This is not the blog I thought I would be writing this week. I had plans to write something hard-hitting about the death of truth, or about Bonhoeffer’s antifascist theology. But I feel led to offer a different piece, one that is both more gentle and yet more potent. (And isn’t there a mysterious potency in gentleness, when you really think about it?)
Here’s what I want to say: After Joe Biden’s is inaugurated,I invite you to lovingly and graciously extend an olive branch to your friends, family, and acquaintances who’ve fallen into conspiracy theories – particularly Qanon and/or the Christian “prophecies” that Trump will be a president for two terms. Only 1 out of a 100 of these conspiracy believers might be willing to emerge from the rabbit hole they’ve disappeared into. But you might be the one to help pull them out.
See, Inauguration Day marks a very significant deadline for both Qanon believers and the Christian prophets who are certain that Donald Trump will serve two consecutive terms. Right now, there are tens of millions of Americans – from a variety of ages, ethnicities, geographies, and socioeconomic backgrounds – who are convinced, against all logic and odds, that Donald Trump will somehow remain the president after January 20th. (I could post screenshots of people I personally know who believe this, but perhaps even more illustrative is to scroll for a few minutes through this Facebook group). Whether it’s through an act of God, a military coup, or some fancy legal maneuvering, these believers just know that Trump/Q/God couldn’t allow someone so wicked as Joe Biden to become president. (In fact, that’s what the insurrection on January 6th was all about; attempting to force Congress into throwing out the election results and keeping Donald Trump in power.)
Admittedly, the leaders of these cults have given other failed deadlines before January 20th, none of which have come to pass, and so they will probably just kick the can to some other deadline. But after Biden’s inaugration, some of the followers might be fed up and willing to start to back out of these conspiracy movements. And this is where you come in. By reaching out after the inauguration in a kind, confident, and non-aggressive manner, you may be able to win these people back to reality. This isn’t something I recommend for everyone, as it can be very emotionally draining and potentially risky if the person lashes out. And it will look different for different people. But by reaching out to your conspiracy-minded friend after Inauguration you may prevent the next terrorist attack, or the next lone wolf gunman–and never realize just how much of a difference you made.
Here’s a few tips and thoughts shared by a @QOrigins on Twitter that I think perfectly encapsulate the importance of this moment:
“For those with friends or family in QAnon, [Inauguration Day] will be quite a day. The Inauguration is going to plunge many Q believers into doubt and dismay. The most committed will simply double down, but others will want a way out. If you’re able, give them an off-ramp. No mocking. It’s HARD not to mock or taunt or say “I told you so” when, for months or years, the person you’re talking to has chosen conspiratorial, antidemocratic Trump worship over… y’know… a relationship with you. But the thing is, QAnon provides its followers with certain benefits: replacement friends. A substitute family. A wholesale new reality. And a sense of community that’s a powerful draw, especially when they’re feeling confused and upset. So… to compete with it, you have to draw on your old ties — and remind them what life was like before Q. Because the truth is that QAnon immiserates its followers. Their relationships falter. They find it difficult to sleep. They fear for themselves and their children — unreasonably, but the fear is often quite real. And while conspiracism GENERATES the fear, it also soothes it.
“So this is, however unfairly, on the shoulders of people who DO have a connection with reality. And that’s NOT to say that you absolutely must reach out to your Q person in a spirit of unity and rainbows. You’ve learned, & shouldn’t rush to un-learn, some ugly truths about them.And it might not be safe, either. Some of these folks were abusive and toxic before Q and will be abusive and toxic after. Some WEREN’T abusive and toxic before Q but will be afterwards. They’ve marinated in bitterness and revenge fantasies. It’s a long and bumpy road back.
“But if there are people in your life who you DO want back, odds are good that [Inauguration Day] is a pivotal moment. So if you want to reach out, what does that look like? Well, I can’t tell you the details. I don’t know your relationship. But I can tell you that it’s not triumphalist, it’s not mocking, it’s not taunting. It doesn’t demand they disavow all their beliefs immediately (if they do it on their own, GREAT). It offers them empathy. It establishes that you care about them as people & want a relationship. And understand they won’t shed all their beliefs in a day. You don’t have to SHARE their beliefs. You shouldn’t pretend to agree with them. Neither is healthy. But talk to them & then follow up. Stay in *very* frequent contact. Give them genuine love. And folks… good luck. (P.S. If you can’t do this, no judgment. QAnon folks are isolated from friends and family because they’ve *hurt* friends and family, and generally refuse to recognize that or make amends. It’s not always healthy to engage with someone like that. It’s VERY much OK not to try.)”
There’s not much I can add to QOrigin’s post, except to close with a story that feels very relevant here. If because of this blog even a one single person who is swallowed in conspiracies can be nudged even slightly towards the path of truth, love, and real community, it will have been well worth it. Helping one person out of a conspiracist mindset doesn’t erase the larger systemic, political, cultural, economic, and spiritual work that’s still to be done in our world. But it’s not nothing, either.
The Starfish Story
One day a man was walking along the beach when he noticed a boy picking something up and gently throwing it into the ocean. Approaching the boy, he asked, “What are you doing?”
The youth replied, “Throwing starfish back into the ocean. The surf is up and the tide is going out. If I don’t throw them back, they’ll die.”
“Son,” the man said, “don’t you realize there are miles and miles of beach and hundreds of starfish? You can’t make a difference!”
After listening politely, the boy bent down, picked up another starfish, and threw it back into the surf. Then, smiling at the man, he said…..
One of the most common metaphors throughout the Bible is that of shepherds (political and religious leaders) who are in charge of the sheep (AKA the common people). Throughout the Hebrew scriptures, God continually calls out the bad shepherds that are misleading and mistreating the people under them, while trying to put into place good shepherds instead – Ezekiel 34 is a great example of this type of metaphor.
Truthfully, as an individualistic American, I don’t really like the shepherd metaphor as it implies that most human beings are simple sheep, without the capacity to make complex decisions on their own. (The pejorative use of the term “sheeple” as a secular insult to castigate people who believe in vaccines and a round earth hasn’t helped my aversion to the concept.)
However, after witnessing the insurrection at the Capitol on January 6th, I actually realize the metaphor of sheep and shepherds is quite apt. Without shifting away any blame from the average Joes and Karens who perpetrated the Capitol invasion (I hope they all face appropriate civil and criminal penalties), the simple truth is that this act would not have happened without the long list of political, cultural, and religious leaders/shepherds who instigated it. After all, six months ago virtually none of these Capitol invaders knew about the role Congress plays in certifying the Electoral College vote. Thusthe mass gathering and violence we saw on January 6th is almost entirely due to the bad shepherds that organized it, promoted it, and then allowed it to happen.
Many of those who stormed the Capitol were planning to take hostages–note the zip ties– and execute them on camera. There was even a noose and gallows set up outside the Capitol.
It’s easy to imagine how differently January 6th would have gone if we didn’t have so many bad shepherds misleading the sheep
If Trump, the political shepherd of our nation, had peacefully conceded the election back in November or December, most of these sheep would have grumbled but peacefully gone along with it. If Trump had not demanded a mass rally in Washington DC on January 6, calling for his followers to march on the Capitol, a few diehard protesters still would have been there, but not the thousands we saw overpower the police.
If far-right newscasters, politicians, and media personalities hadn’t invented and spread hundreds of false and misleading narratives about the election, the sheep would have accepted the conclusions of the 60+ different federal judges (many of whom were appointed by Trump!) that the elections was free, fair, and without widespread fraud. If these same shepherds hadn’t kept stringing along false hopes that Mike Pence would magically overturn the election on January 6, the sheep would not have been so devastated when the inevitable certification of the election results happened.
If conservative Christian pastors and theologians had taught their flocks to love their enemies, instead of dominating and killing them, we would not have seen Christian banners and symbols waved as battle flags and taken into the halls of Congress. If these Christian leaders had accurately taught that white supremacy and Christian nationalism are satanic heresies from the pit of hell, these sheep would not have been so bloodthirsty and eager to overturn the legitimate election of someone who doesn’t represent those things to them. If these Christian shepherds had spent more time speaking against the dangerous Qanon / End Times conspiracies actively spreading in their pews instead of against scary liberal acronyms like “CRT”, “BLM”, and “AOC”, maybe their congregants would have been less likely to fly to Washington DC to beat up cops and scrawl “Murder the Press” on the Capitol walls.
A STUNNING 45 % of Republicans support the storming of the US CapitolLink
The blame for what happened on January 6th does not solely fall on the far-right: If the liberal shepherds who run social media corporations such as Facebook and Twitter had heeded the warnings of experts and taken steps to stop the radicalization of sheep on their platform via viral fake news and incendiary accounts, there would be far fewer people falling prey to conspiracy theories like Qanon or the election fraud narrative. Granted, there’s always a few kooks in every society, but without the aid of social media their numbers would be much smaller. [On a related note, I have actually come around to agree with conservative pundits that Section 230 should be repealed and the federal government should regulate social media corporations much more firmly than it currently is. These massive, greedy companies have shown over and over that they care more about profit than people; they are the bad shepherds that are allowing wolves to eat their sheep and cannot be trusted to keep self-regulating without any checks and balance.]
Those are just a few of the bad shepherds who are to blame for the shameful actions we saw on January 6th. To my knowledge, none of these shepherds have publicly repented of their ways. What will God’s judgment upon these bad shepherds look like? And perhaps an even more important question: who will raise up a generation of good shepherds to better guide the sheep?
My brain and body are absolutely exhausted with our wonderful newborn baby (born last week! Praise God! What a whirlwind haha). But it doesn’t mean I haven’t had random thoughts and ideas. However rather than post them on Facebook (which could lead to blowback, anger, and people getting offended, which I don’t have energy to deal with right now), I’m just going to post them here. They are pretty stream of consciousness and not necessarily related to one another, so take it all with a grain of salt 🙂
PARENTAL LEAVE. With one week of paid parental leave under my belt (I get a full month, Liz gets three–thank you InterVarsity!), I just want to say how incredibly ridiculous it is that the United States does not have any federally guaranteed paid parental leave for mothers (not to mention both parents). There are only 2 other countries on the entire planet besides the US that don’t offer any leave for mothers (Suriname and Papau New Guinea). Even comparatively poorer nations like Libya, Iran, Colombia, Ghana, and North Korea offer multiple weeks of leave! If we don’t want mothers to choose abortion, why isn’t our government doing something about this? It should have bipartisan support! And even Ivanka Trump supposedly was going to push for a plan for this. But of course Congressional Republicans seem to hate whenever government money goes to anyone that’s not a rich man or a corporation. And if Joe Biden becomes president, you can bet that they’ll automatically oppose any and every pro-family spending bill he puts forward for the sake of the “national debt”.
DIAPERS. I was honestly worried about changing diapers of a newborn, as it’s not something I ever witnessed or did growing up. But while it’s a little stinky, it’s honestly not that bad at all. Which reminds me of a fact I read about Donald Trump: on multiple occasions he has bragged that he never once changed a diaper, despite having 5 children–I guess his wives or servants always changed them??… To me I think that says a lot about who he is and his character. Unwilling to be a servant, not a team player with his wives, and a hefty dose of pride. He also thus embodies toxic masculinity instead of healthy masculinity (I could go on and on about that topic, but that’s for another day).
FREEDOM. In America, every citizen has the freedom/right to lie, commit adultery, be mean, curse people out, manipulate, be selfish, be greedy, hate others, take advantage of others, and generally do whatever we want. In certain cases (though not all) it is even legal to commit violence, kill, slander, and incite insurrection. Yet while an American has the right and freedom to do all of those things, in the Kingdom of God, Christians don’t have the right to do ANY them! Instead we are servants of Jesus, and only have the right to do the things he calls us to–which don’t include anything in that list. Thus it makes me sad when I see people who claim to be Christians get all up in arms about their “right” to do things like spread lies, share slander, or endorse violence. In an American sense, yes they have that right, but if they claim to be Christian then they ought not do any of those things, nor expect others to do so on their behalf.
KILL vs. DIE. A big difference between true Christians and most other people is this: most people are willing and eager to kill for the sake of their core values (protecting their personal property, expanding their empire, etc), but usually not to die for them. For a true Christian, it is (supposed to be) precisely the opposite. We are called to be willing to die for Jesus daily, but to never kill for him. Whenever you see Christians more passionate about killing and dominating others than they are about suffering and serving, be sure that you are probably not in the presence of the Kingdom of God.
ABORTION. This is a controversial topic, but I’m going to humbly put it forward. It’s a freaking baby. At the 12-week ultrasound our “Baby Yoda” was already kicking his feet, dancing around, and looking like a baby. It didn’t look like a fish or chicken or anything like that. Thus I’ve mentioned this in a previous blog, but I personally think certain progressive circles need to put a damper on the “abortion is wonderful!”-type rhetoric, which is admittedly rare but I have seen it. Anyone who’s had a birth, or God forbid a miscarriage, knows that there is something special about pregnancy and birth, and we should not be so flippant about that. Babies are not parasites invading a woman’s body; in fact there is something amazing and empowering about a woman who is able to carry a fetus to term and be a functioning, working adult at the same time (men can’t do that). NOW–that said, I think that abortion being legal, safe, and rare is the way to go, and that Democratic policies are actually the ones PROVEN to lead to a decrease in the abortion rate, while Republican policies are PROVEN to increase them (again, see blog). And of course there’s tons of gray areas like rape, incest, health of mother, etc. Thus my point is not about the actual policies, but about the rhetoric that is used. However since I’m not the person who actually has given birth or had an abortion, that’s all I’ll say on that topic for now.
QANON & POST-ELECTION VIOLENCE. Despite recent social media crackdowns, Qanon is once again gaining in support and traction in American society. There will be Qanon believing members of Congress elected this November (it’s inevitable), who will then be in a position to begin The Storm–the part of Qanon where Donald Trump declares martial law, executes all his political enemies, and begins a new rule where all Jews, elites, and liberals are crushed. If Qanon is false, it is spreading a horrific worldview to millions of Americans, most of whom own guns and are ready to kill anyone who stands in their way. And if Qanon is true, we are just weeks away from Donald Trump declaring himself Supreme Leader and ending American democracy. Either way, it’s something to be aware of. As a Christian who takes Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount both seriously and literally, I know I cannot intentionally take another life. But with Qanon out there (and related militia movements like the Oathkeepers, 3 Percenters, KKK, Proud Boys, and myriad others), it is a bit scary to contemplate what might go down after November 3rd. Last month at a Black Lives Matter demonstration a middle-aged white man slowly drove by my wife and me and pointed his fingers like a gun at each of us, and mimed pulling the trigger. Typical toxic masculinity posturing? Probably. But knowing that he definitely owns a gun at home is a bit scary. We saw a different guy drive by, a neighbor with a loud pickup truck who proudly owns guns and supports Donald Trump, angrily filming the demonstrators. Did he see that we were there? Is our house on the kill list for after the election? LOL we’ll find out!
Anyway, those are just a few random hot takes after not a whole lot of sleep! Please take it with a grain of salt; reach out if you have any questions.
Last week, I wrote an article on this blog that sought to explain why so many people are suddenly sharing posts about sex trafficking and pedophilia on social media platforms. In summary, one of the main reasons for this surge is that Qanon conspiracy theorists are seeking to bring more people into their cult by spreading innocent-seeming ideas and hashtags such as #save the children. (A lot of people found my piece helpful, and it reached ten thousand views within a few days – if you haven’t read it yet, click here).
Within 30 minutes of sharing this article on Facebook, I received an angry public comment and series of private messages from a childhood acquaintance who I’ll call “Brett,” who I haven’t spoken to in at least 15 years. As it turns out, Brett is a full time Qanon “researcher” who makes his living from Youtube videos, Patreon donations, and selling Qanon merchandise. While Brett’s initial Facebook messages to me were somewhat intense, demanding that I retract my “shit” article, we ended up having a lengthy, mostly-polite discussion that lasted at least 8 hours of back and forth messages over the course of a few days. While it’s hard to summarize our entire conversation, which was both wide-ranging and involving highly technical Qanon terms and jargon, I’ll attempt to summarize a few key lessons that I learned below. [A few days ago, Brett’s Facebook account and associated Facebook group were suspended by Facebook as part of their crackdown on Qanon-promoting accounts. While I do not begrudge Facebook’s desire as a private company to crack down on the spread of harmful information on their platform, one side effect of this is that I am no longer able to access the messages he had sent me, and am forced to rely on memory. I have tried to reconstruct his point of view as fairly and accurately as possible.]
Marjorie Taylor Greene (in red) in Rome, Georgia, on Aug. 11. Greene, a QAnon supporter, won the Republican nomination for northwest Georgia’s 14th Congressional District. MIKE STEWART/AP
Arguing with a Qanon believer is like trying to hammer water
Growing up, I was enrolled in Christian apologetics courses, and later spent 8 years doing debate in high school and college. Suffice to say that I enjoy arguing back and forth on a variety of topics, so long as the person on the other side is willing to stick to their guns and actually argue back. For that reason, arguing with Brett was deeply, deeply frustrating. I asked a number of key, crucial questions about Qanon that are actually pretty straightforward, and rather than answer them, Brett would deflect to another topic or bring up an unrelated issue.
At the very outset of our conversation, Brett claimed that I should not judge Qanon on the basis of some of its followers, but rather judge it by its source–the 4500+ “Q-drops” that serve as the holy scripture for Qanon. I was excited by that, because I had read a lot of these Q-drops and most of them are garbage: they’re reposts of news articles, prophecies that are so vague so as to be applicable to anything, or are easy to disprove using basic logic. As I tried to get Brett to respond to each of these debunks of the Qanon holy text, he wasn’t able to answer, and instead just would default to standard Qanon catchphrases like “disinformation is necessary”, “do your own research,” and “I can’t explain it for you.” (But that was the whole reason I wanted to hear Brett’s point of view! He should be able to explain these things if he truly believes them, in much the same way that a paid Christian pastor should be able to address hard passages in the Bible.) For example, the very first Q posts stated as a bald fact that Hillary Clinton would be arrested “between 7:45 AM – 8:30 AM EST on Monday – the morning on Oct 30, 2017.” Of course that didn’t happen, but when I asked Brett to explain the discrepancy, he simply said “think for yourself.” Another Q-drop claims that North Korea is not being run by Kim Jong-Un; of course there’s no evidence that’s true. Other Q-drops are incredibly anti-Semitic; to those Brett had no response. For a complete breakdown of hundreds of Q-drops that are easily proven false, click here. Suffice to say that asking Brett to directly explain Q-drops was an exercise in futility.
In our discussion, I also asked Brett about the violent acts that Qanon followers have committed, from tearing families apart, to kidnapping children, to multiple murders, to attempts of assassinations and domestic terrorism. Brett claimed to me that Qanon is inherently peaceful and that followers “police their own”, such as arguing against the crazies in Qanon who believe that JFK Jr. is still alive despite his 1999 plan crash. (Interestingly enough, he himself at one point believed that JFK Jr. was alive!). But to any objective observer it’s impossible to ignore the violence–verbal, physical, and ideological– that is inherent in Qanon. Ultimately, Qanon’s denial of the violence in their movement is an application of the “No True Scotsman” logical fallacy. No matter how many crazy acts of pain and violence Q’s followers inflict on others, Brett and others like him will simply say, “oh they weren’t REAL Qanon followers.” Interestingly enough, Brett declined to denounce such acts of violence committed for the sake of his cause. I told him, ‘hey I’m a Christian and I regularly denounce people in my religion who are in the wrong,’ but for Brett it feels like that is not an option. Perhaps the ultimate reason for that is that Qanon is, at its heart, an inherently violent cult that longs for mass murders under the guise of “justice”. Which brings me to my next major point.
A Qanon believer brandishing a loaded gun at a Portland protest
Q keeps prophesying specific events, and they keep not happening…but that doesn’t bother Qanon believers
One key issue I tried to pin Brett on was the timeline for all the prophecies that Q keeps predicting as part of Donald Trump’s secret war against cannibals and pedophiles, but none of them have come true. Brett told me to expect a “crescendo” in the coming months, and I tried to ask him exactly what he means by that. (Most Qanon followers believe that any day now Obama, Hillary, and a host of other Americans will be jailed and executed in Guantanamo Bay for their supposed crimes.) Brett kept being vague about what this “crescendo” would look like. I asked him if hypothetically Donald Trump were to tomorrow declare martial law and start killing these Democrats for “treason”, if that would make Brett happy, if that would be the long-awaited “Storm.” Brett flatly avoided that question, but a cursory look at his page shows that he longs for this type of violent, totalitarian justice to be wrought upon Democrats. “We just want our country back,” he said in a recent post. To me that’s the scariest part that Qanon has revealed–just how many Americans are ready and indeed excited for mass killings of other Americans if they’re opposed to Trump! Even now I routinely see people I know on Facebook talk about the “treason” of liberals, for which the only just penalty is execution by the State.
Ultimately, given that Qanon started off with an easily provable lie (that Hillary was arrested in 2017), the only true believers who are still in the movement are those who want to believe in it. Any pro-Q “proofs” and “evidence” that people like Brett produce to encourage the faithful are haphazard, misleading, or just flat-out wrong. However, those who have been leaders in the Qanon movement are often reluctant to leave it, because…
Promoting Qanon can be a VERY lucrative business
In our messages, Brett told me that his full-time job is producing content for his Youtube channel and podcast, “Woke Societies.” I asked him to share the link, and spent a number of hours perusing his content across that platform and others, discovering that while Brett is not a top-tier Qanon promoter, he is managing to do quite well for himself. I crunched the numbers: Brett currently has 75 patrons on Patreon, with membership levels at $5, $15, and $25 a month. Thus Brett earns anywhere from $375-$1875 every month in (virtually) passive Patreon income. In addition, his merch store has 59 products of various Trump and Qanon branded mugs, stickers, and other items, which probably earns him another few hundred dollars a month. Most interestingly to me, Brett has over 100,000 subscribers to his Youtube channel—which he started only 16 months ago, and which has increased by nearly 70,000 subscribers in the past 90 days! According to a Youtube analyzer, with 100,000 subscribers Brett earns at roughly $101 per Youtube video through ads. In the past 30 days, Brett has published 15 Youtube videos, which has netted him a cool $1500. All told, at minimum Brett is probably making over $30,000 a year just by promoting Qanon theories and ideas. Clearly, this is more than a hobby, it is essentially a job.
When I asked him if perhaps his financial interest was blinding him to the truth about Qanon, Brett was defensive. Brett claimed that he only dipped his toes in Qanon initially as a hobby, but it wasn’t until people started following him by the hundreds that he decided to make it his career. (To be honest, if I knew I had hundreds of thousands of people hanging on my every word, with hundreds joining by the day, I might decide to make a career of it too!) In this way Brett’s trajectory echoes that of Instagram influencers; the difference being that he’s not hawking a nail polish or makeup tutorial, he’s hawking an ideology that says Hollywood elites eat babies.
Some of Brett’s older Youtube videos.
At this point, Qanon is inextricably linked to a vast number of other conspiracy theories
While I am often focused on debunking Qanon, since I’ve personally seen the damage it can cause, Brett would often demure and say that he actually doesn’t talk much about Qanon on his podcast anymore, and that he’s just about “the truth.” A quick glance at his Youtube channel and Tweets easily disproved that as a flat-out lie, as direct references to Qanon abound. But his reaction was interesting to me; it seems that Brett’s posts deliberately include a variety of other conspiracy theories in an attempt to reach a broader audience. A scan shows Brett’s Youtube channel includes conspiracy theories about a host of matters, including UFOs, Black Lives Matter, George Soros, COVID-19, a secret Nazi base underneath Antarctica, time travel, 9/11, manmade earthquakes, JFK Jr. still being alive, vaccines, al-Baghdadi being a CIA agent, the existence of astral planes, and Trump’s supposed connection to Nichola Tesla, to name a few. As such, Qanon is sort of a “Grand Unifying Conspiracy Theory,” onto which emotionally and spiritually vulnerable people can link all their hopes, fears, and passions. While arguably some of these conspiracy theories aren’t harmful and perhaps even a bit silly, many others of them have a verified death toll and are used to spread an authoritarian, anti-Semitic, and fascistic worldview. That’s dangerous, because…
For many people, Qanon functions as a religious cult, and it’s very hard to leave once you’re in
I originally met Brett at a private Christian school, and so I asked him early in our conversation if he’s still a follower of Jesus. He said he’s not, that he hates all religions and all dogma. Perhaps for that exact reason, he took great offense to my claim that Qanon is a cult. He thinks that is derogatory and offensive (and perhaps there are other terms that might fit better). However, Qanon fits the bill for a lot of things that cult does. Qanon has: a set of holy scriptures (the Q-drops) which get interpreted by a number of prophets (Q researchers), a messiah figure (Donald Trump), a supernatural villain (the Jewish/Democratic/Hollywood cabal), an eschatology (the promise of mass arrests and executions happening, which then makes America great), a persecution complex (Twitter bans), a requirement of evangelism (exposing your friends and family to Qanon ideas via Facebook), and, in its linking to older conspiracy theories, Qanon also has a deep, complex story of good vs. evil that goes back centuries. Moreover, like religious cults, Qanon has the tendency of stealing people away from their families, drawing them to spend more and more time and money in an insular internet chat rooms while driving a wedge between them and their Deep State relatives who “just don’t get it.” In short Qanon fits the basic bill for a religious cult just like Scientology or similar cults do.
Like other cults, there are many paths into Qanon but it is very hard to get out of it. Some Qanon followers come in via dark, anti-Semitic & far-right corners of the internet. Others are loners who feel alienated from mainstream society, and are eager to embrace an ideology that gives them hope and a purpose. More recently, a surge of new members have been coming in from “wellness moms” who are into New Age healing techniques, are anti-vaccines, and are passionate about protecting children from evil people “out there.” While these cultists co-exist somewhat uneasily, in Qanon all of them are unified in their hope of a Messiah, Donald J. Trump, who will liberate them from the evil Deep State overlords that are secretly running society.
The few hard-core Qanon believers who do leave the faith do so for one of a few reasons, all of them rare. The first reason is that these believers become frustrated at the slow pace of “The Storm” and are ready for the hammer to drop on Trump’s enemies. These members are dangerous, as they may violently take matters into their own hands.
Another reason some people leave is that they have a “come to Jesus moment” where they realize just how many loved ones they’ve hurt and alienated by following Qanon, and decide to walk away from it all. However so far these people are rare, as the tendency to simply disappear deeper into the Qanon community is usually easier than rebuilding bridges one has burnt.
One of the many heart-breaking posts in the Reddit thread “Qanon Casulties“
The last reason people might walk away from Qanon is that it ultimately becomes boring, and it’s more fun, meaningful, or profitable to simply move into a different religion. I honestly think that is what will happen to Brett within the next few months/years; he already has so many diverse interests, he may realize it is more profitable and enjoyable to monetize one of those with the skills he learned from Qanon. Perhaps most likely, he will move explicitly into politics, either as an online pundit or by running for federal office like the ~80 pro-Qanon Congressional candidates who’ve entered the race this cycle.
Why it matters
So in the end, does it really matter if a few million Americans believe in this conspiracy theory? Why not just leave them alone? Why take so many hours addressing this issue (after all, unlike Brett I don’t make any money from producing this content!)? The reason is that Qanon holds at its heart a dangerous, anti-Semitic, anti-democratic, fascistic worldview. While not every Qanon follower has these exact views, based on Brett’s videos and worries about George Soros, the Cabal, and the deep state, I have every reason to believe that he himself holds to many of the anti-Semitic conspiracy theories that have been around since the time of the Middle Ages and that were most prominent during the Nazis. It’s uncertain to me that we’re about to enter a new era of bloodshed and violence, but regardless this ideology must be stopped.
In 1985, historian George L. Mosse wrote his ground-breaking analysis of European racism Toward the Final Solution. In his concluding chapter, Mosse warned that the same forces and ideologies that led to the Holocaust were still present in Western society. Read this quote below from that final chapter, but as you read, replace the word “racism” with Qanon. Doesn’t this sound exactly like our current situation?
“Behind all the attempts at justification [for the Holocaust] stood a fanatical belief in racist ideas. This was a racism which stemmed from the outer perimeter of the movement, connected with spiritualism, secret sciences, and cosmic battles. But such ideas came to dominate the mind of Adolf Hilter, who was at one and the same time a fanatic and a superb politician…Racist myths not only explained the past and brought hope for the future, but through their emphasis on stereotypes rendered the abstract concrete…this made racism a visually centered ideology. This stress on the visual [memes], in turn, made it easy for people to understand the thrust of the ideology…racism was never at a loss for proofs which would make its stereotypes convincing…racism was a scavenger ideology which annexed the virtues, morals, and respectability of the age to its stereotypes and attributed them to the inherent qualities of a superior race. If racism annexed the virtues of the age, it also condemned as degenerate all that was opposed to such respectability.”
It might feel weird to spend 3000 words attacking such a bankrupt, scavenger ideology, one that seems foolish from top to bottom. But America in 2020 is a nation where bankrupt, foolish ideologies of white supremacy, fascism, militarism, nationalism, and others are making comebacks of their own. If we do not recognize the tell-tale signs of these ideological viruses, and do what we must to stop their spread, we will once more find ourselves surrounded on every side by politicians, church leaders, and family members who have been infected. Many of them already are.
