Brad speaks with Marc-André Argentino, a PhD candidate and public scholar at Concordia University in Quebec, and an Associate Fellow with the Global Network on Extremism and Technology (GNET) at King's College London. They discuss the origins of QAnon, its deep connections with evangelical Christianity, the new Q-Church, and the ways QAnon's conspiracies are worsening the public health crisis by spreading disinformation.
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AXIS MUNDY Welcome to Straight White American Jesus.
My name is Brad Onishi.
I am Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Skidmore College, and I am thrilled today to be joined by Marc-Andre Argentino, who is a PhD candidate in the Individualized Program at Concordia University and is also a 2020-2021 public scholar there.
He's also an Associate Fellow with the Global Network on Extremism and Technology, GNET, and that is located at King's College in London.
And today, Marc-André is here to talk with me about QAnon, the QAnon Infodemic, as he calls it, and its links to evangelicalism.
So, Marc-André, thanks so much for joining me.
Thank you for having me, Bradley.
I'm happy to be here.
I'm quite excited.
Well, you, first of all, I wanted to ask if you could tell us, you have just a fascinating interdisciplinary sort of PhD program you're doing.
So can you tell us about your research and how it works with the program there at Concordia?
Yep.
So the individualized program at Concordia is a program that is developed for individuals that want to do interdisciplinary work, basically when your project doesn't necessarily fit within one department or you require No, to combine multiple disciplines, it's a place where you go.
It does require for you to have a very clear plan and clear strategy in your research.
It requires a bit more from the get-go.
And in my case, I've always been interested with the nexus of technology, religion, and extremist ideologies.
Whether that is, you know, groups like ISIS, which kind of got me started on my PhD a few years ago, to groups in the far right, to, you know, extreme evangelicalism and Christian identity, all that type of stuff.
And right now, I'm interested in QAnon, so I'm in the Department of Theological Studies, Department of Engineering, and the Department of Computer Science.
Basically, I mix qualitative and quantitative methodologies to see not only How these groups, you know, create propaganda, how they recruit members to their ideological causes, how they inspire, at times, acts of violence or, you know, can be a public health hazard now in the times of COVID-19, and also how this impacts democratic institutions when you see, you know, some extremist groups that want to impact whatever democratic institutions that country may have.
So I try to look at it very, you know, holistically, try to get everything going.
If I'd have to put into one sentence, it would be, I really focus on a digital ethnographic method.
I'd like to be inside the groups to understand their worldview to represent the idealist in their perspective.
And then I try to use some data science to provide quantitative evidence and metrics to the type of work they do online.
Yeah, you know, when I was learning about your research, I was just, I was so impressed because I feel like when I encountered your work, I encountered somebody who has the insight and the training of a scholar of religion, but also has the skills, as you just mentioned, to do these digital ethnographies, to be online, you know, infiltrated in online platforms.
And really seeing sort of from the ground level what's happening in terms of radicalization and extremism with various groups.
And so anyway, this brings me to some of your recent work.
And I just want to say, listeners, that as all of us are doing, both Marc-Andre and I are at home and working from home.
So if you hear noise in the background, there are various family members making dinners and children trying to keep it together while dads are You know, doing podcasts, so just bear with us, but that's how things work in the COVID era.
So, Marc-Andre, you recently wrote a piece that I saw on The Conversation.
It's titled, QAnon Conspiracy Theories About the Coronavirus Pandemic Are a Public Health Threat.
And you have a great opening here, and I'm going to embarrass you just by reading some of your work in front of you, but you say, first there was the pandemic, then came the infodemic.
A term the head of the World Health Organization defines as the spread of false information about COVID-19.
The most dangerous conspiracy theories about the coronavirus are now part of the QAnon phenomenon.
For months now, actors in QAnon have downplayed the severity of the crisis, amplified medical disinformation, and have been originators of hoaxes.
So I will admit to you, Marc-Andre, this is full disclosure to you and to my listeners, I try to keep abreast of so many things that are part of the evangelical and fundamentalist and Pentecostal and other subcultures.
I'm on Twitter.
Folks see me there.
I'm always trying to learn things.
I'm going to be fully open here and say that I have not probably done my due diligence when it comes to fully understanding QAnon.
And I know I've received emails from several folks saying, hey, I don't understand QAnon, I don't know why it's linked to evangelicalism, I don't know why so many of the Christians in my life are sort of getting sucked into it.
So, can we open with this?
Can you give us a one-minute explainer, two-minute explainer on what is QAnon?
In terms of just most basic facts, what is this?
QAnon is...
I'll give you an academic term to start with.
It's what Michael Barthoon would call a super conspiracy.
I think that's important to know at the beginning because it's a conspiracy theory that encompasses a whole bunch of other conspiracies under it.
So when you're going to look at this group, you're going to see every type of conspiracy under the sun.
QAnon at its core, however, is the belief that the world is run by a cabal of satanic, child-sacrificing elites, and they control everything.
So they control our politicians, they control the mainstream media, they control Hollywood, they, you know, they have their hands in everything.
And they would have continued to control the world if it was not for the prophetic election of Donald Trump.
And QAnon believes that Donald Trump knows all about the cabal and the elites and that he's working behind the scenes with a group of military intelligence officials that are called Q-Team.
And Q-Team is basically using messaging boards such as 4chan, 8chan, and now 8kun to let the public know what's going on in their fight against the cabal by leaving drops or crumbs on these messaging boards.
And QAnon believers are there to decrypt these posts So that they can figure out what's actually going on.
And QAnon's been very much mainstreamed recently because they have been making the media more and more.
But this did begin, in fact, October 28, 2017, with just a single post on 4chan called The Calm Before the Storm, which stated Hillary Clinton will be arrested between 7.45 and 8.30 a.m.
EST on Monday morning, October 30, 2017.
That's the one and it's with sign cue.
And that's the message that really started this all.
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