THREAD: It’s time to clarify an ethical stance regarding QAnon, and those who research and report on it. It is a disease — a mind virus — with real victims, people who have been lied to and alienated from their families and communities.

2/ First, we must help the victims, and focus on helping them restore their bonds to family and community. Second, we must hold the perpetrators accountable. Third, we must shun all those who profit from its continuance.

3/ We need to make fringe ideas fringe again. They will always be with us, but fringe groups should remain small and in dark corners. If we think of QAnon as a virus, we need to shrink the number of infected people.

4/ While QAnon has suffered a major blow with the failure of its prophecies, it is slithering along, trying to find new narratives that stick; and it likely will.

But we must not allow it to grow again. Some suggest that’s impossible. I disagree.

5/ By declining to give quarter to communities where it can thrive, we slow the growth of the virus. By setting clear norms about what we will tolerate, we slow its growth. We can push fringe ideas back into the fringes. Deplatforming is a kind of norm-setting, and it works.

6/ There is a debate about whether QAnon is a LARP, an ARG, a PSYOP or just a gag. There is evidence to support all of those points of view. And the people who advanced this operation and profited from it should be held fully accountable.

7/ But there are ethical bounds we can stake out as we deal with this.

1) It’s not funny, because there are real victims, 2) It’s not something to be profited from, 3) All research and journalism should be devoted to ending the disease.

8/ Some people who call themselves “debunkers” have very lucrative gigs and are profiting from very real misery. Developing entertainment properties and book deals from the misery of real victims is unethical. Such people should be called out.

9/ We have entered a new phase, where nonsense is no longer fashionable or transgressive. People who have been profiting from this nonsense should be on notice. This isn’t okay, and we aren’t going to tolerate it.

10/ While it may seem improbable, we CAN rebuild civil society to restore norms like respect for others, and have healthy differences of opinion. But that requires that we anathematize fringe beliefs, as well as those who profit from glorifying them in dime circus sideshows.

11/ If you are a journalist or researcher who amplifies fringe voices, whether trying to be amusing or make a buck, consider your role in hindering progress and validating these operations. When we lift such voices, we contribute to the appearance that fringe voices are co-equal.

12/ Also, if you do need to talk about fringe characters, please use their real names. By using their handles, you are participating in and validating the game world. Don’t do it. We exist in reality; use reality’s terms. This can help bring us back into a shared existence.

13/ Much has already been written about the potential for amplifying extremists, and I will refer you to the excellent report “The Oxygen of Amplification” from @datasociety. All reporters and researchers should have internalized this. But many have not. https://datasociety.net/library/oxygen-of-amplification

14/ So while QAnon will likely slither along and persist, it can be shrunk and anathematized — if we have the will to do it. If you are currently making money from its continuance, find ways to shut that down. Or you are likely part of the problem.

15/ People who are part of the problem are subject to being called out and exposed as immoral profiteers. That’s not a comfortable position to be in, but such are these changing times. Don’t be part of the problem. Find ways to help victims and prevent new ones.

16/ Evidence suggests that QAnon was an emergent phenomenon that was born from a successful LARP and co-opted into a dangerous information warfare operation, centered on Michael Flynn. Investigators will almost certainly get to the bottom of that.

17/ The infighting among researchers over trivial matters is unhelpful. But know that there is only one right side: this thing has real victims, and if you’re not dedicated to helping them recover and actually preventing new ones from being drawn in, then you are a perpetrator.

18/ I am very hopeful that we can reverse some of the damage done in the last few years. But we have to believe that’s possible. And we need to do the hard work to educate ourselves about what actually happened here. We succumbed to some very human failings.

19/ I believe we can understand this much more clearly through a sociological lens; this wasn’t about ideology. I shared some thoughts on this in the program I recorded yesterday with @RealityTeam11. https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?v=459365031766095&ref=watch_permalink

20/ And I have another very big, transformative idea I will be sharing more about soon as well.

There is much work to be done. Let’s stop fighting over trivia, stop wallowing in the “wacky ideas,” stop making fun of people, and move forward. It’s time.

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