It started with a comment at a school board meeting, which was later amplified by a Michigan state Republican leader, and culminated with a school superintendent explaining that, no, there were no litter boxes on school grounds for students to use if they identified as furries…

The rumor that furries — people who have an interest in anthropomorphic animal characters and sometimes dress up as them — used litter boxes in the school district, which is about two hours northwest of Detroit, appears to have started at a school board session last month, based on a video of the meeting.

A member of the public who spoke at the meeting, Lisa Hansen, says in the video that she was informed by someone the day before the meeting that litter boxes had been added to the “unisex bathrooms” for students who “identify as cats.”

“I was stunned,” Ms. Hansen says in the video. “And today I am equally stunned and a little bit upset — well, not a little bit, a lot of bit upset. Furious — I would even use that word.”