Patreon Claimed They Kicked Conspiracy Theorists Off. QAnon Still Flourishes

Both aspiring and well-established QAnon influencers are directly profiting off the paid subscription service platform Patreon, despite the website publicly cracking down on accounts pushing the conspiracy theory last winter. Rolling Stone found nearly a dozen examples of creators on the platform using language that identifies them as followers of QAnon, the far-right extremist conspiracy theory baselessly positing, among other things, that President Trump will arrest and execute a cadre of left-wing political figures who are secretly pedophiles. Some of these creators are making thousands of dollars a month by selling exclusive content to subscribers that promotes extremist conspiracy theories, explicitly marketing their content using such QAnon-related terms as “dark to light,” “the great awakening,” and “wwg1wga” (“where we go one, we go all”). Patreon is a subscription-based platform that allows creators to offer exclusive content to subscribers for a monthly fee. Because it is a mainstream platform primarily geared toward creatives, Patreon is a way for QAnon influencers to “pull people into the movement more softly,” subtly presenting the central tenets of the conspiracy theory versus more fringe platforms like Telegram or Gab, says Kevin Grisham, associate director for the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism. “Because it’s… Read full this story

Patreon Claimed They Kicked Conspiracy Theorists Off. QAnon Still Flourishes have 359 words, post on www.rollingstone.com at January 13, 2021. This is cached page on GameMaz. If you want remove this page, please contact us.