On january 30th 2017, i uploaded this to my facebook page :
The screenshot is from the Michael Radford film 1984 based on the George Orwell novel of the same name. From the novel :
“The horrible thing about the Two Minutes Hate was not that one was obliged to act a part, but that it was impossible to avoid joining in. Within thirty seconds any pretence was always unnecessary. A hideous ecstasy of fear and vindictiveness, a desire to kill, to torture, to smash faces in with a sledge hammer, seemed to flow through the whole group of people like an electric current, turning one even against one’s will into a grimacing, screaming lunatic. And yet the rage that one felt was an abstract, undirected emotion which could be switched from one object to another like the flame of a blowlamp”
The two minutes hates serves two purposes in the novel. First, as a vent for the negative emotions and frustrations felt towards the totalitarian state which one ostensibly loves: blood lust re-directed. And as a method of bending reality to your will.
When I wrote the update, I was referring to the influence of the intellectualised ALT Right. Figures like Richard Spencer, the hipster Neo-Nazi repackaged for millenials, and Milo Yiannopoulos, then technology editor for Breitbart and human strawman argument against LGBT rights.
Now, in October 2020, both of them have become irrelivant. Mostly owing to their own actions ( if you want a shot of schadenfreude, check out what Yiannopoulos did to himself). The digital environments that figures like these came from and helped mold have shifted. Singular figures articulating ideologies are less relevant than the over-arching mythos of the ideology.
Mighty Morphing Conspiracy Theories
The first QAnon ‘update’ happened in October 2017. The figures I saw dealing in untruths and Fascist propaganda were actual people with an identifiable agenda. They distorted the world, but still referred to reality, even if only vaguely. When I thought of disinformation war, I thought of Russian ‘Bot farms and Cambridge Analytica. Their methodologies and practices are deranged and terrifying, though I can comprehend the logic of their purpose. QAon is totally decentralised, irrational, discursive and rabid.
From the BBC Trending article What’s behind the rise of QAnon in the UK?
“QAnon began life – most likely as a joke or prank – on extreme message boards in 2017. It’s an unfounded conspiracy theory that claims President Trump is secretly battling a clandestine network of Satan-worshipping elites who run a child trafficking ring.”
For those who haven’t gotten lost down Wikiholes on QAnon, it may sound like dismissible nonsense. The influence of the group ( ideology, belief, pseudo-religion?) has become pervasive. Like a black hole of weirdness, it’s sucked in numerous ALT-Right beliefs and conspiracy theories and created an alternate reality casting followers as heroes of biblical proportions. Every facet of our lives is dictated by, and proof of, a vast deep state conspiracy. A political cataclysm is coming, called ‘The Storm’. The wheat will be separated from the shaft when the messiah reveals himself as he is : Donald Trump.
This image is from the March For Innocence protest in Dublin, July of this year. This link gives further details on a troubling event.
https://gcn.ie/outside-dail-far-right-campaigners-roderic-ogorman/
What I believe should be noted, and was overlooked by Irish media, is the influence of online subcultures on the various groups in the protest. The symbolism and rhetoric are directly connected to QAnon groups. One of the rally cries of QAnon is “Save The Children”. A basic tactic of propaganda is to find a unifying cause that a disparate series of groups can find common ground on. From that point on, you can begin to indoctrinate into the more extreme elements of an ideology.
This also relates to how people become radicalised( a word I don’t think is hyperbole) through online groups. In his book This Is Not Propaganda, Peter Pomerantsev relays how a Russian ‘Bot farm used a false Facebook page for a psychic to slowly introduce politicised content into the stream of users who normally would have had a-political streams. Without direct intervention, this is happening with contemporary conspiracy theories. Someone who joins a wellness group gets anti-vax content on their stream, and from anti-vax to anti-establishment to outright conspiracy theories to radical action. People join a group for specific content, but over time become influenced by thinking periphery to the group. With the case of Russian ‘Bot farms and trolls, there is a specific intent by specific groups. But now this has begun to occur independent of an agent, fed by algorithms designed get you to interact with content; irrespective of the substance of the content.
The individuals involved in the protests in July were not all direct QAon followers, but their rhetoric and symbolism is taken from it. They have integrated elements of the ideology and thought processes. They’ve cast themselves as heroes against a monstrous, predatory system. Not only do they want to protect the innocent; they’re very specific in how the guilty should be judged. And who should cast that judgement. These are individuals who came together and co-ordinated solely through on-line groups, often only incidentally connected to the cause they state to be for. Thoughts and feelings originally directed towards one object become redirected towards another.
Memes, Deception and Manipulation
A friend of mine posted this a few weeks ago
One of the tropes of QAnon followers is of having ‘researched’ it. ‘It’ being the subject you are pointing out flaws in their logic about. They describe their obsessive consumption of self-reinforcing Youtube clips and meme posts as research. Which it is not .
Every point made in the post is perfectly true. But who is it for, and for what purpose? It’s an expression of frustration and exasperation. It’s meant for people who do actual research. But it isn’t to point out errors in reasoning for QAnon followers. Who will thank you for pointing out that they are ignorant, gullible and foolish; especially with that tone? I feel that frustration myself. This is a graphic I produced recently, describing my source finding method.
I have standards. I’ve also had the benefit of an education that reinforced the necessity of having such standards so as to be credible. Platforms such as Youtube have inexorably blurred the lines between ‘research’ and entertainment, study and consumption. Not knowing how to engage QAnon followers in reasoned discourse, I decided to join some QAnon groups on Facebook and see how they functioned.
This post illustrates the issue of the notion of ‘research’. It lends false authority to their arguments , inaccurately equating time spent in an activity with rigor, discipline and accountability. It also gives insight into how people get sucked into conspiracy theories. Hours each day spent absorbed in content that reinforces a world view through highly emotive content. It’s fascinating to see that the poster has cast themselves as the hero in a narrative, boldly seeking the truth against the powers of the system.
Then I began looking past the content and thinking of it as an art work. Really, it’s just a glorified meme. The framing narrative is clearly made up to give context to the writers diatribe on their countless hours of ‘research’. It also gives the writer an antagonist. A discussion much like QAnon followers must have each day with those close to them. It’s an act of bravery and integrity to block out information that contradicts your thought system. The most emotive and topic specific words are capitalised. I can almost hear the shouting when reading it.
And then there’s the picture. There is something unsettling about the image ; it’s emotive, pulpish and simply ever so slightly ‘off ‘ . It reminded me of a Vice article Things You Learn Designing Porn Banners for a Living.
https://www.vice.com/en/article/9bzg9y/this-girl-designed-porn-banners-for-a-living
The designer said for a porn site banner “It’s not that it looks homemade, as much as something is disturbed about the picture, so you look at it and you click. It’s all about catching the eye. It’s psychology. Low, low psychology”
Seeing past the surface, everything about the post is so…considered.
This post leans much further into the QAnon mythology, and follows the same basic visual format. The chosen photographs have an uncanny quality, and are recontextualised around the QAnon belief system, which turns uncanny to ominous. QAnon followers see the world as full of secret signs and symbols to be decyphered. Anyone familiar with David Icke will see his beliefs incorporated into this, it’s just that they’ve replaced Reptilians with pedophiles. It would be reasonable to ask why these individuals leave clues to their crimes, but I see it as the mystical element of QAnon. It allows them to see the transcendent in everything. The cryptic nature makes QAnon a gamified belief system : you get points for solving puzzles, you get points for participating. This habit of identifying false patterns is like American behaviorist B.F Skinner’s superstitious pigeons . The short clip below describes the experiment.
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I began to notice that all the content was shared from other sources, never from the actual poster, and all in this meme format. Then the obvious struck me. There are only a limited number of people creating the content, knowingly being deceptive, with the content being shared person to person, group to group. The people reacting to and sharing the content were genuine in their belief. The meme format is quickly read and designed to be shared. See it, like it, share it. In his book ALT RIGHT: From 4Chan to the Whitehouse Mike Wendling, editor of BBC Trending describes ‘meme magic’ and quotes three academics researchers of memes :
“It is certainly true that the Alt-right’s pro-Trump “shitposting – the act of flooding social media with memes and commentary designed to bolster their “God Emperor” Trump – raised the public visibility of the alt-right and it’s memetic handiwork.”
Further on, Wendling is dismissive of the wider influence of memes, but he was thinking of memes made by ‘shit posters’ for ‘ shit posters’. These people are in on the knowingness, the ambiguity and the irony of these posts. Their posts are meant to amuse each other and to rile up ‘libtards’, ‘cucks’ and ‘snowflakes’. The Qanon posts have verisimilitude built in, and are taken earnestly. ‘Shitposts’ are generally a gag, something meant to be ephemeral. Whereas the QAnon posts are narrative driven and utilise pathos. In keeping with the QAnon belief in a satanic pedophile elite, many of the posts are of children in distress recontextualised around the narrative of Trump using the US military to save them . They’re grotesque, bordering on the obscene.
How to make a QAnon meme
Understanding the system of creation, dissemination and consumption but still uncertain of how to engage with it ; I decided to make a couple of QAnon memes as something of an experiment. How would people react to and engage with them? Would they see through them? Would the memes be shared? How would I feel after having posted them?
Utilising the techniques and logic that I saw running through posts on Irish QAnon groups, I came up with this. The hysterical, shrieking quality was meant to test peoples credulity. Though, I still followed the format : recontextualied, striking image ( compressed and stretched to give it a further ‘odd’ quality), key words and elements of the QAnon narrative in caps , a battle cry and a Bible verse to lend some authority. Like the Satanic cabals of QAnon mythology, or a gentleman thief, I had to leave a clue :
A fool finds no pleasure in understanding,
But only in expressing their opinion. – Proverbs 18 : 2
I simply couldn’t help myself. What did I expect? Those unfamiliar with QAnon will view the meme as so outlandish no one could take it seriously. Below is a snap shot of the engagements I got.
First, I was immediately caught by someone. The painting is Saturn by Peter Paul Rubens. Depicting a scene from Roman mythology, it was painted in 1636. Amazingly, even with the truth as the first post, people still engaged with it as presented. It seemed that two of the posters incorporated the refutation into the greater mythos, giving the meme back it’s validity. Do they truly believe what is being proposed? I think not entirely. I think it’s part of the ‘fantastic’ quality of QAnon. It fits the narrative, it’s engaging and it doesn’t have to be a literal ‘truth’. What it represents is greater than it’s particulars.
By design, the meme could only be believed by QAnon followers. It’s a case of preaching to the converted, feeding them content they would engage with as an explicit QAnon post. I decided to up the ante.
For this, I wanted pathos and credibility. The use of names, dates and locations, the contextualising and emotive narrative and the empathic writing style are meant to go past Conspiracy theory. This blurring of the real world with out-right lies is how people become introduced to more extreme, more reality detached views. It’s about implanting the idea that all children are at risk, and that you should, can saved them.
The image is Sally Mann’s Candy Cigarette. Shot in 1992, it’s a portrait of her daughter. Mann has produced truly incredible work on the subject of female teenage adolescence. Her portraits of her children, often nude, have a complicated intimacy, so much so that she has been accused of producing child pornography. Mann also utilises antique cameras and developing methods, further adding to the ethereal and uncanny qualities of her portraits. It’s the perfect image. Below is a snapshot of the some of the reactions.
By the standards of the groups, the post garnered a lot of attention. People believed it. Most interestingly, people only reacted to and shared the post. Only one person wrote a comment. It was accepted simply as it was.
This post genuinely made me feel bad. Bad for coming up with the grubby little story. Bad for manipulating peoples emotions. Bad that I might have, no matter in how small a way, contributed to what I’m denouncing. It did give me insight, though I’m uncertain of what I may have achieved. For those making the memes in the knowledge that they are false, it must be an exercise in rage and nihilism. And they are now part of the discourse.
Apocalyptic Visions
Fortunately, this blog post is completely out of date. I had the initial idea in July of this year, when I made my own memes and gathered the reactions. Facebook has of the beginning of October removed QAnon pages and groups from the platform. What is surprising and encouraging is that Facebook are actively engaging with this process. While I focused on the meme format on Facebook for the dissemination of QAnon propaganda, Facebook isn’t the great forge of this disinformation. That would be 4Chan, birthplace of QAnon. This excellent Vice article delves into how it became a cesspool of hate.
The benefit of the Facebook ban is not about the creation of QAnon content and propaganda, it’s that it is a major disruption to it’s dissemination. 4Chan message boards are for the initiated. Boards don’t cross pollinate through sharing. Boards like /pol/ have an in language, a culture. Most importantly, the user interface is no more sophisticated than websites in the 90s : unintuitive with little focus an aesthetics. 4Chan requires a motivated user who invests in the platform. Facebook allows for passive engagement, is highly interactive and has an extremely sophisticated user interface. As such, a lot less people will be engaging with QAnon propaganda.
Richard Dawkins coined the word ‘meme’ in his 1976 text The Selfish Gene. Oxford languages gives the definition as
“an element of a culture or system of behaviour passed from one individual to another by imitation or other non-genetic means”
QAnon is truly a meme, or perhaps I should say memetic. It’s how cryptic nonsense from a digital Nostradamus led to people in Ireland marching behind a banner. It’s why people flood their social media stream with rage born deceits.
I’m writing this paragraph at ten past twelve on November 4th 2020. In the Qanon belief system, Donald Trump is meant to bring about a secular rapture. In the 19th century, the belief that the end of days was imminent was popular. Preachers made predictions as to when. In the case of William Miller, the date was 1844. Famously, Jesus did not bring about the last Judgement. Many of his followers abandoned him, and formed the Seventh Day Adventists. I wonder what will happen if Joe Biden wins. Some Qanon followers will lose faith, some will integrate it with the QAnon mythology, some will see it as a deep state conspiracy. And if Trump wins? Seeing Trump’s precarious positions, Twitter and Facebook were emboldened to counter falsehoods related to Trump. With Twitter, Donald Trump’s personal tweets have become flagged for disinformation. With the Executive Order on Social Media, signed May of this year, platforms will back down. The Alt Right fringe groups that Trump flirted with cynically; Proud Boys, QAnon, the irony poisoned hipsters behind ‘Kekistan’ flags – he may actually acknowledge them.
But this is all speculation. I’ll end where I began, with a quote from 1984
“In the end, the Party would announce that two and two made five, and you would have to believe it. It was inevitable that they should make that claim sooner or later: the logic of their position demanded it. Not merely the validity of experience, but the very existence of external reality, was tacitly denied by their philosophy. The heresy of heresies was common sense. And what was terrifying was not that they would kill you for thinking otherwise, but that they might be right. For, after all, how do we know that two and two make four? Or that the force of gravity works? Or that the past is unchangeable? If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable—what then?”