Facebook

TW: Child Sex Trafficking

Human trafficking is very much a real thing, but #SaveOurChildren is doing more harm than good for the people who actually experience sex trafficking.

#SaveOurChildren is just another extension of Q Anon, which is a far-right conspiracy theory detailing a supposed secret plot by an alleged liberal “deep state” against Donald Trump and his supporters.

I know you’re probably thinking “What’s wrong with spreading information about child sex trafficking??” Well, nothing, but that isn’t what #SaveOurChildren is doing.

Sex trafficking help lines are being flooded with “tips” from these conspiracy theorists sharing misinformation on social media, which prevents actual victims from reaching organizations that can help them.

Make no mistake, #SaveOurChildren is just another method of getting well meaning people who care about children to join the Q Anon movement. Similarly to how the church of scientology hands out pamphlets with generally helpful information (most recently their COVID pamphlet) That has real info in it, but its purpose is to draw you into their website.

The people sharing this hashtag are being tricked into thinking they are helping children, but in reality they are spreading information for, and becoming associated with, a group that thinks Bill Gates is -literally- Satan.

“It’s not a videogame where you make your way fighting off enemies (and saving children) in underground tunnels before emerging in Bill Gates’ lair where you fight Satan, the COVID-19 vaccine and Hilary Clinton with your AR-15 with built in grenade launcher.

No, real life is much worse and grittier and more boring.” (https://webworm.substack.com/p/why-saveourchildren-is-not-about-b9b)

The spread of Q Anon has not and will not save any children. People who have actually been sexually trafficked are seeing this movement and seeing your posts and they do not support it! In fact many have taken to Twitter to try to explain to y’all why it is harmful.

With conspiracy theories, trying to convince people that it isn’t true unfortunately usually just pulls people deeper into the falsities. But, please, if you’ve shared a post like this and you are reading, re-evaluate what you are doing. Listen to the people that have been doing the research on this. Listen to the victims that are telling you that you are not helping but hurting them.

The People that are spreading Q Anon propaganda seem more interested in the sensationalization of it all and being perceived as all knowing truth tellers. Meanwhile actual survivors are being ignored when their experience doesn’t fit into the elaborate conspiracy they’ve made up.

This all comes down to the reality that these very real problems in the world are not going to be solved by posting hashtags. They require extensive work and organizing. Social media can be a good tool for rapid organization, but it unfortunately has been used time and time again to instead stifle movements and encourage people to do less. Join an organization. Fight against the sexual predators in your friend circles, in your family, in your neighborhood, etc etc.

-EDIT- The fact that “being against #saveourchildren” seems like I’m against ending human trafficking or saying it doesn’t exist at all is INTENTIONAL! That is why Q Anon is weaponizing this movement bc who wants to be against something like that? But I’m not against spreading awareness about *actual* child sex trafficking. Wayfair, Pizzagate, all of these ridiculous conspiracy theories. That is what we are talking about here. Donald Trump and the Clinton’s hung out with Epstein. This isn’t about dems or GOP. If you really want to talk about trafficking and sexual assault let’s start with the president. Let’s start with the trafficking happening in our back yards. This isn’t some action movie where you’re the superhero who is gonna save all the kids from the Clinton’s underground cave, it’s a lot more work and it’s a lot more complicated than that. It’s time to stop! You can’t name one child saved by QAnon bc they don’t save children. They use conspiracy theories to increase support for the deranged president. & if you’re with them you clearly don’t actually care about children & should feel ashamed.

-EDIT 2- I am a survivor of childhood & adolescent sexual assault. Telling me I love pedophiles is so disgusting and out of line. I have so much seething anger towards pedophiles. One caused me so much trauma that it affects me to this day. So yeah, I have a very personal connection to this situation, and I’m pissed that people are overlooking actual sexual assault in favor of whatever conspiracy makes their president look best. It’s gross and it’s selfish and I have a right to be pissed about it.

Some podcasts to look into that go into way more detail are:
Q Anon Anonymous- Counters Q Anon propaganda directly with heavily researched episodes.
TrueAnon- Discusses child sex traficking and Epstein in the light that it needs to be talked about, by pointing out the very real and very horrible things that elites of all political backgrounds have committed. They try to keep it a little light hearted, and I would highly recommend them to people who like conspiracy theories.