The plight of First Amendment Auditor John Filax and his firing from a newly found job was the source of great excitement for those in the supposed “anti-auditing” group in the fandom, while it brought concern from those who support the group of first amendment auditors.
I’m PANTS, this is a ReallyCoolNews editorial. The views I’m reading are those of Jim Finch, who has been cancelled five times this week, so please remember that as I may agree with some of these views or I may agree with those who think he is a complete nincompoop. You’ll never know. Really.
Midweek saw YouTuber John Filax release a video in which he shared his new plight as his attempts to leave the First Amendment auditing community and get a real job ran into a complication when an old enemy blocked his path out of the activities that brought the conflict between them.
Filax explained that he had shut down his First Amendment auditing channel in the early part of the year and had spent a good amount of time making all of his videos private. The only revenue left from his channel was his memberships and he had stopped all auditing activity.
He stopped as he said that he was getting older and needed to get a “real” job with benefits and a retirement plan. While he was starting these things at midlife, recently turning 50, he had started training to get his CDL license and had processed through his training over the past few months with a promise of a truck driving job in his future.
However, there was a problem at a Florida DMV. As Filax’s story goes, he had previously had negative encounters with the people who ran the DMV and all of a sudden, his process was halted and he was nearly immediately fired from the job he had worked so hard for.
He immediately reacted to his circumstances in a way we’ve seen before. In his anger he threatened to FOIA for the records leading up to the decision to remove him from the job and essentially may end up going back to having an income based on auditing despite threats from his wife.
The reaction from the “anti-auditing” side of things was predictable. Filax is widely hated by the community as a whole, from those who have seen his work, and it was an easy story. Dumb auditor doing a dumb, getting fired before he even started, and he was an idiot because all auditors are idiots.
Likewise, the reaction from the First Amendment auditing supporters was also predictable. A few supporters gave him super chats during his 20-minute live, and mostly everyone blamed the DMV guys for holding grudges and showing that the government was again working against the common man.
Filax is out of a job, he’s currently out of auditing, his channel is only pulling in the revenue that he can make through going live or from memberships. He can try to make all of his content public again, but unless he starts to make new content, it is unlikely that he’d be able to get back into the algorithm again to restore his source of income.
Filax himself cannot change his past. His future isn’t decided, however. Making amends with those he has trouble with would probably be a good place to start. Picking an industry where he doesn’t have troubles that he can’t resolve is also an alternative, but it also shows that everything you do can have ramifications down the line.
Auditing isn’t the future. Sure, there are folks like SeanPaul “Long Island Audit” Reyes, who can make it a full-time job, but even Reyes is facing problems as his fame proceeds him and people don’t react in the ways that he needs to make a good video.
Opportunities are drying up as more police forces become aware of First Amendment auditing and ironically, begin to act in the manner the auditors have been demanding – showing restraint, showing respect, and disengaging and finding alternate methods of resolution.
In some states, the supposed “halo” laws that require Auditors to stand 25 feet away from police are also hindering what can be recorded and produced into videos. While there’s still a market for “fighting the TYRANT who is DENYING OUR FREEDOM TO RECORD” videos, taking a ticket or doing jailtime may be enough to discourage those from taking up the hobby to begin with.
While the activity isn’t dead yet, Auditing is clearly in the decline and those who eventually leave the hobby (including those who report on said hobby) will have to face a future where their past is in play as they seek work elsewhere.
All we can do is be kind as they face their fates.
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