Before I cancelled my subscription (in a hissy-fit protest against billionaire owner Jeff Bezos), I found the facts of the following from the Washington Post: Michael Protzman, a former Seattle demolition contractor, attracted a following of QAnon conspiracy believers who were so devoted to his prophecies that hundreds of them traveled to Dallas on Nov. 1, 2021, to witness John F. Kennedy and John F. Kennedy, Jr. appear on a grassy knoll adjacent to the assassination site of JFK and proclaim Donald Trump to be “the king of kings.” When the dead Kennedys failed to show, Protzman’s supporters followed him to a nearby Rolling Stones concert, where he said that Keith Richards, Mick Jagger and Steve Jordan would remove their masks and reveal their true identities: JFK, Michael Jackson and Prince, respectively. When that didn’t happen, many members of the group stayed in Dallas for months, and kept raising money from online supporters to pay their bills at the Hyatt Regency. The Dallas fiasco cost Protzman some followers, but it hardened the resolve of the rest. His most devoted believers even refused to believe it when Protzman died in 2023. It’s been said that a cult is built on believing the absurd if the absurd justifies the cult.

“We don’t see things as they are, we see things as we are,” which comes from ancient Jewish texts, is as true today as it’s ever been; belief is a conscious choice. Some of us are more inclined to believe fact-based, provable evidence, some of us believe Fox “news.” It’s hard to walk away from who you are and what you’ve committed to believe, but it is possible with the right evidence presented in the right way.