Limbaugh
A dispute over ad revenue may lead to the end of Rush Limbaugh's relationship with Cumulus Media. Reuters

No, Rush Limbaugh is not dead. "News" of his passing was nothing more than yet another Twitter celebrity death hoax. But as the false report of his death rapidly spread across the social media site Thursday via the #RIPRushLimbaugh hashtag, which trended nationally for part of the afternoon, the dark side of Twitter emerged, as dozens of nasty tweets were sent out about the controversial conservative personality.

It seems there's no respect for the dead on Twitter, especially if the "dead" person in question is someone whose politics you disagree with. And Twitter is full of folks who have no love for Limbaugh.

Despite the fact that Limbaugh was in the middle of recording an episode of the "Rush Limbaugh Show" while the death hoax rumor was at its peak, Twitter users still couldn't help but project their vile fantasies for the world to see.

Twitter user @UpsetTummy chose to create his or her own reasoning behind Limbaugh's supposed death with this offensive tweet:" Rush accidentally felt bad for minorities and gay people so he was forced to take his own life."

Twitter user @SLennonHugs played on Limbaugh's social Darwinist politics in this insensitive tweet, which is one of the more clever of the bunch: " tripped and broke his neck while trying to lift himself up by the bootstraps. Survived by his lovely wife Neal Boortz."

And some of the tweets were just plain dumb, including this one by Twitter user and master wordsmith @DiaperGenius, who clearly was not concerned with being clever: " died of toilet."

Twitter user @JDCrowley decided to make fun of Limbaugh's tendency to get overheated during arguments with the following tweet: " Died doing what he loved most: Having a heart attack."

@Gvrnmntz went for the absolute bottom rung in the following tweet, which is just plain weird: " Heard he had a stroke while trying to lay a fresh brood of eggs in the hollowed corpse of an immigrant."

And all the hate on Twitter is just the latest round of death-wishing directed toward Limbaugh. In perhaps the worst example, a website exists for the sole purpose of asking: "Is Rush Limbaugh Dead Yet?"

The answer is no, Internet. Keep dreaming.

The Rush Limbaugh death hoax is certainly not the first one to hit Twitter in recent years, as Eddie Murphy, Kanye West, Jeff Goldblum, Britney Spears, Morgan Freeman, Justin Bieber, Barack Obama, Kim Jong-Un, Phil Collins, Remy Ma, Gotye, Pitbull, Usher, Robin Williams, Keke Palmer, Patrick Dempsey, Chingy, Paul McCartney, Rowan Atkinson, Madonna, Soulja Boy, Adele, Demi Moore, Jon Bon Jovi, Cher, Tony Danza, Jackie Chan, Hugh Hefner, Mick Jagger and numerous other celebrities have found themselves at the mercy of Internet pranksters who claimed that they were dead on Twitter, usually by getting a tweet or hashtag starting with R.I.P. or RIP and a celeb's name to go viral.

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