I know a wonderful woman, M, who manages a machine shop.  One of her employees, D, who M has known long enough to think of as a friend, frequently expressed extreme annoyance at M’s insistence that all employees must wear masks while at work.  D contracted Covid and got very sick.  She survived, but for many weeks after the primary symptoms subsided, she was super weak and unable to concentrate.   M asked D why she had not gotten vaccinated and had not worn a mask while out and about in the world.  D said she had done her research and was convinced that the Covid “scare” was a hoax, so there was no way that she was gonna catch it.

When I heard this, what especially amazed me was D’s report that she “had done her research.”  What “research” could possibly satisfy someone that Covid is a hoax?  It turns out the authority D had consulted was Facebook.  M is a super smart person, and I’m sure anyone that works in her shop…and especially anyone she regards as a friend…could not be a complete idiot.   But Facebook as the authority for how to respond to a pandemic that had already at that time killed more than a million Americans!!!!!  I had to wonder, is D out of her f—ing mind?  So I also “did my research” and some thoughts that occurred to me follow here.

I doubt that D is technically insane, and I have no idea if she is a QAnon person, but I think she may have what I’m coming to think of as QBrain – an affliction that appears to have taken hold of a scary big chunk of the American population.  Here’s my understanding of the symptoms:

1. You may not have put it into words yet, but you know in your bones that you have an empty, meaningless life.  Your basic survival needs are met so you have time to think about yourself a lot and reflect upon how insignificant you are.
   
   
2. You have come to think that you are in the grips of a system that is rigged against you.  Other people who are no better than you, and some who are clearly a LOT worse, have everything, including control over things that keep you trapped in your empty and meaningless existence.
   
   
3. You are certain that the rigged system is no accident.  Reports on social media, Fox News, and in emails you’ve received confirm a suspicion that has long been in the back of your mind that the government, and the mainstream media that reports upon the government favorably, are tools controlled by a small group of people…a Cabal…that perpetuate the system that oppresses you, and keeps them in control.
   
   
4. Emboldened by the knowledged that lots of others share your discontent you begin to feel a sense of purpose and meaning in resisting, and perhaps even working to thwart, the rigged system.  (Perhaps by challenging your boss around wearing a mask at work).  And like-minded folk you hear on Fox News, or you begin following on social media, or reach out to you via email, tell you:
   
   
   • Since the mainstream media is the government’s partner in perpetuating the rigged system that oppresses you, you can’t believe anything reported there.   But…
     
     
   • There are lots of other people who are studying the corruption of the government and the mainstream media, and are looking for ways to set things right.  And they share what they discover on social media.  So if you do your research there you will find others whose insights into the wrong-doings of the rigged system’s leaders and lackies align with yours.  Others with whom you can exchange the information you’ve discovered, and with whom you can form alliances.   People who will listen to you.  Who will take you seriously.  No matter how macabre or self-serving your take on any topic might be, if you poke around long enough in social media you’ll find soul mates to virtually high five you, and may even invite you to get wild with them at a rally in Washington.
     
     
   • Some of those you encounter in your research help you understand that since the government has been corrupted by a cabal of shadow players, it is your patriotic duty to do your research, find chinks in the cabal’s armor, and discover where you fit into the groundswell that will inevitably shake off the false government that oppresses you.   There’s lots of meaningful work for you to do.  You are important.  Your life is no longer empty and meaningless.  You have achieved QBrain.
     

Conversation with a QBrainer can be frustrating.  For example, try pointing out to them that it’s pretty certain prominent Democrats are not running a child sex trafficking ring out of the basement of a particular pizzeria because an armed QBrainer has stormed that location and found that it has no basement.  Such observations just annoy them.  They don’t care about the truth or absurdity of any particular QBrained assertion.  One or two or hundreds of leads that don’t pan out don’t negate the integrity of the ennobling QBrain process.  AND, they see what you are doing.  They sense that you are implying that the path they are on, which has given their meaningless life meaning, is nonsense.  And that absolutely cannot be.  That must not be.  I can’t go back to being a nobody who doesn’t matter.

You may find of interest The Prophecies of Q – an element of the “research” I performed that significantly contributed to the formation of the thoughts I’ve shared above.