The clever and sharp satirical outlet The Onion has purchased Alex Jones’ right-wing platform Infowars at a court-ordered auction.
The news was confirmed by Jones on Nov. 14, 2024, when he posted a video saying his lawyers met with the U.S. trustee over his bankruptcy. “They’re shutting us down,” Jones said, looking anxious.
Bryce P. Tetraeder, CEO of Infowars buyer Global Tetrahedron published an article explaining the decision to purchase a site he called “an invaluable tool for brainwashing and controlling the masses.”
Related: Shouldn’t InfoWars just simply die? on The Mary Sue
He explained, “A formidable special interest group has outwitted the hapless owner of Infowars (a forgettable man with an already-forgotten name) and forced him to sell it at a steep bargain: less than one trillion dollars.”
In the tongue-in-cheek blog post, Global Tetrahedron joked that the excess funds for the purchase would be reinvested in “business school scholarships for promising cult leaders, a charity that donates elections to at-risk third world dictators, and a new pro bono program pairing orphans with stable factory jobs at no cost to the factories.”
“We own everything. The broadcasting equipment, the supplements, the intellectual property for Brain Force Plus. We are still trying to figure out what to do with it,” Tim Onion wrote on the social media platform Bluesky.
The future of Infowars is going to be “very funny, very stupid” he also clarified.” Well, they’ve already got one-half of that goal in the bag as-is.
All about Infowars
Infowars was founded on Mar. 6, 1999, making it older than some of its young, pliable audience members. Talk shows, podcasts, and video content were created in a Texas studio, where Alex Jones rose to prominence as the leading Infowars voice.
Publisher, director, and owner Jones touted conspiracy theories, far-right politics, and fake news before being accused of sexually harassing employees in Feb. 2018.
Though prominent figures in these culture wars are prone to surviving such allegations, Jones was also hit by several lawsuits. Infowars has been forced to issue multiple retractions during Jones’ tenure.
One lawsuit was filed by the parents of Sandy Hook victims after Jones raised suspicions about whether the school shooting was faked. Eventually, the antics proved costly for Inforwars’ social media reach. Platforms including Facebook, YouTube, and Spotify all removed Jones’ content at one time or another.
As for his personal accounts, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Pinterest, to name a few, took action and wiped his profile. He was also banned from Twitter, but that decision was overturned when Elon Musk purchased it, became CEO, and turned it into X.
This legal action proved fatal for Jones and its operator Free Speech Systems. They filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on July 30, 2022, and were forced to liquidate. A Houston judge then ordered two auctions in 2024, one of which is now being celebrated by Global Tetrahedron.
The number of truly impartial reporting outlets that exist dwindles constantly, but Infowars’ extreme bias and lack of fact-checking is the definitive “f*** around and find out,” and should warn us all what happens when lines are crossed too many times.