Robbie Parker and other parents have spent more than a decade battling the lies of conspiracy theorist Alex Jones, who claimed the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting did not happen.

Robbie Parker is the author of A father’s fight: confront Alex Jones and recover the truth. His six-year-old daughter Emilie died in the shooting in 2012.

WSHU: Tell us about Émilie. What was she like?

PR: She was always all in, and just a very gregarious, loving, generous person. And as I do some of these interviews, the more I talk about her, the more I realize that’s exactly what I’m missing about her. She knew how to feel deeply and she knew how to express that with people. And that’s something that I really struggle with, and it’s one of the things that I miss the most about being with her.

WSHU: I think that came out; After reading your book, it seems like she had friends at Sandy Hook among other kids, and you are also part of the community of many Sandy Hook families. You really built a community with them.

PR: Families, who are going through the hardest thing you’ve ever been through, to be able to have a community that is also unfortunately initiated with you in this process, it was incredible. Through this shared experience, we shared a closeness that I don’t have even with my closest family members, to the point where we could understand each other in this worst part of your life. And so one of the most interesting things about the trial was the fact that I got to know some of these parents on a personal level, that I knew more about them and not just their children.

WSHU: The trial, of course, being that of Alex Jones. One of the most difficult parts of the book is reading the things he said and those of his disciples. It seems like the first time you encountered these conspiracy theories was actually on Emilie’s memorial page. Is this true?

PR: That’s correct. The shooting happened on a Friday morning. By Sunday morning, I was already starting to receive messages, threats and harassment from conspiracy theorists. It’s not like I had any idea who this guy was, but while all the families were in the fire station waiting to hear from their child, whether our child was alive or dead, he was already on his show. He broadcast to millions of people and he was already telling them that it was fake, that it was a hoax, that they should be careful and that we should come get their guns. And he was starting to target the Sandy Hook event before I even found out Emilie was dead.

WSHU: They kind of clung to a few moments that almost seemed like they didn’t need to be explained, putting you in the position of having to explain these things like Madeline wearing Emilie’s dress, like a casual moment where you just laugh before a press conference.

PR: It was very disorienting. I mean, my world and my orbit was already destroyed… And so for this to happen right after that, my compass was just spinning. And so at first it was just my sister-in-law saying, you know, these were just the kind of crazy people who were just saying the moon landing didn’t happen. And that was kind of helpful for me in the beginning to say, okay, I don’t need to pay attention to them and just focus on my family. But their noise became so loud and so explosive, and we had just experienced it, we knew what someone was capable of doing to someone else. Someone broke into Emilie’s school and murdered children because they wanted to. Alex Jones and his followers portrayed me as someone they needed to go after, and had a hatred, and they had a reason, so I had to take that very, very seriously, and it got impacted my grief, and it made things difficult. do anything.

WSHU: You mentioned a few moments in the book that were honestly shocking. I think any human reading some of the things said would find it appalling.

PR: RIGHT? What I still can’t understand is just knowing who Emilie was, and then learning who these other children were and their connections to their families, how innocent and pure and loving and generous they were. So to see their names and memories sullied and raked into the mud. What they did was wrong. They tarnish the names of beautiful, innocent children, and that’s something I still can’t reconcile and get over. It took a lot of years and a lot of work and it culminated in me joining this trial, and that’s how I personally handled it. But finding Emilie’s name and her memory was essential for me in this process.

WSHU: What made you decide to join the trial?

PR: It was a lot of things that had nothing to do with me, and then ultimately everything to do with me. One was meeting with families from another school shooting. Their daughter was killed in the Parkland school shooting, and it was six years after Sandy Hook, and they were going through the exact same thing we were, and I understood how much their grief was affected and how they didn’t were not able to grieve. . And I felt like I had six years of experience. I was on this path. They needed someone to help them fight for them.

WSHU: What was it like facing someone like Alex Jones in court?

PR: I had been imagining this day for a long, long time, and it didn’t turn out the way I had planned. In fact, it shook me a little to see him for what he was. He was disheveled and a shell of a human and I felt very sorry for him. I could see the toll of things he had on him. And he has no love in his heart for himself or anyone else. And it’s just a sad, sad place. When he took the stand, he quickly made all those feelings go away by being who he is. And then I had the moment to take my power back from him. I was lucky enough to be at the helm and figure things out on my own.

WSHU: So the bottom line, of course, is that Jones loses everything, loses all his assets. How did you feel watching this unfold?

PR: Honestly, I got everything I was looking for. I was able to recover Emilee’s memory. I was able to take back the things I felt like I had lost. I lost my voice and my power in all of this, and I was able to get those things back. And that’s what was at stake for me. As for Jones losing everything, it just goes to show that when you engage in this type of behavior and rhetoric, every lie you tell incurs a debt to the truth, and sooner or later that debt is paid. I find this to be very true in my own life right now, and it also really highlights what Alex Jones is. He spent 30 years building something, and it’s all going to be taken away from him because of his own actions and inaction to do what’s right.

WSHU: Have you started hearing less about conspiracy theorists? Does it go away or do they still reappear from time to time?

PR: I mean, they’ll always be there, right? Over time, though, of course, I made it very difficult for them to find me, and so I started hearing from them less and less. But now when I hear from them, it’s exactly the same as them. They have no truth behind what they say, and there is only power in the truth, and the power they feel is irrelevant. And so my feelings towards them are different. I consider many Alex Jones followers to be victims of Alex Jones himself. He uses them. He cheats them out of their money, and they suffer for it. Their relationships suffer. They live in a world where all they see is hatred and lies, and that’s not a place for them to be. So his fans are enabling him, and it’s sad because they’re victims of Alex Jones, and I wish they could see that.”

The state of Jones’ media company, Infowars, is still evolving. Last week, a federal judge threw out the results of an auction that sent him to the satirical site The Onion.