Oh this can’t be good.
Courtesy of NYT:
A city council member in California took the dais and quoted from QAnon, a pro-Trump conspiracy theory about “deep state” traitors plotting against the president, concluding her remarks, “God bless Q.”
A man spouting QAnon beliefs about child sex trafficking swung a crowbar inside a historic Catholic chapel in Arizona, damaging the altar and then fleeing before being arrested.
And outside a Trump campaign rally in Florida, people in “Q” T-shirts stopped by a tent to hear outlandish tales of Democrats’ secretly torturing and killing children to extract a life-extending chemical from their blood.
What began online more than two years ago as an intricate, if baseless, conspiracy theory that quickly attracted thousands of followers has since found footholds in the offline world. QAnon has surfaced in political campaigns, criminal cases, merchandising and at least one college class. Last month, hundreds of QAnon enthusiasts gathered in a Tampa, Fla., park to listen to speakers and pick up literature, and in England, a supporter of President Trump and the Brexit leader Nigel Farage raised a “Q” flag over a Cornish castle.
Most recently, the botched Iowa Democratic caucuses and the coronavirus outbreak have provided fodder for conspiracy mongering: QAnon fans shared groundless theories online linking the liberal billionaire George Soros to technological problems that hobbled the caucuses, and passed around bogus and potentially dangerous “treatments” for the virus.
About a dozen candidates for public office in the United States have promoted or dabbled in QAnon, and its adherents have been arrested in at least seven episodes, including a murder in New York and an armed standoff with the police near the Hoover Dam. The F.B.I. cited QAnon in an intelligence bulletin last May about the potential for violence motivated by “fringe political conspiracy theories.”
Keep in mind that the central tenet of the QAnon conspiracy is that Democrats are deep state pedophiles who victimize children sexually and even drink their blood.
That, by the way, closely resembles similar charges made against the Jewish community for hundreds of years.
The fact that these theories are becoming more prevalent among Trump supporters is not something that should be ignored.
These people are crazy, and crazy is dangerous.
Guess what I’m doing tomorrow? Hopefully waking up and going to work as I always have 46 plus years
Meanwhile, those in charge do their reindeer games and the stupid attend as such rallies.
I know this serious to some, but all I can do is LAUGH.
“Get down with your bad self.” Whatever.
pedophiles drinking blood … thought that was priests
I am so behind the times.
I actually know some of these idiots. It is frightening. I’ve been trying to figure out why they refuse to admit how baseless and hurtful conspiracy theories are to a democracy. I finally realized they find it easier to listen to “entertainers” Alex Jones and Rush Limbaugh than face life as it is. The unfortunate part for me is when they want to “share” the crazy.
How christless. It’s like a list-of-newspapers-from-12-years-ago-christless.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/03/the-2020-disinformation-war/605530/
NOTHING IS TRUE
There is perhaps no better place to witness what the culture of disinformation has already wrought in America than a Trump campaign rally.
And here is the proof of what cutting back on education accomplishes. The dumbing down of the United States.
When I hear someone spewing these conspiracy theories I just laugh and offer them more tin foil for their beanies. The best way to counter these nuts is to laugh AT them. Just laugh and walk off.
I often wonder what they’re going to do when George Soros is dead and they can no longer blame everything on him.
https://www.rawstory.com/2020/02/these-people-are-the-destruction-of-america-conservative-host-ripped-for-attack-on-korean-oscar-winner-bong-joon-ho/
Wasn’t Jesus Korean?