In a matter of weeks the rankest QAnon conspiracy theories have gone mainstream in the GOP and conventional journalism has barely noticed.
One of the abiding features of early 21st century American politics is that a lot of change on the right happens in the subterranean world of what we used to call “the Crazy.” In the pre-Trump years it’s not that any of this was really hidden. It wasn’t subterranean in that sense. The ascension of Donald Trump was in many ways a simple inversion of this dynamic, putting “the Crazy” in formal and open leadership of the party.
Something has happened as recently as the last four to six weeks that follows this pattern, is important and dangerous and is still mostly coasting under the radar of “proper” U.S. political discourse and reporting.
It's hard to express just how radicalized far-right spaces have become in the last month, in part because this new brand of radicalization is so specific.
— Ben Collins (@oneunderscore__) March 31, 2022
These spaces have become openly, aggressively, mask-off anti-gay.
They've also become extremely… anti-sports! It's weird!
You can look at the full thread to see all of what he was talking about. But the gist was the “grooming” discourse I mentioned here and here. In short, the entire bundle of conversations about transgenderism, gender identity and homosexuality have been very suddenly repackaged as “grooming” and “pedophilia.” Any discussion of gender identity or homosexuality in schools is now “grooming” kids for pedophiles. Even same sex marriage — which is, of course, by definition for adults — is another part of the “grooming” agenda. Disney is now routinely attacked as a hotbed of “grooming” and pedophilia as a downstream effect of the corporation begrudgingly taking a position against Florida’s “don’t say gay” law.
If you’ve been seeing the word “grooming” a lot lately it’s because much like “CRT” became a boogyman for any discussion of race, the right is now explicitly attempting to associate any positive discussion of the LGBTQ+ community with child sexual abuse https://t.co/F9P4KxZuGP
— nikki mccann ramírez (@NikkiMcR) March 30, 2022
These aren’t just a few random weeds popping up on your lawn. They’re part of a vast welling up from the deep recesses of the earth that you just heven’t fully seen yet.
This isn’t just from the far right. It’s become normalized within the mainstream GOP.