Q-Anon > Russian placed propaganda

I am developing a theory that the whole Q postings and debacle is a Russian propaganda project conceived to sew discord in the American population.

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/social...ushed-qanon-other-conspiracy-theories-n966091

https://www.forbes.com/sites/sethcohen/2020/07/03/qanon-is-disrupting-america/#ada615634a18

https://www.economist.com/news/2020/07/03/in-lockdown-with-a-conspiracy-theorist



Supportive contributions or arguments against encouraged.


Or is it just a money making scheme?

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/how-three-conspiracy-theorists-took-q-sparked-qanon-n900531

Can’t overlook the money-scheme possibility, witness the Trump campaign‘s recent sales of cameo MAGA hats, ‘limited edition’, for “Trump’s Army” (the few, the proud).

Probably not safe to ignore the possibility it’s a strictly home-grown tanglebrain strategy of massive proportions. Similar, tho less crazy attacks have been used again and again against “undesirable populations”: the Romans made similar attacks against Christians, Europeans agains Jews, US against Mexicans, Eastern Europeans, Africans....

It’s a tried and true trick: to demonize a population segment, accuse them of preying on children...and the more gross, extreme, shocking it is, the more effective it is. The more people will be horrified and react as if it’s true, with little further research. Combined as it is with fragments of ancient and discredited hoax conspiracies, and layered in a culture that has become suspicious of “the news” by some definition, gives it the macabre air of a monster treasure-hunt.

Either way, the source of it has no respect for the intelligence and due diligence of the average US person.

Microbeman said:

I am developing a theory that the whole Q postings and debacle is a Russian propaganda project conceived to sew discord in the American population.

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/social...ushed-qanon-other-conspiracy-theories-n966091

https://www.forbes.com/sites/sethcohen/2020/07/03/qanon-is-disrupting-america/#ada615634a18

https://www.economist.com/news/2020/07/03/in-lockdown-with-a-conspiracy-theorist



Supportive contributions or arguments against encouraged.


Or is it just a money making scheme?

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/how-three-conspiracy-theorists-took-q-sparked-qanon-n900531

Click to expand...

It wouldn't surprise me, now that you bring it up. The Russians have been behind all kinds of misinformation/manipulation campaigns.

I saw this little clip a while ago, seems kind of relevant-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQPsKvG6WMI

Both the US and Russia have agencies that propagate misinformation on the internet and other media resources.

We cannot dismiss the thought that this is actually planted by the US government agency itself with an effort to sow Discord.

It is reminiscent, as one of the Articles points out, of the 1980s when there were witch hunts for people supposedly abusing young children when there was no truth in it whatsoever. Perhaps Whoever has devised this scheme and this propaganda has looked back on that and realized this as a profound weakness of the US public.

I cannot really look at the average US intelligence and due diligence as being very high I'm sorry.

The preceding was dictated so errors I will blame on that

could also be the product of a new type of computer program....artificial stupidity,the opposite of artificial intelligence...

Microbeman said:

Both the US and Russia have agencies that propagate misinformation on the internet and other media resources.

We cannot dismiss the thought that this is actually planted by the US government agency itself with an effort to sow Discord.

It is reminiscent, as one of the Articles points out, of the 1980s when there were witch hunts for people supposedly abusing young children when there was no truth in it whatsoever. Perhaps Whoever has devised this scheme and this propaganda has looked back on that and realized this as a profound weakness of the US public.

I cannot really look at the average US intelligence and due diligence as being very high I'm sorry.

The preceding was dictated so errors I will blame on that

Click to expand...

I read a story this morning in the Washington Post about Adam Rahuba, who has been responsible for a few hoaxes against gullible right wing zealots. The Wapo story is behind a paywall, but other sources have carried the story.

https://www.pennlive.com/news/2020/07/prolific-troll-was-behind-hoax-over-july-4-flag-burning-at-gettysburg-washington-post-reports.html

He has been responsible for some very funny hoaxes/pranks against the right. He remarks how easy it is to prank them due to how easy they are to manipulate.

Russia has also been behind several fake news stories such as the “Seth Rich was killed by Clinton stories”. Some people will believe any nonsense.

White Beard said:

Can’t overlook the money-scheme possibility, witness the Trump campaign‘s recent sales of cameo MAGA hats, ‘limited edition’, for “Trump’s Army” (the few, the proud, the mentally challenged).

Either way, the source of it has no respect for the intelligence and due diligence of the average US person.

Click to expand...

given the "thought processes" (such as they are) displayed by the trumpeters i work with, they would have to really work at it in order to underestimate the "average American person" or their reasoning capabilities.

White Beard said:

Can’t overlook the money-scheme possibility, witness the Trump campaign‘s recent sales of cameo MAGA hats, ‘limited edition’, for “Trump’s Army” (the few, the proud).

More than a few...

Click to expand...

I'm sure well thought out algorithms are involved.

"Computational propaganda is a suite of tools or tactics used in modern disinformation campaigns that take place online. These include automated social media accounts that spread the message and the algorithmic gaming of social media platforms to disseminate it. These tools facilitate the disinformation campaign’s ultimate goal–media manipulation that pushes the false information into mass awareness."

Sound familiar?

"As Lenin purportedly put it, “A lie told often enough becomes the truth.” In the era of computational propaganda, we can update that aphorism: “If you make it trend, you make it true.” "

"Ironically, the platforms powering the information ecosystem of a free and democratic society are more vulnerable to manipulation than the censored platforms that operate in authoritarian regimes. Our commitment to free speech has rendered us hesitant to take down disinformation and propaganda until it is conclusively and concretely identified as such beyond a reasonable doubt. That hesitation gives narratives the opportunity to take hold, and gives propagandists an opportunity to reach the vulnerable."

"There has always been propaganda. But it has not previously been algorithmically amplified and deliberately targeted to reach precisely the people who are most vulnerable. It has never before been so easy to produce or so inexpensive to spread. The idealistic vision of citizen journalism and “the fifth estate” has manifested as an information ecosystem in which polarized partisan extremists, state intelligence services, and terrorists push self-serving propaganda and attack the very idea of objectivity. A sitting president advances the mantra of “alternative facts” and retweets conspiracy theorists to his hundreds of millions of followers.

These technologies will continue to evolve: disinformation campaign content will soon include manufactured video and audio. We can see it coming but are not equipped to prevent it. What will happen when video makes us distrust what we see with our own eyes? If democracy is predicated on an informed citizenry, then the increasing pervasiveness of computational propaganda is a fundamental problem. Through a series of unintended consequences, algorithms have inadvertently become the invisible rulers that control the destinies of millions. Now we have to decide what we are going to do about that."

excerpts are from https://yalereview.yale.edu/computational-propaganda a rather good read in my opinion.

BOTS?

BOTS?

I have made some attempt to find actual statements made by Q but so far find only filtered results from followers. I could not access 4chan using my VPN. Google has become virtually useless for such searches.

Can anyone list Q's actual posts? Hempy?

"What does all of this tell us? We don’t know if the flood of botlike Q tweets now has anything to do with the early attempts to amplify QAnon or what, if any, kind of coordination between bot accounts and any other efforts was happening then or now. But we do know that this kind of automated account—the kind that was a menace during the 2016 campaign, thanks to a Russian disinformation effort—often tweets about issues, such as gun control and racial justice, that divide Americans and stoke sociopolitical tensions. Apparently, belief in QAnon is now one of those partisan issues—and it looks like some parties may have recognized its potential to rile up and divide Americans very, very quickly."

https://slate.com/technology/2018/0...qanon-since-almost-the-moment-it-started.html

i always guessed some joint operation with the GOP oligarchs and domestic/Israeli/foreign intelligence. when trump's back is truly against the wall, Q is all he'll have left to control his zombie horde.

Even in Canada

Even in Canada

"a four-door pickup truck crashed through the wrought-iron gates of 1 Sussex Drive in Ottawa. The driver picked up a rifle and a revolver and proceeded on foot through the long path from the gate to Rideau Hall, where Canada’s governor general resides. As staff radioed the Royal Canadian Mounted Police officers who patrol the grounds, the man hid in some rose bushes. Slinking around the building, he is alleged to have broken into an ornate greenhouse that connects to the residence of Queen Elizabeth II’s representative in Canada. A few hundred yards away from the greenhouse is Rideau Cottage, the temporary residence of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Neither Trudeau nor Gov. Gen. Julie Payette was home at the time.

Police cornered him in the greenhouse and talked him into surrender. The man was identified as Corey Hurren, the owner and operator of GrindHouse Fine Foods. "

"The Instagram page of GrindHouse Fine Foods, a sausage-maker in rural Manitoba, looks exactly as would be expected—at first: lots of pictures of meat, some photos of rural Canada, and a collection of cringey memes. One image, though, offers some clues about the man behind the account. It’s a photo of a white bunny sitting at the wheel of a car, with big white text above that reads: “Just get in the car, Alice. I’ll explain on the way.” "

“Has anyone else been following ‘Q’ and the ‘White Rabbit’ down the rabbit hole?” the caption reads. A mess of hashtags inscrutable to outsiders are below, from #QAnon to #FrazzleDrip, #PodestaEmails, #SethRich, #WWG1WGA, #AdrenochromeHarvesting, and more.

"Nobody has pointed to any signs of radicalization, although he seemed to have a longstanding interest in conspiracy theories — a personal website he created in 2003 recommended readers check out Alex Jones’ InfoWars and David Icke’s personal webpage."

https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/07/13/qanon-canada-trudeau-conspiracy-theory/

reminds me of the whole pizzagate thing, some conspiracy theory nut from like nc i think, iir, drove to a pizza place in d.c. where he tried to rescue kids held as rape slaves... they were supposedly in the nonexistent basement and yet his smart self fired his rifle into the floor.

wasnt that q spreading the bullshit back then?

nepalnt21 said:

reminds me of the whole pizzagate thing, some conspiracy theory nut from like nc i think, iir, drove to a pizza place in d.c. where he tried to rescue kids held as rape slaves... they were supposedly in the nonexistent basement and yet his smart self fired his rifle into the floor.

wasnt that q spreading the bullshit back then?

Click to expand...

yup; that's the gist as I understand it; that the US and the world are controlled by Hollywood and big power elites like the Clintons who are having sex with children and trafficking them around the globe and having related demented ceremonies [and even eating the children; aborted fetuses and associated fluids] and they have created this power organization, 'the deep state' which uses segments of various security agencies and civil servants to carry out their devious plots, which one can guess at by following cryptic messages dropped by Q.

The Trump component is supposedly rooted in that the military heads were overwhelmed by this power, so begged Trump to come to the rescue, run for president and help them to thwart and destroy this deep state. [Note that this is contradicted by the high up military people who have shat on Trump]

As with most planned propaganda campaigns, there is enough smattering of truths here and there to make the sucker, say aha, see....I told you. From what I can ascertain, the disinformation provided is so vague that it can be applied to any fantasy the sucker conjures up and then shares, thereby finding commonality with other suckers. It can be glued to all sorts of conspiracy theories, from 911 to JFK.

These tactics are old school agency propaganda methods but are also used by Russia and likely China, Israel and other countries in the busness of subversion.

Recently we have seen Flynn, Stone and Trump himself give the nod to the legitimacy of this wild concoction. There have been some successful political candidacies supportive of the QAnon base to varying degrees. These seem shameless attempts for support from this crowd.

To me, it spells impending doom to the USA, one reason, I hypothesize it is a propaganda campaign enacted (propagated) by Russia.

It would be interesting to know if there are similar social media phenomena currently expanding in Russia. Anybody?

Funny all these years I thought you were intelligent

Amynamous said:

I read a story this morning in the Washington Post about Adam Rahuba, who has been responsible for a few hoaxes against gullible right wing zealots. The Wapo story is behind a paywall, but other sources have carried the story.

https://www.pennlive.com/news/2020/...ng-at-gettysburg-washington-post-reports.html

He has been responsible for some very funny hoaxes/pranks against the right. He remarks how easy it is to prank them due to how easy they are to manipulate.

Russia has also been behind several fake news stories such as the “Seth Rich was killed by Clinton stories”. Some people will believe any nonsense.

Click to expand...

So who did kill Seth Rich? Why was he OK in the ambulance and died in the hosp under a special guard? Because he was the one who took the DNC data from the system, with a thumb drive, not Russian hackers.

I gotta quit falling for speakers corner threads.

Microbeman said:

To me, it spells impending doom to the USA, one reason, I hypothesize it is a propaganda campaign enacted (propagated) by Russia.

It would be interesting to know if there are similar social media phenomena currently expanding in Russia. Anybody?

Click to expand...

I think you've hit the nail on the head, the Russian propaganda campaign targeting America's disaffected and uneducated is massive and relentless. Q seems so obvious but even more frightening are the mainstream Russian-sponsored entities like local news behemoth Sinclair Broadcasting and $100 million alpha male Joe Rogan.

The Kremlin hooks are in deep and aren't going away any time soon. The U.S. is a nation that has been turned against itself. Give Putin credit for his effectiveness. The harm he has caused the U.S. is massive and growing.

"Russian sponsored entities like Joe Rogan"

Huh lol

Gotta say, Joe has had some interesting guests and some interesting shows, but using him as some kind of bellwether for truth is ... well, as ridiculous as the rest of this mess