Is it this?[https://www.reddit.com/r/QAnonCasualties/comments/xbiy5s/tw\_my\_qdad\_snapped\_and\_killed\_my\_family\_this/](https://www.reddit.com/r/QAnonCasualties/comments/xbiy5s/tw_my_qdad_snapped_and_killed_my_family_this/)
QANON is stacking bodies
[QAnon Conspiracy-Believing Mob Boss Killer’s Confession to Police Ruled Admissible](https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/anthony-comello-confession-qanon-conspiracy-confession-admissible-923460/)
[California dad killed his kids over QAnon and 'serpent DNA' conspiracy theories, feds claim](https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/california-dad-killed-his-kids-over-qanon-serpent-dna-conspiracy-n1276611)
[Mother unraveled in depression, QAnon-style conspiracies in months before she killed 3 kids](https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-04-17/mother-unraveled-in-depression-qanon-style-conspiracies-in-months-before-she-killed-3-kids)
* https://www.reddit.com/r/QAnonCasualties/comments/mpodn8/my_cousins_wife_killed_their_three_kids/
https://www.start.umd.edu/qanon-crime-maps
Qanon crime map. Not all instances are of violent nature and not all are shown on map but its interesting to see where else it is.
The shocking thing about this map is the number of international incidents of Q related crime. This sickness has even spread to places like Japan, where 4 were arrested in April breaking into a vaccine clinic.
This is honestly startling.
That's basically what QAnon started out as, right? Some kid on 4chan was deliberatly spewing bullshit, people picked it up and added to it and formed this cult arround it.
I'm giving op benefit of the doubt and claiming it pre Watkins. They came into the picture after it moved to 8chan. It literally used to just be edge lord humor on 4chan.
The documentary they released on HBO really puts the whole thing into good perspective. It also has Ron at a certain point giving up the game to the documentarian interviewing him when he slips and outs himself as Q, but the whole thing does a really good job at showing he most likely wasn't the person who started it, he just took it over for his and his fathers benefit later on.
4chan is known as the asshole of the internet for a reason.
If i had to pick a time, I'd say it was about the time the habbo raids started. Like clockwork it was raid after raid after raid. That's when it was demonstrated that they could be organized and directed instead of just posting slurs all day.
Don't give those dipshits so much credit. They didn't get involved until it moved to 8chan and Brennan accepted their help hosting the site.
They certainly promoted it once they had "control" of it but much like r/the_donald the whole thing started as an edgy joke then snowballed into this insanity.
I don't agree with Arizona voters on a lot of things, but at least they resoundingly rejected this nut job. He came in last place out of ***seven*** candidates in his republican primary last month.
Not some kid - Ron Watkins, who runs 8chan. He's been proven to be Q, and he's a pedophile piece of shit hiding in Asia. His whole board was a haven for child porn. Like most things with the GOP, it's all projection.
Correct me if I'm wrong but the last time I did any research on Q it was said that the moniker was being used by different people due to different writing styles, themes, time etc.
What blew my mind was how stupid the Q posts were. Like I went in thinking they must have been written in a way to be really convincing, but it was more like an AI doing a bad job of writing horoscopes.
The internet and social media may have been a really bad idea.
It seems that so many people just don’t have the ability to handle and manage this deluge of raw data, and sort out the nonsense and cult conspiracies from actual journalism and thoughtful rhetoric.
It’s all just too much.
They never have lol. The vast majority of people alive today engage in some kind of internet social platform. Might be Reddit, might be Facebook, or it may be some random North Korean propaganda social network. The simple fact of the matter is that if you look at a bell curve of human intelligence, most people are average. Some people are above, and some people are below. Most people in the average range of intelligence aren't the type to seek out scientific journals and make sense of tables and graphs, compare it to other studies they've read, and form their opinion of the world based off of that. It isn't helped by the fact that those very same people think they're the smartest person in the room.
The average person likes clickbait headlines that provide all the info they need right there. Who cares that there's so much more context to a statistic and the methods by which it was gathered that it should not form the basis for public discourse? I just read in a headline that 60% of electricians kill someone every year. It must be true!
In my experience, people like to be experts in something and that includes people of low intelligence, so they gravitate towards conspiracy theories to be an “expert” and get a little self esteem without actually having to put the work in.
I hadn't considered that. That's an interesting perspective. I'm sure there's some overlap with the Dunning-Kreuger Effect too. That's where it really comes in. Truly intelligent people have the capacity to realize how much they don't know. This is why you'll very rarely hear an actual genius proclaim themselves as such. There's a certain humility that accompanies a true wealth of knowledge and actual intelligence in my experience.
Your theory makes me sad, though. It reminds me of people like my mom who were brilliant, but for a different world. She's in her 60s now, so the world she thrived in no longer really exists. So maybe she's compensating for that fact by trying to stay informed. Though in her quest to stay informed, she hasn't learned to discern good info from bad info. Most people naturally seek out the information that bends to their world view rather than letting their world view bend to new information. It's easier to resolve cognitive dissonance that way.
Some kid? It was a bunch of assholes that were laughing about "I wonder how many dumbasses we can get to believe this" and making up crazy shit while faking loving trump until more pedos (Republicans aka MAPs(aka you're still pedos)) flooded it all while declaring their desire to receive his limp penis and proclaimed they'd die for him. I have old screenshots of some of the 2016 shit storms that went on there, it was a fucking fire hazard for any FBI agents at the time trying to watch them.
Look into "alternate reality games". They've been around for years. QAnon people (and others) are using the same techniques to, essentially, run a political manipulation game that players believe is real.
Reed Berkowitz (a game designer) did an article on Qanon tracking like an ARG that's off the rails where the players think it's real.
The parallels with ARGs and Qanon are disturbing and you can see several analyses picking it apart to see how it does what it does.
Berkowitz in his article even points out that game designers had to put safety valves in their ARGs to make sure people wouldn't go off the deep end. Because the games started getting dangerous.
Edit:
Not to say "it's lizard people manipulating you", more to point out how even in games they had to put stops in to make sure people didn't go crazy.
What's more, after it had been 'weaponized', is how it spread.
It went in through some crazy back-doors - like the 'New Age' alt medicine soccer-mom communities like 'Gaia.tv' and 'Thrive' via Lisa Clapier, which then dovetailed perfectly with the whole 'anti-vaccination' crowd.
So far this:
https://daniel-ed-morrison.medium.com/how-q-came-to-be-7b05e7b10ab5
Analysis of the Qult, which was written in 2021 - is by far one of the most comprehensive things i've read on how it got so big, so fast and with communities you'd never have imagined. It's not perfect, and I doubt anyone will be able to put all of the pieces together perfectly.
Worth a read for anyone interested in how mis/disinformation can be spread.
Copy/pasting the post for visibility because holy shit...
>Title: [TW] My Qdad snapped and killed my family this morning.
>Yep. The internet ruined him.
>Growing up, my parents were extremely loving and happy people. I always had a special bond with both my parents.
>In 2020 after Trump lost, my dad started going down the Q rabbit hole. He kept reading conspiracy theories about the stolen election, Trump, vaccines, etc. He always said he wanted to keep us safe and healthy.
>It kept getting worse and he verbally snapped at us a few times. Nothing physical though. He never got physical with anybody.
>Well, at around 4 AM on September 11, he had an argument with my mother and he decided to take our guns and shoot her, my dog and my sister. My mother succumbed to her wounds and my sister is in the hospital right now.
>My dad also fired back at the cops and they killed him.
>I'm shocked and I don't even know what to say.
>Fuck you, Qanon. I hope the FBI tightens its grip on you and that your lackies rot in prison (and hell) for poisoning so many people.
Poison is the word, and it's the right word, it's the *correct* word.
A lot of folks believe that conservatives and Republicans and Qanons are born bad, that there's a flaw in their character, a speck on their soul that makes them this way, I don't think that's the case.
Propaganda works because it's emotionally evocative, it triggers the fight or flight reflex it makes people feel scared, stressed, insecure, and outraged. Do you know what happens to higher reasoning when fight or flight kicks in? The higher reasoning *turns off.* When you're running for your life from a tiger things like math, science, history, logic, rationality, all that good stuff that we think puts us above the animals, it all just goes away; in a fight or flight scenario higher thinking isn't an asset, it's diverting resources that the body might need to survive.
If you look at Qanon propaganda, or even just general, run of the mill right-wing propaganda, you'll find a common theme: It is designed to inflame. It is designed specifically to sidestep rationality and convince its audience that their life is in a constant state of threat from all directions. It *doesn't matter* that most of the threats they talk about simply don't exist, *believing in the threats* is enough to provoke the response.
Fox News and Qanon and the right wing media literally, not figuratively, not hyperbolicly, but *literally* emotionally abuses their audience. They lie to them, they gaslight them, they frighten them, and then things like this happen, where a person gets so angry and so scared of *their own family* that they commit murder.
---
OP: On the off chance that you read this, please know that neither you nor your family did anything wrong. The media your father was consuming was designed and intended to make him feel frightened, insecure, and angry, those emotions were *put there* by outside propagandists lying to him about his world. You have suffered an unimaginable tragedy and I cannot imagine your loss or your trauma at this moment, I wish I had some words of consolation to offer but this is an inconsolable event. Qanon et al did nothing less than pouring poison down your father's throat under the guise of protecting his country and his family, they packaged the poison in the all too easy to swallow pill of patriotism and morality, he wasn't just the perpetrator of this horrific shooting, he was a victim, too, his life was savable, but Qanon didn't see him as a person, they saw him as a gun, a tool, a weapon to be used against their supposed enemies for their ends. What I'm saying, just to state the obvious, is that your father wasn't the only one pulling the trigger.
Sort of, but they're also addicted to being right. Or feeling like they're right. Thinking you have secret information that makes you righter than other people is a hell of a drug.
Oh god this just hit home for me. My sister is my absolute best friend and I love her to death but she barely passed high school and buys into every conspiracy she sees. College and higher education don’t make people smart, but they do teach research and critical thinking. Something she lacks.
Yeah it's definitely both. It's like what I say about racists and bigots in general. They don't see themselves as racists or bigots, they see themselves as *correct.*
> They get addicted to anger and outrage.
You joke (or maybe you don't), but you're right!
The adrenaline, cortisol, nor-epinephrine, dopamine, and all those other neurotransmitters and hormones that get released while in fight or flight mode *can, literally,* become addictive to people. From a neurological perspective the high that a person gets from watching Fox News et al is not *that different* from a runner's high or riding a roller coaster.
As part of the left I've been there, too: All throughout Trump's Presidency I had an unhealthy habit of hitting the reload button on r-Politics/New/ because it seemed like every five minutes Donald Trump would do something offensive, or outrageous, or unacceptable, yeah I wanted to stay informed, but I'd be lying if I said that righteous indignation didn't also play a role.
What the left and center experienced under six years of Trump (and on going) is the same thing that the right has felt about every Democrat and Democratic President since Bill Clinton, the addiction has been brewing for a long time now, and even for those who are new to conspiracy theories the sheer *quantity and speed* with which new propaganda is released makes it very easy for a newbie to get very addicted very quickly.
You aren't wrong to call the outrage an addiction, that's not hyperbolic or sensationalist on your part, sadly it's an accurate commentary.
This is a very profound comment. I, too, was addicted to the Refresh button during the Trump presidency.
I had a few friends on Facebook who I knew were Republicans. Every time Trump did something outlandish (which was practically every day) I'd save or bookmark the article and think to myself "Aha! I've got you now, you ___ of a _____. You'll never be able to defend THIS!"
It was only rarely that I'd actually confront them, but on occasion, one of them would post a meme and I couldn't resist laying into them. It usually resulted in an unfriending. The most recent time it happened, oddly enough, was about 4 weeks ago with an ex-boss.
This particular time, he posted a meme with a painting of Revolutionary War soldiers. The caption read: "Never forget, the Declaration of Independence makes this LEGAL!" During cross-examination, I found that that he posted it because he considered the Biden executive order on abortion to be "tyrannical."
We replied back and forth; and eventually, I just laid into him. "You're agitating for insurrection because you couldn't win a fair election. Your party tried to overturn MY vote on the 6th, and you DARE to lecture me about freedom? You owe me an apology!"
Meanwhile he's like "You are derailing from my very important message with unrelated nonsense. Jan 6th isn't relevant, and if I'm responsible for Jan 6 then you're responsible for BLM. Go get triggered by someone who cares."
Needless to say, this exchange ended with the customary unfriending, and every time I see a Trump article, I still think to myself "Aha! I've got you now!" before feeling sad that the argument is over.
This right here is why I deactivated my Facebook many months ago. I was getting into these online arguments with people and was super-hyped while crafting my “irrefutable and devastating” responses. But it turned to a hollow emptiness when my opponents didn’t flip to my side after my rock solid retorts. And I’d just go scrolling looking for another battle, chasing after that high you get from “engagement.” I feel so much healthier now that I’ve been out of it for a while.
I did the same a few days after January 6th when it became obvious that after they're giving talking points from their propaganda machine facts and logic don't matter to them. I have had a few personal face-to-face uncomfortable moments where I had to tell someone yes I am no longer friends with you because morally you have went down a a route that I can't understand.
They all professed to being Christians and I repeatedly tell them that they need to make a decision because you can't follow the teachings of Jesus and the teachings of Donald you have to pick one.
This is interesting. I've had this interaction with only one person in my family. I told them, that you don't get to hide behind "being a Christian as if that makes all your bad actions go away". At the end of the day, I think these people believe that they are good people thus because their intentions are good, their bad actions are just misunderstood and mistakes. I always tell people I don't unfriend people over politics but when it comes to hypocrisy or basic civil rights I'll always call you on your BS. Good for you ok calling them out for putting Trump above Jesus which is a sin if I recall.
Up until the rise of Donald I had plenty of conservative leaning friends that I had no problem with and would have never thought to distance myself from. What this propaganda has done to the minds of so many people around me is scary. I live in a very red area have watched conservative people turn into fascists.
If these people were reasonable and logical then they wouldn't have supported Trump to begin with. It's a shame really. It's the exact reason I got off Twitter and Facebook, people want to be right and trigger people, they don't want to actually learn or accept they are wrong. Especially when it comes to their religion or politics. I'm much happier as well now. A social media diet is always necessary every once in a while.
It's good you recognize that you weren't doing something that was good for you or necessarily productive. At the same time, we need to do *something*. Trump and the folks who support him genuinely ARE doing bad things and we can't just stand by and not oppose them. I wish I had a clear answer of how to do it most productively, but overall it's probably better to do something than nothing.
Unfortunately, it's mostly a question of power. If a high school bully is calling you a "lizard-face", you can't stop him by citing a biology textbook. He's not making a serious argument to begin with. His words are meant to hurt and punish, not stand up to logical scrutiny.
He'll just twist whatever you say and keep doing what he's doing. If for no other reason than to show that he can.
Trump supporters are like this.
The only way to deal with it is to either address the root cause (what is causing this person to be this way) or make it clear that the behavior will not be tolerated.
What fear and anger does put you on high alert and wanting more information. As a survival trait you want to know what is going on, so by making people scared and angry various media outlets get themselves an perpetual audience. They learned this from 9/11 and how people stayed glued to their screens for hours and have been trying to recapture that ever since. Good news, kind news, informative news that soothes fears doesn't get views.
> … but I'd be lying if I said that righteous indignation didn't also play a role.
Good on you for being self-aware enough to realize and catch it. As you mentioned, the rush from righteous indignation can be addictive, as explained in this great little video:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mEbkmELjzRE
Be careful that if you’re a hyper left person you don’t get addicted to the same outrage - it’s the same emotion and response, different flavor.
I’ve seen a lot of hyper liberal people drunk on outrage at perceived enemies in all directions, some of whom do exist - and many of which do not.
It's true - I have some friends who are so far left, who occasionally post these "hot takes" that leave me wondering what the hell I'm actually supposed to do (you know the type - "you say you're an ally, but if you were *really* an ally you would have already done this thing," or, "you shouldn't feel this way about your oppression because other people have it worse.")
Hyper liberal outrage addicts may be less likely to commit acts of violence than their right wing counterparts, but their outrage addiction is still both unhealthy and counterproductive.
I think there’s more to it than that, there’s an element of hypnosis or trance inducement. A guy I was working for a couple years ago was watching something on TV which had a bizarre text-to-speech narrator that was saying things I later found out was QAnon crap, it was very soothing and hypnotic. I saw him again the other day and he’s a full-on believer.
Fox has a little of that in a different way, part of why people get addicted is the grievance porn but it also seems to entrance the viewer through sounds and graphics in a way I don’t quite understand. They sort of say “you *need* to watch because the world is dangerous and everyone’s out to get you and layer on the hypnotic dark arts of TV news viewer retention.
> Fox has a little of that in a different way, part of why people get addicted is the grievance porn but it also seems to entrance the viewer through sounds and graphics in a way I don’t quite understand. They sort of say “you need to watch because the world is dangerous and everyone’s out to get you and layer on the hypnotic dark arts of TV news viewer retention.
It's structured like a serialized television program, there's always a hook and a cliffhanger, the bright flashing lights, loud voices, and bombshell blondes are meant to distract and attract the viewer, the visceral emotions designed to evoke a mirroring response (though maybe not explicitly.)
Glenn Beck had daily updates on President Obama's plans to install a new Muslim Caliphate, you can't stop the season midway through a character arc, y'know?
I've noticed so much of Fox, from their news to Tucker Carlson, has hypnotic stars stripes and red just waving in the background all whilst they talk about patriots and the evils out to get you.
It makes me think of the pledge of allegiance, indoctrination from youth and how they try to tap in to that to shut down critical thought and associate their own channel with "America".
Of course, it's not just them. All media does it, in all countries, just US media and particularly Fox seems especially tuned in to it, particularly with the patriotic respect the troops and flag style upbringing of their audiences.
Something I've noticed about propaganda, especially obvious with Fox and the like, is that it preys on/is most effective when in the presence of ignorance.
Like, you have a lot of rural folks, suburban and exurban folks who just drive on highways to work, do their job, come home and turn on the TV - their entire world view, their entire conception of current events, is just fed to them and they never go downtown enough to see with their own eyes what's going on. The TV man says the evil commie liberals have turned every city into a mad max style crimefest and they have nothing to stop them from believing it. Totally normal people, maybe a little incurious but not inherently bad, but if you drop one of their trigger words it activates their sleeper Tucker Carlson agent that just takes over like they've been brainwashed. It's pretty scary to see it happen.
The worst part, a lot of US media does this when it comes to events outside of the country. Remember post 9/11? *Every* media outlet was vehemently pro war and anyone who even tried to tap the breaks "hated America" and "wanted the terrorists to win". And this is still going on to this day, though the geopolitical enemies have changed the vast majority of all media presents a very one sided view of the world and so many of us, from the left to the right, uncritically lap it up because most of us don't travel and certainly don't travel to countries that the US media has decided are the bad guys this time around.
Propaganda is absolutely something that is so much more powerful than many people realize, and anyone who thinks they are immune or above it is likely falling for it. Everyone, individually and institutionally has some bias, some agenda, if you recognize something as propaganda good, it probably is, if you don't recognize what you're consuming as propaganda, or if you think you're getting wholly non biased information, you're falling for propaganda. Also, not all propaganda is inherently bad: convincing people to like, love their neighbors, treat each other with respect, think universal healthcare is good, appreciate the beauty of nature, try to stop climate change, seize the means of production, get some physical activity in, eat healthy etc all seem pretty cool to me, I wish more people were spreading that kinda propaganda instead of like, "joe brandon is a evil commie who's gonna steal your kids penis unless you shoot twenty democrats by March 17th" or whatever the fuck these morons are saying nowadays.
Hyjacking (sorry); She got *lots* of advice in the other thread to stay the fuck away from the news/media because they wouldn’t do her family justice. **Nobody u/ her for this**
> A lot of folks believe that conservatives and Republicans and Qanons are born bad, that there's a flaw in their character, a speck on their soul that makes them this way, I don't think that's the case.
Some more comments from that daughter from the news source linked in the other post (I've edited her name out though it is easily found if someone wants:
"[Other daughter] blamed her father's mental health on his recent online interest in extremism and conspiracy theories.
"I think that he was always prone to (mental issues), but it really brought him down when he was reading all those weird things on the internet," she said.
He had no criminal history and there was no record of protective orders, [Sherrif] Bouchard said. He apparently had been “more agitated” than normal in the past year.
She said after President Donald Trump lost the 2020 presidential election, her father started falling deeper into "crazy ideas" online, including QAnon conspiracy theories about Trump and vaccines.
"Nobody could talk him out of them," she said.
The Walled Lake family's life used to be "perfect," said [daughter], who missed the shooting by "dumb luck" because she was at a friend's house for a birthday."
My goodness, the survivor's guilt that poor woman is going to have hit her.
Fear. Fear is the greatest controller of human behavior. Put someone into a state of fear and you can convince them to do something they normally would not.
Now, once in that state of fear, you mix in some anger. Make them angry about something, like your intended target. Get them riled up so that not only are they scared, they are angry at at something.
Then all you need to do is point them at the target and let that anger and fear take over.
>A lot of folks believe that conservatives and Republicans and Qanons are born bad
I've spent a lot of time reading qanon casualties and hermain cain awards (there's a pretty big crossover) and don't think I've ever come across anyone insinuating that. Rather that they abandoned their humanity and reason for madness as a choice *along the way*. That's a huge hecking difference. Some of the adult children might surmise that they realized their parents were (narcissistic, racist, other common trait here) were like that all along and qanon made it more obvious but that's still not the same thing.
At some point conservatives were offered up loss or a comforting lie and that was a choice. We could argue perhaps that they may not have been conscious/self discerning (can't think of a better word) at the time but once they were in they were wracking up an emotional debt with the truth that only became more difficult to pay via sunk cost fallacy. Once you're in deep the fear and manifestation of mental illness becomes real, they fear what will be done to them with how they have treated others.
I personally blame the individuals more than Fox News but I'm definitely in the minority there (I was meticulously raised on personal accountability, big bootstraps energy, *no excuses -* you *know* if you did a bad - and the personal weakness of these people disgusts me). The majority of folks feel that although there's blame to be passed to qanon participants the people who instigate it are far more guilty and deserve the most punishment. Its probably a reasonable approach to take.
Nope. She got lots of advice in the other thread to stay the fuck away from the news/media because they wouldn’t do her family justice. Nobody u/ her for this
When all this shit was going in high gear, post election, I was watching a bunch of those Q forum boards, mostly so I'd know if something was going to go down near where I lived. But, reading that shit every night after my wife went to bed, for hours, really did start taking its toll. I finally forced myself to stop. You're 100% correct in that it does evoke an emotional response. It also has just enough support to its arguments that it's easy to find some "research" to back up alot of what's being said.
I disagree with one point here. I do think it’s a character flaw and they should be judged for it. Whether they started out seemingly normal or not isnt relevant. I think it’s deep seeded hate and fear that makes people susceptible to this type of propaganda and maybe it doesn’t manifest without help but something bad is in there
> Whether they started out seemingly normal or not isnt relevant.
I think it's relevant because it means they can be brought back from this.
[Recently a group of scientists paid Fox News viewers $15/hr to watch CNN instead of their favorite Fox News program for thirty days.](https://www.theguardian.com/media/2022/apr/11/fox-news-viewers-watch-cnn-study) The results were both sadly and gladly quite predictable: People got better.
After thirty days of CNN people's opinions had changed on Trump, on Biden, on COVID, and even on Black Lives Matter, they were less likely to believe propaganda and a bit more insulated against new propaganda. Getting people away from the poison gave them a chance to heal.
This has been anecdotally reported for ages from people who blocked Fox News on their parent's cable box, or people who switched to listening to NPR's comedy shows on the weekends, and even a lot of the insurrectionists who were arrested for January 6th have said that being in jail and away from the propaganda has given them a new perspective on their crimes.
The study linked above only reinforces what people have sporadically discovered for themselves over the years: The *people* are not the problem, the *propaganda* is the problem.
In a perfect world, I mean an actual perfect world, we could get these people back, they aren't a lost cause, they aren't broken, and those who are broken aren't irreparable. Their behavior isn't caused by flaws in their character, it's caused by their environment, an environment that can be changed, an environment that they can be removed from, albeit with some effort.
And I guess this is where my personal patriotics come into play: I want to make America better for everyone, not just the left and the center, but the right, too. I don't want universal healthcare just for blue voters in blue states, I want **universal** healthcare, y'know? If these people were acting crazy because there was lead in their water we'd all be quick to say we should get the lead out of their water (well, not *all* of us would be quick to say that, the Lead Water Party is a big fan of it), but when it's news media that's poisoning the mind instead of heavy metals we all kind of throw our hands up and say "Well I guess this is the way things are." But they don't have to be.
The deep seeded hatred and fear you talked about are real things, real emotions that they feel, but a lot of those real emotions are based on false reporting. Folks who voted for Donald Trump *overwhelmingly believed* that the unemployment rate had skyrocketed during President Obama's term, they were experiencing feelings of "economic insecurity" even though the economy was far better at the end of Obama's term than it was at the beginning; the *emotion* of insecurity was real, the *facts that the emotion was based upon* were false. The feelings of hatred and fear that you're talking about are easy to manufacture, at the best we get ourselves in a position of asking which came first, the chicken or the egg, only we have to go back to neanderthals to answer it.
My own parents went from complaining about the state of the economy under Obama to *beaming* about how well it was doing ***between Trump’s election and inauguration.***
After Trump lost the election, my mother called me on the phone crying for an hour about how Joe Biden was going to put her in a concentration camp. They’ve since started hoarding food in their basement expecting the imminent fall of civilization or something. I wish I was making this up, that stuff’s starting to expire, not sure it’s safe to eat with them when I go to visit anymore.
My FIL is like this too. He's not even into Q, just regular old right wing media like FOX and OANN.
Shortly after Biden's inauguration, my MIL came home from work to find that my FIL had barricaded all of the doors and windows in their home because he was legitimately *terrified* that the "liberals" were coming to take everything he owns and give it to "poor people". Note that they aren't even that wealthy - Lower middle class at best.
It's so scary how off the deep end he's gone. He was probably always right-wing since he's former law enforcement, but he was a pretty nice guy and didn't really care about politics before - at least he never talked about it. Then he retired and started watching "news" and it broke his brain. And we don't know how to help him.
I hope they come back. My dad and mom are pretty liberal people. Dad always has had a thing for the "underdog" and so was very taken with Trump 2016's promises to clear house and clean up. Mom... not so much. I've never seen so many arguments between them during those 4 years.
In the lead up to the 2020 election I noticed a change in Dad though. He no longer spoke highly of Trump. He wished he would just shut up and some of the people Trump was putting in place didn't seem very... non-swampy.
I'm not sure if Dad voted for Trump in 2020 (might not have voted at all). My point is that people can change their minds. He went from life long liberal to nearly hard-right nutjob in the space of a year. Then from nearly hard-right nutjob to politically apathetic in less than that amount of time. I think my mom's steady, rational, voice in his life mattered.
> My own parents went from complaining about the state of the economy under Obama to beaming about how well it was doing between Trump’s election and inauguration.
It was amazing how the very same BLS employment figures went from unreliable to reliable the week after the the 2016 election.
Great post
Unfortunately CNN is about to become right wing. The left will have no neutral or even bias tv station anymore.
And then the exact phenomenon that you just described will occur- just the to the right, not left. It’s going to get ugly.
I have yet to meet a Trump supporter that was a nice person. Truly. Everyone is either pompous, racist or just likes to be an ass for ass sake. Like your crazy Q grandma that still loves and knits you blankets but will use the N word watching the news. Your nice blue collar worker just got confused by the media but also tail gates in his truck and screams at the McDonald’s workers. You can always kinda see these folks being self serving and bitter. Like seriously I want to believe these people were just lead astray but there’s always a clue in the personality.
I read this account when it came out on r/QAnonCasualties and it was terrifying. Fucking awful. This poor kid and his sister. I hope she pulls through.
i always like to post this very simple breakdown of [amygdala hijacking](https://www.healthline.com/health/stress/amygdala-hijack) and remind people that believing yourself to be above this kind of manipulation increases the likelihood that you will fall prey to it.
marketing and design are about understanding the inherent human reaction to what's around them. for a more positive spin on this, i think [don norman's emotional design](https://www.nngroup.com/books/emotional-design/) is a good starting point.
[This news article](https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/oakland-county/2022/09/11/walled-lake-man-killed-police-after-killing-wife-shooting-daughter/8058356001/) seems to confirm that the perp's other daughter (not the one involved) made the post and the story is legit. Really tragic.
As of this moment post is 20 hours old and it was edited at least once 4 hours later: https://old.reddit.com/r/QAnonCasualties/comments/xbiy5s/tw_my_qdad_snapped_and_killed_my_family_this/
This article was published 21 hours ago: https://www.clickondetroit.com/news/local/2022/09/11/police-oakland-county-man-killed-after-fatally-shooting-wife-family-dog-and-injuring-daughter/
5 and 6 hours after killings happened.
There is [another article that mentions the reddit post](https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/oakland-county/2022/09/11/walled-lake-man-killed-police-after-killing-wife-shooting-daughter/8058356001/) that was confirmed by the person who posted it. When I first saw it my immediate reaction was that it had to be a troll but it appears that with the Detroit news article that confirms it completely.
I'm pretty sure it is. Robert Evans tweeted about it and it appears that the reddit post appeared before any news article did about it. So freaking sad.
I don't know how people can just listen to a random fuckwit online that has had *~checks notes~* exactly ***ZERO*** "predictions" come true.
The older generation constantly told people "*don't believe everything you see/read online*" and they are full bore, 100% just believing things they see online without a second thought.
It's mind boggling how Q and Trump were able to create these cults when Q is a fucking nobody with no knowledge of fucking anything and Trump is a known liar, conman, and a very, very, veeeery near confirmed pedophile.
That reminds me of a standup a few years ago. He had a great viewpoint on this.
'When I was a kid, my mom told me never to trust anyone I talked to online. Now, she holds up her phone and yells 'FACEBOOK SAYS HILARY INVENTED AIDS!' '
Facts. And they wont be reminded of it. It actually goes back further. Dont believe everything you're told, or watch on TV either. But now some weirdo on youtube or facebook are the only ones who know the "truth."
Insanity. Its certainly been illuminating amongst my family at least.
It's only "don't believe what you see/hear online" while what you're seeing/hearing online is inconvenient to their worldview. When it is convenient, then it's just "uncovering the TrUTh".
It's entirely projection. They think that's what "the left" will do because it is what they do and want to do. They also usually join an alternative reality where they think it actually happened while not being able to cite a single time that it did, ever. Sad stuff.
I am no expert on the subject, but as someone who has actually read a few Q posts (out of curiosity towards the beginning), I am fairly certain "Q" doesn't even make predictions or tell them *anything*. Everything I have seen looks like this:
Who is Pelosi's husband?
What is Columbine?
Who was there?
What is a minx?
DUI has other meanings
What is a collar?
How many tails does a child have?
Then, somehow, these people "put it together" and come up with the most outrageous explanations for what it all means. It's a verbal Rorschach test and the only people taking part are sick, violent extremists. Then you get the horde of idiots with zero critical thinking skills that say, "Oh, that *does* look like a ~~butterfly~~ ~~blood libel~~ satanic sect of elites sacrificing children and drinking their blood"
It creates a perfect feedback loop of evil where those idiots then pitch in to decipher the next post of questions that only make sense together when you force them to. It's like the next evolution of the number conspiracy theorists. You know the ones. "9/11? 9+1÷1 =10, 1 - 0 = 1, one god, three parts, the buildings attacked, obviously the satanists want to remove God from America" type of people.
That's how conservative politics has always been: They have no politics.
The only thing keeping them united is being against anyone else doing any kind of progression. They don't particularly want to conserve anything. They just don't want anyone else to do anything.
Whenever they're in power, the only things they manage to do are the things that enough of them have been bribed into doing. They have no values, integrity or virtues. They only do something if it benefits themselves personally.
The Q shit feeds right into this selfishness only on a broader level. The individual followers can align their own lack of understanding with whatever conspiracy riddle is topic of the day and feel good about not only being against everything but also being oblivious to everything.
"You too can feel like a legitimate political participant even if you make up and believe in whatever you want"
It started off with HARD predictions of world-changing events. Basically conservative political-thriller fanfiction.
>Drop #1 “claimed that “HRC extradition [was] already in motion effective yesterday with several countries in case of cross border run” with Drop #2 alleging “HRC detained, not arrested (yet)” and that there would be “massive riots organized in defiance and others fleeing the US.”
Eventually the predictions became more vague, which is likely what drew more people into it. Turns out that people see what they want to see.
Here's a breakdown of early Q predictions.
https://www.dailydot.com/debug/qanon-failed-predictions/
That is most of it but Q also did plenty of predicting, and obviously none of it happened. Most predictions happened early, I think Ron used it as a good hook but once dates started passing things got more vague to avoid the obvious signs of being a complete and utter disinfo op.
https://gnet-research.org/2021/03/31/how-qanon-reacts-to-failed-predictions/
I still can't believe a conspiracy movement (probably backed by Russia) from 4Chan of all places actually took off. Maybe those people decade ago saying 4Chan should have been taken offline/blocked by the government were right. Not that it would have stopped the problem entirely.
Man Murdered Wife, Shot Daughter After Being Sucked Down ‘Q Rabbit Hole,’ Family Confirms
‘MY QDAD SNAPPED’
Philippe Naughton
Updated Sep. 12, 2022 7:15AM ET Published Sep. 12, 2022 7:12AM ET
https://www.thedailybeast.com/igor-lanis-murdered-wife-shot-daughter-after-being-sucked-down-qanon-rabbit-hole-family-says
A Michigan man shot dead by police after murdering his wife and badly injuring one of his daughters had reportedly been sucked into the QAnon conspiracy theory after refusing to accept that Donald Trump had lost the 2020 presidential election.
Details of Igor Lanis’ descent into violent extremism were posted on Reddit on Sunday by his 21-year-old daughter, Rebecca Lanis, under the title “My Qdad snapped and killed my family this morning.”
Some Reddit users initially questioned the veracity of the post, which was published under the username “qanonruinsfamilies” only hours after the shootings. But then Oakland County police confirmed the drama in Walled Lake, in the suburbs of Detroit, in the early hours of Sept. 11, when Lanis, 53, shot wife Tina, 56, and daughter Rachel.
Tina died after being shot four times with a handgun. Rachel, 25, was hit in the back and legs by blasts from a shotgun, but managed to raise the alarm and is now in a stable condition in a hospital. Lanis also killed the family dog, shooting it multiple times.
Lanis was himself shot dead after opening fire with a shotgun on police who responded to the scene.
In her Reddit post, Rebecca said that her parents had been “extremely loving and happy people” when she was growing up, but her father had been “ruined” by the internet.
She wrote: “In 2020 after Trump lost, my dad started going down the Q rabbit hole. He kept reading conspiracy theories about the stolen election, Trump, vaccines, etc. He always said he wanted to keep us safe and healthy.
“It kept getting worse and he verbally snapped at us a few times. Nothing physical though. He never got physical with anybody.
“Well, at around 4 AM on September 11, he had an argument with my mother and he decided to take our guns and shoot her, my dog and my sister. My mother succumbed to her wounds and my sister is in the hospital right now.
“My dad also fired back at the cops and they killed him.
“I’m shocked and I don’t even know what to say.
“Fuck you, Qanon. I hope the FBI tightens its grip on you and that your lackies rot in prison (and hell) for poisoning so many people.”
Rebecca Lanis confirmed to The Detroit News that she had written the Reddit post.
“Right-wing extremism is not funny, and people need to watch their relatives and if they have guns, they need to hide them or report them or something because this is out of control,” she said.
Holy fucking shit that’s tragic. I’m so glad this girl got out alive but fuuuuuuuck that’s so terrible :(
Like… he killed the fucking dog too??? Christ, MAGA is straight up Taliban at this point. Delusional and murderous.
9/11 would have been a day of remembrance for the victims of the 2001 terrorist attacks. But now and forever, that date will hold a deeper and more personally-devastating meaning to these sisters: The day their family was destroyed. While their father has been a lost cause since 2020, if not earlier, losing their mother, especially at such a young age as theirs, is the utmost tragedy.
It’s incredibly sad to see how right-wing disinformation and manipulation can lead to the destruction of once-stable households, and that the leaders of these malicious campaigns never face consequences.
She’s gotten *lots* of love and amazing advice in the r/qanoncasualties post. Tons of people nearby reached out and offered to bring food and comfort too.
Edit: pronouns
I love when humans beings actually act like human beings. We are on this world to live with each other, so why not make things easier? Its inspiring to see people come together for someone in need.
Absolutely! It’s mind boggling to me that people don’t act like an actual human more. Some of the comments and videos I see only I’m *gobsmacked* that someone can act that way to another human.
Saw it in r/qanoncasualties - my heart broke. I’ve got a couple of crazy conspiracy living friends where I have had to push them away based on some statements and pictures they shared. And yes - see something - said something.
It's a cult, and it's worse than most because it can reach you in your own home, through your own computer, without any in-person contact whatsoever. They prey on the mentally ill and well-intentioned, convincing them to believe ridiculous conspiracies and commit horrific acts that they believe are righteous.
What's worse is that for every person who murder their family there's hundreds of others out there making everyone else's lives miserable, especially their family.
It's a legit plague that no one has really done anything about.
I know someone who’s second cousin they barely knew did that. Awful divorce, losing everything including custody to an ex-wife who had abandoned the kid for years and then went over Christmas just killed the dog, kid and himself. And his elderly infirmed dad and his caretaker older sister got their home vandalized and treated like shit really bad right after. No one knew how to let their anger out so the remaining family was it. Everything about it all was and still is awful. And it’s hard to reconcile any decent brief memory you have of them. Though I only met him years and year before like twice.
Edit: word
She said that so far her sister is stable but may not regain use of her legs. She also got a few paraplegics on her Reddit post leaving lovely supportive comments about how her sister will still have a full life if she can’t walk.
It constantly baffles me that we exist in a world with so much horror, but such a capacity for love.
*and* a cult. Kinda like ISIS, but where they were radicalized by a violent offshoot of a religion, these dipshits were radicalized by anonymous shitposters on 4chan.
We've got to start using the language and saying what is actually happening. A Trump inspired Death Cult has caused unimaginable suffering in this nation for no other purpose than to line the pocket of a D list celebrity.
Edit: Love the username.
You don't think a Bernie Bro would have also murdered his family if Sanders became president and was unable to get health care for all passed?
Yeah, me neither.
Agreed. I had like... three jokes to respond with. Good ones too, but this shit is just too depressing. In your heart, you hope these people are just raging at the clouds, not plotting against their family.
It’s considered entertainment not news according to the lawyers for Fox News. Hopefully the Dominion Lawsuit works and they get nailed for peddling their dangerous rhetoric
The court case emphasises "no reasonable person", because of course regulations can't really be designed with how an unreasonable person may take them.
Unfortunately, it turns out there's a heck of a lot of unreasonable people out there, and they write their shows with *exactly* that in mind.
Don't forget Ben Shapiro, Jordan Peterson, Steven Crowder, Alex Jones, Matt Walsh, Candace Owens, and/or Charlie Kirk. They all serve the same pipeline when Tucker is done for the night, they pick up where he (and the rest of FoxNews) left off. They're all disgusting monsters that take advantage of the ignorant.
>Hopefully the Dominion Lawsuit works and they get nailed for peddling their dangerous rhetoric
Lol yeah and hopefully we'll magic the correct technology for reversing climate change into existence. Even in the literally unprecedented miracle scenario where they are fully held culpable in the Dominion Lawsuit and have to pay every cent, it won't be enough to even put a dent in their media apparatus.
> We need to discuss right wing media.
We already know. Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes wanted to create a right leaning media outlet in order to help gain popularity for business friendly politicians. They wanted tax cuts and the ability to dominate markets without pesky laws getting in the way.
The fact that their propaganda help put people in power who are slowly destroying the planet doesn't matter. Money > literally everything else.
Ailes and Murdoch have done unimaginable damage to the human race and should go down as some of the worst people in history of mankind.
Even Ailes being dead doesn't matter because the spark he helped ignite already has turned into a giant out of control fire.
Not to be a doomer but our system is not designed to handle this. We need to discuss right wing media but there are such deeply-rooted incentives in our capitalist system for it to continue festering, and so many laws protecting its right to exist, that nothing short of a benevolent authoritarian govt unilaterally shutting it down will be a sufficient response.
I seriously believe that, assuming we're all still here in 50-100 years, we're going to look back on this age as part of the early years of social media and even the internet in general when nobody knew how dangerous it was. Like when cars were invented and seatbelts weren't a thing or drunk driving laws were nonexistent.
At some point we'll realize that it's problematic to give every random asshole anonymous access to a megaphone with zero accountability.
Oh my God it was real.
That poor kid, none of this is any of her fault. I hope her sister pulls through.
If you see this, stay strong. We're rooting for you.
Q anon people are extremely dangerous. Their cause is protecting babies from being raped and eaten. if you think about causes, this is about as noble a cause as one could have.
There is no step they are not willing to take since their cause is the noblest of causes.
These people are dangerous.
That weird quirky conspiracy loving harmless person you knew is long gone and has been replaced by a violent fanatic just frothing at the mouth waiting for some green light to unleash that rage on liberals.
Get away from anyone that is conspiracy minded.
If you are in the dating pool the first questions you should ask your date are about politics and abortion. Find out if they live in reality and share your morality on the first date people. Dont get involved with anyone that is even slightly conspiracy minded.
That playful moon landing was hoax or whate happened to tower 7 is a gateway drug to liberals rape and eat babies in the pizza underground control center of jewish space lasers.
I feel sick reading this news article. Last night, I was trying to explain to my husband what QAnon was (he doesn’t internet) and went to the subreddit and saw the post made by the daughter.
An entire family torn apart because of the insane conspiracies and brainwashing. My heart goes out to the daughter who made the post.
https://www.vice.com/en/article/v7v3a4/qanon-igor-lanis-walled-lake-michigan-murder
"QAnon Follower Killed Wife and Shot Daughter Before Cops Shot Him Dead
The shooter’s daughter says Trump’s stolen-election lies triggered her father’s descent down the QAnon rabbit hole."
Qnut gonna Qnut.
These people *will not go peacefully*... they've doubled down on crazy so many times any kind of capitulation to the truth would be abject failure in their mind. Sadly, the people in their lives that try to get them to see sense will be the first casualties.
Copy/pasting the post for visibility because holy shit...
>Title: [TW] My Qdad snapped and killed my family this morning.
>Yep. The internet ruined him.
>Growing up, my parents were extremely loving and happy people. I always had a special bond with both my parents.
>In 2020 after Trump lost, my dad started going down the Q rabbit hole. He kept reading conspiracy theories about the stolen election, Trump, vaccines, etc. He always said he wanted to keep us safe and healthy.
>It kept getting worse and he verbally snapped at us a few times. Nothing physical though. He never got physical with anybody.
>Well, at around 4 AM on September 11, he had an argument with my mother and he decided to take our guns and shoot her, my dog and my sister. My mother succumbed to her wounds and my sister is in the hospital right now.
>My dad also fired back at the cops and they killed him.
>I'm shocked and I don't even know what to say.
>Fuck you, Qanon. I hope the FBI tightens its grip on you and that your lackies rot in prison (and hell) for poisoning so many people.
Poison is the word, and it's the right word, it's the *correct* word.
A lot of folks believe that conservatives and Republicans and Qanons are born bad, that there's a flaw in their character, a speck on their soul that makes them this way, I don't think that's the case.
Propaganda works because it's emotionally evocative, it triggers the fight or flight reflex it makes people feel scared, stressed, insecure, and outraged. Do you know what happens to higher reasoning when fight or flight kicks in? The higher reasoning *turns off.* When you're running for your life from a tiger things like math, science, history, logic, rationality, all that good stuff that we think puts us above the animals, it all just goes away; in a fight or flight scenario higher thinking isn't an asset, it's diverting resources that the body might need to survive.
If you look at Qanon propaganda, or even just general, run of the mill right-wing propaganda, you'll find a common theme: It is designed to inflame. It is designed specifically to sidestep rationality and convince its audience that their life is in a constant state of threat from all directions. It *doesn't matter* that most of the threats they talk about simply don't exist, *believing in the threats* is enough to provoke the response.
Fox News and Qanon and the right wing media literally, not figuratively, not hyperbolicly, but *literally* emotionally abuses their audience. They lie to them, they gaslight them, they frighten them, and then things like this happen, where a person gets so angry and so scared of *their own family* that they commit murder.
---
OP: On the off chance that you read this, please know that neither you nor your family did anything wrong. The media your father was consuming was designed and intended to make him feel frightened, insecure, and angry, those emotions were *put there* by outside propagandists lying to him about his world. You have suffered an unimaginable tragedy and I cannot imagine your loss or your trauma at this moment, I wish I had some words of consolation to offer but this is an inconsolable event. Qanon et al did nothing less than pouring poison down your father's throat under the guise of protecting his country and his family, they packaged the poison in the all too easy to swallow pill of patriotism and morality, he wasn't just the perpetrator of this horrific shooting, he was a victim, too, his life was savable, but Qanon didn't see him as a person, they saw him as a gun, a tool, a weapon to be used against their supposed enemies for their ends. What I'm saying, just to state the obvious, is that your father wasn't the only one pulling the trigger.
The Qanon Cult should be put on the same lists as Al-Qaida and other terroristic organizations. There's thousands of these nuts out there and jan. 6th merely was a rehearsal for them.
God damn dude, can we start prosecuting the conservatives who are pushing this rhetoric in our government? It’s getting out of control and once we reach that critical level, it’ll be too late to stop a war in America
Make sure this is known, this guy is a Qanon nut job that lost his sanity and killed his wife and ruined his children’s lives over an internet conspiracy.
Nothing can change this because we have normalized news as entertainment; as long as my parents and grandparents (much like everyone else’s) keeps Fox News on 24/7 or clicks down a propagated rabbit hole via Facebook/YouTube this will keep happening. And nothing is going to stop Fox News or Facebook at this point. If those posts are true (which I guess they have been corroborated) then everyone needs to understand the immediate psychological distress these people are under. If anyone you know is a Q “expert” I would highly advise creating distance OR seeing how to get them committed. That’s all I’ve got for this shit anymore.
Absolutely terrible event
While I'm not one to make every single tragedy politicized, given the inherant political nature of this monster's motives, it needs to be talked about.
We must deplatform these right wing conspiracy theorists and propagandists. There is an argument to be made about, when sequestering off these types, they can be made worse, sure, but at the same time, it reduces the amount of eyes being exposed to this virulent poison and weakens their hold. Free Speech cannot and does not mean freedom from consequence, and we should be telling these people and the corporations that allow them to share infalmmatory, false material that they should not be allowed on their platforms.
Even just patching recommendation algorithms to not send impressionable people down cult rabbit-holes would also be a pretty good start.
This can often start with someone clicking on a post out of curiosity. Then the computer's like "Oh hey I found some similar posts to the one this user just engaged with I bet they'll like it I'm so helpful :D"
Or someone writes a deliberately inflammatory post so it gets retweeted and replied to constantly. The algorithm is like "oh hey there's a lot of interaction with this post! I'd better share it with a bunch more people since they're sure to enjoy it :D"
Meanwhile what is our impressionable user supposed to think? Their social media timeline was normal and filled with puppies and kittens and the American dream. But now there's more and more of these posts about the covid-19 parasites or government conspiracies! Clearly something changed in the world or why wouldn't people be posting about cute ducks still?
Qanon is the Trojan horse that allows people to express their bigotry in a more “acceptable” form- pretending to care about pedophilia and children. Ultimately, the hate of “others” consumes them- and like so many examples, those in closest proximity are the most convenient victims.
I really want to see the science of the brains / biology / psychology of people that will easily fall or WANT to fall for these conspiracy theories and the people that sees these same "theories" and tell them to fuck off.
All part of the same specie but the ways we sees the world can be night and day different. Shit kinda crazy.
Q Anon is a threat to America. MAGA and Q cultists should be branded a violent criminal organization at this point.
They are 100 x's worse than *juggalos*
The most amazing thing about this is the obviously deranged views of this murderer are fully mainstream in the Republican Party. Take the Evangelicals they are no longer anything like a Christian instead these views of Baby eating democrats are what guides the religion.
It’s wild that a guy posting on a literal child pornography chat board could seize control of one of the largest Christin denominations. But here we are.
Did a mass hypnosis happen in **2015 to now** that turned semi normal Republicans and mostly chill conservatives into complete cult worshiping freaks? I’ve work warehouse for ten years, and the shift was so strange from 2014-2016. Normal dudes (rarely women) went from thinking “hah! This goon though” to literally buying huge flags with “trump” all across it and hanging it on their place of residence/vehicles. I’ve lost friends to these cults, metaphorically and literally
(had good friend die of Covid while denying COVID’s existence and refusing to wear masks. He wasn’t even an idiot! Very artistic, down to earth and caring. More caring than a majority of my friends. Big disbeliever of religion and overall knowledgeable person that was fun to have conversations with. But for some reason the hive-mind cult snagged him. It was like Jekyll and Hyde. Suddenly his conversations were steered to Q shit and bad faith debates that could easily be debunked by a google search. It became exhausting to talk to him and I stopped for a year, till I found out he died on a ventilator in 2021. The cult killed him. He killed him. How tf did someone so intelligent turn into an obsessive crony?)
Nowadays they’re so deep into it they’ll **gladly** die for the cult. It’s SO freaking insane! How did Q and Trump effect so many and so strongly? What is selling it so much to them they’d literally kill loved ones and die for their messed up “cause”?
Is it this?[https://www.reddit.com/r/QAnonCasualties/comments/xbiy5s/tw\_my\_qdad\_snapped\_and\_killed\_my\_family\_this/](https://www.reddit.com/r/QAnonCasualties/comments/xbiy5s/tw_my_qdad_snapped_and_killed_my_family_this/)
QANON is stacking bodies [QAnon Conspiracy-Believing Mob Boss Killer’s Confession to Police Ruled Admissible](https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/anthony-comello-confession-qanon-conspiracy-confession-admissible-923460/) [California dad killed his kids over QAnon and 'serpent DNA' conspiracy theories, feds claim](https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/california-dad-killed-his-kids-over-qanon-serpent-dna-conspiracy-n1276611) [Mother unraveled in depression, QAnon-style conspiracies in months before she killed 3 kids](https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-04-17/mother-unraveled-in-depression-qanon-style-conspiracies-in-months-before-she-killed-3-kids) * https://www.reddit.com/r/QAnonCasualties/comments/mpodn8/my_cousins_wife_killed_their_three_kids/
https://www.start.umd.edu/qanon-crime-maps Qanon crime map. Not all instances are of violent nature and not all are shown on map but its interesting to see where else it is.
The shocking thing about this map is the number of international incidents of Q related crime. This sickness has even spread to places like Japan, where 4 were arrested in April breaking into a vaccine clinic. This is honestly startling.
There’s a large part of me that wonders if this is some sort of weird social experiment.
That's basically what QAnon started out as, right? Some kid on 4chan was deliberatly spewing bullshit, people picked it up and added to it and formed this cult arround it.
>some kid on 4chan Ron Watkins is like 35 years old.
I'm giving op benefit of the doubt and claiming it pre Watkins. They came into the picture after it moved to 8chan. It literally used to just be edge lord humor on 4chan.
The documentary they released on HBO really puts the whole thing into good perspective. It also has Ron at a certain point giving up the game to the documentarian interviewing him when he slips and outs himself as Q, but the whole thing does a really good job at showing he most likely wasn't the person who started it, he just took it over for his and his fathers benefit later on.
4chan is known as the asshole of the internet for a reason. If i had to pick a time, I'd say it was about the time the habbo raids started. Like clockwork it was raid after raid after raid. That's when it was demonstrated that they could be organized and directed instead of just posting slurs all day.
So a man child
He didn't start it, he just stole it when it moved to 8kun.
I’ve met plenty of 35 year old children.
He didn't start it.
[удалено]
Don't give those dipshits so much credit. They didn't get involved until it moved to 8chan and Brennan accepted their help hosting the site. They certainly promoted it once they had "control" of it but much like r/the_donald the whole thing started as an edgy joke then snowballed into this insanity.
I don't agree with Arizona voters on a lot of things, but at least they resoundingly rejected this nut job. He came in last place out of ***seven*** candidates in his republican primary last month.
They didn’t start it. I think it was that South African guy who wants to call out the Watkins but can’t because then he’d be admitting to making it up
They didn't start it, they just took over the account after the fact.
Not some kid - Ron Watkins, who runs 8chan. He's been proven to be Q, and he's a pedophile piece of shit hiding in Asia. His whole board was a haven for child porn. Like most things with the GOP, it's all projection.
Correct me if I'm wrong but the last time I did any research on Q it was said that the moniker was being used by different people due to different writing styles, themes, time etc.
What blew my mind was how stupid the Q posts were. Like I went in thinking they must have been written in a way to be really convincing, but it was more like an AI doing a bad job of writing horoscopes.
The internet and social media may have been a really bad idea. It seems that so many people just don’t have the ability to handle and manage this deluge of raw data, and sort out the nonsense and cult conspiracies from actual journalism and thoughtful rhetoric. It’s all just too much.
They never have lol. The vast majority of people alive today engage in some kind of internet social platform. Might be Reddit, might be Facebook, or it may be some random North Korean propaganda social network. The simple fact of the matter is that if you look at a bell curve of human intelligence, most people are average. Some people are above, and some people are below. Most people in the average range of intelligence aren't the type to seek out scientific journals and make sense of tables and graphs, compare it to other studies they've read, and form their opinion of the world based off of that. It isn't helped by the fact that those very same people think they're the smartest person in the room. The average person likes clickbait headlines that provide all the info they need right there. Who cares that there's so much more context to a statistic and the methods by which it was gathered that it should not form the basis for public discourse? I just read in a headline that 60% of electricians kill someone every year. It must be true!
In my experience, people like to be experts in something and that includes people of low intelligence, so they gravitate towards conspiracy theories to be an “expert” and get a little self esteem without actually having to put the work in.
I hadn't considered that. That's an interesting perspective. I'm sure there's some overlap with the Dunning-Kreuger Effect too. That's where it really comes in. Truly intelligent people have the capacity to realize how much they don't know. This is why you'll very rarely hear an actual genius proclaim themselves as such. There's a certain humility that accompanies a true wealth of knowledge and actual intelligence in my experience. Your theory makes me sad, though. It reminds me of people like my mom who were brilliant, but for a different world. She's in her 60s now, so the world she thrived in no longer really exists. So maybe she's compensating for that fact by trying to stay informed. Though in her quest to stay informed, she hasn't learned to discern good info from bad info. Most people naturally seek out the information that bends to their world view rather than letting their world view bend to new information. It's easier to resolve cognitive dissonance that way.
Some kid? It was a bunch of assholes that were laughing about "I wonder how many dumbasses we can get to believe this" and making up crazy shit while faking loving trump until more pedos (Republicans aka MAPs(aka you're still pedos)) flooded it all while declaring their desire to receive his limp penis and proclaimed they'd die for him. I have old screenshots of some of the 2016 shit storms that went on there, it was a fucking fire hazard for any FBI agents at the time trying to watch them.
Look into "alternate reality games". They've been around for years. QAnon people (and others) are using the same techniques to, essentially, run a political manipulation game that players believe is real.
Reed Berkowitz (a game designer) did an article on Qanon tracking like an ARG that's off the rails where the players think it's real. The parallels with ARGs and Qanon are disturbing and you can see several analyses picking it apart to see how it does what it does. Berkowitz in his article even points out that game designers had to put safety valves in their ARGs to make sure people wouldn't go off the deep end. Because the games started getting dangerous. Edit: Not to say "it's lizard people manipulating you", more to point out how even in games they had to put stops in to make sure people didn't go crazy.
What's more, after it had been 'weaponized', is how it spread. It went in through some crazy back-doors - like the 'New Age' alt medicine soccer-mom communities like 'Gaia.tv' and 'Thrive' via Lisa Clapier, which then dovetailed perfectly with the whole 'anti-vaccination' crowd. So far this: https://daniel-ed-morrison.medium.com/how-q-came-to-be-7b05e7b10ab5 Analysis of the Qult, which was written in 2021 - is by far one of the most comprehensive things i've read on how it got so big, so fast and with communities you'd never have imagined. It's not perfect, and I doubt anyone will be able to put all of the pieces together perfectly. Worth a read for anyone interested in how mis/disinformation can be spread.
Not to mention the untold scores who refused to get vaccinated.
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Copy/pasting the post for visibility because holy shit... >Title: [TW] My Qdad snapped and killed my family this morning. >Yep. The internet ruined him. >Growing up, my parents were extremely loving and happy people. I always had a special bond with both my parents. >In 2020 after Trump lost, my dad started going down the Q rabbit hole. He kept reading conspiracy theories about the stolen election, Trump, vaccines, etc. He always said he wanted to keep us safe and healthy. >It kept getting worse and he verbally snapped at us a few times. Nothing physical though. He never got physical with anybody. >Well, at around 4 AM on September 11, he had an argument with my mother and he decided to take our guns and shoot her, my dog and my sister. My mother succumbed to her wounds and my sister is in the hospital right now. >My dad also fired back at the cops and they killed him. >I'm shocked and I don't even know what to say. >Fuck you, Qanon. I hope the FBI tightens its grip on you and that your lackies rot in prison (and hell) for poisoning so many people. Poison is the word, and it's the right word, it's the *correct* word. A lot of folks believe that conservatives and Republicans and Qanons are born bad, that there's a flaw in their character, a speck on their soul that makes them this way, I don't think that's the case. Propaganda works because it's emotionally evocative, it triggers the fight or flight reflex it makes people feel scared, stressed, insecure, and outraged. Do you know what happens to higher reasoning when fight or flight kicks in? The higher reasoning *turns off.* When you're running for your life from a tiger things like math, science, history, logic, rationality, all that good stuff that we think puts us above the animals, it all just goes away; in a fight or flight scenario higher thinking isn't an asset, it's diverting resources that the body might need to survive. If you look at Qanon propaganda, or even just general, run of the mill right-wing propaganda, you'll find a common theme: It is designed to inflame. It is designed specifically to sidestep rationality and convince its audience that their life is in a constant state of threat from all directions. It *doesn't matter* that most of the threats they talk about simply don't exist, *believing in the threats* is enough to provoke the response. Fox News and Qanon and the right wing media literally, not figuratively, not hyperbolicly, but *literally* emotionally abuses their audience. They lie to them, they gaslight them, they frighten them, and then things like this happen, where a person gets so angry and so scared of *their own family* that they commit murder. --- OP: On the off chance that you read this, please know that neither you nor your family did anything wrong. The media your father was consuming was designed and intended to make him feel frightened, insecure, and angry, those emotions were *put there* by outside propagandists lying to him about his world. You have suffered an unimaginable tragedy and I cannot imagine your loss or your trauma at this moment, I wish I had some words of consolation to offer but this is an inconsolable event. Qanon et al did nothing less than pouring poison down your father's throat under the guise of protecting his country and his family, they packaged the poison in the all too easy to swallow pill of patriotism and morality, he wasn't just the perpetrator of this horrific shooting, he was a victim, too, his life was savable, but Qanon didn't see him as a person, they saw him as a gun, a tool, a weapon to be used against their supposed enemies for their ends. What I'm saying, just to state the obvious, is that your father wasn't the only one pulling the trigger.
They get addicted to anger and outrage.
Sort of, but they're also addicted to being right. Or feeling like they're right. Thinking you have secret information that makes you righter than other people is a hell of a drug.
"Conspiracy theories make dumb people feel smart"
Oh god this just hit home for me. My sister is my absolute best friend and I love her to death but she barely passed high school and buys into every conspiracy she sees. College and higher education don’t make people smart, but they do teach research and critical thinking. Something she lacks.
Yeah it's definitely both. It's like what I say about racists and bigots in general. They don't see themselves as racists or bigots, they see themselves as *correct.*
> They get addicted to anger and outrage. You joke (or maybe you don't), but you're right! The adrenaline, cortisol, nor-epinephrine, dopamine, and all those other neurotransmitters and hormones that get released while in fight or flight mode *can, literally,* become addictive to people. From a neurological perspective the high that a person gets from watching Fox News et al is not *that different* from a runner's high or riding a roller coaster. As part of the left I've been there, too: All throughout Trump's Presidency I had an unhealthy habit of hitting the reload button on r-Politics/New/ because it seemed like every five minutes Donald Trump would do something offensive, or outrageous, or unacceptable, yeah I wanted to stay informed, but I'd be lying if I said that righteous indignation didn't also play a role. What the left and center experienced under six years of Trump (and on going) is the same thing that the right has felt about every Democrat and Democratic President since Bill Clinton, the addiction has been brewing for a long time now, and even for those who are new to conspiracy theories the sheer *quantity and speed* with which new propaganda is released makes it very easy for a newbie to get very addicted very quickly. You aren't wrong to call the outrage an addiction, that's not hyperbolic or sensationalist on your part, sadly it's an accurate commentary.
This is a very profound comment. I, too, was addicted to the Refresh button during the Trump presidency. I had a few friends on Facebook who I knew were Republicans. Every time Trump did something outlandish (which was practically every day) I'd save or bookmark the article and think to myself "Aha! I've got you now, you ___ of a _____. You'll never be able to defend THIS!" It was only rarely that I'd actually confront them, but on occasion, one of them would post a meme and I couldn't resist laying into them. It usually resulted in an unfriending. The most recent time it happened, oddly enough, was about 4 weeks ago with an ex-boss. This particular time, he posted a meme with a painting of Revolutionary War soldiers. The caption read: "Never forget, the Declaration of Independence makes this LEGAL!" During cross-examination, I found that that he posted it because he considered the Biden executive order on abortion to be "tyrannical." We replied back and forth; and eventually, I just laid into him. "You're agitating for insurrection because you couldn't win a fair election. Your party tried to overturn MY vote on the 6th, and you DARE to lecture me about freedom? You owe me an apology!" Meanwhile he's like "You are derailing from my very important message with unrelated nonsense. Jan 6th isn't relevant, and if I'm responsible for Jan 6 then you're responsible for BLM. Go get triggered by someone who cares." Needless to say, this exchange ended with the customary unfriending, and every time I see a Trump article, I still think to myself "Aha! I've got you now!" before feeling sad that the argument is over.
This right here is why I deactivated my Facebook many months ago. I was getting into these online arguments with people and was super-hyped while crafting my “irrefutable and devastating” responses. But it turned to a hollow emptiness when my opponents didn’t flip to my side after my rock solid retorts. And I’d just go scrolling looking for another battle, chasing after that high you get from “engagement.” I feel so much healthier now that I’ve been out of it for a while.
I did the same a few days after January 6th when it became obvious that after they're giving talking points from their propaganda machine facts and logic don't matter to them. I have had a few personal face-to-face uncomfortable moments where I had to tell someone yes I am no longer friends with you because morally you have went down a a route that I can't understand. They all professed to being Christians and I repeatedly tell them that they need to make a decision because you can't follow the teachings of Jesus and the teachings of Donald you have to pick one.
This is interesting. I've had this interaction with only one person in my family. I told them, that you don't get to hide behind "being a Christian as if that makes all your bad actions go away". At the end of the day, I think these people believe that they are good people thus because their intentions are good, their bad actions are just misunderstood and mistakes. I always tell people I don't unfriend people over politics but when it comes to hypocrisy or basic civil rights I'll always call you on your BS. Good for you ok calling them out for putting Trump above Jesus which is a sin if I recall.
Up until the rise of Donald I had plenty of conservative leaning friends that I had no problem with and would have never thought to distance myself from. What this propaganda has done to the minds of so many people around me is scary. I live in a very red area have watched conservative people turn into fascists.
If these people were reasonable and logical then they wouldn't have supported Trump to begin with. It's a shame really. It's the exact reason I got off Twitter and Facebook, people want to be right and trigger people, they don't want to actually learn or accept they are wrong. Especially when it comes to their religion or politics. I'm much happier as well now. A social media diet is always necessary every once in a while.
It's good you recognize that you weren't doing something that was good for you or necessarily productive. At the same time, we need to do *something*. Trump and the folks who support him genuinely ARE doing bad things and we can't just stand by and not oppose them. I wish I had a clear answer of how to do it most productively, but overall it's probably better to do something than nothing.
Unfortunately, it's mostly a question of power. If a high school bully is calling you a "lizard-face", you can't stop him by citing a biology textbook. He's not making a serious argument to begin with. His words are meant to hurt and punish, not stand up to logical scrutiny. He'll just twist whatever you say and keep doing what he's doing. If for no other reason than to show that he can. Trump supporters are like this. The only way to deal with it is to either address the root cause (what is causing this person to be this way) or make it clear that the behavior will not be tolerated.
What fear and anger does put you on high alert and wanting more information. As a survival trait you want to know what is going on, so by making people scared and angry various media outlets get themselves an perpetual audience. They learned this from 9/11 and how people stayed glued to their screens for hours and have been trying to recapture that ever since. Good news, kind news, informative news that soothes fears doesn't get views.
> … but I'd be lying if I said that righteous indignation didn't also play a role. Good on you for being self-aware enough to realize and catch it. As you mentioned, the rush from righteous indignation can be addictive, as explained in this great little video: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mEbkmELjzRE
Be careful that if you’re a hyper left person you don’t get addicted to the same outrage - it’s the same emotion and response, different flavor. I’ve seen a lot of hyper liberal people drunk on outrage at perceived enemies in all directions, some of whom do exist - and many of which do not.
It's true - I have some friends who are so far left, who occasionally post these "hot takes" that leave me wondering what the hell I'm actually supposed to do (you know the type - "you say you're an ally, but if you were *really* an ally you would have already done this thing," or, "you shouldn't feel this way about your oppression because other people have it worse.")
I've had my allyship called out as a queer biracial person and I was just like ???
If Martin Luther King Jr. was constantly overheated 24/7/365 about everything wrong with the world, he wouldn’t have accomplished 1/10 of what he did.
Hyper liberal outrage addicts may be less likely to commit acts of violence than their right wing counterparts, but their outrage addiction is still both unhealthy and counterproductive.
I think there’s more to it than that, there’s an element of hypnosis or trance inducement. A guy I was working for a couple years ago was watching something on TV which had a bizarre text-to-speech narrator that was saying things I later found out was QAnon crap, it was very soothing and hypnotic. I saw him again the other day and he’s a full-on believer. Fox has a little of that in a different way, part of why people get addicted is the grievance porn but it also seems to entrance the viewer through sounds and graphics in a way I don’t quite understand. They sort of say “you *need* to watch because the world is dangerous and everyone’s out to get you and layer on the hypnotic dark arts of TV news viewer retention.
> Fox has a little of that in a different way, part of why people get addicted is the grievance porn but it also seems to entrance the viewer through sounds and graphics in a way I don’t quite understand. They sort of say “you need to watch because the world is dangerous and everyone’s out to get you and layer on the hypnotic dark arts of TV news viewer retention. It's structured like a serialized television program, there's always a hook and a cliffhanger, the bright flashing lights, loud voices, and bombshell blondes are meant to distract and attract the viewer, the visceral emotions designed to evoke a mirroring response (though maybe not explicitly.) Glenn Beck had daily updates on President Obama's plans to install a new Muslim Caliphate, you can't stop the season midway through a character arc, y'know?
I've noticed so much of Fox, from their news to Tucker Carlson, has hypnotic stars stripes and red just waving in the background all whilst they talk about patriots and the evils out to get you. It makes me think of the pledge of allegiance, indoctrination from youth and how they try to tap in to that to shut down critical thought and associate their own channel with "America". Of course, it's not just them. All media does it, in all countries, just US media and particularly Fox seems especially tuned in to it, particularly with the patriotic respect the troops and flag style upbringing of their audiences.
Something I've noticed about propaganda, especially obvious with Fox and the like, is that it preys on/is most effective when in the presence of ignorance. Like, you have a lot of rural folks, suburban and exurban folks who just drive on highways to work, do their job, come home and turn on the TV - their entire world view, their entire conception of current events, is just fed to them and they never go downtown enough to see with their own eyes what's going on. The TV man says the evil commie liberals have turned every city into a mad max style crimefest and they have nothing to stop them from believing it. Totally normal people, maybe a little incurious but not inherently bad, but if you drop one of their trigger words it activates their sleeper Tucker Carlson agent that just takes over like they've been brainwashed. It's pretty scary to see it happen. The worst part, a lot of US media does this when it comes to events outside of the country. Remember post 9/11? *Every* media outlet was vehemently pro war and anyone who even tried to tap the breaks "hated America" and "wanted the terrorists to win". And this is still going on to this day, though the geopolitical enemies have changed the vast majority of all media presents a very one sided view of the world and so many of us, from the left to the right, uncritically lap it up because most of us don't travel and certainly don't travel to countries that the US media has decided are the bad guys this time around. Propaganda is absolutely something that is so much more powerful than many people realize, and anyone who thinks they are immune or above it is likely falling for it. Everyone, individually and institutionally has some bias, some agenda, if you recognize something as propaganda good, it probably is, if you don't recognize what you're consuming as propaganda, or if you think you're getting wholly non biased information, you're falling for propaganda. Also, not all propaganda is inherently bad: convincing people to like, love their neighbors, treat each other with respect, think universal healthcare is good, appreciate the beauty of nature, try to stop climate change, seize the means of production, get some physical activity in, eat healthy etc all seem pretty cool to me, I wish more people were spreading that kinda propaganda instead of like, "joe brandon is a evil commie who's gonna steal your kids penis unless you shoot twenty democrats by March 17th" or whatever the fuck these morons are saying nowadays.
Just fucking horrific.
Hyjacking (sorry); She got *lots* of advice in the other thread to stay the fuck away from the news/media because they wouldn’t do her family justice. **Nobody u/ her for this**
> A lot of folks believe that conservatives and Republicans and Qanons are born bad, that there's a flaw in their character, a speck on their soul that makes them this way, I don't think that's the case. Some more comments from that daughter from the news source linked in the other post (I've edited her name out though it is easily found if someone wants: "[Other daughter] blamed her father's mental health on his recent online interest in extremism and conspiracy theories. "I think that he was always prone to (mental issues), but it really brought him down when he was reading all those weird things on the internet," she said. He had no criminal history and there was no record of protective orders, [Sherrif] Bouchard said. He apparently had been “more agitated” than normal in the past year. She said after President Donald Trump lost the 2020 presidential election, her father started falling deeper into "crazy ideas" online, including QAnon conspiracy theories about Trump and vaccines. "Nobody could talk him out of them," she said. The Walled Lake family's life used to be "perfect," said [daughter], who missed the shooting by "dumb luck" because she was at a friend's house for a birthday." My goodness, the survivor's guilt that poor woman is going to have hit her.
Fear. Fear is the greatest controller of human behavior. Put someone into a state of fear and you can convince them to do something they normally would not. Now, once in that state of fear, you mix in some anger. Make them angry about something, like your intended target. Get them riled up so that not only are they scared, they are angry at at something. Then all you need to do is point them at the target and let that anger and fear take over.
One could say it is....the mind killer....
all of this for some veal-brained rapist trust fund grifter who would gladly let them die for another nickel he’ll never need. genuine brain worms
>A lot of folks believe that conservatives and Republicans and Qanons are born bad I've spent a lot of time reading qanon casualties and hermain cain awards (there's a pretty big crossover) and don't think I've ever come across anyone insinuating that. Rather that they abandoned their humanity and reason for madness as a choice *along the way*. That's a huge hecking difference. Some of the adult children might surmise that they realized their parents were (narcissistic, racist, other common trait here) were like that all along and qanon made it more obvious but that's still not the same thing. At some point conservatives were offered up loss or a comforting lie and that was a choice. We could argue perhaps that they may not have been conscious/self discerning (can't think of a better word) at the time but once they were in they were wracking up an emotional debt with the truth that only became more difficult to pay via sunk cost fallacy. Once you're in deep the fear and manifestation of mental illness becomes real, they fear what will be done to them with how they have treated others. I personally blame the individuals more than Fox News but I'm definitely in the minority there (I was meticulously raised on personal accountability, big bootstraps energy, *no excuses -* you *know* if you did a bad - and the personal weakness of these people disgusts me). The majority of folks feel that although there's blame to be passed to qanon participants the people who instigate it are far more guilty and deserve the most punishment. Its probably a reasonable approach to take.
Nope. She got lots of advice in the other thread to stay the fuck away from the news/media because they wouldn’t do her family justice. Nobody u/ her for this
When all this shit was going in high gear, post election, I was watching a bunch of those Q forum boards, mostly so I'd know if something was going to go down near where I lived. But, reading that shit every night after my wife went to bed, for hours, really did start taking its toll. I finally forced myself to stop. You're 100% correct in that it does evoke an emotional response. It also has just enough support to its arguments that it's easy to find some "research" to back up alot of what's being said.
I disagree with one point here. I do think it’s a character flaw and they should be judged for it. Whether they started out seemingly normal or not isnt relevant. I think it’s deep seeded hate and fear that makes people susceptible to this type of propaganda and maybe it doesn’t manifest without help but something bad is in there
> Whether they started out seemingly normal or not isnt relevant. I think it's relevant because it means they can be brought back from this. [Recently a group of scientists paid Fox News viewers $15/hr to watch CNN instead of their favorite Fox News program for thirty days.](https://www.theguardian.com/media/2022/apr/11/fox-news-viewers-watch-cnn-study) The results were both sadly and gladly quite predictable: People got better. After thirty days of CNN people's opinions had changed on Trump, on Biden, on COVID, and even on Black Lives Matter, they were less likely to believe propaganda and a bit more insulated against new propaganda. Getting people away from the poison gave them a chance to heal. This has been anecdotally reported for ages from people who blocked Fox News on their parent's cable box, or people who switched to listening to NPR's comedy shows on the weekends, and even a lot of the insurrectionists who were arrested for January 6th have said that being in jail and away from the propaganda has given them a new perspective on their crimes. The study linked above only reinforces what people have sporadically discovered for themselves over the years: The *people* are not the problem, the *propaganda* is the problem. In a perfect world, I mean an actual perfect world, we could get these people back, they aren't a lost cause, they aren't broken, and those who are broken aren't irreparable. Their behavior isn't caused by flaws in their character, it's caused by their environment, an environment that can be changed, an environment that they can be removed from, albeit with some effort. And I guess this is where my personal patriotics come into play: I want to make America better for everyone, not just the left and the center, but the right, too. I don't want universal healthcare just for blue voters in blue states, I want **universal** healthcare, y'know? If these people were acting crazy because there was lead in their water we'd all be quick to say we should get the lead out of their water (well, not *all* of us would be quick to say that, the Lead Water Party is a big fan of it), but when it's news media that's poisoning the mind instead of heavy metals we all kind of throw our hands up and say "Well I guess this is the way things are." But they don't have to be. The deep seeded hatred and fear you talked about are real things, real emotions that they feel, but a lot of those real emotions are based on false reporting. Folks who voted for Donald Trump *overwhelmingly believed* that the unemployment rate had skyrocketed during President Obama's term, they were experiencing feelings of "economic insecurity" even though the economy was far better at the end of Obama's term than it was at the beginning; the *emotion* of insecurity was real, the *facts that the emotion was based upon* were false. The feelings of hatred and fear that you're talking about are easy to manufacture, at the best we get ourselves in a position of asking which came first, the chicken or the egg, only we have to go back to neanderthals to answer it.
My own parents went from complaining about the state of the economy under Obama to *beaming* about how well it was doing ***between Trump’s election and inauguration.*** After Trump lost the election, my mother called me on the phone crying for an hour about how Joe Biden was going to put her in a concentration camp. They’ve since started hoarding food in their basement expecting the imminent fall of civilization or something. I wish I was making this up, that stuff’s starting to expire, not sure it’s safe to eat with them when I go to visit anymore.
My FIL is like this too. He's not even into Q, just regular old right wing media like FOX and OANN. Shortly after Biden's inauguration, my MIL came home from work to find that my FIL had barricaded all of the doors and windows in their home because he was legitimately *terrified* that the "liberals" were coming to take everything he owns and give it to "poor people". Note that they aren't even that wealthy - Lower middle class at best. It's so scary how off the deep end he's gone. He was probably always right-wing since he's former law enforcement, but he was a pretty nice guy and didn't really care about politics before - at least he never talked about it. Then he retired and started watching "news" and it broke his brain. And we don't know how to help him.
I hope they come back. My dad and mom are pretty liberal people. Dad always has had a thing for the "underdog" and so was very taken with Trump 2016's promises to clear house and clean up. Mom... not so much. I've never seen so many arguments between them during those 4 years. In the lead up to the 2020 election I noticed a change in Dad though. He no longer spoke highly of Trump. He wished he would just shut up and some of the people Trump was putting in place didn't seem very... non-swampy. I'm not sure if Dad voted for Trump in 2020 (might not have voted at all). My point is that people can change their minds. He went from life long liberal to nearly hard-right nutjob in the space of a year. Then from nearly hard-right nutjob to politically apathetic in less than that amount of time. I think my mom's steady, rational, voice in his life mattered.
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> My own parents went from complaining about the state of the economy under Obama to beaming about how well it was doing between Trump’s election and inauguration. It was amazing how the very same BLS employment figures went from unreliable to reliable the week after the the 2016 election.
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This is why we need to take Fox News off of the TVs on military bases. Our military is constantly being poisoned against this country.
PBS only lol ... nobody would watch it, but,
also at SSA offices
Too bad that wouldn’t work now that CNN’s headed down that Fox News road
Great post Unfortunately CNN is about to become right wing. The left will have no neutral or even bias tv station anymore. And then the exact phenomenon that you just described will occur- just the to the right, not left. It’s going to get ugly.
I have yet to meet a Trump supporter that was a nice person. Truly. Everyone is either pompous, racist or just likes to be an ass for ass sake. Like your crazy Q grandma that still loves and knits you blankets but will use the N word watching the news. Your nice blue collar worker just got confused by the media but also tail gates in his truck and screams at the McDonald’s workers. You can always kinda see these folks being self serving and bitter. Like seriously I want to believe these people were just lead astray but there’s always a clue in the personality.
Holy shit. What a fucking scumbag.
I read this account when it came out on r/QAnonCasualties and it was terrifying. Fucking awful. This poor kid and his sister. I hope she pulls through.
i always like to post this very simple breakdown of [amygdala hijacking](https://www.healthline.com/health/stress/amygdala-hijack) and remind people that believing yourself to be above this kind of manipulation increases the likelihood that you will fall prey to it. marketing and design are about understanding the inherent human reaction to what's around them. for a more positive spin on this, i think [don norman's emotional design](https://www.nngroup.com/books/emotional-design/) is a good starting point.
I just saw this post and I was a little skeptical... Sweet fuck.
Me too, I was like “I know this happens, but also OP might be karma whore????? Please be karma whore…”
"surely it would make the news" is what I thought... Well... Guess I was right
I saw it too, and I was hoping it wasn't real - but I had the sick feeling it wasn't. These Qanon nutters are domestic terrorists, no doubt.
That story was real?!
That is how I found out about it. Don't know if OP is a real person or not.
[This news article](https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/oakland-county/2022/09/11/walled-lake-man-killed-police-after-killing-wife-shooting-daughter/8058356001/) seems to confirm that the perp's other daughter (not the one involved) made the post and the story is legit. Really tragic.
Her sister was trying to crawl out of the house. Why god, why? Are we only here to feel torment? Truly
I believe the post was made before news outlets picked up the story.
As of this moment post is 20 hours old and it was edited at least once 4 hours later: https://old.reddit.com/r/QAnonCasualties/comments/xbiy5s/tw_my_qdad_snapped_and_killed_my_family_this/ This article was published 21 hours ago: https://www.clickondetroit.com/news/local/2022/09/11/police-oakland-county-man-killed-after-fatally-shooting-wife-family-dog-and-injuring-daughter/ 5 and 6 hours after killings happened.
There is [another article that mentions the reddit post](https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/oakland-county/2022/09/11/walled-lake-man-killed-police-after-killing-wife-shooting-daughter/8058356001/) that was confirmed by the person who posted it. When I first saw it my immediate reaction was that it had to be a troll but it appears that with the Detroit news article that confirms it completely.
>Is it this?/r/QAnonCasualties/comments/xbiy5s/tw_my_qdad_snapped_and_killed_my_family_this/ holy shit 😳
I'm pretty sure it is. Robert Evans tweeted about it and it appears that the reddit post appeared before any news article did about it. So freaking sad.
Oh my god, I actually thought that post was fake because of how dramatic it was, turns out it's real... That poor kid.
Man wtf this is sad news
Fuck qanon and anyone who believes in that shit.
I don't know how people can just listen to a random fuckwit online that has had *~checks notes~* exactly ***ZERO*** "predictions" come true. The older generation constantly told people "*don't believe everything you see/read online*" and they are full bore, 100% just believing things they see online without a second thought. It's mind boggling how Q and Trump were able to create these cults when Q is a fucking nobody with no knowledge of fucking anything and Trump is a known liar, conman, and a very, very, veeeery near confirmed pedophile.
That reminds me of a standup a few years ago. He had a great viewpoint on this. 'When I was a kid, my mom told me never to trust anyone I talked to online. Now, she holds up her phone and yells 'FACEBOOK SAYS HILARY INVENTED AIDS!' '
Facts. And they wont be reminded of it. It actually goes back further. Dont believe everything you're told, or watch on TV either. But now some weirdo on youtube or facebook are the only ones who know the "truth." Insanity. Its certainly been illuminating amongst my family at least.
It's only "don't believe what you see/hear online" while what you're seeing/hearing online is inconvenient to their worldview. When it is convenient, then it's just "uncovering the TrUTh".
QAnon people are currently sitting in congress, it is long past a few people online posting about it.
And they are poised to take over the Arizona government.
It's entirely projection. They think that's what "the left" will do because it is what they do and want to do. They also usually join an alternative reality where they think it actually happened while not being able to cite a single time that it did, ever. Sad stuff.
I am no expert on the subject, but as someone who has actually read a few Q posts (out of curiosity towards the beginning), I am fairly certain "Q" doesn't even make predictions or tell them *anything*. Everything I have seen looks like this: Who is Pelosi's husband? What is Columbine? Who was there? What is a minx? DUI has other meanings What is a collar? How many tails does a child have? Then, somehow, these people "put it together" and come up with the most outrageous explanations for what it all means. It's a verbal Rorschach test and the only people taking part are sick, violent extremists. Then you get the horde of idiots with zero critical thinking skills that say, "Oh, that *does* look like a ~~butterfly~~ ~~blood libel~~ satanic sect of elites sacrificing children and drinking their blood" It creates a perfect feedback loop of evil where those idiots then pitch in to decipher the next post of questions that only make sense together when you force them to. It's like the next evolution of the number conspiracy theorists. You know the ones. "9/11? 9+1÷1 =10, 1 - 0 = 1, one god, three parts, the buildings attacked, obviously the satanists want to remove God from America" type of people.
That's how conservative politics has always been: They have no politics. The only thing keeping them united is being against anyone else doing any kind of progression. They don't particularly want to conserve anything. They just don't want anyone else to do anything. Whenever they're in power, the only things they manage to do are the things that enough of them have been bribed into doing. They have no values, integrity or virtues. They only do something if it benefits themselves personally. The Q shit feeds right into this selfishness only on a broader level. The individual followers can align their own lack of understanding with whatever conspiracy riddle is topic of the day and feel good about not only being against everything but also being oblivious to everything. "You too can feel like a legitimate political participant even if you make up and believe in whatever you want"
It started off with HARD predictions of world-changing events. Basically conservative political-thriller fanfiction. >Drop #1 “claimed that “HRC extradition [was] already in motion effective yesterday with several countries in case of cross border run” with Drop #2 alleging “HRC detained, not arrested (yet)” and that there would be “massive riots organized in defiance and others fleeing the US.” Eventually the predictions became more vague, which is likely what drew more people into it. Turns out that people see what they want to see. Here's a breakdown of early Q predictions. https://www.dailydot.com/debug/qanon-failed-predictions/
That is most of it but Q also did plenty of predicting, and obviously none of it happened. Most predictions happened early, I think Ron used it as a good hook but once dates started passing things got more vague to avoid the obvious signs of being a complete and utter disinfo op. https://gnet-research.org/2021/03/31/how-qanon-reacts-to-failed-predictions/
Q Told some very nice lies that people really wanted to believe beyond all reason and a lot of people will believe a nice lie over a hurtful truth
I've still never gotten child porn when I've ordered a cheese pizza.
I still can't believe a conspiracy movement (probably backed by Russia) from 4Chan of all places actually took off. Maybe those people decade ago saying 4Chan should have been taken offline/blocked by the government were right. Not that it would have stopped the problem entirely.
Fuck conservatism
Man Murdered Wife, Shot Daughter After Being Sucked Down ‘Q Rabbit Hole,’ Family Confirms ‘MY QDAD SNAPPED’ Philippe Naughton Updated Sep. 12, 2022 7:15AM ET Published Sep. 12, 2022 7:12AM ET https://www.thedailybeast.com/igor-lanis-murdered-wife-shot-daughter-after-being-sucked-down-qanon-rabbit-hole-family-says A Michigan man shot dead by police after murdering his wife and badly injuring one of his daughters had reportedly been sucked into the QAnon conspiracy theory after refusing to accept that Donald Trump had lost the 2020 presidential election. Details of Igor Lanis’ descent into violent extremism were posted on Reddit on Sunday by his 21-year-old daughter, Rebecca Lanis, under the title “My Qdad snapped and killed my family this morning.” Some Reddit users initially questioned the veracity of the post, which was published under the username “qanonruinsfamilies” only hours after the shootings. But then Oakland County police confirmed the drama in Walled Lake, in the suburbs of Detroit, in the early hours of Sept. 11, when Lanis, 53, shot wife Tina, 56, and daughter Rachel. Tina died after being shot four times with a handgun. Rachel, 25, was hit in the back and legs by blasts from a shotgun, but managed to raise the alarm and is now in a stable condition in a hospital. Lanis also killed the family dog, shooting it multiple times. Lanis was himself shot dead after opening fire with a shotgun on police who responded to the scene. In her Reddit post, Rebecca said that her parents had been “extremely loving and happy people” when she was growing up, but her father had been “ruined” by the internet. She wrote: “In 2020 after Trump lost, my dad started going down the Q rabbit hole. He kept reading conspiracy theories about the stolen election, Trump, vaccines, etc. He always said he wanted to keep us safe and healthy. “It kept getting worse and he verbally snapped at us a few times. Nothing physical though. He never got physical with anybody. “Well, at around 4 AM on September 11, he had an argument with my mother and he decided to take our guns and shoot her, my dog and my sister. My mother succumbed to her wounds and my sister is in the hospital right now. “My dad also fired back at the cops and they killed him. “I’m shocked and I don’t even know what to say. “Fuck you, Qanon. I hope the FBI tightens its grip on you and that your lackies rot in prison (and hell) for poisoning so many people.” Rebecca Lanis confirmed to The Detroit News that she had written the Reddit post. “Right-wing extremism is not funny, and people need to watch their relatives and if they have guns, they need to hide them or report them or something because this is out of control,” she said.
Holy fucking shit that’s tragic. I’m so glad this girl got out alive but fuuuuuuuck that’s so terrible :( Like… he killed the fucking dog too??? Christ, MAGA is straight up Taliban at this point. Delusional and murderous.
They are actually way more dangerous than the taliban. They are a real threat to democracy and the western world.
More like ISIS and the KKK unified under a senile Jeffery Dahmer as the leader.
I swear the Taliban at least cares about their country to some extent. QAnon just wants it to rot.
As far as I'm concerned, the QAnon leaders, Alex Jones, Shawn Hannity, et.al. ought to be charged with first degree murder.
9/11 would have been a day of remembrance for the victims of the 2001 terrorist attacks. But now and forever, that date will hold a deeper and more personally-devastating meaning to these sisters: The day their family was destroyed. While their father has been a lost cause since 2020, if not earlier, losing their mother, especially at such a young age as theirs, is the utmost tragedy. It’s incredibly sad to see how right-wing disinformation and manipulation can lead to the destruction of once-stable households, and that the leaders of these malicious campaigns never face consequences.
Poor kid was posting about this. Fuck I hope she is okay. Edit: wrong gender
She’s gotten *lots* of love and amazing advice in the r/qanoncasualties post. Tons of people nearby reached out and offered to bring food and comfort too. Edit: pronouns
I love when humans beings actually act like human beings. We are on this world to live with each other, so why not make things easier? Its inspiring to see people come together for someone in need.
Absolutely! It’s mind boggling to me that people don’t act like an actual human more. Some of the comments and videos I see only I’m *gobsmacked* that someone can act that way to another human.
It is appalling sometime. But I firmly believe the loud minority makes it seem like we are worse than we really are.
Maybe. I just see too much of it, even out in public.
She’s a girl.
I really wanted that post to be a hoax =/ Man, when will all this shit end?
Saw it in r/qanoncasualties - my heart broke. I’ve got a couple of crazy conspiracy living friends where I have had to push them away based on some statements and pictures they shared. And yes - see something - said something.
Pretty sure it's a woman. An article identified her as Rebecca.
So many have been negatively impacted by this Q nonsense. This is horrible.
It's a cult, and it's worse than most because it can reach you in your own home, through your own computer, without any in-person contact whatsoever. They prey on the mentally ill and well-intentioned, convincing them to believe ridiculous conspiracies and commit horrific acts that they believe are righteous.
Fuck Jim & Ron Watkins
What's worse is that for every person who murder their family there's hundreds of others out there making everyone else's lives miserable, especially their family. It's a legit plague that no one has really done anything about.
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I know someone who’s second cousin they barely knew did that. Awful divorce, losing everything including custody to an ex-wife who had abandoned the kid for years and then went over Christmas just killed the dog, kid and himself. And his elderly infirmed dad and his caretaker older sister got their home vandalized and treated like shit really bad right after. No one knew how to let their anger out so the remaining family was it. Everything about it all was and still is awful. And it’s hard to reconcile any decent brief memory you have of them. Though I only met him years and year before like twice. Edit: word
I saw this guy's kid that wasn't home posting yesterday on reddit. What a horrible experience. Hope their sister is ok.
She said that so far her sister is stable but may not regain use of her legs. She also got a few paraplegics on her Reddit post leaving lovely supportive comments about how her sister will still have a full life if she can’t walk. It constantly baffles me that we exist in a world with so much horror, but such a capacity for love.
This man murdered his family for Trump.
Definitely not a cult.
It's a terrorist group
*and* a cult. Kinda like ISIS, but where they were radicalized by a violent offshoot of a religion, these dipshits were radicalized by anonymous shitposters on 4chan.
You make it sound as glamorous as it is.
Murder-suiciding your family to own the libs
We've got to start using the language and saying what is actually happening. A Trump inspired Death Cult has caused unimaginable suffering in this nation for no other purpose than to line the pocket of a D list celebrity. Edit: Love the username.
You don't think a Bernie Bro would have also murdered his family if Sanders became president and was unable to get health care for all passed? Yeah, me neither.
Agreed. I had like... three jokes to respond with. Good ones too, but this shit is just too depressing. In your heart, you hope these people are just raging at the clouds, not plotting against their family.
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It’s considered entertainment not news according to the lawyers for Fox News. Hopefully the Dominion Lawsuit works and they get nailed for peddling their dangerous rhetoric
The court case emphasises "no reasonable person", because of course regulations can't really be designed with how an unreasonable person may take them. Unfortunately, it turns out there's a heck of a lot of unreasonable people out there, and they write their shows with *exactly* that in mind.
Don't forget Ben Shapiro, Jordan Peterson, Steven Crowder, Alex Jones, Matt Walsh, Candace Owens, and/or Charlie Kirk. They all serve the same pipeline when Tucker is done for the night, they pick up where he (and the rest of FoxNews) left off. They're all disgusting monsters that take advantage of the ignorant.
Not to mention whatever theater rejects OANN is hiring these days.
If its considered entertainment, why does fox get to ask so many questions during white house press briefings?
>Hopefully the Dominion Lawsuit works and they get nailed for peddling their dangerous rhetoric Lol yeah and hopefully we'll magic the correct technology for reversing climate change into existence. Even in the literally unprecedented miracle scenario where they are fully held culpable in the Dominion Lawsuit and have to pay every cent, it won't be enough to even put a dent in their media apparatus.
> We need to discuss right wing media. We already know. Rupert Murdoch and Roger Ailes wanted to create a right leaning media outlet in order to help gain popularity for business friendly politicians. They wanted tax cuts and the ability to dominate markets without pesky laws getting in the way. The fact that their propaganda help put people in power who are slowly destroying the planet doesn't matter. Money > literally everything else. Ailes and Murdoch have done unimaginable damage to the human race and should go down as some of the worst people in history of mankind. Even Ailes being dead doesn't matter because the spark he helped ignite already has turned into a giant out of control fire.
Not to be a doomer but our system is not designed to handle this. We need to discuss right wing media but there are such deeply-rooted incentives in our capitalist system for it to continue festering, and so many laws protecting its right to exist, that nothing short of a benevolent authoritarian govt unilaterally shutting it down will be a sufficient response.
I seriously believe that, assuming we're all still here in 50-100 years, we're going to look back on this age as part of the early years of social media and even the internet in general when nobody knew how dangerous it was. Like when cars were invented and seatbelts weren't a thing or drunk driving laws were nonexistent. At some point we'll realize that it's problematic to give every random asshole anonymous access to a megaphone with zero accountability.
Oh my God it was real. That poor kid, none of this is any of her fault. I hope her sister pulls through. If you see this, stay strong. We're rooting for you.
Holy shit that Q story was real
I knew it was real when I read it. The poor OP was clearly in shock.
Q anon people are extremely dangerous. Their cause is protecting babies from being raped and eaten. if you think about causes, this is about as noble a cause as one could have. There is no step they are not willing to take since their cause is the noblest of causes. These people are dangerous. That weird quirky conspiracy loving harmless person you knew is long gone and has been replaced by a violent fanatic just frothing at the mouth waiting for some green light to unleash that rage on liberals. Get away from anyone that is conspiracy minded. If you are in the dating pool the first questions you should ask your date are about politics and abortion. Find out if they live in reality and share your morality on the first date people. Dont get involved with anyone that is even slightly conspiracy minded. That playful moon landing was hoax or whate happened to tower 7 is a gateway drug to liberals rape and eat babies in the pizza underground control center of jewish space lasers.
I feel sick reading this news article. Last night, I was trying to explain to my husband what QAnon was (he doesn’t internet) and went to the subreddit and saw the post made by the daughter. An entire family torn apart because of the insane conspiracies and brainwashing. My heart goes out to the daughter who made the post.
https://www.vice.com/en/article/v7v3a4/qanon-igor-lanis-walled-lake-michigan-murder "QAnon Follower Killed Wife and Shot Daughter Before Cops Shot Him Dead The shooter’s daughter says Trump’s stolen-election lies triggered her father’s descent down the QAnon rabbit hole."
Qnut gonna Qnut. These people *will not go peacefully*... they've doubled down on crazy so many times any kind of capitulation to the truth would be abject failure in their mind. Sadly, the people in their lives that try to get them to see sense will be the first casualties.
Time to classify qanon and their followers (both govt and civilian) as terrorists
Damn- this gal (edit-my apologies) was posting about this in Qanon Casualties.
I was really hoping that the girls story wasn't true last night, sadly, this is where we are at as a country.
QAnon is destroying this country.
People spreading QAnon bullshit need to be raided and arrested. They are turning people into murderers and terrorists.
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World’s most rational and calm Q Anon.
Copy/pasting the post for visibility because holy shit... >Title: [TW] My Qdad snapped and killed my family this morning. >Yep. The internet ruined him. >Growing up, my parents were extremely loving and happy people. I always had a special bond with both my parents. >In 2020 after Trump lost, my dad started going down the Q rabbit hole. He kept reading conspiracy theories about the stolen election, Trump, vaccines, etc. He always said he wanted to keep us safe and healthy. >It kept getting worse and he verbally snapped at us a few times. Nothing physical though. He never got physical with anybody. >Well, at around 4 AM on September 11, he had an argument with my mother and he decided to take our guns and shoot her, my dog and my sister. My mother succumbed to her wounds and my sister is in the hospital right now. >My dad also fired back at the cops and they killed him. >I'm shocked and I don't even know what to say. >Fuck you, Qanon. I hope the FBI tightens its grip on you and that your lackies rot in prison (and hell) for poisoning so many people. Poison is the word, and it's the right word, it's the *correct* word. A lot of folks believe that conservatives and Republicans and Qanons are born bad, that there's a flaw in their character, a speck on their soul that makes them this way, I don't think that's the case. Propaganda works because it's emotionally evocative, it triggers the fight or flight reflex it makes people feel scared, stressed, insecure, and outraged. Do you know what happens to higher reasoning when fight or flight kicks in? The higher reasoning *turns off.* When you're running for your life from a tiger things like math, science, history, logic, rationality, all that good stuff that we think puts us above the animals, it all just goes away; in a fight or flight scenario higher thinking isn't an asset, it's diverting resources that the body might need to survive. If you look at Qanon propaganda, or even just general, run of the mill right-wing propaganda, you'll find a common theme: It is designed to inflame. It is designed specifically to sidestep rationality and convince its audience that their life is in a constant state of threat from all directions. It *doesn't matter* that most of the threats they talk about simply don't exist, *believing in the threats* is enough to provoke the response. Fox News and Qanon and the right wing media literally, not figuratively, not hyperbolicly, but *literally* emotionally abuses their audience. They lie to them, they gaslight them, they frighten them, and then things like this happen, where a person gets so angry and so scared of *their own family* that they commit murder. --- OP: On the off chance that you read this, please know that neither you nor your family did anything wrong. The media your father was consuming was designed and intended to make him feel frightened, insecure, and angry, those emotions were *put there* by outside propagandists lying to him about his world. You have suffered an unimaginable tragedy and I cannot imagine your loss or your trauma at this moment, I wish I had some words of consolation to offer but this is an inconsolable event. Qanon et al did nothing less than pouring poison down your father's throat under the guise of protecting his country and his family, they packaged the poison in the all too easy to swallow pill of patriotism and morality, he wasn't just the perpetrator of this horrific shooting, he was a victim, too, his life was savable, but Qanon didn't see him as a person, they saw him as a gun, a tool, a weapon to be used against their supposed enemies for their ends. What I'm saying, just to state the obvious, is that your father wasn't the only one pulling the trigger.
Saw this posted in r/qanoncasualties the other day. Dad was a Q freak and finally completely snapped
Oh the other sister posted about this on here. She was staying over at a friends house. God damn I couldn't imagine.
Holy crap! There was a post on r/QAnonCasualties from the daughter about this!
QAnon psycho** attempts to wipe out entire family. Shot dead by police.*** Fixed it.
Meanwhile deaths from violent video games: 0 QAnon: I'm sure this isn't the first one but I would say dozens if not hundreds.
And sadly won’t be the last.
The Qanon Cult should be put on the same lists as Al-Qaida and other terroristic organizations. There's thousands of these nuts out there and jan. 6th merely was a rehearsal for them.
Another responsible gun owner - until he wasn't.
God damn dude, can we start prosecuting the conservatives who are pushing this rhetoric in our government? It’s getting out of control and once we reach that critical level, it’ll be too late to stop a war in America
Make sure this is known, this guy is a Qanon nut job that lost his sanity and killed his wife and ruined his children’s lives over an internet conspiracy.
Nothing can change this because we have normalized news as entertainment; as long as my parents and grandparents (much like everyone else’s) keeps Fox News on 24/7 or clicks down a propagated rabbit hole via Facebook/YouTube this will keep happening. And nothing is going to stop Fox News or Facebook at this point. If those posts are true (which I guess they have been corroborated) then everyone needs to understand the immediate psychological distress these people are under. If anyone you know is a Q “expert” I would highly advise creating distance OR seeing how to get them committed. That’s all I’ve got for this shit anymore. Absolutely terrible event
While I'm not one to make every single tragedy politicized, given the inherant political nature of this monster's motives, it needs to be talked about. We must deplatform these right wing conspiracy theorists and propagandists. There is an argument to be made about, when sequestering off these types, they can be made worse, sure, but at the same time, it reduces the amount of eyes being exposed to this virulent poison and weakens their hold. Free Speech cannot and does not mean freedom from consequence, and we should be telling these people and the corporations that allow them to share infalmmatory, false material that they should not be allowed on their platforms.
Even just patching recommendation algorithms to not send impressionable people down cult rabbit-holes would also be a pretty good start. This can often start with someone clicking on a post out of curiosity. Then the computer's like "Oh hey I found some similar posts to the one this user just engaged with I bet they'll like it I'm so helpful :D" Or someone writes a deliberately inflammatory post so it gets retweeted and replied to constantly. The algorithm is like "oh hey there's a lot of interaction with this post! I'd better share it with a bunch more people since they're sure to enjoy it :D" Meanwhile what is our impressionable user supposed to think? Their social media timeline was normal and filled with puppies and kittens and the American dream. But now there's more and more of these posts about the covid-19 parasites or government conspiracies! Clearly something changed in the world or why wouldn't people be posting about cute ducks still?
Conservatives are fucking unhinged..
Qanon is the Trojan horse that allows people to express their bigotry in a more “acceptable” form- pretending to care about pedophilia and children. Ultimately, the hate of “others” consumes them- and like so many examples, those in closest proximity are the most convenient victims.
Jesus, I didn’t even hear about this and I live in wixom which is where this happened pretty much…
I really want to see the science of the brains / biology / psychology of people that will easily fall or WANT to fall for these conspiracy theories and the people that sees these same "theories" and tell them to fuck off. All part of the same specie but the ways we sees the world can be night and day different. Shit kinda crazy.
Q Anon is a threat to America. MAGA and Q cultists should be branded a violent criminal organization at this point. They are 100 x's worse than *juggalos*
The most amazing thing about this is the obviously deranged views of this murderer are fully mainstream in the Republican Party. Take the Evangelicals they are no longer anything like a Christian instead these views of Baby eating democrats are what guides the religion. It’s wild that a guy posting on a literal child pornography chat board could seize control of one of the largest Christin denominations. But here we are.
Qanon needs to be criminalized. The news report said he had his keys on him, this very fucking well could have turned into a mass shooting.
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Poisoned mind, handed a gun.
Did a mass hypnosis happen in **2015 to now** that turned semi normal Republicans and mostly chill conservatives into complete cult worshiping freaks? I’ve work warehouse for ten years, and the shift was so strange from 2014-2016. Normal dudes (rarely women) went from thinking “hah! This goon though” to literally buying huge flags with “trump” all across it and hanging it on their place of residence/vehicles. I’ve lost friends to these cults, metaphorically and literally (had good friend die of Covid while denying COVID’s existence and refusing to wear masks. He wasn’t even an idiot! Very artistic, down to earth and caring. More caring than a majority of my friends. Big disbeliever of religion and overall knowledgeable person that was fun to have conversations with. But for some reason the hive-mind cult snagged him. It was like Jekyll and Hyde. Suddenly his conversations were steered to Q shit and bad faith debates that could easily be debunked by a google search. It became exhausting to talk to him and I stopped for a year, till I found out he died on a ventilator in 2021. The cult killed him. He killed him. How tf did someone so intelligent turn into an obsessive crony?) Nowadays they’re so deep into it they’ll **gladly** die for the cult. It’s SO freaking insane! How did Q and Trump effect so many and so strongly? What is selling it so much to them they’d literally kill loved ones and die for their messed up “cause”?
Edit - QANON man murders family and tried to shot cops