QAnon is coming. We need to be ready.
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This was originally published as a thread on Twitter.
Extremist researchers, law enforcement, community leaders, legal experts, and media, please prepare a worst-case scenario with QAnon being re-platformed. Do not underestimate the potential threat. Some groups consume content straight from foreign states and conspiracy theorists.
QAnon is a threat on its own, but the risk of outside manipulation may be greater than before. QAnon appears to radicalize people faster than other ideologies, and it also appears to increase the likelihood of violence more than other conspiracy theories.
We are not prepared to deal with this threat. Traditional counterterrorism strategies do not and cannot address this. So we will see a problem that we are ill-equipped to face, grow.
A big problem for democratic societies is that conspiracy theories can decrease our ability to work with other groups.
Across the board, conspiracy theories hold the potential for harm. There seems to be a significant negative relationship between anti-vaccine conspiracy beliefs and vaccination intentions.
In what has to be the darkest irony, “QAnon adherents have shown a disturbing willingness to engage in interpersonal violence, often harming those around them, including their own children.”
There are many consequences of conspiracy beliefs that go uncounted and not considered. An example that should outline the damage a conspiracy theory can do involves the US. No one counted the cost of the lives lost in the attached example.
Here's another. Over 690,000 COVID-19 hospitalizations could have been prevented by vaccination between June to November 2021, costing about 13.8 billion.
"With a total nonvaccination harm of $1 billion per day and misinformation and disinformation causing between 5% and 30% of this harm, misinformation and disinformation have caused between $50 and $300 million worth of total harm every day since May 2021."
The social costs must be studied, but most researchers could tell you about families that have paid a steep price even with a Qanon adherent who is nonviolent.
Declines in parenting ability, divorce (I've seen cases where a spouse had to move out for safety), and child endangerment all cost society. Some of those costs play out over the lifetime.
I can't put a price on the experience of the people in these quotes, but they likely find that QAnon has been very costly.
QAnon adherents at the Capitol on Jan 6 were more likely to have children, to be married, and to have a criminal record. Either way, most Qanon adherents who break the law have kids.
Having an incarcerated parent can have lifelong consequences.
And again, we don't have time like with other movements where people are radicalized over time. 2/3 of the people on January 6th radicalized in under a year.
Fundamentally, I see this as a public health problem. People are not adequately educated about the mental changes experienced in crises that make them more susceptible to distortions and disinformation. They aren't taught about tactics bad actors use to draw us in.
We aren't teaching people what to expect mentally across their lifetime. Conspiracy theories can feel real and not be. They are like a cognitive illusion. It is like seeing the spinning bird in a cage and not understanding that what you see is not real.
Just as we now talk to all women about postpartum depression long before it could happen, we need to tell people how uncertainty affects them. The woman who experiences postpartum depression and learns of it ahead of time can recognize something may be wrong.
We see the same themes and stories across decades and even centuries. We know susceptibility may increase in times of crisis. We know people resist disinformation better when they understand manipulation tactics. Knowing this but doing nothing preemptively is negligence.