What Is QAnon: Explaining the Internet Conspiracy Theory That Showed Up at a Trump Rally
"Why should I care about a fringe corner of the internet?
Because
QAnon is not limited to a fringe corner of the internet. In addition to
its front-and-center presence at Mr. Trump’s rally, it has been
promoted by celebrities including Roseanne Barr and Curt Schilling, the former baseball star who has a podcast for Breitbart.
The
paranoid worldview has crossed over from the internet into the real
world several times in recent months. On more than one occasion, people
believed to be followers of QAnon have shown up — sometimes with weapons
— in places that the character told them were somehow connected to
anti-Trump conspiracies.
“The
biggest danger is you are one mentally unstable person away from the
next massive incident that defines whatever happens next,” Mr. Decker
said. “The next Pizzagate, which for better or worse did define the
political conversation for a while.”"
