Is 'Sound of Freedom' a QAnon Film?
Does the sleeper hit film of the Summer, "Sound of Freedom," promote QAnon-related conspiracies?
The film had a relatively low budget and was promoted by a small studio, Angel Studios, not one of the big players. Yet as of this week, it has achieved over $172 million in sales, which puts it slightly ahead of the new Indiana Jones movie.
"Sound of Freedom" was made to bring attention to child sex trafficking. It's based upon the real life of Tim Ballard, a former DHS agent who founded Operation Underground Railroad, a nonprofit that combats sex trafficking.
The film has been controversial for four reasons.
1) It dramatizes what really happened, which is a nice way of saying it used a real person as the main character and then made a bunch of stuff up. This critique, while important to know, strikes me as hypocritical, given that also describes almost every historical film or show produced by Hollywood these days.
2) Anti-trafficking experts have accused the film of over-simplifying a complex problem. This false perception leads to misunderstanding the problem and could harm real trafficking victims.
3) Angel Studios’ “pay it forward” campaign, in which audience members are encouraged to buy another ticket so someone can watch the film for free, has been accused of lacking transparency in how the money is used.
4) It has been characterized as a QAnon or QAnon-adjacent film. This is where things get weird.
First of all, nothing in the film itself promotes or discusses QAnon or a QAnon conspiracy. The film was created by accomplished Mexican director Alejandro Gómez Monteverde. I've read several interviews where Monteverde was asked about supposed QAnon connections and he comes across confused and despondent over the controversy. He points out that he first started working on the film in 2015, before QAnon even existed, and filming wrapped in 2018, just as QAnon started gaining public attention.
On the other hand, QAnon adherents have promoted the film and are using it as a recruitment tool. They are aided by the subject matter, since many QAnon conspiracies involve child sex trafficking, and by the fact that the movie's lead, Jim Caviezel, and Ballard himself appear to be QAnon adherents and have mentioned QAnon conspiracies in interviews they did for the film. Also, a QAnon catchphrase, "save the children," is included on some of the movie posters and promotional material.
Combating human trafficking should be an effort we can all support, regardless of partisan or ideological commitments. Films that bring awareness to the problem should be aimed at building consensus. But I worry that "Sound of Freedom," as it's currently being promoted by some, is doing the opposite — dividing not uniting. When Caviezel was interviewed by Fox News, for instance, he argued that Donald Trump needs to be reelected to stop child sex trafficking. This tribal and defeatist attitude is unhelpful, especially to victims of trafficking.
What Else We're Reading
NBC: "Trump shares barrage of QAnon content and other conspiracy theories on his social media platform"
Users of QAnon forums rejoiced at Trump’s apparent endorsement of the conspiracy theory and its mythology. The top response on the most visited QAnon forum to one of Trump’s posts about the conspiracy theory read simply, “Wipe them out sir.” Others pleaded with Trump to “nuke them from orbit” and to “sir, please finish them off,” referring to QAnon enemies such as Hillary Clinton and President Joe Biden.
NYT: "The Hunter Biden Case: An example of America’s dueling realities."
My colleague Luke Broadwater, who covers Congress, told me that he initially found the public discussion of Hunter Biden to be uninteresting — typical partisan noise. But Luke came to believe the story was more important. “Many rich and famous people try to cash in on their family name, including relatives of the politicians,” Luke said. “It’s certainly worth newspaper coverage.”
Luke notes that Joe Biden made a false statement during a 2020 campaign debate when he claimed, “My son has not made money” in China. “The only guy who made money from China is this guy,” Biden continued, referring to Donald Trump. (Amazingly, Biden was correct about the Trump part: The Trumps received money from the same Chinese company.)
These details are not pretty. The current president’s son made substantial sums of money from the perception of his proximity to top government officials, and the president has claimed otherwise. That story is notably different from past Republican lies about Obama’s birthplace or Kerry’s war record.
TGC: "Social Media Is a Spiritual Distortion Zone"
Social media acts as a spiritual and cognitive distortion machine that warps our view of reality and bends our will away from God. It’s the systematic, corporately incentivized inversion of Romans 12:1–2. Instead of our minds being renewed by the Spirit of Christ, they’re shaped by algorithmically curated delivery of the particular patterns of the world that best play to our unsanctified desires. They beckon us into conformity with the world by drawing our hearts and minds away from God.
DMR: “Warren County voters can protect election integrity after supervisors failed”
After I heard the news, I did the first thing most inquisitive people do when vetting a candidate for an important job: I scanned his social media.
What I saw was shocking. Just after the 2020 election, Whipple posted an easily falsifiable claim that Minnesota had millions more votes than voters. He ranted that President-elect Joe Biden is a “pedophile” and that unnamed Democrats should be in jail for a “cheating operation.”
After Christmas, Whipple shared a video where President Donald Trump falsely claimed he won “a magnificent landslide” and that massive, suspicious “vote dumps” in swing states helped Biden. Whipple reacted: “Get ready for it... He’s not leaving [office]. I’m loving this!”