Not just rhetorical violence, although that’s important. QAnon is violence in its ideology, in its finality and in its imagination: the “StormA military coup where Donald Trump defeats the so-called “deep state” and arrests and executes their opponents in something very similar to that of white supremacist Turner Diaries. Rope day. We saw it on January 6, when the putschists put up a makeshift gallows and shouted “Hang Mike Pence”. That bloodlust has gone nowhere, although some humorous headlines about the dissent in the Q ranks distract from the underlying bloodlust at the heart of the movement.

QAnon has made the news because two of its biggest figures, Lin Wood and Michael Flynn, are at war with each other. As a result, QAnon influencers were forced to choose sides and engage in endless recriminations. QAnon John, whose “For God and Country Patriot Roundup” is one of the main QAnon travel conventions, issued a statement from Telegram that “It has become incredibly EXHAUSTING now that not only do we have to go to war with the obvious Deep State players, but now we also have to speak out against some dubious incognito actors on our side. I let your discernment guide you, I hope you are listening to the Holy Spirit. … Believe me, I wish it wasn’t like that, and that we were all “one big happy family” fighting for the same things, but NO.

While John may have hopes of unity, other influencers at QAnon believe the solution to internal fighting is direct action against their enemies.

Romana Didulo, who called herself the “Queen of Canada” QAnon, called on her 70,000 Telegram subscribers on November 21 to murder healthcare workers, writing, “Shooting to kill anyone who tries to inject children under 19 with coronavirus vaccine / biological weapons19 or any other vaccine.” This order is effective immediately. She changed that to quit two days later, but not because she doesn’t want those “traitors” dead: “Please use airports, hospitals, schools, stadiums and other places. public to detain and detain all traitors. They will remain there until the military tribunal is held for each of them until the day they are executed by firing squad or hanging.

This is, of course, the heart of QAnon – the mass executions – but calling on its supporters to actively begin the process is not a daily occurrence; one wonders how the self-proclaimed “queen of Canada” followers will answer him Stop.

Another mid-level QAnoner, Jarrin Jackson, posted a video calling for the formation of an unorganized militia on November 30, calling for essentially the same things as Didulo but with more plausible denial. He noted:

The militia is self-preservation gathered, and so if you have the ability to come together with people and reunite peacefully with them and if you have the ability to conduct self-preservation opportunities and activities… hmm… you associate self-preservation with the ability to come together and you have an unorganized militia. You put those two things together and you and your neighbors defend your property, and let’s just say your militia is organized around this specific idea that government is tyrannical and abusive. Any unorganized militia that is organized there and that conducts training and operations and makes sure that the government does not abuse you on your property… you have the right to defend the Constitution by force.

But he also posted on his 117,000 telegram to subscribers things like, “What are you doing to your enemies?” With a photo of a dog lying on a dog’s skull, and ends a number of posts with “Now go to war”.

Yet he is more subtle than the people of “SqvageDawgTelegram, of which about 500 listened to and contributed to a Nov. 28 discussion about the Wood-Flynn fight. Over 50 minutes were spent trying to figure out what was going on between Wood and Flynn and what their separation meant for the future of the movement. Then the cat got more serious: some discussed the American Revolution and the three percent theory, and a caller suggested organizing small local “strike teams” to do something now. Lin Wood, on his telegram feed, had many fans commenting on “a rope would cost less than bullets”, posting links to firing squad executions with fans promoting this as the fate of “all those evils that [sic] against humanity ”, and other similar examples.

The new need to assassinate their enemies as soon as possible is a attempt to create unity. Mid-level QAnon influencer Joe Oltmann called on Q sidekicks via Telegram on November 28 stop fighting each other, saying, “We have to stop the chaos and stand on one side or the other.” The “we need more” side and the “build the gallows” side. I am not going to side with the American movement. I’m going to stand back on the “build the gallows” side. I want the fighting to end, but I also understand that I am my own man as they are. They will either understand or they will not.

He doesn’t mean it metaphorically: “Build the gallows” is the end point of QAnon. The next day he wrote: “Hello… have your coffee… we don’t negotiate with terrorists. The radical left is a terrorist. … Get organized, go door to door. Just like in 1776, we must show them that we are a nation with a voice and the courage to protect it. More charitably, he advocates militia building and intimidation, but again, the reference to “building the gallows” is the QAnon Doctrine. David Clements, assistant professor of finance at New Mexico State University suspended, who posts on Telegram as The professor’s file, took up this same point on December 2, writing: “Joe knows we have everything we need to arrest, prosecute and bring justice to the traitors now. “One of his the fans followed this wondering why they don’t just start arresting citizens now? Another Telegram user suggested, “Build the gallows, then put it to good use by running 500 per hour of access [sic] the nation would get rid of a lot of our problems in less than a year !! Those who cannot attend personally need not worry, as suggestions have been made to air the performances on a prime-time pay-per-view.

Joe reinforced this on December 5th, writing, “Don’t you like me wanting to hang traitors to our nation?” Sorry, not sorry. Men, women and children have died, suffered unimaginable pain and anguish at the hands of those who have stolen our voice and installed an illegitimate government. Not only did his 55,000 Telegram subscribers see it, Lin Wood forwarded it to his 750,000 Telegram subscribers. This is a substantial hearing for a murder appeal.

This rhetorical violence is not new. But it’s still worth pointing out, especially as these discussions have moved away from more visible platforms like Twitter. These are not niche Telegram channels; These are mid-to-top QAnon influencers, with audiences in the top five and bottom six digits. And the rhetoric has shifted in time focus, from “trusting the plan” to “auditing the elections” to “forming a militia” to “slaughtering healthcare workers” and “building a gallows now”. We’re used to QAnon being a lot of gossip, and therefore less dangerous than the Patriot militia movement or one of the more aggressive white supremacist movements. Atomwaffen Where Oath keepers, whose ideology starts from a violent overthrow, remain more likely to engage in actual violence.

But this kind of accelerationist rhetoric finds a following. QAnon prompted Matthew Taylor Coleman murder her children. The fbi warned the government this summer that the QAnoners could engage in violence when the predictions fail to materialize. And even if we, as a nation, choose to ignore the January 6 coup attempt, the active attempt to overthrow the government and assassinate members of Congress and the Vice President, QAnon links are a common factor among participants.

The gallows they installed outside the Capitol might have been poorly constructed, but that was sincere – and QAnon’s bloodlust, far from diminishing, only grows stronger.