The Onion Buys InfoWars, Promises to Deliver Fake News… on Purpose This Time
In a move that proves 2024 just couldn’t let us go quietly into the night, satirical juggernaut The Onion has purchased the assets of Alex Jones’s InfoWars in a bankruptcy auction. This means that the most infamous conspiracy theory platform on the Internet will now be run by people who are actually trying to be funny, as opposed to people who were accidentally funny while being dangerously deranged.
For those who have managed to avoid the fever swamp of InfoWars, congratulations. You’ve successfully steered clear of a website that operated under the groundbreaking philosophy of “predict the apocalypse every day, and you’ll eventually get it right.” When not busy making Nostradamus look like a reliable forecaster, Alex Jones used InfoWars to sell sketchy dietary supplements (ingredients: sawdust and hope), accuse grieving parents of faking their children’s deaths, and yell so loudly you could hear him over a jet engine.
But now, thanks to a bankruptcy auction brought on by a tsunami of defamation lawsuits (shout-out to the Sandy Hook families for introducing the concept of accountability to Planet Jones), The Onion has taken over InfoWars. That’s right—The Onion, the same satirical outlet that gave us such classics as “New President Feels Nation’s Pain, Breasts“ and ‘No Way To Prevent This,’ Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens. The Onion plans to relaunch InfoWars as a parody of itself, which is a bit like relaunching a sinking ship as a submarine. It’s a lateral move at best, since in 2025 it’s likely no one will be able to tell the difference between the actual news and satire.
According to reports, The Onion will replace InfoWars’ “relentless barrage of disinformation” with their own “relentless barrage of humor.” This is excellent news for anyone who ever watched a Jones rant and thought, “This would be so much better if it were actually a joke and didn’t destroy lives.”
Here’s the kicker: The Onion announced that the site’s exclusive advertiser will be Everytown for Gun Safety, a gun control advocacy group. That’s right, The Onion managed to achieve what no one thought possible—turning Alex Jones into a financial supporter of gun control. Somewhere in a parallel universe, irony just burst into flames.
Of course, the sale still needs to be approved by a bankruptcy judge, because even satire has to deal with paperwork.
