Pardon me for asking a stupid question ...

Excuse me if this is a stupid question, but if QAnon is such an existential threat to our republic, as the media and federal law enforcement agencies would have us believe, why haven't they captured or neutralized this threat? After all, we're not talking about cave-hopping, Tora-Bora dwelling Jihadis. The alleged threat isn't emanating from some faraway land. Supposedly, this group is home grown and the US government, we are also led to believe, is keeping close tabs on them. Yet, with the plethora of mind-bogglingly sophisticated tracking and surveillance technology at their disposal, are we supposed to believe the government is helpless against this seemingly almighty foe? Isn't it obvious by now that this whole thing is a crock of BS? There, I said it.

If Q is for real and his rabbit droppings are not the fever dreams of a pig farmer, but real super spy squirrel goodies,

What? Do you think Q is a ghost? What does “for real” even mean. Either Q is on the inside of the administration, or he/they are not. That’s it. So enough with the condescending “super spy squirrel” nonsense.

So many of Q detractors will only ever try to talk about Q posts, and they keep insisting that Q is making predictions. The posters are making predictions, not Q and detractors are blaming Q for the posters. Much like you bringing up adrenochrome. It has been pointed out to you that Q never talked about it.

So the only question is is Q inside or outside?

Thinking logically. Would the person who coined the term “fake news”, be ok with someone pretending to send out information on his behalf? Heck, would anyone be ok with an anonymous person contacting the public saying they are you? Of course not. Some Q detractors have even stated they think Q is deep state. Honestly, the idea that DJT wouldn’t mind if deep state was lying to his supporters is just silly. One tweet. 20 seconds of his time. It stops. “Q is fake news” Done.

Now, can you explain to me why you think Q is on the outside. Please don’t use Q drops, because there are so many different interpretations of the same drop. Just a thoughtful theory on why, and who? you know, like a real discussion, instead of name calling.

“Democrats and their media mouthpieces can’t defend their ideas, so they smear and caricature and maliciously malign those holding dissenting views with oversimplifying labels as a means to shutdown debate altogether.”

Thanks, agreed! Their approach falls into the “No case! Abuse the witness!” category of prosecutorial practice.

Lets get the Presidents input on this subject.

PRESIDENT (PRESIDENT TRUMP) COMMENTS REGARDING Q:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNI553Np__k

“They like me very much.”

“Are you saving the world from pedophiles and cannibals?” “I haven’t heard that … “ “Is that supposed to be a good thing or a bad thing?”

President sidesteps issue of QAnon;
Denounces white supremacy, asked if JoJo and HoHo have denounced Antifa”
Asked if “Q Anon” is true, sidesteps issue.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hybkzCWb_w

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhibVl0m8FM

“Greasy Jim” Acosta:

“The President (Trump) knows about “Q-Anon” they are at his rallies ...etc”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enyep7yAKxY

IF Q does not have any connection to, or represent President Trump then he should end all this argument by simply stating that the SocDems, The Media, The McConnel/Ryan and “Licking Project” Republicans are correct and that Q is a fraud and a hoax and we should all go home and be more available to RNC calls asking for more money. He can end this all but for some reason does not. (And IF false, should end it.)

Q is clearly, to me, on the outside, as should be obvious from my previous posts that I think the Q thing started off as a LARP just for larks in the shadowy hinterlands of the internet, was subsequently taken over by grifters who took it to mainstream social media, and it spiraled from there (and made the grifters promoting it some nice $). Your opinion may differ and you have your right to it.

The adrenochrome chrome thing? There are Q followers right here on FR who believe in it. How did it start? Here you go:

****
It’s not surprising, as Q is very much a product of the channels on which it started. In the dark recesses of the 4chan and 8chan message boards, these theories have long been bandied about. The core tenets of QAnon are not so much novel as they are a reflection of what the users of these boards wanted to see.

That’s no coincidence, according to Fredrick Brennan, the founder of 8chan.

While he has distanced himself from his former site in recent years, he believes he knows who is really behind QAnon.

On a recent episode of the podcast Reply All, Brennan laid out his belief that Q was, originally, an 8chan moderator who had created the character to cosplay with fellow users, as part of a running bit where posters pretended to be anonymous security-cleared American officials.

To that end, many of the early tenets of Q were borrowed wholesale from the 8chan message boards. In early 2018, before hitting the big time, Q’s so-called drops of information included cryptic messages like “we haven’t started the drops re: human trafficking / sacrifices.” Other drops from the same time made oblique references to the CIA and its “ability to harvest”

That has spun off an entire homegrown conspiracy around the supposed harvesting of the chemical adrenochrome. Q followers believe that the sataan trafficking operation is all a means to abduct children and extract adrenochrome from their brains, injecting the chemical to stay young. Never mind that adrenochrome, while it has been touted for its mild hallucinogenic properties, isn’t produced by the human body. But it’s no coincidence that this theory has spread, Brennan said.

He pointed out that adrenochrome harvesting has been “a big thing” on 8chan for years. “I’d never seen it anywhere else, personally,” Brennan said. The puppet master behind Q must have known they would find a receptive audience for it.

***

Link: https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/10/06/qanon-creator-ultimate-conspiracy-theory-q/

One tweet would cause Q followers to abandon their belief in Q? I don’t think so, personally. I think you guys would claim that “Q says disinformation is necessary” as you always do. After all, this from Trump was not enough:

“I don’t know anything about QAnon,” Trump said when asked by “Today” co-anchor Savannah Guthrie whether he would denounce the conspiracy theory.

I have never called Q followers nasty names like QTtards and Qballs, I have stated I believe they are good people, caring people, patriotic people, smart people. I have stated I can see how the whole Q thing can be very attractive at this time. I have stated I do not think they should be censored. In return, I have sometimes gotten nasty posts and threats from certain Q followers who are not very polite. Some of you are polite. I respect that.

I have shown you the respect of taking time answering your questions politely. You are welcome. How about you explain why you think Q is on the inside?

One tweet would cause Q followers to abandon their belief in Q? I don’t think so, personally.

You really don’t understand what Q is at all. The entire point of Q is Donald Trump, and his ability, using his administration to get around our fake news. It is there to expose exactly how evil, not just corrupt, our system has become.

You copied and pasted from an article you linked to that is nothing but a Q hit piece.

Hey sideboard mod, did you know that us Q freepers believe in lizard people? Oh, and we are also terrorists, according to the article. And that isn’t even the half of it. is this what passes for research?

Anyway, I asked you why you think Q is on the outside, you said it was started as a lark. So, if true, then where is the fun in this lark. The motive per se. I would think the “fun” would be to try to get gullible people to believe what you were writing, and then mock and laugh at them.

This brings us to the entire point. Q, being inside the admin. or outside. THAT IS THE ONLY THING THAT MATTERS!

So are you saying that Trump does not care that his supporters are being mocked and ridiculed? See, I just don’t believe that. He could have sent out one single tweet. boom. Q (By the way, you can tell when people don’t have a clue they call Q Qanon) lol. Q is fake news.
Can you give me any logical reason why any slightly reasonable person wouldn’t let his group know they were being played?

Q did make predictions, Here is every QAnon prediction that’s failed to come true. Q started off making very specific predictions. When those did not come true, Q became vague and cryptic and asked questions without giving answers.In January, when someone on twitter posted that Biden faked being in the Oval Office and was on a movie, Q supporters were digging through Q drops to find where it was predicted. Q has made predictions, and Q followers interpret the drops as predictions.

It is not fair for Q supporters to say now Q never made predictions, when Q drops were clearly predictions and interpreted that way. and then shift the blame. If people are misintepreting Q, then it is on Q to clear it up. Q doesn't do that and none of Q's supporters try to hold Q accountable for anything.

The people who created Q came out and said it was a hoax, when analysis of Q indicated it was a hoax, it allgets ingored and dismissed. When Microchip explained how he helped create Q, Q responsed with drop #2125. I explained here how Q edited a discord screen shot and lied to discredit Microchip.

Why would Q need to fake a screenshot and lie about timestamps to discredit someone, if Q is real?
Who would do that, someone deep in the U.S. government, or the types who hang out on 4chan?

Trump supporters were mocked and ridiculed by the left long before anyone had ever heard of Q. Before Trump, they mocked and ridiculed the Tea Party and even referred to its adherents using an epithet for a peculiar homosexual practice.

Of course the article I linked to is critical of Q. Yes, it uses the term Qanon. Whether true Q followers like it or not, that is what the phenomenon has come to called by the press. It is also a better keyword for getting hits from internet searches than just the letter Q, so it continues to be used.

The article does not claim all Q followers believe in lizard people, and only mentions once that in Q World “David Icke’s stories of lizard people could be true.” (There was a mentally ill guy claiming to be a Q adherent in Seattle who stabbed his brother to death with a sword because he “thought he was a lizard person” but this was not mentioned in the article.) Later in the article, the author points out similarities between Icke’s writings (satanic rituals, secret cabal, the Rothschilds, international banking conspiracies, etc.) and Q drops.

The main theme of the article is the similarities between the Q phenomenon and other conspiracy theories and cults, and, as an example of where some of these cults have eventually led, cites Aum Shinrikyo and Heaven’s Gate.

From the article:

***
History is littered with cults and movements that have crafted a new world for their followers. A world where something revolutionary is happening just below their feet, and the only key to seeing it all is to wake up. As a favorite expression of conspiracy theorists, borrowed from the Matrix movies, is “take the red pill.” At their least damaging, these movements are a home for disaffected and frustrated people looking for a comforting alternative to a society in tumult. At their worst, this detachment from reality inspires acts of terrorism.
***

The following paragraphs concern Aum Shinrikyo and Heaven’s Gate.

“Foreign Policy” has always leaned left, increasingly so over over the past decade or so. I think it unfair fear-mongering to compare the Q thing to Aum Shinrikyo and Heaven’s Gate for the satisfaction of their pearl-clutching readers, but that’s what they do.

Q appears to have spawned few acts or attempted acts of terrorism. Here’s the only one that seems truly Q-driven:

https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/arizona/2021/01/04/qanon-follower-matthew-wright-sentenced-hoover-dam-bridge-standoff/4134612001/

The Corey Hurren case is often cited, as he posted some Q memes and whatnot, but it seems to me his downward spiral into attempted suicide-by-cop was actually driven by family and financial problems and isolation due to Covid lock downs.

A few other incidents and arrests commonly reported in what you might well call Q hit pieces appear to me to be kooks or drunks who happen to be Q followers doing the sorts of crazy things kooks and drunks do, not worthy of being labelled “Q terrorism”. In other words, to make it crystal clear, crazy acts committed by kooks and drunks have little or nothing to do with who they voted for, what they ate for breakfast, or whether they follow Q or not, and everything to do with their being kooks or drunks.

Where’s the fun in the lark? Apparently, some of the folks who hang out on places like 4chan and 8chan and 8kun get a kick out of role playing various high-level insider types. It’s a game to them, and they probably do laugh at those falling for it and taking them seriously. In the case of Q, it escaped the bounds of the dark web. Noticed as potentially lucrative, the Q thing was taken up by certain grifters and introduced into mainstream social media where it took off — and did prove lucrative for some.

Who is Q? I don’t know or particularly care, but the best evidence so far points to Watkins and/or his son (as well as means, motive and opportunity). Motive? Money, mainly, of course. Perhaps he also got a sort of power high off it, too.

Trump, when asked, said he did not know anything about Q. That is not enough for you. No, it must be a tweet, not a statement he made on national TV. His tweeting days are over now, so that is convenient for you.

Logically, why would he need to tweet about it? He made a public statement that was widely reported in the news. Why would he want to tweet about a movement he stated he knew nothing about?

By the way, Q followers are not his only supporters.

Logically, why would Trump turn to the ugly underbelly of the internet and choose a slimy site linked to mass shootings and known for providing a gathering place for neo-Nazis and pedophiles? He already had his tweeter to “get around the fake news”.

***
Can you give me any logical reason why any slightly reasonable person wouldn’t let his group know they were being played?
***

1. He does not consider Q followers as “his group”. Why should he, if he knows nothing about Q, did not start it, and is in no way affiliated with it?

2. He did let Q followers know, phrasing it as gently and politely as possible, that they were being played when he said he knew nothing about it on national television.

I still think it would make no difference to Q fanatics if Trump got his tweeter back and tweeted “Q is a hoax!” No, the Q community would claim “disinformation is a necessity” and go into overdrive divining a hidden message in the tweet based on the time stamp and the number letters in the tweet and the numerical values of the letters and run it through some sort of numerology hocus pocus mental machination to reveal something BIG is coming SOON. And, why did he tweet this NOW? It’s Proof! With a capital P! He’s sending us a message! Yes, something Big!

It’s just like the people on FR promoting the “Ashli Babbitt was a crisis actor and it was all fake blood” conspiracy theory. “No memorial service! Show me a memorial service!” When the memorial service happened and there were photos of it, they cried “fake memorial service with crisis actors!” Same with “Why don’t we hear anything from Ashli’s family, her friends?” When published quotes from her family and friends were provided, videos, etc., they cried “Fake news! Fake actors!” Nothing will ever convince them poor Ashli was not a crisis actor, that she was indeed shot to death on Jan. 6.

Speaking of Ashli, don’t you find it at least distasteful that Q followers would denounce one of their own as a “paid Antifa crisis actor” and ridicule her very real death as “fake”? Some of those promoting this “crisis actor” theory here on FR were Q followers. I find it appalling. She was a patriot with good intentions. She truly believed in Q, truly believed Jan. 6 was “The Storm” and believed they were about to rescue thousands of abused children and bring the evildoers to justice. She gave her life for her beliefs.

I have often mused that the Q thing is sort of like a real live Foucault’s Pendulum.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17841.Foucault_s_Pendulum

There is even “The Plan”! The entity (or entities) known as “Q” plays the part of Belbo, Diotallevi and Casaubon, feeding random bits of various conspiracy theories into the collective hivemind of the Anons and followers, who play the part of Abulafia (the nickname for the computer in the novel).

In the novel, Abulafia is programmed to follow certain rules for making associations between the disparate bits of various conspiracy theories and historical facts, crunches away, and spits out the Mother of All Conspiracy theories. In Q World, Q makes cryptic drops drawing on various conspiracy theories floating about in 4chan and 8chan, the anons and Q followers grind away doing their “research”, apparently using certain rules and adding “deltas” as well as associations, and come up with an amalgamated sort of conspiracy theory that goes viral once Q adds in bits of Christian eschatology to broaden the appeal.

Belbo, Diotallevi and Casaubon concoct “The Plan” partly out of boredom, partly for fun and partly to attract more authors and their money to their vanity press. Q appears to have had the same motivations, only instead of a vanity press, he owns 8chan. What started off as a LARPing lark soon became a means to an income stream.

Like the vanity press’s clients (who write books promoting their pet conspiracy theories), the early anons and Q promoters took it all seriously (and also saw money-making opportunities). And both the novel’s “Plan” and Q’s “Plan” took on lives if their own.

The novel pokes fun at many things in many levels: secret societies, intellectuals who take themselves too seriously, historical thrillers, conspiracy theories, and more — and even you, dear reader, if you take the book too seriously, taking it for a high-brow version of a Dan Brown novel, instead of enjoying all the jokes. (The book is basically one big 800+ page postmodern joke.) Like Causaubon, Q is an unreliable narrator (”disinformation is necessary”). I could go on and on.

It is likewise a cautionary tale about getting sucked down the rabbit hole of conspiracy theory, and the consequences of taking them too seriously.

If a loved one of mine was a Q fanatic, I’d be tempted to lock him up with a copy of Foucault’s Pendulum (providing meals of course) until he’d read the whole dang thing. Then he could be mad at me and Umberto Eco for wasting 800+ pages of his time on a conspiracy theory that turned out to be a giant hoax. That might take the sting out of having to admit to himself Q is a big hoax, and perhaps free him from Q World.

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