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A Whopping 15% Of Americans Believe Country Is Run By Satan-Worshipping Pedophiles, Poll Finds
To most of the world, the QAnon conspiracy theory—which posits the world is run by a group of child-murdering pedophiles former President Donald Trump is working to stop—may seem laughably preposterous.
But a new poll gives a chilling glimpse into the degree to which the conspiracy theory has been mainstreamed across the United States.
According to the poll's sponsors—non-profit Public Religion Research Institute and the Interfaith Youth Core—a staggering 15% of Americans—more than 30 million people—sincerely believe the theory's claims that the United States is run by a nefarious cabal of Satan-worshipping child rapists.
A\u00a0poll by the Public Religion Research Institute and the Interfaith Youth Core 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. OMG!!!https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/27/us/politics/qanon-republicans-trump.html\u00a0\u2026— Laurence Tribe (@Laurence Tribe) 1622158130
The findings of PRRI, a non-partisan organization dedicated to "independent research at the intersection of religion, culture, and public policy," paint a decidedly disturbing picture of the American electorate today.
The 15% figure alone is startling.
But in an interview with The New York Times, PRRI founder Robby Jones brought the figure into even more unnerving focus. Such a proportion of Americans basically equates to an established religious group.
"Thinking about QAnon, if it were a religion, it would be as big as all White evangelical Protestants, or all White mainline Protestants. So it lines up there with a major religious group."
Sharing the astonishment of much of the rest of the world, Jones added of his "Satan-worshipping pedophile" question:
"These are words I never thought I would write into a poll question, or have the need to, but here we are."
Jones' further findings are even more disturbing.
The same proportion, 15%, of respondents, agreed with the statement "American patriots may have to resort to violence" in order to depose this evil cabal, which QAnon adherents claim includes everyone from Hillary Clinton and Bill Gates to Madonna and Tom Hanks.
Another 20% of respondents agreed a Biblical-level "storm" was coming to rid the world of this evil confederacy. PRRI also found that fully 25% of Republicans—one in four—consider themselves QAnon believers.
PRRI also created a category for "QAnon doubters," who were somewhat skeptical of the movement's claims but did not reject them out of hand entirely. This category comprised another 55% of Republicans. If you're keeping score, that makes 80% of Republicans who have placed faith in an online, unsupported conspiracy theory over reality.
In his analysis, Jones cautioned against many Americans' reflex to laugh off QAnon adherents as crackpots.
"It's one thing to say that most Americans laugh off these outlandish beliefs, but when you take into consideration that these beliefs are linked to a kind of apocalyptic thinking and violence, then it becomes something quite different."
On Twitter, many were deeply disturbed by PRRI's findings.
Not good https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/27/us/politics/qanon-republicans-trump.html\u00a0\u2026pic.twitter.com/QusiIkKOuU— Parker Molloy (@Parker Molloy) 1622159176
People ask why I want to retreat to a mountaintop fortresshttps://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/27/us/politics/qanon-republicans-trump.html\u00a0\u2026— southpaw (@southpaw) 1622158876
This is what happens when funding education is not a number 1 priority.— Ben Jones (@Ben Jones) 1622158345
pic.twitter.com/JmDibo8zy8— David (@David) 1622164695
Yea we need to combat this. Someone needs to make an initiative that focuses on understanding QAnon and how to combat these conspiracy theories— Obby (@Obby) 1622164735
this is the bad placehttps://twitter.com/nytimes/status/1398085446698156033\u00a0\u2026— sophia (@sophia) 1622165458
14% of Americans have completely lost grip on realityhttps://twitter.com/nytimes/status/1398085446698156033\u00a0\u2026— Jonathan Blue (@Jonathan Blue) 1622165182
It genuinely feels like we're living in something similar to the fall of Rome sometimes.https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/1398085446698156033\u00a0\u2026— \ud83e\udd8c\ud83c\udf88Buckley\ud83c\udf39\ud83c\udf08 (@\ud83e\udd8c\ud83c\udf88Buckley\ud83c\udf39\ud83c\udf08) 1622168721
The level of alarm about Qanon and the broader anti-democratic conspiracy culture it represents is at a 2 and it needs to be at least an 8: https://nyti.ms/3p6cXJZ\u00a0https://twitter.com/stevanzetti/status/1399115895469969409\u00a0\u2026— Lindsay Beyerstein (@Lindsay Beyerstein) 1622433123
PRRI's poll also found a high degree of correlation between QAnon adherence and viewership of networks like Fox News, Newsmax and One America News Network, as well as conspiracy theories about the pandemic and vaccines.