Last year, as the number of QAnon congressional candidates became very high, I warned that QAnon supporters had become so organized via social media that politicians saw a benefit in appealing to them. It's now time to sound that alarm with anti-vaxxers.
Like with politicians, we're seeing prominent anti-vaxxers see a group of people, QAnon supporters, organized enough via these shows & primed enough to believe conspiracy theories that they're going on these shows to further their own anti-vaccine agendas.
And with one of the world's most famous anti-vaxxers going on a QAnon show that was involved in the insurrection, we're seeing how dangerous this overlap is getting & how big QAnon is to anti-vaxxers.
To a significant extent, YouTube deserves blame here. It's where many of these shows first gained their audiences. And despite YouTube belatedly cracking down on QAnon last year, it seems these shows have kept much of their audience as they moved to alternative platforms.
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New from me: Multiple anti-vax influencers in recent months have been going on QAnon shows, where they have spread misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines. mediamatters.org/coronavirus-co…
One of those influencers is Andrew Wakefield, a disgraced anti-vaxxer who helped catalyze the anti-vaccination movement due to discredited work suggesting a link between vaccines and autism. He appeared in March on a QAnon show that participated in the insurrection.
At least 2 of these influencers who have gone on QAnon shows to attack vaccines are also part of the so-called “Disinformation Dozen,” influencers identified in a report by @CCDHate as the originators of an estimated 65% of vaccine misinformation spread on Facebook and Twitter.
"Wurzelroot," a TikTok personality who has become increasingly popular in the far-right, is currently speaking online with white nationalist Nick Fuentes. Wurzelroot told Fuentes he joined TikTok because he followed Fuentes. TikTok has previously banned Fuentes & his "Groypers."
Fuentes just lauded Wurzelroot for being on TikTok & using it to spread Fuentes' beliefs.
Wurzelroot suggests to Fuentes that he wants to use TikTok to make white nationalism appealing to QAnon supporters on the platform. And Fuentes, while opposing QAnon on the whole, praised parts of it & said there's "fertile ground" with it.
The Krassensteins, anti-Trump Twitter personalities when Trump was president, are now promoting a cryptocurrency feature from Ali Alexander, a far-right figure who organized the "Stop The Steal" efforts leading to the insurrection (Alexander amplified their praise).
The Krassensteins have also participated in multiple Clubhouse chatrooms with Alexander about cryptocurrency efforts.
Ali Alexander and Ed Krassenstein are in a Clubhouse chatroom together about cryptocurrency efforts right now.
New from me: Months after YouTube announced a crackdown on QAnon, the platform is still hosting multiple channels airing shows supporting the conspiracy theory, some of which run ads. That includes multiple ban evasion channels for banned QAnon figures. mediamatters.org/google/despite…
There are still some major QAnon influencers YouTube hasn't targeted despite banning other QAnon influencers, such as a channel run by a group of QAnon influencers who were banned from Twitter following the Capitol insurrection, & channels from individual members of that group.
And among the QAnon ban evasion channels, some are run directly by people behind the banned channels. Take Edge of Wonder, whose co-host began uploading the show to his own channel after the show was banned. YouTube is also running an ad for the show even though they banned it.
New from me: Alternative streaming platforms have become major hotspots for coronavirus vaccine misinformation, & links to or copies of the videos have spread onto mainstream platforms like Facebook & Instagram. mediamatters.org/coronavirus-co…
In recent months, videos attacking COVID vaccines have gotten millions of combined views on these alternative streaming platforms. And in turn they've earned (at least) hundreds of thousands of Facebook combined engagements -- undermining FB's coronavirus vaccine misinfo ban.
And earlier this month, a video from one of those alternative streaming platforms, Rumble, was repackaged on Instagram, getting it more than 100,000 views.
This lawsuit makes some blatantly false claims. Contrary to what this lawsuit claims, the Flynns absolutely took a QAnon oath last July. In June, "Q" had posted the exact same oath that the Flynns recited in that video. "Q" also wrote, "take the oath."
It is also dishonest to act like the Flynn family does not have other connections to QAnon and that they took this QAnon oath in a vacuum. For example, Joseph Flynn has gone on QAnon shows & tweeted the QAnon slogan multiple times. thedailybeast.com/michael-flynns…