The message is clear: Accept the narrative, or else.

Happy Wednesday! 

Well, Happy Wednesday to everyone but Alex Jones who is, I’m pretty sure, not having a very happy day.

Isn’t it crazy how sometimes things can turn from a laughing matter to something deadly serious in almost an instant.

The Alex Jones story is, to me, a perfect example of this.

It used to be that every time news broke of the government doing something mind-blowingly corrupt or evil, I’d shake my head, laugh a little to myself, and say, “We owe Alex Jones an apology.”

Sure he’s a kooky guy—shirtless, red-faced rants don’t do a lot to garner credibility when you’re trying to be taken seriously—but I always thought he was kind of interesting.

I mean, he definitely has the ability to make people think about things in ways that they haven’t before, and from where I stand, that’s pretty much always a good thing.

Jones’ real trouble started when he ran afoul of the powers-that-be (and lost a good bit of support from people who had previously been fans) by claiming to have evidence that Sandy Hook was a false flag operation. 

Although probably on the radar for years, this was, it seems, the proverbial straw.

The government went all-in on the takedown of Alex Jones. Not content to simply refute his claims, or silence him, what has happened over the last several years has been nothing short of the nuclear decimation of the man behind Infowars.

Now, a judge has ordered that his platform must be sold off, piece by piece, to pay over a billion dollars in damages previously awarded to the families of the Sandy Hook victims.

Jones has already admitted (whether he believes it or not is another thing) that Sandy Hook happened. He apologized to the families of the victims for any harm that his questioning of the official story may have caused them. But that has not, by any stretch of the imagination, satiated the appetite for revenge—the very real need to make him pay, and make him pay dearly, for what he said.

I’m certainly not here to defend every word that’s come out of Alex Jones’ mouth. He can get pretty far out there sometimes. But I am here to ask why the government—and by extension, the media—is so laser-focused on crushing him into the ground.

It’s not like they do this to every person out there spouting off crazy ideas.

In fact, as a guy who has spent a good bit of time (I even wrote a book about it) learning about confirmed-true stories of government conspiracy, I consider myself a bit of an expert on this subject. And what I know, is that those in power tend to save this kind of intense, calculated destruction for people who are are onto something. 

In Jones’ case, it seems as if they want to make an example out of him. Whether it’s because he’s lying, or because his questions and challenges could be closer to the truth than they’d like to admit may never be known.

Think about it: Do they ever go after liars who spread “approved” messages? 

The government and the corporate media ignore plenty of people spouting off nonsense every day. But when someone starts hitting a nerve, that’s when the hammer comes down.

We’ve seen this before. Julian Assange. Edward Snowden.

People who exposed uncomfortable truths get targeted because they represent a threat to the narrative—not because they’re spreading lies.

There is a pattern emerging. One where it is actually dangerous to your life and well-being to question the official story.

Whether it’s an election result, a mass casualty event, or COVID-19, the pattern is clear: dissenters aren’t just debated, refuted, or allowed to be judged in the court of public opinion; they’re systematically (and permanently) silenced.

And then they’re made into cautionary tales to keep the rest of us from asking questions. The message is crystal clear:

“Don’t even think about questioning what we say, or you’ll end up like him.”

That’s what makes this attack on Alex Jones so much bigger than the man himself.

People who think critically are being warned that if they question the official narrative, especially if they do it in a way that garners any kind of attention, they’ll be ruined.

The sheer scale of the campaign to destroy people like Jones, Snowden, and Assange tells me that their criticisms of government power and official narratives have hit far too close to home.

In the case of Jones, if all he had were outlandish, baseless claims, they’d laugh him off, or simply ignore him.

But they’re not laughing.

They’re liquidating his company and auctioning off his platform.

So much of what we’ve witnessed in the last few years feels designed to make us afraid to ask questions. But isn’t that the essence of a free society—to question authority?

I’m not saying Jones is a hero. I was never one to hang on his every word. His persecution and destruction at the hands of the state put him in the company of others who I do consider heroes, though.

People like Snowden and Assange who have literally lost everything because they simply told the truth. 

Watching this all play out makes it hard for a thinking person to not come to the conclusion that maybe these so-called conspiracy theorists are onto something. The dramatic effort to silence anyone who disagrees with the state-sanctioned “truth” should actually lead more of us to question whether or not we can trust those in power to tell us the truth at all.

As I watch the government work harder than ever to silence, deplatform, discredit, and permanently ruin those who dare to disagree, I’m more convinced than ever of the vital work we are doing to educate the rising generation about the dangers of government overreach and the essential ability to think critically and discern truth from manipulation.

That’s why I love what we’re doing with The Tuttle Twins. We’re empowering the next generation to question, to think for themselves, and to not just accept what they’re told.

In our book, The Tuttle Twins Guide to Courageous Heroes, we wrote a chapter about the lives of Hans and Sophie Scholl.

Hans and Sophie were siblings, just starting their lives, when they were executed for daring to refute the official stories of the Nazi regime in Germany. They were relentless and fearless in their commitment to make known the lies and manipulations they saw being perpetrated against the German people by their own government. 

In The Tuttle Twins Guide to Modern Villains, we take a look at the worst bad-guys the modern world has known. And while it’s important to know who these people were, and what they did, the focus of the book is really on the ways that these people came to power.

Because just knowing that bad people rise to power isn’t enough to have any meaningful impact on the future. The key is to teach young people to understand why and how these dictators and tyrants were able to do what they did. When they learn that, they have the tools they need to observe the state of the world today, and identify patterns that have helped really bad people take control of others in the past. 

Patterns like silencing dissent, criminalizing thought, and ruining the lives of critics through the weaponization of the law.

Scary stuff. But stuff that needs to be taught if we have any hope of avoiding repetitions of the darkest chapters of history.

The truth is, if we don’t teach our kids how to think, the government and media will happily teach them not to think at all.

And that’s just not something people like us are we’re willing to let happen.

Not on our watch.

— Connor