Monday Mini: Women in QAnon

As more and more female politicians who support QAnon make the news, Anney and Samantha discuss women in QAnon.

Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hey, this is Anny and Samantha. I'm notlcoing to stuff.
I never told you protection of I heart radio. All right,
here's today's question. All right, did you ever is there

(00:25):
ever a conspiracy theory that you got really into, not
necessarily believed, but like I got really into. No, I
don't think I really understand conspiracy theories because I'm not
about digging. I'm lazy. Let's just leave it at that.
I'm just really lazy. And some things I believe some
things are not being completely truthful. So I do think

(00:47):
things are being hidden. But my my theory is, is
everybody's hiding something that's your conspiracy theory? Yes, And I
don't know if it's a conspiracy theory. It's just it's
just and so therefore why I'm worried about it? If
it's a really big deal, Okay, Um, to be obsessed
with something like this type of conspiracy can actually really

(01:10):
cause a lot of harm. So I'm just like, no,
I'm good, I'm good. I have like theories on things,
but I think my theories are not relevant because I'm
not like, I'm not the professional. I'm not the expert here.
Move on. I thought you were gonna see. I thought
you were going to say, but my theories are not

(01:31):
theories because what I think is true. And I was like,
he come swinging as some conspiracy theorists, but you don't
admit it. I mean, I don't know if I don't
believe that aliens don't exist. Although you know, we know
that the White House just released some weird photos for
some odd reason. Did I tell you about why UFO experience?

(01:53):
Do you've had the UFO experience? Yes? I have resell
me about this please. Um. Well, I was uh visiting
my mom. We did the whole quarantine thing um in Alabama,
and I was out late at ninth, very very late, um,
and I was just looking at the sky and it

(02:13):
is near a military base, so I this is my
probably what it was. But it looked like I saw
this ball of light like and it looks like um
iron Man. Like how it moved like it darted and
dance and stopped and we go up and down and
it was beautiful. Um. It kind of in the movement
was like how when you're playing with a laser pointing
with a cat. You know, That's what I imagined. It

(02:35):
looked like a shooting star but moving like that. Um,
And it was out there. I stayed out until it
went until sun came up, and it was out there
all night. I tried to wig people up and they
would not get up. Um. So no one can confirm it.
And my phone was dead, of course it was dead. Um.
But yeah, I don't know what it was, but it
was pretty Do you have conspiracy theory about that or

(02:57):
just really um no, No, I just uh, I know
that I saw it and I don't know what it is.
That's pretty much all I can give you. Um. I
don't really have a theory about it, except that there
is a nearby military base. So, but honestly, in the closet,
like in front of you, is there like a whole
diagram of where you believe? Behind me, my closet is

(03:22):
very cluttered. It's quite possible I'm gonna find something hidden somewhere.
I was terrified of aliens growing up, and it was
after my brother showed me that Roswell autopsy video and
then played a very cruel prank on me. Um right
after that, and it's stuck with me. So I guess, like,
not really conspiracy theory, but I have anxieties around well,

(03:47):
there you go. That that makes sense. Yes, I got
pretty big into the Paul Paul is dead one. For
a while I didn't believe it, but I did. I
called the phone number and I did the whole thing. Um. Anyway,
if you don't know what I'm talking about, that up
if you're interested to look that up to. Yes, Okay,
we're not talking about that one in particular today, but
we are talking about Q and on and specifically women

(04:10):
in Q and on and very very basically like so
diluted because this is a very sprawling theory, so interesting
to me that people are also willing to grasp onto
this um, and it is really phenomenal to see women
in this But yes, keep going. Yeah, it's I feel
like it's a catch all conspiracy theory where you can

(04:31):
pretty much put in any conspiracy you want in there,
and then it it will work even though it doesn't
make sense. Um. So this is a conspiracy theory that
revolves around I mean, at its heart, it's protecting Trump
that prominent Democrats and liberals are involved in a global
satanic child sex trafficking ring. Um, someone close to Trump

(04:53):
with security clearance named Q. It's called Q clearance. Claims
that Trump is the only one that can take down
this satanic child sex trafficking ring, which is interesting because
the whole Jeffrey Epstein thing. But all right, Um, it
started on four chan, uh and grew after Pizza Gate,
and the FBI considers them violent extremist UM or they

(05:16):
they have the potential their extremist that have the potential
for violence. I think it's probably more acting there alert
with them, right, FBI has kind of put them as
an alert but has not really classified them yet. Yes, yes,
because there have been several violent instances and I'm just
kind of frightening things UM like the guy who showed
up to Pizza Gate had a gun, UM could have
gone much worse. And their membership has rapidly grown during

(05:39):
the pandemic thanks to things like doom scrolling and social
media algorithms and people in positions of power like we've
seen SWAT team members sporting Q merchandise. Our police union
has UM showing their support for Q and on and
you know President himself, Yeah, they that has not said
it out loud, but it's retweeted. Menia thing as well

(06:00):
as we see people who are running the people who
are in government officials taking the oath, which I was
trying to figure out, what is happening? What is this? Um?
And some folks over red Box recently did a piece
where they used the computer program to analyze one of
Human's biggest subreddits to get an idea of who was
on there, and it was largely ardently pro Trump supporters

(06:24):
who are also men's right activists into video games, martial arts,
and yes, mostly white men. Most of them are conspiracy
light quote, but most of the content is produced by
a small part of the sub like two hundred out
of fifty thou and their active conspiracy theorists. Yeah, so
it's like a lot of people in this subreddit are

(06:48):
It's almost like they're casually perusing it. They're not commenting.
A lot of them, Um, they're not posting, but they're there.
But two hundred of these like big conspiracy theorists are
posting almost all of the content, which is hilarious, which, yeah,
it's interesting. Um, But more and more women have started
supporting Q and on despite these kind of these men's

(07:11):
rates activists, or well despite possibly because of I can
share the same views UM. In our Women in Politics
Part two episode we mentioned that a handful of Republican candidates.
Female Republican candidates embrace Q and ON and one here
in Georgia, Marjorlie Taylor Green, who we mentioned, just want
a primary despite yeah, having made many racist comments. Um.

(07:34):
She also once said the most mistreated group of people
in the United States today are white males. Um. At
least fourteen Republican candidates that openly support Q and ON
have made it to runoffs or will be on the
ballot for Novembers election. And yeah, we just kind of
want to have a conversation about that. I know that
you and I've been talking about this for a minute

(07:54):
and just kind of trying to wrap our mind around
this thought that this is the way to have a
platform and that it's working, that it's working for women.
That is, it's kind of like how we've talked about
how women have to be overachievers to be seen and
so that means to also be an extremist and maybe
this is what's working. Um. I mean, like Melissa rain

(08:17):
Lively or Quann Karen who trashed the mass selection out
of target and live streamed it. She called herself the
Q and non spokesperson. Which do you just put you
give yourself this title. Did someone say she was this
this is really yeah, it's like interesting. Um. She has

(08:38):
since called the outburst a symptom of a depressive episode,
which could be true ish, but also the community that
you participate in would be a factor. Yeah. Um, well,
her experience is really interesting because she she's spoken about it,
she's written a book about it, about how quickly it

(09:00):
took hold and how it destroyed her life. Um, not
her actions but the consequence right well because with in
her words, she was part of kind of this like
yoga wellness groups and that's sort of the entry point
for a lot of um especially on Facebook like Q
and on to kind of infiltrate. And then they I

(09:21):
think they cited spirituality is one of the biggest ways,
biggest like kind of overlaps and um. So she was
involved in those groups and then like friends of her said, well,
you should check out this cuban on thing now like
it within a matter of months, Um, it just consumed
her life. And they talked about how it's sort of

(09:42):
an echo chamber because right now we're deprived, we're isolated,
a lot of us don't have jobs. There's like more
time um and you're in your you're depending on social
media for contact in a lot of ways, and it
kind of it forms this echo chamber because because of
the algorithm, it just gets bigger and bigger. A lot

(10:02):
of people spoke about like they're not doing it when
they make these videos of them yelling at people for
wearing masks. It's not for you. They're purposely doing it
so they can post it on Facebook later and get
a bunch of likes right and say we're finding the system.
It's really interesting too that I think because one of

(10:23):
the big well many celebrities, but one that's big on
Twitter obviously is Chrissy Teagan and the amount of control
because of this Q and on theory and them going
after her, calling her Satanists, talking about how she ate babies,
that she sacrificed babies, she had blessed babies. It was
such a weird phenomenon and I'm just sitting here going,

(10:46):
what is what is happening? Who's talking about babies? Like,
who's talking about eating and sacrificing babies? What is happening?
And this whole level even to them saying Jesus is
gonna come and get you slashed through Donal's up and
it's like a big chunk of it what seemingly is
middle aged white women and more and more, and even

(11:08):
to a point where I've had friends just talk about
theories about not even theories, about their beliefs and seeing
things that are going wrong with the way the pandemic
is being handled, or or the way election fraud is
being seen, all of these things. And a woman respond
who was obviously for fifty years old, say, I don't know.
I only know one thing that I'm a believer of
Jesus Christ, and I believe that this is evil killing

(11:30):
babies after they're born. And I'm like, what, who, what?
Who's doing this? She's like, and I will not allow that,
and that I know, even though I may not agree
with everything, that Trump's gonna save us from that. And
I'm kind of saying, they're going telling babies after they're born.
What are you talking? What are you talking? But doesn't
even make sense, and trying to reference it as if

(11:51):
it's a part of the abortion propaganda, but somehow that
gets flushed under the Q and non thing that it's
not just abortion, it's about sacrif sacrificing to Satan. Yeah,
and I mean this is a different show and other
podcasts Honor Network, I've done it. But it's interesting why
like the the reason your brain wants to believe in

(12:14):
conspiracy theory and kind of what makes a conspiracy theory
a conspiracy theory. But going back to that, like this
is all about protecting Donald Trump. It's a way to justify,
like make it makes sense and that everyone else is
against him. Um, and you know Robert Mueller is a

(12:34):
big part of this too. They say they were working together. Um,
it was all a big and that's that's to justify
why Trump was being impeached, Like it's it's such a
huge and because and again this is kind of a
theory in my own mind, and that the way to
get to middle aged white women have to talk about

(12:56):
the possibility of the death of a child like that
that almost you know, maternalistic. I have to protect because
it's come to the point that people who do work
in sex trafficking, who do work in prevention of child
sexual abuse, all that are having to come out and
be like, please stop doing this. These theories actually hurt
our work and having to be like you are taking

(13:18):
this light off of what is really really happening and
therefore damaging the system in trying to get these kids out,
those kids who are truly truly affected. And it's a
kind of a phenomenon that these people who believe this
theory are believing they are warriors fighting of at all,
which is again, people need a quest, I guess, and

(13:40):
this is kind of that level of what this quest
looks like and how they're bringing in women because a
lot of this again, when we talk about men's right activists,
you start thinking, weight this is not for your betterment,
Like you think you're saving someone at the sacrifice and
of another thing, but it's not. I don't understand what.
It feels like a very mix and match conspiracy though,
like you can really choose what parts do you want

(14:03):
to believe? Um. And also like there's so much uh
discussion of who Q is and some people think it's
like a leftist troll and um, but they've done a
lot of outlets. I've seen it described as this is
like a role playing game gone wrong, like Q. They
it was never meant to come to real life. But

(14:23):
people do feel like they are warriors and they're protecting
people and it's their duty, it's their mission. Um. So yeah,
it is. This is dangerous for a lot of reasons. Um,
there's violence. We've already seen some attacks, some attempted kidnappings. Um.
Putting people at risk, not wearing masks, also just being
total jerks by yelling at kids who really don't or

(14:44):
who tried to enforce mass policy and recording it. Um.
And yeah, it's troubling that more and more women are
getting involved and that they're getting elected potential right yeah, yeah,
like major big wigs. And I'm very scared yep, uh
me too, me too. And well, tip, this is something

(15:07):
we're gonna be keeping an eye on. We have done
episodes on women, and past hosts have done episodes on
women and cults. But it'd be interesting to return to
and talk about women and conspiracy theories maybe, um. But
in the meantime, listeners, we would love to hear from you.
Our email is Stuff Media, mom Stuff at I heart
media dot com. You can find us on Twitter at
mom Stuff podcast or on Instagram as stuff I Never

(15:29):
told you. Thanks it's always to a superproducer Andrew Howard
and j J and j J and j J P.
And thanks to you for listening Stuff I've Never Told
You's a production of I heart Radio. For more podcast
from I heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast,
orherever you listen to your favorite shows.