I am definitely concerned to see that not only has QAnon gained traction within the American Right, but that we're seeing Democrats accept (or at least not fully reject) some of its beliefs as...
Those are the findings of a poll released today by the Public Religion Research Institute and the Interfaith Youth Core, which found that 15 percent of Americans say they think that the levers of power are controlled by a cabal of Satan-worshiping pedophiles, a core belief of QAnon supporters. The same share said it was true that “American patriots may have to resort to violence” to depose the pedophiles and restore the country’s rightful order.
But the analysts went a level further: They created a category labeled “QAnon doubters” to include respondents who had said they “mostly disagreed” with the outlandish statements, but didn’t reject them outright. Another 55 percent of Republicans fell into this more ambivalent category.
Which means that just one in five Republicans fully rejected the premises of the QAnon conspiracy theory. For Democrats, 58 percent were flat-out QAnon rejecters.
I am definitely concerned to see that not only has QAnon gained traction within the American Right, but that we're seeing Democrats accept (or at least not fully reject) some of its beliefs as well. Due to the sheer size of the group, I worry that moderates will start seeing QAnon and the far-right as a viable political position to have, and any sort of normalization of QAnon's violent rhetoric won't be good for anybody.
Surveys are a cursed instrument for reasons described here. In particular you need to study the survey questions and consider what alternative explanations there might be for why some people might...
Surveys are a cursed instrument for reasons described here. In particular you need to study the survey questions and consider what alternative explanations there might be for why some people might have answered a certain way. Are they expressing sincere beliefs or tribal loyalty or just messing with the survey for the lulz? These are things people do.
Unfortunately we can't ask what they meant, only speculate. For example, why might people choose "mostly disagree?" Maybe they have friends they don't want to reject?
Which isn't to say that surveys are useless or QAnon isn't alarming, just that the results might not be straightforward to interpret.
I am definitely concerned to see that not only has QAnon gained traction within the American Right, but that we're seeing Democrats accept (or at least not fully reject) some of its beliefs as well. Due to the sheer size of the group, I worry that moderates will start seeing QAnon and the far-right as a viable political position to have, and any sort of normalization of QAnon's violent rhetoric won't be good for anybody.
Surveys are a cursed instrument for reasons described here. In particular you need to study the survey questions and consider what alternative explanations there might be for why some people might have answered a certain way. Are they expressing sincere beliefs or tribal loyalty or just messing with the survey for the lulz? These are things people do.
Unfortunately we can't ask what they meant, only speculate. For example, why might people choose "mostly disagree?" Maybe they have friends they don't want to reject?
Which isn't to say that surveys are useless or QAnon isn't alarming, just that the results might not be straightforward to interpret.