Newsletter: Epstein and trafficking won’t go away - Many MAGA folks are angry and disillusioned!
Education and Information are Vital for Strategic Efforts Going Forward
This week’s livestream will be tomorrow, Wednesday, July 23rd, at 3-4 p.m. EDT. I welcome everyone to tune in with questions and comments! Last week’s livestream was a great success; you can see the recording here if you missed it. With the Epstein files and so much more going on, come bring your questions!
In this week’s episode of Cult Conversations: The Influence Continuum, titled “How the International Church of Christ (ICOC) Preys on Hispanic Communities,” I spoke with Tania Díaz, an outspoken advocate and ex-member of the group, who rose through the church’s ranks, only to escape nearly thirty years later. She would become an anti-cult activist, self-compassion advocate, and host of a podcast dedicated to survivors of religious abuse, Voces: Espacio Sagrado para Sobrevivientes de Abuso Religioso (In English, Voices: A Sacred Space for Survivors of Religious Abuse). Many authoritarian groups now target the Latin American community, and brave people like Tania are at the forefront of speaking out and spreading awareness of the predatory tactics of those groups. You can listen to the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Of course, the video of the interview is on our YouTube channel and is embedded in the Substack post.
In next week’s episode of Cult Conversations: The Influence Continuum, “Ending Corporate Harm: Undue Influence Within Corporate Product Health and Safety,” I will speak with Dr. Tracey Woodruff, who previously served as a scientist and policy advisor in the US EPA Office of Policy. During our discussion, we discussed how the current administration’s policies will make people sicker. The video of our talk is available in advance for our YouTube members, so now is an excellent time to become a YouTube channel member.
My Instagram post from yesterday is going viral! I spoke about how we are at a pivotal moment: this isn’t just about politics, it’s about understanding how authoritarian influence can take root and shape entire belief systems. Trump may be the current face of this movement, but the tactics he’s used go back decades. They’re designed to divide, destabilize, and control. And the antidote to manipulation isn’t panic: It is education and community! If you’re unsure of what to trust right now, you’re not alone. We aim to be a trustworthy resource for people to use to reality-test. And, the good news is that awareness is growing. People are waking up. And every time we choose curiosity over fear, truth over unquestioning loyalty, we move things forward.
A former Trump follower and guest on my podcast, Rich Logis, was interviewed on MSNBC; he spoke about not calling the MAGA community a cult but a “community,” and while I get where he is coming from, I have a very different perspective on what’s going to help people in the big picture. So I decided to livestream on Substack to agree that it is bad to tell someone they are in a cult, and that it can backfire and push people deeper into their beliefs. But just referring to MAGA as a “community” is also a mistake in my opinion, as I know many people who left cults bought into the MAGA cult because they didn’t do their healing work. It is vital to understand my Influence Continuum and BITE Model, as well as the attributes of malignant narcissism, to avoid the trap of leaving one high-control organization only to get sucked into another one.
I was recently quoted in an Economic Times article, “Thomas Fugate’s appointment amid Iran tensions triggers controversy: MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow brutally trolls Trump’s pick,” relating to the appointment of a 22-year-old former Trump campaign staffer who has zero experience in counter-terrorism to a lead central US counterterrorism hub. It is truly frightening to think that the only qualification for a vital position protecting our nation is now unswerving loyalty to Donald Trump.
The interview I did for the Opperman Report was posted online; we discussed my book, The Cult of Trump, and how Donald Trump’s behavior over the past few years has become both more disturbing and yet increasingly familiar as he continues to spread the divisive mentality of us-vs.-them.
“I know I was looking for a purpose. I know I was full of ideals. I know I was feeling like I wanted to make a difference in this world.”
That hunger for meaning is precisely what cults prey upon, and is a core theme in today’s story. I was honored to speak with Tania Diaz, an outspoken advocate and ex-member of the International Churches of Christ (ICOC), on this Cult Conversations: The Influence Continuum episode. Her story shows how someone with a big heart and high ideals can be unduly influenced to act against their best interests.
Read the blog post or listen to the podcast, below:
As always, please let us know what you think about these pieces or what you’d like to see us discuss in the future. Thanks so much!
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I watched the whole video with Tania Diaz, and it was great. I liked how you chimed in as she went along explaining what happened, because it helped me understand the cult process better. Thank you, Steven Hassan, PhD.