On MSNBC, Ayman Mohyeldin discusses Alex Jones profiting from his game on Steam
Published
Citation From the January 20, 2024, edition of MSNBC's Ayman
AYMAN MOHYELDIN (HOST): It is time for our worst of the week, the cruelty edition. Our first pick is far-right conspiracy theorist and shock jock Alex Jones. After falsely claiming the Sandy Hook shooting was a hoax and terrorizing the victims' families, Jones was sued for defamation in order to pay families nearly $1.5 billion. In a shock to no one, plaintiffs have yet to see a penny. Jones insists that he is broke, even filing for bankruptcy in the wake of the ruling. However, Media Matters now reports Jones is earning hundreds of thousands of dollars from a new business venture, an Infowars-themed video game, where players get to virtually embody Jones and kill so-called evil globalists.
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MOHYELDIN: Because, let's be honest here: When he is talking about killing globalists, we know what globalist now means for the Republican party and what that is code for based on the conspiracy theories that they espouse. Who do you have as the worst of the week?
RICK WILSON (GUEST): Look, any time you get a chance to drag Alex Jones, you drag Alex Jones. He is a guy who is a central part of the mechanism of the MAGA conspiracy press and media ecosystem. He is a guy who has repeated lies on every conceivable topic, from Pizzagate to Sandy Hook, to vaccines, to conspiracy theories of every single dimension in the world. And he is a guy who has so far gotten away with it. He's using every legal maneuver in the book not to be held accountable. And the fact of the matter is, he is enormously successful as a part of one of the darkest elements of the MAGA agit-porn propaganda system.
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WILSON: I assure you, if I went out and got some some devs to make a game called “See Donald Trump Be Pursued Through the Woods by Rabid Wolves” the right would lose their damn minds. There would be pitchforks and torches in the streets. These people, they rely on a willingness to go through any venue to communicate a message. And they are not stupid when they do it. This is not something that is done without consideration and forethought and strategic implications, because they understand they're reaching a bunch of young guys who are getting this sort of message beaten into them right now. And I don't know what the characteristics of the game are beyond that he's involved and that it's killing globalists, but this is the kind of thing that will become a normalization lever in teaching people, hey, yeah, it's okay to kill “the globalists," the “cosmopolitan elites," however you want to phrase it. We all know what it means in the end, as you pointed out.