But THEN, plot twist! What if something ELSE is going on?
"He could have had surgery, but no cancer. They coul've just made the incision and called it a day."
Another anon puts on his lab coat and frowns thoughtfully. Sure, this is PLAUSIBLE, but how would you PROVE it?
And then an administrator comes by to talk about how weird and, um, devil-worshippy? the board of directors is.
Listen, I didn't say it was a GOOD episode of House, MD. I said it was a 4chan episode.
So the standards of evidence, and ability to stay on target, are... special.
But this does illustrate that, from the earliest days, QAnon people *always* made strange, loose connections and caromed from idea to idea in an evidence-free atmosphere, while sometimes *nodding* to the idea that evidence might be, upon the whole, a good thing. Plus ça change...
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MEGATHREAD: "GUYS WE NEED TO DIG" -- ANONS DISCOVER Q
INTRO
Q's earliest activity drew little attention or excitement from anons. But that changed dramatically in the thread where Q posted drops 6-13. He got rapturous, breathless responses; here's my favorite.
In fact, by the time that post was made, there was already a separate thread about Q -- and it was about an hour old.
This thread, linked below (warning: 4chan is an open sewer and you read at your own risk), is the first instance of QAnon culture.
A key element of QAnon culture, "baking," makes its first appearance in this thread.
"Baking" is what happens when the anons take one or more parts of Q's drops and speculate about their meaning until a consensus emerges. (This isn't a terribly precise definition, but it'll do.)
Shortly after *that*, he claimed that the EU and NATO was being "heavily" pushed to war against Russia, then went back to explaining George Soros' master plan and didn't hesitate to add that "the Holocaust was a lie." (Always remember: 4chan loves Nazis.)
I think the reason QAnon is so dangerous is less that it inspires physical violence & more that it disconnects its members from observable reality, while still leaving them very politically engaged and motivated bc they think the Dems are Satanist pedos.
So it creates a bloc of voters who are ride or die for the GOP *and* who think that opposition to it is treason (treason in the service of Satan, no less).
This doesn't exactly encourage a peaceful handover of power, especially if these folks become a large % of the primary vote
But wait, there's more: not only are they disconnected from reality, they're also flagrantly disloyal to any GOP elected official except, of course, for President Trump.
Any official OTHER than Trump is subject to accusations of Deep State allegiance, Cabal membership, etc.
The QAnon-ification of the GOP has progressed *much* faster than I ever imagined.
In addition to Mike's tweet, note that Don Jr. has held campaign events claiming Dems were trying to "normalize pedophilia" and even Ted Cruz has flirted with this kind of rhetoric.
The risk here is that, if enough Republicans come to *believe* the obvious and extremely offensive lie that Dems are pedophiles, they'll believe that Dems can never legitimately wield political power.
Right-wing rhetoric has hinted at, and sometimes overtly embraced, that idea for decades. (@SethCotlar is a great follow to learn more about this.)
But so far, the GOP (with the arguable exceptions of state GOPs in NC and WI) has ultimately accepted the will of the voters.
MINITHREAD: "TRIBUNAL" FANTASIES ON /POL/ BEFORE Q
Earlier, we noted that -- on just Q's second day of posting -- anons had already sussed out Q's metaplot. It was especially striking that one predicted the "military tribunals" that are central to the Q mythos.
How? Well...
As it turns out (surprise!), 4chan users often fantasized about their perceived enemies -- frequently Jews -- being hauled before a military tribunal and executed.
How often is "often?"
From 1/1/17 to 10/28/17, "tribunal" was used at least 1,208 times on /pol/.
Not all of these refer to military tribunals, but many do.
In fact, one of the screenshots above is from a thread posted on 10/26/10 -- two days before Q's first drop.
Let's take a look at some responses -- first, a few that mesh with Q's main themes...
In Q's first three threads, he toiled in obscurity. He drew very few replies, and some were skeptical.
In THIS thread, he broke out -- REALLY broke out, getting replies like this:
But why? Well, possibly the drops were seen as more compelling in this thread than in others. But here's the thing: drop 6, his first in this thread, was essentially drops 4 and 5 (which he had posted on the morning of the 29th to minimal response) just smashed together.
Incidentally, it's worth noting that Q posted drops 3-5 between 8:47 and 9:47 AM, then wandered away from 4chan and returned in a completely new thread 9 hours later.
The gap is interesting -- this is wild speculation, but it's enough time to work a 6-8 hr shift and come home.