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Patreon Is Banning QAnon, Joining Facebook, YouTube and Others (businessinsider.com) 172

Patreon is the latest tech company to take action on the QAnon conspiracy theory, announcing in a blog post Thursday morning that creators promoting the movement would be banned from the platform. Business Insider reports: Patreon, a membership platform that lets fans support creators and celebrities financially through subscriptions, previously hosted 14 QAnon influencers on the platform, according to a recent report from the progressive media watchdog Media Matters for America (MMFA). QAnon, the baseless far-right conspiracy theory that alleges President Donald Trump is fighting a deep-state cabal of human traffickers, has recently been banned or limited by Facebook, YouTube, Etsy, Spotify, Triller, and several other platforms. While many QAnon followers base their beliefs on "Q drops" from an anonymous "Q" figure on the messageboard 8kun, the movement is now spread by QAnon influencers who analyze and explain the "Q drops" for their followers.

Patreon creators who used the platform to earn money included some of the movement's top influencers, MMFA found, including Patriots Soapbox, Sean Morgan, Praying Medic, and InTheMatrixxx, all of which were already banned from YouTube. As of Thursday morning, soon after the company published its blog post, those four creators were still up and running on Patreon with QAnon references in their profiles. By Thursday afternoon, the four users were taken down from the platform. Patreon said that creators who have been identified by Patreon's Policy and Trust and Safety teams as QAnon-specific will be removed, but those "who have propagated some QAnon content, but are not dedicated to spreading QAnon disinformation, will have the opportunity to bring their campaigns into compliance with our updated guidelines."

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Patreon Is Banning QAnon, Joining Facebook, YouTube and Others

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  • by ArhcAngel ( 247594 ) on Friday October 23, 2020 @05:34PM (#60641734)
    I know numerous people who had never even heard of Q prior to the bans. They do now! I have always just ignored them but now it's hard to. I suspect Q is gaining new followers from all of this.
    • I rather suspect the population of batshit crazy asshats hasn't changed at all.

    • by ljw1004 ( 764174 )

      I know numerous people who had never even heard of Q prior to the bans. They do now! I have always just ignored them but now it's hard to. I suspect Q is gaining new followers from all of this.

      As a response to your unsubstantiated anecdote, here's mine. I think that the large majority of people under the influence of QAnon nonsense have never heard of QAnon. I think they hear bits and pieces of the conspiracy theories, and come to believe them, in contexts where the QAnon origin+context of the stories has been largely absent. If this is true, the effect you're describing (by which more people hear about QAnon) will be completely dwarfed by the suppression of its messages.

      • Hi, In response to both of you:

        I am a realtor, I deal with different people of multiple economic level. After about 3 months of hearing about CP and hollywood, I did some reading about QAnon. then I read some of postings and stuff.

        I then looked at my client base of who was spouting it ( I had more knowledge about this ) and sure enough, some of my client were.

        I would say that it was mostly 50 years old or older reposting the CP attacks and then along with this a specific voting type message. I would like to

      • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        That's it exactly. The QAnon brand is toxic so they hide it until people are well down the rabbit hole.

    • If they start sending you articles set alight their pets immediately.

    • I know numerous people who had never even heard of Q prior to the bans.

      I have a technical question: How do people who clearly have never watched the news or read a newspaper hear about the bans?

      I will bet you that either they lied, they are incapable of understanding a conspiracy group when they see one, or you are lying in an effort to support free speech under the guise of a non-existent Streisand effect.

      I suspect Q is gaining new followers from all of this.

      Where? On their Twitter feed or their Facebook group? Humans don't go out of their way to dig up stupidity. That's kind of the reason for the bans. Conspiracy theories aren'

  • by OzPeter ( 195038 ) on Friday October 23, 2020 @05:58PM (#60641804)

    I know FB is evil and all, but I didn't know that Patreon put it and YouTube at the same level of evil as QAnon

  • Public Fatigue.... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by beheaderaswp ( 549877 ) * on Friday October 23, 2020 @06:08PM (#60641842)

    People aren't finding this shit funny or interesting anymore.

    At some point censorship becomes a justified reality (even in a de-facto sense). Even though the government can't silence you- private entities can. Especially on their property.

    These organizations are just responding to market realities anyway. They are losing business because of the affiliation. That's the only thing that motivates corporations... money.

    In this case most of us will benefit from this "censorship" and sink happily back into the free flow of kitten pictures.

    • Yeah, the real problem is not Queer-Anon.

      It's people taking them seriously.

      • An interesting, yet uncomfortable, truth... some/too many of the people taking the Qnony, and the like, conspiracy theories seriously, are folks we might've previously considered too intelligent to fall for the hucksters. Yet, it's clear now that higher intelligence is no insulation blanket against false belief.

        Perhaps ffor the world to seek a higher station, we need the voters of average to less than average intelligence to advance beyond our current station.

        • by uufnord ( 999299 )
          Our entire world is made up of stories that we tell ourselves, repeating it to each other and believing it because we trust our friends. It's not intelligence, it's who we choose to trust.
      • It's people taking them seriously.

        The real problem is that people in general have a trust for the materials they are exposed to, especially when that material claims to be on your side against some evil unknown boogeyman (they are against pedophiles, that's good right? I support Q-anon's efforts to. ... wait. dammit!)

        The human mind is to fragile to be exposed to an endless barrage of bullshit, so while the government should have absolutely no say at all in this matter I support people and companies ridding bullshit from their feed.

  • Excellent (Score:5, Interesting)

    by gweihir ( 88907 ) on Friday October 23, 2020 @06:19PM (#60641876)

    These people need to be shown that they are not part of civilized society and that their messed-up ideas are _not_ welcome. They have done enough damage as it is with their anti-truth, anti-reality and anti-science stance. That is not to say I want them silenced, but any amplifier platforms (and Patreon is that as well) needs to shut them out.

    • If only we would do the same to the violent rioters who knocked a black man's teeth out for his free speech. But no, HE got his Instagram, Twitter and Facebook accounts deleted for the crime of...being a victim of racist attacks. He's not a part of civilized society and his messed up ideas that black people should be able to speak their minds are not welcome.
      • by gweihir ( 88907 )

        Rioting and assault are already criminal acts. Please do not do any meaningless posturing, you are making the problem worse.

      • Oh you mean like Anti-Fa and BLM rioting, looting, burning down businesses and cities?
        Why are they not being BANNED all over the place?

        I don't give a shit what people SAY you can choose not to listen or read their bullshit. But if it turns into illegal action then something should be done.

        This goes for BOTH the Radical Right and Radical Left. BOTH are to fucking blame for the current state of the United States. Both should be SHUT THE FUCK DOWN! Then and ONLY then we MIGHT have some civility in this country

    • by MobyDisk ( 75490 )

      The way you demonstrate ideas are not welcome is by ignoring them. Banning something that a person has to actively seek out anyway is silly. I bet most of us have never actually seen anything about QAnon other than meta-posts about how it is being banned. I'm not even sure it even exists, other than as a thing to be banned. Each summary of what QAnon means seems completely different from every other one, like the person writing it just made it up on the spot or Googled to see what it means today.

      • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        The way you demonstrate ideas are not welcome is by ignoring them.

        Patreon can't ignore them. It's a financial service, either it helps them or it bans them, there is no eyes-shut-fingers-in-ears middle ground when they are processing payments.

        • by gweihir ( 88907 )

          The way you demonstrate ideas are not welcome is by ignoring them.

          Patreon can't ignore them. It's a financial service, either it helps them or it bans them, there is no eyes-shut-fingers-in-ears middle ground when they are processing payments.

          Exactly this. The dishonesty and cluelessness of so many people is staggering.

    • by sinij ( 911942 )

      These people need to be shown that they are not part of civilized society and that their messed-up ideas are _not_ welcome. They have done enough damage as it is with their anti-truth, anti-reality and anti-science stance. That is not to say I want them silenced, but any amplifier platforms (and Patreon is that as well) needs to shut them out.

      Something only a QAnon would say. Ban him!

      • by gweihir ( 88907 )

        Stupid statement is stupid. Seriously.

        • by sinij ( 911942 )
          My point went over your head, so let me explain. You think that you are going to ban only bad people, but the moment you declare any group unacceptable this label will be weaponized and misapplied. Just like what I did to you.

          This is already happening with spurious accusations of racism. I heard people declare with all seriousness that a vote for Trump is racist action. Entirely new kinds of racism were invented - systemic racism, unconscious racism, white fragility... All of this is because attacking raci
          • by gweihir ( 88907 )

            My point went over your head, so let me explain.

            No, it did not. I am perfectly aware how the relevant mechanisms work. You, on the other hand, are operating on a simplified model of reality that is inherently deficient.

            • by sinij ( 911942 )

              You, on the other hand, are operating on a simplified model of reality that is inherently deficient.

              This is an empty assertion. If your goal is to convince, you would not succeed with this approach.

  • QAnon influencers who analyze and explain the "Q drops" for their followers

    Priests. They're priests tending to their flocks. They're preaching the holy word and helping their congregations maintain their piety whenever they encounter a crisis of faith.

    Whatever you may feel about this new religion, I think we can all agree that the most important thing right now is to ensure that they should not have to register as a non-profit organization when they apply for tax-exempt status.

  • Its their platform, their rules. This is my last place I have left open to post things (and I don't post things fringe anywhere). I've been trolled by china goons on reddit when covid first started and redditt censored my account 3 times (for no reason, I don't tweet political stuff, but I do read tweets that are off base because I like tabloid tin foil hat stuff...). Welcome to the future....

    I've given up reddit and twitter, tossed away my discuss accounts. I really just don't want to even bother, if I am

  • Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday October 23, 2020 @08:14PM (#60642144)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • by ndykman ( 659315 ) on Friday October 23, 2020 @09:00PM (#60642288)

    Which is what is sorely, sorely missing from today's media. It's funny to see how many claim a threat to free speech when speech is the most unregulated it has ever been in popular media today.

    Honestly, there's a whole generation that seemed to forget that newspapers, TV and books would be subject to things like checking and validation of facts and sources and making sure that subjects of an article would be allowed to comment (and those comments would be printed) so that news was clearly news and entertainment was clearly entertainment.

    Today, you just get people complaining that they can't present things with no basis in fact as news on any platform they choose as a lamentable erosion of free speech, when that speech was never actually allowed to try and maintain the integrity of the press in its role as a necessary counterbalance to government and individual speech.

    It wasn't perfect, but it was better than it is now. The problem isn't all major platforms using editorial discretion on what they allow (and profit from) on their platforms, it's how badly they do it.

    Nobody is owed the legitimacy of a wide platform without none of the responsibilities that entails and no platform needs to threaten its very credibility or existence by allowing any one person or group equal access.

    Don't like it? Make your own platform.

    • The lame stream media gave up on FACTUAL reporting a long, long, long,long,long time ago. So people started filling in with their "facts". So now we have NO ONE putting out the TRUTH! Everyone is putting out flat out lies in my opinion.

      When there is actual factual reporting and NOT "opinion" news then I'll start believing things.

  • by msauve ( 701917 )
    >Patreon Is Banning QAnon, Joining Facebook, YouTube and Others

    Out of the frying pan, into the fire. Good luck with that.
  • General: Try one of these Jamaican cigars, ambassador, they're pretty good.

    Ambassador Desadeski: Thank you, no, I do not support the work of imperialist stooges.

    General: Oh, only commie stooges, huh?

  • When will they ban real misinformation like Gwyneth's Goop and Homeopathy?
  • OK, free speech absolutists, if promoting violence and deranged conspiracy theories is acceptable on the right, what about free speech for violence advocates on the left? Would you defend the right to discuss attacking the police on the part of militant groups?

    Here's a hypothetical for all you libertarians out there. Suppose radical anti-capitalists say corporate ownership is unacceptable, and people should destroy capitalist physical infrastructure. Think of the Oklahoma federal building bombing by Timot

    • by Cederic ( 9623 )

      promoting violence

      Does QAnon do that? I've never bothered to hunt down and read their musings but I always got the impression they talk rather than invite action.

      But since I agree that promoting violence is bad, why is it that this is a reason to cancel QAnon yet multiple Antifa groups - that explicitly pursue political objectives through the use of violence - continue to raise money via Patreon.

      Something isn't adding up here.

    • ... I'm also curious about how libertarian political thinking approaches opinions that attack fundamental libertarian principles.

      I am speaking as someone in the UK, with libertarian tendencies. I am generally dead against cancel culture, no platforming, and so on. I also like to explore radical ideas, such as preferring individual liberties and diversity of opinions over rule by mega-corporations and entrenched power elites. I guess that makes me some kind of anarchist. Parp! Parp! Loony alarm activated!

      I hear about QAnon, but nothing obliges me to believe a word of what they are saying. So personally, I do not feel that QAnon are a

  • Waiting for tweet from president complaining antifa got a hold of Patreon and convinced them to de-platform his base before the election.

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