The rise of online conspiracy theories during the 2016 Presidential Election demonstrated a few of things: 1) that the Internet was the perfect vehicle for misinformation and was actively used to persuade millions of people to believe fringe ideologies with relatively little effort, 2) that typically moderate individuals were most easily persuaded and brought into these extremes, and 3) that the rise of theories like QAnon were just the beginning of a new kind of community and element of online participatory culture. In our episode of “Cult Chats”, a completely fictional podcast where my friend, Stephanie, and I discuss things we know way too much about for fun, we argue that the phenomenon known as “QAnon” is dangerous, widespread, and here to stay.
I chose a podcast format because I thought that it offered a great medium to discuss a controversial and convoluted topic. We could present a heavily-researched and structured thesis on this topic in a way that sounded like a casual conversation between two friends. Because we both have MA’s in English, we don’t know how to NOT have researched conversations, and because we’ve known each other for several years, I knew that we would have great rapport and chemistry in a recording. The intention of this podcast is to situate the concept of QAnon within ongoing discussions of extremist groups and ideologies (we are big cult fanatics) and to persuade our audience to pay attention to what could easily be dismissed as a crazy online cult. We argue that it is not a cult, and that in many ways, this makes it MORE dangerous to the individual and to democracy. A cult often has clear and distinct boundaries with clear and distinct individual parishioners. QAnon as it stands, however, has neither of these things and therefore poses a greater threat to our society as a result.
