QAnon’s second act: how a rampant conspiracy theory took hold in Europe

Berlin, 18 November 2020, 5.38am

The revolution began online. “We’re off to Berlin to fight for our rights,” one user posted to a group on Telegram, the encrypted messaging app. “We’re going to resist this oppression with all our might.” 

By sunrise there were around 7,000 of them: communists, hippies, neo-Nazis and cat lovers (“This doesn’t really fit the theme,” one user replied, to the photo of somebody’s pet, “but your cat is ultra cute”). Coronavirus rules had unified them. Beyond that, a constellation of foes stood in the protesters’ crosshairs: Angela Merkel, Joe Biden, Bolsheviks and fascists, the Vatican, Freemasons, Jews, Muslims, Bill Gates, George Soros, China, Russia, fake news, the meat industry and Hitler. 

The crowd marched along the banks of the River Spree and through Tiergarten park, heaving a syncretic sea of flags – Gandhi, rainbows, QAnon and the Reichsflagge, the red, white and black of the German Empire that collapsed after the First World War – toward a police cordon posted just yards from the Reichstag, Germany’s grand, old seat of power. Some wore tinfoil hats, a jab at those who decried their Illuminati claims as crackpot. Hundreds of selfie sticks bobbed gamely along, streaming every angle to the web. Sometimes, to paraphrase Malcolm X, you have to pick the phone up to put the phone down. 

“The shit is hitting the fan,” wrote one user. The police column clabbered. Two water cannons lumbered behind them. As the cadre grew, one question lit up Telegram above all others: “Where can I park?” To which one user replied, “Guys, seriously, how laughable can one make themselves? Scared of a little ticket from the state powers and you piss yourself already.”

*** This article has been archived for your research. The original version from British GQ can be found here ***