Thread by @ARCCollective

A few days ago Facebook announced that they would be removing groups such as militias and QAnon from their platform. 1/25

about.fb.com/news/2020/08/a…

Reactions from Canadians such as this former III%er leader were as expected. 2/25

Because, you know, being deplatformed on social media is a precursor to show trials and force labour in isolated gulags. 3/25

I don't know if this is merely an effort to placate critics of Facebook (and god knows Facebook deserves criticism) but so far quite a few groups and pages have been removed including this one. 4/25

I'm going to delve a bit into QAnon now, but as a heads up @VestsCanada are currently in the process of writing an article on the subject. In the meantime, here is a CBC article that discusses the conspiracy theory in light of the US election. 5/25

cbc.ca/radio/frontbur…

QAnon basically roles a bunch of conspiracy theories into one overarching conspiracy in which the elite are secretly trafficking children, molesting them, eating them, and harvesting chemicals from their remains for nefarious purposes. 6/25

They further believe that Donald Trump, presented as a messiah-like figure, is waging a secret war to save said children and has already arrested, tried, and executed Democratic politicians and powerful figures in Hollywood. 7/25

When shown that, no, Tom Hanks, Justin Trudeau, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and others they claim are in "gitmo" or already executed are still very much alive, they claim these are doubles. Here is such an example a member of the Canadian Combat Coalition. 8/25

These images are easily disproven. For example, the image of Obama is not of him in his cell in Guantanamo Bay, but of his visit to the cell on Robben Island in South Africa that held Nelson Mandela. 9/25

nytimes.com/2013/07/01/wor…

The other image is at Guantanamo Bay, but it as poorly Photo-shopped Hillary Clinton instead of the actual prisoner being transported. 10/25

dawn.com/news/712010/tw…

Despite being easily proven false, the supporters of the conspiracy believe it without question.

"Trust the plan."

And based on my own observations the conspiracy theory has become one of the main drivers of much of the far-right I've watched for years. 11/25

As the members of these groups are already distrustful of media and live in an echo chamber where the same false narratives are believed without question, it was probably only a matter of time before QAnon became THE accepted world view. Here III% Alberta leader pushes it. 12/25

QAnon supporters also look for symbols that they are convinced support their belief that the world is run by Child sacrificing cannibals. One of those symbols?

Pizza. 13/25

MAPP, one of whose moderators is Northern Guard leader Nick Gallant, is among of many groups started on Facebook ostensibly to combat child trafficking but which are really vehicles to uncritically disseminate QAnon conspiracies. 14/25

In this case, the pizza hearkens back to the #pizzagate conspiracy which predates QAnon but which has been seamlessly incorporated into the overarching conspiracy. 15/25

esquire.com/news-politics/…

That pizzagate is being invoked as fact isn't a surprise. What is fascinating it watching what happens when there is push back from others who still support the philosophy of the group but aren't quite as far down the rabbit hole. 16/25

What you'll see in the next few tweets in this thread is what happens to those who don't accept the orthodoxy of QAnon and are branded, for lack of a better word, heretics. 17/25

18/25

19/25

If you try to argue that sometimes a pizza really is just a pizza, you run the risk of being accused yourself of being involved in the conspiracy 20/25

While QAnon is novel, the panic of the supporters really isn't. We've seen this through history including relatively recently. 21/25

thedailybeast.com/what-fueled-th…

Other similar examples include the Salem Witch trials... 22/25

smithsonianmag.com/history/a-brie…

... and Jewish blood libel. 23/25

thenation.com/article/archiv…

We are also seeing some real world events connected to QANon. 24/25

https://twitter.com/jaredlholt/status/1296530983311876098?s=20

So what do we do when a fringe movement based on superstition and paranoia is no longer fringe?

I'm not sure I have an answer.

It's all well and good Facebook is removing QAnon, but how do you put the genie back in the bottle? 25/25

theguardian.com/us-news/2020/a…