It's been one week since a gunman walked into a high school in Parkland, Florida and killed 17 of his former classmates with a semiautomatic rifle. In a civilized society, such a tragedy would cause citizens from across the ideological spectrum to set aside their differences, hear the impassioned pleas of the Parkland survivors, and embark on an honest discussion about the social costs of living in a free society in which the availability of military-style firearms remains unchecked.

This is America, though, which means that instead of participating in any of these things, many prominent right-wing voices are strenuously arguing that those "students" are actually actors complicit in the long-awaited, government-sponsored, Soros-funded national disarmament.

Like all nonsensical conspiracy theories, this one appears to have originated on conservative blogs and spread via social media posts. The fact that the father of Graham Hogg, one of the surviving students who has spoken eloquently about the need for gun safety legislation, is a retired FBI agent was sufficient for some bloggers to assert that Hogg was, and I quote, being "be used as a pawn for anti-Trump rhetoric and anti-gun legislation." Without further explanation, the writer alleges that the FBI—already not the most popular bureaucracy in MAGA circles—wants this in order to "curb YOUR Constitutional rights and INCREASE their power." They put scary red-font text on his forehead and everything.

Some of the associated social media posts were liked by Donald Trump Jr., who at this point might be medically incapable of seeing a moronic tweet without pressing the little heart that appears beneath it. (He later rescinded his endorsement of the second one of these, probably after someone politely suggested to him that accusing someone else of "running cover for his dad" might be construed as a case of the pot calling the kettle a potential obstructor of justice.)