The QAnon Clock Explained

Mike RothschildLeave a comment

QAnon acolytes love jargon, and they love using jargon to prove that the conspiracy theory they’ve invested so much time in is real.

One of the most popular QAnon “proofs” is “the map,” a massive layout of how centuries of conspiracy theories all connect to each other in ways only Q can reveal – and only Q believers can understand.

To outsiders, it’s proof that everything skeptics believe about conspiracy theorists is true, that they’re deranged and obsessive and need heavy doses of medication. And to believers, it’s proof that the skeptics are asleep and unaware, totally oblivious to the maleficence going on all around them.

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Conspiracy Theorist Excuses for Losing the Midterms!

Mike RothschildLeave a comment

Every election cycle seems a little more beset by conspiracy theories, outrageous and unfounded accusations, and bizarre plots. They get weirder, and yet more normal at the same time.

The conspiracy theory community has mobilized to support Donald Trump and his fellow Republicans. And they’re going much further than anything that happened to John McCain in 2000,  desperately trying to shore up their support with suburban white women by terrifying them into a thinking a rape caravan of ISIS invaders is (very slowly) making its way north to take their jobs, force them to drive electric cars, and treat refugees humanely.

But one day before the election, polling for the House of Representatives doesn’t look good, nor does it look good for Republicans to keep their death grip on state legislatures.

And if there’s one thing conspiracy theorists are good at, it’s making excuses for why the stuff they theorized didn’t come to pass.

So here are a few of the most prevalent excuses you’re likely to see on conspiracy theory social media if the election really does go the way it’s looking:

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There’s Got to Be a Morning After the Midterms

Mike Rothschild1 Comment

In case you haven’t been paying attention to the news, the United States is about to hold its quadrennial midterm election, where the entire House of Representatives, one-third of the Senate, thousands of local legislature seats, and numerous governorships are all up for grabs.

It’s being called the most important vote of our lifetimes, a hyperbolic phrase applied to every recent election.

Liberals think it’s going to be our last chance to stop Donald Trump from “consolidating power,” rolling back our freedoms, putting soldiers in the streets, mass incarceration of enemies in FEMA Camps, and executing his final plan to declare himself President God King for Life.

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“Motivated by Conspiracy Theories”

Mike Rothschild3 Comments

To state the obvious, pipe bomb maker Cesar Sayoc and Pittsburgh synagogue shooter Robert Bowers were violent, paranoid, hate-filled dwellers in the pervasive discourse of such people: conspiracy theories.

The targets of their ire were different. Sayoc was a hardcore Trump acolyte who felt that oppositional Democrats were the scourge of America, while Bowers appears to have disdained Trump for not doing enough to cleanse America’s REAL scourge – the Jews.

But both wanted their foes disposed of in the same way –  a violent purging that spared no one they felt was not sufficiently on their side.

It’s a race war fought on obscure message boards and Fox News alike, pumping out anti-Semitic and violent conspiracy theories to broken minds who have no ability to discern fact from fiction.

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These are self-proclaimed patriots who see themselves as the vanguard of a new digital war, where hearts and minds are won with memes, anonymous legions of soldiers fight by “digging” into people’s pasts, and anyone not sufficiently with them must be destroyed.

But when their memes and social media bitching didn’t get the job done, Sayoc and Bowers resorted to what paranoid killers have always resorted to when words aren’t cleansing the filth fast enough – bombs and bullets.

Their actions aren’t random. Their motives aren’t mysterious.

And they aren’t alone.

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The Worst, Swampiest Migrant Caravan Conspiracy Theories

Mike Rothschild1 Comment

As of this writing, a caravan of Central American migrants is making its way north, crossing into Mexico, and picking up both members and media coverage as it goes.

This isn’t even the first migrant caravan of 2018, with an earlier one moving northward in April, stopping in Tijuana, with only about a dozen of the 700 participants arrested for trying to cross the border.

But things are different now, because we’re just a few weeks away from a midterm election.

And with Republicans looking likely to get blown out in both the House of Representatives and state legislature, a migrant caravan is exactly the thing the far right can use to stoke fear of the brown hordes relentlessly moving north to overwhelm the border and invade the good old’ US of A.

After all, it was fear of immigrants and the desire to keep them out with a giant wall that propelled Trump into office – why not use the same thing to keep his Congressional majority?

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