Regina Dugan
https://www.cnn.com/videos/cnnmoney/2018/04/10/facebook-robert-mueller-interview-mark-zuckerberg-segall-lead.cnn/video/playlists/zuckerberg-congressional-testimony/
>There's Jim, Ron, Flynn… who else?
>AND meme warfare
https://www.hks.harvard.edu/faculty/joan-donovan
Dr. Joan Donovan is the Research Director of the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy. Dr. Donovan leads the field in examining internet and technology studies, online extremism, media manipulation, and disinformation campaigns.
https://medium.com/memewarweekly
https://www.facebook.com/hksbelfer/photos/a.389032087837302/3087471621326655/
https://medium.com/memewarweekly/put-a-q-on-it-dac7cd8cec35
Technology and Social Change Research Project
May 29, 2020
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8 min read
Put A Q On It
In this week’s Meme War Weekly, we continue to look at the memes of the “new deplorables,” the groups that make up the MAGA coalition, focusing closely on Qanon. Networked factions, due to their individual differences and rivalries, rarely become a full fledged social movement, rather they are the product of communication networks facilitated by major social media platforms, like Facebook and Twitter. While these networked factions may be welcoming some new groups into the fold for 2020, the themes are the same: conspiracism, white nationalism, and hyperpartisanship. With Trump’s polling data thrown askew by the COVID-19 pandemic, and the uncertainty of the November elections looming, we will continue to track how these ‘’ are memeing their way into mainstream political conversation.
While supporters of the Qanon conspiracy theory have gained new relevance by inserting themselves into conversations around #Obamagate, the and subsequent , they’ve been a visible presence at since 2018. Reenergized by the conviction and death of Jeffery Epstein and the acquittal of General Flynn, the Qanon movement has used COVID-19 pandemic for recruitment, using lockdown protests in public spaces and on social media to further an anti-institutional agenda by spreading hashtags, coded phrases, and memes emblazoned with the fiery Q. Despite attacks from establishment , Qanon followers are moving closer and closer to the mainstream of Trump’s supporters, where Qanon from all walks of life are hanging on his every tweet in hopes of decrypting a coded message.
What is Q
The Qanon movement is built on decades of previous conspiracy theories, and uses leftover iconography from the “alt-right” and the MAGA coalition of 2016. Emerging in October 2017, like many arresting and confusing moments in contemporary internet history, the Qanon conspiracy theory first grew on 4chan, an anonymous image board that spawned trolling and hacktivist movements, and later helped facilitate the rise of the “alt-right.” The saga begins with a psuedoanonymous 4chan poster dubbed “Q,” claiming to have high level White House security clearance, planted a cryptic message into a conspiratorial thread about the Muller investigation, indicating the upcoming arrest of Hillary Clinton. In the following days, this poster gained temporary legitimacy with some 4chan users, who left breadcrumbs hinting at unseen changes Trump was trying to enact against agents of the “deep state.”
Since 2017, a mass of followers have reposted and overanalyzed the frequent cryptic messages posted by Q across many websites as it spread from anonymous message boards and into other online communities. Forced to migrate from 4chan to , and then later its replacement , Qanon content was outright banned on for the violent speech of its supporters. Despite these deplatformings, this networked factor of Qanon believers has embedded itself on major social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook and Youtube, where they can reach even wider audiences.
Qanon, like the “alt-right” and manosphere before it, has appropriated the ‘redpill’ metaphor from the Matrix, meaning bits of information that can awaken one to the real world. To this end, the Qanon community relentlessly spreads their narratives on social media, often taking over conservative hashtags in an effort to grow their following. While not directly mentioned by name, Qanon content praising Trump has been retweeted by him , most recently on in a tweetstorm blaming Obama for the Covid-19 pandemic. While still a culturally fringe movement, that according to most Americans haven’t even heard of, Qanon’s growth doesn’t seem to have been blunted by ongoing debunking and criticism from mainstream press.
Q and the Media
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