QAnon is one of the most bizarre political strategies ever put into practice. Its origin is the deep underground of the internet. Its roots, on the other hand, lie in the language of video games, in situationalism and in the question of how the public space of the network can be instrumentalized relatively easily by coordinated and well-financed groups.
The word QAnon is on the surface just one of the conspiracies. But only on the surface. The character “Q” would be a federal agent in the US with the highest level of access to confidential information, the Q-Level. That agent would have rebelled and decided to tell the “truth” publicly. That truth is that the world is ruled by a cabal of satanic pedophiles whose main job is to administer a global network of child trafficking.
The only force threatening the group’s power would be Donald Trump.
For those first reading these words, the conclusion is madness. Even so, this tactic has become a strong trend in the electoral cycle. There are at least 44 US Congressional candidates who are accepting their “Q” membership. At public campaign events, groups of people wear T-shirts with the letter “Q” on them.
Trump himself used a language that came from theory.
In practice, QAnon is an articulated advertising production network. In technical terms it is a Datti network (Adversarial Disinformation, Tactics and Influence Techniques). Your strategy is one of the most sophisticated advancements in advertising methodology. It is operated using a tripod with strategies:
First, the coordination between anonymous people on the network, a tactic made famous by the anonymous group (which QAnon honors on their behalf).
Second, exploring psychological techniques such as what is known as functional fixation, which is very common in video games.
Third, the methods of so-called Alternative Reality Games (Alternative Reality Games) began in the 2000s and were applied to real life using the Internet.
In short, QAnon influences because it encourages people to become “detectives” in the search for the “truth” on the Internet. To this end, the supervisors of the strategy spread hints that are very well hidden in the network. A video there, information on a website here, a sentence from a political speech there.
By not providing ready-made information, QAnon gives people a sense of intelligence and contentment by allowing them to “discover for themselves” this hidden truth that is carefully spread.
It is the same sensation that several video games create in their players as they create puzzles that depend on discovering and combining several separate elements within the structure of the game to undermine its functional fixation. Anyone who wants to experience the pleasure that this kind of structure creates can play the brilliant game Dandara, developed by Nintendo Belo Horizonte Longhat Studios and acquired by Nintendo.
To replicate this strategy, QAnon relies on groups that invest the time and money to maintain this elaborate tactic.
Several social networks have banned QAnon information in the past few months. However, due to its rhizomatic structure, this prohibition is only partially effective. It’s like the extreme right has read Guy Debord and Deleuze and understood all of their impact on the internet.
reader
It’s over
Brazil with no data protection law
Already
General data protection law in force
It’s coming
Another Public Safety Data Protection Act?