On 14 September, a lawyer named Vibhor Anand published some big “revelations” on his Twitter account. His account is now suspended, but not before Anand told his 87,000 followers that the Bollywood elite is involved in drug and child trafficking.
Anand shared a tweet with pictures of Bollywood stars Salman Khan and Jacqueline Fernandes, as well as members of the British Royal family with clumsily photoshopped bloodshot eyes. This image was almost an exact replication of those seen in other parts of the internet — the ones in which celebrities are seen with a bloodshot or black eye; so-called symptoms of “adrenochrome eye”.
Anand’s tweet was then screenshot and sent around WhatsApp networks. After this, videos about his “revelations” were made in different regional languages and Anand was asked to participate in panel discussions hosted by YouTubers. His supporters claimed that by making such claims he is risking his life and therefore there must be some truth to what he says, and the comment sections of these videos show an outpouring of admiration for him. When Anand reemerged on Twitter on new accounts— two of which were also suspended — he encouraged suspicion in his followers by asking them, “Why do you think they are suspending my account?”
The baffled doctor says that he has never heard of the adrenochrome drug, to which Anand insists that it is so expensive and that you can only get it from the brains of children subjected to extreme degrees of torture.
Anand goes on, saying that syringes are inserted into the child’s eye to collect adrenochrome from the brain. The doctor again states that he has never heard of such a practice and asks Anand if he is medically qualified. He warns that if he isn’t, then he should refrain from talking about what he doesn't understand. Anand then tells him that researchers at Harvard know the truth about adrenochrome and so does the FBI.
Adrenochrome — better known in the medical world as Carbazochrome — is a real compound that can be bought online for Rs 40,000 per kilogram. It is the product of oxidising lab-synthesised adrenaline, and large quantities can only be produced synthetically. Its main use is to slow blood loss by promoting clotting in open wounds. However, it is not widely used in medical science.
Adrenochrome does not come from the bodies of captive children let alone human bodies. It does not make you younger, nor does it get you high.
In a few other videos, Anand states that Salman Khan has a penchant for young boys and that Aditya Thackeray — the son of Maharashtra Chief Minister Udhav Thackeray— is a paedophile. All these claims are baseless and there is no evidence to back these theories.
He claims that both Salman Khan and Aditya Thackeray keep trafficked children at their respective farmhouses. Following these speculations, Republic TV journalists were arrested for trespassing at Thackeray's Karjat Farmhouse.
This “revelation” about Bollywood and other outlandish claims have made Anand famous. He began asking for donations for his “unbiased” news channel, something he had previously attempted in 2018.
A closer look at Anand shows that he fought a case against his university chancellor for not promoting him in law school due to his poor attendance and malpractice during exams. His father — an advocate called VK Anand (who also defended the accused in the Nirbhaya case) — helped him with the case.
The Mumbai police arrested Anand on 16 October for spreading conspiracy theories around the death of Sushant Singh Rajput. In response to his arrest, his followers on Twitter have started the hashtag #nationwithvibhoranand. On his Telegram channel, he is being hailed as a hero and a “brave warrior.”
In different times, Anand might have been dismissed as an attention seeker making up tall tales, but his personal brand has been boosted by irresponsible reporting by mainstream television news organisations.
While covering the Sushant Singh Rajput case, Indian Television news channels indulged in speculative reporting. Everyone “felt” something had to have gone wrong, that there had to have been some foul-play. Almost instantly, there were war cries resounding all over social media asking for justice for Sushant and the arrest of his girlfriend, Rhea Chakraborty.
We identified a coordinated inauthentic behaviour coupled with a bot-like activity that amplified the hashtags #justiceforsushant and #cbiforssr.
In an attempt to find out what really happened, psychics and tarot card readers allegedly made contact with Sushant’s spirit, WhatsApp messages ran into essay lengths about the “facts” and “proof of what really happened”, about how his death was not just related to depression but something more menacing.
These messages started making the rounds on WhatsApp right before the CBI took over the investigation. Almost at equal speed, conspiracy theories on social media—usually shared first on YouTube channels—made their way to mainstream news channels where they were debated with fervour.
On 3 October, after months of speculation, the forensic team at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences ruled out the murder of the celebrity, confirming that it was a suicide. Once again, there was disbelief among conspiracy theorists on social media. On 14, 15 and 16 October there were “Memorial Yatras” in Patna, Varanasi and Kolkata.
In the backdrop of all of this, Anand has seized on the opportunity to neatly co-opt what in the American part of the world is better known as the QAnon Conspiracy theory. Q is an anonymous figure who claims to be a high-level government employee. Q claims to release confidential information (known as ‘Q Drops’) that is only privy to the highest level of government. Anand aims to replicate this same method citing mysterious “sources.”
“Q Drops” are often cryptic and they redirect the followers to Q research groups and forums where YouTube videos and memes are shared. This material is in turn posted across social media platforms and the conspiracy organically grows.
The followers of QAnon, egged on by way of Q drops and specialised aggregation websites, believe that the Hollywood elite along with Democrats run a child-sex trafficking ring and extract adrenochrome to promote their own youth and vitality. They also believe that this cannibalistic paedophile cabal is secretly controlling the world and that Donald Trump is working to overthrow them.
With the US elections underway, the false narratives and hypotheses pushed by QAnon have controlled the way organic discussions take place online. Hashtags commonly used by Q supporters on Twitter and Facebook drown out legitimate movements like #MeToo and those related to climate change. For comparison, there were 22,232,285 tweets using #Qanon and related hashtags such as #Q, #Qpatriot, and #TheGreatAwakening in 2019—an average of 60,910 per day. The total exceeded other popular hashtags such as #MeToo (5,231,928 tweets in 2019) or #climatechange (7,510,311 tweets).
Adherents of QAnon claim that it is an "open-source intelligence effort" to bring to light the crimes of the “deep state” and other shadowy figures. In reality, however, QAnon disproportionately hijacks social media to spread pro-Trump narratives while harassing opponents and spreading falsehoods about Democrats, celebrities and other perceived enemies.
In the past, conspiracy theories hardly mattered. They thrived on the fringes and affected little of consequence. However, in the information age, conspiracy theories can spill over from the internet and have real-world effects, meaning that conspiracy theorists cannot be simply dismissed as nut-cases.
In the US, there have been some extremely harmful effects of the QAnon conspiracy theories, and the FBI has even named the fringe conspiracy group as a potential domestic terrorism threat. The group has spread its reach to other parts of the world, always finding a way to fit with localised political narratives. The adherents of Q in the UK have taken out ‘Save our children’ marches—similar to the “memorial yatras” being carried out in the Indian cities in the name of Sushant.
According to a recent report by the National Crime Records Bureau, more than 600 women and 180 children go missing every hour in India. Being wedged between two major illegal opium-producing areas, the Golden Crescent and the Golden Triangle, India has become both a destination and a transit route for drug trafficking. According to the Narcotics Control Bureau of India, 49,450 cases were registered for drug seizures in 2018.
The coming of Q to India not as Q but via a nondescript lawyer in search of his two minutes of glory may at first seem frivolous, but it’s not. Q lore has been adapted to take on local issues in India. This can be leveraged for political gain at a later date.
There is already an existing crossover between conspiracy theories and Indian politics in the hashtag #nojusticeforssrnovote, making now a timely opportunity for false narratives to latch on to politics.
Indian society is already divided along many lines. Theories like will only Q widen the chasm, spreading harmful narratives and dividing the country further.
(Disclaimer: This story has been done in general public interest to create public awareness about the harmful social effects of conspiracy theories. The article seeks to discredit and debunk outlandish, bogus and untruthful claims made against public figures for self-promotion and to gain publicity by referencing such claims and showing their complete falsity. This article was first published on Logically and has been republished with permission.)
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