On the eve of the eclipse and Johnson’s destructive actions, she reposted a cryptic message from a QAnon conspiracy account QTHESTORMM, this is: “Warning: This is your final warning. Turn on notifications. Don’t look at the solar eclipse. Something big is going to happen…”
The link between alternative spiritual practices, so-called New Age mindsets, and right-wing conspiracy ideologies such as QAnon is particularly relevant in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, when widespread anxiety and systemic racism converge. Communities of color distrusting medical institutions has created a breeding ground for exploitation of vulnerable communities by people with questionable intentions.
However, this phenomenon is not new. said Jules Evans, who studies the relationship between leading members of the Nazi Party and alternative medicine in the 1930s and 1940s. washington post“There was this idea that Western culture had lost its way and needed to go back to traditional sources of wisdom, whether it was Hinduism or Sufism or traditional gender roles,” he said. “Traditionalist ideas overlap with New Age and far-right populism, saying that the West has lost its way with feminism, multiculturalism and egalitarianism, and that we need a return to order.” The irony is not lost here that beliefs such as Hinduism held by people of color are exploited to subjugate and control those very same people.
Conspiracy beliefs like QAnon are a driving force behind violence in the United States, and there is significant overlap between certain spiritual communities and the alt-right conspiracy community. Still, while this connection is worth considering and keeping in mind, it should be made clear that joining an alternative spirituality does not automatically become a dangerous path. Although it opens the door to a questionable worldview and can be a slippery slope, practicing tarot or astrology does not necessarily indicate belief in dangerous conspiracies. And condemning violence like Johnson’s by its association alone could spark a moral panic similar to the Satanic panic of the 1980s.
The Satanic Panic, in its original form, was a period of moral panic in the ’80s over all sorts of “occult” practices and “satanic ritual abuse” of women and children, and the harsh policies of the Reagan administration. This was a phenomenon consistent with that. -Criminal politics and a performative call to “protect our children.”
American conservatives, who were predominantly white, conflated homosexuality with pedophilia, as well as non-white, non-Christian alternative spiritual beliefs, and attempted to link the three with “satanic” practices. He exploited the fear of his eager audience. Back then, as now, marginalized people were made scapegoats in response to societal anxieties about child abuse.
Now there is a new cycle of diabolical panic. A 2022 study conducted by researchers at the University of Miami found that fears of satanic rituals and child sexual abuse are widespread. One-third of respondents agreed with the statement that “Members of satanic cults secretly abuse thousands of children each year.”
