Join us today as we talk with cult expert Steven Hassan about how to help a loved one who believes in and follows the QAnon conspiracy cult.  Questions we will address include:

  • What is QAnon?
  • Does QAnon qualify as a harmful cult?
  • How is QAnon harming people, families, and our nation?
  • How can you help a loved one who believes in and follows AQnon, or any other destructive cult?

Dr. Steven Hassan’s Reddit AMA (Q&A) at QAnonCasualties entitled “How to Help People Involved in QAnon” can be found here.

Steven’s main web site is: Freedom of Mind.

Books Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

Cult Documentaries Mentioned in Today’s Episode:

 

Download MP3

9 Comments

  1. shawn February 25, 2021 at 11:32 am - Reply

    John,

    Thanks for the much needed, and interesting LDS content you provide. Recognizing that you have to appeal to your base, but believing you may want to maximize human welness, you might want to explore thoughts outside your current tribe. For example, churches need a threat to combat. Human nature provides plenty, labeled as the devil. All political parties need the same.

    Does trump get elected, or does QAnon exist without short comings on the left? Imagine if Hillary could have announced to trump, and the world, “I know a sexual predator when I see one, I divorced one.” If only she, and others on the left would have put principle ahead of the party, they could have had real, lived moral power to stop trump. If you were to add the historical, and current problem areas of the left to the dialogue you may help avoid the back fire affect, and create less extremes on the right.

  2. Holly February 26, 2021 at 12:08 am - Reply

    Thanks for putting this on John. I have been following Steven Hassan and his work for about 5 years now and he continues to impress me. I do have a question for him or for you. Steven spoke about spending time listening to the person in a cult and not debating them but perhaps occasionally sharing with them things that don’t directly remind them of their cult but of a different cult. How does one handle this if the person doesn’t trust fact and doesn’t trust mainstream media and well recognized medical research?

  3. Keith Blonquist February 26, 2021 at 8:28 am - Reply

    I’ve been compiling election statistics, and looking at claims of voter fraud for the last couple of months. So far, I haven’t found any claims that appear very credible, especially when you look at the evidence and numbers. In most cases, the persons claiming voter fraud are (intentionally or unintentionally) not telling the whole story (e.g. cherry-picking data). John, if you are interested in seeing the data that I’ve compiled, reach out to me at my e-mail address.

  4. Dave Green February 28, 2021 at 10:41 am - Reply

    Steven, you mentioned the importance of evidence to support your hypothisis. I would like to know what evidence you have that William Binney and Michael Flynn were involved with QAnon and in what capacity they were involved. How do you know who started QAnon and all the other players who later became involved? This topic leads to so many other questions that demand some reliable answers. I would love to be able to have a dialogue with you Steven about these things. I would be happy if John could somehow put us in touch with each other via email or some other way. Thanks to you and John for sharing your information with us. Dave

  5. Shon Stevens March 1, 2021 at 11:45 am - Reply

    First of all, as Trump supporters we have never believed in QAnon. Yes, there will always be fringe groups, but Steven Hassan is so caught up in his psycho-babble and dissemination of disinformation that he like many others of the liberal left have fully immersed himself into falsifying what has really happened in America. He is arguably more a purveyor of conspiracy theories than the conservative right, who characteristically adhere to moral principle in their fight to preserve the U.S. Constitution, and the freedoms and liberties found therein.

    In regard to the recent presidential election, numerous individuals came forward with substantive evidence of mishandling of ballots in multiple states. The judiciary refused to hear the evidence not because it didn’t exist, but because it did not want to be the first to say the emperor wore no clothes. The news media then used this to support their claim that there was no evidence when the opposite was true.

    The number of extremists who rioted on January 6th are not representive of the nearly 75 million Trump supporters who heard the president’s call to “fight peacefully and patriotically.” Unlike the encouragement and support Nancy Pelosi, Kamala Harris, and other Democrates gave BLM and Antifa during their destructive and riotus behavior in Washington last summer and across America last year, Trump supporters are lawfully minded and want those guilty of breaking the law to be prosecuted.

    As dedicated truth seekers that believe in equal rights we are open minded as we listen to and consider alternative perspective. Unfortunately this podcast was full of left leaning bias and unsupported conjecture, leaving many to be sure that church members and Trump supporters are not welcome.

    • Keith Blonquist March 2, 2021 at 1:16 pm - Reply

      Shon, I have been digging pretty deeply into several claims of voter fraud. I’ve mostly focused on claims related to statistical anomalies, e.g. the lead that Trump had in several key states at midnight on election night, Bellwether counties, etc. So far I haven’t found anything very convincing, but I’m still open to the idea that substantive evidence exists. Can you point me to some of your specific sources? If you are interested in the claims that I’ve looked into, and the data that I’ve found, feel free to reach out to me at my e-mail address: kfblonquist@gmail.com

  6. MarkLee March 1, 2021 at 8:33 pm - Reply

    John, as you know as a missionary we were taught if presented with “Anti-Mormon” material our response was to be something similar to… “if you want to know about the Mormon Church do you ask an enemy of the Church or do you go directly to the source?” Steven having written the book “The Cult of Trump” am I to believe what he says in regards to Trump and Michael Flynn? Is what we learned on our Missions no longer relevant? In regards to QAnon much of what I’ve read about the subject was circulated by my left leaning friends on fb. Why? Probably because this is the narrative pushed on the outlets they listen to along with the “alleged” Russian Collusion. I certainly recognize my right leaning friends weren’t immune either. Question… In regards to the supposed 30,000,000 people in the QAnon “…rabbit hole…” does that include my left leaning friends that also circulated the material or is it exclusive to 40% (4 out of 10) of the 70,000,000+ that voted for Trump? You realize the problem with this format is Michael Flynn wasn’t here to defend himself, would it not be interesting to hear his response? Maybe Steven is 100% correct. The more likely scenario is “some” of what Steven espouses is correct and the remainder is his theory! Whether it’s Trump or Ron Desantis in 2024 have you considered that people might be voting on issues like… Executive orders; biological males competing in women sports; freedom of speech (big tech); right for law abiding citizens to protect themselves; voter id; rights of future women (currently in the womb); peace through strength (foreign policy); open borders during a pandemic; pipe lines (gas prices, dependency on foreign oil, green new deal); defunding or funding blue; term limits (PAC money, lobbyist); health care; reasonable national debt in relation to GDP;… ; …. ;. At some point we really should be talking about mutually agreed upon issues that bring us together rather than Trump Cult theories that drive us apart. Where is the agreement? Are we cool with Women’s Records being shattered by biological men? (maybe so) Are we cool with big tech shutting down front-line doctors speech pre-vaccine? (maybe so). There must be consensus somewhere; yes, no, maybe so? I’m personally not an advocate of either party, I represent the party of “good ideas.” The problem with Washington is there’s too much infighting, the focus needs to be upon mutually agreed upon ideas and representation from people who aren’t influenced by Corporate/Foreign Money and have the attitude of “what’s in the best interest the Country.”

    • John Dehlin March 2, 2021 at 5:03 am - Reply

      False beliefs in the QAnon conspiracy have hurt a lot of people. Much like false beliefs in cults. And in many cases, Mormons and ex-Mormons seem to be heavily involved.

      I’m zero percent embarrassed for highlighting this problem, and attempting to address it.

      John

    • VFanRJ June 19, 2021 at 7:13 am - Reply

      On the 14th the FBI and Homeland Security released a new report on Qanon:
      “A new federal intelligence report warns that adherents of QAnon, the conspiracy theory embraced by some in the mob that stormed the U.S. Capitol, could target Democrats and other political opponents for more violence as the movement’s false prophecies increasingly fail to come true.”
      Of the 400 arrested for the capitol riot, many of those defendants reference Qanon as their motivation. Like other cults, they base their beliefs on first embracing a conspiracy and then finding pseudo evidence to support it.

Leave A Comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.