 But I refuse to cave into that bulls**t. I refuse. In my opinion, I think you should refuse too right now. Because it's more important than ever not to cave into their propaganda and to make a statement. Make a visible statement that you're not going to go along with the crowd, that you are not a sheep. And what more powerful statement is there by then just not wearing a mask? It's unconstitutional. I don't have to f**king do it. I don't want to do it. I just want to shop. Maybe it is unconstitutional. It is. I'm an American. This is f**king America. Make a visible statement. And what more powerful statement is there by then just... Not wearing a mask? You can't mandate somebody to wear a mask. If you want to wear a mask, hey, but... What are you talking about? I've been walking around for four months, flying, interacting with people, no issues. Don't buy into the media hype. I still have constitutional rights though. Have you ever sat back and wondered who these people are and why they're so confident in their refusal to wear a mask? People being able to record misconduct is one of the reasons we're so aware of Karen's and police brutality. But what about the other people who are holding the camera? As you saw from the previous video clips, people are so confident that they're right, that they're recording their arguments with others about why they won't wear a mask. Another thing I've been doing more and more is try to ask myself, why did this person post this? Why do we tweet out our opinions? Why do we showcase our outrage on Facebook? And why do some people record themselves refusing to wear a mask? While there are many reasons why we throw out these various social signals on social media, we're going to focus on aspects of validation and being part of an in-group. Sharing a video of you yelling at someone while you refuse to wear a mask is sending out a signal. The underlying psychology is the hope for some sort of validation. Once they publish this video, they're hoping that people will say, you did a great job taking a stand. But who would validate something like this during a global pandemic? Well, a specific population of people is actively trying to get one another to not wear a mask. And this is why conspiracy theories can potentially be dangerous. While I can't say for certain if any of the people in these clips I showed you are part of QAnon, they very well could be. If you don't know what QAnon is, we don't have time to get deep into all of the details in this video, but here's a top-level overview. QAnon is a conspiracy group that Twitter recently had to take action against because of the fear that QAnon's actions could turn into real-life violence. QAnon is a far-right conspiracy group who believes that Trump is their savior and that he's here to rescue us from a cabal who is involved in sex trafficking and the drinking of blood in their satanic rituals. Recently, in a BBC piece, people discuss how they've even lost family members who fell into the QAnon rabbit hole. People are coming here to post about family members that they feel have been sucked into the QAnon conspiracy. A lot of these relatives are older, parents or even grandparents. She believes that Bill Gates created the COVID pandemic. That COVID-19 is by a warfare that only affects pedophiles. And also created the upcoming vaccine. Bill Gates is a cure-all. Which is going to contain microchips to track everybody. Wacky things such as Michelle Obama is really a man. And people like Ellen and J.Lo are all Satanists. And the pedophile rings interdimensional demonic pedophiles. For the last few years, QAnon has been focused on their sex trafficking conspiracies, but now that we're in a pandemic, their focus has shifted. If you thought influencers having parties was bad because they're being a bad example, influencers in the QAnon community are actively telling people not to wear masks. This is a channel called Destroying the Illusion. He's a conspiracy theory YouTuber with over 235,000 followers. In June, when his state of Washington mandated masks, he made a video expressing his anger while telling his following not to wear masks. While a lot of focus has been on young influencers being bad examples, the psychology around influence is much weaker than the psychology of obedience. As someone giving his audience instructions to not wearing masks, this QAnon channel is doing something far worse, and it's putting many people at risk. I wish I could say that videos like this get flooded with people saying how wrong they are, but that's not the case. At the time of writing this, the video has over 35,000 views, but that's not the worrisome part. When we look at the like to dislike ratio, that's what we need to worry about. In this video, not only are we going to debunk some of the QAnon COVID conspiracies, but we're also going to discuss the psychological motivation behind channels like this. As critical thinkers, it's important that we understand motivated reasoning. When our reasoning is motivated by being part of a community, it can skew our logic. But as with channels like this, money can be quite the motivator as well. But before we get started, if you're new to the Rewired Soul, make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell. Here, we use critical thinking and skepticism to not only improve our emotional intelligence, but our overall well-being. As you know by now, I'm quite the skeptic. And based on my history, I'm the prime target for QAnon to sell me on the idea that COVID is a hoax cooked up by Big Pharma. Eight years ago, I almost died from a prescription opioid addiction. And in my recovery, I spent a lot of time learning how Big Pharma helped create the opioid epidemic. So if anyone is going to be skeptical about Big Pharma, it's going to be me. And that's what QAnon and other conspiracy theorists will try to sell you on. Fortunately, people like you and I practice critical thinking to see what's really going on. Humans are creatures that are fueled by incentives. So it's a good critical thinking practice to always ask what someone's motivation might be. For example, the United States is one of the only two countries in the world where it's legal to do direct to consumer marketing for medications. So I hope you ask yourself the motives of the commercial when it tells you to ask your doctor about medications. But more importantly, when we come across major claims such as COVID is a hoax and masks don't help keep you safe, we need to ask if the person telling us this has any incentives. Although there are many QAnon members pushing this narrative, we'll be focusing on the channel destroying the illusions because he's one of the bigger creators with the most influence. His theory is that this is all a hoax to control us. So before we analyze his potential motivator reasoning, let's start by taking a look at the other side. He argues that COVID is a hoax and the government is trying to control us. He cites fake research and fake science. His best theory is that this is a way for the government to control us. So what does that mean? As a critical thinker, I think it's okay to hear an argument out, but we need to ask if it makes sense. What would the government have to gain by having us wear masks? How would that control benefit the government in any way? Now one could argue that they would start out with a small amount of control so they could control us more later, but this is using the slippery slope logical fallacy. There's no evidence that having us wear masks would somehow lead us to being mindless zombies they could control in other aspects. And many conspiracy theorists are also worried about facial recognition. So wouldn't this be counterproductive? My iPhone won't even unlock with my mask on. So making us wear masks would just make it more difficult for quote unquote big brother to spy on us. I have seen some QAnon people say that the masks help hide the identity of child sex traffickers, but which one is it? You either believe that the government wants to use facial recognition on us, or they want to hide the faces of traffickers. It can't be both. Next, we can ask ourselves what motivated reasoning doctors would have to tell us to wear masks. What argument people from QAnon use is that people like Dr. Fauci have vested interest based on some debunked information. But let's say that hypothetically Dr. Fauci would somehow benefit financially from us wearing masks, because maybe he has a massive amount of stocks in a mask making company. What about all of the other doctors encouraging us to wear masks? How would this benefit them? With a few keyword searches on YouTube, you can find plenty of videos showing how masks help slow the spread of the virus. So QAnon would have to argue that not only does every doctor have some sort of vested interest in us wearing masks, but so would all of these people making videos about how masks work. As you start to ask yourself more common sense questions about conspiracy theories, they start to crumple like a house of cars with the slightest breeze. But what about this channel destroying the illusion? Does he have any reason to push the narrative about COVID being a hoax? Why would people like him do this if he could possibly put people's lives at risk? While he may 100% believe in this conspiracy, some of the reasons he believes in it may be due to his own financial benefit. Unlike QAnon claims, we can actually trace the financial benefit back to QAnon members making these claims. QAnon channels like destroying the illusion will tell their audience that their videos are being suppressed by the algorithm and don't get monetized. This is a manipulation tactic to have people support them in other ways, which makes much more money than YouTube monetization. As you can see from his Patreon, he has 674 members. His tiers range from $3 up to $177 per month. Even if we took a conservative estimate and assumed that each of the 674 members are signed up at the lowest tier, he'd be making roughly $2,000 a month. But if we're just even a little bit more realistic and assume that even 50 people are at the $17 tier, 5 people are at the $37 tier and just one person is at the $177 tier, it's over $3,000 a month. Right now, tens of millions of people are unemployed in the United States and millions may not be able to pay rent. Meanwhile, destroying the illusion is making a minimum of $2,000 a month from his supporters on Patreon. In a video last year from some more news, they pointed out how many of these QAnon people sell merch or other items. This is the powder keg in which Q currently resides. And along with being volatile, it is extremely susceptible, which is probably why there are so many people fanning the flames in exchange for neat blood bucks. Also known as the Great Awake Grifsteading. Hey you, do you like having your walls plastered with conspiracy board gibberish but simply don't have the time to cobble together miles of twine into an elaborate web of thumb-tacked photos and scribblings? Well, luckily there's not one, but two. No, not two, but three. No, actually four. Not four, but five. Or maybe six QAnon deep state maps that you can purchase for your wall. This website seems to be offering a seventh, but is also asking for our email to even look at it, which we're not going to bother even making a dummy account for. Because when you're the true believer to what would be the biggest conspiracy known to mankind, you're going to need a commemorative coin to kickstart that revolution for the low, low price of $17. And yes, while there are multiple coins to choose from, that first Q coin is the only one you can get from Jordan Sather, a real thinker seen here boasting about drinking chlorine dioxide, something he regularly does, and also the host of destroying the illusion. So, when your income is based around you being a source spreading conspiracy theories, what happens when presented with contradictory information? Even the most rational and moral person will be biased towards the information they receive when they're affected by motivated reasoning. Now that we've taken a step back to look at the potentially motivated reasoning on both sides, we're going to jump into this last section by asking more questions that help us debunk QAnon COVID conspiracies. Let's talk about the real reason why masks are being pushed so hard right now. The real reason is not for our health. It's not for you. It's not for me. It's not for the greater good of society. No, the real reason why masks are being pushed so hard right now is simple. It's for control. That's it. Control. Because when you put a mask on and go out in public, what does that say? That basically says, I'm a brain dead zombie. I'm a sheep. And I do as I'm told by the talking heads on television. That's what it says. You don't even need to say anything. But it says all about you when you put that mask on and acquiesce to their propaganda. Social engineering, that's the real reason why masks are being pushed right now. And it's so sad that people are more than happy to go along with it. More than happy just to do as they're fricking told and not think twice. Not even think once really. They don't even second guess or question what they're being fed by their TV. A common tactic conspiracy theorists use is that they sell their followers on the belief that they are in fact the independent thinkers. As you saw in destroying the illusions video, he talks about how the ones wearing the masks aren't the ones thinking for themselves. But when you put it under a microscope, you realize that groups like QAnon are reliant upon people that don't ask enough questions. As I mentioned before, I'm one of the most skeptical people when it comes to doctors, but I've had to learn how to ask the right questions. If we hope to be critical thinkers, we need to be curious and constantly have our wheels turning. I try my best not to be an alarmist, but when it comes to COVID, this is extremely serious due to how contagious it is. So we all need to stay vigilant about the information that we're receiving. Let's take a look at that. What they're trying to do with masks is basically the same thing, okay? What they're trying to do is force a medical procedure onto us, whether it's injecting something into our bodies or putting the cloth over your mouth. They're trying to force a medical procedure onto us, and they're doing that through faked wrong information, faked data, faked science. If you think your news is fake, try science. Learning how much fake science out there would blow some people's minds, that's for sure. They're literally selling this forced medical procedure onto us with fake statistics. When I was watching this QAnon conspiracy video, this young man made claims of fake science and fake studies. And then I asked myself, who is he? Personally, I'm more than happy to concede that there are a lot of bad studies out there. But you just need to show me the evidence. In fact, I love reading books about bad science, and I talk about it quite a bit on my channel. I think it's important that we question sensational studies that come out, and if you're interested in learning more about how to spot these bad studies, I highly recommend two great books that just came out this year. Science Fictions, How Fraud, Bias, Negligence, and Hype undermine the search for truth, and Calling BS, the art of skepticism in a data-driven world. So, what's different about the authors of these books calling out bad science compared to QAnon? These authors are credentialed scientists and college professors. In each book, they pick apart specific studies and explain why they're flawed. Another great website is RetractionWatch.com, and this is where they share retracted studies. Meanwhile, as you saw from the QAnon video, he doesn't cite any specific study. Listen, I get it. COVID is scary, and most of us don't know the ins and outs about medical science, which is why it's so important that we practice critical thinking. QAnon is able to sell their conspiracies by giving seemingly simple answers to complex topics, but topics like this can put lives at risk. Personally, I try to educate myself as much as possible, which is why I recently binged Dr. Steven Novella's audiobook, The Skeptics Guide to Alternative Medicine. Dr. Novella understands that some doctors out there aren't great, and he gives some fantastic advice to stay skeptical while practicing critical thinking. Here are two tips he offers when confronted with what people like QAnon members say. 1. Ask yourself, what's the medical community say? Yes, it's true that sometimes the medical community disagrees, but on many subjects, such as wearing a mask, there's a vast consensus. While there are French doctors out there giving bad information about COVID, it's important to research and see what the majority of doctors are in agreement on. 2. Ask yourself, when confronted with some of these claims, if this was true, what else would need to be true? This is the best question you can ask yourself if you think you might be hearing a conspiracy. What else would have to be true for COVID to be a host? Here's a list of things that would also have to be true if COVID was a host. First off, the infection rates and death rates would all have to be a lie. Next, thousands upon thousands of hospital staff members around the country would have to be incentivized to sell the same lie. Then, millions of people around the world would also have to be in on it. And finally, and this is the most important one, if this was a hoax, none of us would know anyone infected by COVID. But personally, I know of multiple people who have contracted the virus, so obviously that can't be it. And even though you might not personally know somebody who's been infected by the virus, I guarantee within one or two degrees of separation, you could find somebody. As many of you know by now, I don't mind what people believe in as long as they aren't hurting anyone. Unfortunately, QAnon is actively telling people not to wear masks. And in order to prove their loyalty to the group, they're filming themselves not wearing masks. But remember, yelling at someone or insulting their intelligence isn't going to help the situation. Try to understand why the person believes what they believe. And through your conversation, they may discover that there are a lot of questions about QAnon that they never asked themselves. And that may help pull them out of the rabbit hole. But if you're ever confronted by someone trying to make these claims, who has a lot of influence, feel free to put them on blast like Anderson Cooper did. You said you've seen this test. Where is it? The tests are out there. The 1,000 people face one face two. Where is the test? Show it to us. I don't have the test. Name where it's from? Who did the test? What university? What doctor? Well, you'd have to talk to, I guess you'd have to have Dr. Carson and then the company and all the tests that were done on yourself. You said you saw the test. You read the test, so tell me about the test. Where was it done? The test was done on over 1,000 people. Where was it done? And what were the procedures for the test? You read this. Let's hear it. The procedures are that was used against cancer. So they did, when you do a safety test of phase one and phase two, it's to see if there's any... There's been no phase one and phase two on this drug, sir. There's been no phase one and phase two on this drug, sir. Yeah, absolutely there has. The FDA has had it since April. 100%. You're just misconstrued because the media is trying to take away this amazing cure that works for everybody. Okay, so just for our viewers, you have no medical background. You're not a scientist. A guy called you in April said he had this product. You are now on the board and going to make money from the sale of this product. No, no, no. The reason he reached out to you is because you have the ear of the president, so he gets a meeting with the president and you stand to make money from this. How do you sleep at night? All right, everybody. I hope you enjoyed that video. A lot of you requested it. I put a poll up over on Instagram, and a lot of you wanted me to discuss conspiracy theories and things like that, and I keep seeing QAnon pop-ups, so do me a favor and please share this video out. One of my goals is to help people start thinking more critically about the information that they're getting, especially when it comes to this pandemic. This is some serious stuff. Like I mentioned in the video, I know people who have been infected. One of my best friends, like three or four people in his family got infected, including his parents, who were basically like my parents growing up and his father had to go to the hospital. So I'm sitting here worried. I'm like, okay, this dude is older and he has this illness and it's killing older people. You know what I mean, so we need to take this seriously, and hopefully this video provides you with some tools that you can use to maybe talk to people and just get them started asking questions. Like I said, like the number one thing to ask when confronted with any type of possible conspiracy theory is if this is true, what else would have to be true? And as you start that line of thinking, you start to see how it is no way conceivable how that many people could be involved. You know what I mean? But anyways, that's all I got for this video. If you liked this video, please give it a thumbs up. If you're new, make sure you subscribe and ring that notification bell. And a huge, huge thank you to everybody who supports the channel over on Patreon or gets my mental health books at therewiresole.com or gets merch from the merch store, you're all amazing. Alright, thanks again for watching. I'll see you next time.