-QAnon is in essence
a conspiracy theory
that gives hope to people
who want the things
it says to be true.
-And according to the
conspiracy theory,
Trump is actually leading
an effort
to prosecute
villainous Democrats,
most of whom are engaged
in baby sex trafficking rings
and committing
other heinous crimes.
-It also wraps in "deep state"
conspiracy theories.
It is used as a hopeful way
to explain things
like the Mueller probe
into the Trump campaign.
-I personally believe that much
of what we are taught
and told by authorities
or institutions in this country
is false information.
It looks to be
a public intelligence
dissemination program
whereby they're utilizing
anonymous online posting boards
such as 4chan and 8chan
as a back channel
to give the public information
to help guide them,
to help show the way and let
them know what's really going on
and what's going on
behind the scenes.
-Although Trump hasn't given
any indication
that he is aware of QAnon
or believes it,
he is the person who I guess
inadvertently started it.
He made a cryptic statement
to reporters in early October
where he talked about
the "coming storm,"
a statement that he then
refused to explain.
-The calm, the calm
before the storm.
-The phrase "the storm" has come
to be super important to people
who believe or circulate
these posts,
where "the storm refers to this
kind of coming mass justice
against all of Trump's enemies.
After this statement a few weeks
later,
there started to be
these kind of anonymous posts
on a site called 4chan.
They started spreading
to other platforms,
like YouTube and like Reddit,
where people who maybe aren't as
familiar with how 4chan works
or how to read
it could start to access
and see these posts
and get excited about them.
-I came across Q at the end
of October in 2017.
And it was within the first
maybe one, two, or three days.
Now I first started seeing these
posts on Twitter, actually.
-A bunch of people who believe
in QAnon
or wanted to give it
more visibility
showed up to a Trump
rally wearing T-shirts
and carrying signs
that had big letter Q's on them.
Many media outlets covered that
and explained what QAnon was
and began to kind of dive
into this breakthrough moment
for this conspiracy theory.
-People who believe in the QAnon
conspiracy theory --
-Conspiracy theories
are so broad
and often bizarre -- -It is also
shockingly widespread --
-It's like an
alternative-reality game.
-Experts I've talked to
who study media amplification
will often kind of describe
this paradox where journalists
who are reporting on
conspiracy theories or outlets
that are pursuing these stories
are simultaneously
doing important
and necessary work
and doing the worst possible
thing that they could do,
which is giving these conspiracy
theories an even wider audience.
-Common understanding
of conspiracy theories
and political life
says that people
who are out of power
politically cling
to political conspiracy theories
or advance political
conspiracy theories
to somehow explain
or justify their station.
What's different about QAnon
is that it's a vast conspiracy
theory advanced by proponents
of the victor
of the presidential election.
I think a lot of it is Trump
supporters who love Donald Trump
who look at the publicly
available evidence and say,
"Well, I'm a little
disappointed," right?
And a small fraction
of those people
then say there's some
other explanation for this
that transcends
the available evidence.
The vast majority of Americans,
including the vast majority
of Republicans,
including the vast majority
of Trump supporters
do not believe in or subscribe
to the QAnon conspiracy theory.
That being said, the Internet
has made exposure to QAnon
pretty easy to come by.
-First, you don't know how many
people who are circulating QAnon
really believe it, right?
So, there are a couple reasons
why you might circulate
a conspiracy theory.
One is because you believe it
to be true
and you want to awaken
the masses
to the truth of that theory.
Another reason
you might spread it
is you like to cause chaos.
The other thing is that
it's really easy to look big
on the Internet
without being big.
You know, it doesn't take
a lot of people
to get something trending,
particularly when you have
the help of outrage.
-It's incumbent upon
media institutions,
it's incumbent upon scholars,
it's incumbent upon anybody
who feels that an informed
citizenry matters
to actually tell
their fellow citizens,
"No, QAnon is false,
QAnon is not real,"
and then point them
to evidence showing why.
