Procedurals like Law & Order and NCIS and their many, many iterations are, thanks to their quick turnaround time, uniquely suited to commenting on the stories, crimes, and conspiracies capturing the public’s attention. SVU, for example, just did an episode about the violent “incel” community, and now NCIS: New Orleans is out here name-dropping conspiracy theories like QAnon and Pizzagate. Journalist Travis View, who covers far-right extremity, noticed and tweeted out the context-free clip early this morning.
For anyone feeling completely lost: QAnon (deep breath) is a labyrinthian far-right conspiracy positing that everyone is a pedophile and that Special Counsel Robert Mueller is investigating Democrats, not Trump, and that the Clintons will be arrested any day now. Pizzagate operated similarly, and resulted in a dude opening fire in a D.C. pizza restaurant. As such, it’s kind of troubling how light and jokey the show treats this stuff. View called it a “terrible move by the show’s producers who clearly have no idea what they’re doing.”
The writers were pretty clearly just riffing on some political buzzwords, but we won’t be surprised when the QAnon chuds read it as yet another sign that the Dems are truly, definitely heading to Guantanamo Bay any day now.
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