The QAnon phenomenon has emerged in France – prompting President Emmanuel Macron’s government to order a multiagency inquiry on conspiracist movements scheduled to report back at the end of February from r/worldnews
‘Stakes are high’ as QAnon conspiracy phenomenon emerges in France
https://www.france24.com/en/france/20210220-stakes-are-high-as-qanon-conspiracy-phenomenon-emerges-in-france
The French state agency responsible for tackling sectarian movements, MIVILUDES, has received some 15 reports over recent weeks raising the alarm about the rise of QAnon in France, Le Figaro reported.
The DéQodeurs website offers links to “information” including articles relaying fake news based on QAnon tropes – such as the baseless claim that in 2016, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was about to release documents proving the existence of a massive paedophile ring in Washington DC.
While it tends to eschew such lurid narratives, anti-vaccine sentiment is relatively widespread in France. An Ipsos poll published in November found that 46 percent of French adults said they would refuse to receive a Covid-19 vaccine – compared to 21 percent in the UK. A 2019 Gallup poll found that one in three French people thought all vaccines are dangerous – the highest proportion of respondents to say so in 144 countries surveyed.
QAnon’s French sympathisers are far more ideologically heterogenous than those in the US, St Denny observed: “QAnon in France is definitely not the monopoly of far-right sympathisers as it might be in the US. Its anti-government underpinnings have made the conspiracy theory attractive to a very disparate collection of groups and individuals including established conspiracy theorists, some fringes of the Yellow Vests movement, and some of the more conspiracy-oriented among the alternative health movement.”
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more on QAnon in this iMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=qanon
QAnon goes European
https://www.politico.eu/article/qanon-europe-coronavirus-protests/
In France, the Yellow Jacket movement has embraced the American movement. In Italy, backers hail from the anti-vaccine community. In Britain, adherents draw from Brexit followers.
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What’s behind the rise of QAnon in the UK?
https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-54065470
The FFTCUK Facebook group has now amassed more than 13,000 members.
People were dressed in QAnon shirts or ones displaying the slogan “WWG1WGA”. Short for “Where we go one we go all”, it is the best-known rallying cry for QAnon believers.
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How QAnon Went Global
https://slate.com/technology/2020/09/qanon-europe-germany-lockdown-protests.html
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QAnon Gains Traction in Russia
https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2020/11/30/qanon-gains-traction-in-russia-a72180
Alexandra Arkhipova, an anthropologist at the Russian Presidential Academy of National Economy and Public Administration who tracks the spread of online conspiracy theories, has found that while there are fewer explicit references to QAnon on Russian-language social media than Covid-19 denialism and 5G fears, its prevalence is spreading.
Data gathered by Arkhipova since August reveals thousands of Russian-language social media posts about QAnon. On VKontakte and Telegram — an encrypted messaging service popular in Russia – groups dedicated to spreading the conspiracy theory in Russia have grown to include tens of thousands of members.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/nov/29/how-to-deal-with-a-conspiracy-theorist-5g-covid-plandemic-qanon
Fake authority
You may see articles by Vernon Coleman, for instance. As a former GP he would seem to have some credentials, yet he has a history of supporting pseudoscientific ideas, including misinformation about the causes of Aids. David Icke, meanwhile, has hosted videos by Barrie Trower, an alleged expert on 5G who is, in reality, a secondary school teacher. And Piers Corbyn cites reports by the Centre for Research on Globalisation, which sounds impressive but was founded by a 9/11 conspiracy theorist.
“pre-suasion” – essentially, removing the reflexive mental blocks that might make them reject your arguments.
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more on conspiracy theories in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=conspiracy
more on fake news in this IMS blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims?s=fake+news