QAnon followers are giving up on their conspiracy theory after Biden's inauguration: 'Is anyone still holding the line?'
One hour after President Joe Biden was inaugurated in Washington, DC, on Wednesday, QAnon conspiracy-theory chat rooms had an overwhelming - albeit familiar - sense of hopelessness.
"What are we waiting for now?" one comment in a QAnon Telegram channel said. "Is anyone still holding the line?" said another.
"So, was Q just one big lie and psyop that I foolishly followed and believed for over 3 years?" another user said.
In a QAnon message board, the discussion was similarly bleak: "Guys and gals, I'm losing my everloving mind right now. Is this really happening? Was this part of the plan?"
Wednesday was the final chance at redemption for QAnon, a baseless far-right conspiracy theory alleging that former President Donald Trump was fighting a "deep state" cabal of pedophiles and human traffickers.
Many believers of QAnon had anticipated that Biden would be arrested at his inauguration, or that Trump would do something, anything at all, to prevent his successor from taking office.
But in the end, Trump said goodbye, danced to the "YMCA," and flew to Florida, and Biden became president.
Finally, QAnon followers appeared to realize en masse that with Biden inaugurated, Trump's rule and the fantasy they'd created around it had come to an end.
Ron Watkins, who had for years facilitated the spread of QAnon, echoed sentiments of resignation elsewhere in the QAnon movement.
Watkins is the former administrator of 8kun (formerly 8chan), the fringe message board where "Q," the anonymous leader of QAnon, posts cryptic messages. After two months of fighting to overturn Biden's election win with claims of voter fraud on One America News Network, he finally gave up.
"We gave it our all. Now we need to keep our chins up and go back to our lives as best we are able," Watkins said on Telegram, where he has more than 120,000 followers. "We have a new president sworn in and it is our responsibility as citizens to respect the Constitution regardless of whether or not we agree with the specifics or details regarding officials who are sworn in."
Extremism researchers have questioned whether Watkins or his father, Jim, who owns 8kun, were somehow associated with Q. The younger Watkins had in many ways become the de facto leader of QAnon, as Q has not posted on 8kun since December 8.
The conspiracy theory began on fringe message boards in 2017 when an anonymous figure called "Q Clearance Patriot" claimed to have high-level government security clearance and said Hillary Clinton would soon be arrested for involvement in a child-trafficking ring. Three far-right activists noticed the message on 4chan and spread it, NBC News reported in 2018.
Clinton, of course, was never arrested. But the allegation that Democrats and powerful figures - which eventually expanded to include Chrissy Teigen and Oprah Winfrey - were involved in human trafficking has been central to what experts call the "big tent" conspiracy theory, which can adapt and change as needed.
While it's difficult to track the number of people who believe in a conspiracy theory like QAnon, Facebook documents obtained by NBC News in August indicated that there were millions of users in QAnon groups.
In 2020, the movement migrated from the fringes of the internet to mainstream social-media platforms. It became hugely popular thanks to its association with COVID-19 misinformation and anti-human-trafficking sentiment.
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