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| - Social media users are sharing photographs of the damaged Georgia Guidestones in USA's Elbert Country, Georgia, claiming that the granite monument was destroyed by an earthquake.
The Georgia Guidestones were solid granite pillars erected in 1980, with inscriptions in Spanish, Hebrew, Hindi, English, Swahili, Arabic, Traditional Chinese, and Russian. The inscriptions on the stones were meant to act as "guides" for people to conserve humanity after a nuclear war.
The people and intent behind the construction of the guidestones have been shrouded in mystery, attracting many conspiracy theories over the years.
However, the stones did not fall due to an earthquake. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) released security footage of the site, showing a silver car leaving the area shortly after an explosion destroyed one of the Guidestones carrying inscriptions in Hindi and Swahili.
WHAT WE FOUND OUT
A simple keyword search led us to news reports by multiple media outlets.
According to the Times of India, the monument, dubbed "America's Stonehenge" was bombed, as per the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI).
The monument was bombed early Wednesday morning around 4 AM on 7 June, reported Wall Street Journal.
Citing GBI, the report mentioned that the rest of the structure was demolished and cleared from the site due to safety reasons.
The nearly six metre-high Guidestones were commissioned by a group or person, under the pseudonym RC Christian in 1980, and were unveiled to the public the same year.
We came across the GBI's verified Twitter handle, which shared two surveillance videos of the explosion. It said that as per the available footage, a car was seen leaving the site shortly after the explosion occurred.
The bureau also released footage showing an unidentified person placing explosives at the site. They added that the explosion had weakened the structure, creating "an unsafe environment for investigators to search," and they took a call to demolish the entire monument.
We also checked the United States Geological Survey's (USGS) website for any recorded seismic activity in Georgia, which showed that there was no earthquake in the state in July 2022.
Since its erection, the monument had been surrounded by unfounded theories and conspiracies. Some conservative Christians considered the pillars to be "satanic," reported National Public Radio (NPR).
The multilingual inscriptions on the panels, which gave guidelines to live in "an age of reason," gave cryptic advice on maintaining world population under 50 crore people, uniting humanity with a "living new language" and leaving "room for nature."
Since the identity of the people who commissioned it, and the reason behind its erection being a mystery, the monument was targeted by far-right conspiracists. Republican gubernatorial candidate Kandiss Taylor, who made the Guidestones' removal a part of her campaign, tweeted that the destruction was caused by God, further pushing an incorrect narrative.
Clearly, an earthquake did not destroy a pillar of the Georgia Guidestones. The GBI stated that "unknown individuals detonated an explosive device," which damaged the monument.
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