QAnons Are Harassing People at the Whim of a Woman They Say Is Canada’s Queen
A woman who claims she is the secret ruler of Canada has, thanks to QAnon influencers, thousands of followers, some of which are extremely active offline and harassing Canadians.
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Didulo, a B.C.-based woman in her 50s, has recently built up a following of thousands of people who listen to her claims of having been put in control of the Great White North by the same forces that QAnon believers think are fighting the deep state in America. QAnon, for the uninitiated, is a wide-ranging, wildly unfactual conspiracy centred upon Donald Trump's secret fight against an international cabal of elitist pedophiles. Didulo was recently thrust into her position by several well-known QAnon figures who helped anoint her as a leader and in turns sent a swarm of followers her way.
One particularly riled-up group of conspiracy theorists in Cochrane, Alberta, went to over 30 businesses last week to hand out the notices. On June 10 they decided to go to a K-8 school—while children were present—and hand the notices and anti-vax flyers out. They eventually were kicked out and Cochrane RCMP confirmed to VICE World News that two people received trespassing tickets for their actions. The group complained about its mistreatment by police inside its Telegram chat and mulled over "bombarding" the school's principal with letters.
She now has almost 20,000 followers on Telegram, her primary channel, and a growing and engaged audience. The audience consists of an intersection of QAnon believers, anti-lockdown zealots, and "sovereign citizens" (people who think government laws do not apply to them, especially ones related to taxes). And her audience is not a passive one.
"Hello, Canada, I'm Ramona Didulo, I'm the founder and leader of Canada1st. As of February this year, 2021, I am the head of state and commander in chief of Canada, the Republic," she said in her announcement video. "The people who appointed me are the white hats and the U.S. military, together with the global allied troops and their governments—the same group of people who have helped President Trump."
She speaks to her audience either through Telegram posts or via poorly produced videos in which she sits on a couch in front of an empty beige wall. In a follow-up video to her initial decree, Didulo declares herself not only the "the head of state," "commander in chief," and "head of government," but also the "Queen of Canada, replacing Queen Elizabeth II of England who has now been executed for crimes against humanity."
Even her initial posts declaring Canada's new secret rulers were met with relatively little fanfare until she was signalled out by QAnon figures such as Charlie Ward and Whiplash347, who legitimized her to their audiences.
"It's their endorsement that seems to have been the cause of all of this," said Smith. "Without them, I don't believe that there is a Canada1st party like we're seeing right now."
Drew, an anti-fascist researcher who follows the anti-lockdown group closely (and didn't want to be named because of fear of reprisal), said he came across Didulo in early 2021 but that she "was a nobody" until she got big-upped by Q-influencers.
VICE World News viewed the groups for Alberta, Ontario, British Columbia, and Manitoba. Each was extremely active, with users posting address after address of where they have sent the letters or are planning to send them. Some have even created spreadsheets that break the province down by town and business, lists when the cease and desist was filed and by whom, and, in some cases, the name of the person who received it. Others posted videos of them going from store to store handing out the notices.
Many of the people who are actively organizing cease and desist efforts and celebrating imaginary executions do so under their real names. The members run the gamut from electricians to real estate agents to outdoor adventure guides to, of course, people who run holistic health clinics. Many of them are elderly. VICE World News reached out to several people involved in these efforts, as well as online supporters of Didulo, to see just how much of her rhetoric they believed, but most did not respond.
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