The attack on the US Capitol on January 6 was an attempt to change the results of the presidential election and was motivated by the former president’s claim that the election had been stolen from him, the so-called “big lie.”  Unfortunately, polls indicate that a significant fraction of the population, especially among Republican voters, believes the big lie.  Republicans in Congress refuse to cooperate on the initiation of a thorough investigation on the events of January 6, and legislatures in states dominated by Republicans are introducing voting laws designed to give them an advantage in the polls.

Overall, there is a trend in the nation toward believing conspiracy theories, and in particular, the QAnon movement appears to be gaining ground, as suggested by the results of a new survey conducted by Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI). QAnon is a far-right conspiracy theory movement that made itself known on the internet in late 2017, and was promoting the bizarre idea that Satan-worshipping pedophiles were plotting against Trump.  It was also predicting the coming of a “storm” that would clear out those evil forces.

The PRRI survey was based on online interviews of a random sample of 5,149 adults (age 18 and up) living in all 50 states in the United States.  It asked respondents whether they believe any of three statements that capture three elements of QAnon conspiracy theories:

• The government, media, and financial worlds in the U.S. are controlled by a group of Satan-worshipping pedophiles who run a global child sex trafficking operation (Statement 1).
• There is a storm coming soon that will sweep away the elites in power and restore the rightful leaders (Statement 2).
• Because things have gotten so far off track, true American patriots may have to resort to violence in order to save our country (Statement 3).

The results in the chart below show how Republicans, Independents and Democrats responded to the survey questions.  Clearly, Republican voters are most inclined to accept all three of the QAnon assertions and Democrats are least inclined to do so.

Agreement with the three QAnon statements was greatly influenced by the media sources the respondents got their news from.  The table below shows that those who trust far-right media sources such as OANN or Newsmax are more likely to agree with all three QAnon statements, while viewers of public television and MSNBC are least likely to do so.

Of particular interest is the impact of religious affiliation on the survey results.  The chart below shows that 15% of Americans agree with Statements 1 and 3, while 20% agree with Statement 2.  However, among white evangelical Protestants, these percentages rise to levels well above the national averages for all three statements.  They are even higher among Hispanic Protestants for Statements 1 and 2.  Even though the percentages related to Statements 1 and 2 are somewhat lower for Mormons compared to white evangelical Protestants and Hispanic Protestants, Mormons are as likely as white evangelicals to agree with Statement 3.

Statement 3, of course, reflects a propensity for violence that manifested itself in the events of January 6.  The willingness among some Christian denominations to resort to violence as a means of solving human problems should be surprising to anybody since Christians claim that their allegiance is to their Lord and Master, the one called Prince of Peace, who told his disciples to love their enemies, pray for their persecutors and repay evil with good.

The survey authors combined the responses to the three questions into an additive scale that provides a composite measure of agreement with QAnon beliefs.  With the new measure, they were able to group respondents into QAnon believers, doubters and rejectors.  The chart below shows how various religious affiliations are represented in this grouping.  White evangelical Protestants distinguish themselves by having the highest percentage of QAnon believers and the smallest percentage of QAnon rejecters.  On the other hand, Jews and religiously unaffiliated Americans have the lowest percentages of believers and the highest percentages of rejecters.

The PRRI report also reveals a correlation between educational level and agreement with QAnon beliefs: Americans without a college degree are 2.4 times more likely than those with a college degree or higher to agree with QAnon beliefs.  In addition, there is a correlation with income: people with incomes lower than $50,000/year are 3 times more likely than those with incomes higher than $100,000/year to be QAnon believers.

The survey authors did not attempt to provide explanations for the results, which obviously raise questions about the attitude, in some Christian denominations, toward critical thinking.  It is certainly true that, in some Christian circles, critical thinking is discouraged, especially when reading the Bible is concerned.  It seems to me that this is a concern that needs to be addressed.