All hail the queen
June 20, 2022 10:41 AM   Subscribe

An unemployed real estate agent from Victoria, British Columbia is now officially Queen of the Earth. She has her own RV.

Romana Didulo has barely been mentioned on the blue before*, but she has been making waves in the QAnon world for a while. She is leader and founder of the Canada1st Party of Canada**. She has previously asserted her position of supreme commander of the Kingdom [sic] and Republic [sic] of Canada and has required her followers to shoot to kill anyone attempting to administer Covid vaccine to minors and then issued the same order on Telegram to “the Kingdom [sic] of Canada’s Military" to do the same. “Please, use airports, hospitals, schools, stadiums, and other public venues to hold and detain all traitors. They will stay there until military tribunal is held for each one of them until the day they are executed via firing squad or hanging,” a Telegram message from November 21 last year reads. She was then arrested by the RCMP and subjected to a psychiatric evaluation, but she revealed the findings were that she is not insane.

Apparently in May of this year, Didulo as the then-Queen of Canada spoke with the United States Commander and Chief [sic] who confirmed her new role as Global Big Enchilada. She had previously been appointed Queen of Canada after she executed HM Queen Elizabeth in 2021 for crimes against humanity.

Last year she posted on her page a PDF of a cease and desist order to out a stop to masking and requested that followers turn up at police stations, coffee shops, etc. and serve these orders on her authority. Among her other declarations are that all utilities are free, and her followers do no need to pay their electricity or water bills. Utility companies are not recognizing her proper authority in this matter. Indeed, the so-called Canadian government also differs with her on her role as ruler of the country.

Although she has previously claimed "We, the people of Canada will share the responsibility in appointing a People’s Council and a Galactic Council, to share joint leadership duties with appointed interim leadership," the Galactic Federation of Light has revealed that she is a Khazarian mafia impostor.

(No links to her personal website because eww.)

*By me.
** Yes, that is the right number of Canadas. Contrary to popular misconception, it is not the Canadian Canada1st Party of Canada. Fucking splitters.
posted by ricochet biscuit (50 comments total) 14 users marked this as a favorite
 
I just wish my brain would stop rendering her surname as Dildo every time it encounters it on the page. But it shows no sign of doing so.
posted by flabdablet at 10:50 AM on June 20, 2022 [18 favorites]


It is a problem I share.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 10:51 AM on June 20, 2022 [4 favorites]


I just wish my brain would stop rendering her surname as Dildo every time it encounters it on the page. But it shows no sign of doing so.

Poor innocent dildos don’t deserve the negative association.
posted by Special Agent Dale Cooper at 10:52 AM on June 20, 2022 [11 favorites]


Emperor Norton I sends his regards.

(Has Norton's record been whitewashed by emphasizing some of the more out there aspects of his reign? Because this QAnon madness is making me think less of him)
posted by RonButNotStupid at 10:55 AM on June 20, 2022 [9 favorites]


She may well be Queen of Canadia, but she'll never be Queen of Hutt River Province.

Poor innocent dildos don’t deserve the negative association.

This Queen, it vibrates?
posted by flabdablet at 10:56 AM on June 20, 2022 [9 favorites]


Poor innocent dildos don’t deserve the negative association.

Indeed; they are blameless at worst and at best serve a noble function, unlike certain new monarchs I could name.

One of Didulo's followers pushed other believers to abide by the “royal decrees” after she “stopped paying hydro, weather, natural gas, property taxes, line of credit, and my credit cards.”

I'm especially relieved to hear I no longer have to pay for weather. I know it is a crushing burden to many people. I am a little surprised the Queen has not just abolished weather entirely and saved a step. As well, when you talk about monarchs issuing orders to the ecosystem, it pays to be very careful when typing the name King Cnut. Ask me how I know.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 10:56 AM on June 20, 2022 [10 favorites]


You just get to incite all the violence you want as long as you aren't insane?
posted by The Monster at the End of this Thread at 11:00 AM on June 20, 2022 [8 favorites]


As long as no nipples appear on TV it's all good.
posted by flabdablet at 11:04 AM on June 20, 2022 [4 favorites]


You know how everyone loves Emperor Norton now?
posted by Going To Maine at 11:06 AM on June 20, 2022


it pays to be very careful when typing the name King Cnut.

If he were still alive today he'd doubtless be getting about in fcuk.
posted by flabdablet at 11:14 AM on June 20, 2022 [3 favorites]


Was Norton genuinely disliked at the time? Sincere question. I am broadly aware of his life's outline and can see why he may have been disliked* but don't actually know the details of contemporary reaction to him.

*Proclaiming yourself emperor or king in this sort of context is a definite oddball factor but I am unaware that Norton called for the execution of covid vaccinators.
posted by Whale Oil at 11:16 AM on June 20, 2022 [1 favorite]


WHEREAS, a body of men calling themselves the National Congress are now in session in Washington City, in violation of our Imperial edict of the 12th of October last, declaring the said Congress abolished;

WHEREAS, it is necessary for the repose of our Empire that the said decree should be strictly complied with;

NOW, THEREFORE, we do hereby Order and Direct Major-General Scott, the Commander-in-Chief of our Armies, immediately upon receipt of this, our Decree, to proceed with a suitable force and clear the Halls of Congress

-- Norton I
Sounds pretty similar.

I guess the difference is that Norton was preaching moon law at a time when it was safe to humor that sort of thing and respond with laughter. (Or was it? The Civil War was was still a recent memory and 'lost cause' bullshit was gaining steam)
posted by RonButNotStupid at 11:45 AM on June 20, 2022 [3 favorites]


Clearly any definition of insanity that doesn't include what she's doing is incomplete.

If she is insane, she needs to be cared for and deplatformed. If she isn't insane she's a willful stochastic terrorist and fraud and needs to be prosecuted and deplatformed.
posted by The Monster at the End of this Thread at 11:55 AM on June 20, 2022 [11 favorites]


I would like to never hear of this woman again, but alas.
posted by Kitteh at 11:57 AM on June 20, 2022 [8 favorites]


(Has Norton's record been whitewashed by emphasizing some of the more out there aspects of his reign? Because this QAnon madness is making me think less of him)--
RonButNotStupid

My understanding is that Emperor Norton was pretty well respected for the eccentric oddball that he was. The Army gave him his uniforms to wear. All the city's policemen would salute him. He printed his own money, which was accepted at many businesses in San Francisco. (Many tourists would also buy his money).

He enjoyed going to political and philosophical talks given around town, and these were given by respected political and academic groups--nothing extreme.

He once was arrested for lunacy, but public uproar forced the police to release him.

His proclamations were things like that they ought to build a bridge across the Bay, which they eventually did anyway 60 years later.
posted by eye of newt at 12:03 PM on June 20, 2022 [10 favorites]


There were people who regarded Norton as an annoyance but he seems to have been looked on fondly as sort of a colorful local character; some local businesses accepted his currency, and when a policeman attempted to have him confined (he was, to be uncharitable, a mentally ill vagrant) the judge said Norton had shed no blood, robbed no one, and despoiled no country, and that that couldn't be said of any other kinds, and upon his release the city donated a military uniform for him to wear. Hell, he also denounced an anti-Chinese gathering to their faces and made several proclamations defending the rights of Chinese people.

I think ultimately the difference comes down to intent, on a character level. Norton was an unwell man who found an unconventional way out of despair, as Gaiman saw clearly, and seems to have been a fairly genial sort overall. Yes, he called for the "rebellious" Congress to be removed, but when that didn't happen he seems to have gotten over it. He didn't spend the rest of his life trying to organize a militia to enforce his will, he didn't try to inspire authoritarian violence, and if he was angry that people regarded his proclamations as a form of comedy, it's not something that seems to have surviving records of it.

Didulo, by contrast, encourages racist hate and calls on the regular for mass murder along the standard fascist Qanon lines. They do not, to me, seem to be similar people playing, as it were, similar games.
posted by Pope Guilty at 12:03 PM on June 20, 2022 [34 favorites]


From the Free Press article about her sanity: "Edwin Hodge, a University of Victoria research fellow who specializes in extremism, said it’s not important if some people think what Didulo is touting is mentally unbalanced. What matters is how many people are listening to her messages and how many are acting on them.
The answer is already concerning."

Why are so many people so easily conned by this dildoperson, by our former US president, and by all the others who enrich themselves at the expense of those too ignorant to know they're being deceived.
posted by mareli at 12:06 PM on June 20, 2022 [5 favorites]


-- You just get to incite all the violence you want as long as you aren't insane?

I think the search warrant was the only legal move independently confirmed?

The ultra-violent rhetoric has sparked action by the RCMP’s Integrated National Security Enforcement Team which, on Nov. 27, obtained a search warrant for a Victoria address connected to Didulo, the Victoria court registry confirmed for Black Press Media.

Didulo detailed what she said occurred during the search in a 90-minute video posted to one of her YouTube channels. In it, Didulo told her followers the RCMP team served her with a search warrant, seized her devices, and detained her under the Mental Health Act. She said she was taken to Royal Jubilee Hospital where she was assessed by a psychiatrist before being released. “Aren’t you all glad to see that Queen Romana is not insane?” she said in the video.


Was the warrant served, and served to Didulo? While the address 'was connected' to her, she's been on tour in that RV she's insisting her followers pay off. (Did she take to the RV to avoid the warrant?) This year-old Vice article, "QAnons Are Harassing People at the Whim of a Woman They Say Is Canada’s Queen' (June 17, 2021) is informative. Didulo's not just an unemployed real estate agent -- she's the head of the "Canada1st Party of Canada" online political par corporation.
posted by Iris Gambol at 12:10 PM on June 20, 2022 [1 favorite]


I feel like there should be a link to her soundcloud.
posted by srboisvert at 12:21 PM on June 20, 2022


If she were on the other coast we could diagnose her with Delusions of Gander.
posted by srboisvert at 12:22 PM on June 20, 2022 [11 favorites]


Well, I certainly didn't authorize any of this!

- - King Janis Joplin Forever I, by the Grace of God, of the United States and his other Realms and Territories, Protector of the Weak, Fidei Defensor.
posted by Naberius at 12:57 PM on June 20, 2022 [3 favorites]


i'm sorry, she cannot be queen unless some kind of farcical aquatic ceremony is performed first - baptism with a hose of very cold water comes to mind, but i'm open to suggestions
posted by pyramid termite at 1:15 PM on June 20, 2022 [3 favorites]


As long as no nipples appear on TV it's all good.

I'm not going searching for this at work but i don't think the displaying of female presenting nipples on tv is illegal in Canada. Certianly one can display male presenting nipples and a regulation banning female prenting nipples only wouldn't withstand a charter challenge.
posted by Mitheral at 1:19 PM on June 20, 2022 [3 favorites]


Humanity will never be free until the last queen is strangled with the entrails of the last priest.
posted by Madame Defarge at 1:36 PM on June 20, 2022 [11 favorites]


Farcical aquatic ceremonies are no basis for a system of government!

(But a firehose does seem warranted.)
posted by bcd at 2:15 PM on June 20, 2022 [3 favorites]


Splitters.
posted by kirkaracha at 2:18 PM on June 20, 2022 [1 favorite]


(Has Norton's record been whitewashed by emphasizing some of the more out there aspects of his reign? Because this QAnon madness is making me think less of him)--
RonButNotStupid


Emperor Norton, mentally ill or otherwise, was pretty much the opposite of Qanon. He also never tried to get any of his subjects to harass or kill each other:

In 1871 and 1874, the Emperor issued Proclamations insisting on the rights of African-Americans to attend public schools and ride public streetcars. The Proclamations were published in the Pacific Appeal, an abolitionist weekly owned and edited by Peter Anderson, an African-American activist and editor who was respected and influential as an intellectual and political leader of blacks on the Pacific coast. Anderson had taken on Emperor Norton as a regular contributor to the Appeal in late 1870 and, over the next four-and-a-half years, would publish some 250 of the Emperor’s Proclamations.
posted by oneirodynia at 2:38 PM on June 20, 2022 [19 favorites]


I'm not going searching for this at work but i don't think the displaying of female presenting nipples on tv is illegal in Canada.

As far as I understand the rules, if it is after 9pm it is fine.
posted by Ashwagandha at 2:40 PM on June 20, 2022


The self proclaimed American Dictator.

(hides behind Kevlar curtain)
posted by clavdivs at 4:21 PM on June 20, 2022


it pays to be very careful when typing the name King Cnut.

Or Jeremy Hunt, for that matter.
posted by pipeski at 4:23 PM on June 20, 2022


When you haven't worked for months, and you are still sending $3500 to pay off a scammer's shiny new RV, you are certainly out of touch with reality.

(I want a shiny new horse trailer with living quarters. I pledge to paint American flags on both sides, and I will paint MAGA on the back in 2 foot high letters. --I will also spell out "Moronic Asswipes"Governing" America"--but that's neither here nor there. SEND ME YOUR MONEY!!)

Why isn't speech inciting hate and violence considered illegal and punishable by law? If humans ever get to the point of being civilized, society will look back on this in disbelief. Nobody wants the thought police, but surely moral compass can be used to draw a line beyond which we do not go.
posted by BlueHorse at 4:23 PM on June 20, 2022


My understanding is that the mental health system does not declare people to be insane or sane anymore. She was detained and released. Delusional are released every day with no treatment from similar situations. It is my understanding that a longer hold is only done when the patient is an immediate threat to others or themselves. It is also a pretty high bar for someone to actually meet that test. Threats/ Statements alone are usually not enough.
posted by interogative mood at 4:56 PM on June 20, 2022 [6 favorites]


I've been seeing her covered on twitter by a few "conspiracy watch" accounts. It's too much for me. It seems her followers semi-regularly post news of their own troubles with utilities and the law; at least one appears to be headed for losing her home.
posted by Jack Karaoke at 5:18 PM on June 20, 2022


Yes, 'sanity' and 'insanity' aren't really categories that have meaning in describing mental health, they're really outmoded concepts, and they don't describe actual symptoms (for example, delusions, disordered thinking, feelings of persecution, feelings of grandeur). In NSW a while ago a tribunal was asked to rule on whether having a Qanon blog was in itself evidence that a person was suffering serious delusions, and therefore unfit to practice, at s.60:
As to the beliefs about global conspiracy, Dr Wright acknowledged that “a range of people hold these beliefs, and that they do not necessarily indicate mental illness.” Nevertheless, Dr Wright regarded such beliefs as “bizarre and suggestive of impaired reality testing.” Again, we agree with that opinion...
When I first read about this I was fairly unimpressed—I can think of any number of beliefs many people hold which other people would find to be bizarre or suggestive of impaired reality testing (crystal healing, let's say, or divination with tarot cards), but which, because they're culturally widespread, we regard as ordinary. In North America specifically there would be plenty of beliefs that are nowadays universal, that in the past would have suggested madness or witchcraft or worse.

It does sound like an elaborate scam for a person to avoid work by travelling around, making proclamations and having other people pay for their bills, except that when you think about it that's exactly the point of the actual Queen in the Commonwealth countries; she makes Royal visits, has her face on coins, she appoints Governors-general, and that's all. It's bizarre and alarming if I claim to be a Queen; but only up to the point when enough other people begin to give me allegiance and behave as my subjects (then, watch out!). What it really comes down to is that on one hand we expect other people to behave as if we all share an exogenous, testable, reality—but the whole point of politics is to alter that reality and change what's considered normal.

The primary problem with Qanon is that they're dangerous, not that they're delusional.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 6:17 PM on June 20, 2022 [5 favorites]


I'd laugh harder at this if her followers hadn't terrorized a nurse friend of mine at work during the Ottawa occupation back in February. They were scary and violent and my friend and her colleagues feared for their lives. A couple of them had brought young children with them on what they clearly saw as a mission.

The fact that our legal system can't or won't protect innocent people from this dangerous grifter is a travesty.
posted by rpfields at 7:01 PM on June 20, 2022 [14 favorites]


The Yahoo News link suggests the RV may be rented, so I see the edifice of the monarchy crumbling already.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 7:07 PM on June 20, 2022 [2 favorites]


posted to one of her YouTube channels

She has too many YouTube channels.
posted by bendy at 8:33 PM on June 20, 2022


Genuine question:
Why does it matter whether or not she has mental health problems?
Since many people with (possibly the exact same) mental health problems are not hateful and violent?
She's pleased to announce that she is not insane because she and her followers believe people with mental health issues are less than human, have no right to be heard, are not to be trusted.
Do we agree with them?
Is it comforting to find an explanation for her hatred or than "people are capable of hatred" ?
Is it because we hope a diagnosis means that she can be fixed by treatment or medication?
Is it because it makes it easier to just write her off, "oh, she's [insert diagnosis here] and I'm not, so all is well with me and mine."
posted by Zumbador at 9:12 PM on June 20, 2022 [6 favorites]


I think the mental health/"insanity" angle is more to do with her seemingly tenuous grasp on reality more than it's her evil. Claiming to be a person of great importance, whether that's royalty or Napoleon, is a trope that has often been used to signify "insanity", so it's not hard to see how you get to that read.
posted by Dysk at 9:38 PM on June 20, 2022


It's not hard to see how you'd get to that read, but why is it important or helpful to diagnose her in this particular way?
posted by Zumbador at 9:53 PM on June 20, 2022 [2 favorites]


The one claiming it's important is Didulo herself, in a manner reminiscent of Trump boasting of his certified remarkable intelligence, per the article linked in the OP. I tend to doubt that "insanity" is actually guiding the decisions of the RCMP.
posted by polecat at 10:42 PM on June 20, 2022 [1 favorite]



The one claiming it's important is Didulo herself, in a manner reminiscent of Trump boasting of his certified remarkable intelligence,

Yes, exactly.
She's equating having mental health problems as being a justification to dismiss a person's validity.
Do we agree with her?
posted by Zumbador at 10:52 PM on June 20, 2022


Flagged for fantastic, Fiasco da Gama and Zumbador.

I would like to call for a moratorium on the armchair diagnoses of Ms. Didulo.

I am slowly recovering from an episode of severe depression, for which I am starting intensive outpatient treatment next week. It's been really fucking frightening. FYI, none of my symptoms has included conning other people into paying my housing expenses.
posted by virago at 11:42 PM on June 20, 2022 [7 favorites]


Yes, exactly.
She's equating having mental health problems as being a justification to dismiss a person's validity.
Do we agree with her?


I'm not sure reducing this to a "mentally ill, yes/no" binary it's useful here. If someone is clearly delusional, then yes, their statements of supposed fact about a reality to which they have an art best tenuous connection are indeed not to be taken seriously as facts.

This is not the same as some blanket statement that the opinions of people with mental illness can be dismissed, and characterising it as such obscures more than it illuminates.
posted by Dysk at 4:47 AM on June 21, 2022 [4 favorites]


I don't think the issue is this woman's reality.

It's that we no longer have a shared reality and it's breaking society down. And some people, particularly politicians and some media outlets, are exploiting that for profit, power, and to be able to make decisions without fear of political consequence (climate change, Covid failures.)
posted by warriorqueen at 5:15 AM on June 21, 2022 [8 favorites]


I think there are several issues going on at once, and they're interacting in all kinds of ways to amplify each other.
posted by Dysk at 9:12 AM on June 21, 2022 [2 favorites]


“impaired reality testing” is an apt and useful descriptor. I will use it to replace my previous guano-based label for QAnon “thinking”.

(meanwhile while I get where it’s coming from, I don’t love framing it as “we no longer have a shared reality”. Reality remains shared, despite the multiple factions choosing to disregard it. )
posted by ook at 9:36 AM on June 21, 2022 [1 favorite]


on the one hand my (many years ago) undergraduate brain wants to recall my philosophy of mind readings to discuss 'reality' and the degree to which we share it

on the other hand, whatever has happened since we all retreated into social media bubbles is a completely valid take on fractured reality. we're in a bubble here (MeFi). I'm sure it's an enlightened bubble and only the correct perceptions filter through, but it's a bubble. self-inflicted sarcasm, please don't mind me.

as to mental illness.. I'm going to use words that are imperfect and I appreciate reminders from others here to be careful. that said, like many others I've experienced mental illness. that doesn't explain me and that hasn't led me to manipulate others and incite others to violence. this woman seems dangerous and crazy to me, in a different but similar way to Trump and the fascists seeking to tear up the fabric of what we know to replace it all with an imagined system. it's entirely rational on the one hand, but absolutely crazy (to me) otherwise. death and cruelty.
posted by elkevelvet at 9:45 AM on June 21, 2022 [3 favorites]


we no longer have a shared reality

Pretty sure we do, but I agree that the world models people build and use to navigate within it have become quite wildly divergent.

Also pretty sure that the Karl Rove attitude - the one that says
We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you’re studying that reality — judiciously, as you will — we’ll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that’s how things will sort out. We’re history’s actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.
is the root of the shared delusions of grandeur that drive the QAnon rabble, who are both ignorant enough and arrogant enough to believe that they are actually building something new - when all they're really doing is running a cracked and slipshod attempt to resurrect an old and thoroughly studied reality, the utterly banal evil that is fascism.
posted by flabdablet at 9:56 AM on June 21, 2022 [5 favorites]


Actually, it's plausible that she's not insane. Just another grifter raising money off the rubes to pay for her lifestyle. She may not actually be queen of the world, but at least she got an RV out of it.
posted by thoughtful_jester at 2:08 PM on June 21, 2022 [3 favorites]


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