A trail of "bread crumbs," leading conspiracy theorists into the wilderness

“Your President needs your help,” writes Q in one “Q drop” — that’s what Q’s followers, or “bakers,” call each bread crumb. Q engages the bakers as collaborators who “research” lines of inquiry and offer possible answers to Q’s hypnotic flurries of leading questions. (“Las Vegas. What hotel did the ‘reported’ gunfire occur from? What floors specifically? Who owns the top floors?”) But Q balances fear-mongering with notes of reassurance: The bakers are, by poring over each nonsensical hint, supposedly aiding their fellow “patriots” on the inside. Bad news is merely a “distraction.” The president’s behavior is merely a ruse. The good guys are secretly in control, and they are going to win.

So the baker-followers assemble the crumbs into what they call “dough” or “bread,” to be circulated online — feverishly complex diagrams and bulletin-board collages of words and images. Bright red lines highlight connections, an approach familiar to viewers of “True Detective” or “Homeland” or “The Wire,” and satirized by a popular GIF of a wild-eyed Charlie Day, from the TV comedy “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia,” standing in front of a messy bulletin board. Day’s character, who is working in a corporate mailroom, has convinced himself that half of the company’s employees don’t exist, even as a friend assures him that not only are they real, but also that “they have been asking for their mail on a daily basis.” Rather than deal with the complex reality of his duties, he has retreated into fantasy.