Now, many members of the older generation engaging with cellphones have begun to experience the wonderful world of conspiracy and being "pilled." In terms of being pilled, people often refer specifically to the umbrella conspiracy theory "QAnon."
QAnon holds that there is a government operative (or group of operatives) who are attempting to leak information against all of our older generation's least favorite people-- progressive politicians. These leaks are done through Q-drops, which are released on the anonymous messaging board 8Kun. Q, the name of the operative(s), releases these posts with strange phrases and terms, encouraging others to decipher them to unlock these hidden truths.
More politically, mind you, this theory deifies Donald Trump as a savvy, powerful man fighting against the cruel "cabal" of elites.
Supporters of the conspiracy theory are often baby boomers, who, on average, spend even more time online than millenials do (Binder). Especially at a time of distrust and confusion in 2020 over COVID-19, conspiracy theories stemming from QAnon has enraptured our older generations.
In 2020, NPR and Ipsos found 200 that 17 percent of Americans believed that there is "a group of Satan-worshipping elites who run a child sex ring" (Roose).
And in case you assumed these believers were just weird cranks, the conspiracy has left the Internet in a few cases, as well. Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene from Georgia originally gained her based on her support of QAnon (though she put distance between herself and the eponymous "Q" as she got placed into the public eye more).
We can also look towards January 6, where many of the rioters hearkened back to one of the core phrases in the QAnon universe: "Where we go one, we go all!", taken from the movie White Squall.
Above is a video from Vice News on the subject of QAnon, attempting to decipher these mysterious and insane conspiracy theory.
But QAnon is an umbrella, as I have said. It could be that people slip right into QAnon by various other conspiracies. Aliens, 9/11 "truthers," grooming elites, a historic battle of "good" against "evil" all can lead you to Q. And especially when something like LGBTQ+ hatred is on the rise over ideas that people are "grooming" children, one may just end up in that rabbit hole.
"Today, technology risks dividing us. Let’s help people reconnect instead - with the world around us, and with each other" (Moscogiuri); and in order to do so, we must eschew these radical ideas on how the world works.
The old folks are especially capable of being washed away in a zone flooded with propaganda and misinformation to deify Donald Trump.
Below are links to a few (hopefully) useful sites to counter QAnon's many insane beliefs. Stay safe out there in this world.
Works Cited
Biner, Matt. "Why some baby boomers are eating up the QAnon conspiracy." Mashable, Ziff Davis, 7 August, 2018.https://mashable.com/article/qanon-conspiracy-baby-boomers-4chan
Illing, Sean. "How propaganda works in the digital age." Vox, Vox Media, 2019 October 20. https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/10/18/20898584/fox-news-trump-propaganda-jason-stanley
Moscogiuri, Federic. "Facebook, Cambridge Analytica… and Hippocrates." C4Urselves, 7 Feb 2019. https://c4urselves.com/article_read.php?a=5
Rajan, Anjana. "Countering QAnon." Polaris, Februrary 2021. https://polarisproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Polaris-Report-Countering-QAnon.pdf
Rose, Kevin. "What Is QAnon, the Viral Pro-Trump Conspiracy Theory?" The New York Times, 3 September 2021. https://www.nytimes.com/article/what-is-qanon.html
Credits:
Created with images by Aliaksandr Marko - "A man, a puppeteer, manipulates the planet. The concept of world conspiracy, world government, manipulation, world control." • BillionPhotos.com - "Conspiracy." • releon8211 - "Cybercrime, hacking and technology crime. hacker with laptop." • thodonal - "Home assistance"