I Went Undercover In QAnon For A Year, And Here’s Everything I Learned -- by Van Badham
You might think that a homicidal cult of aspirational psychics actively threatening to murder members of elected government, thereby provoking a Judgment Day-like military coup and mass-arrest event to install an authoritarian world government under leader-for-life God-Emperor Donald Trump would inform some fascinating personal stories. You would be wrong.
How is this possibly boring? Two ways. Firstly, there's a "don't tell me what to do" narcissism to their denunciations-of-cabals that has the familiar, foot-stompy energy of teenagers refusing to tidy their bedrooms. Secondly, from their content on social media to the contents of their lives, there's a sameness to their engagements that's beyond bleak. It's mostly either nonsense, whining, or cut-and-paste hate.
Ultimately, it was this truly sheep-like uniformity that became most fascinating to me. Not because of the individual participants in it -- but because where there are sheep there are shepherds... and as I spent more time in Conspiracyland, who those shepherds were and how they had worked out how to herd these people towards political targets, from Michael Gunner to the US elections, became a story that was far more interesting -- and important -- to tell.
More at: This Op-Ed Piece
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No love for Hamas, Hezbollah, Iranian Leadership, Islamic Jihad, other Islamic terrorist groups, OR their supporters and sympathizers.
08 Dec 2021, 9:41 am
