From Pizzagate to the Presidency: QAnon’s Infiltration of Our Democracy

Once relegated to the fringes of only the most paranoid online communities, today the QAnon conspiracy theory has followers and supporters on an international scale, going so far as to be endorsed by a number of political candidates and one elected member of Congress. The fanatical far-right theory combines allegations of child sex-trafficking by Satan-worshipping pedophiles with a volatile cocktail of belief in shadow governments, antisemetic tropes, racism, and outlandish assertions (JFK Jr. lives!). Why did QAnon take such deep hold in its short three-year existence? How is it undermining legitimate efforts to combat the sexual abuse of children? And what has its impact been on our democracy? Join Travis View, host of the podcast QAnon Anonymous and an authority on conspiracy theories, and Kevin Roose, technology columnist for the New York Times who has written extensively on disinformation and online radicalization, for a conversation exploring what the insidious prevalence of QAnon means for the future of the nation.