Relax, Bill Cosby fans. The 75-year-old Cosby Show star is not dead — just the latest unfortunate victim of an internet death hoax.
Rumors of the actor’s demise surfaced Monday when Facebook user Jonathan Gorman created a group page on the social networking site called “R.I.P. Bill Cosby.” The site quickly garnered 315,000 likes, causing Cosby to take to Twitter to dispel rumors of his own death.
“I’ve never met anyone who didn’t like this one!” the actor tweeted, along with a pic of him in character as Cliff Huxtable wearing one of his brightly-colored sweaters, continuing his postings of memorable looks from the ’80s comedy. He did not directly address the hoax in his Twitter message.
As “Bill Cosby Dead” became a trending topic, Facebook group owner Gorman was forced to come clean. “My name is Jonathan Gorman and I am the page admin/creator. With the recent slowdown of likes and high amount of attention from news sources. . . I have come to the conclusion that I should tell you all the truth. Bill Cosby is not deceased,” he wrote late Tuesday. “I made around 315 THOUSAND people angry.”
Gorman also said that this is not the only celebrity death hoax he would make up. “I love you all for making me laugh at your stupidity for the past day and a half. You’re great,” the Facebook user wrote.
Cosby is no stranger to Internet death hoaxes. In 2010, he confirmed to CNN that he was declared deceased four separate times. “I don’t want [the person who spread the rumor] to do this anymore, because this is my fourth time being reported [dead],” Cosby told CNN at the time. “Maybe a psychiatrist will say I’m feeding [the originator’s] ego, but I just want to say to friends of that person: Just tell him to stop, because it isn’t funny.”
