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About

Alex Jones Yelling at Masked Austin Lifeguards is a viral video of conspiracy theorist Alex Jones confronting a group of park employees at Barton Springs in Austin, Texas. The video trended on Twitter in August 2020. Jones says he went to the park after employees denied entrance to his wife for not having a reservation, a system put in place to stop the spread of the coronavirus.

Origin

On August 9th, 2020, Jones released the video "Austin Police Reopen Greenbelt After Mayor Illegally Deploys Contact Tracers." In the video, Jones accosts a group of park employees, who ask Jones for a pass to the park, calling the coronavirus pandemic a "COVID hoax."He calls the reservation system an "illegal power grab of the people's greenbelt." The video received more than 129,000 views in less than four days (shown below).

Jones' video shows a family speaking to the park officers and says that they had also been turned away. Police arrive to monitor the situation. An unseen Infowars narrator says that "there was no law" preventing people from entering.

In a statement,^[1] Amanda Ross, natural resources division manager for Austin Parks and Recreation said, "We regret the interaction that happened at the Hill of Life trailhead with Alex Jones and are talking with staff members about ways to protect themselves from personal verbal attack when working as a public servant."

Spread

On August 9th, 2020, Twitter^[2] user @scottcobb published the video on Twitter. They captioned the tweet, "Bully who believes Coronavirus is a hoax harasses city of Austin lifeguards working as park monitors." The post received more than 8 million views, 13,000 likes and 7,100 retweets in less than one week (shown below).

Bully who believes Coronavirus is a hoax harasses city of Austin lifeguards working as park monitors. pic.twitter.com/FLqmBWnXQ7

— Scott Cobb (@scottcobb) August 10, 2020

That day, others shared the video, which reached #1 on Twitter's trending charts. Twitter^[3] user @BradMossEsq tweeted the video with the caption "Alex Jones is a sad and lonely man." The tweet received more than 35,000 likes and 10,000 retweets in less than 24 hours (shown below, left). Comedian Patton Oswalt shared the video with the caption,^[4] "Imagine being Alex Jones and this is the life you’re living. Yelling through a bullhorn at disinterested teenagers." The post received more than 75,000 likes and 11,000 retweets in less than 24 hours (shown below, right).

The video also became a popular topic of discussion on Reddit, with topics on /r/LPOTL,^[5] /r/BoomersBeingFools,^[6] /r/qualityrareinsults^[7] and more.

The following day, Jones responded to the popularity of the video, claiming that he went to the park after the park employees told his wife that she needed a reservation to enter. Within 24 hours, the post received more than 84,000 views (shown below).

Several media outlets covered the video, including Statesman,^[1] Complex,^[8] The Independent^[9] and more.

Search Interest

Not available.

External References