QAnon social network promises ‘free speech absolutism’ - but you can't say 'space is fake'

We wish far-right activists would stop setting up pointless fringe social media platforms, but it appears supporters of the disproven QAnon conspiracy theory are the latest to follow in the footsteps of Gab and Trump’s Truth Social.

QPatriot was announced on Thursday by James Kingsley – a friend of Jim Watkins, the man believed by researchers and journalists to be affiliated with the ringleader, Q.

In a post on Twitter, he wrote: “Welcome to QPatriot.org, the web’s newest patriot based social site. We believe in Free Speech Absolutism and will refrain from undue censorship.

“We only ask you maintain general legal standards (don’t do nuttin [sic] illegal and Be Nice).”

The site’s terms of use, however, appears to completely contradict its commitment to ‘absolute free speech’.

Alongside the stuff you’d expect a social media site to ban completely – “no Nazi stuff” and “no antisemitism” – the platform states there must be “no politics” and “no ‘space is fake’”.

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Obviously arguing our solar system isn’t real is more than worthy of ridicule, but banning discussions about politics is a bit weird when QAnon is all about the baseless theory that former US president Donald Trump is at war with Satan-worshipping paedophiles.

And much like Trump’s Truth Social, images of the interface on Twitter show that QPatriot is very similar to the bird app.

In a group chat message on QPatriot – shared by Daily Dot - showing just how misinformed far-right activists are about free speech, Kingsley stressed “as long as it’s legal”, anything “can be discussed” on the platform.

“Share memes, comments, articles, ideas, pictures of your cat, educational videos about how toasters work… Anything and everything… BE FREE PEOPLE,” he wrote, seemingly going against the site’s own terms of use.

Since QPatriot was unveiled earlier this week, Twitter users have been ridiculing the platform and its design:

As well as questioning why this nonsense exists, we also can’t help but wonder who needs a toaster tutorial…

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