New York, NY — The Epoch Media Group, the owner of the popular rightwing and conspiratory-ladened newspaper The Epoch Times, said that it plans to purchase the online publication The Babylon Bee for approximately $42,420. An offer the Bee accepted immediately even though the asking price was over $27 million in cash, stock, and a few quasi-racist (and no-so-quasi) puns and jokes.
The all-cash transaction closed this past Friday, with the Bee’s founders taking home as much as $27.37 in profit, after paying off its lawyer’s retainers and unpaid hosting fees over the past three years.
“This is a great day for the Epoch Times,” said editor and chief information officer Daryal Nguyen. “We can now expand our reach into a demographic who will share anything we post, regardless of whether they read it. Also, we’re gaining the award-winning photoshop and graphic design expertise of The Bee, which is renowned throughout the Internet for its masterful depiction of everyday Americans.”
For those unfamiliar with the publication, The Epoch Times is an international multi-language newspaper and media extension of the Falun Gong new religious movement based in the United States. The group’s news sites and YouTube channels have spread conspiracy theories such as QAnon and anti-vaccination propaganda. As a result, the newspaper and its associated online outlets have been throttled and banned numerous times for spreading lies, falsehoods, and propaganda.
The Babylon Bee, on the other hand, is known for off-color, often distasteful racist and bigoted portrayals of anything outside of its conservative Christian point-of-view. The Bee’s followers are notoriously dim-witted and aggressively share its articles, much like your crazy uncle Phil used to forward conspiracy emails to you 14 times per day.
Analysts say The Babylon Bee is a perfect fit for The Epoch Times.
“Well, it makes perfect sense,” said Professor James Badwater of the University of Chicago’s Badwater Institute for Public Policy and Corgi Research. “You’ve got, on the one hand, a publication that regularly publishes the most heinous lies, and on the other, you’ve got a publication that attempts to be funny at the sake of the disenfranchised, the poor, and the disabled. And I’m just talking about The Babylon Bee here. I need another two hours to discuss the evils of The Epoch Times.”
It’s unclear what the Bee’s founders will do with their new-found fortune of $27.37, but insiders say the crew is overwhelmed with their wealth and plans on investing the windfall.
