I believe the QAnon thing is a fringe group that does not represent the thoughts of most Republican voters. They do believe many things that seem...well...like there is no way in hell they should believe them. Alex Jones is quite a nut as well, not sure if you were here in the Kent days, Ross. This guy Kent was a big Jones fan but back then it was a lot of stuff about shape shifting reptiles running the planet. Jones, who always came across as a huckster, eventually became a right wing staple. Mainly because Trump counted himself as a giant fan. Not sure that Trump bought into the things Jones was saying but Donald just loves people that can bullshit people into believing absolutely stupid stuff. This has always been one of the Donald's main goals and I believes he thinks he is the reigning king of bullshit because he conned 74 million people into voting for him. Truth is, maybe he is. It was quite a trick and he seems to have been able to continue to con many of these people and to get right wing media and elected Republicans to participate in the bullshit. 

The crossover point between Q and more mainstream Republican voters seems to be the belief that Trump somehow won or was screwed out of winning the 2020 election. It requires some serious blinders and self-bullshitting to believe that to the extent that it appears as wacky as many of the Q theories. 

Despite the fact that they have had more than a year that Trump was somehow screwed or won...they have yet to present a single shred of evidence to show this. Nothing, not one single thing. They have lost or had thrown out over 100 court cases for presenting no evidence once in court. If they had anything, even one tiny little thing, it would have been presented and screamed from every Republican rooftop. 

However, crickets. The pivot point just became, well, yes there is no evidence but we are allowed to challenge the vote. We should challenge it because there are people that THINK there was an issue, so we are just helping prove there was no issue. OK, but you also conned these people into believing there was an issue when you knew there was not. When that part comes up they just deny they conned the public and claim we are just letting people think or believe what they want to believe.

I actually made headway when chatting with Kent. He did surrender some of his beliefs and I sort of got through to him on Alex Jones. The whole time I did believe he meant well and was doing what he thought was the right thing to do to help us all. 

I also believe that this QAnon woman I am meeting believes she is doing the right thing to help us. That she thinks the info she is helping push out is vital and we need to see it. I don't think she means to hurt us. She may want harm to come to some leaders that are Democrats and even some Republicans. 

I think these people tend to believe there needs to be total destruction and then a rebuilding of the world. This, I think, falls into the realm of their Christian beliefs which end up merging well with the belief in these conspiracies. 

Truth is, I feel sad about what this woman is going through. I don't see it as a good thing and I don't really feel she is well. Physically, she looks great. Mentally, and how she has closed herself off to her family, I think she is in a bad place. I assume she has talked about this stuff with other people. There are a couple of our old classmates that seem to be into this stuff with her. One of them I know is a convicted drug dealer and criminal. We grew up together and he lived just two houses down from me when we were kids. Him being into this stuff does not surprise me. Her being in so deep...well...that is a surprise. 

I see no issue with people having opposing political beliefs, religious beliefs, policy beliefs, these things are how we sort out a problem. Where I feel things have gone off the rails, and where conversation has grown difficult, is just the lack of agreement on facts and reality. 

This is where it gets frightening. The real difference here is that I see Democrats attempting to deal with reality and our problems and Republicans pushing out absolute fiction at their voters that isolates them and leaves them adverse to listening to anyone. And we have seen through the many death threats Republicans get from their own voters that this can and will come back to bite you.

And if I said I typed all that while I was sitting here in my "Hang Mike Pence!" t-shirt would you think of me in a different way?