When the QAnon conspiracy theory first came to the attention of the American public in 2017, many people saw it merely as a bizarre new ‘cult’.
Sharper observers, though, saw something else in the right-wing fervour around a supposed child-trafficking cabal of Democratic politicians and Hollywood ‘elites’, to which it was widely believed Donald Trump would eventually put a stop.
The conspiracy, they realised, was a renewed example of good, old-fashioned American Satanic Panic.
