, getting your child ready for school. It is the holiday season in mid-December. Imagine what they are wearing, their clothes emblazoned with Marvel superheroes and Disney princesses. Imagine dropping them off, telling them goodbye. What are the last words you say to them, without knowing they will be the last words you say?
Imagine getting a text later in the day: school is on lockdown. Imagine getting more texts, then phone calls, confused and panicked inquiries: have you heard? Imagine getting in your car and racing to the school. Imagine how long that drive takes.
Imagine what you see when you arrive. Dozens of police cars, ambulances, firetrucks. Imagine the large men in tac vests and assault rifles standing impotently on the perimeter. Imagine the kids running out in a single-file line, their hands on each other’s shoulders, their eyes closed because they have been told not to look at what the inside of their school has become.
Imagine searching for your child. Imagine being unable to find them. Imagine waiting for hours in a fire station, knowing the worst has happened, but still clinging to that last shred of faith that there is a just god somewhere in the infinity of the universe, a god that can run-back time and re-ravel the unspooled threads of your existence.
Imagine that they let you in the school – they would not, but imagine. Imagine the tacky squelching beneath your feet from the estimated 45-60 gallons of blood that has been exsanguinated. Imagine the smells. Imagine the bits of flesh, bone, and brain that have been spattered on the walls, ceiling, and floor, transported there by .223 caliber bullets traveling at around 3,200 feet per second. Imagine trying to find your child. It will be hard, not just because of the physical damage, but because of the tangled position of the bodies, which a medical examiner called “a dogpile of children.”
Imagine that first moment when you know your child has died before age eight. Imagine how long your own life might feel. Imagine that weight.
Imagine that shortly thereafter, a man on the internet says that your child didn’t die. Imagine, in fact, that he says your child never existed.
Imagine the phone calls you start to receive. The emails. Imagine the people who are physically stalking you, shouting at you, mocking you. Imagine being forced to switch phones, switch jobs, switch homes. Imagine having to move to another state. Imagine how they follow you.
Then imagine someone threatens to kill you.
That’s the infuriating, emotionally-draining, entirely necessary tale that Elizabeth Williamson tells in her magisterial, epically-reported Sandy Hook.
***
Sandy Hook is about a lot of things, but mainly it’s about the way the internet in general, and social media in particular, has created a system whereby a delusion can be turned into an opinion, an opinion transformed into fact, and the “fact” made into something that can be forced down another person’s throat, at the point of a gun if necessary.
***
This is a tough book to summarize because it contains so much. Broadly speaking, it follows a chronological arc that begins with a brief, subdued retelling of the shooting itself, follows some of the victims’ parents through the wrenching aftermath (one family shows Williamson a scarf with six holes in it; the seventh hole bored into their child), merges its narrative with the rise of the hoaxers, and ends with charlatan-in-chief Alex Jones being sued for defamation.
Between the first literal shot fired from the killer’s Bushmaster, to the first legal shots fired by the parents’ attorneys, Williamson takes many paths, following the Sandy Hook story as it splits like the limbs of a tree.
Three parents in particular are highlighted: Neil Heslin, Robbie Parker, and Lenny Pozner. Of the three, Pozner takes center stage, as he ultimately fought back against the hoaxers, using the Digital Millennium Copyright Act to take down copyrighted material, and founding the Honr Network to defend the targets of online abuse.
Williamson also spends a lot of time with the hoaxers themselves, delivering surprisingly restrained, even empathetic portraits of vicious liars. Chief among them is Jones himself, the founder of Infowars, a far-right website trafficking in fake news. An intrepid journalist, Williamson even managed to get an interview with the man (one of over 350 interviews upon which this book is based).
Along the way, Williamson talks about the psychology of hoaxers with experts, expounds on the First Amendment and defamation law, and discusses other conspiracy theories, including a thorough and chilling recounting of Pizzagate. If you are blessed not to have heard of this event, it involved a man taking an AR-15 to a family pizzeria, because he thought the owner was hiding sex-trafficked children for Hillary Clinton.
This section alone had me looking upwards to the heavens, asking for some benevolent intercession to destroy the internet and its many toxic byways.
***
One of the more disheartening aspects of a disheartening book is the unimaginable depth of the problem. This isn’t simply about correcting misinformation. The disease has spread far beyond the ability of Snopes to counter.
Hoaxers often say they’re “just asking questions.” In reality, they have settled on an unassailable truth that becomes inseparable from their identities. As such, they cannot be reasoned with.
In an actual criminal investigation, forensic evidence is gathered and tested in a lab; photographs are taken; eyewitness testimony is gathered and collated; and surveillance footage and body cam images are studied. For a hoaxer, though, “research” amounts to “anything I read online that I agree with.” This makes it hard to combat untruth with fact, though Williamson tries on occasion.
For example, one of the weird seams that hoaxers cling to is the allegedly-shrouded identity of the company that did the crime-scene cleanup. Williamson finds out the company’s name with a single phone call, and then interviews its owner. When she confronts a hoaxer with this simple act of Journalism 101, the hoaxer is unimpressed. This should not be surprising. The September 11, 2001 terror attacks were the most documented crime in all of human history. Despite the near-24-hour video coverage – the second plane that crashed in New York did so on live television – there are still people who scoff at the “official” story.
In other words, arguing with hoaxers is a waste of the energy it takes to tap a key.
***
The millions of digital pitchfork-wielders who listen to people like Alex Jones – shrill and shrieking basement dwellers who are obsessed with elaborate conspiracies and false flag operations – are motivated by many things, among them stunning ignorance, mental illness, and pure meanness. They seek to blame the state of their lives on issues like gun control, race, and gender. Going after them is next to impossible.
Instead, the Sandy Hook families rightly went after the people – such as Jones – who actually packaged and published the lies. While this can only ever make a dent, it sends the signal that there is at least the possibility of consequences. Perhaps the next time someone tries to follow in Jones’s footsteps, they will hesitate, knowing that they might be bankrupted.
***
While Jones’s followers believed him for a variety of pathological reasons, Jones himself was motivated by greed. He made a fortune in ad revenue, hocking a variety of boner pills and diet supplements (which tells you a lot about his audience, I suppose).
Money is also the big reason why the huge tech companies have been dragging their feet. They could be doing many things, such as vigorously deleting hate speech and falsehoods disguised as news; reducing anonymous postings; purging bots; verifying users; and simply turning off the comments section on news articles, since it’s entirely unnecessary, and serves only as a platform for propagandists. But these companies don’t want to do this, because any engagement – whether it’s positive or negative – means increased advertising profits.
Unable to affect any systemic change, the families went after wallets. They forged a strategy to confront a notorious liar in the courts of the law, made him recant his untruths, and forced him to literally pay for them. Sandy Hook ends before the massive judgments delivered against Alex Jones. Even if the families see only a fraction of the damages sought, there is some redemption there. Of course, it is a shallow consolation. The problem we face with misinformation goes well beyond Jones and the Sandy Hook massacre, to encompass an alternate reality that will challenge the very pillars of democracy in the years to come.
***
Imagine you had a child. Imagine that child was murdered in their school. Imagine someone told you that your child didn’t exist. Imagine that people you’ve never met harassed you, hounded you, tried to destroy a life that had already been gutted.
Imagine what you would do.
March 22, 2022
"It was a fine idea at the time
Now it's a brilliant mistake."
--Elvis Costello
I'm far from the only person to make this observation, but it's what came to my mind as I read Elizabeth Williamson's utterly soul-crushing account of conspiracy theorists in the wake of the Sandy Hook school massacre:
If only they were right.
Conspiracists love to position themselves as the brave truth-tellers in a world of sheep, the renegade nonconformists uniquely capable of seeing through the conventional wisdom, tying all the loose strands and connecting all the disparate dots, doing the research, before emerging with, in an act of selfless service, the Real Truth, in all its shocking glory. Hold for applause.
But once you hack through their data dumps of names and dates and acronyms all strung together on a cork board, their final conclusions are invariably oversimplified, naive, and frankly boring. Whenever something unthinkably bad happens, the big spooky reveal is that it's all the doing of some shadowy cabal -- THE GOVERNMENT! THE DEEP STATE! --a faceless entity that secretly runs things by pulling the wool over everyone's eyes -- except them, o brave truth-tellers!
Personally, I think the real bravery comes from having to confront a reality where a mentally ill teenager can stockpile an arsenal of assault weapons and then slaughter 20 schoolkids in 5 minutes, because then we all have to do some real work and ask some tough questions: What's the plan here? How much more of this are we willing to accept? And if we do accept it (which, let's face it, we did), what does that say about us?
If only the government had paid off actors to fake the attack, then I wouldn't have to deal with these hard realities*, or the systemic choices we've made that enabled it, and I wouldn't have to acknowledge that my continued existence on Earth is made possible only by the dumb luck and coincidence that governs all of our lives. As several people in the book point out, there's no reason whatsoever that what happened in Newtown couldn't happen to your kid's school, either. And in a country whose guiding ethos is that you make your own destiny, that might be a bridge too far.
This book will make you feel a lot of things (mostly bad) about a lot of (mostly bad) people, but it's the bad faith-ness of it all that really sticks with you after 448 pages. Williamson does her level best to engage, but she learns the hard truth that you will never convince Truthers to change their position because you're not occupying the same sphere. You're coming at them with things like "facts" and "arguments" and "common ground"; for them it's existential, their core identity wrapped up in a toxic brew of nihilism, narcissism, and peer approval. You say tomato, they say fuck off and die.
Obviously, there's nothing new about conspiracy theories and the crackpots who believe in them, but the instant gratification system of social media algorithms has made your loved one's journey from mildly skeptical contrarian to full-blown babbling idiot so much more rapid and dangerous. It's an addiction, as serious as any opioid or stimulant, and we need to figure out fast how we're going to deal with it.
*This doesn't even begin to touch on the other part of this, the wholesale dehumanization of the victims by suggesting their children didn't exist. A moral Rubicon that has unleashed something that we may never be able to reverse.
Now it's a brilliant mistake."
--Elvis Costello
I'm far from the only person to make this observation, but it's what came to my mind as I read Elizabeth Williamson's utterly soul-crushing account of conspiracy theorists in the wake of the Sandy Hook school massacre:
If only they were right.
Conspiracists love to position themselves as the brave truth-tellers in a world of sheep, the renegade nonconformists uniquely capable of seeing through the conventional wisdom, tying all the loose strands and connecting all the disparate dots, doing the research, before emerging with, in an act of selfless service, the Real Truth, in all its shocking glory. Hold for applause.
But once you hack through their data dumps of names and dates and acronyms all strung together on a cork board, their final conclusions are invariably oversimplified, naive, and frankly boring. Whenever something unthinkably bad happens, the big spooky reveal is that it's all the doing of some shadowy cabal -- THE GOVERNMENT! THE DEEP STATE! --a faceless entity that secretly runs things by pulling the wool over everyone's eyes -- except them, o brave truth-tellers!
Personally, I think the real bravery comes from having to confront a reality where a mentally ill teenager can stockpile an arsenal of assault weapons and then slaughter 20 schoolkids in 5 minutes, because then we all have to do some real work and ask some tough questions: What's the plan here? How much more of this are we willing to accept? And if we do accept it (which, let's face it, we did), what does that say about us?
If only the government had paid off actors to fake the attack, then I wouldn't have to deal with these hard realities*, or the systemic choices we've made that enabled it, and I wouldn't have to acknowledge that my continued existence on Earth is made possible only by the dumb luck and coincidence that governs all of our lives. As several people in the book point out, there's no reason whatsoever that what happened in Newtown couldn't happen to your kid's school, either. And in a country whose guiding ethos is that you make your own destiny, that might be a bridge too far.
This book will make you feel a lot of things (mostly bad) about a lot of (mostly bad) people, but it's the bad faith-ness of it all that really sticks with you after 448 pages. Williamson does her level best to engage, but she learns the hard truth that you will never convince Truthers to change their position because you're not occupying the same sphere. You're coming at them with things like "facts" and "arguments" and "common ground"; for them it's existential, their core identity wrapped up in a toxic brew of nihilism, narcissism, and peer approval. You say tomato, they say fuck off and die.
Obviously, there's nothing new about conspiracy theories and the crackpots who believe in them, but the instant gratification system of social media algorithms has made your loved one's journey from mildly skeptical contrarian to full-blown babbling idiot so much more rapid and dangerous. It's an addiction, as serious as any opioid or stimulant, and we need to figure out fast how we're going to deal with it.
*This doesn't even begin to touch on the other part of this, the wholesale dehumanization of the victims by suggesting their children didn't exist. A moral Rubicon that has unleashed something that we may never be able to reverse.
March 8, 2022
This book was heartbreaking and infuriating and hard to read. Composed of hundreds of hours of research and interviews, Sandy Hook from Dutton and Penguin Audio was about the investigation into the Sandy Hook school shootings and the years that followed. What came from this horrible tragedy were conspiracy theorists and a crazy following of people tormenting the victim’s families online, stalking, and tons of social media attacks on privacy.
Thoughts: I didn’t know much about Alex Jones and Infowars but it was sickening to hear about. This person purposely spread lies about a horrible tragedy and called on his show listeners to stalk, verbally attack, and dox victim’s families. He started the pattern of denial and attack that we see after almost every major tragedy. The book talked about how media, specifically social media, is extremely harmful in many of these cases and can lead to so much trauma for the survivors.
This book made me want to immediately delete Facebook. The fact that Mark Zuckerberg heard about troll groups and hate speech and didn’t care enough to do anything about it is so sad. These groups contributed to radicals storming the capital after the 2020 election and were responsible for some of the harmful misinformation spread about the COVID-19 vaccine.
This book is about the families of the children killed at Sandy Hook and their fight against trolls and hoaxers for years afterwards. It was a long book, but the journey was something worth learning about and I think more people need to be aware of this story. It is so important to be informed online and not share and spread misinformation. It is so important to remember that social media represents people, and those people should be treated like human beings. Sometimes social media brings out the worst kind of people, and we should strive to be the best we can be. 5-stars for this incredibly researched and powerful story.
Thoughts: I didn’t know much about Alex Jones and Infowars but it was sickening to hear about. This person purposely spread lies about a horrible tragedy and called on his show listeners to stalk, verbally attack, and dox victim’s families. He started the pattern of denial and attack that we see after almost every major tragedy. The book talked about how media, specifically social media, is extremely harmful in many of these cases and can lead to so much trauma for the survivors.
This book made me want to immediately delete Facebook. The fact that Mark Zuckerberg heard about troll groups and hate speech and didn’t care enough to do anything about it is so sad. These groups contributed to radicals storming the capital after the 2020 election and were responsible for some of the harmful misinformation spread about the COVID-19 vaccine.
This book is about the families of the children killed at Sandy Hook and their fight against trolls and hoaxers for years afterwards. It was a long book, but the journey was something worth learning about and I think more people need to be aware of this story. It is so important to be informed online and not share and spread misinformation. It is so important to remember that social media represents people, and those people should be treated like human beings. Sometimes social media brings out the worst kind of people, and we should strive to be the best we can be. 5-stars for this incredibly researched and powerful story.
July 31, 2022
I wanted to love this book but it fell short. I liked learning about the madness of the conspiracy theorists and what happened. I appreciated that she drew parallels between SH related conspiracy and January 6th. The content was good but it needed thorough editing. It was too long by 100 pages (easily). There were sections that had no flow. The author would dig in on things then barely give us any payoff. It’s much less about Sandy Hook and more about the conspiracies, which I wish I grasped earlier.
February 28, 2023
If the minute-by-minute reconstruction of the mass shooting - 20 children and 6 educators - is too unbearable for you (as it should be for any reasonable person), skip the first three-four chapters of Sandy Hook. The other 20+ chapters focused on American conspiracy theorists are worth your effort.
In Sandy Hook, Elizabeth Williamson dives deep into the alternative reality of American 'truth-seekers.' Sandy Hook, a staged fake attack with child actors; Pizzagate with child trafficking by Democrats; 09/11 as a planned demolition of the World Trade Center - what else does the American government hide from its citizens? What purposes does it have? What masters does it serve? Taking a heart-breaking mass shooting in Newton, Connecticut, as a starting point, the author unravels the deluded world of conspiracy theorists. When a father of a murdered child presents a birth certificate, his child's photos, and a death certificate, the truth-seekers still cry foul. In their worldview, anything can be falsified; nothing rings true. Some may argue that believing in an alternative version of events is not a crime. The victims' families' legal victory over Alex Jones and his Infowars empire proved those skeptics wrong. Suppose the public denial of events bores a wave of hatred, doesn't correspond with official reports, and causes distress to the affected families. In that case, it becomes defamation, with legal consequences for the broadcaster.
Elizabeth Williamson's observations reminded me of another book, Saints and Soldiers: Inside Internet-Age Terrorism, from Syria to the Capitol Siege by Rita Katz. Elegantly veering to the side to explore the influence of the Trump policy on conspiracy circles, Elizabeth Williamson traces the social media's developmental tendencies that implicitly led to the Capitol siege of January 2021. When a curious mind opens a single video/link connected with a conspiracy theory, flawed algorithms of big social platforms start to suggest more and more material on the same topic. Ultimately, specific topics morph into a mental trap, and the person cannot see beyond the suggested bubble. An alternative reality is created.
I recommend Sandy Hook to true crime lovers and people who want to be aware of modern social media dangers. It's the book I want to re-read in the future (apart from the first three-four chapters).
In Sandy Hook, Elizabeth Williamson dives deep into the alternative reality of American 'truth-seekers.' Sandy Hook, a staged fake attack with child actors; Pizzagate with child trafficking by Democrats; 09/11 as a planned demolition of the World Trade Center - what else does the American government hide from its citizens? What purposes does it have? What masters does it serve? Taking a heart-breaking mass shooting in Newton, Connecticut, as a starting point, the author unravels the deluded world of conspiracy theorists. When a father of a murdered child presents a birth certificate, his child's photos, and a death certificate, the truth-seekers still cry foul. In their worldview, anything can be falsified; nothing rings true. Some may argue that believing in an alternative version of events is not a crime. The victims' families' legal victory over Alex Jones and his Infowars empire proved those skeptics wrong. Suppose the public denial of events bores a wave of hatred, doesn't correspond with official reports, and causes distress to the affected families. In that case, it becomes defamation, with legal consequences for the broadcaster.
Elizabeth Williamson's observations reminded me of another book, Saints and Soldiers: Inside Internet-Age Terrorism, from Syria to the Capitol Siege by Rita Katz. Elegantly veering to the side to explore the influence of the Trump policy on conspiracy circles, Elizabeth Williamson traces the social media's developmental tendencies that implicitly led to the Capitol siege of January 2021. When a curious mind opens a single video/link connected with a conspiracy theory, flawed algorithms of big social platforms start to suggest more and more material on the same topic. Ultimately, specific topics morph into a mental trap, and the person cannot see beyond the suggested bubble. An alternative reality is created.
I recommend Sandy Hook to true crime lovers and people who want to be aware of modern social media dangers. It's the book I want to re-read in the future (apart from the first three-four chapters).
July 27, 2022
I was left a little disappointed here. This book began as an absolutely devastating read. I think the author is clearly very capable with words, weaving factual writing with emotion and storytelling. It captured the character of the children beautifully, describing their last day, little character traits, drawings hung up on the classroom wall and a little boy that said, “Don’t worry I know karate.” The grief captured and the demonstration of what they meant to their families was wholly indescribable. I read it with a lump in my throat.
However, the narrative soon began to focus on another aspect of this story: Alex Jones, Infowars, and the subsequent conspiracy theories of which Sandy Hook became a focus. From the title, I guess you can surmise this angle. To have this type of speculation on the shoulders of grieving families is abhorrent. To be aggressively told by strangers that their grief and the death of the their child somehow isn’t real and to have something so private tossed around in the internet as fodder. However, I find reading about anything to do with that hard conspiracy mentality highly frustrating and akin to banging your head against a brick wall. I wanted to read the stories of those affected, the backgrounds, the perpetrator, criminal psychology, the investigation, all the factors leading up to the day, and the aftermath on the community. The way Dave Cullen wrote so completely in Columbine. Here, it definitely touched on all these aspects, but then it was knee deep in the truth/ internet angle which I started skimming.
I think the book began to lose focus for me. I would rather the conspiracy aspect was delegated to a much smaller role. Because of this, it missed the mark for me.
However, the narrative soon began to focus on another aspect of this story: Alex Jones, Infowars, and the subsequent conspiracy theories of which Sandy Hook became a focus. From the title, I guess you can surmise this angle. To have this type of speculation on the shoulders of grieving families is abhorrent. To be aggressively told by strangers that their grief and the death of the their child somehow isn’t real and to have something so private tossed around in the internet as fodder. However, I find reading about anything to do with that hard conspiracy mentality highly frustrating and akin to banging your head against a brick wall. I wanted to read the stories of those affected, the backgrounds, the perpetrator, criminal psychology, the investigation, all the factors leading up to the day, and the aftermath on the community. The way Dave Cullen wrote so completely in Columbine. Here, it definitely touched on all these aspects, but then it was knee deep in the truth/ internet angle which I started skimming.
I think the book began to lose focus for me. I would rather the conspiracy aspect was delegated to a much smaller role. Because of this, it missed the mark for me.
November 18, 2024
Yes, I read this book that was difficult to read.
There were parts I concentrated on far more than others, however.
For example:
The account given by the state trooper who led a group of children out of the school, hands on each other’s shoulders, the image caught on camera and broadcasted around the world. She was the one who took the responsibility of cleaning the victim’s clothes and returning them to the families in personalized boxes, herself.
The memories several of the parents shared about their children’s lives before 2012…and of sending them off to school that morning…
Then there were parts I began to skim over.
Any paragraphs that had Alex Jones’ venom-laced messages in them.
Ditto to the passages about Kelly Watts.
And my stomach turned, because I couldn’t help reading about the hate spewed upon these 26 families of murdered loved ones, in my search for the passages that spoke of them tenderly….
I love America, but it sure is full of a lot of hateful people…
I hope that someday, a book will be written that contains only the sweet memories about those 26…
*Here I am again, two weeks after the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. Tears running down my face after listening to Matthew McConaughey’s speech at the White House, and seeing the green Converse tennis shoes that identified a ten-year-old girl to her family on May 24th…😓*
There were parts I concentrated on far more than others, however.
For example:
The account given by the state trooper who led a group of children out of the school, hands on each other’s shoulders, the image caught on camera and broadcasted around the world. She was the one who took the responsibility of cleaning the victim’s clothes and returning them to the families in personalized boxes, herself.
The memories several of the parents shared about their children’s lives before 2012…and of sending them off to school that morning…
Then there were parts I began to skim over.
Any paragraphs that had Alex Jones’ venom-laced messages in them.
Ditto to the passages about Kelly Watts.
And my stomach turned, because I couldn’t help reading about the hate spewed upon these 26 families of murdered loved ones, in my search for the passages that spoke of them tenderly….
I love America, but it sure is full of a lot of hateful people…
I hope that someday, a book will be written that contains only the sweet memories about those 26…
*Here I am again, two weeks after the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. Tears running down my face after listening to Matthew McConaughey’s speech at the White House, and seeing the green Converse tennis shoes that identified a ten-year-old girl to her family on May 24th…😓*
January 24, 2023
On December 14, 2012, a young man with deteriorating mental health and a fascination with mass shootings entered Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut by shooting out the glass in the locked entrance. Adam Lanza then used a semiautomatic rifle to kill six educators and twenty first-graders. The 20-year-old Lanza then took his own life. The rampage lasted less than 11 minutes. In addition to the rifle, police found two handguns and a 12-guage shotgun. Police later discovered that, earlier that same morning, Lanza had killed his mother, Nancy, in the home that the two shared in Newtown. She had been shot four times with a rifle. She had legally purchased the rifle, as well as an AR-15 semiautomatic assault rifle and several other firearms, for her troubled son.
Knowing the pain that these families were going through, Americans opened up their hearts to them. The United Way fund of Newtown took in $2 million dollars. However, some of the donations received were less useful to the victims’ families, even a bit odd. In the two weeks that followed the shooting, people sent 68,000 plush toys, school supplies, cast-off clothing, and used household items.
Little did the parents and families of the victims know that their pain would soon be made worse—much worse—by other, less well-meaning Americans. Days after the shooting, the Infowars web and radio host Alex Jones insisted that the shooting had been staged and suggested that it was a “false flag”—a hostile or harmful act committed with the intent of disguising the responsible party and pinning blame on another person or group.
― “Jones has always been staunchly opposed to limits on gun ownership, real or perceived. … By 2012, Jones had been a celebrity among far-right “patriot” militias. … A racist who protests that he is not racist, Jones was an early adopter of the “birther” lie, claiming Obama is a foreign-born Muslim.”
― Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
Inspired by Jones and their shared delusion, conspiracists asserted that the tragedy was a stunt intended to bolster liberal efforts to pass gun control legislation and that the grieving parents were actually “crisis actors” faking even the existence of their dead kids.
― “This twisted hierarchy of needs drove Jones’s conspiratorial interest in Sandy Hook. For Infowars, his radio and online outlet, a horrific massacre of children meant engagement, attention, and a chance to spin a myth of official fraud and cover-up starring himself as a crusading truthteller.”
― Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
As much as these false claims hurt, these conspiracists went further, tormenting the families of the victims for years afterward. The families of the victims were harassed and even threatened in voice messages, emails, text messages, and letters. By labeling the victims’ families as threats, it made it all the easier to dehumanize and persecute them.
― “The Sandy Hook Hoaxers were bound by the powerful, false belief that their freedoms were under siege. Group survival demanded they nurture that falsehood, and protect it. To them, the people who died in the gunfire, their families and all who tried to help, weren’t victims, grieving survivors, or heroes. They were threats.”
― Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
Driven by desperation, some members of the victims’ families decided to fight back. Elizabeth Williamson, feature writer in the Washington bureau of the New York Times and a former member of that paper’s editorial board, covers their fight to stop this harassment. Since most of the attacks occurred in the dark anonymity of the internet, much of the fight starts there by trying to get social media sites Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter to block these false claims. They quickly find that these platforms were not particularly interested in policing their sites.
― “One of the first Facebook groups was for knitters. But the system is tailor-made for toxic groups—anti-vaxxers, white supremacists, conspiracy-theorists—to find and recruit new members.”
― Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
Williamson covers much of the litigation in the aftermath of the shooting. She recognizes that Sandy Hook had become “a battle over truth itself.” Williamson goes on to discuss QAnon and the complicated web of pro-Trump conspiracy theories. She draws the connection between the denial of truth following Sandy Hook and the events of January 6, 2021, when supporters, summoned by Donald Trump, stormed the Capitol in an attempt to overturn an election he falsely claimed had been stolen. Trump had successfully used the same tactics that allowed Jones’s lies to spread, with terrible effectiveness. After that day, many Americans still fear our democracy remains in danger.
― “American anti-intellectualism provides a rich cultural agar for growing these theories. Americans distrustful of institutional expertise have increasingly been swapping facts for gut feelings, a trend accelerated by social media algorithms that feed us “information” tailored to our prejudices, and by President Trump, who blithely denigrated facts and science. This collective pivot away from established knowledge undermines efforts to understand and battle global challenges like climate change, pandemics, and societal violence.”
― Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
Williamson shares the results of a 2016 Fairleigh Dickinson University poll that found 22 percent of Americans still believe that Sandy Hook was “definitely” or “possibly” faked. Just as troubling is the fact that nearly one in five Americans (and one in four Republicans) believe in QAnon conspiracy theories. Candidates who voiced support for QAnon theories have even been elected to Congress. When the pandemic struck, conspiracy theories about COVID-19 and vaccines sped across the internet.
This is a difficult book to read. Mass delusion is not something that’s pleasant to read about. Nevertheless, this is an important book about the rise of conspiracy theories in American society. While I’m not one to say that a book should be required reading, Sandy Hook is certainly recommended for anyone concerned about the post-truth age we currently live in.
― “Societal chasms between adherents to truth and consumers of fantasy are widening, aided by those who deliberately manipulate social media channels and discourse. By the end of the second decade of this new century, foreign adversaries and domestic extremists, the traditional culprits had been joined by a significant swath of the Republican Party.”
― Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
Knowing the pain that these families were going through, Americans opened up their hearts to them. The United Way fund of Newtown took in $2 million dollars. However, some of the donations received were less useful to the victims’ families, even a bit odd. In the two weeks that followed the shooting, people sent 68,000 plush toys, school supplies, cast-off clothing, and used household items.
Little did the parents and families of the victims know that their pain would soon be made worse—much worse—by other, less well-meaning Americans. Days after the shooting, the Infowars web and radio host Alex Jones insisted that the shooting had been staged and suggested that it was a “false flag”—a hostile or harmful act committed with the intent of disguising the responsible party and pinning blame on another person or group.
― “Jones has always been staunchly opposed to limits on gun ownership, real or perceived. … By 2012, Jones had been a celebrity among far-right “patriot” militias. … A racist who protests that he is not racist, Jones was an early adopter of the “birther” lie, claiming Obama is a foreign-born Muslim.”
― Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
Inspired by Jones and their shared delusion, conspiracists asserted that the tragedy was a stunt intended to bolster liberal efforts to pass gun control legislation and that the grieving parents were actually “crisis actors” faking even the existence of their dead kids.
― “This twisted hierarchy of needs drove Jones’s conspiratorial interest in Sandy Hook. For Infowars, his radio and online outlet, a horrific massacre of children meant engagement, attention, and a chance to spin a myth of official fraud and cover-up starring himself as a crusading truthteller.”
― Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
As much as these false claims hurt, these conspiracists went further, tormenting the families of the victims for years afterward. The families of the victims were harassed and even threatened in voice messages, emails, text messages, and letters. By labeling the victims’ families as threats, it made it all the easier to dehumanize and persecute them.
― “The Sandy Hook Hoaxers were bound by the powerful, false belief that their freedoms were under siege. Group survival demanded they nurture that falsehood, and protect it. To them, the people who died in the gunfire, their families and all who tried to help, weren’t victims, grieving survivors, or heroes. They were threats.”
― Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
Driven by desperation, some members of the victims’ families decided to fight back. Elizabeth Williamson, feature writer in the Washington bureau of the New York Times and a former member of that paper’s editorial board, covers their fight to stop this harassment. Since most of the attacks occurred in the dark anonymity of the internet, much of the fight starts there by trying to get social media sites Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter to block these false claims. They quickly find that these platforms were not particularly interested in policing their sites.
― “One of the first Facebook groups was for knitters. But the system is tailor-made for toxic groups—anti-vaxxers, white supremacists, conspiracy-theorists—to find and recruit new members.”
― Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
Williamson covers much of the litigation in the aftermath of the shooting. She recognizes that Sandy Hook had become “a battle over truth itself.” Williamson goes on to discuss QAnon and the complicated web of pro-Trump conspiracy theories. She draws the connection between the denial of truth following Sandy Hook and the events of January 6, 2021, when supporters, summoned by Donald Trump, stormed the Capitol in an attempt to overturn an election he falsely claimed had been stolen. Trump had successfully used the same tactics that allowed Jones’s lies to spread, with terrible effectiveness. After that day, many Americans still fear our democracy remains in danger.
― “American anti-intellectualism provides a rich cultural agar for growing these theories. Americans distrustful of institutional expertise have increasingly been swapping facts for gut feelings, a trend accelerated by social media algorithms that feed us “information” tailored to our prejudices, and by President Trump, who blithely denigrated facts and science. This collective pivot away from established knowledge undermines efforts to understand and battle global challenges like climate change, pandemics, and societal violence.”
― Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
Williamson shares the results of a 2016 Fairleigh Dickinson University poll that found 22 percent of Americans still believe that Sandy Hook was “definitely” or “possibly” faked. Just as troubling is the fact that nearly one in five Americans (and one in four Republicans) believe in QAnon conspiracy theories. Candidates who voiced support for QAnon theories have even been elected to Congress. When the pandemic struck, conspiracy theories about COVID-19 and vaccines sped across the internet.
This is a difficult book to read. Mass delusion is not something that’s pleasant to read about. Nevertheless, this is an important book about the rise of conspiracy theories in American society. While I’m not one to say that a book should be required reading, Sandy Hook is certainly recommended for anyone concerned about the post-truth age we currently live in.
― “Societal chasms between adherents to truth and consumers of fantasy are widening, aided by those who deliberately manipulate social media channels and discourse. By the end of the second decade of this new century, foreign adversaries and domestic extremists, the traditional culprits had been joined by a significant swath of the Republican Party.”
― Elizabeth Williamson, Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth
November 5, 2022
Super political! I was looking for an informative book about what happened at Sandy Hook. However the majority of the book focuses on one conspiracy theorist and every aspect of his life that could discredit him. The author uses an overload of overly emotional diction that made me distrust her. Despite agreeing with her points, the read was almost unbearable. It felt a bit divisive in the sense that the author was constantly generalizing republicans as the gun-loving enemies, spreading false information, and making violent threats to the Sandy Hook families. I feel like no matter what your political views are, read with discernment and critical thinking skills because like the conspiracy theorists described in this book, who used powerful persuasion and emotional arguments to win over an audience, Williamson is doing the exact same thing from the other extreme end of the spectrum. Definitely not the book that I thought I was getting.
March 25, 2022
Sigh. Some of this book was really done well. Being able to hear the interviews with the families of the victims and hear their stories was at times hard to hear, but at the same time done well. Then we start the part about Alex Jones and the ridiculous conspiracy theories. It is a part of the Sandy Hook story so I get it. However, I wish the author would have left out her politics and just made the story thr personal ones of her families. I felt like there was more of an agenda here than what the book suggests it’s about.
March 17, 2022
December 14, 2012 was an indescribably tragic day for an entire community close to my CT home, and proved to be a pivotal point in the exploitation of information. Even before many of the bodies had been identified, online deniers were claiming the murders were a hoax - a plot leading towards government removal of guns. Ms. Williamson deftly avoids any talk of 2nd Amendment rights intentionally, to focus squarely on the tragedy and the truth.
Recent Pew Research data shows that 71% of Americans get their news from social media and this book highlights just how dangerous and destructive that can be. It took years for these platforms to even consider protecting these families from death threats, personal information exposure and the lies of hoax groups. I confronted someone I knew who propagated these outrageous lies and theories and denied my truth; what I saw, how I felt, who I touched. It was a minuscule example of the firestorm these poor families have faced for a decade. Russia today is engaged in propaganda on these very sites, pushing their Ukraine invasion agenda forward.
The portrayal moves from disturbing to terrifying as the author chronicles the heart break of the event and the subsequent relentless torment of the victims, spearheaded by Alex Jones’ Infowars. This event opened the floodgates, and every school shooting since has fallen victim to these false narratives. Ongoing legal battles have provided some relief for many Sandy Hook families, who have fought tirelessly to remove this digital conspiracy content in order to reclaim the legacy of their loved ones.
Recent Pew Research data shows that 71% of Americans get their news from social media and this book highlights just how dangerous and destructive that can be. It took years for these platforms to even consider protecting these families from death threats, personal information exposure and the lies of hoax groups. I confronted someone I knew who propagated these outrageous lies and theories and denied my truth; what I saw, how I felt, who I touched. It was a minuscule example of the firestorm these poor families have faced for a decade. Russia today is engaged in propaganda on these very sites, pushing their Ukraine invasion agenda forward.
The portrayal moves from disturbing to terrifying as the author chronicles the heart break of the event and the subsequent relentless torment of the victims, spearheaded by Alex Jones’ Infowars. This event opened the floodgates, and every school shooting since has fallen victim to these false narratives. Ongoing legal battles have provided some relief for many Sandy Hook families, who have fought tirelessly to remove this digital conspiracy content in order to reclaim the legacy of their loved ones.
October 17, 2022
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“This book documents a battle by victims’ families against deluded people and profiteers who denied the December 14, 2012, shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, that killed twenty first graders and six educators.”
The author modestly and massively understates the scope and impact of her book. You could have no knowledge of the events of December 14, 2012 and learn the important details from reading this book but also a deeper understanding of social media’s role in offering a platform for noxious behavior in exchange for advertising dollars.
Adam Lanza was the deranged gunman who murdered the young children and teachers at Sandy Hook but he’s mostly an afterthought. The obvious villains are the supremely execrable Alex Jones and the hardcore deniers who continually harassed the victims’ families for years after the massacre. It would be easy to stop there but Williamson widens the scope and rightly assigns large portions of blame to the leading social media sites which ignored the dangerous messaging until they were publicly shamed into action. And let’s not forget the political climate that mainstreamed paranoia, deep state conspiracies and hatefully divisive language beginning in 2015.
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“Facebook’s business model focuses on growth, to the exclusion of most everything else. Its algorithms are designed to keep users on the platform for as long as possible, while the company collects personal data it sells to advertisers. The algorithm operates with relentless, sometimes murderous neutrality, rewarding whatever horrible behavior and false or inflammatory content captures and retains users. “Enragement is engagement,” Swisher told me. “You can’t shut it down, and you can’t fix it. It’s like air. You can’t stop it. Even if some of it’s poisonous.”
The other big platforms operate similarly. When confronted over their role in spreading hate or inciting violence, their creators typically cite free speech principles. Zuckerberg has for years protested that Facebook is not an “arbiter of truth,” while it devolved into a spreader of hate.”
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The source of social media poison are its content algorithms, engineered to keep users online for as long as possible while feeding them advertising and separating them from their personal data. The big platforms are paid by advertisers, and the platforms in turn pay content creators for advertising placed on their sites or channels. The more awful or outrageous the content, the more people click, and the more everybody earns.
The algorithms are secret, but the results are obvious. If you consume conspiracy theories, your newsfeed and recommendations adapt, so you receive more and more of them. “Seventy percent of videos on YouTube is YouTube telling us what to watch,” Farid told me. When dangerously false content goes viral, “YouTube is promoting that stuff.”
Farid scoffs at the platforms’ free speech piety. He points out that “from the earliest days Facebook and YouTube said ‘we will not allow adult porn as part of our terms of service,’ ” even though the distribution of adult pornography has been repeatedly affirmed by the courts, as a signal test of First Amendment freedoms.
“For Zuckerberg to rhapsodize about banning the actual speech that gave us First Amendment law? The hypocrisy and the irony is deep here. The reason they banned it is that they knew their advertisers did not want to be adjacent to it,” Farid said. “They can ban all forms of content without running afoul of the Constitution. But they choose not to do it because they’re making so much goddamned money.”
After suffering such a heartbreaking loss this is a sample of the abuse they had to endure:
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“Lenny was out with Sophia and Arielle—he no longer remembers where—in the late afternoon of January 10, 2016, when he got an alert from Google Voice. He had four new voicemails on his cell.
“You’re going to die, motherfucker, nigger, kike, Jew bastard, fag, tranny, cunt. And what are you going to do? Absolutely nothing. You’re a loser. You are going to rot in hell. DEATH. You’re going to die. Death is coming to you real soon, motherfucker. You’re going to die.”
Lenny didn’t listen to the whole thing. “As soon as I heard the word ‘die,’ I immediately pushed stop,” he told me. It was a woman’s voice, reedy and cracking with hate and menace. Chills flowed through him. He masked his shock and turned back to the girls.
Lenny and Veronique already lived in hiding. Veronique refused to live outside a gated community. Since 2014, when he first engaged with the hoaxers, Lenny had avoided being photographed or appearing at events where he would be publicly identified. He was moving every six months or so because trolls kept posting his home address. He received his mail in a series of post office boxes, including one in Newtown and the one at the address Jones had aired on his show. Once, a week after Lenny had moved, Philip Craigie, a conspiracist who went by the name “Professor Doom,” called his cell and read him his new address and social security number. “I moved a few weeks later,” Lenny told me, jokingly adding, “New apartments give a thirty-day satisfaction guarantee.” A couple of years later Professor Doom would be charged with attempted murder after attacking a man with a knife, stabbing him five times.
“Did you hide your imaginary son in the attic? Are you still fucking him, you fucking Jew bastard?”
“Did you let that nigger in the White House fuck you in the ass, you cheap piece of Jew bastard?”
All four messages were in the same woman’s voice.”
So what kind of person could do such a horrible thing?
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“Lucy Richards was enraged that Professor James Tracy had lost his job because Lenny and Veronique Pozner complained about him. Richards was a fifty-six-year-old former waitress living on disability checks and food stamps who rented a single room in a house in Brandon, Florida. A friend had gotten her a cheap deal on a cell phone, which she had used to call Lenny.
Richards liked to watch Alex Jones’s show online, where for three years he had been rehashing Veronique Pozner’s long-ago interview with Anderson Cooper, claiming it was staged. She told the FBI agent who visited her that she was a fan of Jim Fetzer’s too. Like Fetzer, Richards believed nobody died at Sandy Hook. She found Lenny’s phone number wherever she had read about Tracy’s firing, maybe on Fetzer’s website.
Struggling, angry, and probably lonely, Richards had been given access to the global misinformation chain with a bargain cell phone and a cheap computer, which allowed her to torment Lenny from a remove that had made it difficult for him to gauge the threat. Was she a harmless misfit, or was the killer in the house? For many of these people, internet theorizing was their main source of human connection. For others, the internet was all they had left after their pastime hardened into compulsion.”
Williamson goes on to mention the events of Pizzagate and its reformulation as QAnon, which grew during the pandemic. Later, she poses this thought which I think goes to the heart of the book:
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“I wondered: What role does this collective turning away play in our country’s embrace of conspiracy theories, or our ignorance of their impact on survivors? If we can’t stand to hear about the survivors’ pain, do we cede the battle for truth to the liars?”
What of the survivors? What about their rights?
Before I read “Sandy Hook” I would probably just say the deniers were mentally ill, foreign trolls (Russians trying to foment dissent), profiteers, bullies and contrarians. I think that’s partially correct but Williamson tells of others who are initially skeptical but ultimately able to accept the truth and walk away.
Towards the end she leaves us with this sobering thought:
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“The nature of conspiracy theorizing has changed, from relatively harmless speculation about the Bermuda Triangle or Bohemian Grove to sinister theories that place democratic governments at the center of dark plots to control, sicken, and murder their own citizens. These online accusations are now often invented and spread by demagogic leaders around the globe, who use social media platforms to undermine trust in the very institutions that keep the powerful in check—elections and the courts, competing branches of government, and objective journalism. These political opportunists play to constituencies willing to relinquish objective truth for attractive, fantastical Deep State schemes in which political opponents are pedophiles and satanists, and society’s most vulnerable morph into villains deserving vigilante justice. As the world saw during the Capitol insurrection on January 6, 2021, some believers in these myths have proved themselves increasingly willing to use violence.”
“This book documents a battle by victims’ families against deluded people and profiteers who denied the December 14, 2012, shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, that killed twenty first graders and six educators.”
The author modestly and massively understates the scope and impact of her book. You could have no knowledge of the events of December 14, 2012 and learn the important details from reading this book but also a deeper understanding of social media’s role in offering a platform for noxious behavior in exchange for advertising dollars.
Adam Lanza was the deranged gunman who murdered the young children and teachers at Sandy Hook but he’s mostly an afterthought. The obvious villains are the supremely execrable Alex Jones and the hardcore deniers who continually harassed the victims’ families for years after the massacre. It would be easy to stop there but Williamson widens the scope and rightly assigns large portions of blame to the leading social media sites which ignored the dangerous messaging until they were publicly shamed into action. And let’s not forget the political climate that mainstreamed paranoia, deep state conspiracies and hatefully divisive language beginning in 2015.
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“Facebook’s business model focuses on growth, to the exclusion of most everything else. Its algorithms are designed to keep users on the platform for as long as possible, while the company collects personal data it sells to advertisers. The algorithm operates with relentless, sometimes murderous neutrality, rewarding whatever horrible behavior and false or inflammatory content captures and retains users. “Enragement is engagement,” Swisher told me. “You can’t shut it down, and you can’t fix it. It’s like air. You can’t stop it. Even if some of it’s poisonous.”
The other big platforms operate similarly. When confronted over their role in spreading hate or inciting violence, their creators typically cite free speech principles. Zuckerberg has for years protested that Facebook is not an “arbiter of truth,” while it devolved into a spreader of hate.”
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The source of social media poison are its content algorithms, engineered to keep users online for as long as possible while feeding them advertising and separating them from their personal data. The big platforms are paid by advertisers, and the platforms in turn pay content creators for advertising placed on their sites or channels. The more awful or outrageous the content, the more people click, and the more everybody earns.
The algorithms are secret, but the results are obvious. If you consume conspiracy theories, your newsfeed and recommendations adapt, so you receive more and more of them. “Seventy percent of videos on YouTube is YouTube telling us what to watch,” Farid told me. When dangerously false content goes viral, “YouTube is promoting that stuff.”
Farid scoffs at the platforms’ free speech piety. He points out that “from the earliest days Facebook and YouTube said ‘we will not allow adult porn as part of our terms of service,’ ” even though the distribution of adult pornography has been repeatedly affirmed by the courts, as a signal test of First Amendment freedoms.
“For Zuckerberg to rhapsodize about banning the actual speech that gave us First Amendment law? The hypocrisy and the irony is deep here. The reason they banned it is that they knew their advertisers did not want to be adjacent to it,” Farid said. “They can ban all forms of content without running afoul of the Constitution. But they choose not to do it because they’re making so much goddamned money.”
After suffering such a heartbreaking loss this is a sample of the abuse they had to endure:
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“Lenny was out with Sophia and Arielle—he no longer remembers where—in the late afternoon of January 10, 2016, when he got an alert from Google Voice. He had four new voicemails on his cell.
“You’re going to die, motherfucker, nigger, kike, Jew bastard, fag, tranny, cunt. And what are you going to do? Absolutely nothing. You’re a loser. You are going to rot in hell. DEATH. You’re going to die. Death is coming to you real soon, motherfucker. You’re going to die.”
Lenny didn’t listen to the whole thing. “As soon as I heard the word ‘die,’ I immediately pushed stop,” he told me. It was a woman’s voice, reedy and cracking with hate and menace. Chills flowed through him. He masked his shock and turned back to the girls.
Lenny and Veronique already lived in hiding. Veronique refused to live outside a gated community. Since 2014, when he first engaged with the hoaxers, Lenny had avoided being photographed or appearing at events where he would be publicly identified. He was moving every six months or so because trolls kept posting his home address. He received his mail in a series of post office boxes, including one in Newtown and the one at the address Jones had aired on his show. Once, a week after Lenny had moved, Philip Craigie, a conspiracist who went by the name “Professor Doom,” called his cell and read him his new address and social security number. “I moved a few weeks later,” Lenny told me, jokingly adding, “New apartments give a thirty-day satisfaction guarantee.” A couple of years later Professor Doom would be charged with attempted murder after attacking a man with a knife, stabbing him five times.
“Did you hide your imaginary son in the attic? Are you still fucking him, you fucking Jew bastard?”
“Did you let that nigger in the White House fuck you in the ass, you cheap piece of Jew bastard?”
All four messages were in the same woman’s voice.”
So what kind of person could do such a horrible thing?
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“Lucy Richards was enraged that Professor James Tracy had lost his job because Lenny and Veronique Pozner complained about him. Richards was a fifty-six-year-old former waitress living on disability checks and food stamps who rented a single room in a house in Brandon, Florida. A friend had gotten her a cheap deal on a cell phone, which she had used to call Lenny.
Richards liked to watch Alex Jones’s show online, where for three years he had been rehashing Veronique Pozner’s long-ago interview with Anderson Cooper, claiming it was staged. She told the FBI agent who visited her that she was a fan of Jim Fetzer’s too. Like Fetzer, Richards believed nobody died at Sandy Hook. She found Lenny’s phone number wherever she had read about Tracy’s firing, maybe on Fetzer’s website.
Struggling, angry, and probably lonely, Richards had been given access to the global misinformation chain with a bargain cell phone and a cheap computer, which allowed her to torment Lenny from a remove that had made it difficult for him to gauge the threat. Was she a harmless misfit, or was the killer in the house? For many of these people, internet theorizing was their main source of human connection. For others, the internet was all they had left after their pastime hardened into compulsion.”
Williamson goes on to mention the events of Pizzagate and its reformulation as QAnon, which grew during the pandemic. Later, she poses this thought which I think goes to the heart of the book:
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“I wondered: What role does this collective turning away play in our country’s embrace of conspiracy theories, or our ignorance of their impact on survivors? If we can’t stand to hear about the survivors’ pain, do we cede the battle for truth to the liars?”
What of the survivors? What about their rights?
Before I read “Sandy Hook” I would probably just say the deniers were mentally ill, foreign trolls (Russians trying to foment dissent), profiteers, bullies and contrarians. I think that’s partially correct but Williamson tells of others who are initially skeptical but ultimately able to accept the truth and walk away.
Towards the end she leaves us with this sobering thought:
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“The nature of conspiracy theorizing has changed, from relatively harmless speculation about the Bermuda Triangle or Bohemian Grove to sinister theories that place democratic governments at the center of dark plots to control, sicken, and murder their own citizens. These online accusations are now often invented and spread by demagogic leaders around the globe, who use social media platforms to undermine trust in the very institutions that keep the powerful in check—elections and the courts, competing branches of government, and objective journalism. These political opportunists play to constituencies willing to relinquish objective truth for attractive, fantastical Deep State schemes in which political opponents are pedophiles and satanists, and society’s most vulnerable morph into villains deserving vigilante justice. As the world saw during the Capitol insurrection on January 6, 2021, some believers in these myths have proved themselves increasingly willing to use violence.”
April 22, 2024
One of my students saw that I was reading this and asked me why. I can remember the weeks following Sandy Hook that I was just devastated at the loss of life. My daughter was about the same age of those beautiful children murdered that day.
For the families to have struggled through the trauma of this experience to then have to deal with Alex Jones and his campaign of misinformation surrounding Sandy Hook is disgusting. I applaud the efforts of Noah Pozner's father, Lenny, to take down the many posts and forums surrouding conspiracy theories and the Sandy Hook shooting.
The families fought long and hard and won their case after many years of reliving the events.
Williamson does a good job of giving a full picture of the events of that day, but of also demonstrating how so many conspiracy theorists still believe their own narratives.
For the families to have struggled through the trauma of this experience to then have to deal with Alex Jones and his campaign of misinformation surrounding Sandy Hook is disgusting. I applaud the efforts of Noah Pozner's father, Lenny, to take down the many posts and forums surrouding conspiracy theories and the Sandy Hook shooting.
The families fought long and hard and won their case after many years of reliving the events.
Williamson does a good job of giving a full picture of the events of that day, but of also demonstrating how so many conspiracy theorists still believe their own narratives.
March 24, 2022
I learned a lot and cried multiple times. 10/10.
September 5, 2022
On the year that will bring the 10 year anniversary of this tragedy this book was such a powerful and tremendously sad read. Alex Jones is scum and the pain he caused so many is heartbreaking.
August 16, 2022
"It's going to take another generation before they even begin to understand, let alone actually achieve, how to legislate these companies." -Lenny Pozner
An incredibly important, thorough, and difficult read. We have got to seriously consider how far social media has gone, imagine how much farther it could potentially go, and get some laws in place now. It feels like we are just waiting around for the next catastrophe--whether it be another massive data breach, another campaign of misinformation, or another insurrection. Or God forbid, something worse beyond what we can fathom at the moment.
Also you could easily change 'social media' to 'gun control' in my first sentence. This book does not go into that aspect of the shooting much at all, but it still needs to be said.
While most reviews are pretty high for this, most of the lower ones complained it wasn't enough about Sandy Hook and focused too much on the conspiracy theories, politics, and Alex Jones. This is all pretty clear that the book is about this from looking at the synopsis. Regardless, I'd argue it is impossible to tell the story of Sandy Hook without addressing and analyzing this. The other complaint is that it is dry and repetitive. I did reach a point where some of the conspiracy theorists involved blurred together, but I'd rather non-fiction be thorough, so it didn't bother me much.
An incredibly important, thorough, and difficult read. We have got to seriously consider how far social media has gone, imagine how much farther it could potentially go, and get some laws in place now. It feels like we are just waiting around for the next catastrophe--whether it be another massive data breach, another campaign of misinformation, or another insurrection. Or God forbid, something worse beyond what we can fathom at the moment.
Also you could easily change 'social media' to 'gun control' in my first sentence. This book does not go into that aspect of the shooting much at all, but it still needs to be said.
While most reviews are pretty high for this, most of the lower ones complained it wasn't enough about Sandy Hook and focused too much on the conspiracy theories, politics, and Alex Jones. This is all pretty clear that the book is about this from looking at the synopsis. Regardless, I'd argue it is impossible to tell the story of Sandy Hook without addressing and analyzing this. The other complaint is that it is dry and repetitive. I did reach a point where some of the conspiracy theorists involved blurred together, but I'd rather non-fiction be thorough, so it didn't bother me much.
May 31, 2022
I highly recommend Sandy Hook: An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth. I am glad that true crime books are focusing less on the gory details and are focusing instead on "what happened next?". I've read quite a few lately and have gained a lot from them. This one focuses on the alternate reality conspiracy theorists have created for themselves and their communities online, with the main target being Alex Jones of InfoWars. It was incredible to learn the things the Sandy Hook families have done to protect themselves and to fight for truth. In particular, I think Lenny Pozner and his HONR Network really shine in this book. Other parents and their plight are documented compassionately, including Veronique de la Rosa, Robbie Parker (the first parent to make a public comment, who was torn to shreds online and later stalked), and Neil Heslin (he seemed very giving of his time to the author).
The main conclusion I got is that conspiracy theorists don't see victims as people, but as threats to their worldview. Our only hope is to continue to slowly knock that worldview. It brings me optimism to see people like Alex Jones lose defamation cases and be deplatformed from YouTube, etc., but it's also a whack-a-mole situation and the Internet is full of conspiracy theorists until massive media companies do more to combat it. The only thing I wish is that this book had less Donald Trump and 2016 election; I know why it's there and see the through lines but I felt most of it was a rehashing of things already known about the 2016 election.
The main conclusion I got is that conspiracy theorists don't see victims as people, but as threats to their worldview. Our only hope is to continue to slowly knock that worldview. It brings me optimism to see people like Alex Jones lose defamation cases and be deplatformed from YouTube, etc., but it's also a whack-a-mole situation and the Internet is full of conspiracy theorists until massive media companies do more to combat it. The only thing I wish is that this book had less Donald Trump and 2016 election; I know why it's there and see the through lines but I felt most of it was a rehashing of things already known about the 2016 election.
December 30, 2024
This book made me feel two emotions: angry and sad. While most people would shy away from a book that would make them feel this way, I’d argue that sometimes confronting the reality of tragedy is a difficult but necessary part of furthering justice.
While I have been known to believe the occasional conspiracy theory, I’ve long held the belief that anyone who denies that the Sandy Hook shooting is an actual POS. This book confirmed that for me. What’s more, though, is that it helped me to understand the ins-and-outs of conspiracy theories themselves and how even intelligent people can fall into their trap.
I haven’t stopped thinking about the families since reading this book. It tears at you right in your very core because while many may deny the truth, the fact of the matter is that a bunch of babies and a few of the educators who loved them dearly were slaughtered in a place where they should have been safe.
Read this book if you can handle it. It’ll change you for good — but in a necessary way.
While I have been known to believe the occasional conspiracy theory, I’ve long held the belief that anyone who denies that the Sandy Hook shooting is an actual POS. This book confirmed that for me. What’s more, though, is that it helped me to understand the ins-and-outs of conspiracy theories themselves and how even intelligent people can fall into their trap.
I haven’t stopped thinking about the families since reading this book. It tears at you right in your very core because while many may deny the truth, the fact of the matter is that a bunch of babies and a few of the educators who loved them dearly were slaughtered in a place where they should have been safe.
Read this book if you can handle it. It’ll change you for good — but in a necessary way.
May 30, 2022
**2.5 stars
This is not what I was looking for in a book on Sandy Hook. In fact, only a portion of the book directly related to the evens at Sandy Hook and the rest is essentially a leftist political commentary. This book was not balance, it didn't even pretend to be. Much of it was a bit of a hit piece on conservatives and Trump. That being said,
Alex Jones and all of the 'truthers' are tosses, but the author is providing them with another platform..
This is not what I was looking for in a book on Sandy Hook. In fact, only a portion of the book directly related to the evens at Sandy Hook and the rest is essentially a leftist political commentary. This book was not balance, it didn't even pretend to be. Much of it was a bit of a hit piece on conservatives and Trump. That being said,
Alex Jones and all of the 'truthers' are tosses, but the author is providing them with another platform..
April 8, 2024
Look, I don't want to say there was a conspiracy about Sandy Hook, but...
...there is no 'but', and if you thought there was going to be a 'but', then we're gonna have a problem. There just wasn't one. And the amount of vicious trolling and harassment that people who held their murdered children in their arms had to put up with is inhumane and stupid. The author does an excellent job delving into the psychology of conspiracy theorists and 'alternative facts' people, and what she ultimately emerges with is very sad. Most of these people, you could feel sympathy with their situation, initially. They're lonely; there was some kind of catalyzing event; they retreat into nonsense because it makes their reality more stable, and stable is what they need more than the inconvenience of their reality not being...well...actual reality. Then you see the obliviousness to the pain and havoc they cause and your sympathy dries up fast. There's very little you can do to pull someone out of that nosedive, especially if they had some predisposure to those attitudes, so the book instead highlights some examples of successful "pre-suasion" where folks are educated about what misinformation / alternative facts networks are, how they are used tactically to fool them, and then can spot those tactics in the wild when nuts like Alex Jones try to use them to recruit further. It's very hard to convince someone they've been scammed, because their ego is too tied up in it. But you could prevent someone from being scammed in the future by teaching them to watch out for (and then they instead get their ego stroked by not falling for it). Or an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Or whatever metaphor you want, I guess.
5 stars not because it's the most perfect book ever, but because it is a very good book that I think everyone unfortunately should take time to read in today's topsy-turvy world of internet nonsense. Just make sure there's plenty of pina coladas handy because whew this is a downer.
((Rough thoughts. May return/revise later when the rum hangover wears off))
...there is no 'but', and if you thought there was going to be a 'but', then we're gonna have a problem. There just wasn't one. And the amount of vicious trolling and harassment that people who held their murdered children in their arms had to put up with is inhumane and stupid. The author does an excellent job delving into the psychology of conspiracy theorists and 'alternative facts' people, and what she ultimately emerges with is very sad. Most of these people, you could feel sympathy with their situation, initially. They're lonely; there was some kind of catalyzing event; they retreat into nonsense because it makes their reality more stable, and stable is what they need more than the inconvenience of their reality not being...well...actual reality. Then you see the obliviousness to the pain and havoc they cause and your sympathy dries up fast. There's very little you can do to pull someone out of that nosedive, especially if they had some predisposure to those attitudes, so the book instead highlights some examples of successful "pre-suasion" where folks are educated about what misinformation / alternative facts networks are, how they are used tactically to fool them, and then can spot those tactics in the wild when nuts like Alex Jones try to use them to recruit further. It's very hard to convince someone they've been scammed, because their ego is too tied up in it. But you could prevent someone from being scammed in the future by teaching them to watch out for (and then they instead get their ego stroked by not falling for it). Or an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Or whatever metaphor you want, I guess.
5 stars not because it's the most perfect book ever, but because it is a very good book that I think everyone unfortunately should take time to read in today's topsy-turvy world of internet nonsense. Just make sure there's plenty of pina coladas handy because whew this is a downer.
((Rough thoughts. May return/revise later when the rum hangover wears off))
April 10, 2022
An excellent, well-researched read about the Sandy Hook tragedy, Alex Jones’ push to label the tragedy a hoax and what some of the families decided to do about it.
I highly recommend this book. The author also delves into the psyche of conspiracy theorists to understand why it’s almost impossible to change their minds about what the truth actually is.
I highly recommend this book. The author also delves into the psyche of conspiracy theorists to understand why it’s almost impossible to change their minds about what the truth actually is.
April 3, 2023
3.5 stars
Sandy Hook was my first book for the 2023 Octofinals and the first few chapters tore my heart out, reliving that awful day through the eyes of parents whose children were killed. After that the narrative turns to Alex Jones and how he had an outsized influence on the conspiracy theories that arose and how that culture of lies has fed into American politics in a lasting way.
The first part is strong, but as the legal battles wore on I started to lose interest. Still, a fairly strong book in a very week Octofinal group.
For more complete thoughts check out this Octofinal vlog!
Sandy Hook was my first book for the 2023 Octofinals and the first few chapters tore my heart out, reliving that awful day through the eyes of parents whose children were killed. After that the narrative turns to Alex Jones and how he had an outsized influence on the conspiracy theories that arose and how that culture of lies has fed into American politics in a lasting way.
The first part is strong, but as the legal battles wore on I started to lose interest. Still, a fairly strong book in a very week Octofinal group.
For more complete thoughts check out this Octofinal vlog!
October 26, 2022
First of all, let me mention to those considering this book, it is not what a lot of people think it to be - which is a detailed account of how this all came to happen. How Adam Lanza became so detached from the world and humanity itself, he was capable of carrying out such a horrifying massacre against our nation’s most innocent, vulnerable population. It is also not a recount or play by play of September 14, 2012. Lastly, it is not an update nearly a decade after the shooting to see how the different families are currently living, or coping with the massive grief they’ll forever be condemned to live with.
Yes, of course all of these elements are touched upon in this book, some in more detail and more often revisited than others.
However, most of the book is devoted to many of the Sandy Hook families still struggling to even BEGIN their grieving process. Why? Well, because of the many insane morons who have envied the accomplishments of the “academic elite” and felt as though they were too common, too average, not good enough, for too long (as they should).
So, do they embark on a quest to go back to school, obtain a degree and do something meaningful with their lives? Nah! Nope! Why do that when the common citizen has theatrical bozos like Alex Jones hawking his conspiracy theories to them, grounded in no empirical research or evidence? Where simply forwarding something that looks “contradictory” to a fellow hoaxer can earn you a badge similar to those worn by respected journalists (at least, among an ever-growing community)?
All these impressionable minds needed was a leader, and people like Alex Jones, disgruntled university professors, and even our former president were all too happy to exploit these families (along with every mass shooting tragedy since) for two purposes: monetary, of course - but secondly to push THEIR agenda: that these shootings never actually occurred, they were carried out by “crisis actors” in the big bad government’s quest to come and stomp all over every patriot lovin’ American’s God-given right to bear arms, dammit all. And they’ll be damned if they’re just going to turn over their guns to a government that plans on ruling them like a police state!
(Wait - wasn’t it Donald Trump who nearly toppled democracy, threatened to impose a military state, alleged that the election was a fraud? I’m so confused, because I was sitting here thinking it was the *liberals* who wanted to take away our guns and subject us to slave worker control. Lol.)
Not really understanding what a few citizen militias would or could possibly do with even a well stocked armory vs. the largest military in the world (they should know, given they’re the ones always boasting about American might and law enforcement - oh, except when they’re bashing their heads in while trying to break into Capitol Hill, anyway).
Some people have accused this book of being too political, but really, it’s not. It’s literally just the facts and if that bothers you, don’t read it, I guess. The truth is, Donald Trump DID appear on Alex Jones’s show, Jones did endorse him, Jones did appear as a guest of honor at the 2016 RNC. Trump did intentionally validate the conspiracy theorists’ arguments... and worst of all, created so many of his own throughout his short-lived presidency. Not to mention he directly fits into this story when the Sandy Hook families penned him a letter after his election in 2016, begging him to denounce Jones and say that Sandy Hook actually happened (no response, of course).
If you’re hoping to read a book just about Sandy Hook and what happened, how the families are coping today... well, maybe skip this. I also didn’t realize that the book was namely dedicated to the long road the families have had to travel from the day Jones and his fellow hoaxers declared war on them.
How they’ve had to produce evidence their massacred children even EXISTED, and how they finally had to sue Jones for defamation, after they realized this may be the only way to make stop. By deplatforming him and cutting off his funds. The harassment they have suffered at the hands of his followers for nearly a decade, as well as the disturbing, hateful vitriol, is at times hard to read. However, I find this a necessary read and a highly recommended one.
A read which proves there is a massive difference to being entitled to maintain one’s freedom of speech, and that of outright lying for personal gain (whether that personal gain may be money, power, fame, or all three) by capitalizing on the suffering and trauma of innocent victims.
NOTE: might need to go back and proofread this review later... two people keep blowing up my phone, and I’m going to end up losing the review. So my apologies in advance if this review sucks or contains grammatical errors... I haven’t had the chance to look it over yet! I will in the morning though (now that it’s actually written, lol).
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April 7, 2022
For my own reference: I cried quite a bit while reading this, especially during the first few chapters, and really appreciated how Williamson presented the rise of conspiracies/fake news in relation to the tragedy.
October 16, 2022
I started this book in August but had to walk away for a few weeks because the content was so upsetting. This is because the author handled the subject matter all too well, with thorough reporting, interviews, and a deep dive into the lives of both conspiracy theorists and victims of conspiracy theories. It's a compelling timeline of the events that brought us to this post-truth era. And it was both shocking and unsurprising to learn how just a few bad actors who got in on the ground level (i.e. Alex Jones) managed to upend the way we all view truth, the media, and democracy itself.
I finally finished the book following the conclusion of the latest Alex Jones trial. We'd all love to believe the $1 billion in damages will ruin Alex Jones and cause other conspiracy theoriests to think twice about spreading lies and ruining lives, although reality will (sadly) probably prove otherwise. As the lines between objective truth and subjective fiction become more blurred, "Sandy Hook" will stand as a compelling chronicle of critical moments in history when the script flipped.
I finally finished the book following the conclusion of the latest Alex Jones trial. We'd all love to believe the $1 billion in damages will ruin Alex Jones and cause other conspiracy theoriests to think twice about spreading lies and ruining lives, although reality will (sadly) probably prove otherwise. As the lines between objective truth and subjective fiction become more blurred, "Sandy Hook" will stand as a compelling chronicle of critical moments in history when the script flipped.
July 7, 2022
Picked this up because I had the unfortunate (read: traumatic) experience of growing up submerged in these types of conspiracy theories. Williamson aptly recounts the emergence of the Sandy Hook denial trend and explores some of the psychology behind it. Alex Jones your nasty ass will not be seeing heaven.
The background of some of the more aggressive conspiracy theorists continues to reveal how there is no intellectual map or blueprint of someone who can fall prey to these ideas. Williamson testifies to the unfortunate reality that nothing in America has to be truthful to be powerful - in a society that is so closely married to algorithms and sensation, the sinister mass distribution of misinformation is practically guaranteed.
The background of some of the more aggressive conspiracy theorists continues to reveal how there is no intellectual map or blueprint of someone who can fall prey to these ideas. Williamson testifies to the unfortunate reality that nothing in America has to be truthful to be powerful - in a society that is so closely married to algorithms and sensation, the sinister mass distribution of misinformation is practically guaranteed.
March 2, 2022
This was incredibly difficult to read but well worth it. Extremely well researched and written, Elizabeth Williamson builds the story from that awful day in Newtown to the triumph in the courthouse and the build up in between. To see how those horrible conspiracies began and were nurtured intentionally was shocking. This is an important, gripping read.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.
March 2, 2022
This was incredibly difficult to read but well worth it. Extremely well researched and written, Elizabeth Williamson builds the story from that awful day in Newtown to the triumph in the courthouse and the build up in between. To see how those horrible conspiracies began and were nurtured intentionally was shocking. This is an important, gripping read.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.
January 18, 2023
I think the most important thing I can put in my review of SANDY HOOK is this: It’s not a book focused on the forensic details of what happened that day, nor is it a treatise on gun laws. If you go in expecting either of those things (or if you were wary of reading it in case that was its focus) you’ll find out very early on that your expectations were misplaced. In my opinion that’s actually a good thing, because the rest of the book’s title – “An American Tragedy and the Battle for Truth” – is much clearer about what you’re going to get, and it’s what I was looking for when I picked it up.
The focus here by Elizabeth Williamson is fairly broad, but it covers a lot of interesting arms of the conspiracy theory monster. She looks into the specifics of how and why there were so many “false flag!!!” screeds that came out almost immediately after the shooting of 20 young children and six staff at Sandy Hook Elementary. A lot of time is spent on Alex Jones and his disinformation machine, which – as a non-American and someone who has never followed anything the guy put out (well, except that whole “turning the frogs gay” thing that was everywhere a few years ago) – was morbidly fascinating. I admit to not being fully in touch with the grounds upon which he is currently being sued for hundreds of millions of dollars by the parents of the murdered children, but after reading this book and seeing exactly what he did and how he profited greatly by it I understand completely.
Williamson does dig into more than just Jones, though. She has lengthy sections with some of the bereaved parents and a look at how they navigated the world after their unimaginable losses. There are remarkable looks inside some of the more insular corners of the conspiracy-minded web, too, like message boards dedicated to pulling apart every facial expression the parents, coroners and police officers had in the press following the shooting. The mental gymnastics on display here are astounding. Major props to Williamson for working her way into those spaces, because a lot of it is stuff we as the general public probably wouldn’t have known existed otherwise. It does get repetitive at times, which makes some sense in context because there has been a lot of round-and-around discourse by those who think the shooting was a hoax, but it does slow the pace down and make certain sections feel like a bit of a slog. (Also: the audiobook is weirdly produced, with some lines being repeated as though they forgot where they left off and started back in a line too early. Distracting but not insurmountable as a listener.)
As long as you go into this book knowing it’s more about the way a certain subset of people react to mass tragedies now (“fake news”) and how these ideas are propagated, as well as who benefits most from disseminating them, I think you’ll find it a very rewarding read. As I said, enough attention is given to the specifics of the Newtown tragedy that people interested in the topic will still come away knowing more than they did going in; it’s just not 100% centred on the forensic evidence, the crime scene, and the investigation itself. There’s plenty here, though, that will be upsetting to most everyone with a heart, including passages from the autopsies of the kids, and some of the recreations given to the parents of their kids’ last moments. It’s chilling to read and it’s very, very vivid, so be prepared. Just don’t expect it to be mostly about Adam Lanza the way Dave Cullen’s book COLUMBINE (which I read and reviewed in glowing terms several years ago) was about Klebold and Harris. It’s a different angle, and it’s one that Williamson effectively explores.
The focus here by Elizabeth Williamson is fairly broad, but it covers a lot of interesting arms of the conspiracy theory monster. She looks into the specifics of how and why there were so many “false flag!!!” screeds that came out almost immediately after the shooting of 20 young children and six staff at Sandy Hook Elementary. A lot of time is spent on Alex Jones and his disinformation machine, which – as a non-American and someone who has never followed anything the guy put out (well, except that whole “turning the frogs gay” thing that was everywhere a few years ago) – was morbidly fascinating. I admit to not being fully in touch with the grounds upon which he is currently being sued for hundreds of millions of dollars by the parents of the murdered children, but after reading this book and seeing exactly what he did and how he profited greatly by it I understand completely.
Williamson does dig into more than just Jones, though. She has lengthy sections with some of the bereaved parents and a look at how they navigated the world after their unimaginable losses. There are remarkable looks inside some of the more insular corners of the conspiracy-minded web, too, like message boards dedicated to pulling apart every facial expression the parents, coroners and police officers had in the press following the shooting. The mental gymnastics on display here are astounding. Major props to Williamson for working her way into those spaces, because a lot of it is stuff we as the general public probably wouldn’t have known existed otherwise. It does get repetitive at times, which makes some sense in context because there has been a lot of round-and-around discourse by those who think the shooting was a hoax, but it does slow the pace down and make certain sections feel like a bit of a slog. (Also: the audiobook is weirdly produced, with some lines being repeated as though they forgot where they left off and started back in a line too early. Distracting but not insurmountable as a listener.)
As long as you go into this book knowing it’s more about the way a certain subset of people react to mass tragedies now (“fake news”) and how these ideas are propagated, as well as who benefits most from disseminating them, I think you’ll find it a very rewarding read. As I said, enough attention is given to the specifics of the Newtown tragedy that people interested in the topic will still come away knowing more than they did going in; it’s just not 100% centred on the forensic evidence, the crime scene, and the investigation itself. There’s plenty here, though, that will be upsetting to most everyone with a heart, including passages from the autopsies of the kids, and some of the recreations given to the parents of their kids’ last moments. It’s chilling to read and it’s very, very vivid, so be prepared. Just don’t expect it to be mostly about Adam Lanza the way Dave Cullen’s book COLUMBINE (which I read and reviewed in glowing terms several years ago) was about Klebold and Harris. It’s a different angle, and it’s one that Williamson effectively explores.
March 27, 2025
4.5.
This book actually took me well over a year to read, because the first couple chapters were so horrific that I had to put it down for a long time. I went back only because I knew the book was about the conspiracy theories surrounding the hellish events at Sandy Hook in 2012, which I felt I could emotionally handle better than reading about the murdered six year olds and teachers. That was an easier story for me to take, though of course not without its own horrors.
I was in the girls’ bathroom at my high school when the Sandy Hook shooting happened, getting ready to go to rehearsal for Legally Blonde the musical. I remember seeing the notification about the shooting- I don’t know how I found out- and I was immediately sent into despair. I remember telling my friends about it and feeling really upset that they didn’t seem to care as much as I did. (This isn’t a judgment at them, I am sure they were also horrified). I do think the teachers should’ve cancelled rehearsal that day.
I only share my own experience because it’s quite astonishing to me how I had such a different one than the people who made it their life’s mission to prove the events didn’t happen, torturing victims’ families in the process. I didn’t know a lot about the conspiracies before reading this book, but I’d heard of them, and reasoned they simply couldn’t deal with the reality of the situation. I still believe that’s probably true for many people, though some are coming from different places that I cannot fathom.
Onto the book: Williamson did a very, very thorough job with this book. It painted a detailed picture of the harm Alex Jones’ lies had on the Sandy Hook families, as well as how he (and his followers) have spread conspiracy theories about countless other subjects and harmed many others in the process. I have to give the author major kudos for her reporting, which was extensive and took a lot of bravery. I will say I think the scope of the book went a little too far, at the loss of knowing more about the Sandy Hook families. I didn’t find the lengthy tangents into Pizzagate, Covid deniers, or January 6 necessary (not that I disagree with her conclusion on those). I get that Alex Jones was implicated throughout, but it was distracting and often went into way too much detail. Sometimes Williamson appeared to go into too much detail about the subject at hand, too— for instance, I have mixed opinions on how she regularly described Jones’ physical appearance as sweaty and fat. I don’t care about his feelings but it seemed slightly unnecessary—his actions are horrible, not the way he looks (although it is notable how red that MFs face gets). But I get why she wanted to do that.
The last critique I’ll make is that the book repeated itself a lot. I understand pieces of journalism can harken back to statements made earlier (that’s what a nut graf is for, essentially) but sometimes Williamson repeated almost exact sentiments on the same page. It could’ve been tighter, that’s all I’m saying.
Overall though this was a valuable and harrowing read. I don’t want to be too critical because I fully agree with Williamson’s conclusions and I appreciate the care she dedicated to her subjects. I would recommend it.
This book actually took me well over a year to read, because the first couple chapters were so horrific that I had to put it down for a long time. I went back only because I knew the book was about the conspiracy theories surrounding the hellish events at Sandy Hook in 2012, which I felt I could emotionally handle better than reading about the murdered six year olds and teachers. That was an easier story for me to take, though of course not without its own horrors.
I was in the girls’ bathroom at my high school when the Sandy Hook shooting happened, getting ready to go to rehearsal for Legally Blonde the musical. I remember seeing the notification about the shooting- I don’t know how I found out- and I was immediately sent into despair. I remember telling my friends about it and feeling really upset that they didn’t seem to care as much as I did. (This isn’t a judgment at them, I am sure they were also horrified). I do think the teachers should’ve cancelled rehearsal that day.
I only share my own experience because it’s quite astonishing to me how I had such a different one than the people who made it their life’s mission to prove the events didn’t happen, torturing victims’ families in the process. I didn’t know a lot about the conspiracies before reading this book, but I’d heard of them, and reasoned they simply couldn’t deal with the reality of the situation. I still believe that’s probably true for many people, though some are coming from different places that I cannot fathom.
Onto the book: Williamson did a very, very thorough job with this book. It painted a detailed picture of the harm Alex Jones’ lies had on the Sandy Hook families, as well as how he (and his followers) have spread conspiracy theories about countless other subjects and harmed many others in the process. I have to give the author major kudos for her reporting, which was extensive and took a lot of bravery. I will say I think the scope of the book went a little too far, at the loss of knowing more about the Sandy Hook families. I didn’t find the lengthy tangents into Pizzagate, Covid deniers, or January 6 necessary (not that I disagree with her conclusion on those). I get that Alex Jones was implicated throughout, but it was distracting and often went into way too much detail. Sometimes Williamson appeared to go into too much detail about the subject at hand, too— for instance, I have mixed opinions on how she regularly described Jones’ physical appearance as sweaty and fat. I don’t care about his feelings but it seemed slightly unnecessary—his actions are horrible, not the way he looks (although it is notable how red that MFs face gets). But I get why she wanted to do that.
The last critique I’ll make is that the book repeated itself a lot. I understand pieces of journalism can harken back to statements made earlier (that’s what a nut graf is for, essentially) but sometimes Williamson repeated almost exact sentiments on the same page. It could’ve been tighter, that’s all I’m saying.
Overall though this was a valuable and harrowing read. I don’t want to be too critical because I fully agree with Williamson’s conclusions and I appreciate the care she dedicated to her subjects. I would recommend it.
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