Documentary Claims to Unmask 'Q'. Are Q's Drops Over? (mashable.com) 150
QAnon "was all but confirmed to be a hoax by the person who ran the hoax," writes Mashable, citing the finale of a six-episode documentary on HBO by Cullen Hoback.
"All of it leads back to the same place — that there are very few other people who could have and would have made the Q drops other than the person who ran the place where they were posted," notes Newsweek: Ahead of the first episode, Ron Watkins posted on encrypted messaging service Telegram stating: "I am not Q. I've never spoken privately with Q. I don't know who Q is." However, during the final episode, Hoback suggests that Ron Watkins slips up and inadvertently reveals that he posted as Q on 8kun
A BBC investigative reporter on disinformation tweeted that climactic moment from Cullens' documentary, adding "It was so good it made the whole six hours worth it."
Or as Mashable puts it, "Ron Watkins seems to admit he's Q, in the dumbest possible ending to QAnon," calling it "so anticlimactic it bordered on absurd." The previously camera-shy Watkins — who runs 8kun [formerly 8chan] alongside his father, Jim — has long been the key suspect for the identity of Q... But his accidental reveal, the slip of the mask is huge, if anticlimactic, news... It's wild and so...dumb...that this is how we all find out — because Watkins slipped up for a second.
It makes sense since Q had somewhat inexplicably tied its fortunes to posting only on 8chan/8kun. It's inexplicable unless, you know, the Watkins family was behind the ordeal.
Insider notes that Fredrick Brennan, the software developer who created 8chan and has since become a vocal critic, also believes Q is one of the Watkins' — a theory investigated last June by the Atlantic. And in a September investigation, ABC News reported on the likelihood that Watkins is Q, finding that he and his son, Ron, were the "two Americans most clearly associated" with Q drops. The theory was also popularized by a September "Reply All" podcast episode...
At the end of February 2020, Watkins registered the PAC, "Disarm the Deep State," with the Federal Elections Commission.
They also note that after the documentary aired on HBO, "the community reacted as many experts suspected it would: denial and accusations of 'fake news.'" Watkins had apparently gone to great lengths to suggest to Cullen that Q was instead former Trump advisor Steve Bannon. And last week, the BBC reporter points out, Watkins' father began suggesting a new theory: that Q was actually....documentary maker Cullen Hoback. But the BBC reporter adds: Based on the finale of #QIntotheStorm Q drops are over for good. Both Jim and Ron told Cullen Hoback Q would end after the election, and that's exactly what happened.
We already had proof of the end given there haven't been any drops since 8 December, but we can now be certain.
Hoback's tweet specifically says that "Both Ron and Jim, but especially Ron, told me multiple times over the years that they believed Q would cease at the election." And Hoback adds:
"Ron implied on more than one occasion it *might be* a marketing campaign."
"All of it leads back to the same place — that there are very few other people who could have and would have made the Q drops other than the person who ran the place where they were posted," notes Newsweek: Ahead of the first episode, Ron Watkins posted on encrypted messaging service Telegram stating: "I am not Q. I've never spoken privately with Q. I don't know who Q is." However, during the final episode, Hoback suggests that Ron Watkins slips up and inadvertently reveals that he posted as Q on 8kun
A BBC investigative reporter on disinformation tweeted that climactic moment from Cullens' documentary, adding "It was so good it made the whole six hours worth it."
Or as Mashable puts it, "Ron Watkins seems to admit he's Q, in the dumbest possible ending to QAnon," calling it "so anticlimactic it bordered on absurd." The previously camera-shy Watkins — who runs 8kun [formerly 8chan] alongside his father, Jim — has long been the key suspect for the identity of Q... But his accidental reveal, the slip of the mask is huge, if anticlimactic, news... It's wild and so...dumb...that this is how we all find out — because Watkins slipped up for a second.
It makes sense since Q had somewhat inexplicably tied its fortunes to posting only on 8chan/8kun. It's inexplicable unless, you know, the Watkins family was behind the ordeal.
Insider notes that Fredrick Brennan, the software developer who created 8chan and has since become a vocal critic, also believes Q is one of the Watkins' — a theory investigated last June by the Atlantic. And in a September investigation, ABC News reported on the likelihood that Watkins is Q, finding that he and his son, Ron, were the "two Americans most clearly associated" with Q drops. The theory was also popularized by a September "Reply All" podcast episode...
At the end of February 2020, Watkins registered the PAC, "Disarm the Deep State," with the Federal Elections Commission.
They also note that after the documentary aired on HBO, "the community reacted as many experts suspected it would: denial and accusations of 'fake news.'" Watkins had apparently gone to great lengths to suggest to Cullen that Q was instead former Trump advisor Steve Bannon. And last week, the BBC reporter points out, Watkins' father began suggesting a new theory: that Q was actually....documentary maker Cullen Hoback. But the BBC reporter adds: Based on the finale of #QIntotheStorm Q drops are over for good. Both Jim and Ron told Cullen Hoback Q would end after the election, and that's exactly what happened.
We already had proof of the end given there haven't been any drops since 8 December, but we can now be certain.
Hoback's tweet specifically says that "Both Ron and Jim, but especially Ron, told me multiple times over the years that they believed Q would cease at the election." And Hoback adds:
"Ron implied on more than one occasion it *might be* a marketing campaign."
Why the heck is this even on Slashdot? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Why the heck is this even on Slashdot? (Score:5, Informative)
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Really? That rates as a "Hot comment" to be featured. Looks like troll food to me. RE: AC FP BS.
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There are fads which are more or less internet based. It is true that as the internet has become nearly ubiquitous it is harder to say whether something is internet based in an intrinsic fashion or whether it is just that everything is on the internet now. But if for example one had an article about say some controversy involving popular professional football player, it would be clear off topic for Slashdot even if parts of it had played out over the internet.
As for the idea that this is somehow "liber
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As for the idea that this is somehow "liberal fodder" that seems to have two issues. First, while Q-Anon is an actual thing happening among people, mostly associated with the American right. But that doesn't make it "liberal fodder" except in so far as it makes the right look bad
Its the counterbalance to ANTIFA meaning its a relatively small group of extremist wackos with no real power inside the party that the other side can use to smear you. Its shitty when it happens to the left. Its shitty when it happens to the right. Because you know what we are not doing? Debating real issues.
Re:Why the heck is this even on Slashdot? (Score:5, Informative)
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In fairness, General Flynn is a ratshit crazy conspiracy theorist and sold his country out to the russians (and got convicted for it) so his endorsement don't count for much, although does seem to point at a wider pathology within movement Conservatism of not acting on signs representatives have gone off the rails and in fact amplifying it.
Politics is anxiety inducing. Any position can lead to spiral eyed devotion to the point of completely disco
Re:Why the heck is this even on Slashdot? (Score:5, Informative)
I'm not sure why you are talking about the Steele dossier since it isn't at all related to any of the topic at hand. That appears to be a variant of the same treating-politics-as-a-sports-game issue where an unrelated point against the "other side" is somehow more important than actually dealing with the issues at hand. In this particular case, your comment about "burning cities" isn't terribly relevant or responding to the actual data which was looking at how in favor of self-identified Republicans and self-identified Democrats are in favor of political violence. If you do want to instead focus on violence by extremists in each, then the data there is itself pretty interesting but shows a similar pattern. The most violent ideological terrorists if one looks at number of deaths going back to 1992 in the US have been Islamic extremists (primarily due to 9/11 being so massive), then right-wing extremists, and then left-wing extremists, with right-wing groups killing about 10 times as many people as left wing groups. See data here https://www.cato.org/blog/terrorism-deaths-ideology-charlottesville-anomaly [cato.org] (and note that that is an analysis by the Cato Institute, hardly a group biased in favor of the left.)
Note that those numbers come out in part due to the Oklahoma City bombing, which accounted for 77% of right-wing deaths in the US, but even if one drops that event, that still makes right-wing deadly violence at about twice that of left-wing deadly violence. Also, this is to some extent, a post-Soviet situation. In the 1970s and 1980s, deadly violence due to left-wing groups around the world was much more common, in part due to massive support from the USSR. See for example the history of the Red Brigades and the Weather Underground.
The GOP is Q-Anon. It's fucking pathetic. (Score:4, Informative)
Ask a Q-Tard what he thinks about Trump, and we say that Moscow Donald was the best President over (unironically).
Then look at all the republican traitors who tried to block the election of Joe Biden with their treasonous, violent insurrection at the capitol.
Look at all the Q propaganda mixed in with Trump flags, racist propaganda, and other Republican calling cards.
Open your eyes, and watch what the GOP's propaganda machine is selling. At this point the Republican party is Q-Anon.
Re:The GOP is Q-Anon. It's fucking pathetic. (Score:4, Insightful)
> Moscow Donald
Why did Hunter Biden receive a $3.5M payment from the wife of Moscow's most corrupt major ever while Joe was VP?
cf. Confession through Projection
It's really a simple answer: he didn't.
Maybe look into some books on critical thinking?
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Ah the magical laptop that nobodys seen, that supposedly was taken by the FBI and then.. nothing.
Kinda seems like that whole thing was a big ol' nothingburger to me.
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Of course, this news got no play on the MSM.
I suspect that's because everyone in the "MSM" already knew it was his laptop, and those who didn't know assumed it as such. MSM covers things people give a shit about or things which may be important. This is neither of them.
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https://www.usatoday.com/story... [usatoday.com]
Re:The GQP is Q-Anon. It's fucking pathetic. (Score:3)
What is this GOP thingee you referenced?
Brand hijack. Now it's the GQP. Actually a double hijack. On the GQP side they stand for government of the corporations, by the lawyers, for the richest 0.1%, while on the Trumplican side, it's just government of, by, and for the Donald.
Re: The GOP is Q-Anon. It's fucking pathetic. (Score:3)
Who cares? Unlike Trump, Joe Biden didn't immediately move his defective offspring into the White House and demand they all be given security clearances.
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Hey, you don't know that bill_mcgonigle isn't being paid by Russia. Putin has a pretty big budget for paying agents like bill_mcgonigle.
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Couldn't the same be said for anyone? With the number of shell companies and cutouts involved, how do we not know that [insert any name here] didn't receive the $3.5M payment?
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Re: The GOP is Q-Anon. It's fucking pathetic. (Score:2)
+many. The Q is out of the bag. Thereâ(TM)s no putting it back in. No matter what is revealed about its origins.
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Only Democrats listen to Q-Anon (Score:2)
Re: Only Democrats listen to Q-Anon (Score:2)
All I know is to never trust a politician.
An Q is most likely one that's trolling.
But sometimes anonymous posters can come with valuable info. But it has to be independently verified.
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Final Q Drop - Trump is an obvious Russian agent. (Score:5, Informative)
On Tuesday, the Republican-chaired Senate Intelligence Committee released a report with damning details of the extent of cooperation between the Trump campaign and Russian intelligence operatives.
The Post reports: "The long-awaited report from the Senate Intelligence Committee contains dozens of new findings that appear to show more direct links between Trump associates and Russian intelligence, and pierces the president's long-standing attempts to dismiss the Kremlin's intervention on his behalf as a hoax." These include a determination "that a longtime partner of Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort was, in fact, a Russian intelligence officer."
Also according to The Post:
The report also for the first time cites evidence that that alleged operative, Konstantin Kilimnik, may have been directly involved in the Russian plot to break into a Democratic Party computer network and provide plundered files to the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks. . . .
It offers new proof that former national security adviser Michael Flynn lied about his conversations with the Russia's ambassador to the United States, raises troubling questions about Manafort's decision to squander a plea agreement with prosecutors by lying to Mueller's team, and accuses Blackwater founder Erik Prince of 'deceptive' accounts of his meetings with a Russian oligarch in the Seychelles weeks before Trump was sworn into office.
Just as Norman Eisen, former counsel for the House impeachment managers, detailed in his book "A Case for the American People: The United States v. Donald J. Trump," the intelligence committee report suggests, according to The Post, that there was evidence Trump had lied about discussions concerning Roger Stone and the WikiLeaks release of stolen Democratic emails. "Collusion simply means Trump and those around him wrongly working together with Russia and its satellites, and the fact of that has long been apparent," Eisen told me. "Indeed, it was clear to anyone with eyes from the moment Trump asked, 'Russia, if you're listening.' " Eisen added, "The Senate report is a valuable contribution advancing our understanding, including explaining former Trump campaign chief Paul Manafort's nexus to Russian intelligence. The report further elucidates our understanding of collusion via WikiLeaks, which acted as a Russian cut-out."
In addition, the Trump Tower meeting on June 9, 2016, with Manafort and Donald Trump Jr. included Natalia Veselnitskaya, a Russian attorney and, according to the report "part of a broader influence operation targeting the United States that was coordinated, at least in part with elements of the Russian government."
That Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), the acting committee chairman, declared there was no evidence of collusion is belied by the mounds of evidence in the bombshell-filled report. Eisen tweeted, "I said it was collusion at the time and I have not wavered. Every additional piece of evidence that has come in has only proved it more."
Max Bergmann, who runs the Center for American Progress's Moscow Project told me, "He did it. He colluded with Russia during the 2016 election." He added, "The bipartisan report from the Senate Intelligence Committee should erase any lingering doubt that Trump and his campaign deliberately sought out and coordinated with Russia and its influence operations during the election." Moreover, "the report also demonstrates that the president of the United States is a clear counterintelligence threat to the country. He is not only compromised by his close contact with the Kremlin but he eagerly sought out covert Russian support in 2016." Bergmann warns that "Trump is certainly willing to cheat again in 2020, and there is no doubt the Kremlin will do what it can to help him."
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) acknowledged proof of the "alarming lengths to which Donald Trump and his campaign welcomed and relied on a hostile foreign power's interference in the 2016 election." However, Pelosi stressed Russia's ongoing efforts to interfere with our electio
Old nonsense (Score:3)
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It's still bullshit no matter what some fool with mod points says it is.
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No, he isn't.
No, he wasn't.
No, its not.
and finally. No, he's not.
You people really need to get this Russian conspiracy bullshit out of your head. Not that we have had the final word on that, we can move along.
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You speak for yourself and nobody else. You don't get to decide what is the final word on anything, regardless of topic. At least pretend to be honest.
I speak for The Truth, and once that is laid out for you, your option no longer matters. If I tell you that a discussion is settled then its settled. You have nothing more to add to it.
Please keep that in mind when going forward. Carry on.
Idiocy hasn't stopped yet (Score:1, Interesting)
Are you guys in the USA running competitions who can post the most inane drivel? Are you giving out prizes for this rubbish?
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Still more factual than BlueAnon. (Pee tapes, Jussie Smollett, Cocaine Mitch, Hunter Biden's laptop as Russian disinformation, Ukraine, police officer's head bashed in, etc.)
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Why is it when a rightie gets caught in a lie they immediately point the finger at the horrible liberals.
As if somehow pointing out that since the worst people on the planet did it, it's fine if i do it.
Like they have no moral standard of their own, because any shitty thing done by anyone anywhere is all the rationalization they need to be just as big as a piece of shit as those they pretend rail against,
After all how can you claim someone else is terrible and you're better if you never miss a chance to emu
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Are you guys in the USA running competitions who can post the most inane drivel? Are you giving out prizes for this rubbish?
Well, we did once give the presidency to such a person, and then lived with it for 4 years before sobering up...
Re:Idiocy hasn't stopped yet (Score:5, Interesting)
The reality is that Q is irrelevant. What is relevant is that so many people want to believe not what is evidence based, but what conforms to their expectations. So even though novel viruses have mutated and spread through animals through history, so many want to believe COVID came from a Chinese lab, and will defy all logic to keep that hope alive.
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QAnon followers are like the fan from Galaxy Quests, where near the end when he's told "it's all true" over the phone, he immediately shouts "I Knew It!" despite the lack of evidence.
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Re:Idiocy hasn't stopped yet (Score:4, Insightful)
Are you guys in the USA running competitions who can post the most inane drivel? Are you giving out prizes for this rubbish?
Yes, exactly that. Ever since the internet drove the cost of making news down to near zero, that's exactly what's going on in the U.S., and anywhere else without China-level controls. Rubbish = engagement = Advertising money.
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Are you guys in the USA running competitions who can post the most inane drivel? Are you giving out prizes for this rubbish?
Yes, exactly that. Ever since the internet drove the cost of making news down to near zero, that's exactly what's going on in the U.S., and anywhere else without China-level controls. Rubbish = engagement = Advertising money.
The weird thing is that 8kun makes no money. I can't understand why they run the site either.
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Does a seat in the US congress count as a prize?
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A booby prize maybe.
Yes absolutely!! (Score:3)
I am Spartacus (Score:2)
First thought -- Q from Star Trek Next Gen? (Score:1)
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Or also Q from the James Bond movies. Those are the only two valid understandings for "Q".
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There's also https://www.cbc.ca/radio/q [www.cbc.ca] though it is not a capital q
Don't know if it's true (Score:2)
Don't really care, TBH. But this is the first vaguely sensible thing I've ever heard about QAnon.
news sources (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:news sources (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly, my "favorite" aspect of these nuts has been "MSM can't be trusted" but some entity posting under a pseudonym, well that sounds like a trustworthy source to them.
And I'm not saying there aren't loads of problem with so-called main-stream media, I'm just saying for every reason you have to mistrust them, you have a thousand times more reasons to mistrust randos on the Internet.
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Exactly, my "favorite" aspect of these nuts has been "MSM can't be trusted" but some entity posting under a pseudonym, well that sounds like a trustworthy source to them.
It's not simply the MSM, because Fox, and to a lessor extent Newsmax and OAN (One America News Network), are also part of the Main Stream Media -- just not *their* MSM... They only trust sources that tell them what they want to believe w/o engaging in any critical thinking.
Q never made much sense. (Score:4, Informative)
"Q" is supposed to be a former high-ranking military individual with security clearance.
But "Q" clearances are issued by the DoE. In other words, to civilians, for work on nuclear weapons. A high-ranking military official would not have Q clearance.
Re:Q never made much sense. (Score:5, Funny)
Why try to apply logic to something so absurd?
It's like someone told you they just saw a flying pig, and you're trying to reason they must be lying because it was foggy on the day they claimed to see it.
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With sufficient thrust, pigs fly just fine.
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My theory is that someone heard it in an old Bond film and thought it sounded cool and made it sound spy-like and it was just pure coincidence that it also turned out to be a DoE thing.
Who cares? (Score:1, Troll)
Qanon is 1% news and 99% manufactured narrative to make us think that crazy white supremacists have taken over the Republican Party. I really don't care what the media has to say about qanon or q.
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Every democracy is governed by a coalition of interest groups. A common anti-pattern in parliamentary democracies is the emergence of a small party that can play a kingmaker role by joining or defecting from a government. Although the faction the party represents is small, it can drive national policy.
The exact same thing happens in the US two party system, but because there are only two parties that matter the coalitions happen between *factions of each party*. Neither party is truly ideologically coher
Reading list (Score:3)
Facts don't matter (Score:2)
It really doesn't matter (Score:5, Insightful)
So the basic problem here is you've got a ton of people trying to make sense of the world. Religion is waning and they need a new framework. For many (most?) the new framework to understand why the world is what it is is science.
But, well, for some science is so far beyond their kin that it might as well be magic. Worse science, specifically climate change, is threatening their jobs ("It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.").
But they still need a framework to make sense of the world. Along comes the Fox News style propaganda. This is how you got "spontaneous" Tea Party demonstrations announced weeks in advance by Fox and where you'd find porta poties and guys selling Tea Party branded shirts.
But eventually these things run their course, their insanity gets debunked and made fun of until the people involved are forced to at least stop talking about it. It's usually around the time Family Guy does an episode on the topic (a few months/years after South Park does and a decade or two before the Simpsons did it).
Q is running out of steam. The question isn't who started it or why, that doesn't matter. What we should be asking is: What's next for the Fox News/OAN/NewsMax types? What are they going to slyly promote next in order to keep the sheep in line?
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I agree with most of your message, except:
1) Lack of trust in science seems more a matter of lack of education, than anything else. Science education in the USA is an absolute joke compared to Europe. Typically you go through highschool in USA only doing one or two years of each science subject. In the UK you'll be doing all 9 core subjects (incl. math/physics/chemistry/biology) every year from age 12 until you graduate. If you don't understand how the world works then you're wide open to being suckered int
I'm not worried (Score:5, Informative)
Fox News is very much about keeping sheep in line. Go read up on it's history. It was created specifically to be the propaganda arm of the Republican party. No joke, originally Roger Ailes wanted it to be integrated directly into the party and possibly the government. He had to buy his way on the air with $21 million because at the time nobody would run it.
It doesn't matter what side the guests on, what matters is what side O'Reilly's on.
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Is this the same knowledgeable UK population that voted in favor of Brexit? And had people burning [cnet.com]
/.ers know (Score:3)
that Q is John de Lancie
Doc was a bit of a bait and switch (Score:3)
80% of it was about 8chan and its white supremacist groups and 20% about Qanon. I enjoyed it, but really was looking for a deeper dive into the whole QAnon than it did.
But thats what the deep state WANT you to believe (Score:2)
Q is really Matt Gaetz (Score:1)
He's being watched very closely now so has to stop releasing 'Q' thoughts to his followers.
Don't worry people. His master will soon be taking back the reins. Donald just has to finish his round of golf first.
Never Thought of Q as One Person (Score:3)
On a semi-related note, I was wondering how Republicans were going to handle the responsibility of having full control of the federal government. For almost a decade they had a Democrat in the White House and a Democrat majority in some chambers for some of those years to blame everything on. Republicans then took it all by riling up their constituents and getting them even more pissed. The problem was that the anger they fomented in their base wouldn't be easily quelled and they no longer had the boogieman of Democrats to blame it on. And then came Q who "revealed" a cabal of pedophilic, blood-sucking Democrats constantly attempting to undermine their Republican superiors. It was perfect - except the part about making any sense but that didn't matter since many are living in a post-fact alternate reality where arguing with facts is like bringing a dildo to a gunfight.
Q is NOT one person! (Score:2)
The design / nature of the whole communication system used prevents verification of a single account for the messages. It doesn't require a hacker to post messages as Q.
It is FAR more IDIOTIC than most people realize; the only thing more stupid would be if Q was using telepathy and sending messages to "patriots" to spread his word!
I've been told by people who followed Q that there were people lying and just claiming to have read Q messages that were never posted (not like it mattered much given the audienc
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It's not. Q posts are still appearing on various boards. Some are poor imitations of the original. Some are more convincing. Although the issue of 'is this really Q' is a set of conspiracy theories unto itself.
And then came Q who "revealed" a cabal of pedophilic, blood-sucking Democrats
This was just human nature at work. People tend to search for and 'see' patterns in noise. And that's how we got religions and other crap. Take any group that tends to attract pedophiles (due to a lack of moral principles). People just start to connect the dots and look for some organizational structu
The father admitted it the most openly (Score:3)
"It began as a LARP (Live Action Role Play), and it's now real". These people are human scum and should be face charges both for their role in qanon, and the attack on the US Capitol.
I hope someone kills the son of a bitch (Score:2)
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QAnon? (Score:2)
Lord help us!
conspiracy paranoiac (Score:2)
You won't believe how weird the mind of a conspiracy paranoiac works.
Ever heared of the Bielefeld Conspiracy? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
This is an absurd satiric conspiracy theory that this 300.000 citizen town doesn't exist.
Even though people could just travel over there and check if there is a Bielefeld or not.
And I am not talking about people from australia who refuse the long journey but about people living like 20km next to Bielefeld.
The theory poses three questions:
Wrong (Score:2)
Who needed Q? (Score:3)
I've known that this world is run by evil, corrupt, and spiritually wicked people, powers, and principalities long before Q came on the scene. Do any of you really believe those sitting in positions of worldly power are there to work for you? AND, it's gonna get much worse...
Read your Bible kids. God's Word hasn't failed me yet after ~40 years of study, and it's more on point and helpful now than it's ever been.
Re:Glad I'm not on social media or care about rume (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re: Glad I'm not on social media or care about rum (Score:2)
political nihilists have a legal right to complain. but nobody cares about their opinions.
Re:Glad I'm not on social media or care about rume (Score:5, Insightful)
Presumably you are posting on slashdot because you enjoy doing so. It's normal enough, since humans are pack animals we enjoy conversing with each other and/or arguing, insulting, and proving each other wrong. Anything done for enjoyment alone can be represented as a "waste of time," though it is unfair to do so, since a certain level of joy is necessary for mental health (though I would never recommend participation in slashdot as a method of improving mental health, for what that's worth).
I somewhat agree with your attitude of general powerlessness in politics. Voters don't have nearly as much power as we like to believe we do. The primary effect of the enterprise of voting is to give a sense of authenticity to the power that our current leaders hold over us, thus producing the buy-in that is necessary to keep people compliant enough to keep a country running. Voters like to believe that the primary effect is THEM choosing who their leaders are and determining what those leaders do. THAT is the lie that creates the buy-in that makes voting worth all the fuss our leaders put into it.
The president doesn't actually have very much power, most of it is focused in congress. And the setup that we have forces members of congress to cooperate with each other in order to actually accomplish anything. That means, in effect, that the only way to get anything done is to "sell out" to the other side, at least to some degree. In theory this means they have to perpetually find the middle ground between the political extremes, but in practice it mostly means they engage in shady deals of mutual back-scratching and all of them mostly just do whatever makes them the most in legal bribe money from their corporate sponsors.
And that is where the real power is held: the wealthy elite. You can read more about that in this article [washingtontimes.com] about a university study that found that America is a democracy in form only, and actually functions as an oligarchy.
(Yes, I used the word "oligarchy" but no, I am not endorsing or supporting in any way that moron who recently tried to blow up a data center to "fight the oligarchy")
I have already typed too much. What I am really getting at is that there ARE things you can do that are politically impactful, but voting is one of the lowest-impact options, supporting lobbies with cold-hard cash is more impactful, but all your options (unless you run a megacorporation) will require you to "jump in" with a large group and pool resources before you can get anything done.
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This argument about powerlessness is false. Two examples from over the pond, where I live, in germany.
Months ago the government decided on mask mandates. So now you have to wear masks in shopping centers and in public gatherings, which are mostly prohibited anyways. Shortly after the infection rates went down. Then you could start hearing some people getting angry about the masks. Conversations went like
"Person 1: Why do we have to ware masks, the infection rates are low anyways."
"Person 2: They are low bec
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Q is a poster on 4chan, and later 8chan. 4chan is an anonymous image board. 8chan is like 4chan, but you can create and administer your own boards. 8chan was relaunched as 8kun with stricter rules, after they were cut off by Cloudflare (a reverse proxy to protect against DDOS attacks).
He posted various conspiracy theories, the most famous of which being that Obama and other rich folks are running a child sex-trafficking ring, with Donald Trump trying to expose and destroy the ring. Most of these claims have
Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)
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WTF is a Q? And how is this news for nerds?
Car accident? Drug overdose? I know Americans don't like sharing medical details but I'm genuinely curious as to why you spent the past year in a coma.
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It really doesn't. The QAnon crowd are a very small, rather embarrassing, but very noisy and attention-hungry minority. From https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/07... [cnn.com]:
Sorry, that's not how it works with ideology... (Score:4, Informative)
Sorry... but a fascist supporter IS a fascist.
Claiming that they are "neutral (11%), or weren't sure or didn't know (45%)" doesn't work in this case.
Once you elect and/or support fascists - you are a fascist. It's an ideology.
And unlike, say, animal-rights activism, due to its core vileness - there is no neutral option with fascism. You are either against it - or you're a fascist. There is no middle ground.
Republican voters elected Qanon loons like Taylor Greene and Boebert - without a peep from anyone on that side.
And they kept supporting them, openly and tacitly, despite [wikipedia.org] their actions. [wikipedia.org]
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The comment I replied to claimed that QAnon "shapes the political opinions of an almost majority of people in the US". That's not even close to true, as I showed with my link. Why do you think your rant has anything to do with that? Your attitude reminds me of the horseshoe theory and an infamous saying: "Tutto nello Stato, niente al di fuori dello Stato, nulla contro lo Stato."
Re:Sorry, that's not how it works with ideology... (Score:5, Interesting)
So funny because MTG was a carpet bagger in the first place. You'd think Georgia would hate carpet baggers, but she moves to the district just to get elected because she knew she would lose badly in her home district. It's not that the new district really cared about MTG, they were just rabidly anti-Democrat and would have voted for any ventriloquist dummy with an R label.
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That's not quite how it works. As you've noted, fascism is an ideology. Therefore, people who are fascist are those who share the ideology. History is full of examples of people who weren't ideologically fascist, but who supported fascists because they thought they had something to gain from it; indeed, most of German right in the Nazi era (before they fully took over the government) was like that.
One particularly stark example is the 1931 Prussian Landtag referendum, in which NSDAP was backed by the KPD.
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The last time I checked, Congress had 535 members, and 2% of 535 is considerably more than two.
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You've got me on the numbers. I suppose I let the enormity of the situation influence my perception of scale. As one might do when describing the 40 square foot fire in a 1070 sq/ft house.
To some extent Q anon is getting used as shorthand for the various delusions that animate America's right wing: Trump established his GOP bonafides claiming that there was a giant conspiracy to make Barak Obama look like a natural born citizen when he was actually born in Kenya (he allegedly sent investigators in Hawaii w
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The snag was that Trump did not want to disavow Q, because he saw that any supporter, no matter how clinically insane, was a great supporter and should be embraced. So he would toss out tidbits to keep the rabid fans frothing at the mouth and then later deny that he even knew what QAnon was (the most well informed person on the entire planet, if he paid attention that is). Maybe he figured out by that point that his popularity was so low that he needed every last voter if he was going to win.
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Bullshit. Many of the people involved in the Q nonsense were 9-11 "truthers [thedailybeast.com]. To a large extent these are the same people.
And the fact that Trump received direct support from Putin, and carried water for him, is now a well documented fact [washingtonpost.com]. His subservience to Putin and acting to advance Russia's interests were no concealed in any way.
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And how about the many more who don't really put much stock in the 9/11 conspiracies and who believe more that Trump would take help from anywhere he could get it and that Putin would naturally see Trump as a means to weaken America but aren't so sure it rises to the level of conspiracy?
Those people are also laughing loud and long about conservatives that fell for the Qcrazy, especially the ones that treat Trump and/or Q like they were the second coming of Christ? (there are golden statues and everything!)
T
Re: Meaningless in the real world (Score:5, Insightful)
You don't need some nutty thing like that to choose something other than nutty leftism.
That might be easier to believe if conservatives could go one election cycle without inventing a new nutty boogie man, like the war on Christianity, voter replacement theory, some new mark of the beast variant, etc.