37: The Ant Hill Kids | Red Thread
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The truck rattled down the dusty road. You'd heard the whispers. This place, the Hill, offered escape from a corrupt world. A strict community where followers found purpose and where others found meaning. Like an army of ants rushing forward as one. Some called it a refuge for the lost. Others spoke of the leader's ability to cleanse the dirt from souls themselves. Arriving at the secluded outpost, you're guided into a dimly lit building. The air is noticeably thick with incense, chants low and rhythmic.

It felt ritualistic, like a place heavy with secrets. A robed figure hands you a bitter drink. This will purify you, they say with a low growl. You drink, feeling the room pulse, the energy rising. But then everything changes in an instant. The quiet chanting shifts to a pounding bass. The robes vanish, replaced by leather and sequins. You blink in confusion as people dance around you, laughing and smearing themselves with copious amounts of...

of baby oil. So much baby oil, you begin to wonder if perhaps there was an unlimited supply somewhere nearby. The air now reeked of cologne and sweat. A voice boomed from the back of the room, there in the middle of the chaos sits a man on a large white couch, laughing maniacally.

pee diddy. A neon sign above him flashes, welcome to the freak-off. He grins amidst the chaos. The air buzzes with electricity as partygoers wave marital aids like trophies. It was too much for you to bear. You look around, disorientated, where you catch sight of a large mirror on the far wall. Stumbling towards it, you wipe away a smear of baby oil from the glass, desperate for clarity. But the reflection that stares back at you isn't your own. It's Jeffrey Epstein's.

Come on. Come on. That's it? No way. I was expecting more. Come on. I was like, that was going to keep going on. I did what you wanted. I made it Jeffrey Epstein. You know what? Yeah, I liked it. I'm not a hater. I just thought I'd keep going.

I can't go further on the Jeffrey Epstein trade. That's how all of them should end. Just you are Jeffrey Epstein. You look in the mirror. That's what good writing is.

Thank you. Thank you, Jackson, for that. That was incredible. I'm glad that's how we open the story of extreme physical and sexual violence. So you know what? I'm proud of you. Hey, we're getting all the laughs out of the way first so that we can spend the next hour crying. And now, Caleb will not laugh. Not once. Oh my god, bro. I didn't know this was this. I didn't know this was what this was about.

Are you not aware of this story? I know of it. My girlfriend's talked about it a lot. Yeah, she made a video, right? I think I've seen her video about it. I'm pretty sure. Yeah, I think so. I'm pretty sure she did. I don't know. I just have a way with just not listening when she's talking.

I don't know what's usually happening, but I don't keep track of that. No, I have a base familiarity, but I'm going to be learning a lot today. I'm the viewer as well. You're specifically talking about the actual topic of the episode, which is the anthill kids. I'm sure you know a lot about Jeffrey Epstein and P. Diddy, both of which have nothing to do with this. Just so people are clear, there's no connection between, as far as I know, the anthill kids and those individuals. I mean, there might be. Who knows with P.

P Diddy and Jeffrey Epstein at this point this story I actually feel the need to up front say this is an extremely fucked up story if you guys are a bit sensitive out there maybe put this one away because this is fucking wild Isaiah this was one of the first videos I saw of yours and that video is what taught me about this generally speaking

I'm both flattered and sorry that you had to find out about this. Yeah, it's one of the first video, earliest videos on my channel, or at least earliest ones that popped off. So like my channel really kicked off with like the disturbing movie iceberg. You know, that was like the first thing that got me any clout. And then this video was... Hold on, I could tell you. Thank God the anthill kids didn't get you clout. Oh, wait, no, the anthill kids, I was wrong. It...

Wait, does it predate? Am I losing my mind? Where's the disturbing movie iceberg? What was your first video? How long into your illustrious YouTube career was this? The Ant Hill Kids video was one, two, three, four, five, six videos after the disturbing movie iceberg. To give you an idea, the Ant Hill Kids was my first sponsored video. So it's the first video I've ever had a sponsorship on. It was a really big deal. I think it was right after I hit 100,000 subscribers, I'm pretty sure. Uh...

So yeah, that's when your YouTube career began. No YouTube career is a career until you start getting sponsorship offers. Yeah, yeah. So in that case, this is my first video. You know, this is your first YouTuber video. Yeah, it's my first YouTuber video. Also, I want to mention, Caleb, I go to look at Chris's video to make sure she did make one about it, and she recorded it in your setup, in the chair you are sitting in right now. So...

And you're like, I don't remember what she did. That's very funny. So think about him every night to record her videos in your setup and you don't know. It's funny. Think about it this way. The chair you are sitting in right now knows about the anthill kids and you don't. It's a hell of a chair. I tell you what. Hell of a chair. I love it.

But yeah, so yeah, very familiar with the anthill kids. And yeah, a lot of people, I think, found out about it through me, which was a very humbling experience from the get-go. I feel like I said a lot, and maybe it shows how overwhelmingly naive that I am, but it's such an alien experience.

seeing humans or people in general this depraved. Every time you go in and you see this kind of thing happen, it's like, how? How did this happen in the world? How did someone have this much evil inside them where they act out in this way? It's such a foreign...

It is genuinely like looking at aliens, which is scary because I feel like it probably is me being like extremely naive, right? Like we probably, there's, there is a lot of evil in the world and I probably a very sheltered person, but it's, it's so fucking, so fucking wild. It's, it's, it fucks with me. Like reading, even reading it, like reading a book or something. I've been rereading some pretty interesting books with my mom. My mom is really, we used to be really big into horror.

uh, and just like really fucked up, insane depraved books. Um, and all these stories like nothing aliens and ghosts and stuff don't make her scared at all. But if she reads about like a serial killer that makes her scared for some reason. So, uh, we've been, uh, reading different, uh, different books and we've read, um, uh, we read Helter Skelter, we've read blood Meridian and we've read, um, shit. What else? Uh,

It just came in the mail. It's Skeleton Key, Stephen King, something like that. It's short stories. It's like a collection of short stories. That was her request. Some of the stuff, I can't even... I'm like, this is fucking crazy. I can watch...

you know, someone die on X all day long. It's crazy. You just get shown that all day, every single day. I'm just like, fuck, just get the fuck. But reading it is like you were actually in a sense participating in it mentally. And it's worse. It's more repulsive.

Yeah, I hate it. You get a deeper insight into the psyche of the people involved. I hate it, yeah. Just watching a random trending gore video on Twitter or X or whatever that's just on the feed, that shit served up to you at the moment. You see it for five seconds and you're kind of, it's sad, but you're kind of desensitized to it at this point in the span of your life and the internet.

But then actually going into detail and reading about the horrifying things that people can do to one another over long durations of time and getting an insight into their psyche and their experiences that way is just so deeply different in my eyes. It's very confronting. And not to equate this to a fictional story, but I'm just talking about reading general depravity and positing it in your mind as real.

Some stuff is. Like, you mentioned Blood Meridian. That was based off a real gang who did that. And a lot of the brutality from that story is taken from the autobiography about a surviving member of the gang. So, I mean, like, yeah, a lot of the fiction we draw comes from, you know, these points of depravity as well. But yeah, it's a lot to think about. So, you know, at your discretion.

Oh, I'm just doing a lot of research at the moment into John Wayne Gacy as well for a different series, podcast series that I'm working on. But is there any connection between Stephen King's It and John Wayne Gacy? Like, was it written at a time when John Wayne Gacy was like kind of blowing up, for lack of a better word? I'm sure it was inspired by. I think it was 1984 the book was written.

Yeah, and Gacy was what, 70s, right? Yeah, 70s. I think end of 70s. Yeah, it came afterwards. So, yeah, there's no direct tie-ins, but I mean, it's hard to argue that there was zero influence because, you know, John Wayne Gacy was like a creepy clown. Right.

right and then a book is written about a clown that kills children right i know it's more complex than that in the plot but that's the that's the front facing giant turtle cosmic turtle right because it becomes more than that but the initial attractor is that it is a clown a creepy scary visceral part is that there's a clown going around killing people which i feel like is very gacy-esque

Stephen King is such a fucking prolific writer. Weird. I read it for the first time very recently, and I'm sure you guys know the scene that I'm talking about towards the end. I'm speechless. It's so weird. Why? Why did he write that? It was a different time, man. No.

See, we're just dudes being dudes. It's just words, man. They're not real. You can't write about child gang scenes anymore because of woke. Yeah, exactly. Holy shit.

The 80s was a different time. It's my mom. That's how I started even reading is my mom gave me a signed copy of it because her sister lives is Stephen King's was Stephen King's neighbor in Maine. Oh, wow. And like the 90s. And so like that was one of the very first books I read. And my mom did not. She did not. She took that part out or like don't reach that part out. Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

Exactly. It's so funny. It's, it's, yeah, it's crazy. It's like, I get it. I get, you know, art is art. You should be able to write about whatever you want, et cetera, et cetera. But like, I think it says something about the author. If you include something like that without there being any direct real purpose or need to include it, it really felt like such a weird inclusion into an otherwise good story and good, uh, good book.

It's a great book. That part's weird. Stephen King is a weird guy. Just pointless. It felt like such a tonally weird choice. You'd have to be looking really hard for that part to make sense as to why you would add it. Yeah, so weird. There was camaraderie already fairly well established, guys. Yeah, I think they got along. We get it, we get it. Yeah.

that was the point where they became mature they all love each other they're all friends yeah we understand brother holy fuck point of it if i remember right was like they had to uh they had to lose their innocence right they didn't grow up or whatever i would have rather them done literally anything else i'd rather than like do drugs beat up each other get into a fight

Do you taxes something? Get just literally anything else other than what happened. Anything else in the world. But Isaiah, it's a coming of age story.

I would rather them evade each other, just like cannibals, just like tore each other up. I'd be like, yeah, that's the point across. Yeah, I'd rather them go full Lord of the Flies than what Stephen King said happened. And then let's remember that these characters are still friends afterwards and friends for the foreseeable future, which is so weird. Imagine being friends with a group of people that you ran a train with when you were younger while you fought an alien clown.

So fucking weird. Yeah, it's weird. Stephen King, you weirdo. That was absolutely drug-fueled or something. Yeah, coke-fueled for sure.

Well, most of his books are, but... P. Diddy, Jeffrey Epstein, Stephen King's It series, all things not connected to the Anne Hill kids. Right. Totally not relevant. But this just shows how much we don't want to talk about the Anne Hill kids, really. It's fucked, man. But...

Yeah, I guess we should start real quick though. The show notes are in the description below if you want to see our sources for the research and stuff. This document and script was created by my girlfriend and it's her birthday today. So a very big happy birthday goes out to her on the show. I'm sure she'd appreciate hearing that. And a big thank you to her for writing this as well. She does fantastic work that we very appreciate. Happy birthday.

Thank you. I mean, thank you on her behalf. I will collect her birthday wishes. They're mine. Deliver them. No. This episode was brought to you by AG1, so you can check out the description if you'd like a free bottle of D3K2 and five free travel packs. More from them later on in the show. Big thank you to them as well.

slightly more important than my girlfriend and birthday so thank you to ag1 for that um yeah who wants to start this rock paper scissors i'll take it i'll take it i've traveled these roads once before i'll run it down you can take the entire document how about that i'll do it

I do it on Creepcast. I read everything and Hunter just sits there and he's like, wow. He just giggles. That's pretty funny. He giggles, yeah. He's just there as an audience stand-in. Alright, just read this first part. This kind of first part gives a pretty good prelude to it. Alright, so...

It was the late evening of September 28, 1978. Solans Waller, a 20-year-old woman, stood on the outskirts of a remote Quebec commune, staring into the dark woods that surrounded her. Behind her, nestled deep in the wilderness, lay the crude encampment of the Ant Hill Kids, a commune led by a man who once called himself a prophet, Rock Thoreau.

Rock Terrio? I've always said Thoreau. Rock Thoreau or Terrio. Terrio? I mean, who cares? They get the jokes. Who cares? I don't care to pronounce his name right. Fuck that guy. Yeah, fuck that guy. Bro. Solans, like the others, had once believed in Terrio. His charm and promise of protection lured them in, but what started as a peaceful commune had turned into a nightmare of control and cruelty.

Thoreau had banned many things, chief among them outside medical help, claiming to his followers that only he had the power to heal. That's a great sign. If someone says that only they have the power to heal, fuck modern medicine. That's usually a very good sign, actually. You probably know what he's talking about and you should trust that guy. Yeah, especially if he lives in a commune in the woods. Yep.

That day, he decided to perform a divine surgery on Solans. Strapped down, she faced no medical aid, but only horror. By morning, Solans was dead, but the story does not end there. What followed, and indeed preceded these events, is one of the most horrifying stories of individual depravity that has existed. Before we talk about that, though, we need to talk about Theriot himself. Ooh, Caleb, I think you can take this part. There's nothing really egregious about it.

fucked up here he's ugly this guy's real funny looking well he looks like a he looks like a pretty typical doomsday cultist to me someone that would uh kind of live in an underground bunker and only come out for supplies uh for audio listeners how how would we describe this kind of like a it looks like a middle earth dwarf kind of like a bald head dwarf eyebrows slash resputin maybe

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Rasputin's a good one. Very thick beard, like chest length beard, it looks like. Good skin complexion. I'll give him that. But other than that, he does look to be like a very unhinged individual. Receding hairline, obviously, all the way back.

Rock was born in New Brunswick, Canada on May 16th, 1947 and raised a French-Canadian family of seven. Rock has said that he was abused by his father as a child, but there is no actual evidence of such events. While often described as quite intelligent, Rock dropped out of school in the seventh grade, claiming to suffer from a stomach ailment, and he began teaching himself the Old Testament of the Bible.

He grew up in a very Catholic household and at this point in his life was still entrenched in this religion. He had at this point developed a fascination with apocalyptic prophecies and the idea of a vengeful God from his interpretations of religious texts. As he entered his teenage years, Rock formed a bad drinking problem, something that would carry through with him the rest of his life. He would often have aggressive outbursts to those close to him.

So the Old Testament of the Bible, Isaiah, that's the more hardcore one, right? The one that wasn't changed for modern sensibilities. Yeah, well, I mean, none of it was changed for modern sensibilities. It was just functionally different. So the Old Testament is pre-Christ.

The differentiation between the Old and New Testament is before and after Christ. So, the law, the stories of the Old Testament are typically more rigid, typically tends to be a lot more violent, tends to be a lot more brutal. Because it is a very black and white, yes in the law, no out of the law, judgments tend to be much harsher. It's typically associated with more violence and heaviness, right, than the New Testament. Yeah.

Do religious people choose one or the other to focus on, or is it like they take both? Not typically. It's typically a problem if they do, because the Old Testament, like...

All of it, like as a Christian, all of it is still, you know, holy and all of it is still something to live towards. But that doesn't mean that the rules they followed are the same ones we follow now. If anything, the New Testament of the Bible is the one that Christians should base their life off of because that is everything to do with Christ, right? Yeah, that's what I'm saying. So what does this say about a person?

If someone has a specific interest in the Old Testament, it implies that they have an interest with the stories of damnation, of heavy-handed judgment, of stuff like that. Or at least it does in Rock's case. Without knowing much about it, to me, it sounds like the Old Testament was intended to be like, this is what the world looked like before Christ. Like an untamed wilderness that was very...

very scary and full of awful things. And then with the New Testament, it sounds like through faith and Christ, the world became a lot nicer. Is that kind of... Yeah, with the caveat that the Old Testament was written by the people in the time, like it's all accounts taken at that moment. So it's like the people who are writing it, they have prophecy of Christ and stuff like that, but they don't have...

Uh, it's not like they're writing retrospectively about how things used to be. They're just writing about how things are. And it just so happens that the way things are is violent and, you know, a lot of bloodshed and stuff like that. Um, so they have prophecy of Christ coming of things getting better, but they don't, but,

But it's like all parts of the Bible, except for some exceptions like the book of Chronicles, are like current perspective. So during the Old Testament, things were worse off in the New Testament. Things were...

I won't say better because most of the New Testament authors were in jail, but we have Jesus, so that was better. That's an upgrade. That's an upgrade. It's worth waiting for. It's like, well, at least he came. At least that guy, at least it meant something. Yeah. I'm still going to die, but it turns out they weren't lying. That would have been awkward if you didn't show up. Christ sure can be born in Bethlehem. So, yeah. Yeah. I'm sure they were happy when that happened for multiple reasons.

Okay, Isaiah, would you like to take the beginnings? Yes, so...

Rock had intense beliefs that there would be a world-ending war between good and evil that would take place in February of 1979, and to be fair, the Iranian Revolution and the Chinese-Vietnamese War did both occur in February of 1979. However, I would argue that most people in our audience probably didn't know those existed. Or Rock, for that point. Or Rock for that matter, yeah. That's a lucky guess. He was talking about that.

it was that time period as well. You could go to any month and that's, I think that's what we did with this research document. We just like search up things that happened in February, 1979. Yeah. You could do that for any month in that time period. And there was probably a new war prop, like popping up or a new conflict somewhere. Yeah. We were involved. CIA. Yeah. You, you were involved in everything. Good. Good job. Especially me. USA. USA. Yeah.

You're the best at wars. We're the best at starting wars. We can't help it. We're just the best at everything. Can't help it, dude. Except for education, economy. I don't know. I don't know. I don't fucking know. I feel the best, and that's all that matters. No one's ever had an economy like ours, so we're number one at what we do.

Y'all got Atwoods out there in New Zealand or wherever the fuck you are? Didn't think so, brother. We ain't even in their race. We're one lap ahead because we're in a different game already. Number one all around. USA, USA.

Yes, sir. You guys are joking, but this is what Americans actually sound like to an outsider, by the way. You know what you sound like to me? Rubbish, rubbish, icy poles. G'day, mate. G'day, mate. Shrimp on the barbie. G'day, mate. Dingo ate my baby, it did.

Shrimp on the barbie. You're speaking Australian hate from the Old Testament, I see. I thought the New Testament was all about loving thy neighbor and shit. No, that's the Torah. It is, but if you get to the end of it, there's like this little parenthesis that says none of this applies to Australia. Damn technicalities. Always fucking me up. It's that Pentateuch technicality.

That was actually like on the Sermon on the Mount when Jesus was ascending into heaven. Everyone says his last words were like, you know, walk and not be hurt, you know, step over coals, whatever his actual last words were. Don't tell any of this to Australia. And he meant the whole Bible, which is why you all are the way that you are. Godless realm, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Oceania, the godless realm of Oceania. Mm-hmm. Yep.

What you don't know, though, is he's up there in heaven right now, chowing down on some icy poles. So we won him over eventually. We got him. Don't you put that on him. Don't you put that on him. It's blasphemous to deny your lord and savior or god icy poles. Don't call it icy poles. Don't call it icy poles. I'm going to tell the church immediately. Kill the heretic.

When you wake up in the middle of the night, you'll see me standing over your bed, Jackson. So Rock, he had come to despise the Catholic religion and converted to the Seventh-day Adventist church where he supposedly began to follow their strict lifestyle rules. No drugs, no smoking, or processed unhealthy foods. That sounds healthy. That's probably good.

That's probably good. That's a healthy life choice. No alcohol, no drugs, no smoking. Most Seventh-day Adventists I know are very traditional about that stuff. Isn't vegetarianism kind of common in Seventh-day Adventism as well? I'm pretty sure. They're very big clean eating. They're similar to like Quakers, I believe, in a lot of their dietary stuff. And I know that vegetarianism is a thing seen in some Quaker communities, I'm pretty sure. It's all about clean eating and stuff like that, yeah.

It's weird, since you usually associate, like, vegetarianism and veganism with alternate lifestyles. People who aren't necessarily religious, but more, like, spiritual, I guess, in other ways. Yeah. That's who I usually associate it with, not religious people. Religious people, I usually...

consider more traditional and you know uh meat eaters most of the time you're right but when you get into some uh some offshoot religions there's different beliefs and stuff there's a lot of crossover between stuff i think you might be conflating uh christians with the stereotype of the southern south the american south is what you might be yeah

Probably. Amen, brother. You're right. You're absolutely right. Don't you forget it. The cities are usually godless realms of despair, whereas I do feel like the South and those kind of rural areas are more religious, right? Is that a misconception?

I don't know. Well, they call it the Bible Belt, like the area through Southern Appalachia and stuff like that. Yeah, that's what I mean. So it is stereotypically Christian for sure. But Christian influence exists all over the country. The country is, what, 70% Christian, 67% something like that?

But definitely, it is more culturally believed to be a Southern thing. So there's a lot of people conflate the two a lot. Yep. Fair enough. It's weird. Vermont, Maine, and Massachusetts, and New Hampshire are the least devout states in the country.

Are they all city states? I believe it. Have you ever met them? Those areas are quite rural outside of maybe Massachusetts and Vermont, but it's just all old rich people. It's got a lot of farmland and stuff outside of Boston, of course, and the coast. Are they like the northern states on the Canadian border? Yeah, they're north of the Mason-Dixon line. Maybe it's proximity to Canada equals less religious, like, you know,

Belief. Canada is also a British... It's not, but it is a European... How do I say this? Canada is a European settled area similar to Australia. It's part of Great Britain until 1985, bud. Exactly, exactly. And you could say, well, isn't the United States that? No, we shot all those people. We shot all of those people.

Queen's still on the money, bud. We removed any remote level of British influence whatsoever. They burnt our White House down in 1812. They burnt our White House down. Absolutely. You know what? We came back. We slept sore. Colonel Jackson went down there with his cannons. He sent them back and he sent them back over the road. So anyway, we have to get through this document. I'm sorry. America's a sir friendly. I will sit here and beat up Jackson for hours over being Australian if we don't. And I'll help.

Yeah. Just hours straight of like, in 1814 we took a little trip. You big strong Americans ganging up in a small... Fired our guns and the British kept coming. Alright, that's awesome. Continue, please, before I break down into tears. Yeah, so Rock was... It wouldn't be the first time I've made a Brit cry.

Converged to Seventh-day Adventist Church. Utilizing his charm, Rock formed a small religious group of his own, managing to convince several individuals to abandon their families, homes, and jobs to follow him into the wilderness. His initial followers were often people going through personal struggles, those who felt isolated or unfulfilled in their lives. And Rock preyed on their vulnerabilities, offering them a sense of purpose and community.

In one instance, he met Giselle, a deeply religious woman from the Seventh-day Adventist congregation, and charmed her into becoming one of his first devoted followers. Brock was evidently very charismatic and had grand ideas about who he was and what he could do as he proclaimed himself a prophet under the new name

moise which is moses in french yeah it's still like we've talked about this so much it shouldn't surprise me at this point but it still does surprise me just how how capable people are of you know recruiting people to go do these things like yeah strip all senses of their identity their jobs uh run away from their families and stuff it it takes a special skill to be able to do that uh

or those people need to be in such horrible conditions in the first place for that to be an interesting offer. I just try to put myself in their shoes and I try to do that a lot. I'm imagining some guy coming up to me in the street and not that it would happen this way, obviously, in this situation, but telling me, I got to calm you down in the woods. You should ditch everything and come join me. And me saying yes to that sounds so fucking...

foreign and not right. I think just a lot of people don't feel safe or like they belong. And that's really... Just from what I've learned about cults and this type of thing, and just in general, I mean, like the government, it even transcends to any sort of authority relationship. People just want to be safe and to feel like they don't have to necessarily look out for themselves. Not saying that they... It's like a conscious thing people do. But...

I mean, I want to feel safe and my mind is different from people who are, you know, who have gone through a lot or, you know, just have had terrible lives up into a certain point. And then they find someone who offers them what they don't have, which is safety, something totally intangible. Um, and it's just like, it makes sense. It makes sense why people get, why people get misled.

It doesn't mean they're stupid or anything. No, no, absolutely. I don't think they're stupid or anything. It's just like they must have been in such a destitute position where this guy...

Seemed like a safe figure, I guess. But he was charismatic, obviously. But I feel like they should have an element of safety in their lives where they don't feel the need to look outward. And I think it was like a situation where these people needed someone to lead them and someone to follow, basically. Like, there's people out there like that that need that kind of

that kind of person in their life. Like you said, I think it ties into safety and feeling safe and secure. Yeah, I understand it. It's like, I totally get it. It's like some people

I don't know if you guys have ever just felt like you're never... You don't have that option to feel safe. You don't feel safe with just yourself. And I'm not even talking about being killed or you're in danger or anything like that, but it's just like you're uneasy and you always have to keep finding and trying new things to try to fill some kind of gap. Yeah, that I get. People turn to drugs, they turn to other addictions, just bad things, and then

uh that's a coping mechanism yeah yeah exactly coping mechanisms and just feeling like a level of camaraderie or safety and just all that stuff it's super super super powerful that's why like i don't know there's a lot of a lot of crossovers that i won't make on public television or public video but i have a lot of examples of this that people do and probably don't even realize yeah you actually yeah yeah i think i think it's not that disconnected from that idea then yeah

I agree. It's a, yeah. I mean, anyone, you know, in the wrong place at the right time can fall victim to all kinds of stuff, you know? Yeah. It's just like doing that though. Like being that kind of guy that's walking around, talking to people and convincing them to join, join the cult. I feel like all it takes is like one person saying no to that and then telling their friends like, Whoa, what's this fucking weirdo doing? I feel like that's all it would take for that to happen.

kind of crumble the facade typically people who have a ton of friends and uh things are going well in their life aren't the people who fall for this kind of thing it's people who are isolated and stuff yeah these guys these people are good at identifying that as well it never starts with a cult step it's just like a very charismatic fun guy who wants to be your friend and then from there the deception begins i could talk you into all kinds of stuff right now jackson if i wanted to i'm not going to i'm not talking to this fucking podcast what the fuck

now I'm laughing at people dying all the time look at that fuck look at see look what I did you talked him into that you can't talk me into anything he actually didn't talk me into anything he's like I'm on a boat I got an idea and I was like let's do it brother I mean I want to laugh at dead people it was awesome

It was cool. That's actually how it went, too. That is exactly what happened, yeah. Word for word, yeah. Yeah, I guess it is possible for people to be talked to a cult then very easily, clearly. Rock and his new followers, approximately a dozen people, formed a commune in Santa Marie in Quebec. What was originally supposed to be a free space for people to listen to Rock's motivational spiritual speeches and a place to live in unity, quickly turned into a living nightmare.

While we don't have direct transcripts of his speeches, former followers have provided general descriptions of his speeches. Sermons often contain the following themes. So among these was apocalyptic prophecies. He would repeatedly warn of an imminent global disaster or war, which he claimed only his group would survive. Another thing he claimed was divine authority. He declared himself a messiah and claimed that he had a direct connection with God.

Continuing, he claimed purity and self-sacrifice, enforcing people to abstain from alcohol and tobacco. This is like the classic playbook. This is everything. Yeah, yeah. And then finally, an anti-Catholic sentiment. So while raised Catholic, Theriot felt, or he came to despise the church and used his speeches to criticize its authority, positioning himself as an alternative for churchgoers who felt disenfranchised and unrewarded for their faith.

Yeah, makes sense. I mean, this is literally every single cult. Yeah, it's all pretty textbook. Abstain from worldly pleasure, divine. You know, like, I have a direct line to God. There's an event coming that I can keep you safe from. Yeah, it's typical. I have a direct connection because I preach purity and stuff, and also the other religions suck. So hang out with me and the sad guys.

Real quick, though, I'm just going to cut in here with a quick word from our sponsors of this episode and back in. I'll take the next part, Isaiah, because I haven't spoken much yet. And then, yeah, we can continue from there. So everyone had to give up all their belongings and were forbidden from contacting their families or other churches.

Rock's ever-growing fear of the end of the world continued to build, consistently preaching about how God had warned him of the end. This, of course, made the followers even more anxious and, as a result, more dependent on Rock, of course. They relocated in 1978 to Gaspé Peninsula near a mountain Rock coined Eternal Mountain, which sounds like a super old

uh like animated movie or something it sounds like a kid's movie to me yeah it's like a he-man yeah kind of yeah yeah after the seventh day adventist church became uncomfortable with his growing influence they were like yo this dude this dude's weird he's stealing all of our members what's up with that okay so rock was able to afford the land for his commune largely through the financial contributions of his followers unsurprisingly

The scam happened very quickly. Many of the people who joined the group were convinced to give up their personal savings and assets. Rock also exploited government welfare programs to fund his lifestyles, encouraging his followers to apply for social assistance, which they would then pull together. Already hate him. Like, abusing welfare.

That's, uh, what's-his-face did that. Jim Jones. Jim Jones did that a ton. Yeah. I like welfare systems for people that need welfare, but good God, I hate knowing that. Call me controversial, but I don't like welfare systems when they're being abused by a political leader. Only brave statements on this podcast. Mic drop. Mic drop, dude. That's my platform that I'll run on. Stealing people's money is bad.

I don't care about stealing. Well, I do, but like knowing that taxpayer money, like my money. I'm not saying stealing the taxpayers, but I'm saying stealing money from your congregants in your own private religion is bad. Yeah. Rock didn't do much good. Let's put it that way. Not a fan. I'll take Bozo. Since many of the Ant Hill kids followers had children, they were able to collect welfare payments and child benefits from the Canadian government.

Rock kept tight control over the funds, using them to purchase land and supplies for the commune. Money was always tight somehow still, and they earned what little they had by selling baked goods and crafts on top of that. Unhappy with the pittance coming in from baked goods and welfare fraud, which is...

A wild sentence. The tension within the commune was thick frequently as Rock would get angry if they did not bring in enough money. You piece of shit. You're not happy with the welfare fraud that you're committing? Like, that's not enough money for you? You need more welfare fraud? Well, that's also like... Like, Rock's a smart guy. I mean, obviously evil, but he's like... He's planned in his evil. In order to keep someone subjugated, you have to...

mix the you know boy string with fear right it's the same way abusive relationships work right like you spend a while being very coddling and loving and then you're aggressive and mean so that way they don't get too brave and feel like they can leave or do something on their own you don't want them getting too much independence so you break that down and then immediately you go back to the coddling and the loving which is where they uh then trust their

Yeah, I love bombing. What do they call that? I mean, is it just called the cycle of abuse? Is that what the... Yeah, the cycle of abuse. I swear it's called something else. Maybe. I don't remember. But yeah, very effective because it kind of like keeps the victims in a perpetual state of mental confusion. Even if subconsciously they feel like they can't do anything independently. Yeah.

They also desire, you know, they're humans. They desire love and affection and companionship. And you set yourself up as the only way for them to achieve that because you're going to break down anything else they do. So they eventually enter into this area of like, you know, remorseful. What's the word I'm looking for? Negligible like attempts at stuff rather because it's easier to just do whatever you say because that's how they get the love they need.

Yeah. I think there's like, I mean, I think there's research that says the sudden flip between extreme emotional ends, extremes, like you said, the love bombing and then like the abuse, they're so drastically different. And when done in short proximity to one another, it basically like just mentally confuses the fuck out of people to the point where they can't.

they can't figure out what is abuse and what is love so it all becomes kind of like the same thing and it's just completely brain breaking which makes sense people are weird that's what I'm taking away from this guys am I right? yeah brother there we go

Okay, so the exploitative aspect of the cult began immediately at the new compound with Rock spending his days relaxing, you know, sipping on Mai Tais, sitting on a bench as he would watch on as his now devoted followers started to build their little town from scratch, like ants working tirelessly on an anthill. In fact, that's where the name itself of the cult was born from.

Rock likened their work to that of ants, constantly busy, industrious and building.

Rock ordered his followers to engage in endless grueling manual labor, often for no clear reason other than to keep them exhausted and compliant. One example of this was his demand that the group continuously dig and build even when it wasn't necessary. They constructed their commune in the wilderness, which were obviously untamed conditions, and he would regularly have them clear the land to build and rebuild structures over and over again. The followers were essentially forced to work endlessly.

Calling them his ants and preoccupying them with menial and physically demanding but ultimately meaningless tasks was in of itself a tactic. His goal was to break down their sense of independence so that they would be easy to control and manipulate. I mean, yeah, if you're doing like physical labor all day, you're not going to be in any, you're not going to have any energy to put up like a mental shield basically against these manipulations. I'd be so tired.

Yeah. Physical labor is, is will breaking genuinely. Yeah. I feel for people who work very difficult, tough jobs. Yeah. And then you hit your, you know, your forties and fifties and your body is broken from it as well. Yeah. My, uh, my dad's a farrier. So like, that's like a fucking difficult, uh,

Job and I think I get I definitely attribute my work ethic to that just like how tired he was all the time It's like I totally understand. That's that's yeah, that's fucking crazy. That's actually a unique tool Hmm to use to tire people out to just be able to kind of control them and take power over them. It's weird totally makes sense though Yeah, it does. Yeah, no not an envious position to be in that kind of now, you know day-to-day manual labor aspect and

I spent so much of my life waking up tired. It's a bit of an oxymoron when you think about it, right? Waking up tired. That sounds stupid, but it is real and it sucks. Knowing that you're going to spend a lot of your day tired, it just saps the energy out of your day even more. Even more than just being tired itself does. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy at that point, really. It just...

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Another aspect of this was the constant doomsday proselytizing. The problem with speaking of doomsdays and indeed assigning dates to them is that eventually that date will come and pass without much of an effect.

I did not write that joke, by the way, just for clarity. No, that was your joke. Own it.

thank you brother for writing me such an excellent quip hopefully we got a few titters from the audience um it's

It's hard to believe that anyone would buy this, but there were several aspects working against the Anteo kids. Stunt cost fallacy, they had already interested so much time and energy into the cult, a need for salvation born from fear of the end times, the charismatic nature of Rock himself, and of course being too tired to think straight from all the building of trenches. It's really easy to do that, to just be like, well, it hasn't come because of this. It's easy to justify things. It's really simple, especially...

Well, the whole, hey, who's talking to God here, buddy? All right. Now, listen, he said it'd be this time. Clearly, it's a different time zone. All right. I'm talking to God and you expect him to be in your area code. Come on. Let's be reasonable. Celestial Thunder Time. God slept through his alarm clock. That's what happened. That's why he didn't show up. Happens to the best of us. Classic. Happens all the time. Isaiah, you can take this whole segment because I don't want to read it.

Yippee! Great. Rock had simply gained complete control over his followers. No longer was he a motivational speaker, but he was instead a controlling and already abusive slave owner. The commune was secluded and kept away from the outside world. No one was allowed to talk to each other without Rock's permission or his presence.

wanting to grow the group all of the women were told that they had to marry him and provide the cult children in the end rock had eight wives and 23 children in total every cult leader does the same thing it's always oh i have to get that you don't get them pregnant i get them pregnant every time yeah that's the classic his followers were stripped of their identities and they all wore the same style of tunic representing unity and equality among the group

Due to no one speaking out against Rock, with it being impossible to do so, there was an element of groupthink where no one wanted to act out of the norm in fear of ostracization. In fear of ostrich... ostrich... ostrich... ostrichization. What the fuck? Ostrichize?

ostracize ostracization ostracization ostracization yes yes i just i just needed a minute to figure that one it's a big one right yeah yeah yeah these all tennessee boys i don't think more than two syllables at a time i should make a great sandwich i never seen an ostrich that big i tell you what

Rock used this to his advantage and was very quickly willing to push the line further and further. There was no line, by the way, with Rock. Spoiler alert. This guy did not believe in lines. Rock told his followers that any punishment he inflicted upon them was simply because God told him to do it. He would spy on them, and if someone wished to leave, they would be punished by being beaten, hung from the ceiling, and having individual hairs plucked from their bodies. In some cases, Rock would even defecate on them.

Around 1980, there were approximately 30 to 40 members of the Angel Kids. In 1984, they relocated out of Quebec to Burnt River in central Ontario. Rock wanted to purify members of their sins and believed that the only way to do so was to beat them.

Efficient and expert psychological manipulation, isolation from society, emotional and psychological dependency, religious and apocalyptic subtext, and a growing dependence on the group for basic needs. These were all reasons why it was possible for a group of 30 to 40 adults to be willing to let a grown man defecate on them frequently and beat them relentlessly.

And then there's a few pictures here of him sitting on his throne, which looks like a very comfortable, plush, giant white seat. The robes are basically just like red skirts, it looks like. Kind of like Tibetan monk kind of aesthetic.

Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if rocks was a different color because that sounds like something, you know, something that a cult leader would do. Yeah. But yeah, they're all just... It's like he has his own, like, ancient harem around him at all times. Psychopathic and unchallenged aspects of rock became bored by the same activities that once brought him the serotonin he craved.

Ouch.

In cold months, followers would be made to sit outside naked while being whipped and beaten, or brought in to sit on lit stoves burning themselves. Abuse didn't just come from his hands as he forced them to inflict physical and psychological pain by shooting and taunting one another. No individuals were spared, not even the children. As Rock would sexually and physically abuse the children,

He had a desire to turn cult members against each other often, and in the case of the children, would make them throw rocks at one another during punishments. How... Was he born this evil? What do you think? Do you think he developed it over time? Or was he just... Are people just born this way?

I mean, it's a question of nature versus nurture. What causes it? I think in most cases, it's a combination of the two. He probably had some pre-existing status of his mind that made him very eager for the suffering of others. I don't think there's ever a case of someone being purely nature or purely nurture. Yeah.

So, like, you're born with the capability of it, but if the nurturing is maladjusted or whatever, then it's possible to turn out this way. But you have to already have the pre-ability to. Sometimes, or sometimes, maybe if it's enough, you know, terror that happens to people, maybe people who aren't predisposed to it at all can become this length. I don't know. Yeah.

It is a cruel world and cruel things happen. You know, I think people can give themselves to... I think we are beings of free will and people can turn themselves over to as much evil as they desire. And if you never put the brakes on it, I think things like this can happen. Rock would sexually abuse and manipulate members of the commune. He would put tight rubber bands around the testicles of the men and then cut them off. Oh, fuck.

Why? Members were prostituted in exchange for basics such as meat and milk. It would not be an understatement to say that Rock was potentially the cruelest person to have ever inflicted evil upon this earth. Living with him must have felt like being on a knife's edge, never knowing what would set him off and what punishment would be delivered. One child, a newborn baby, was left outside by their mother, Elazar Lavelle, in an attempt to hide them from the abuse of their leader. The baby ended up dying from the freezing temperature.

Another baby also shared the same fate. It's the baby of Giselle and Jacquees Gagier was placed outside in freezing temperatures as punishment for crying in rocks presence. I think it's, I think that's pronounced Jack, like Jack, Jack. Yeah. Jacques. Yeah. Jacques. Probably. Yeah.

The name of the father. Yeah. The manipulation has to be overwhelmingly strong. I mean, already with everything that we've talked about in terms of the acts that he's committing, obviously these people, the participants, or the unwilling participants, were so mentally brainbroken at this point that it's just crazy to me that even the maternal instinct of protecting a child, your own child,

was completely gone. Yeah, that's crazy.

It's the mental state that those people must have been in to where that's a logical thing. Yeah. And in the same cult, you have someone who would rather kill their child. Yeah, I guess that is... It's interesting how the human mind breaks. I can read it in different directions. In a weird and extremely depressing way, that may have been the maternal instinct at play of this is actually protecting you from a lifetime of misery. True.

I don't know how the brain in that position can justify that. But this happened over a short period of time, right, Isaiah? This happened over like two years. 1979. 1979.

uh the entire cult was long but them being at this last compound i think was only two or three years it was very short um okay because they were at that last one in uh quebec or wherever the first one was they were there for a while uh like a decade uh and here when things got really intense i think they're only there for a couple years yeah

Okay. So it wasn't this intense until the last point that, that, I mean, it was intense in like the yelling and the shouting and the meanness or whatever. I don't think any deaths happen. And I don't think any mutilations happened until if I remember right, until they got to this last location, that's when it seemed to kind of, I think rock kind of realized, you know, he had ran his course. He had convinced this group of people. He could do anything. Yeah.

Another detail to mention is the reason they left that last location is because Rock got arrested. I think it was for tax evasion. It was something, it was some minor thing. It was like tax evasion or disorderly or I can't remember. But he was in jail for a while and his cult stuck around with him. But now like a guy who has a criminal record can't have any influence in the local community. So they go, you know, set up a mountain in the Canadian wilderness and

Doc realized at that point that the jig was up, you know? Like, you're not getting any more people in the cult. You're not getting any more power. The group of people you have in front of you right now are as many people as are going to be in your cult. So, do with them what you want. Like, you no longer have to worry about outside eyes or worried about what influence you cause on the community around you. You can do whatever you want now. Before then, he was already, like, having...

children with the women and stuff like that uh but it got lethal at this last community i believe yeah that makes sense he was also he also preached um you know cleansing cleansing oneself not not doing substances and stuff like that but i believe he himself was a raging alcoholic which is pretty yes if i if i recall right initially he wasn't but i think he started drinking sometime into the cult uh and just wrote off some excuse for it but yeah

God wanted him to drink the alcohol. Yes. The baby that was killed for crying that was set outside, that was, I believe, at the first location. Then the police found out about the death, but Roke had claimed that the kid was trampled by a horse.

And there was an investigation into it for a while and they couldn't prove anything, so they let him go. But it was during the time he was being held for that investigation that the cult members stuck around and stuff. It probably wasn't a super long duration of time, if I can imagine. But regardless, they probably would have waited a long time anyway. They attempted to burn the body. Yeah.

And then that didn't work, so they buried it. And then the police found it, and they're like, oh, a horse stepped on it. Like, okay. Again, incompetent police. They had many, many, many, many, many chances to put an end to this before it got worse, but they didn't do the proper investigation. I mean, they found a body of a baby, though. How is that not enough? That's got to be it. That's enough. How is that? I don't understand.

Sorry, it was another member of the cult after the child was killed who was punished. He died of his injuries and that's the one they said was trampled by a horse. Okay, so there were two murders happening at the same time that was being passed off as a mistake and the police are like, yeah, seems fine to me. But it was after that that he had to hightail and move somewhere else because, you know.

Too much heat in the area. Yeah, bad heat. But after that, everything amped up to 11. Sorry for that side tangent. I was just curious. But anyway, one of the group members, Gabrielle, from a very young age had always looked for the truth. She worked as a nurse, but her life was unstable beneath her feet. Romantic love interests had failed and her confidence fell, describing herself as her worst enemy. She left her job and fell into a life of sex and drugs when she met Rock.

Immediately enchanted by his incredible charisma, Gabrielle was spellbound, joined the Ant Hill Kids as a member. Gabrielle was tortured by Rock, suffering torch burns on her genitals, a hypodermic needle inserted and broken in her back, and had a total of eight of her teeth pulled from her mouth. Her eventual attempted escape was unsuccessful, and she faced harsh punishment from Rock, who grabbed an axe and hit her in the head with the blunt side.

From there, he cut off part of her breast and pinned her hand to a table and used wire cutters to cut off her finger and then used a cleaver to amputate her arm. She later described this moment as a dazzling encounter and felt love for the first time, which obviously shows how much mental damage been inflicted upon the people rock controlled. Fucking crazy. Crazy. Fucking crazy.

I don't know. That's fucked. I don't know. I'm just speechless, really. And it's getting worse. Yeah, the hypodermic needle thing sent chills through my body that's fucking insane. I just don't understand why. How he even came up with these things to do to people.

I mean, at some point it becomes like a playhouse, right? Like, he obviously doesn't personify them in any meaningful way. So it's just like things you can kick around. Yeah, but it's like, again, like I wouldn't, speaking of objects or whatever, like I wouldn't stick a hypodermic needle in my toaster. It's like, I guess it's like he's able to do anything. So his mind just comes up with more and more depraved things. New things to do, yeah. Yeah.

It wasn't even limited to the vague idea of punishment either. Rock claimed that he had healing powers and to demonstrate them, he performed quote-unquote surgeries on sick devotees. Ethanol would be injected into sick members' stomachs while Rock amputated limbs and performed circumcision all without anesthesia.

In 1987, 17 of Rock's children were removed from Ann Hill Kids by social workers who had heard of the abuse that was happening at the commune. But somehow, Rock was not punished for any of these acts. With no real danger to his freedom, Rock was essentially encouraged to continue sliding into more and more depraved acts where we come to the surgery of Solange Bolliard. Let me make sure I'm pronouncing that right. It was near the top. Solange Bolliard.

Salon's a baller. All right, well, I can keep going. I'm totally fine with reading depraved stuff. We all know me. So I can keep going unless one of you all want to take it or... My hand's down at the moment. Yeah, you can keep going, Isaiah. Yippee! My friends! The surgery performed on Salon Bolliard and her resulting death is often seen as the beginning of the end of the Anhill Kids.

In 1989, Solans complained to Rock about an upset stomach. Rock took it upon himself to fix the medical issue. With no anesthesia, Solans laid down naked on a cold table while Rock performed what he called surgery, but what any other person would call mutilation.

Solanz was repeatedly punched in her stomach before Rock decided that she needed an olive oil and molasses enema. What is molasses again? Is that like... It's like syrup. It's the root that syrup's made out of. Syrup, whatever. Forcing a tube up her anus.

Believing she needed further help and that the enema wasn't enough, he grabbed a knife and cut open her stomach, providing him access to her intestines. He grabbed part of them with his bare hands and cut a segment off. Solans was, of course, in immense pain and was now internally and externally bleeding. The damage done by Rock was immense.

Another member was forced to attempt stitching her stomach back together with a simple needle and thread while someone else put a tube down her throat and blew through it, presumably in an attempt to try to keep her alive and breathing while Ruck stood back and admired his handiwork. That would have caused an embolism, right? Mm-hmm.

Uh, yeah, someone inflating your lungs for you. Yes, they just kept breathing. Solans died the following day from all of the brutal mutilations that were inflicted upon her. The commune was in shock as Solans was a close and vital part of the community, but Rock told them all not to worry because he could resurrect the dead. This is the part I remember. Oh my god. Yeah. Uh, how, you may ask?

By drilling a hole into her skull and making his male followers pleasure into her brain with him following suit. This act did not raise Solans from the dead and she was later buried near the commune. Just the absolute grotesque, just the monstrous nature of that entire ordeal. It is like...

It's just vile. Vile in every word. I don't understand. At this point, it's not cult psychology. At this point, it is deep, deep abuse trauma psychology. People who are constantly afraid and scared and like victims to this guy all times. His brains are broken, right?

That's how they get to that degree. It is so... It's such... It's the most extreme example or situation... Like, experience of this that I think I've ever read. Yeah. Yeah. In 1989, Gabrielle managed to escape the commune, thankfully reaching local authorities and telling them of all the terror that was happening at Anne Hill Kids.

There were always suspicions surrounding the commune, as seen by the children being removed years prior, but the police were never able to do much. The strict practices of the commune were described as religious practices, meaning the adults in the church could not be investigated. In many countries, Canada, wait, hold on, meaning the adults could not be investigated.

I guess it would depend on the thing. Just because someone's in a church doesn't mean you can still try them. You can still do investigations. I think what it means is for things that appeared as religious...

Not like if they- It was a veil that they could- Yeah, it was a veil they could use to push off stuff for a while. Investigators and police still need probable cause to go investigate things. Right, right. So if they just saw the cult members being weird out in public, they could chalk it up to they're just exercising their religious freedom to do religious rituals or something. That wasn't enough proof for them to go investigate.

In many countries, including Canada, religious freedom is strongly protected by law. Brock exploited this, using religion to shield the group from scrutiny.

This didn't suddenly make them able to do illegal things, but it did make it difficult for authorities to distinguish between religious rituals and abuse, especially when the adult members seemed to be willingly complicit. Okay, yeah, if I would have shut up for five seconds, I would have got there. It's still, it's still, I mean, it's still completely is confounding to me that they, like, because they saw the state that the children were in when they went and took them away and things like that. How is that not enough probable cause to conduct an investigation? Oh,

I'm sure there was an investigation, but the main issue, I mean, it's the same thing that happens in abuse cases, because at this point, Rock wasn't killing people on operating tables yet. Yeah, there's no physical evidence. All of their evidence would have been interviews. Yeah, you're right. It would have all been interviews, and everyone's complicit with it. Yeah, the same thing that happens in abuse cases all the time. So you can't really convict them. Like, sure, I'm sure every cop in that town assumed that it was an evil cult, and this guy needs to be stopped.

But legally there wasn't a lot that could have been done. There should be like vibe laws where if we all collectively decide, yeah, that's... If we all have the same vibe, yeah. Yeah, that's weird. That's enough proof. I believe they had something like that. The ancient Greeks, I believe the term was mob rule. We already have mob rule. Let's just fucking use it for useful things. For old Tom's sake, some frontier justice.

The location of the anthill kids also made it difficult to near impossible for the police to monitor anything suspicious and no outsiders would be near enough to see anything to report. Yeah. Again, like they were extremely secluded. So yeah, yeah. Hard to, hard to get anyone in. You basically have to wait for a case like what happened. Gabrielle running to the police and telling them, you know, what went down. Yep. Now that the police had Gabrielle's testimony, the door to investigating rock and the anthill kids was left wide open.

Suspicions of the abuse and terrible living conditions happening at the commune had now been revealed. Police charged Rock with assault for amputating Gabrielle's arm, and he received 12 years in prison during sentencing. Anil Kidd's dissolved after he was incarcerated, but the indoctrination and manipulation was so immensely deep-rooted at this point that some of his wife's wives actively visited him for conjugal visits, and he fathered a further four children while behind bars. What is the basis for conjugal visits?

you can still have relations with your wife. Yeah, but, like, why? They're in jail. Fuck them. Yeah, but, I mean, like... Okay, not everyone who goes to jail is a man-eater. In Brock's case, yes. Sure. But, like, if...

I right now was to go to jail for marijuana. Let's tax evade a crime that none of us care about. Right. Yeah. It's like, I would still like to touch my wife sometime in the next five years. Right. Not everybody in jail is evil. Yeah. Yeah. I get that. But this guy is, I feel like there should be a limit. Like you know, most of the time he was charged with assault. Right.

uh i don't think which he was guilty of but i don't think they have on i don't think you can get conjugal visits for like murder if you well that's something hold on can you i think it varies state by state as well right in america prisoners convicted of violent crime sexual crimes or child abuse are often denied conjugal well that would make sense yeah

uh citizen prisoners serving life sentences are often denied conjugal visits that makes sense because you know it's like they don't they don't get that anymore prison record prisoners must have a clean record of good behavior and no recent infractions uh the inmate and visitor must submit applications and safety issues with the inmate or visitor may prevent conjugal visits this is the google ai so it may not be accurate but this is a this is a weird question but like

You know how in the prisons there's like the meeting rooms where you can go meet with your family members and stuff, but it's heavily guarded and there's like guards in the room watching to make sure that nothing happens. Like, do they watch the conjugal visit or is that private? Typically it's like a trailer. It's like a trailer with a bed that you go into and there's like a guard outside of the trailer. I feel like that would probably be the easiest way to get like stuff smuggled in.

Not advice for any criminals out there, but unless someone is directly in the room, I feel like anything can happen. Is the criminal in the room with us? Inmates must be legally married to qualify for the family reunion program, which allows conjugal visits. California inmates don't need to be married, but they must have been in an established relationship before being incarcerated. What are you would prove that? Yeah, that seems so convenient. That seems weird.

This chick and I are fucking... Hey kids, everyone look up your state's conjugal visit. It's important to know for when you go to jail. I'll finish reading this while you look at that. Four years after his initial arrest and following an intense investigation into the cult from authorities beyond just that of Gabrielle's case, Rock was tried for the murder of Boylard. He pleaded guilty and was given a life sentence for his crimes.

He applied for parole in 2002, but was denied and deemed a high risk of reoffending. Stuck in jail for the rest of his life, Rock took to creating...

oh my god I remember this story Rock took to creating art and attempted to sell it on a website called murderauction.com the website was willing to sell his painting but the correctional service of Canada was not happy about this and in turn prevented his artwork from making it out of the jail unwilling to let a murderer profit from work in prison and I think the department of justice or the correctional department they faced scrutiny for allowing him to even create art in the prison

and then like seek you know money for that which probably I don't know it's still it's still weird to me that people are willing to like pay for art from these from these individuals in the first place

As well as using a site called murder auction.com murder auction.com. The craziest shit. And this ties into the conjugal visits is the, you know, the super fans of the serial killers, like the women that all stand outside of the prison and cheer for their favorite serial killers. That shit is so fucking weird. I remember all this about the artwork. Cause I think there's still some of it floating around.

I mean we have some it looks like we have a picture in this yeah we got a picture of one of them yeah but imagine like he goes from a cult leader to like well I'll paint pictures and sell it on murder auction.com yeah it's insane I mean he's not tragic he's not like he's wasn't bad all righty let's wrap this shit up and never think about anthill kids again are you still here caleb

I am here, yes. Okay, cool. He's on the edge. I can hear it in his voice. I'm taking this next part. On February 2006... I said that wrong. On February 26, 2011, an inmate...

At Dorchester Penitentiary by the name of Matthew Garad, McDonald walked up to a nearby guard and handed him a bloody knife and said, that piece of shit is down on the range. Here is the knife. I've sliced him up. The piece of shit in question was Rock, who was Matthew's cellmate at the time. Matthew had stabbed Rock in the neck with a shiv and was promptly arrested and charged. He pleaded...

He pleaded guilty, though he was already serving a life sentence for a previous murder charge. Rock was 63 years old when he died. His reign of terror was finally over, but his years of horrific abuse would go down in history as some of the most depraved, inflicted upon people, and the after effects are still felt to this day. How obnoxiously evil do you have to be that even other murderers are like that piece of shit? If I remember right, Rock would talk about the killings a lot.

And like Matthew was just like, okay, I can't do this anymore. I'm already in here till I'm dead. I don't want to be in here with him for that period of time. So yeah. Good deed done. He's still probably a bad person, but he did something good in this situation probably.

Okay, so Rock left a haunting legacy behind him, both for the survivors under his rule and the public. Years of severe psychological, physical, and sexual abuse, along with emotional manipulation, left deep, lasting scars. Many members suffered from PTSD and struggled to reintegrate back into society after the cult disintegrated. Yeah, I wonder what that's like, going from a cult back to society and re-acclimatizing to how society functions. Yeah.

I don't know. I don't know. Yeah, it's going to be easy. I can't even comprehend it. It's crazy.

For years, they had relied on rock for direction and had been stripped of their self-worth and identity. This is something that does not come back easily, but slowly. To continue the allegory from before, it was like the queen ant of their hill had been killed and they were left directionless and empty. You guys ever seen like an ant colony without their queen where they just fucking stand around moping? They don't know what to do. It's like that hive mind is gone. The

The story of Ant Hill Kids inspired books and documentaries. Most notably, Gabrielle wrote her own memoir called L'Alliance de la Brebis, which translated to Alliance of the Ewe. What's E-W-E-W? How do you pronounce that? It's like a female lamb. Yeah.

Is that you? Am I saying it right? Yeah, you. Yeah. Okay. Gabrielle used her voice to raise awareness of the long-term effects of psychological abuse in addition to how deep the depth of depravity can reach with a person as evil as rock. And the quote, so this is the description translated from French to English of the book,

When the crimes committed by Rock, known as Moise, against the members of the sect he led were revealed, the entire country shuddered in horror. Gabrielle Lavallee was one of his victims. After a hell of 12 years from which she emerged with one arm and several teeth missing, she delivers a moving testimony in the Alliance of the Sheep.

The mention reserved for adults on the back cover should not be taken lightly because certain passages of this true story are truly unbearable. Much more, in fact, than the scenes from the film that inspired the story, which is Moy's La Faire Rue Theroux with Luke Picard in the title role. Beating, stabbings, cold extraction of healthy teeth, surgical interventions on the kitchen table, circumcision, amputations, evisceration, the sheep of the mad pastor were definitely treated to the worst.

Uh, I'm sure that is a harrowing read. I haven't read it because it's in French, but I'm sure it's, you know, absolutely excruciating. Gabrielle has spoken recently about the power of forgiveness. Somehow she has forgiven rock and what he did to her. Despite everything she went through, she is happy now and able to trust others.

and has moved on and become a stronger person. Understandably, her relationship with faith became rocky. At first questioning why she and the other women of Ant Hill Kids were forced to bear so many children and why they were treated the way they were. Unable to accept that a world with God would let that happen. But she managed to reconcile her faith and relationship with the church. She's now happily married to a real man of God.

and spends her time speaking at Quebec high schools as an advocate and motivational speaker. And this is her quote on forgiveness. Quote, I'm alive, so I'm going to live it happily. Without forgiveness, it's impossible to heal. Forgiveness frees us from our bonds. I even prayed for his conversion. How do you guys feel about that?

It takes such strength to be able to do that, but I also, I don't think I would be capable of it. That's the woman of faith right there, I'll tell you that. I'm not capable of it.

I mean, forgiveness is a one-sided poison. Sorry, not forgiveness. Hate is a one-sided poison, right? If you hate someone who's wronged you in some way, chances are they are not thinking about you at all, right? So it's not like you hating them does anything. And in a situation like Rock's case, he's dead. So he's definitely not on the path to any self-improvement, right? Yeah.

So instead, all Gabrielle has, she has this hate that can just make her a bitter person, make her bitter at the world, bitter at God, as she said. There's a difference between forgiving someone and trusting someone again. There's plenty of people that have wronged me who I have forgiven, but I'm not going to put myself back in the same situation that I was wrong the first time, right?

Or you're not going to advocate for them or things like that, I'm sure. Exactly, yeah. Like, fool me once, you know, shame on you. Twice, shame on me. I'm not going to let myself be fooled again. But the hate I have... You're not going to hang on to that hate. Yeah, it's not going to help anything. And hearing her say that, it goes a long way.

To me, it sounds less like forgiveness when you describe it that way and more kind of just accepting what happened and moving on from it. Acceptance is a part of it. But even then, if you accepted what happened, you can still hate the person involved, right? Like...

say someone has trauma from an individual, they can come to accept that trauma and still despise the person that was responsible for it. I think forgiveness is the step after the acceptance. Forgiveness is the step where you don't feel content. You don't want to see that person lose. She said she prayed for his conversion to Christ, which is incredible, which is something I've only heard out of very few people. I remember, I won't say the name so that

Doesn't get harassed or this brought up anymore. There was a pastor back home in Kentucky who, when I was, I want to say I was 15 years old, 15, 16 years old, his son and his daughter-in-law were murdered by a

They were renting out a house to this dude, and they went to his house. The other went to collect rent or do repairs or something, and the tenant murdered both of them. So it's a pastor whose son and daughter-in-law was murdered, and I went to their funeral, and he got up there and preached on forgiveness.

about how even as Christ looked at the people who murdered him and said, Father, forgive them. They know not what they do. He was like, who are we as people to be anything else? Because if the perfect human was able to forgive, something that we can all declare, like a sin against a perfect person is something that has never been replicated in the world since Christ. It is a...

a pure, unadulterated act of evil, and Christ forgave that. So who are we to be any different? And I remember hearing them being like, yeah, that's what forgiveness is. Being like, that is your takeaway from it, that the world is a harsh and cruel place, but yet I prevail. I think that's something that is rarely seen, and it's really encouraging to see people like Gabrielle who managed to pull that out of it. I think that's what forgiveness is. I think it's a step after acceptance.

It sounds like a way of coping as well, because you need to shed that negative energy or the negative aspect of the trauma to survive. I just don't think I would be capable of it. I've put myself in that situation mentally a lot of the times. If someone killed my family members or something, I just could not see myself being able to forgive them.

Well, think about it this way, right? And for one, I agree with you. I don't know. I've never been... I've never had a test of strength that great, and I hope I never do. Like, that is the kind of thing I don't think someone knows that they have it until they have it, right? Yeah. I couldn't imagine being in a situation... Or I can imagine being in a situation like Gabrielle. But put yourself in Gabrielle's shoes, right? Like, Rock's dead even before then he was in prison, and he's not getting out. Yeah.

uh you can either spend your entire life as just bitterness in your own mind against him and then in that sense he's kind of one right that you're always just his victim and nothing more but when you go to the level that she has you're no longer rock's victim you are gabrielle who overcame a cult you are something greater than what he had envisioned for you yeah yeah you pull something out of it i actually uh

I want to bring this up. So I've talked about this on podcasts before and stuff. So when I made the Ant Hill Kids Kids video, you know, it was one of my first YouTube videos. I had not made that many videos going over, you know, traumatic cases like this and stuff. And in the video, I had made a remark along the lines of,

There's no way to cope with the trauma that they saw. Or I said something like, I don't think these people could ever get over the trauma that they saw or anything like that. I had a woman email me who claims to be the daughter, one of Rock's daughters that he fathered during the cult.

And she sent me an email and said, as someone who did live in that world, I always find it fascinating to hear the opinions of outsiders. And she brought up my line where I said there's no way that they could cope with that trauma.

And she said,

I can assure you with 100% certainty that I did find ways to cope with and make peace with my past and who my father is.

She continues to go on and talk about some other experiences I won't bring up for the sake of the email. But those lines have always stuck with me. Because I remember thinking, like when I made that video, I just had the thought of, oh, well, they can never get better. And then someone's like, yeah, I got not better. Well, I think you were coming at it from the point, the angle of just being so incredulous how evil...

Oh, yeah. I was certainly making the point to emphasize the heaviness of the evil that's happening. Yeah. But even at that cost, it is not worth diminishing...

a survivor's experience, right? Ever since then, every single story I've looked at, it is not just a woman, like in anything, it's not just a woman who was a victim of something. It is a mother, it is a wife, it is a friend, it is, you know, something beyond... It's a survivor capable of healing. I think that's... Exactly. I think that's a very strong point is that like, no matter what you go through,

you're capable of healing. I think that is an important thing to take away from it. And especially, you know, in the case of what we've just discussed, like people were able to come out of this and lead, you know, healthy lives, which is just obviously remarkable and a sign of incredible strength on their part. Because it is, it would be a very difficult thing to overcome, but the fact that you are able to overcome it says a lot, I think. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, the annual kids video stuck a lot with me because it kind of reframed really my entire perspective of talking about true crime cases or anything that involves real people. Because I always try to keep in mind that the people I'm talking about are real people. And their lives aren't... Like the person who emailed me, she was a child when she was in this cult. She has an entire life after that.

right she's not dictated by what happened in the first 10 years of it or whatever um like you know it it i'm glad i had that break check when i did um but yeah that being said the evils of rock cannot be overstated um just a monster a monster who uh

like the world is a better place without him for sure. Uh, and it's especially a better place with people like Gabrielle who were able to come out and make something out of all that terror, take something that negative and turn a positive, uh, you know, spreading advocating, uh, the way that she does is an incredible thing to do. Yep. Uh, yeah. But like you said, awful person, uh, glad that he's dead, glad that he got stabbed at that prison. Um,

But that's Ant Hill Kids. Probably, what do you think? The worst example of a cult?

It's up there. There's a few that are in the running. Honestly, Jonestown's pretty high up there. Yeah, Jonestown's fucked too. Jonestown, obviously in terms of the grand scale of what happened. Jonestown had constant physical sexual assault of members and stuff like that. There's some other stuff around. I would say Children of God are pretty high up there, I would think.

There's a lot. I mean, there's a lot of cults. There's a lot out there. I wonder what the nearest cult to me is. I actually don't know. I'm going to investigate that later. I actually do know a couple local cults that I've like... I would never make a video on them because they haven't done anything wrong per se. As far as you know. I mean, as far as I know, right. There's one actually...

I probably shouldn't talk about this online, but there was one that someone emailed me and actually I got on the phone with to talk about. And I did some light research into it. It looks like an actual cult that isn't too, too far away from me. And then there's been like some accusations of weird stuff online, but nothing confirmed. And I really wanted to like go in person and make a video. But I'm like, well, no, because then if it becomes like,

If there's ever a police investigation, I don't want to tamper with that or to cause any issues of anything. But so I've just kept like...

Like, I don't know anything the police don't know that hasn't already been forwarded to the authorities. All the stuff I only know is public information. But I've just been, like, keeping tabs on it every now and then to see if anything comes of it. But there's a few cases like that. Other than that one, though, all the quote-unquote cults are just, like, weird offshoot church branches and stuff. Yeah. That I'll meet kind of, like...

odd person from every now and then like I've I grew up near that snake handling church that the pastor died at a few years ago when he got bit by a snake and it was a big story in the news for a while so people like that

That's kind of like borderline cults. But yeah, there's, there's some weird, if you go look in you, I'm sure you'll find one. There's cults, there's cults. And then there's like, you know, capital C cults, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There's low level cults and then there's high level cults. Yeah. There's, there's a difference. I think on a scale of cultiness. I, yeah, I'd be interested. I wouldn't, I wouldn't do anything in terms of like making a video on it. Like,

With your example, the one nearby you, I think that's a bad idea because they're too local. You don't want to be targeted by them. And it is a public... To be clear, it is a public church that you can go to and just be at a sermon, which is what I wanted to do. But then I was like, well, even though it's a public thing, I don't like...

If there is any validity to some of the accusations, I don't want to provoke anything. I don't want to be involved. I don't want to cause any issues for authorities or anything like that. And like I said, everything that I was aware of, the police have already looking into and stuff. So it's not like I can help. Your presence wouldn't benefit in any way. I would exclusively make things worse if I went. So I didn't, of course. But I...

there is a part of my brain that would want to do something stupid like that, that I have to fight every day. Is it the desire to break the story or something? No, no, no. Not to break the story. Just to see... I don't have a desire to break the story because the story's been broken. It's been in local news stations and stuff like that. I just... There's a part of me that wants to...

See, in my head, it's like, oh, I know this stuff about it. Maybe the evil stuff's real, but because it's not like apparent because there's not like court trials about it, it's not something that can be confirmed. It's like, for example, if I were if the Angel cult happened, if all that went down when I was nearby, I would want to see Rock get arrested. I would want to see the final moments of it and stuff like that, just because.

Like I've been asked before, like if a serial killer was on death row and I had the opportunity to interview him, would I? Absolutely. Because there's something about like that level of evil and depravity. It's like, I just, I want to see it. But in a situation that's like ongoing, it's not worth me complicating anything that's going on with it. So I wouldn't. So is it just curiosity? Like what are you describing there? It's a level of curiosity. It's a level of, how do I describe it?

I guess morbid fascination in a sense of just like, it's strange in my mind that people are that evil and they're just out there, right? Like, you know, going about their day, doing stuff. Fair enough.

I don't know. I just feel... I guess morbid fascination is the best way to describe it. I think that probably, yeah. And, like, if this cold time referring to, if it ever came out like they got arrested, the trials happened and stuff, I would 100% make a video on it. But until I am...

100% positive that something I say publicly would not invalidate any accusations, criminal stuff, whatever. I'm not saying anything. Especially as a YouTuber, if you make that public and then people start diving on. Oh my gosh, could you imagine? Yeah, absolutely not. And not just from a publicity standpoint, but also just like, you know, if there's abuse happening at a place and then people don't see justice because I talked about it too early, I could not live with myself. That would be a nightmare. Yeah.

Yep. That's why you should only report on things that have gone through the system and not insert yourself into the middle of complex issues. Looking at you kick streamers who catch predators and stuff like that and ruin investigations and let them get away with their crimes. Yeah, what I'm not going to do is show up and just start beating up people. Like the Avenger. What about you, Caleb? Do you have any cults nearby that you keep an eye on?

There is one. Uh, that's really weird. I've talked about it on podcasts before, but I don't, I really don't want people to go fuck with them or anything like that. Cause it's like, you don't have to give specifics. Yeah. Well, they got, they got like some, they got, I'll tell you guys as soon as the podcast is over, but it's really odd. And the police have repeatedly warned people about it. And once I show you guys their website, you will, uh, I'm on it right now. Cause I was thinking about that. Uh,

You guys will totally see like, okay, this is a little odd. This is weird. So wait, the police are warning people about the existence of this, let's say, group? So I bought, yeah, yeah, yeah. The police have warned me about having unguarded women.

In a certain area. Whoa, what the fuck? Whoa. Now, to be fair, I don't know if it's... It could be... I'll give away anything. I'll give away more if I say that. Okay, okay. Yeah. Hold on, hold on. There's a group near you. Are they a religious cult? Yeah, a spiritual community. Okay, so there's a religious cult nearby that is attacking. Do you want to go kill them? We could do that. Well, so...

I'll shape them so hard they wouldn't know what happened. And it's in a good area to do it to. Nobody would ever know. Oh, bro. We could be in and out 30 seconds. They go to fake heaven so quick. Oh, dude, I really don't know. Like, I don't know if there's some level of prejudice from the local sheriffs in the area. But like, I'll it'll make sense when I when I when I explain it offline. But I really don't. I don't know.

It could just be a level of prejudice. That's wild that the police are actively warning people about this thing and then they can't do anything to stop it. That's so crazy. And I mean, that's like being in the area. I've heard it and I don't know if it's true. I've heard it from realtors as well.

uh in the area and real says never lie yeah well i don't know it's also like why would you why would you tell me that if you're trying to sell me a true yeah you know it's kind of weird so it's usually they hide hide bad things about the places they're selling this that does seem strange very weird it's very strange yeah i really don't want anybody to obviously like go go look into it or anything because it's it's seriously like it could just be literally be a level of prejudice i'm not sure

And also, again, with what Wendy Goon, what Isaiah was saying before, that kind of attention from online communities really does not help a lot. We talked about last week about Smart Schoolboy9. That investigation is probably soiled forever because people had to get involved. You just have to be so careful with this stuff. Nothing that you're going to say as a YouTuber is going to be worth it. Worth what happens, right? I agree.

There's times where like, like an example of that's a lot of the stuff Muda Heart does, right? Where it is a good case of a YouTuber exposing information and put it out there because all the times there's not avenues in the authorities for like a charity that was holding money for too long or something like that. But when we're talking about like physical abuse and like stuff like that, like that, that is not, that is, that is not our pay grade. That is someone else for sure. Yeah. I don't want to be involved in that. I'll also say this.

To clarify, because I was kind of thinking about why I have such a fascination, Jackson, with what you were talking about, like why I want to go film or be at this location. This cult in particular is Christian-based. That's the face they use for it. It's like a Christian denomination church. And I don't really have the desire to go check out or see other ones. If it was just a random cult that's just like...

being violent or whatever with no religious backing, I wouldn't be as interested as being on site. But I think I just have a special hatred for people that use Christ and Christianity as a front to do it. It makes me personally angry in a weird way. I want to see them get what they deserve. I want to see it happen. Which is some malice in my own heart, I'm sure, that I probably need to confront. Need to work on...

But I have this bitterness that I want resolved, seeing people use Christianity. Something that you love. Your whole religious and spiritual system, the thing that you believe in. Taking that and adjusting it for something that you love.

people think is evil perhaps or exactly yeah yeah because like i mean good christians get a bad enough rap because of christian people doing stupid stuff in the name of christianity right so you have an entire like group of people doing it i just kind of want to i just kind of want to watch it burn you know um i think that's a big part of it yeah yeah totally makes sense yeah i get it

All right. That's going to do it for this episode of Red Thread. Thank you very much for joining us. I'm glad that we were able to talk a bit after the, you know, the darker elements and we didn't just end on that. So it's good that we had that little conversation at the end. Thank you very much for joining us for this episode of Red Thread. Big thank you to the sponsors of this episode, AG1. Please go check them out because they make the show possible and it really helps out the show. Big thank you to you guys for watching. We got, you know,

audio platforms link below as well as the show notes or a bunch of links below you can listen to the show on the go through your favorite audio platforms and you can read the document to find our sources and information and things like that as well as just read along yeah that's good that's going to do it unless you guys have any you know final words no sir

If you so happen to see that a large commune in southern Texas was gunned down sometime this week, we don't know what you're talking about. I have no idea what you're talking about. I'm not even in Texas, so yeah, for sure. Same. I'm not there either. Nice. All right. That's going to do it. Signing off on that. Thank you, guys. We'll see you next time. Bye.

so