Only idiots still believe in the Qanon hoax, but that is enough produce tens of millions of believers. This is down from the peak when Trump was meeting with Kim in Singapore and more seemed that more people were watching the summit on QNN than on CNN. Support has inevitably decayed as the predictions never come true. A prophet lives and dies by his prophecies, it is time for the Qanon hoax to die. To any simpleton who still believes in this nonsense, take a walk outside, look up at the sunny sky and feel the breeze on your face and get back in touch with reality. Because if you still believe in this nonsense your are in your own little world. Leave it, and come back to the world of the living. We may not need you, but you need us. The world of reality, it is better here, I promise.
That Qanon is a hoax is beyond dispute but what matters is why so many people once believed it. This is true of all fiction. What is always the most important question is why is it popular, how does it resonate with the audience? The first Star Wars movie will be remembered forever, the last one is already in the clearance bin. What makes a fiction compelling? What does it say about the audience? These questions are always the issue. Imagine a mirror with nothing to reflect, it goes unnoticed. The importance of the mirror is the importance of what it reflects, the importance of a fiction is what it reflects about those who are drawn to it. Every fiction is in someway a mirror reflecting its audience and the Qanon hoax is no different. And the better the fiction reflects the audience the more fascinating is the inevitable question of why. This puts Qanon in the category of the first Star Wars movie, the one which fascinates as a mirror to the audience due to its popularity, its bond with the moviegoer. Qanon was one of the top ten stories of the last three years. It went unmentioned by the media but was wildly popular with the same audience that the media, with vastly inferior results, was trying to gain the attention of. This fascination needs to be explained, we need to understand the popularity of the Qanon hoax because we need to understand ourselves and our time. Why did a series of what amount to text burps to image sharing forums become the most telling mirror of our current time? Why is this fiction resonating with the audience, and what can we learn about ourselves from this fictional mirror? What does it all mean?
But before what comes who. The first question is who and the answer is Russia. Qanon is Russia, Rus, Muscovy, Ivan. That no one can see this is a combination of the brilliance of the hoax itself and the stupidity of the human race. I am part of the human race so I should know, our species is so unintelligent I’m still surprised we haven’t killed ourselves off yet. So most of the credit for the success of the Qanon hoax goes to our stupidity, but let’s give some credit to the Russians too. I believe Qanon will eventually be seen as the most brilliant hoax of all time. There was a genius behind it and it worked. It worked in being believed and it worked in accomplishing Russia’s goals. It was in all ways brilliantly effective. Russia, I tip my internet hat to you.
Of course the purpose is obvious. Russia uses internet trolling to stalemate US politics to weaken the US by making forward progress in any direction impossible. “The broader Russian strategy is pretty clearly about destabilizing the country by focusing on and amplifying existing divisions, rather than supporting any one political party,” said Jonathon Morgan, an expert on the subject. This is Russia’s goal and this is what the Qanon hoax accomplishes. It stalemates US politics. It turns us into a country where nothing is done and we endlessly play tug of war with the flag never moving as both sides strain themselves to senseless exhaustion. The Qanon hoax accomplishes this by matching the self destructiveness of the Muh Russia hoax and obsession on the left with a similarly destructive hoax and obsession on the right. This keeps the country stalemated. This keeps both sides exhausting themselves in a game of tug of war that neither side can win. The method is clear. Both hoaxes promise the believer that their political side does not need to change, they can stay the same, they can remain forever unchanged. The world has not changed, Trump does not mark a turning point, history has not entered a new era. It is continuing to move straight along and we can keep doing what we were doing before forever and never change. Because a super scandal will save us from change. A super scandal will save us, keep us safe from the need to change. A super scandal will sink the other side and our side can remain unchanged forever. This super scandal will deliver such a blow to the other side that our side will emerge permanently victorious and permanently free from any need to change or adapt. Our side can be the same forever, forever young. This is the dream, whether you are a liberal boomer or a conservative boomer. Whether you are a Democrat boomer or a Republican boomer. The dream is to die of old age without ever changing, always being that little boomer watching a black and white television in the 60s. The dream of being above the world, immune to its effects, almost godlike. A dream which never comes true.
With a super scandal of Trump taking orders from Putin the liberal boomers never have to change. They can stay the same forever, the super scandal will save them. With the Qanon hoax the conservative boomers can stay the same forever, the super scandal of Hillary in a child dungeon will save them. The fantasy of the super scandal is that the other side will be caught violating existing and universally agreed on norms so that the supporters of the other side will have no choice but to admit defeat enabling a permanent victory to one’s own side. A victory which does away with the need to change in a changing world. Because the world has changed. Latinx immigration means the Republicans don’t have the numbers to win elections without union voters, without blue collar voter, without the manufacturing employees that they normally sacrifice to promote Lazy Fairy economics. The dream that the idiot bow tie conservatives of the National Review will stay relevant, the dream that Lazy Fairy economics and George Will still matter dies when Latinx numbers are so high that the Republicans can’t win without union voters, voters who hate NAFTA, TPP and George Will. Wow, I just found out I’m a union guy now. I hope this means I can finally change my own oil. I hope that’s how it works, you hate George Will and now you know how to fix and make things. Because if that’s how it works I’m ready to fix the Space Shuttle.
For Democrat boomers the dream is that Latinx immigration means they don’t have to change. The dream is always to avoid change, to live above the world and not in it. The liberal boomer fantasy has always been that the Republicans are a stationary target and their victory is inevitable as the countries demographics are a moving target. Allow enough Latinx in then the Democrats get enough votes to rule forever. All has been foretold, the future is written in stone. It will take time, but once enough Latinx have immigrated to America the endless rule of the Democrat party will come. The Democrats will have a Thousand Year Administration, it will happen, it will happen in the lifetimes of the liberal boomers. They will live to see the start of the Thousand Year Administration, their final victory over the world. And then a guy with a reality show becomes President. And it wasn’t even hard. All he had to do was drop Lazy Fairy economics and get union voters. And just like that the target moved. The Republicans were supposed to be a stationary target. They were supposed to stand still until Latinx immigration brought the Thousand Year Administration of the Democrats. It was foretold, it was written in stone. Let enough Latinx in, it will permanently change the world. But then the hotel guy from Noo Yawk dropped Lazy Fairy economics from the Republican platform, the stationary target moved and is now the favorite of union voters. And just like that what was written in stone was erased.
Both types of boomers are horrible people, we all know that. Whether they are liberal or conservative is less important than that they are boomers, scourge of the world, the greatest obstacle to world peace. They both dream of going unchanged through their lives, never adapting, never learning. And with the super scandal they can get that. The super scandal will save them from needing to change. The super scandal will let them stay boomers forever, watching black and white televisions in their parents house as kids, coming up with ideas and opinions they never want to change.
It was a brilliant plan by Russia and it worked. But give credit where credit is due, the liberal boomers did invent this on their own. When Trumped added union voters to his vote count the liberal boomers invented the super scandal. They convinced themselves that a super scandal would save them from the need to change, from the need to adapt. A super scandal would expose the other political side as violating universal norms and doom the other side, giving their side permanent victory without any need to change their ideas, actions or expectations. Latinx immigration would begin the Thousand Year Administration, it really would. Clever Ivan knew this would wreck the Democrats. They would spin their wheels for years trying to convince themselves that their was no need to change. A hotel guy with an accent and a toupe and no political experience and no institutional or media support and who was hated and opposed by the entire leadership of his own party had defeated them despite having every disadvantage possible. Does this mean the world has changed? No, says the boomer. Whether liberal or conservative the one thing the boomer hates the most is change. The world has not changed. People cannot get elected now just by advocating common sense policies, people cannot beat the Democrat elite just by dropping Lazy Fairy economics and proposing common sense policies rather than bow tie conservative fantasies. Because the super scandal will save us.
Clever Ivan realized that with the Democrats destroying themselves by refusing to change and putting their hopes in a super scandal the stage was set for the Republicans to decisively win and implement a vigorous policy, the stage was set for the Republicans to win the game of tug of war and get the country moving. And so Clever Ivan came up with a plan. Have both sides destroy themselves with fantasies, have both sides destroy themselves in fantasies about a super scandal. Then the tug of war lasts forever, just as Ivan wants. And so the Qanon hoax was started. A brilliant hoax which gives various types of boomers, conservative boomers, evangelical boomers, bow tie boomers, they all can dream that change isn’t necessary. The Republicans don’t have to drop Lazy Fairy economics to win. They don’t have to support free healthcare to win, they can stay the same and win forever. They can win with a super scandal of videos of Hillary in a child dungeon. Then the bow tie conservatives can talk about Lazy Fairy economics forever, nothing has to change. They won’t grow up, they won’t even try. The super scandal will give the Republicans the votes they need to overcome Latinx immigration. So nothing needs to change. Union voters don’t need to be added. Free healthcare doesn’t need to be offered, conservatives can wear their bow ties forever. This fantasy of a super scandal cripples the Republicans. It keeps them from making the needed changes, it keeps the country stalemated, it keeps the tug of war going forever with the flag never moving. Just like Clever Ivan wants.
The brilliant Qanon hoax killed the border wall. Republican leadership hates Trump, hates the border wall and loves Latinx immigration. Former Speaker of the House Paul Ryan is the Republican leadership. So he hates Trump, hates the border wall and loves Latinx immigration. He gave Trump only a fraction of the amount needed for the wall during the last time the Republicans will ever hold the White House, the House and the Senate. So the border wall will never be finished. Trump will serve eight years but he will never again have a Republican controlled House and so the money for the wall will never be allocated. This means America loses its Superpower status due to third world immigration. Just as Clever Ivan wants. And while this is happening the Boomer Republicans are busy reading Qanon posts about secret money hidden somewhere to fund the wall. Secret indictments hidden in Utah, secret videos of Hillary in a child dungeon hidden on Anthony Weiner’s laptop. All these secret super scandals which will save the Boomer Conservatives from ever changing. The Qanon hoax promises that the military will build the wall, it will be finished. It will never be finished, Paul Ryan killed it. Paul Ryan made himself one of the 100 most influential Americans in history. He himself determined that America will become a third world country. And the Republican voters watched in comfort, assured by Clever Ivan that the military would build the wall, there were sealed indictments in Utah and there are videos of Hillary in a child dungeon.
Anyone familiar with both the Qanon hoax and the Protocols of Zion can see the similarity. This 1903 document reveals its authorship in its claims that the Russian aristocracy was the only group that could stop the nefarious evildoers as in “the Russian autocracy, the one and only
serious foe we had in the world” comment in the text. The Protocols presents a world threatened by a nefarious cabal and all the usual guardians of the public good compromised, complicit and corrupt. Except for the Russian aristocracy. Thus revealing authorship. The same applies to the Qanon hoax, which presents a world threatened by a cabal and all the usual guardians of the public good compromised, complicit, and corrupt. The Qanon hoax does hold out the dream that a secret group in the US military called Q is not compromised, complicit and corrupt and they will save the day. This is meant to communicate authorship to the reader. The US military being the only blameless guardian of the public good is meant to give hope and to prove that Qanon is authored by a secret group in the US military. Holding a group within the US blameless is necessary for the success of the hoax. The purpose to give false hope, the imaginary Q group in the US military is that hope. But am I the only one who noticed that not once does the omniscient narrator reveal a single Russian is compromised, complicit or corrupt? An international cabal covering the entire earth except for one country, Russia. The authorship is revealed.
The Protocols of Zion falls into the consistent Russian theme of aspiring to be the Third Rome. The first Rome was called Rome, after that it gets complicated. The second Rome was called Constantinople and it fell. The Russians decided that Moscow was the Third Rome, the third center of Christianity and civilization. No one else has ever agreed with them on this, it’s a point of contention. But for centuries Russia has harbored the belief that it is the Third Rome, the new center of Christianity and civilization and the pure hope in a defiled world. This theme centers on the same themes you see repeated in the original Protocols and later in the Protocols of Qanon. The consistent theme is that the West, once the natural leader of the Christian world has fallen into corruption and is no longer deserving of the crown, which now passes to Russia which has avoided the decadence and moral decline of the nations to the west. This is one of the consistent themes of Russian history. The once proud West, previously above Russia, has fallen into moral decay leaving Russia as the new natural leader of Christianity and civilization and truly the savior of the West it was once inferior to. This Third Rome theme always involves a hostility towards the Catholic Church and the Vatican in particular. This again comes out in the first Protocols, the Protocols of Zion. A useful example is “it is probably all the same to the world who is its sovereign lord, whether the head of Catholicism or our despot of the blood of Zion!” Thus the nefarious cabal claims moral equality with the Catholic Church. In the Protocols of Qanon it is all the same, the Vatican is once again portrayed as separate to, but morally equivalent to the nefarious cabal.
The Third Rome theme of the Russian identity is wrong, but not entirely without merit. The Russian self image as the only true Christians upholding morality against barbarism has some historical justification. When the Mongol Hordes attacked Russia from the East they asked the Christian countries to their West to support them. Instead they viewed this as the ideal time to attack Russia and the country was quickly swallowed up from both directions. Through centuries of struggle the Russians fought to get back their country from invaders east and west. They fought off the barbarian hordes from central Asia and the Muslim invaders to the south, upholding the rights of Christians in formerly occupied lands. To the east their lands had been seized by Catholic Poles and Lithuanians who reduced the native Orthodox Christians of these lands to serfhood and rented their labor out to foreigners under three year contracts called Arendas. Thus the start of the Russian bitterness towards Catholicism. People claiming to be fellow Christians rent them out as forced labor while refusing to aid in the fight against the hordes, safely protected by being on the other side of Russia. It’s not a bad reason for Russians to think of themselves as the Third Rome, the only true Christians. This self image has stuck through the centuries though it is now most publicly expressed in Russian attitudes towards World War Two, which they see as confirmation of their world view of the countries to the West of them having fallen into decay and needing to be saved by the new natural leader of the Christian world, the one country which has avoided the moral corruption depriving the West of its traditional role of leadership.
There are many more of Clever Ivan’s fingerprints on the Qanon hoax. When Turkey shot down a Russian fighter in November, 2015, the immediate response of the Russian government was to release to the media information implicating Turkey and especially family members of its President Erdogan in the export of oil from ISIS. As the tiny terrorist state was landlocked it exported oil through secret deals with Turkey and even the official Syrian government. The Russians had to be tracking this, the information couldn’t have been acquired in just days. But in the days following the downing of the Russian fighter the Russian government released a flood of information it had gathered showing who in Turkey was benefiting from this oil trade. It was mostly the sons and son-in-laws of prominent politicians. The same thing Putin is accused of. If you want to get rich marry a Putin daughter, it works. The consistent them of the Qanon hoax is follow-the-wives, follow the family members and see the financial corruption. This is the same tactic Russia has publicly used before, through Qanon they use it covertly. And above all they expose very real corruption involving family of US politicians and Ukraine. Make no mistake, the Russians want Ukraine back. Stalin only agreed to join the UN if Ukraine and Belarus were treated as independent countries giving the USSR three votes instead of one. This fiction became a reality when the USSR fell apart. Ivan wants the Ukraine and Belarus back. Don’t expect them to ever stop, and so the Qanon hoax has a special focus on Ukraine. Funny how often Qanon posts about Ukraine, while never including the Third Rome among the countries that are compromised, corrupt and complicit with the nefarious cabal. That one country is never mentioned. Clever Ivan.
The legacy of the Qanon hoax is that the border wall will never be built. The hoax worked, it gave the Republicans a super scandal to hope for in imitation of the Muh Russia super scandal. Both halves of America put their dreams in a super scandal which would permanently sink the other side. And so the country drifts onward while its leaders exhaust themselves in an endless game of tug of war. And the wall doesn’t get built. Paul Ryan got what he wanted, the border wall won’t be built. And Republican voters did nothing because of secret money hidden away that Qanon had promised them. Secret military funds to build the wall. Secret indictments in Utah. Secret videos of Hillary in a child dungeon on Weiner’s laptop. Which will stay secret forever, because it never happened. Qanon was a brilliant hoax, the most brilliant hoax of the century. Just when it looked like America’s endless political stalemate was going to end we get text burps on an image boards telling us “nothing can stop what is coming.” And just like that the boomers believed it.