Dallas QAnon Cult Leader Is Using Indoctrinated Kids To Spread His Ideas On Livestreams

MICHAEL MURNEY

Dallas Observer

MARCH 14, 2022

Dallas QAnon cult leader Michael Brian Protzman is using children to build his following and spread his QAnon-based beliefs through live-streams on the messaging app Telegram.

On Thursday evening, Protzman led an hour-long conversation with a 12-year-old girl on a Telegram livestream. Before the girl joined, the conversation’s moderators said they aim to spread Protzman’s teachings to children by featuring more kid-teachers like the girl, who Protzman and other adult participants referred to as "Tiny."

Before about 500 subscribers, Protzman and the girl exchanged so-called "decodes" using gematria, a simple alpha-numerical system in which A = 1, B = 2, C = 3 and so on. All of the decodes trace nonsensical gematria-based connections leading back to a few simple conclusions: Q has been right all along, and Protzman, alongside Donald Trump and the long-dead JFK and JFK Jr., are about to set in motion the mass execution of a network of satan-worshiping child traffickers who control society.

For example, early in the conversation, the girl laid out a series of convoluted associations between an alleged U.S. government mind-control experiment called Project Montauk, the time on the clock in background of Donald Trump’s first appearance in the movie Home Alone 2 and supposed subliminal messaging about a QAnon-like revolution buried the 2011 movie The Smurfs.

All of these connections, she claimed, lead back to an 111-acre island in Australia called Elliott Island, where an Australian university is leading a marine biology study that somehow involves the brother of the late alligator wrangler Steve Irwin.

Protzman then piggybacked on her chain of connections with a series of Gematria-based links between the Kennedys, Donald Trump’s signature catchphrases and movie-theater popcorn, which all supposedly show that predictions by him and Q, the purported anonymous whistleblower behind QAnon, are about to come true any day.

Last Thursday's stream isn’t the first time Protzman has platformed children in attempts to expand his audience and target kids, recordings of Telegram livestreams show. Late last month, the same 12-year-old girl made at least two extended appearances on Protzman’s channel, the Observer found. During at least one February live-stream, Protzman also brought a 12-year-old boy on to exchange similar gematria-driven nonsense connections for Protzman to riff on after.

One expert said that use of young children who’ve internalized Protzman’s bizarre ideology and speech patterns is unprecedented amongst QAnon leaders.

“There was never anything that I’ve ever seen specifically targeting Q to children, and it’s extremely disturbing,” said Michael Rothschild, whose book The Storm Is Upon Us documents the rise of the QAnon movement from its post-2016 election roots up to last year’s Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol.

Rothschild emphasized that the situation raises immediate concerns about the kids’ wellbeing. “The biggest issue is exploitation of children,” he said.

It’s unclear if these children’s parents are members of Protzman’s group, or whether or not they have been in Dallas alongside them.

Protzman did not respond to requests for comment about how the 12year-old girl and boy became so well-versed in his teachings, which even other QAnon believers have reportedly condemned as outlandish.

At one point in Thursday’s livestream, the girl recalled a "decode" Protzman made “in the room” a few days before they went live. At multiple other points during the stream, Protzman and the girl appear to refer to in-person interactions when they discussed the finer points of their "decodes" in the days before the event.

Rothschild emphasized that even if the children on Protzman’s streams aren’t learning from him in person, their appearance on the streams is alarming. “Is there anyone around that is thinking about her as something other than a vessel for his bizarre ideology?” he said.

Protzman and a core group of followers decided to follow the U.S. ‘Freedom Convoy’ to Washington last week. But in chats and livestreams Protzman has made clear that he intends to return to Dallas after the convoy and a South Carolina Trump rally are over.

They originally came to Dallas in droves in early November. Protzman had predicted that JFK Jr. and his father would reappear in Dallas, where JFK was assassinated, to set in motion all of the righteous persecution and societal reorganization QAnon believers have held onto for years.

https://www.dallasobserver.com/news/dallas-qanon-cult-leader-is-using-indoctrinated-kids-to-spread-his-ideas-on-telegram-livestreams-13583190

CultNEWS101 Articles: 2/12-13/2022

QAnon, Negative 48, Michael Protzman, Proselytizing, Podcast, Narcissism, Trauma, Daniel Shaw, Book, Academic Research, Australia

Newsweek: QAnon Followers Think This Fake Mexican Trump Twitter Account Is Real

" ... Using Gematria, a type of numerology that allocates words to numbers, Protzman, known to his followers as Negative 48, explained how he had stayed up late in order to decode the message he believed was for his group.

Il Donaldo Trumpo's tweet was not lost on other followers associated with Protzman, with one linking the post to a real-life Batman-themed emergency message that was sent out in Missouri earlier this month.

Speaking in a January 23 live stream on a Dallas QAnon faction-affiliated Telegram channel, the follower said: "I live in Missouri and after President Trump did say he was Batman what did we get on our alerts - the Batman signal EBS and who talks about Batman sometimes? Negative 48."

In response to a question about what he had been doing, Protzman said: "Pretty much sat around doing some coding, stayed up late yesterday. Trump, he was back talking to us and said 'I am Batman,' 'cause Batman's 51 which is 'Michael.'"

In December, the group wrongly celebrated Trump's birthday, as part of its unfounded belief the former president was adopted into the Trump family."

Religion Dispatches: IS PROSELYTIZING EVER OKAY? ARE WE ALL PROSELYTIZING ALL THE TIME?

" ... Proselytizing goes to the very core of someone's identity. The person attempting to convert someone else to their religion does so because they believe that their religion is superior (which may be combined with a sincere concern that those who refuse to convert will be eternally tortured). Proselytizing also involves appeal to divine authority, which means the ordinary rules for evidence are not in play.

A related issue that evangelical-turned-humanist Bart Campolo and I have argued about on his HumanizeMe podcast is whether it's ethical to form relationships with other people on the basis of hoping to change them—an example of which is the manipulative evangelical practice of "friendship evangelism." I was surprised to learn that there are some, like Campolo, who believe this isn't much of an issue. As Campolo sees things, vying for influence is one of the most fundamental aspects of any human relationship, which is a point of view on relating that I frankly find troubling.

By contrast, I believe that friendships need to be forged around some organic connection, some aspect of common ground and that shared values are essential for a close friendship, whereas befriending someone who's different so you can deliberately try to change them–particularly if you plan to try to change something central to their identity–is objectification, and therefore unethical. In any case, no matter how you slice it, proselytizing is not the same as me telling a friend they should try my favorite sushi place."

NARM Training Institute: Transforming Trauma Episode 028: Traumatic Narcissism: Relational Systems of Subjugation with Daniel Shaw

"In this episode of Transforming Trauma, our host Sarah Buino is joined by therapist, social worker, and author Daniel Shaw to discuss his seminal book Traumatic Narcissism: Relational Systems of Subjugation. Daniel explores the theme of traumatic narcissism from a developmental and trauma-informed perspective. In his work, he connects the challenging symptoms and behaviors of clients diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder and Borderline Personality Disorder to the deeper understanding that they were raised in a highly traumatic environment by narcissistic caregivers. His underlying message for listeners is that, "It's important to understand what's going on in the mind of the narcissistic traumatizer in order to help patients free themselves from those relationships, in order for therapists to help the patient, and in order for the patients to help themselves."

Daniel began his research in social work after leaving a religious group that he participated in for thirteen years, and which he later came to identify as a cult. In this group, Daniel experienced traumatic abuse through the cult leader, who "needed to inflate their own narcissism by controlling others." This dynamic is exactly what he came to see represented in the relational system of the traumatizing narcissist, which he identified as a "system of subjugation."

Unlike perspectives that can ostracize or vilify narcissistic tendencies, Daniel's perspective on narcissism is very similar to that of the NeuroAffective Relational Model (NARM). Narcissism is understood to be a common trait that all personalities experience to some degree. While Daniel acknowledges that this trait can be quite harmless, for example "sometimes people are just a little more self centered", his work focuses on the narcissistic person who is predatory in their behavior, and who seeks to establish relational dynamics in which they can control others "through belittling and intimidating and humiliating." Daniel describes these individuals as highly seductive at first, and then after their initial phase of seduction others become subjugated to the narcissist. "So that person actually … comes to believe that they are bad and the narcissist is good. And the reason the narcissist is cruel to them is because of their badness." He goes on to explain that the victim of traumatic narcissism is so affected by this relational system, that it is incredibly difficult to stop blaming themselves or feeling alienated from themselves.

In a healthy parent-child relationship, the parent honors and understands a child's natural dependency, and allows them to gradually grow more independent over time through healthy individuation. This healthy individuation celebrates the child's growing independence, while also allowing the child to come back and check in to re-establish safety as they slowly venture farther and farther into the world. Daniel and Sarah come together with Daniel's statement that "We are born completely dependent and there's… no reason on earth why a child should grow up ashamed of that dependency." However, the narcissist is not brought up in this healthy environment. Narcissistic parents resent the child's dependency, shame them for it, and create a traumatizing environment in which the child's dependency on their parent becomes the source of pain and suffering. These children often grow up with one of two outcomes: to become profoundly depressed with low self-esteem, or to take on aspects of this narcissism themselves and recreate relationships with this relational system of power-over and control through humiliation. As Daniel states, the traumatized child can then become the narcissist, who begins "disavowing and denying any kind of dependency, any kind of need, and associating [need] with shame. And then the person that they choose to relate to has to carry that neediness and that shame for them."

Sarah and Daniel discuss the common thread in Daniel's work and NARM. Much like in NARM, in which the therapists support clients to reconnect with their own agency, Daniel's intention in working with people that have experienced narcissistic abuse is to help them "retrieve a faith in themselves that has been taken from them by the narcissistic abuser." In both NARM and Daniel's work, the therapist supports the client to raise their awareness of what has become internalized from their childhood abuse, including the vicious ways that these clients often degenerate and belittle themselves throughout their lives. This is a  "powerful moment" in the therapeutic process, as the client begins to recognize that they themselves have taken on the role of their abuser through their own self-objectification.

Sarah then turns the conversation to the complexity of narcissism in a family system. Oftentimes, there is not only the traumatic narcissist who is creating relationships of subjectation, but there is also the covert narcissist, who is often the one that is standing by and watching what is unfolding, and not protecting the children from the abuse that is taking place. This person is essentially sacrificing the child to the relationship, which is a form of narcissistic abuse. Though there are common gender dynamics in these family configurations, both Sarah and Daniel are careful to note that these forms of narcissistic abuse are truly 'gender blind,' and can happen in any family system.

Daniel describes the healing from these forms of traumatic narcissism he sees when the client is able to look at themselves without judgment, and with compassion for their own experience. This form of self-inquiry is about re-discovering their own relationship to themselves through compassionate understanding. Sarah and Daniel close by discussing the role of the therapist, and how therapists can support the client in this process of self-reflection through being fully attuned and letting them know that we are "in their corner." If the therapist is able to do this, the therapeutic relationship then becomes a place where the client can begin to feel this unconditional, fully present relationship from another, so that they can begin to feel it for themselves." 

NARM Training Institute: Transforming Trauma Episode 062: Continuing the Conversation of Traumatic Narcissism and Recovery with Daniel Shaw

"In this episode of Transforming Trauma, we've invited Daniel Shaw back to have a conversation with our host Emily to further discuss his work and his most recent book, Traumatic Narcissism and Recovery: Leaving the Prison of Shame and Fear. Daniel Shaw LCSW is an author, private practice psychoanalyst, faculty and supervisor at the National Institute for the Psychotherapies. He has provided professional counseling for former cultic group members, and their friends and loved ones since 1994.

Daniel shares that he wants listeners to understand the ways that we become alienated from ourselves because of trauma and the internal antagonism between the part that wants to live, and the part that wants to shut down life. He also shares, "We within ourselves, have healing capacities, we have healing energy. That's innate."

Throughout the episode, we hear from Daniel about his influences such as Sensorimotor Psychotherapy, Internal Family Systems, and EMDR, and how these models have supported his understanding of Trauma and the Self. "The benefit of subsequent training in trauma theories has been to understand that within us is always an energy trying to survive and trying to LIVE. We're not just trying to survive. I think we're trying to live," he shares. "

Daniel Shaw LCSW: Traumatic Narcissism and Recovery, Leaving the Prison of Shame and Fear

"This book looks at the trauma suffered by those in relationships with narcissists, covering topics such as surviving a cult, dysfunctional families, political dysfunction, and imbalances of power in places of work and education.

This new volume by author and psychoanalyst Daniel Shaw revisits themes from his first book, Traumatic Narcissism: Relational Systems of Subjugation. Shaw offers further reflections on the character and behavior of the traumatizing narcissist, the impact such persons have on those they abuse and exploit and the specific ways in which they instill shame and fear in those they seek to control. In addition, this volume explores, with detailed clinical material, many of the challenges mental health professionals face in finding effective ways of helping those who have suffered narcissistic abuse. From within a trauma informed, relational psychoanalytic perspective, Shaw explores themes of attachment to internalized perpetrators, self-alienation, internalized aggression, and loss of faith in the value and meaning of being alive.

This book will be especially illuminating and rewarding for mental health professionals engaged in helping patients heal and recover from complex relational trauma, and equally valuable to those individuals who have struggled with the tenacious, often crippling shame and fear that can be the result of relational trauma."

Daniel Shaw LCSW: Traumatic Narcissism: Relational Systems of Subjugation

"In this volume, Traumatic Narcissism: Relational Systems of Subjugation, Daniel Shaw presents a way of understanding the traumatic impact of narcissism as it is engendered developmentally, and as it is enacted relationally. Focusing on the dynamics of narcissism in interpersonal relations, Shaw describes the relational system of what he terms the 'traumatizing narcissist' as a system of subjugation – the objectification of one person in a relationship as the means of enforcing the dominance of the subjectivity of the other.

Daniel Shaw illustrates the workings of this relational system of subjugation in a variety of contexts: theorizing traumatic narcissism as an intergenerationally transmitted relational/developmental trauma; and exploring the clinician's experience working with the adult children of traumatizing narcissists. He explores the relationship of cult leaders and their followers, and examines how traumatic narcissism has lingered vestigially in some aspects of the psychoanalytic profession.

Bringing together theories of trauma and attachment, intersubjectivity and complementarity, and the rich clinical sensibility of the Relational Psychoanalysis tradition, Shaw demonstrates how narcissism can best be understood not merely as character, but as the result of the specific trauma of subjugation, in which one person is required to become the object for a significant other who demands hegemonic subjectivity. Traumatic Narcissism presents therapeutic clinical opportunities not only for psychoanalysts of different schools, but for all mental health professionals working with a wide variety of modalities. Although primarily intended for the professional psychoanalyst and psychotherapist, this is also a book that therapy patients and lay readers will find highly readable and illuminating."

ABC AU: Death threats, ghost researchers and sock puppets: Inside the weird, wild world of dodgy academic research

"Unlike many other countries, Australia has no national office for research integrity."  

" ... [The work of a Australian whistleblower] has included spending hundreds of hours reviewing scientific papers in the field of construction engineering, an academic discipline not typically known for drama or intrigue.

What the whistleblower has uncovered is shocking: Hundreds of published scientific papers dating back a decade based on dodgy science involving multiple researchers working at Australian universities."

A Little Bit Culty: SEASON 3 EPISODE 2: Silver Fox: Mark Vicente Part 2

"It sure is good to see Mark Vicente back in the saddle again. In Part 2, he shares what happened during his last conversation with Keith Raniere, how he's defragged his brain since he helped burn ol' Dead Eyes' playhouse down, and what the bleep he's working on next. Oh, and there is bountiful ass-chapping."

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QAnon Followers Think This Fake Mexican Trump Twitter Account Is Real

ANDERS ANGLESEY

Newsweek

January 31, 2022

Hardcore QAnon followers are confident a fake Mexican Donald Trump Twitter account is directly communicating to them via coded messages.

In the aftermath of Trump's election defeat in 2020, the QAnon conspiracy movement was left fractured, having been abandoned by the anonymous "Q" poster and social media platforms permanently denying a voice to the former president to communicate directly with his followers.

While many QAnon influencers ditched the conspiracy rhetoric and embraced fresh causes centered around unfounded election fraud claims, others sought out anyone who they believed would affirm their views.

One such account latched on to by numerous QAnon followers is Il Donaldo Trumpo, a fake account that frames a mustachioed Trump as a Mexican who poorly imitates a Spanish accent in its tweets.

The bio for the pro-Trump account reads: "Me look like el Presidento, but me no him, señor Twitter Jacko [Jack Dorsey] and his no-hug Twitter niños. I mucho different with glorioso moustachio. Please no ban me again."

Further examples of poorly imitated Spanish include calling various figures, including President Joe Biden, piso****o and erroneously calling his followers "patriotos" when it is "patriotas."

In numerous tweets, the Il Donaldo Trumpo account plays into outdated perceptions of Mexican culture with photos of the mustached Trump wearing a sombrero and "taco Tuesday" posts.

While most people will dismiss the account as a parody attempt, hardcore adherents of the QAnon mythos believe the person behind it is, in actuality, the former president himself.

A spokesperson for Donald Trump has confirmed to Newsweek that the account has absolutely no connection to the former president.

Among those who believe the account is run by Trump are members of the Dallas QAnon faction that waited for JFK Jr. to emerge in Dealey Plaza last year, and now believe the former President is communicating to them via coded messages.

In a January 21 live stream shared on a Telegram channel associated with the Dallas QAnon faction, its de facto leader Michael Protzman revealed to tens of thousands of followers his group had attempted to decode a January 18 tweet by Il Donaldo Trumpo, which read: "I'm Batman."

Using Gematria, a type of numerology that allocates words to numbers, Protzman, known to his followers as Negative 48, explained how he had stayed up late in order to decode the message he believed was for his group.

In response to a question about what he had been doing, Protzman said: "Pretty much sat around doing some coding, stayed up late yesterday. Trump, he was back talking to us and said 'I am Batman,' 'cause Batman's 51 which is 'Michael.'"

  

Il Donaldo Trumpo's tweet was not lost on other followers associated with Protzman, with one linking the post to a real-life Batman-themed emergency message that was sent out in Missouri earlier this month.

Speaking in a January 23 live stream on a Dallas QAnon faction-affiliated Telegram channel, the follower said: "I live in Missouri and after President Trump did say he was Batman what did we get on our alerts - the Batman signal EBS and who talks about Batman sometimes? Negative 48."

 

In December, the group wrongly celebrated Trump's birthday, as part of its unfounded belief the former president was adopted into the Trump family.

Il Donaldo Trumpo commands a large following at 282,900, and nearly 200,000 subscribers on Twitter and Telegram, respectively.

The fake Trump account has also created numerous accounts on other social media accounts and video-streaming services, including YouTube.

Many of Il Donaldo Trumpo's posts are shared among QAnon influencers, including lawyer Lin Wood and John Sabal, who command a subscriber count that combined reaches hundreds of thousands of people.

But Mike Rothschild, author of "The Storm is Upon Us: How QAnon Became a Movement, Cult, and Conspiracy Theory of Everything," said it was not surprising QAnon followers believed the account was real.

He pointed to the number of people who mistakenly believed messages written by "Q" on imageboard 8chan were written by people in positions of enormous influence, or by Trump himself.

Speaking to Newsweek, Rothschild said: "It's very similar to what was going on with QAnon where there were certain Q drops that were signed "Q+" and Q believers really thought that that was Donald Trump using 8chan to communicate with them, bypassing the media, bypassing all of his handlers. Trump was directly speaking to them and I think that this thing is the same.

"The particulars are a bit different, but it's the need to believe that you are special, and that the person who you worship and venerate sees how special you are and is communicating with you because you are important and you're going to do something great.

"It's completely ridiculous. Donald Trump does not know how to use 8chan and is famously computer illiterate. He was able to tweet, but only then because people put stuff in front of him and that's all he did."

Donald Trump speaks to reporters on the South Lawn of the White House before boarding Marine One on July 15, 2020 in Washington, DC. Many QAnon followers believe the fake Twitter account is really Donald Trump.

https://www.newsweek.com/qanon-followers-think-this-fake-mexican-trump-twitter-account-real-1674560

The dead-end doomsday cult of Donald J. Trump

At a recent rally, Trump bathed his supporters with the usual ill-fated promises and unhinged conspiracy theories. But there’s one crazy theory floating around — about JFK Jr. — that Trump has yet to publicly embrace.

S. E. Cupp  

Chicago Sun Times

Jan 19, 2022

This weekend in Florence, Arizona, supporters of former President Donald Trump gathered to attend one of his infamous rallies, to bond with like-minded MAGA cohorts and bathe in Trump’s ill-fated promises and unhinged conspiracy theories.

They got their money’s worth. Trump pushed the debunked theory that the FBI had plants among the insurrectionists at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. He pushed the so-called “massive evidence” that the 2020 presidential election was “rigged and stolen,” evidence that has yet to reveal itself, despite Republicans in state houses looking really, really hard for it.

And he continued to lie about the role of Democrats in the violent insurrection. The crowd, unsurprisingly, ate it all up.

Cool, cool.

But one conspiracy theory Trump has yet to publicly embrace is the, erm, “idea” that John F. Kennedy Jr. — who definitely died more than 22 years ago in a tragic plane crash — is alive and poised to be Trump’s running mate in 2024.

Go to any MAGA gathering and it isn’t hard to find the folks who earnestly believe this lunacy. And if maskless rallies aren’t on your 2022 agenda, just go to TikTok or YouTube. Jaw-dropping interviews with JFK Jr. truthers abound.

Politico caught up with one in Arizona, who admitted, “I don’t want to sound too much like a conspiracy theorist,” about the return of a man who definitely is no longer living, “but he’s coming back. He’s supposed to reveal himself on the 17th if he’s truly alive. I think we’ll see him.”

For those of you with access to a calendar — admittedly an evil apparatus of the deep state — Jan. 17 has come and gone, and John-John has yet to make an appearance. That we know of.

Fear not, however. These “predictions” are merely suggestions, it would seem. According to QAnon adherents, John-John was also supposed to arrive on Nov. 23 of last year.

That was after he was going to appear on Nov. 3, 2021.

And that was after he was definitely arriving on July 4, 2019.

You’d think that all these disappointing no-shows would pierce the infallibility of the JFK Jr. resurrection-or-revival-or-reemergence theory, but alas, “evidence” is the domain of the elite, the establishment, the Deep State, the left, the so-called scientists and the lamestream media.

But you’d also think the fact that Trump himself hasn’t endorsed this conspiracy (yet) would also provoke some gentle chin-scratching.

Or at the very least, you’d wonder why the newly alive son of a beloved Democratic dynasty would reemerge from hiding after two decades to run for president with a reviled Republican loser.

Obviously, there are good explanations for all this. According to one Trump supporter, JFK Jr. was in fact at the Arizona rally, but he was disguised — you guessed it — as Trump. (You didn’t guess that?)

If you think this sounds more like a kooky cult than a major political movement, I have two words for you: Harold Camping. Camping was an engineer-turned-evangelist who launched California-based Family Radio in the late 1950s. Camping was bit by the doomsday bug hard, and first predicted the Biblical End of Times would occur on Sept. 6, 1994.

When the day came and went, he pushed his prediction back a bit, to the end of the month, Sept. 29.

Then he changed it to just a few days later, Oct. 2. Eventually giving up on the year 1994, he predicted March 31 of 1995 would be the end of the world as we knew it.

In the decade that followed, Camping raised millions in donations and gained an international following off of these failed predictions. In 2011, he returned to the doomsday business, announcing a new date for the Rapture — May 21. When that day disappointed, he gave his final prediction, Oct. 21. He retired that year following a stroke, after leading his company into financial ruin. Many of his former followers described becoming disillusioned and coming to view him as a cult leader.

Science reporter Tom Bartlett studied Camping’s followers, and described one, “a gifted young musician.”

He continued: “Because he was convinced the world was ending, he had abandoned music, quit his job, and essentially put his life on hold for four years. It had cost him friends and created a rift between some members of his family.”

“It all seemed so real, like it made so much sense, but it wasn’t right,” the former follower said.

We’ll have to wait and see if QAnon and the JFK Jr. truthers have the same wake-up call one day, if anything can pull them out of the cult of Trump, where I’m sure it all seems so real.

Until then, no need for alarm — only the fate of our next election and the future of democracy on Earth hang in the balance.

S.E. Cupp is the host of “S.E. Cupp Unfiltered” on CNN.

Send letters to letters@suntimes.com.

https://chicago.suntimes.com/columnists/2022/1/19/22891537/donald-trump-cult-conspiracy-theories-jfk-column-se-cupp

Trump superfans dream of a run again, and of JFK Jr. on the ticket

The former president did his first rally of 2022 and left no doubt about the base he wants to build

MERIDITH MCGRAW

Politico 

January 17, 2022

FLORENCE, Ariz. — Ray Kallatsa is a die-hard Trumper who “definitely” wants to see former President Donald Trump run for office again in 2024.

So it was natural that he’d travel from Tucson to see Trump’s first rally of 2022. But as Kallatsa stood there on Saturday, pondering whom he would like to see as Trump’s next veep — from Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, to former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, to onetime national security adviser turned ardent conspiracy theorist Mike Flynn — an unorthodox idea came to him.

“JFK Jr.,” he said, referencing the son of the 35th president who died in a plane crash in 1999. Kallatsa realized he might have come off a bit odd with the suggestion. “I don’t want to sound too much like a conspiracy theorist, but he’s coming back,” he explained. “He’s supposed to reveal himself on the 17th if he’s truly alive. I think we’ll see him.”

If Kallatsa was worried about sounding too conspiratorial, he shouldn’t have been. He was not alone among the crowd in believing that JFK Jr. is not only still alive but is also a secret Trump supporter embedded far in the “deep state.” One attendee was spotted wearing a red shirt with the faces of Trump, Kennedy and Kennedy Jr. in the crowd. Michael Protzman, the QAnon influencer who organized the event last year in Dallas’ Dealey Plaza where he and others also believed John F. Kennedy and John F. Kennedy Jr. would reappear from the dead, was spotted in the rally stands.

Elsewhere were individuals in hats that read “Trump Won” and buttons with “Q.” Figures from fringe QAnon online groups, like Jim and Ron Watkins, shared their visit to the rally with online followers. And conservative activist Ali Alexander — who helped organize last year’s Jan. 6 “Stop the Steal” rally, which has led to countless arrests and fears about the erosion of American democracy — was given priority access to the event.

One of the introductory speakers, Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.), who represents the district that includes Florence, invoked a “storm coming” — a phrase used by QAnon — in his speech. Another speaker was Arizona state Rep. Mark Finchem, who is running to be Arizona’s secretary of state, has been linked to QAnon and has reportedly discussed conspiracies about a network of elected officials involved in a network of pedophilia. Both have been endorsed by Trump.

Trump has always had one foot firmly in the camp with conspiracists on the right, starting with his promotion of birtherism during the Obama years. Having been ousted from power, he has continued to adopt and amplify this world and its views, effectively solidifying it as the base of the Republican Party. Figures once relegated to corners of the internet and the fringes of the party have been welcomed with open arms at Trump rallies and found some of their theories shared by the former president himself.

Up on stage Saturday night, Trump pushed a right-wing conspiracy suggesting that some of the people who attacked the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 were actually FBI informants.

“Exactly how many of those present at the Capitol complex on January 6 were FBI confidential informants agents or otherwise working directly or indirectly with an agency of the United States government? People want to hear this,” Trump said.

Days earlier, the congressional committee investigating the capital attacks said it had interviewed Ray Epps, the Arizona man central to the theory that the FBI was secretly involved in the riots. Epps, the select committee said, had informed investigators “that he was not employed by, working with or acting at the direction of any law enforcement agency on Jan. 5 or 6 or at any other time, and that he has never been an informant for the F.B.I. or any other law enforcement agency.”

But that did not stop the former president, who, following the footsteps of allies like Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) and Sen. Ted Cruz, (R-Texas), as well as Fox News host Tucker Carlson, suggested Epps was part of a “false flag” operation. “How about the one guy, ‘Go in, get in there everybody.’ Epps,” Trump declared.

It was one of several lines from Trump in which he asked his followers to dismiss the evidence in front of them. Elsewhere, he continued to argue that his election loss was the result of an elaborate effort to cheat by Democrats.

“Why aren’t they investigating November 3, a rigged and stolen election?” Trump said to a cheering crowd that jumped to its feet. “Why aren’t they looking at that, and there’s massive evidence that shows exactly what I’m talking about.”

Trump also said he planned to address “dishonesty” from Democrats and the media surrounding the Capitol riots, including his false claim that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi blocked the National Guard from going to the Capitol to stop the riots on Jan. 6. For followers, the comments didn’t raise eyebrows — they drew applause.

“Why don’t they talk about the guy that killed that girl Ashli Babbitt?” said Cece Fager of Mesa, Ariz., referencing the Jan. 6 protester who was shot and killed by a Capitol police officer as she and others tried to break down a door that led to the House Speaker’s Lobby. “It’s all a cover-up. Our country is so divided, it’s sad.”

Thousands had come out on a cold, windy night an hour south of Phoenix to dusty desert fairgrounds to see and hear the former president. Decked out in red, white and blue Trump gear or wearing T-shirts with, shall we say, colorful words for Biden, his supporters danced to his MAGA rally playlist, took selfies with one another and high-fived strangers as they walked past.

And as the warm-up acts and Trump spoke, they joined together in chorus to chant “Let’s Go Brandon,” a popular GOP slogan that gives the middle finger to Biden, and “Lock him up,” aimed at Anthony Fauci, the infectious disease expert turned conservative enemy.

Few, if any, masks were worn. Nor was there much concern played to the pandemic ripping through the country (Trump, for his part, did not encourage followers to get Covid booster shots, as he had done in recent appearances, but instead railed against vaccine mandates). They were happy to be in a crowd of like-minded people, but also angry — at Biden, at Democrats, at the media for, among other things, their portrayal of the Jan. 6 riots. After all, some of them had been there.

That included Diane Meade from La Verne, Calif., who said she traveled 6.5 hours to Florence on Saturday night because she believes the 2020 election was stolen and wants to be on the “right side of history.” Meade said she was at the Capitol the day of the riot, and since then has felt “persecuted.”

“People associate me with a terrorist group. I’m guilty by association,” said Meade, who said she did not enter the Capitol. “I went to peacefully protest. The people I met just love our country.”

As the rally came to a close, the fieriness of the festivities had become dotted with anger. Terry Schultz, an Arizona snowbird from North Dakota, waited on the tailgate of a truck. His friends described the rally as “invigorating.” Schultz, however, seemed agitated by, as he explained, “all the corruption the Democrats pulled.” The election, he said, was stolen. Trump was robbed.

“It was all a bunch of bullshit,” he said.

https://www-politico-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.politico.com/amp/news/2022/01/17/trump-rally-arizona-2024-527253

I Left QAnon in 2019. But I'm Still Not Free.

Some say the movement is losing its power. But I see the opposite.

JITARTH JADEJA, AS TOLD TO ANASTASIIA CARRIER
POLITICO
December 11, 20121

Since it became clear that the QAnon conspiracy theory was a driving force in the siege of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, Anastasiia Carrier has been interviewing former QAnon believers and hearing from them, in their own words, how they were drawn into that world and how they got out. Their stories reveal surprising political implications of a movement that is still thriving outside mainstream scrutiny. This is the second article in the series; you can read the first here. (This interview was done virtually over a series of video calls.)

I left QAnon back in 2019, but I don’t seem to be able to walk away. I talk about my experience a lot — to the Washington Post, CNN and Rolling Stone magazine among many others. I even apologized to Anderson Cooper on his show for having once thought that he ate babies.

I’m one of the few former followers willing to go on the record with their story, which means I’m a source for journalists and researchers and sometimes also a guide for former believers who want to talk to someone who understands what they went through. I’m also one of the senior moderators of the QAnonCasualties forum on Reddit, a message board for family members of QAnon believers. I might have left, but I still have a close look into how the conspiracy theory is spreading and affecting people.

These days, QAnon isn’t getting the headlines it was after Jan. 6. I guess most of the world doesn’t pay attention to QAnon anymore unless its followers do something especially bizarre, like the recent gathering in Dallas where hundreds met in hopes of seeing John F. Kennedy Jr. alive. But from where I stand I don’t see QAnon fading away — I see it getting stronger.

I was sucked into QAnon in the winter of 2017. At the time, I casually followed various conspiracies online and the internet led me to Q. I was living in Australia, where I still live, but I had been interested in American politics since spending six months in the U.S. a few years before. I had rooted for Bernie Sanders during the 2016 primary and felt let down when he lost.

When I found QAnon, I didn’t just flirt with it — I fell deep. I internalized the idea that the world was run by the Cabal, a Satan-worshiping child-molesting group of liberal politicians, Hollywood moguls, billionaires and other influential elites. I believed that Donald Trump was leading the fight against the Cabal and that there was a plan in place to defeat them. I couldn’t wait for the coming of the Storm, QAnon’s version of judgment day that would herald the announcement of martial law and a wave of public executions. I was looking forward to the execution of Hillary Clinton, whom Q portrayed as a pedophile and a murderer. I would have cheered. QAnon showed me that I can be enthusiastic about violence, and it’s hard to forgive myself for that.

I understood QAnon was a lie on June 13, 2019. Just minutes after I wrote a post online laden with QAnon conspiracies, I watched a YouTube video that reviewed the times that Trump used the phrase “tippy top” throughout the years. Q said that when Trump said this phrase, he was signaling to Anons, “the patriots,” that everything was going according to the plan in the fight with the Deep State. But the video showed that Trump had always used this phrase a lot, long before he ever ran for the presidency and Q came to be. That’s when it clicked for me: This was all a lie.

I walked out onto the porch of my house in Sydney, Australia, smoked a cigarette and took in the idea that I had lost two years of my life to a vile conspiracy crafted by a psychopath. I had even introduced my dad to it. He is still a follower; I can’t get through to him.

Then I went inside, sat down and wrote a different post, this time on a Reddit forum devoted to debunking the conspiracy. I titled the post: You guys were right.

The pain and shame that came with the disillusionment were overwhelming. I couldn’t look people in the eyes. I felt like I had committed a violent crime and was running for my life. I was terrified that someone would find out my secret and my life would be ruined forever. I lived with this fear for a year. During that time, I didn’t speak about QAnon or read anything about American politics because it reminded of my time in Q’s thrall.

There was only one way I reexposed myself to QAnon during that time: I reread comments on the Reddit post I had written the hour I quit. The kind words of strangers saying that it wasn’t my fault and that I was brave for getting out made me feel better. It was through that post that a journalist found me in June 2020 and I got my first interview request. The only thing the journalist asked was for me to tell my story.

“The only thing?” I thought. There was no such thing as just telling my story. I asked everyone in my life who knew about my time with QAnon if I should talk to the reporter. Every single one of them tried to talk me out of it.

And yet, the general public was just becoming aware of QAnon and was underestimating the real-world danger the online conspiracy could cause. I thought people should know more. I also wanted to be able to reach those who were on the edge of falling for QAnon or leaving it. I thought that going public about my experience might provide them with the nudge that would help them escape the lie. I also didn’t see the point of doing it halfway — if I wanted Anons to take me seriously, I needed to put my name on the record.

I also felt physically safer speaking up in Australia than I would have if I lived in the U.S. I knew Anons could be violent (someone later posted my address and a photo of my house online) and I found comfort in knowing that most QAnon followers seem to live in the U.S. and that it would take an expensive plane ticket and a very long flight for anyone to get to me. Australia also has stricter gun laws, so I didn’t need to worry that someone could show up armed.

“Whatever. I’ll do it. Life is too short. Who cares?” I thought. And after ignoring the interview request for a month, I responded and said I’d do it.

I was very nervous during my first interview, but it felt great to get my experience out. Even before that story published, more interview requests came in, and I accepted them all. One after another, these interviews drained me of my shame. Now I tell all former QAnons to share their stories — it’s cathartic. For so long, my biggest fear had been that someone would find out I had followed Q. By telling the whole world about it, I removed all the power that shame had over me. I still feel guilty for my beliefs, but I’m not scared or ashamed anymore.

Over the past year, I’ve spoken with many journalists, researchers and family members of those who fell for QAnon. No one has told me that my story has helped them escape QAnon, but I do speak with current Anons surprisingly often. Usually, they reach out to mock or confront me, but I almost always manage to turn it into a real conversation. I know how to speak to them because I used to be one of them — I don’t demean them but neither do I let them get away with rambling and bogus reasoning. These conversations are very draining — they can last 12 hours and require writing long essays, addressing their arguments point by point. The trick is to not let them walk over you and to push back on their beliefs without insulting their intelligence. And if it’s someone you care for, you can try to ask them why being right is more important to them than having a functioning relationship with you.

A few months ago, I livestreamed a QAnon conference in Dallas. Attendees didn’t refer to their movement as QAnon, but all the elements were there — the ideas, the slogans and the current “celebrities” of the conspiracy movement. I wanted to be there to talk to them. Why? Going from a Bernie Sanders supporter to a Trump supporter to being politically homeless left me with a lot of unfinished emotional and intellectual business with both the right and the left. I’ve sorted through all my unfinished business with the left by talking with the media. I think most media leans left, but I also saw how journalism works and how carefully I was vetted before my story was considered credible. But I still feel angry and betrayed by the right. The intellectual right has a lot of great ideas but they abandoned them all to stand by Trump and his claims about election fraud. What went wrong? I would have talked to the Dallas attendees about that.


Even though I wasn’t there, one thing that surprised me about that Dallas conference was how polished and well put together it was on a professional level. It tells me that the movement’s infrastructure is improving and it is growing. I disagree with people who say that QAnon is fading away — I think its believers are growing as fast as the fandom of “Game of Thrones” when it came out. Their content might be banned from popular social media but I think they are still there, flourishing away from the eyes of polite society.

This worries me. I believe QAnon has a lot in common with doomsday cults and in the past, doomsday cults turned violent. I was not surprised when the FBI said that “digital soldiers” could turn to violence, nor was I surprised by the storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6. I think it’s inevitable that more real-world violence will occur in future. Eventually, Anons will get tired of waiting for the Storm. Then, they will take the bringing of the martial law into their own hands.

I don’t see a natural end point to this conspiracy now. It has survived Q’s disappearance and Trump’s 2020 loss, which, according to the theory, was never supposed to happen. The movement is changing, though. QAnon has always been a blanket conspiracy that allowed people to bring what conspiratorial beliefs they wanted into it. Now, without Trump in the White House and Q trying to directs its flow, this inclusiveness has become more pronounced. What is left is a more decentralized movement, with an ever growing range of beliefs, united by a shared culture of distrust toward institutions and a do-it-yourself approach to conspiracy theories.

My biggest dream now is seeing other former QAnon followers go on the record with their experience so I can fade away into obscurity and bum around. I had a life before this and I want to go back to it. But no one is willing to take these responsibilities from me. Once a reporter told me that maybe no one speaks up because I’m already doing it. Maybe so. But I don’t want to be doing this forever.



https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/12/11/q-anon-movement-former-believer-523972

Ex-QAnon Believer Warns Movement 'Getting Stronger,' Compares It to 'Doomsday Cult'

JASON LEMON
Newsweek
December 11, 2021

A former believer in the QAnon conspiracy theory has warned that the movement appears to be "getting stronger," comparing the bizarre movement to a "doomsday cult."

QAnon adherents believe that former President Donald Trump is fighting against a Satanic cabal of Democratic elites who sexually exploit children in their quest for power and domination. In recent months, the QAnon movement appears to have increasingly become an umbrella for a range of other conspiracy theories as well.

In an interview with Politico published on Saturday, former QAnon believer Jitarth Jadeja outlined how he became involved with the conspiracy theory and eventually left the movement, realizing it was all a lie. He warned that he sees the movement as becoming more influential, not fading away.

"These days, QAnon isn't getting the headlines it was after January 6. I guess most of the world doesn't pay attention to QAnon anymore unless its followers do something especially bizarre, like the recent gathering in Dallas where hundreds met in hopes of seeing John F. Kennedy Jr. alive. But from where I stand I don't see QAnon fading away—I see it getting stronger," Jadeja said.

The QAnon movement drew substantial national attention in the wake of the January 6 attack against the U.S. Capitol carried out by Trump supporters. Many in the crowd of hundreds of Trump loyalists openly promoted the QAnon conspiracy theory, waving flags and wearing clothing items promoting it.

As Jadeja pointed out, hundreds of QAnon followers gathered in Dallas, Texas in November—bizarrely believing that John F. Kennedy Jr. (the son of former President John F. Kennedy) would appear there. However, Kennedy Jr. died in a plane crash back in 1999.

Despite their fantastical beliefs, hundreds gathered in Dallas in mid-November and then dozens again gathered there later in the month. They believed that Kennedy Jr. would reappear in the Texas city and declare Trump to be the rightful president.

"I disagree with people who say that QAnon is fading away—I think its believers are growing as fast as the fandom of Game of Thrones when it came out. Their content might be banned from popular social media but I think they are still there, flourishing away from the eyes of polite society," Jadeja said.

"This worries me. I believe QAnon has a lot in common with doomsday cults and in the past, doomsday cults turned violent. I was not surprised when the FBI said that 'digital soldiers' could turn to violence, nor was I surprised by the storming of the Capitol on January 6. I think it's inevitable that more real-world violence will occur in the future," he added.

An FBI report released in mid-June warned of the possibility that some QAnon adherents could commit acts of violence. The report cautioned that some believers could "begin to believe they can no longer 'trust the plan' referenced in QAnon posts and they have an obligation to change from serving as 'digital soldiers' toward engaging in real-world violence."

Although Trump has never fully embraced the QAnon movement, he has spoken favorably of its believers. "I don't know much about the movement, other than I understand they like me very much, which I appreciate," Trump told reporters in April 2020 during a White House press conference.

In the wake of Trump's election loss, QAnon adherents have repeatedly rallied around a series of dates on which they believed the former president would be reinstated. Even as the dates have passed without Trump returning to the White House, many of the conspiracy theories have moved the goal post and set new deadlines. Some adherents also believe that Trump is still serving as the president, despite Biden's presence in the White House and on the world stage.

Newsweek reached out to Trump's press office for comment.

https://www.newsweek.com/ex-qanon-believer-warns-movement-getting-stronger-compares-it-doomsday-cult-1658500

This Family Believes Their Loved One's in Dallas with the QAnon Cult. They Want Her to Come Home.

MICHAEL MURNEY
Dallas observer
December 10, 2021

Sean Leek was excited to live near his mother again. It was 2018, and he'd recently moved back to the area around the same time she bought a house in Delaware. "Finally," he thought, "we're gonna be back in each other's lives."

Within months, he realized something was off about his mother. It didn't take long for every conversation they had to become an argument, including "things about Bill Gates, all of these different conspiracies," he said.

"She’s always been into, you know, natural remedies, getting aluminum out of deodorant, things like that,” he recalled. “But that led to anti-vaxxing, and anti-vaxxing led to QAnon."

Now, she's in Dallas with a fringe group of QAnon believers who are waiting for John F. Kennedy, the president who was assassinated in 1963, and JFK Jr., who died in 1999, to reappear in Dealey Plaza.


Mike Rothschild, whose new book The Storm Is Upon Us delves into the rise of the QAnon movement, says this gradual progression from one conspiracy to the next is a common way people end up believing in QAnon.

"Most of the followers were already conspiracy theorists. They didn't wake up one day and say, 'Hey, it'd be fun to join a gematria cult'," said Rothschild. (Gematria is a system assigning numbers to letters of the English alphabet often used by QAnoners.)

In 2017, QAnon had first bubbled up in remote corners of the internet, on online forums like 4chan, but it spread quickly. By 2018, the conspiracy theory had taken root among some mainstream right-wing media figures and politicians.

The way followers see it, former President Donald Trump was waging a secret war against a powerful, shadowy group of Democrats, Hollywood elites and the deep state, all of whom were operating a global child sex-trafficking ring.


In October 2020, The Guardian published a list of a dozen violent incidents, some of them fatal, reportedly linked to QAnon. Earlier this year, the FBI warned U.S. lawmakers that the movement could become more violent.


But in early November, an even more fringe group of QAnon supporters traveled from all over to Dallas at the command of Michael Protzman, who once ran a Washington-based demolition company and has now built an impressive following trafficking conspiracy theories on his Telegram channel, Negative48.

In recent weeks, Protzman and his followers have claimed that President Joe Biden and former Vice President Mike Pence have been dead for years. In one Telegram post, Protzman promoted the conspiracy theory that Biden had orchestrated a fatal car ramming at a holiday parade in Wisconsin (apparently despite Biden being dead).

Meanwhile, Sean's mother is one of the dozens who have been in town waiting for Protzman's predictions to come true: when Kennedy and his son reappear in Dealey Plaza, they will quickly reinstate former Trump as president and begin executing en masse everyone involved in the supposed secret cabal of Satan-worshipping pedophile elites that QAnoners believe run the world.

Hundreds of people like Sean’s mom were convinced by Protzman’s predictions and felt compelled to follow his instructions to travel to Dallas early last month. They’ve sacrificed their businesses, properties – and, in many cases, family ties – to make the journey.

Now, more than a month since the date Kennedy was supposed to show up at Dealey Plaza, Sean’s mother and dozens of fellow believers remain in downtown Dallas, at Protzman’s instruction.

What they’re waiting for, or what Protzman has planned for his followers, remains unclear. Experts and family members of Protzman’s followers emphasized that the seeds for Protzman’s cult following in Dallas were planted long before the Telegram star came on the QAnon scene.

“I’ve had this discourse with my sister for four years concerning this QAnon shit show,” said Bill Leek, a retired Marine Corps colonel and Sean's uncle. He suspects that his sister is the Delaware woman described in the Observer’s last dispatch on Protzman’s Dallas cult.

Bill worries for his sister’s wellbeing. He's been concerned for a while. In 2017, three year before she uprooted her life in Delaware to follow Protzman to Dallas, Bill felt he had to confront his sister and tell her that her belief system was false. He tried to explain that as a veteran of the Marine Corps, and a colonel with a high-level intelligence clearance, he knew the core tenets of the QAnon canon to be false.



“We need to get this snake to crawl back under the rock from which he slithered out from." - Bill Leek

His sister was too far gone, though. She said he was obligated to use his high-level clearance to confirm those beliefs. “I’m the brother of someone who has fallen for lies and disinformation that not only hurt her, but hurts the country as well," Bill said. "And it will eventually hurt other people and other families unless we get a handle on it."

The Leek family isn’t alone. Rothschild has seen it happen to others. "They alienate anybody who might care about them, and then they find themselves where often they can’t go back, where nobody wants to be around you at a certain point," he said.

Dallas wasn't a surprising choice. On top of being the city where Kennedy was shot and killed, it's also become a QAnon hotbed in recent months.

In May, John Sabal, known as "QAnon John," and his partner, Amy, held the "For God & County Patriot Roundup" downtown. The event was attended by retired Gen. Michael Flynn, former Texas Republican Party chairman Allen West and East Texas U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert, among others.

Meanwhile, the Leeks know how complicated their situation is.

Sean Leek’s sibling, who chose to remain anonymous to protect his own children, said that while they hope their mother returns home safe to Delaware, their relationship is irreparably damaged. “How can I trust anything she says ever again?” he asked.

“Overall, we want you home,” Sean said, addressing his mother directly. “Basically your family loves you and when you’re ready to come back we’re here for you.”

Bill Leek said he’s not focused on Protzman himself, but on the threat that disinformation presents moving forward. "If it’s not Protzman, then it’ll be someone else in a couple years,” he said.

Still, he wants a stop put to Protzman’s movement in Dallas. “We need to get this snake to crawl back under the rock from which he slithered out from,” he said.

MICHAEL MURNEY is a reporting fellow at the Dallas Observer and a graduate of Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism. His reporting has appeared in Chicago’s South Side Weekly and the Chicago Reader.




https://www.dallasobserver.com/news/this-family-believes-their-loved-ones-in-dallas-with-the-qanon-cult-they-want-her-to-come-home-12982112

CultNEWS101 Articles: 12/6/2021 (QAnon, Grand Concourse Seventh-day Adventist Church, Marcus Lamb's Daystar Television Network)

QAnon, Grand Concourse Seventh-day Adventist Church, Marcus Lamb's Daystar Television Network

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Yahoo: QAnon Hero Michael Flynn Secretly Said QAnon Is 'Total Nonsense'

"Former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn has embraced his position as a hero to QAnon conspiracy theorists. He took the QAnon oath, sold QAnon T-shirts, and even auctioned off a QAnon quilt. He appeared at a QAnon convention and signed books with a QAnon slogan. Some QAnon followers even believe that Flynn is "Q," the mysterious figure behind QAnon.

But a recording released late Saturday night by a one-time Flynn ally suggests that the retired three-star general privately believes QAnon to be 'total nonsense.'"

Christian Post: Pastor, marriage counselor resigns after preaching 'the best person to rape is your wife'

"Burnett L. Robinson, a New York pastor and marriage counselor who has spent more than 35 years in ministry, apologized and resigned from his post at the Grand Concourse Seventh-day Adventist Church in the Bronx last Wednesday after he declared in a sermon that "the best person to rape is your wife."

"Pastor Burnett Robinson has resigned as the senior pastor of the Grand Concourse Seventh-day Adventist Church, and as a worker in the Greater New York Conference," the Greater New York Conference of the Seventh-day Adventist Church explained in a statement.

"The Greater New York Conference of Seventh-day Adventists recognizes many have been deeply harmed by the sentiments expressed by Robinson. The views he expressed are wrong and not accepted by our church."

The conference assured that "rape" and "sexual assault" are 'crimes and should always be treated as such.'"

LGBTQ Nation: One of America's biggest televangelists died of COVID-19 after his alternative treatments failed

"Marcus Lamb's Daystar Television Network promoted both anti-vaccine and conversion therapy quackery. One killed him in the end.

"The son of televangelist Marcus Lamb – who once compared LGBTQ people to "drug addicts and shoplifters" – is saying that his recent COVID-19 death is "a spiritual attack from the enemy."

Lamb, who was 64, passed away early this morning, his wife Joni Lamb announced in a broadcast today. He had tested positive for COVID-19 after over a year of his network's anti-vaccine advocacy."

While this programming puts viewers in danger, Marcus and Joni Lamb reportedly lived pretty well. Daystar purchased a private jet with millions of dollars it got from the Paycheck Protection Program, government funds that were intended to help businesses pay their employees during the pandemic. Lamb and his family posted pictures of themselves taking vacations with the jet during the pandemic.

His family's fortune caused him some problems, though. Years after an extramarital affair, three people tried to extort the Lambs and demanded $7.5 million to keep quiet about it in 2019."

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