The Atlantic's Shadowland Series

LaFrance begins her QAnon takedown with a fictional-like reading of the Pizzagate Comet Ping Pong shooter. Sorry, but he didn't kill anyone. He was just a guy looking to save a bunch of non-existent kids. A guy who could have killed everyone in the diner but didn't.

Why did the shooter get so riled up about the supposed liberal pedophile scandal? Because of the conspiracy theory interpretations of Wikileak documents from the then-Clinton campaign. I've read the docs. And I have to admit, it's odd. But without proof, there's little reason to think that it's code for sex trafficking. However, if you look into the world of the Podestas...you'll find a dark rabbit hole.

While Pizzagate was a false, many conspiracy theorists (including myself) believe that people are being ritualistically killed by powerful people/deep state. Any proof? Yes. The UK is the pedophile capital of Europe. Hollywood is the second Western pedophile capital of the world. Just Google it.

In the UK, most the higher up pedophiles are already dead (like Jimmy Savile). Prior to his death, if you claimed that Savile was a pedophile, you would get laughed at by liberal media outlets and then sued for defamation. But the reality was that he was, and he was highly connected to the UK royal family. But that's just the surface. The real meat is the UK officials and royalty who were/are pedophiles. Members of the UK Royal family and former President Bill Clinton have deep connections now-dead Jeffrey Epstein. These are just recent events. We haven't even gone in the Dutroux pedophile ring in Belgium in the 1970s. See Pedophile Rings.

There is definite evidence of pedophilia and sex trafficking by royal/wealthy people in Western-European countries. Denying or downplaying this is something that an asset of the deep state would do. Ha ha ha.

LaFrance points to the creation of QAnon to obfuscate reality. It should be clear to people in the past and now, that QAnon is simply a group of Trump supporters in the intelligence world. Or at least it was initially. It’s unknown who's controlling it now. Some conspiracy theorists got sucked up into the QAnon mix like Alex Jones and Simon Parkes. Parkes even believes that Q is artificial intelligence. Oh boy. At least he still has his connecting consciousness YouTube channel. For now.

But David Icke never fell for the Q nonsense. Why not? Because he's too busy busting people's balls about our reptilian overlords. I never fell for QAnon either. Why? Because I was too busy thinking about my future wife and kids. Someday I'll turn it into a reality...someday.

Ah, the life of a broke writer/philosopher/conspiracy theorist. Where are all my sell-out checks? I need them to cover my monthly bank fees. Damn your minimum balance requirements.

LaFrance even mentions Marshall McLuhan. Oh dear. McLuhan is an academic asswipe. His works are garbage. See Conspiracy Theorists.

The warping of reality from the internet? If that applies to climate change as the harbinger of death, as well as the idea that there's no such thing as biological sex, then I agree. The liberal ideological bubble prevents them from seeing their own ideological shortcomings. I could probably get a list of biology textbooks taught in public schools by liberals over the past 50 years. Prior to the 2000s, I would bet that very few of them mentioned transgender as something "real" relative to one's biology.

But don't worry, I'm not anti-trans. You do you, and I'll do me (within ethics of course). Don't push your ideologies on me and I won't push my ideologies on you. If you want to pretend that you're a woman when you're a man, go for it. I'll pretend that I'm a successful author with a loving wife and kids. We all have our illusions.

But lets get back to the desire of various groups to prove that their ideologies are correct. Which is only natural. Each groups believes that they're correct (liberals, conservatives, conspiracy theorists, progressives, LGBTQ movements, climate change movement). Each group is fighting to justify their ideologies. That's fine. I support free speech. But we all know that liberals today don't really support free speech.

Free speech for liberals only. Everything else is fake news.

And you wonder why they lost the 2016 election.

Funny how LaFrance laments the scourge of the internet because of the proliferation of conspiracy theorists when it's the internet that will most likely destroy their media empire.

You censor conspiracy theorists and I'll bankrupt your company. One for one.

"To look at QAnon is to see not just a conspiracy theory but the birth of a new religion."

Sigh.

No, the QAnon movement isn’t a new religion. But the liberal Church of Satan is. [1]

Like I said, the QAnon movement was just a bunch of Trump supporters in the intelligence world. Whether that's the case now is debatable. Most likely not. I wouldn't be surprised if regular deep state intelligence officials have taken over Q and are just f*cking with their followers. It's easier to control the narrative than start a new one. See The Media.

I have yet to see the supposed video of Hilary Clinton and Huma Abedin eating a child. A video that the NYPD and FBI supposedly have. The idea that one police officer has yet to leak the supposed video is a bridge too far for me. While I believe that ritualistic killings happen. Most of the participants aren't stupid enough to be video-recorded while doing it.

While LaFrance sees QAnon as some sort of powerful religion, in reality, it's just another Trump movement which has little power to change anything of significance. If an election was held right now, Trump would probably lose and the Democrats would sweep the White House, the Senate, and the House. Like all ideological bubbles, liberals need to leave conservatives and conspiracy theorists alone and let them believe whatever they want to believe. Just because you believe X doesn't mean that you're going to take any significant action on X. Some people just like the idea of believing in X. It makes them feel good about themselves and the world. And that's fine.

LaFrance talks about conspiracy theorists become domestic terrorists and stoking violence, when in reality it's...wait for it...liberals who are doing that right now across America and throughout the world. I support your right to protest, but not to damage property. Liberal journalists and their editors are working overtime to downplay the destruction caused by liberal protests. Why? Because it's all about controlling the narrative of the story. See The Media.

"QAnon adherents are feared for ferociously attacking skeptics online and for inciting physical violence."

I don't know a single person who is scared of QAnon supporters. If you are, you're delusional. Both sides have the power to dox people online and have done so. Mudslinging. But that's usually it. I would recommend that both sides keep the fight above the belt.

I'll threaten to kill your family.

An unethical and illegal action. But 9/10 times, the person has zero power or interest in actually doing so. Most people like to talk a big game. But deep down, most people are p*ssies.

It's interesting that LaFrance mentions all of the threats to Clinton but doesn't mention any of the threats to Trump and his family. [2] CNN even laughs at Trump's potential death, [3] while the New York Times plans his assassination in a satirical article. [4]

The fact that none of QAnon's predictions have come true (Clinton's arrest, names of high level pedophiles) is another testament to how...wait for it...weak it is. Aides in Congress can be members of Q, of climate change, of Islam, of the LGBTQ movement, of the neo-Nazi movement...either way it's makes little difference in terms of significant results. But Lafrance can't see that being stuck in her ideological bubble.

And now LaFrance moves onto the COVID/coronavirus conspiracies. Where do they come from? The usual anti-vaccine bunch. It's nothing new under the sun. The stuff that was said in previous pandemics by conspiracy theorists are the same things being said now. The only difference is that YouTube and Facebook didn't have such a hard-on for conspiracy theorists in the past as they do today in censoring them.

Yes, I've heard the JFK Jr. theory as well. Faked his death and he's really the architect of QAnon. Yah...yah. And that changes the 2020 election how? And that changes racism, sexism, and inequality how? Exactly. And no, Trump can't be the architect of Q. That would imply that he's a secret genius in planning his rise to power. That's a bridge too far for most people to cross (including me).

For all the takedowns of conspiracy theorist videos and threads, I'm wondering if the conservative community will wise up and realize that they need their own servers and cloud computing to have an unfiltered say on the internet. It's not exactly rocket science. A conservative company gets private donors to back it and starts buying land/servers. You can't lease the servers because they have rules and regulations about the content being run on those servers.

LaFrance talks about the lives of various Q members and conspiratorial thinking. Yes, there's a conspiracy for every major event. And that creates a significant impact...how? In reality, Hollywood is a goldmine for exploiting conspiracy theories for profit. Conspiracy movies area a hit with the Da Vinci Code, the Transformers series, the John Wick series, the Jason Bourne series, Eagle Eye, Marvel movies, the Manchurian Candidate, the Men in Black...and such.

QAnon is simply a new movement for politically active Christians.

It's better than those boring church sermons. And I hooked up with a girl. I love Q.

It's a shame that LaFrance never keyed into the reason why people stopped trusting liberal media outlets and moved to the fringes of conspiracy theories. Prior to the shift, conspiracy theorists had little power (even less than now) over the American public.

If Lafrance dug a bit further she would have found an ideological backlash to the liberal/deep state agenda. She would have found the same bullsh*t spewed by various administrations, all of which were trumpeted by liberal and conservative media outlets. Unlike media outlets, mature conspiracy theorists aren't loyal to presidents or political parties. They're loyal to their perception of reality and can admit when they're wrong. A rare feat, but genuine people are worth their weight in gold. Something that mainstream journalists are lacking.

Almost all of the followers of QAnon felt (at one time or another) that there was something wrong with America and that media outlets were part of the problem instead of the solution.

If liberal journalists have never considered themselves as part of the problem, they've never stepped outside of their ideological bubble. And if you've never stepped outside of your ideological bubble, then you're not living a genuine life.

References:

[1] Dickson, Ej. The IRS Officially Recognizes the Satanic Temple as a Church. RollingStone. April 24, 2019.

[2] Eady, Ashley. 15 Stars Who Imagined Violence Against Donald Trump, From Kathy Griffin to Pearl Jam (Photos). Wrap. August 15, 2018.

[3] Fredericks, Bob. CNN apologizes for producer’s joke about a Trump plane crash. New York Post. December 2, 2016.

[4] Flood, Brian. New York Times under fire for 'fantasy' about Secret Service helping Russian assassin gun down Trump. Fox News. October 25, 2018.