No, CNN Did Not Accidentally Air 30 Minutes of Hardcore Porn Thanksgiving Night

Did CNN became a very different kind of network Thanksgiving night in Boston? Nah.

Not Available Lead
Image via Complex Original
Not Available Lead

UPDATED 4:12 p.m. ET: Watching porn is a much better way to spend one's time than, say, watching some CNN. Sadly, not everyone agrees with this assessment. So when a Boston woman found claimed that her CNN feed had been mysteriously swapped with "hardcore porn," she was decidedly not stoked:

Twitter user @solikearose was reportedly trying to peep a fresh episode of Anthony Bourdain's Parts Unknown Thursday evening when, much to her immediate and tweeted shock, she claimed she was met with "about a half hour" of hardcore pornography instead. Though the Twitter account has now been set to private after "weirdos" started "sending [her] hate mail" in the wake of this mishap, BGRreported Friday that CNN was later temporarily "blacked out" on both of the woman's devices.

The region's cable provider, RCN, ultimately reached out to the Twitter account to confirm that they had not received any similarly porn-themed reports from other users in Boston:

As BGR noted in their report, dismissing this accidental CNN porn broadcast as just another viral prank hoax would be easy to do were it not for one glaring concern: Who the hell would even have the time or the patience to expertly photoshop shit like this?

The answer is, um, A LOT OF PEOPLE. A lot of people have both the time and patience to expertly photoshop shit like this. In fact, the SVP and General Manager of RCN Boston hit up the Hollywood Reporter with a statement suggesting that exact reality. "We are in the process of researching this incident but see no evidence our CNN network feed was compromised last evening in Boston," Jeff Carlson said Friday afternoon. Barbara Levin of CNN International's statement was more to the point: "Despite media reports to the contrary, RCN assures us that there was no interruption of CNN's programming in the Boston area last night."

Goddammit internet!

Latest in Life