Brother Stair has apparently died

[Checkmite]

This will probably be little more than a footnote, as I don't imagine many here have heard of Ralph Stair. His death has been reported by Allan Weiner, the owner/operator of the WBCQ shortwave radio station, who to be sure is one of the few people who would be in a position to know.

Shortwave radio has fallen on hard times lately. By "lately" I could easily mean "since the 1980's", but even more since the advent of the internet. If you're in the United States and you're looking for domestic-origin, English language broadcasts, there's very little else to be heard on shortwave radio except for conspiracy theorists and politico-religious nuttery.

If you have ever heard any of that politico-religious nuttery on shortwave radio, chances are, you heard Brother Stair. Brother Stair ran the Overcomer Ministry, an insular apocalyptic cult based in South Carolina where he styled himself "the Last Day Prophet of God" and exercised draconic control over his members' lives, and where he used the group's collective funds to pay for hours of airtime on just about every still-remaining commercial shortwave broadcasting station in the US to broadcast his stream-of-consciousness sermons. He was also arrested twice for sexually assaulting women, including minors, at his "commune", most recently in 2018.

Despite his tremendously outsized AM/SW radio presence and large audience that kept him funded to the tune of over a million dollars per year, Brother Stair was not a terribly influential figure among the Christian right in the US at large, due in no small part to his relatively anti-Christian-nationalist leanings.

Here's an excerpt from one of Stair's rants, if you want to see whether you recognize his voice:

 

[Thor 2]

Couldn't open your link but found him on another You Tube vid.

Typical religious nutter.......... I won't mourn his passing.

 

[rjh01]

Fixed your link https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJQLDKQAjUM

This is the only way to link to that youtube. The normal way, as per the OP, does not work.

 

[Thor 2]

Thanks for that rih.

The disturbing thing for me is that no matter how big a nut the nutter is, there are some people that will listen, and it resonates with them.

 

[rjh01]

Thanks for that rih.

The disturbing thing for me is that no matter how big a nut the nutter is, there are some people that will listen, and it resonates with them.

In the US they have a huge population. If he appeals to only 0.1% of the population that is still a huge number. There are a huge range of reasons why people will follow strange beliefs. These include
- long term stress (then a security blanket is needed. Strange beliefs meet that need)
- lack of education
- lack of a decent social life (others who can tell them the beliefs are stupid)
- mental illness

These nutters will probably have more than one of the above reasons to be nutters.

 

[dann]

Mental illness, yes, but stress, lack of education and lack of people to tell you about the stupidity of CTs, no, not really. If you have long-term stress, what you need is less stress. CT beliefs don't provide any kind of security blanket. Lack of education may make you less likely to be able to distinguish between reliable and unreliable sources, but it is no reason to join a CT cult. And there are many articles online about people mourning the friends, acquaintances and family members they have lost to QAnon and how much time they have spent arguing against their CT beliefs in vain.

 

[rjh01]

Mental illness, yes, but stress, lack of education and lack of people to tell you about the stupidity of CTs, no, not really. If you have long-term stress, what you need is less stress. CT beliefs don't provide any kind of security blanket. Lack of education may make you less likely to be able to distinguish between reliable and unreliable sources, but it is no reason to join a CT cult. And there are many articles online about people mourning the friends, acquaintances and family members they have lost to QAnon and how much time they have spent arguing against their CT beliefs in vain.

Just done some research on the subject. Should have done that before making that post.

conspiracy theories have always thrived during times of crisis and social upheaval
<snip>
So people with lower levels of education tend to be drawn to conspiracy theories. <snip> they haven't been allowed to have, or haven't been given access to the tools to allow them to differentiate between good sources and bad sources or credible sources and non-credible sources. So they're looking for that knowledge and certainty, but not necessarily looking in the right places.
<snip>
Research has shown that people who do feel powerless and disillusioned do tend to gravitate more towards conspiracy theories.
<snip>
people's desire to feel good about themselves as individuals and also feel good about themselves in terms of the groups that they belong to. And I guess at the individual level, people like to feel... Well, they like to have high self-esteem. They like to feel good about themselves. And potentially one way of doing that is to feel that you have access to information that other people don't necessarily have.

https://www.apa.org/research/action/speaking-of-psychology/conspiracy-theories

 

[SteveAitch]

Ah, I remember listening to the Overcomer station on shortwave years ago - I'd have to dig out my old SWL logbooks to check when. I think it was just before he ran into all those legal problems.

 

[SteveAitch]

A bit more on the subject, from a SWLing site.

Interesting collection of comments, combining freedom of speech arguments, short-wave and a major lack of de mortuis!

 

[maximara]

Mental illness, yes, but stress, lack of education and lack of people to tell you about the stupidity of CTs, no, not really. If you have long-term stress, what you need is less stress. CT beliefs don't provide any kind of security blanket. Lack of education may make you less likely to be able to distinguish between reliable and unreliable sources, but it is no reason to join a CT cult. And there are many articles online about people mourning the friends, acquaintances and family members they have lost to QAnon and how much time they have spent arguing against their CT beliefs in vain.

In a twisted way CT beliefs do provide kind of security blanket in that there is a kind of twisted comfort in that the world is the way it is because there is some organized force behind it be it the Devil, Jews, Banks, Immigrants, Men in Black or what ever the boogeyman is this month rather than it being the results of random chance or shortsighted actions.