Ted Nugent says Parkland shooting survivors are liars who ‘have no soul'
Ted Nugent has gone out of his way to personally launch a verbal attack on the survivors of the Parkland, Florida, school shooting who organized last month’s march of protest to push for stricter gun laws.
Last month saw hundreds of thousands of people in the US and beyond take part in the ‘March For Our Lives’ – calling for stricter gun control in America in the wake of the Parkland shooting, where 17 teens were gunned down and killed at school.
Now, The National Rifle Association board member and rockstar has slammed the teens during a Friday (Mar 30) interview on the nationally syndicated conservative radio program 'The Joe Pags Show,' calling the teens “liars,” “soulless” and “poor, mushy-brained children,” reports NME.
“All you have to do now is not only feel sorry for the liars, but you have to go against them and pray to God that the lies can be crushed and the liars can be silenced so that real measures can be put into place to actually save children’s lives,” Nugent said about the Marjory Stoneman Douglas students, just six weeks after a student shot and killed 17 people at their South Florida high school.
“The lies from the left, the lies from these poor, mushy-brained children who have been fed lies and parrot the lies, they are actually committing spiritual suicide because everything they recommend will cause more death and mayhem, guaranteed,” Nugent said.
Later in the segment, host Joe Pagliarulo showed Nugent clips of two of the most vocal student activists, David Hogg and Emma González, railing against the NRA. In response to the clips, Nugent said: “The dumbing down of America is manifested in the culture deprivation of our academia that have taught these kids the lies, media that have prodded and encouraged and provided these kids lies. I really feel sorry for them because it’s not only ignorant and dangerously stupid, but it’s soulless.”
“To attack the good, law-abiding families of America when well-known, predictable murderers commit these horrors is deep in the category of soulless,” the 'Cat Scratch Fever' hit-maker added.
In response to Nugent's comments, several Stoneman Douglas students took to Twitter to condemn his actions, including Cameron Kasky. Another of the school’s students, Kyra Parrow, called Nugent a bully.
The NRA launched a heated offensive soon after the massacre this Valentine's Day. It has warned its members against the “freedom-hating left,” and claimed that the students’ campaign for reforming gun laws violates Americans’ “fundamental rights.”
But it looks like Nugent isn't the only one to side with the NRA and criticise the students' protests. Nugent's comments follow an apology from Eagles Of Death Metal frontman Jesse Hughes who last month made similar comments.
Referring to the Bataclan terror attack in Paris at which 89 people lost their lives at an Eagles Of Death Metal show, Hughes wrote: “As the survivor of a mass shooting I can tell you from first-hand experience that all of you protesting and taking days off from school insult the memory of those who were killed and abuse and insult me and every other lover of liberty by your every action.”
After facing a huge backlash, he then took to Instagram to issue a full and frank apology for any offense he caused.
Nugent meanwhile, who has been honored by the National Rifle Association, has previously caused controversy by saying that he was "repulsed by gay sex", and for referring to former President Barack Obama as a 'subhuman mongrel' among other things.