- But viewing their message boards, it’s clear that QAnon crosses a new frontier. In the black hole of conspiracy in which “Q” has plunged its followers, Trump only feigned collusion to create a pretense for the hiring of special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, who is actually working as a “white hat,” or hero, to expose the Democrats. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and George Soros are planning a coup — and traffic children in their spare time. J.P. Morgan, the American financier, sank the Titanic.
In the world in which QAnon believers live, Trump’s detractors, such as Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona and Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin, wear ankle monitors that track their whereabouts. Press reports are dismissed as “Operation Mockingbird,” the name given to the alleged midcentury infiltration of the American media by the CIA. The Illuminati looms large in QAnon, as do the Rothschilds, a wealthy Jewish family vilified by the conspiracy theorists as the leaders of a satanic cult. Among the world leaders wise to satanic influences, the theory holds, is Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Please vote, Hubski.
edit: ArtemusBlank, if you hated pizzagate, come hate on this. Keeping up with these kooks is a full-time job.
I had thought that there was a possibility to maintain the same 6 character alphanumeric identifier as your poster ID on 8chan, but looking at screenshots of "famous" "QAnon" posts, that is apparently not the case. So yes, in addition to having no way of verifying that QAnon is who they claim to be (some well-connected, high up government source), we have no way to verify that anyone else claiming to be QAnon is the same QAnon. Minor detail COUGH ...BuT yOu'LL kNoW tHe TrUtH wHeN yOu HeAr It, kApTeiNb, JuSt LiStEN tO uR hEArT
I think that's the most likely explanation, except it's not just a single crafty teenager, but really just anyone with a high IQ and too much time and malice on their hands.
Here's a good episode about this on Reply All: https://www.gimletmedia.com/reply-all/122-the-qanon-code#episode-player
That sounds pretty good. Almost good enough to make me wish my commute to work was longer. I guess I'll break it up into different sessions. Thank you!
My God. These people need lives and jobs probably.
Might already have been. Let's stop for a minute and process that. It's estimated that the average healthy 65-year-old today will spend an estimated $200,000 on healthcare over the course of retirement. If we assume a 25-year retirement, that's $8,000 a year, which means that anyone aiming to exist on Social Security alone would essentially be left with a mere $737 a month to cover his or her remaining bills. And frankly, that's just not going to happen.The average monthly Social Security payment this year is $1,404. That figure accounts for the 2% cost-of-living increase that recipients were given for 2018. Now when we multiply that number over 12 months, we arrive at an annual income of just $16,848.
My dad tried talking to me recently about how the gig economy is a positive. That millennials actually prefer a transitive lifestyle with work style/hours dictated on our terms. Couldn't convince him that we would also like job security, healthcare, and regular paychecks let alone retirement benefits, stock options, and flexwork at a 9-5. Like yeah, Pop, you want me driving for Uber and freelance web development while raising your grandkids? Cool. Boomers are dicks, even the ones who should know better.
OK, I screenshotted that. Let the wider hubski audience know how that book is please. I don't get enough opportunity to bitch about the baby boomers IRL because there's usually one in earshot to bitch right back about how ungrateful I am or whatever. So venting here about how awful they are is pretty awesome and I think a lot of other people agree and would like to know if that book is good.
'k. I'll give it a review. I've been burning through my Audible backlog (18 books out of 272 titles) which has included the first three books of the Barrayar series, which I read as a teenager and downloaded for my wife, but which I've forgotten how much I enjoy. But those take me about 2 days each. I'll move it to the front of the list.
Well, their decisions are certainly speeding that process up for them.
I think you do a disservice to the severity of a terrifying new epidemic. The Book of Revelation is: 1. 1,950 years old. QAnon is a new wave of memetic lunacy that has popped up within the last two years. 2. Rife with symbolism. QAnon states, with no uncertainty, what is going on and who the "bad" actors are (Democrats, duh). 3. Set in the mythical future, and thus unfalsifiable. The QAnon, erm, movement takes place in the present and near past, and completely disregards all factual evidence against it (which is abundant) to the contrary. No, what we are seeing here is mankind's ability to delude itself en masse, assisted by the internet. What remains to be understood is the necessary size of a "core" group of members (presumably malicious?) to influence X% of the population, or whether or not this is actually a natural phenomenon that occurs when you disrupt traditional hierarchies of information flow. Unfortunately, there is nothing historically analogous to the impact that internet has had and will continue to have on civilization. I know that you're pointing out that these are the same people strange enough to give credence to the Book of Revelation, but this is on another level, and we're nowhere close to understanding this yet. I'm not optimistic about it getting any better anytime soon. edit: and I should explicitly note that this is not really about QAnon so much as it is QAnon as a litmus test of ideological susceptibility.
Basically the insane man with the conspiracy pamphlet shouting in a park in the 90s or earlier had an audience but he didn't have a vehicle for his message outside of the copier at the library. Now he has a mass audience and a vehicle and it turns out a lot of people are really stupid, they just were never exposed to the right level of stupid to make them dangerous
I mean, yes. But this type of politicking is not new. The fourth and fifth pages are most relevant.they just were never exposed to the right level of stupid to make them dangerous
The stuff he mentions as archaic paranoid style is still around though and added with the new style you get these byzantine conspiracy theories like Qanon. Alex Jones has this ever evolving mythology that he creates on the fly to fit his paranoid worldview. My point being that there's always been an audience for this, we just didn't know how many people bought into the "lizard people are using chemtrails to turn the frogs gay for the benefit of the NWO and illuminati" until the Alex Joneses and David Ickes got a mass media platform instead of remaining on public access cable and self publishing bullshit right into bankruptcy. Where they deserve to be.
Right, I'm clear on your point, but where you think no one knew how many people could be duped, I think it's pretty clear someone knew and planned for it. The paranoid gullibility of the American populace isn't an unstudied field, and these media personalities/platforms banked their success on it - make explicit reference to it in the case of Andrew Anglin/Daily Stormer. Like...you mention "Illuminati" right here, but that actually has roots in anti-Masonic paranoia from waaay back (that tie is made in the Hofstadter paper too). I think we're making the same point. I'm just adding that the buildup to this level of conspiratorial frenzy is a decades-long process that's a pretty well-known and anticipated feature of the American electorate. Also, that the historical efforts and reach of political paranoia were more effective than you give them credit for (i.e. yes, they reached "mass audiences" in the 1800s). The Internet's advent didn't make this phenomena some new strange beast of our age - it's been around, relatively unchanged, for quite a while.
That's an incredibly paranoid line of reasoning in itself. Someone noticed and took advantage of it. Someone being Donald Trump because he's stupid enough himself to buy this shit and politically naive enough not to distance himself from it as the Ron Pauls of the past have done. I think it's pretty clear someone knew and planned for it.
Lol more like a candid description of Machiavellianism than paranoia, but I hear you. There's a fair bit of hysteria in my views as well. Among friends, I've started ending all my political ramblings with, "...but I'm an extremist, so maybe don't listen to me." Shit's weird, bud. Stay afloat.
Combined with record-breaking levels of distrust in longstanding institutions and authority, the flames of which are fanned by the fucking POTUS.
He fans them but they helped him get elected in the first place. There are a lot of unintended consequences like Joe Scarborough on MSNBC putting him on his show for ratings and Rupert Murdoch putting him on his network for the same reason. I'm not deflecting blame, I'm partially deflecting ill intent at money instead of at pure malice. Which isn't all that comforting to me in the end because I still have to trust the mechanism that got us here to undo the damage it did. I just try to find comfort in small victories which might be self delusion in itself
I meant that some people are taking this joke way too far. Not sure how this is antithetical to my point. Bunch of morons taking a joke way too far to the detriment of all humankind. Sounds literally exactly like the evangelical fascination with Revelation (which was a political cartoon when originally written).No, what we are seeing here is mankind's ability to delude itself en masse, assisted by the internet. What remains to be understood is the necessary size of a "core" group of members (presumably malicious?) to influence X% of the population, or whether or not this is actually a natural phenomenon that occurs when you disrupt traditional hierarchies of information flow. Unfortunately, there is nothing historically analogous to the impact that internet has had and will continue to have on civilization.
You know, it's strange, I went to Sunday School almost every week for about 15 years, and no one ever happened to mention that Revelation was political in nature. And especially not a joke. Are those widely held beliefs? I mean, among biblical scholars? Fun fact: the sign of the beast... sin(666)... is exactly the negative of half of the golden ratio, phi (1.6180337889...). So we're all going to heaven, basically
I went to Sunday school but in Episcopal church, which is more like just learning that white people are rich and live in big houses and no one really takes the Jesus thing seriously we just don't really like Catholics. I never really heard of Revelation when I was a kid. The first time I remember hearing about the Rapture was on an episode of the Simpsons when Flanders' family gets Raptured. This is a decent primer into the political nature of Revelation: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/03/05/big-reveal Also, WTF?!??! How is that even possible about the golden ratio? That can't be a coincidence, right? Was that part of the joke? Was the golden ratio even discussed in Roman times? Did they use degrees? I'm so confused right now.
I never did manage to figure out a possible explanation for the 666 thing. Any research using the internet typically devolves into batshit craycray very quickly.