Kicking the Bucket List

Mark Twain once said, "Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated." Although Mark Twain is dead, Bill Cosby is not.
A hoax circulated the Internet this week, reporting that comedian Bill Cosby had died. According to Huffington Post, Jonathan Gorman had even set up a bogus Facebook page (already deleted), intentionally fabricating Cosby's death for kicks, to see how fast it would go viral, and to show how many people were gullible and naive enough to believe the story. After Cosby tweeted that he was very much alive with:

“About Bill Cosby being dead. Stop it! Stop it!” billcosby.com/2012/08/cloud-… — Bill Cosby (@BillCosby) August 29, 2012

on Twitter, and embedding the snippet on BillCosby.com, Gorman came clean, admitting he did it just to remind me people that you can't trust what you read on the Internet, and to not rely on social media as a source of verified news. Now, I know people who have personally experienced this phenomenon, not with stories of their deaths, but with fabricated stories about them. The lynch mob morons glom onto a blog, a post, a rumor, and immediately find safety in numbers, as they verbally assault a person online, thereby destroying a reputation and potentially a life. Those verbal assailants are bullies and stalkers, and do not base their comments on facts, but rather, on misinformation, twisted half-truths, assumptions, inferences, and just plain bullshit. Congress must step up and regulate the Internet better. Online bullies must be held accountable for their anonymous cowardice. Freedom of speech should not and cannot extend to people creating fake identities, posting behind screen names, fake Facebook accounts, Facebook pages dedicated to stalking others, and worse. The lesson is clear. You cannot believe everything you read on the Internet. There are many articles on this subject. Here's just one at PsychologyToday.com.