[JadoJodo]

I’ve never been able to tell if Alex Jones is “real” or just a character. I’ve seen him on Rogan and clips of his InfoWars stuff and he’s just so far off the scale that it makes me wonder if it’s just a very very very weird bit.

It sorta reminds me of George Noory (of Coast to Coast AM fame) where he “believes” everything that anyone calls in about.

[mkfs]

> Alex Jones is “real” or just a character

It's a bit of both, I think. He's clearly learned that behaving in certain ways garners him more attention (which he craves), especially back in his "bullhorn on the streets" days, and he's clearly willing to ham it up for that sake. But people who knew him as a young man back in Rockwall, and later Austin, all vouched for his lunacy. In fact, I can't recall anyone close to him ever being convinced of his sanity.

[burnt-resistor]

All evidence points to a character performing to feed the hobgoblins of the mind of morally and intellectually stunted people while selling them scam products. Zero integrity and no concern for negative impact on society, just grift. Basically, nonchalance about being a memetic terrorist without any shame.

[mkfs]

> memetic terrorist

From what I can tell, Jones, who's been on the air in some capacity since the mid 90s, has only two significant "IRL" incidents directly attributable to him: the raid on Comet Ping Pong--which resulted in shots fired, but no injuries (or rescued children)--and the execrable harassment of Sandy Hook families.

Meanwhile the Young Turks had an actual mass shooter, Gavin Long, who made videos directly referencing the show, and rather than resulting in their cancellation, the entire thing was memory-holed. Even their wikipedia doesn't mention it.

Granted, from time to time you do hear about "eccentric" acts of violence (e.g., against 5G towers, or people lashing out due to "gang-stalking"), and it's not difficult to imagine Jones having some influence on them.