It's a religious movement, in the form of a modern-day (if loosely-structured) syncretic mystery cult, based around unintelligible posts to seedy online forums, currently 8kun. The primary source "Q" is mostly not relevant, as the typical observation is from the website https://qalerts.app/ which aggregates all of the Q "drops" and is considered canon. Beyond the canonical QAlerts, secondary sources can include any "conspiracy theory" fare, there is really nothing too outlandish unless it is heretical or hostile to the mythological framework of the cult (e.g. meta-conspiracy, doubting in Q's intentions, etc.) These secondary sources are incorporated into the dogma in a piece-meal fashion, often in ways that are contradictory, and swapped in and out of use over time, or emphasized and de-emphasized over time.

Q itself takes the role of a Prophet, herald, or oracular entity, generally thought to be one individual, but perhaps a group of individuals. (or [apocryphal] an AI, extra-terrestrial or extra-dimensional being, an angel, a time traveler, etc.) Q is understood to be a "Patriot" who is "on the inside" working against the Adversary known as "the Cabal" which may constitute the so-called "deep state" (three-letter agencies, the Pentagon, off-the-books SAP's, military contractors), government officials, but also other power players who may have never had any role in government (e.g. George Soros).

The Cabalists are almost invariably political enemies to Trump, or occasionally neutral or unrelated, but useful for the Q entity or the "Clergy" to further a compelling Narrative. Trump himself is viewed as a messianic figure i.e. a savior, or mythic hero, sometimes imagined or inferred to possess preternatural abilities such as superhuman cunning or charisma, manifestations of charismata (spiritual gifts), the beneficiary of angelic or spiritual intervention, unusual fortitude or ability resist manipulation, access to top-secret technology, etc. (or [apocryphal] working with alien technology or entities.)

Trump is believed to working with other Patriots in secret, (who take a role like saints, apostles, or acolytes), to "drain the swamp" meaning "take down" the Cabal. The envisioned eschatology is usually in the form of dozens or hundreds of secret indictments filed by the DoJ, to be followed by mass-arrests of Cabal members. (Though other means are considered: executions, suicides, "disappearing", Cabal members "flee" the country and go into hiding, etc.) After this event, Trump's role and other the Patriots who have been working in secret will be able to reveal their identities, including the Prophet Q. This is believed to usher in some kind of mass political awakening towards conservative values, authoritarianism, Xtianity, and white supremacy, and that without the Cabal in positions of power, the forces of social liberalism and progressivism will either internally fail, or more darkly, be suppressed by force or intimidation.

These are merely the mythological aspects of the QAnon cult, and I think this is the underlying framework you need to really comprehend the phenomenon. The specific details of one conspiracy or another are less important, because most of them will change dramatically over time.

Which leads me to social aspects, which probably what most people want to talk about. The Narrative details are ever-changing, depending on what events happen in reality, or what motives Q or the influential "Clergy" have. There are some bedrock elements, such as George Soros and Hillary Clinton being key Cabal players, or there being an element of pedophilia -- and even this could change under the right circumstances. (I doubt the Q entity could ever make Clinton or Soros to be one of the "good guys" though I do think it could make either one essentially irrelevant to the Narrative through.)

The most important thing to understand about the social aspects of the cult is the role of what I am calling the "Clergy", who are driven by perhaps unknowable motivations, but mostly it is a severe case of conspiracy-brain. These individuals may spend hours a day pouring over QAlerts or 8kun posts, looking at the cryptic messages, keeping detailed notes or conspiracy boards, trying to divine some kind hidden code, or otherwise discern what Q might have meant.

This is conjecture, but I believe these are not merely puzzles or curiosities, but for some practitioners, they approach a mystical or ecstatic experience, or like prayer or contemplation. In many ways, it is looking for patterns upon patterns, some intentionally planted by Q, others purely serendipitous, blurring the line between insight and pareidolia; a madness, like searching for the face of God. Yet for others, they may feel like they are playing an ARG, looking to advance to the next level. Not unlike certain True Believers who perceive there is constant spiritual warfare, angels battling demons, all around them, like Xtian Harry Potter, but real. (Check out some Xtian "allegorical" fiction e.g Frank Peretti). It's dynamic and exciting, and "real" enough if you have other believers to share your experiences with.

At any rate, these "Clergy" exuberantly share what they are thinking, or what they have discovered, shape the discourse, with other QAnon adherents who are more tangentially involved, who may never look at QAlerts. They are the parishioners, the flock, the laity, the passive believers who may have no sense of the grander mythology, they participate mostly as a social activity. The prime directive of the social aspect is one we know well: never stop posting! They are always idling in Facebook groups or on forums like 8kun, though rarely there since imageboard style forums are caustic and jarring, and not at all conducive to boomer-posting.

And beyond even this laity, lies a tertiary degree, entailing nearly the entire universe of Facebook boomers, who by some friend or sibling, cousin, co-worker, churchmate, etc., will be subjected to a steady stream of QAnon-adjacent posting, if not outright cult propaganda; often disguised as merely partisan political content, yet perniciously transmuting the boomer brain to worm-feed. (The worms come later.)

But it is soteriologically vital, for adherents to maintain the "salvation" of being a Patriot themselves, they must stay vigilant within the cult because the Narrative can change overnight. To lose the plot is to fall from grace, to backslide into atavistic awareness, perhaps even lose one's MAGA essence. This week, the conspiracy de jour may be adrenochrome harvesting. Next week, it may be about Trump's hospitalization, or particulars his polyclonal antibody treatments, with the adrenochrome plot being shoved off the table to make room for this new Narrative, perhaps only to shift back to adrenochrome harvesting again next week.

This chaotic, ever-shifting Narrative and rhetorical focus, which is only partially related to the canonical QAlerts, is one of the most critical aspects to understand about the QAnon cult. It is surely about conspiracies, but the QAnon mythos presents a kind of order, a master conspiracy, into which all the others may be slotted, configured, or set aside as needed to construct the next chapter of the Narrative. And that is why you will never fully know what they are on about on any given day, nor can you ever debunk them. The distinguishing characteristic between religion and science is that science is falsifiable, and religion is not. It is taken on Faith. It can never be disproven, only disbelieved.

Two final points. The first is non-exclusivity. While most of the themes presuppose conservative Xtian beliefs, the cult dogma is malleable enough to be compatible with other religious beliefs, yet oblique enough to not seem sacrilegious toward them; the QAnon cult becomes a sort of henotheistic subordinate practice. Note here that QAnon is in the form of a syncretic mystery cult. It is not a full-fledged religion.

The second is that there is a heavy social emphasis on formalized expressions of belief, or even a kind of "catechism", e.g WWG1WGA (where we go one, we go all), "Trust the Plan", symbols of the letter Q, etc. This also includes a nontrivial degree of technical and situational knowledge to actually do the posting. I won't go so far as to call it "OpSec", but there is practical knowledge involved: what sites to use, how to join groups, recover passwords, not get scammed, save or post images, etc. and it all must be propagated somehow through the smooth-brained, boomer milieu. Most QAnon adherents are naturally disinclined to those skills. To me, that is an impressive feat of evangelism and organic organizing power.

Let me conclude with an important materialist analysis on this last point: the technical knowledge, it is not incidental to the cult, but inherent to its mythology. That includes the imageboards, their pagination, tripcodes, the functionality and accuracy of the canonical QAlerts aggregator, even the primary Q "drops" on 8kun are exclusively a function of the technological medium in which they exist. They cannot be understood outside of it. Like how "church" means primarily the physical building itself -- not per se the collective membership, nor the act of church-ing, of having church or doing church.

In this sense, the QAnon cult is nothing but a collection of posts, and the servers on which they exist. But from the vast array of kooky, and often noxious QAnon-adjacent behavior that manifests in the "normie" world, there is clearly an animating psychic element as well. A mind-disease. And now come the worms, to feast upon the warm and supple grey, tenderized with every Q-post scrolling down the feed. There is the real danger.

Okay, more than a few sentences. I got carried away. But it's such a fascinating topic. 😅