Ronda Rousey apologizes 11 years after sharing Sandy Hook conspiracy video

Eleven years after sharing a conspiracy video about the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting, Ronda Rousey has issued a public apology.

Rousey was supposed to take part in an Ask Me Anything on Reddit’s Squared Circle community this week, but it never happened after the Q&A session was flooded with questions asking if Rousey still believed the mass shooting was staged. Rousey shared the conspiracy video to Twitter in 2013, calling it “interesting” and must-watch.

In an apology late Thursday night, Rousey said reposting the video was the “single most regrettable decision” of her life. She’s wanted to apologize but — until now — always convinced herself that it wasn’t the right time.

“I can’t say how many times I’ve redrafted this apology over the last 11 years. How many times I’ve convinced myself it wasn’t the right time or that I’d be causing even more damage by giving it. But eleven years ago I made the single most regrettable decision of my life,” she wrote. “I watched a Sandy Hook conspiracy video and reposted it on twitter. I didn’t even believe it, but was so horrified at the truth that I was grasping for an alternative fiction to cling to instead. I quickly realized my mistake and took it down, but the damage was done. By some miracle it seemingly slipped under the media’s radar, I was never asked about it so I never spoke of it again, afraid that calling attention to it would have the opposite of the intended effect – it could increase the views of those conspiracy videos, and selfishly, inform even more people I was ignorant, self absorbed, and tone deaf enough to share one in the first place.”

Rousey said she wanted to include an apology in her “Our Fight” memoir that was released earlier this year, but her publisher begged her to take it out because they thought it would do more harm than good. Rousey believes she deserves any hate that has come her way and deserves to miss out on every opportunity in her career.

“But honestly I deserve to be hated, labeled, detested, resented and worse for it. I deserve to lose out on every opportunity, I should have been canceled, I would have deserved it. I still do. I apologize that this came 11 years too late, but to those affected by the Sandy Hook massacre, from the bottom of my heart and depth of my soul I am so so sorry for the hurt I caused. I can’t even begin to imagine the pain you’ve endured and words cannot describe how thoroughly remorseful and ashamed I am of myself for contributing to it. I’ve regretted it every day of my life since and will continue to do so until the day I die,” Rousey wrote.

“And to anyone else that’s fallen down the black hole of bullsh*t. It doesn’t make you edgy, or an independent thinker, you’re not doing your due diligence entertaining every possibility by digesting these conspiracies. They will only make you feel powerless, afraid, miserable and isolated. You’re doing nothing but hurting others and yourself. Regardless of how many bridges you’ve burned over it, stop digging yourself a deeper hole, don’t get wrapped up in the sunk cost fallacy, no matter how long you’ve gone down the wrong road, you should still turn back.”

Twenty-six people — including 20 children — were killed in the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut in December 2012.

At the time she shared the video, Rousey was in the middle of her UFC career. She went on to become a star for WWE and is now focused on writing projects, including writing her first graphic novel and penning the screenplay for an upcoming Netflix film about her life. Rousey announced last month that she and husband Travis Browne are expecting their second child together.