The appeal is what makes the Q cult dangerous. For those unable to conceptualize the material reality and understand why modern life has grown pseudo-apocalyptic and increasingly precarious, conspiracy becomes that much more alluring. Q offers an explanation, albeit false, and gives proponents hope that Trump will give them deliverance from imagined pathologies. The result for Trump and his allies creates distraction from material reality and alienation, while creating a zealous base.
Over the last several decades, resources have increasingly shifted from the ordinary to less than 2,200 individuals who now hold more wealth than the bottom half of the world. While worker productivity and corporate profits soar, wages in the U.S. and much of the world remain stagnant as the cost of living skyrockets. A U.S. bipartisan political duopoly, owned by opposing factions of the business class, along with the rapid decline and delegitimizing of liberal institutions, has resulted in the abject failure to shield downwardly mobile people. By promising to deliver revolutionary change and free the masses, Trump uses conspiracies like Q to attract confused, desperate, or hateful people into his fold.
As capitalism becomes more unstable, conspiratorial rationales and loyalty to a god-like leader, who is offering salvation from a broken system, becomes more enticing. Through creating an altered version of reality, a fanatical and violent base is lulled further into a false dream, benefitting the leader and his goals. To understand this historic moment, it must be recognized that a classic tactic of fascism is the promotion of false reality, the goal of restructuring a fabled past (Make America Great Again), and conspiracies. Q, along with other rhetorical pitches by Trump and his allies, is ultimately meant to divert attention away from the true mechanisms of alienation and exploitation allowing for consolidation of political power and capital.
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