I recently had the chance to speak to YouTube star and comedian Jon Jafari, known online as JonTron, where we spoke about the decline of the mainstream media, the public’s distrust for news outlets, and the rise of free speech in response to language-policing regressives.
Charlie Nash: Do you think this social justice era we’ve been through contributed to the election of Donald Trump? Was it a reaction to an overly-political correct climate?
JonTron: Yeah, I definitely do. I think we’re in sort of a period where everybody has to think one way, in the mainstream way, or else they get socially outcasted. It’s almost a monopoly of thought that the left has, and it’s anti- what they claim to be so pro, which is free speech and liberty. But it’s like, “You’re only correct if you agree with me.” Or, “You can have your opinion as long as it’s in line with mine.” I think that’s the prevailing thought of the left at the moment.
CN: What’s your opinion on the mainstream media? Do you think their election predictions came from a lack of understanding for their audience?
JT: I don’t think it was a misunderstanding at all. I think it was an intention to mislead, at least that’s my opinion. I think the mainstream media dug in. They doubled down, they tripled down. They said this is what we believe, and then America disagreed with them, so now the country doesn’t trust them anymore, and rightly so.
I mean, they had spun Donald Trump’s campaign since the very first day. They didn’t even stop to say, “Are we doing any accurate reporting? Maybe we should be a little more unbiased, even if we don’t like this candidate,” which is fair. But I think the blatant lies have killed their credibility, and I’d say that’s rightly so. I don’t think people will trust them, at least until they redeem some of their credibility.
CN: So, do you think it will be like GamerGate, where people started off reading outlets like Polygon, and Gizmodo, and Kotaku, and they were the go-to outlets, then after GamerGate many people just didn’t trust them?
JT: I’m gonna be honest with you, I don’t know much about GamerGate. It just didn’t really interest me, I didn’t know what it was really about. But I think the GamerGate situation is kind of tied into this situation with the social justice mindset. Obviously they’re tied, but this time on a much bigger scale. Because it’s gone from video game blogs to our entire mainstream media. It’s a cataclysmic version of GamerGate.
CN: Heat Street recently misbranded you as a conservative, so I’ll give you the opportunity to rebut and address that.
JT: I voted for Barack Obama twice. I supported Bernie Sanders in the primaries. I’m someone who surveys the situation, and I don’t like putting people into camps. I don’t like getting into conservative or liberal, because if you take a label and run with it, what if that label changes? I think I’m just somebody who tries to make the best decision every time.
I just think it’s funny that a couple of logical tweets have made me a “conservative,” such a strong label. I don’t even know what it means to be conservative, or what a conservative is anymore. I feel like the meanings of these labels are changing. I certainly would never have called myself a conservative.
CN: You’re basically just a comedian, like Ethan Klein from H3H3Productions, that is logical. It doesn’t make you a conservative if you call out bullshit when bullshit appears.
JT: Yeah that’s basically the way I would see it. I like to think that all I’m trying to do is see things for the way they are, and call it out the way it is. Nowadays if someone disagrees with you, they can say, “Well that’s just your opinion,” but there are certain points where we go into the realm of fact, and sometimes people don’t like that very much.
I don’t think you’re going to see the narrative of Laci Green take off for much longer, because at the end of the day, those kinds of people were trying to tell others how and what to think, and I don’t think your average person appreciates that very much.
You can subscribe to JonTron’s YouTube channel, and follow him on Twitter here.
Charlie Nash is a reporter for Breitbart Tech. You can follow him on Twitter @MrNashington or like his page at Facebook.