JonTron

About

JonTron is the online alias for YouTube comedic video game reviewer Jon Jafari. Gaining notoriety online since his account creation in August 2010 for having a reviewing system much like The AVGN, he has over 4.9 million subscribers and 675 million views as of December 2018.^[1]

Online History

JonTron first began Youtube on a previous channel called TheOnionKing^[2] where most of the videos are now removed but uploaded to another channel^[3]. The most popular video on the first channel being a Minecraft with 30,000 views (shown below, left). JonTron uploaded his first video to his new channel, and Normalboots, on August 31st, 2010, a two-part review of Dakiatana, the video has since gained 1.8 million views (shown below, right).

Normal Boots

In 2010, JonTron with PeanutButterGamer created a site called NormalBoots. The site was made for exclusive and extra content besides their main channels, but was shut down in 2012^[4] and reopened in 2014 along with new members. JonTron himself has gained 15,000 "equips" on the site^[5].

Game Grumps

On July 18th, 2012, JonTron announced (shown below, left) alongside Egoraptor a joint 'let's play' channel called Game Grumps. On August 12, 2012, an animated version of Game Grumps was uploaded detailing their misadventures in a Pokémon game, gaining 3.8 million views (shown below, right).

On June 25, 2013, Jon announced his departure from Game Grumps with a video titled "Ode to Jon" gaining 1.8 million views (shown below). Many fans began to wonder the true nature of Jon's departure and if he had been kicked out^[6]. On September 23rd, 2013, JonTron went to the Game Grumps subreddit to clear things up, where his post gained over 2,400 upvotes^[7].

Starcade

On April 30th, 2015, Jon uploaded a video called "JonTron Whereabouts" detailing his absence of videos in the past months, announcing he was working on a project, with the video gained over 1 million views (shown below, left) before being unlisted. On May 4th, 2015, Jon released the official trailer for what was called StarCade, a massive review of many of the Star Wars games today. The trailer went on to get 1.3 million views (shown below, right).

Controversies

Sargon of Akkad Livestream

On January 24th, 2017, YouTuber Sargon of Akkad broadcast a five-hour-long livestream in which he discussed social justice warriors and political correctness with Jafari (shown below).

That day, NeoGAF user Inferno313 submitted a thread accusing Jafari of bigotry.^[17] On Twitter, various users accused Jafari of being a "Nazi" (shown below). In the coming days, posts about the controversial livestream were submitted to /r/JonTron,^[20] /r/GamerGhazi,^[19] /r/KotakuInAction.^[21] On January 29th, the news site HeatStreet^[18] published an article titled "Popular Gaming YouTuber 'JonTron' Threatened by Liberals for Criticizing Political Correctness."

Destiny Debate

On March 13th, 2017, Jafari and Steven "Destiny" Bonnell streamed a political debate on Twitch in which the two got into racial politics and particularly the idea of "white displacement." During the debate, JonTron asserted that "Wealthy blacks commit more crimes than poor whites. That's a fact. Look it up." Destiny then tried to look it up and found no evidence supporting the claim (moment shown below). He also claimed that while discrimination is wrong, America has gotten rid of discrimination.

Later in the debate, while talking about white displacement, Jafari stated, "Nobody wants to become a minority in their own country."^[22] Bonnell then asked Jafari "Is it okay to keep a country from progressing in order to keep its racial identity? Do you think that’s an okay thing?" to which Jafari replied "Yeah, I think it’s fine. Japan does it." The debate's stream was posted to /r/JonTron.^[23] Commenters were shocked by JonTron's comments and criticized them harshly, with one user posting, “GAHHH it’s like watching a fucking train wreck, it’s so horrible and gruesome but I can’t fucking look away.” The full debate is shown below.

Later that day, Jafari tweeted his support of Republican Iowa congressman Steve King's controversial tweet that "We can't restore our civilization with someone else's babies." King was supporting Dutch right-wing politician Geert Wilders, who wishes to ban the Quran and shut down mosques in the Netherlands.^[24]

"Just Trust The Science, Bro!" Tweets

On October 25th, 2021, JonTron posted a series of tweets with screenshots from articles reporting on allegations that Dr. Fauci and the NIH oversaw cruel animal testing in the development of a vaccine for Leishmania infantum.

The tweets were widely seen as anti-vax in the COVID-19 era and drew sharp criticism online. JonTron later attempted to clarify he wasn't anti-vax and wasn't implying that vaccines aren't safe, but was speaking as a concerned citizen about "dangerous levels" of "conformity.

Fandom

Ever since his popularity exploded, JonTron has accumulated a large fanbase. About a year ago, a Reddit page called r/JonTroncirclejerk^[8] for shitposting about JonTron gaining 1,600 readers. In early 2015, a Wikia^[9] page was made for all things JonTron.

Fan Art

Reaction Faces

Because of the nature of Jon's reviews, many of his expressions on the show have been transformed into reaction images or videos, with more than 29,000^[10] videos featuring compilations and forum weapons. JonTron's reactions can also be found on Tumblr^[11][12] and Reddit.^[13]

Related Memes

Actual Noise It Made

Actual Noise It Made is a closed caption featured in an episode of JonTron uploaded on because of an abnormal noise caused by putting a Commodore 64 game inside a cassette player, spawning many parodies and Youtube Poops

Ech

Ech is a descriptive noise given to the sounds JonTron makes during his reviews caused by frustration or exaggeration. Because of the presentation of the sound, many YTPMVs (shown below) and photoshops have been made. The site MyInstants documents a myriad of typically memetic soundbites which are playable at the press of a digital button and variations of Ech have become popular buttons to push on the site.^[14]

Personal Life

Jon was born on March 24, 1990. He displayed a close friendship with Egoraptor while producing episodes of Game Grumps. He currently resides in New York after moving out from the Game Grumps house in California. He has had up to 5 pet birds, with the main bird and pseudo co-star being Jacques.

Search Interest

External References