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Ep. 235 – Michael Tait: Just a Freak... Leave Jesus Out of It
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*TRIGGER WARNING: this episode contains graphic descriptions of sexual assault and abuse.
This week we’re finally going to dive into the Michael Tait allegations. If his name doesn’t ring a bell, he is a lifelong Christian musician originally known for being in DC Talk, but he spent the last 16 years as the lead singer of the Newsboys. Earlier this month The Roy Report published the first of several exhaustive articles detailing allegations of sexual assault, drug use, and overall predatory behavior against Michael Tait from a growing list of victims. If you just happened to overhear the broad details of the first set of allegations, you might understandably think that this sounds like a poor, closeted gay man forced to hide his sexuality from an industry capitalizing on his faith. Friend, I’m here to tell you that that ain’t it… The picture that these allegations paint is far, far darker, and we’re going to get into them. On a lighter note, we also look at the bizarre and unrelated lawsuit against Newsboys owner Wes Campbell, a multi-millionaire who still has a foothold in hillbilly hell. If you disagree with our characterization of these men or just want to discuss these things in more detail, join our Discord server by following the link in our IG bio.
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Transcript
Introduction and Hosts' Background
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey yo fellas, kick the melody. Socially acceptable. It's okay. It's alright.
00:00:12
Speaker
Socially acceptable. It's okay. Move side. Socially acceptable.
00:00:49
Speaker
Hello and welcome to another episode Growing Up Christian. I'm Casey. I'm Sam. And we're just two honks with a keyboard serving the Lord.
00:01:04
Speaker
We're just two honks with a keyboard who never went to prom. is ah It's keyboard, is it? it Well, yeah, I had to make an edit.
00:01:19
Speaker
Dude, that is a wildly uncomfortable video. it I mean, they made it all in the same room, happy together. Would they now? Would they do that now in 2025? I don't know.
00:01:33
Speaker
It is a different time. it's um it's ah been that It's a real, but well, it's a thing that actually happened.
Early 90s Music Nostalgia
00:01:41
Speaker
It's not just a real. It's an old ah video circulating of The Newsboys.
00:01:48
Speaker
ah DC Talk. I mean, yeah, sorry, DC Talk. I got the Newsboys on my mind for another reason. It was on Arsenio Hall, right? Yeah. ah It's funny because it's like it was the early 90s. I don't know if that's a word you can... like That's not a word that's ever been like...
00:02:05
Speaker
turn to a slick you can say it i guess but no one knows for sure so we're just like you just sidestep it you just try not to yeah there's no point in which it actually could like you would never use that there's no reason for that word anymore if other people uh people of color want to use it you're like okay but i don't that It doesn't get censored off of TV.
00:02:32
Speaker
You can say it on the History Channel, ah but you can't. I'll avoid it I'm uncomfortable it. think I just, you know, in my younger, cool... younger cool evangelical kid, you know, who was just like over racism.
00:02:48
Speaker
I forget what what I said about, what did I say about racism on that Facebook survey from like 15 years ago? I was like, everybody, racism will go away if people stop taking themselves so seriously. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Reflections on Racism and Societal Change
00:03:04
Speaker
yeah
00:03:06
Speaker
Yeah, the guy who wrote that used up all of his slur passes, I think, yeah in college. ah So we're just not going to do that anymore. I don't yeah think we're done we're done even walking close to that line.
00:03:21
Speaker
Prior to... prior to Video evidence, you know? Don't even... Oh, man. there I just... it's it's It's crazy to think back on, like, how stupid you were in college and stuff and just, like, how how positive you were of, like, your dumb notions, you know? And how unoppressed and how little, like...
00:03:49
Speaker
how much your life lacked challenge to be able to have no way to conceptualize how somebody could be to take offense to something.
00:04:01
Speaker
Like, you're just like, I don't know. Cause that was like classic late teen, white middle-class kid of like, nothing offends me. It's like, yeah, no shit. Like, I don't,
00:04:13
Speaker
That's part of the problem. And you're partly not a great person because. Yeah. Or doing the classic boomer like, well, I mean, if it's a bad word, then why do they say it so much?
00:04:25
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. It's just it's no nuance. No. The sad thing is, like, we grew up right. We grew out of that. I know people in their 40s and 50s and 60s that still have that same exact mindset. And that's embarrassing. like Yeah, I am constantly like in awe of the fact that like Some of my family members have been saying the exact same things about the exact same subjects since I was a little kid.
00:04:56
Speaker
Yeah, dude. That's been something that's been driving me a little bananas lately. Because it's just the more when you spend enough time around certain people or like you don't see like people as often like people like aunts, uncles, whoever it is that you might run into. You're like, can't.
00:05:14
Speaker
these are the same These are the same things that we've been that have been said since for a decade. Yeah. Like the same stories. the same like There's always the same stories that get told. like They tell it like it's the first time anyone's ever heard it, but everybody knows they know it and everyone's laughing.
00:05:32
Speaker
I don't know if it's just a nostalgia thing for older people, but I'm like, God, if I'm like that, I need someone to like ah need someone to speak truth into my life at that point.
00:05:44
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. You got to be willing to hear it though. And that generation is not, no, no, no, no. It is funny. Like, cause you know, like I almost anytime, like the subject of war comes up, I, it's,
00:05:59
Speaker
it's It's hard for me to not jump in yeah on it, you know, and stuff like like the Vietnam War.
Vietnam War and Generational Perspectives
00:06:08
Speaker
So like when the Vietnam War would come up around like my, you know, family gatherings or something.
00:06:15
Speaker
So my grandma's brother was ah he served in the army or something. He was in Vietnam. And i I don't know much about what he did there or what, you know, I know he was there for, a i think he did two tours of duty there. Okay.
00:06:32
Speaker
I don't think he was drafted. I think he enlisted. And it was kind of like a controversial thing in the family that like he, you know, they wanted him to go to college or something. And he went and enlisted in the...
00:06:44
Speaker
in the military, but, um, it was clearly like from all accounts and I never hear it from him. i don't know him well, but like, it was clearly a very traumatic thing and he didn't talk about it a lot.
00:06:58
Speaker
And, uh, you know, just all the stuff that you hear about Vietnam vets, like, Like, yo, they really went through some stuff so they don't you know sit around bragging about it and things like that.
00:07:08
Speaker
But you would use you they would use like these like affectations from his experience that he had told them once or twice or something like that to justify like the whole mindset about how they thought about like that conflict.
00:07:21
Speaker
Like a conflict where we were clearly in the wrong. We clearly were trying to project power in a place where we should not have anything. And despite every bit of evidence that it wasn't going well and that we should, you know, stand back, get out of the way, like we just kept dumping more bodies into it. And it feels like that sentence could be attributed to a ah pretty much anything post World War Two.
00:07:47
Speaker
That was a pretty much. I had a lot of little flashbacks during that little that little phrase there. it kind of describes every military conflict sense, I guess, you know, but.
Allegations Against Michael Tate Begin
00:07:59
Speaker
But they would say they would talk about like, well, you know, ah Bob would say that, you know, they would they would have like the Viet Cong would have like this hill and it was like hollowed out. It had tunnels all through it and stuff. And they would like fight their way up and take this hill.
00:08:16
Speaker
But then, ah you know, as soon as they took it and secured it, you know, the army would pull them back. And the the commanders would pull them back and they would sit across the line and watch like the Viet Cong stream back into the hill and retake the position overnight.
00:08:30
Speaker
And, you know, and like the whole the whole insinuation being that we didn't lose because it was ah failed experiment. It was a place we shouldn't have been. it was a bad strategy. It was, you know, we shouldn't have been involved. We we failed because they wouldn't let our guys win.
00:08:47
Speaker
Rules of engagement ruined our shot at actually winning in Vietnam. So they would have just let them win and let them be soldiers and really go to town and flatten that place and stuff, then we would have won. And it's like, have you guys, I mean, watch or listen to any, any, anything.
00:09:05
Speaker
about Vietnam and you will not be able to hold on to that, that mindset. But like, they've been saying it now for 38 years that I've been alive. And ah it's so frustrating to hear stuff like that.
00:09:17
Speaker
They hear the same story over again, where you're like, God, I just, and it's not, is it worth even trying to like interject? Like clearly we're not open for business. We're not taking new information in about this.
00:09:32
Speaker
Right. It's like anything like that reminds me of... um It's like the Redcoats during the Revolutionary were complaining that like but they the other other people were hiding behind trees and firing guns at them. It's like... That's not how we're supposed to do They didn't fight armed. They didn't stand in a line and soak up bullets like a big blanket.
00:09:53
Speaker
yeah they They literally used to do war like the actual game of Risk. You're like, that this is... It doesn't make any sense to just line up and just play. It's just a numbers game at that point. like, who has more pieces on the board?
00:10:08
Speaker
all right, they win. So stupid, lax strategy. Wild that anyone ever thought that that was an honorable or noble way to fight a war. Because we used they were not fought like that for a long time. It was just like bloodbaths on an open field for sure. But then at some point...
00:10:25
Speaker
This country, the the country that ended up taking over the majority of the world at one point is just like, no, you're supposed to line up and just whoever gets shot gets shot.
00:10:36
Speaker
Yeah. War is cool. It's when guys in powdered wigs sit up on a big hill and they play meat chess.
00:10:46
Speaker
Move this group over here. They're going to soak up fire from ah from those guys and maybe we can flank them. Yeah. Well, ah
00:10:58
Speaker
we are we're late to the game here, which is not a good way of saying this, but we. have been reading today and trying to take in so as much info as possible about the Michael Tate allegations.
00:11:14
Speaker
Yeah, and which are bigger than... like it's It's bigger than I thought. Because the first ones came out. I was with my friend. It was actually the day I was moving. i rented my...
00:11:27
Speaker
No, I just had a friend helping me move some stuff. And we were just sitting out by my car. And he's like, oh, michael Michael Tate looks like he's in some hot water. And i was like, huh? And he's like, this is like the first three like allegations of like someone just being like, he touched us at a sleepover or on the on tour or something like that.
00:11:46
Speaker
And I didn't know any. i just That was it. That was the information I soaked in. And I would see headlines here and there. And then I just kind of assumed... this one would go away like that. It was not that big in that it was a few instances that couldn't necessarily be a hundred percent proved other than the fact that he did admit it, but you're just like, okay, it's not the first. I did a couple of gay things inappropriately when I was young and repressed in this Christian world. And I thought, I just kind of thought it like some, they it would kind of chill from there.
00:12:20
Speaker
um And it turns out that's not true. ah There's a lot more to it. There's been more stuff
Deepening Allegations against Tate
00:12:27
Speaker
released. Yeah. Like I listened Dan Koch's podcast about the first set of allegations that came out. He had somebody on that was a Christian music insider. And they talked about the allegations from the first three victims that the Roy's report published an article on. uh,
00:12:45
Speaker
I should have gone and read the report, but instead I just listened to a podcast. And like when you're only hearing... an overview of what was written. It's easy to like form opinions that upon reading the article, you, you feel a lot differently about, you know?
00:13:02
Speaker
So i yeah, I kind of did the same thing. And then i heard about the second set of allegations, which involved, um, you know, like him participating in the, in the drugging and assaulting of, uh, of a young lady in North Dakota.
00:13:18
Speaker
which is, that's, that's where we're at a different level now. That's yeah nuts. Yeah. And I only had just learned of that one today also when when you had mentioned not, uh, yeah. When you mentioned looking into the Tate stuff, I was like, i I was like, yeah, maybe there's something more going on. And that was the first thing that came up and I read a couple articles about that.
00:13:42
Speaker
Uh, and that's, that one's really dark. Like, yeah, I'm very, just it's, uh, disturbing and, I don't know. I just kind of get that icky feeling when you read it, especially like what was like his, which we'll get to more details on, but you just go, what, why even, why'd you have a role in that?
00:14:02
Speaker
Like, what, what did you get out of that? And what did you, what enjoyment was there for you to just set the stage for a woman to be sexually assaulted or to be raped? don't know.
00:14:15
Speaker
Yeah. And then on top of that, the next set of allegations involved six victims. So two of which were minors at the time that Tate, you know, uh, made advances towards or exposed himself to. And there's just a lot here, man. This is just getting deeper and deeper as, as things come out.
00:14:38
Speaker
But, yeah, Yeah, it's a lot to try to wrap your hands around. i think what what what is... As you start talking about these, one thing that that I'm a little like hesitant to do is...
00:14:56
Speaker
chalk this I'm not I'm not hesitant one one thing that's annoying to me that I see some people doing or maybe they're changing their tune now that more stuff has come out is to oh poor poor Michael is a closeted gay man you know and this is just the result of having to live a life in secrecy and stuff and I think what we're seeing with these continued allegations is that no this isn't about him being a gay man this is about him being a psychopath and Right. That uses his power to impose his will on people.
00:15:29
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. That's what it seems like. I don't care if you're if you're gay or straight or whatever, when you non-consensually like give somebody like drink, get somebody completely drunk so that you can assault them in their sleep.
00:15:43
Speaker
Yeah. Or roofie them or whatever. I mean. like that's not because you that has nothing That's not to do with the fact that you're that you might be gay. That is because you're a psychopath. right that you You don't have a problem hurting other people. you know But before we jump into that, ah there's a a little side story that's a that's more fun that I thought maybe we could talk about. Because...
00:16:10
Speaker
One of the things that that popped out of me from ah from some of the articles here was ah they they mentioned this guy, Wes Campbell, who is the owner of the Newsboys, which is a weird thing.
00:16:24
Speaker
It's kind of a weird thing, right? It's like he owns the band. It's like Tim Lambesis owned As They Lay Dying. Right. He's also in Azaleigh Dying. I know. You know, which is, it's weird to not have like and all of the band members as, as owners in a, in a property like that. But it's very, it's very weird to have some guy on the outside that owns a group of musicians.
00:16:53
Speaker
Yeah. Very strange. And he is having a really bad summer. Yeah. That's sad. It is Maybe we can cheer him up. So the the side story here is a newsboy's owner and family sued for defamation, conspiracy, and infliction of emotional distress in $5.4 million lawsuit.
Wes Campbell's Legal Troubles
00:17:15
Speaker
This is on JuliaRoyz.com. And this, I initially saw the headline and thought, this oh this is to do with the Tate allegations. They're taking it up the chain. you know Somebody's got a civil suit going or something. Yeah, that was my first assumption.
00:17:31
Speaker
This is different. Okay. This is This is just like white trash, loser, egg evangelical Hatfield and McCoy crap that has just gone completely haywire.
00:17:46
Speaker
And it all revolves around Wes Campbell's parents' church. Oh, a church scandal. Yeah, so ah Campbell and four family members are being sued by Randall Scrum.
00:18:00
Speaker
Great name. That sounds like a character from Recess. It does, yeah. The former pastor of Campbell's parents' church, Hilltop Fellowship House of Prayer in Prim Springs, Tennessee, an hour southwest of Nashville.
00:18:18
Speaker
And I'm just going to, I'll kind of read you a little bit here just so you can kind of get a feel for what's going on. But Campbell, his parents, Colin and Nancy Campbell, and younger siblings, Rocklin,
00:18:29
Speaker
lawsuit reads like a modern-day version of service and of and curses. the plaintiffs are seeking damages of five point four million dollars the lawsuit reads like a modernday version of the hatfields and mccoy's starting with a large family clan breaking up a church service and claims of demonic assaults and curses It continues with an alleged false report of child abuse resulting in a massive police raid on an unsuspecting family in the wee hours of the morning.
00:19:01
Speaker
The family then goes into hiding in fear for their lives. The suit against the Campbells was filed on June third one day one day before the Roy's report released its year-long and years-long investigation into the alleged assault by former news police lead singer Michael Zane.
00:19:17
Speaker
Oh my god. The day before it drops. He gets this news that he's being sued. So, dude, that's like, a that feels like, what's that? I'm blanking on that show that everybody fell in love with. That was just, the what it was like that Western country farm, whatever. oh ah Yellowstone.
00:19:44
Speaker
Yellowstone. it's like It's like the church version of Yellowstone is what that feels like. Yeah, it's Yellowstone, but everybody's a dumpy loser.
00:19:54
Speaker
The white trash church version of Yellowstone, feuding churches, different clans operating within a church. I love it. That's beautiful stuff. Let me see if I can give you just a quick overview of like how this all starts, because it just turns into like throwing accusations and people like doing petty stuff.
00:20:12
Speaker
Yeah. i But according to the lawsuit filed by Scrum, who leads Refuge Ridge Fellowship, also in Prim Springs, it's not just Wes Campbell's band and multi-million dollar brand that is falling apart. So is his family.
00:20:26
Speaker
And according to the lawsuit, the plaintiff is asking for up to $1.8 million in compensatory damages and $3.6 million in punitive damages. um Wes Campbell, his parents, and two of his nine siblings are named in a thirty eight page lawsuit.
00:20:40
Speaker
ah The battle between the Campbell clan and members of their church, former house church, Hilltop Fellowship, started with Evangeline, twin sister to Steve, and a mother of 10 who is married to Howard Johnson.
00:20:54
Speaker
I wonder if he ah if he's the he the crappy motel baron. ah Wait, did it say that Newsboys is a multi-million dollar band?
00:21:05
Speaker
I think so, yeah. That's just surprising. Like, I don't... They have like four Grammy awards or something like that. and Like millions in record sales.
00:21:16
Speaker
I guess they get a lot of, I'm guessing they probably still get some radio play on Christian radio. and ah But I'm not sure like where they're, where that continual income comes from.
00:21:29
Speaker
You don't, you don't still listen to shine. I don't think I ever listen to Shiner. You're never driving to school to ah to to yell at children and go, Shine, let them wonder what you got.
00:21:43
Speaker
Let them wish that they were not. On the outside looking bud. being an air engineer near Shine, let it shine before all men. still go Let them see good works and then... i can keep going.
00:21:55
Speaker
yeah I mean, feel free. I'm not going to stop you, but...
00:22:01
Speaker
Well, okay, so this is all a revolves around, it starts with Evangeline, who who is a mother of 10, who's married to Howard Johnson, maybe maybe a hotel baron.
00:22:13
Speaker
The church was officially established in January 2021 by Colin Campbell as lead pastor and his wife, Nancy, and was held in the basement of the Campbells' Prim Spring property. Scrum joined in March 2022 and became an elder soon after.
00:22:27
Speaker
wonder if that had anything to do with COVID lockdowns. A church starts in 2021 in a basement, and by 2025, they can be sued for $5 million. I'm very fascinated in where their fast track to financial success comes from.
00:22:47
Speaker
White trash smells money up the chain, so they're trying to rope Wes Campbell into this. Okay. He's the only one that has a bank account. Okay. Okay, so this isn't that this church got very wealthy very quickly for some reason.
00:23:02
Speaker
Not that I've seen. Not that I've seen, but we'll we'll see. All right. According to the lawsuit, the leadership group formally began looking into Evangeline's, quote, improper conduct in January 2024.
Church and Family Drama
00:23:16
Speaker
respect her marriage? who had stopped attending the church by this point was still known as a member was allegedly quote engaging in behavior with respect to her own marriage unquote that was in conflict with hilltop's beliefs with respect to our own marriage Yes.
00:23:33
Speaker
So she wasn't attending the church, but she was still a ah supposed member. And the the leadership group was was wanted to confront her about behavior with respect to her own marriage. What is that? I mean, was she having an affair or what? She tried anal and they found out about it. They found out.
00:23:56
Speaker
The husband couldn't stop talking about how how great it was and how happy he was. And it just got around real fast. And yeah, I mean, the church didn't love that because that's for the gays.
00:24:08
Speaker
Another thing. Can't escape the implications of anal. No. Another another thing, the straights stole from the gays. It used to be like, for the longest time, it like, that's gay stuff. And then now it's like the straights love it.
00:24:22
Speaker
They're... I mean, it's just as much a straight thing. You don't even hear anal and think gay anymore. That's how much the straights love it. You know, every time i have to, I picked up my prescription from ah Walmart Pharmacy today. That's the pharmacy that we have. We go to Walmart. Yeah. And every time I have to stand there in line to get my prescription, it's right next to the the glass case with all the Walmart sex toys in it.
00:24:49
Speaker
I didn't know Walmart just had sex toys out like that. Yeah. Nice. Yeah. Regressive, really. Buzzers and ribbers and strokers and i don't know. um All sorts of stuff. No dildos. Yeah, they have a dildos. Really? They get into dildo territory. Good for them.
00:25:08
Speaker
They have a bunch of sex toys. with like explicit They have names that imply what they do. They show the picture on the box, but everything's very like ah tank smooth over and ergonomic.
00:25:20
Speaker
They don't sell one with balls. No, no. When I worked at the retail company that I worked at before I... um Started my new career. We and it did a lot of online retail and we were, it was all funny for us because we're, but it's a pretty wholesome company. Like, and then that like a big thing for us that was like, I can't believe that, uh, that we got customer complaints about was, um, was, uh, socks and, oven mitts that had like vulgarities on them.
00:25:56
Speaker
And like, it's my kitchen, bitch, or get the fuck out of my kitchen. Like, so like things that aren't even funny, like a couple of like punny ones, probably about wine and something like that. But yeah, just the hilarious millennial novelties.
00:26:12
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. So we had these little cutters. So the, where the oven mitts hung, we had a paper cutout of an oven mitt that went in front and it was laminated. And it's like, had the warning sign if you're offended by whatever, coarse language, don't look at these. like And then people would still look behind him and then be like, oh oh my God, and then still complain even though it directly says, because that's just the world we live in. you know That's what people over 50 like. They have nothing else to live for.
00:26:41
Speaker
But then we online, we started selling a vibe and it ah maybe another sex toy. And the the description on the website was hilarious because they did everything they could to just and refrain from...
00:26:59
Speaker
any language that would indicate that it's a sexual item at all. It was just like very subdued. Pulsating personal massager. Yes, yes, exactly.
00:27:10
Speaker
um And those lasted about a week on our website before we got so many complaints that we um we just packed them all up and sent them back to the manufacturer.
00:27:24
Speaker
Just keep them as a novelty gift for like anybody who sends in a customer complaint. Just send them a free vibrator. Free vibrator. You seem like you need to chill out. I don't like those crass oven mitts.
00:27:37
Speaker
Here, just just just sit on this. Rub one out and shut the fuck up.
00:27:44
Speaker
Okay, so after investigating these claims, the leadership team tried to restore Evangeline. The lawsuit states that Scrum paid up to $3,500 personally so Evangeline and her husband could get counseling with the goal of reconciling with the church and getting the marriage back together.
00:28:02
Speaker
So she must have left her husband. Must had effect. Yeah. Yeah. Left her husband and they're like, well, can't have this, you know, come back to church and we'll buy you counseling and blah, blah, blah.
00:28:15
Speaker
The lawsuit says this was unsuccessful. However, to date, it appears Evangeline is still married and will celebrate her 35th wedding anniversary in October. The leadership group led by the plaintiff Scrum shared its findings with Colin Campbell earlier this year, recommending consequences. Yeah.
00:28:32
Speaker
yeah that were not outlined in the lawsuit. So they didn't go into... So old Scrum did not go into the consequences he was recommending for Evangeline.
00:28:43
Speaker
Although Colin had agreed to similar discipline for other church members, he would not accept leadership's recommendation for Evangeline, Scrum said. ah wonder if they were going to, like, make her walk naked through the center of Prim Springs and, like, throw eggs at her something and like, shame, shame. I do like that... um The irony of it being like, though he did submit to discipline, he would not blah, blah, blah, blah. but It's like if you're submitting to discipline and you it you're and and then at some points you're not being like, no, they'll submit to it. Like we're all just quietly agreeing that discipline is voluntary. And if it's not bad enough, you'll do it so you can get the fucking show on the road.
00:29:25
Speaker
Right. It's not. Yeah. You can just deny the discipline and they're like, oh, shit, what do we do now? That's what's so funny about churches that try to enforce any rules. It's like, yeah, people could maybe stop talking to you, but like you can go there forever and no one can make you stop.
00:29:42
Speaker
So they were probably trying to like officially oust her from the church, like revoke her membership because she left her husband or whatever. yeah. yeah And they have done that to other people in the past.
00:29:55
Speaker
Colin Campbell had agreed to that in the past. But when it comes to his daughter, he's like, no. It says, calling Colin's response hypocritical and a dereliction of his duties as the pastor of Hilltop Fellowship, the leadership group then submitted a confidential report on March 22nd.
00:30:11
Speaker
This detailed the consequences on the church if Colin treated Evangeline differently than the rest of the congregation. And that, it seems, is when everything fell apart and Wes Campbell got him.
00:30:22
Speaker
So this ah there's a lot of petty stuff that gets thrown around in here, but here's the most serious one. Okay. The most egregious in so or the most egregious incident occurred March 30th when a mob of 16 Campbell family members led by Rocky Campbell stormed the church during a Sunday service.
00:30:44
Speaker
was It wasn't a... Oh, March 30th. It wasn't the first week of January or anything. The Campbells allegedly defamed Scrum with statements like, I'm going to get you.
00:30:56
Speaker
i will come after you. i will be on you. and if you don't back down, you'll regret it. oh Allegedly, Rocky also proclaimed that Scrum was driven by a desire for money, wanted to steal the church from his parents.
00:31:11
Speaker
What you are doing is evil, he said. And this happened in front of approximately 75 church members, including Scrum's four young children and pregnant wife.
00:31:22
Speaker
My word, that's not good for the fetus. No. um While other Campbell family members clamored in support of these threats and false accusations, the lawsuit said, it added that Colin Campbell agreed with the mob and did not rebuke them.
00:31:38
Speaker
So basically everybody played along and went just was aghast at the fact that they were running around in the church building. yelling at everybody just the entire show up and just heckle they just showed up and heckled and then i mean does it divulge into violence does it or devolve into violence does it no this is just white trash yelling at each other Yeah, this whole thing. and And there's a picture of the family and ah they look they look like the customer base at at like Old Country Buffet. yeah It's like you emptied an Old Country Buffet at some point during like a Tuesday afternoon.
00:32:18
Speaker
And all of those people like picked up pitchforks and, you know, stormed a castle. like They have a Sunday tradition of going to the local Golden Corral.
00:32:28
Speaker
Golden Corral was the one I was trying to think of. Okay, dude. Golden Corral is a nightmare. That's the worst place I've ever eat in my life, I think. Yeah. It's really like once you reach a certain age, like you really just shouldn't be going to buffets anymore. You know? And when you go there, it's age is less of a factor and it's more of a particular body type that you see most of.
00:32:54
Speaker
Yeah. It's a, cause they had the, that's the place that has the buffet, right? Yeah. Yeah. It's a buffet. Okay.
00:33:05
Speaker
That's what I thought. It's a buffet where you can also order like scum steaks. Yeah. Yeah. And so we, when I worked in Virginia, and when I worked at Liberty, one of the guys that I worked with, it was like eight feet tall and a big man, with,
00:33:23
Speaker
We would always go out for people's birthdays because it was a small little department like that. And he picked Golden Corral and that was the first and only time I ever went. Dude got like four full plates worth of food.
00:33:34
Speaker
And I got like, I took one little bite of everything I got and was just like, I can't eat that. Like I can't physically chew and swallow this. So bad. i felt real sick.
00:33:48
Speaker
Real fast. And this dude downed like four plates in the amount of time it took me to like... this This tastes like props they would set up in like a mock village that they were going to test a nuclear bomb on. yeah Why does every food have the consistency of mac and cheese?
00:34:05
Speaker
You have to serve every single item with an ice cream scoop like something's wrong. You shouldn't be there.
00:34:13
Speaker
the so The entire leadership team at Hilltop resigned the next day and joined with 70 members to begin their own congregation called Refuge Ridge. Just the most dramatic douchebags in the world. Yeah, that's so funny.
00:34:29
Speaker
I love that. That's how most churches start. It's like, oh, shoot, I don't like that one thing you did. And then they... And then it just splits and they get like, it's like a custody battle over their children at that point. And it's funny because it's like the entire church minus the Campbells just like was like, we're leaving. We're we're Refuge Ridge now.
00:34:49
Speaker
And we meet in a different basement and there's nothing you can do about it. And they did that because you can't kick people out of church as easily as people like to pretend you can. But the hilarious thing would be. As if the Campbells just started going to the, whatever the new Ridge something churches. Like if they just started showing up every Sunday, they're like, actually we go here now too.
00:35:12
Speaker
The lawsuit says this was only the beginning of the Campbell clan's retribution. Around that time, someone filed a false report with the Tennessee Department of Children's Services alleging that Scrum was abusing his nine-year-old daughter.
00:35:26
Speaker
Then, 3
False Child Abuse Report and Police Raid
00:35:27
Speaker
a.m. m on April 2nd, 2025, Scrum woke to the sound of barking dogs pounding on his front door and an officer shouting, Sheriff, the lawsuit says.
00:35:37
Speaker
There were five police cars with lights trained on his home. Police demanded to see each of Scrum's four young children and shine flashlights in each of their faces. Scrum, his pregnant wife, and their young children were terrified.
00:35:50
Speaker
Scrum claimed the tip came from Evangeline Campbell and was false, so police left. But and would he how would he know that? How would he know where the tip came from? i mean, they wouldn't divulge that, would they?
00:36:04
Speaker
I wouldn't think they could. um I don't know. it's probably one of the Campbells. ah Everything is pinned on Evangeline. She must be a real peach.
00:36:16
Speaker
So, yeah, they've he says ah Scrum added that he saw unidentified people running away from his property and in the morning found a car tire that had been slashed. Damn. Which is also funny. They slashed one tire. One, yeah.
00:36:29
Speaker
Yeah. Because most people have a spare that can just whip out. I mean, that's inconvenient. Getting a tire slashed is, i mean, that would suck. A flat tire is one of the worst forms of moderate inconvenience there is.
00:36:43
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah, it was kind of conscientious of him to only to only slash one. That's like being mugged and the the the mugger takes out like your driver's license and gives it back to you, you know? Yeah.
00:36:57
Speaker
It's like, hey man, I don't agree with what you did, but I do appreciate this gesture. Thank you. So, yeah, there's a... That's kind of the long and short of it.
00:37:07
Speaker
And then the rest is just like, we tried to go to their summer camp and they wouldn't let us. and It does mention that old lady Campbell, so she has a ah ministry called Above Rubies, which I didn't i didn't get to look at.
00:37:23
Speaker
but What is that reference for? I mean, has to be... That's gotta something biblical. It must be like some sort of a Bible verse or something like that. It says Nancy has been called the grandmother of the Quiverfull movement, a conservative Christian movement that encourages Christian parents to have as many children as possible.
00:37:41
Speaker
Yeah, Quiverfull is weird. It's also a dumb name, a quiver to have a quiver full, like a quiver full of arrows. Yeah, that they use it as one word, too. It's not like hyphenated or anything. Yeah, I know. It's weird that they coined a word. Like, they got their own word out of it.
00:37:58
Speaker
Ugh, yeah. So, this is all just dumb. And, by the way, Wes Campbell looks like a total twat. He has like bleach blonde hair and a long goatee.
00:38:11
Speaker
And he's always wearing like some sort of dumb sunglasses or something like that. He clearly thinks he's a rock star because of his proximity to the news boys. Right.
00:38:22
Speaker
What a douche. It's, um... I wonder if he does, does he have any other ties to bands or what's his other ties to the industry? Or is it just that? And how did he come to own the news? think he I think he owns like some Wes Campbell.
00:38:42
Speaker
Campbell. He owns like ah some other stuff too, I think. Oh, he, yeah. He's um you. It's funny because you wait, now I can't find him again.
00:38:55
Speaker
oh he's I know he owns like ah like a lighting company. I looked at the wrong person at first. He's got to be in his 60s. Oh, then that's a picture. Yeah.
00:39:06
Speaker
Okay, okay, okay. Well, either way, it's all good. He seems like... Oh, there he is. He's... Yeah, yeah.
00:39:17
Speaker
little... um It's weird. It's weird when... Like your proximity to to culture, media, pop culture, um industry, especially something like the music industry that is really predicated on being hip.
00:39:39
Speaker
Like you see some people get older and look like they can they're holding it down, right? Like you see like Springsteen or Bono or like Like you see them and you don't go, oh you look like a poser.
00:39:56
Speaker
You look like you're trying too hard. And then there's plenty of others ah like our... um Who's the... Why am I blanking on his name? Who's the guy that we love who was in the Goonies? Stephen Baldwin?
00:40:10
Speaker
No, Stephen Baldwin. Oh, no, no. ah ah Oh, God. cory Corey... Corey Feldman. Yeah. That is Corey Feldman. We were like, dude, stop bleaching your heart. Guitar hard.
00:40:22
Speaker
stop bleaching your hair, no more filler. Like you gotta to give it up, dude. Like it's when, it's, it's when they try to dress and look younger than they are. And this is probably ah more, this is a difference between men and women in the industry too. Right. Like, you know, but if Madonna, like everyone makes fun of Madonna now because you know, all of the filler she's had over the years is starting to not hold up so well. And she just kind of,
00:40:50
Speaker
Yeah, you know, it's not looking good. She's beautiful character. But then they like, but she gets shit on for that, right? But if she just aged normally, people would have just shit on her for looking old earlier. Like, you can't really win as a woman in that industry. um Because once people don't see you and want to have sex with you, they don't, they'll just make fun of you, I guess. And the funny thing is, even those who are making fun of would probably still have sex, but...
00:41:16
Speaker
I think it's like with her, it's like, man, you're like a successful musician and you've been an artist for a long time. Like, why... why can you not get over the fact that people don't jerk off to you anymore?
00:41:29
Speaker
Like, that's just the way it is. Like, we're all going to be old someday. Like, you've got to figure out a better way to deal with it than this. Like, yeah just being angry at the world for the fact that, like, you're not a sex symbol anymore just weird. don't know. That doesn't last forever. But then you have someone like Pam Anderson who recently, like, made an appearance without without makeup in...
00:41:54
Speaker
All that, and everyone's like... Did she have like her breast implants removed and stuff? think she did, yep. I think she's kind of just trying to be a normie, and you people are like... That's that. See, that is interesting.
00:42:06
Speaker
like mean That, to me, is like... She got shit on, dude. She got dragged. Like, look how awful and shitty she looks now. That's like every... tabloid is like all over that shit yeah I heard a lot of people that said otherwise though I mean there is a crowd that just sucks and they're gonna do that you know like right the crowd that was originally the Pam Anderson fan base is gonna be awful about it like that's just how it is yeah you know but clearly she's like trying to find a new sense of self and purpose and stuff that doesn't involve like
00:42:41
Speaker
Yeah, people don't jerk off to me as anymore like they used to or whatever, you know? And there's more to me than that, so it's okay. Like, I've got other things i've going on. It's all easy for me to say, you know? It's not... Right. I mean, it's easy for anyone, and it's not something that we have to cope with in any way similar to that. But there's there's just, like... Madonna is one of those that's just, like, every public statement she makes, you're just like, oh, God, will you just...
00:43:11
Speaker
Can you just move on? like right Go be a great musician. you know yeah no i think it's really easy to have really good opinions about all this stuff as a couple of fives. you know We're just like...
00:43:22
Speaker
Dude, you nobody jerks off to me. You fly under the radar. you no one shits You're not ugly, but you're not like noticeable. I was trying to explain to April i've at different times. until i like you know I said, i I've never felt like anybody's ever looked at me and been like, wow that's an attractive guy.
00:43:44
Speaker
like Never once have I ever felt that way. Your wife does every day, Casey. yeah She stomachs me, and that's very nice of her. She's a great lady.
00:43:56
Speaker
but And she's driving home from Philadelphia right now because airlines are awful, and they canceled all the flights. Oh, my God. That sucks.
00:44:06
Speaker
It sucks so bad. That's like what? She was supposed to be home last night, and it got canceled. No, that's not that far. Is it? I mean... it's six yeah it probably is because it's 16 or so to kansas city where she's got to pick up her car and then yeah yeah that's terrible i feel bad for her my friend's a flight attendant uh i don't know if he wants that information oh he yeah it's fine i didn't mention his name uh or that he's been on the podcast before oops
00:44:38
Speaker
Um, no, but it's, uh, it's so now it's nice. I got that insider knowledge now when all the articles were going out about, um, like the New Jersey blew up is like, don't fly into, um, Newark, Newark.
00:44:54
Speaker
Yeah. But it's funny. Cause like, there's a lot of, because of everything going on with air traffic control whatever, it seems like there's a lot of sensationalization about flying to, um,
00:45:07
Speaker
It all like it's like it it doesn't feel as safe anymore. All the plane crashes, even though it's still obviously relatively safe. I'm going to Six Flags with my family tomorrow, and I think that's probably the scariest thing you could do to put your life in danger by getting in a vehicle of some sort. I trust yeah that less than anything else.
00:45:28
Speaker
ah Even though you only hear like one story a year of someone dying at their theme parks, that's enough to make me... um wories sam Sam dropped his one and only hat while on the roller coaster and he scaled the fence to try and get it.
00:45:45
Speaker
And a teenage girl kicked his head off. yeah I do have one hat. One hat. I've been wearing it for use. It's probably time to throw it away. but she's ah She's got a salty band.
00:46:00
Speaker
Yeah, it sure does. I would not put this anywhere near your mouth. I'll have to keep it away from my new baby. Okay, aside from being like a multi-millionaire, rock star, whatever, you know.
00:46:12
Speaker
Like if you just have to pick a lane, like I want to be, I'm starting a new, a new character in the real world here. And my character is going to be this, like somewhere near the top of the list has got to be like, I want to be a slender little gay fella. That's a flight attendant.
00:46:33
Speaker
Yeah, maybe. Is anybody having more fun than like gay flight attendants just traveling around the place like sassing old ladies, making little jokes into the loudspeaker?
00:46:46
Speaker
Dude, they're like living their best life. That does that. Yeah, they always that seems enjoyable. i could see that floating to the top there. i What would you I mean, could well that seems like a lane we can save um if we want to get to our to our Tate topic. I'd want to be in the news, boys. That's what I'd pick.
00:47:04
Speaker
Would you which one would you want to be?
00:47:09
Speaker
Frankenstein.
00:47:12
Speaker
There's a guy literally named Frankenstein. only option the in your only option is Michael Tate. Who would you pick? Oh, boy. I'll be his left nut. but So, yeah, boy, how do you even dive into these?
00:47:27
Speaker
Because I think what... so Like I said, I have a, I have a, I'm resistant to the idea of painting Tate as just like yeah this, you know, tortured, closeted gay man.
00:47:40
Speaker
Because this goes much further than he made unwanted, you know, he made advances towards, you know, sexually repressed straight guys in, ah you know, at different times that were close to the Christian music industry.
Michael Tate's Predatory Behavior
00:47:54
Speaker
Like if, if this, if the allegations were all that, like, oh, Michael made a pass at me.
00:48:01
Speaker
And ah that it was awkward, then like that would be something you could deal with. But I think what what these stories all show is a guy who he's calculated, you like you look at the people who are and who are making these allegations. And at the time, like the initial three allegations, all of these the dudes that were talking were 22 when they occurred.
00:48:28
Speaker
So he's singling out like young kids who have just started in this and, you know, young men, not young kids, but like young guys that have just started in this industry. They're trying to get a foothold. They want to play music or they want to be in sound production and stuff.
00:48:45
Speaker
And he is like a, you know, late 40s, 50 some year old man or whatever, ah takes an unusual interest in them, befriends them, starts just like, you know, pouring adoration and money and favor over them, asking them to hang out and stuff.
00:49:03
Speaker
And then they all seem to kind of end up, you know, he he gets them really drunk, gets drunk himself, and then just tries to make it happen.
00:49:14
Speaker
And it's, ah hit dude, it's very uncomfortable reading some of these. I mean, they're, you know, like... People you know passing out and waking up with you know his hands all over them and you know is his you know fondling their genitals. There's one dude that he ah he said that Michael served him a drink that tasted funny.
00:49:42
Speaker
And he lapsed in and out of... you know, consciousness for a bit. But when he like came to, he was in a closet and Tate was on his knees, like blowing him.
00:49:54
Speaker
Damn. He tried to push him off and Tate ignored him. And so he punched him a couple of times and then like stormed out of the closet. That's crazy.
00:50:06
Speaker
And yeah, these, just so every, everyone that I read just got darker. Right, because originally it sounded like he did this when he was young and on the road, and but as more and more things have come out, just like, he was a he was a grown-ass man, and this wasn't like, I'm a sexually repressed young man, which that obviously wouldn't excuse just like...
00:50:32
Speaker
blowing somebody against their will. But when you're talking like the thigh grazes and things like that, you, that's what it sounded like at first, right? Like, Oh, he was like kind of rubbing my thigh and he maybe like brushed up against my dick and you're trying, he seemed like he was trying to make it happen, but it didn't. So like you could kind of, at first it just had that feel of like, uh, didn't know, couldn't approach the subject to being gay, but was like,
00:50:58
Speaker
rolled the dice hoping someone would be into it with him. But then like you hear these stories and you're like, oh, he's not in his early twenties in a band that will collapse if people find out that he's secretly gay or whatever. Like this is all like past the band's prime and he's older and he's doing a lot of pervy shit.
00:51:21
Speaker
Yeah. It's also like there's portions of this where they talk about some of the things that would happen on the road and they mentioned certain bands being known as naked bands and they would just hang out naked in the bus. Sounds like Liberty University dorms.
00:51:39
Speaker
Dude, I just kept thinking about that. Like, ah here, yet again, we have a weird situation where a bunch of dudes are just, like, stripping for no reason yeah and just making people uncomfortable with their nakedness, you know?
00:51:52
Speaker
Like, can't can't, you know, make out with your girlfriend or whatever, but, you know, you can sit around naked with your buddies and play darts or, you know, whatever. just so strange, man.
00:52:06
Speaker
it And it's homoerotic in a way that's, like, it's It's confusing for people and maybe that's the intent at times, but it's like the first, it's like when you're a kid and you look, you're looking at internet porn and you're a teen, early, early teen and you go and you accidentally like see a penis and you see a ah male on female something and you kind of freak out a little bit and you're like, you get more concerned and worried that you're
00:52:39
Speaker
seeing a penis was gay and that you're going to go to hell for that. But that more than you are, because you're like, i can just I can just ask for forgiveness for the straight aspect of looking at porn. But if I got like hard and I saw a penis, then that's like really freaky.
00:52:56
Speaker
like But that happens, right? You can be straight. And if you if so if you're straight and somebody shows you, like forces you to watch gay porn, you'll probably get an erection because that's just ah human a human, natural human response to seeing something like that. And it's like...
00:53:13
Speaker
So I think that's what's really weird about these Christian spaces where guys will just like strip down and like force you to basically look at them because also if there's a dick in the room, you can't not look at it. And that's ah that is a proven fact for every single person. If you saw, if there was just a penis somewhere, you would have to look at it.
00:53:34
Speaker
if You can't just ignore privates in a room. So you're like, so now you're constantly in this battle of like, taking a peek and then looking away and then feeling like you have to look again, but don't want other people to see you looking. And then it's, don't know, I'm going on too long with this, but it's ah it's a confusing thing. And it happened on dorms all the time. And it, as stuff like this comes out and happens, it makes me question whether or not, like it was always just like locker room bro shit.
00:54:05
Speaker
Or if like other times on the dorms, it was like more more like ah power over like a power over situation that people were enjoying.
00:54:19
Speaker
Yeah. I feel like there's a lot going on in some of those situations. Probably a little different for a bunch of people in there, but I don't know. It is just a weird... had one kid that just thought doing the helicopter was funny as shit, and it's like...
00:54:33
Speaker
Yeah, and we've talked about the guy in our dorm that had she just had like a ah mule penis. I mean, it was huge. And he took every opportunity to get it out. He's faked it every time he got an erection.
00:54:48
Speaker
Yeah.
00:54:51
Speaker
He gave Sam a wet willy with it. yeah
00:54:58
Speaker
So, okay. so here's here's kind of the one of the incidents here that i was talking about. ah He recalls that late into the night during his second stay, this is at Tate's house, someone suggested they go skinny dipping in Tate's spa.
00:55:10
Speaker
Philip remembers what happened next viscerally. Everyone just starts shucking off their pants and jumping in. And I was like, oh, wow, they're actually doing it. I'm the new guy. I'm not very shy about that stuff. So I did it too and hopped in. um And if I remember right, this guy was from like a real conservative background where like he wasn't supposed to listen to DC talk. You know, was that that level.
00:55:33
Speaker
Oh, wow. um But when people started leaving, ah Tate became more intimate with Philip. The guys start peeling off relatively soon after that. And at some point it may have just been me and Tate left in there. Phillip said, and he started giving me a back rub.
00:55:48
Speaker
So it's like naked. Yeah. Yeah. So now he's like, they've been sitting in the spa and everybody takes off. Like as soon as they start getting, you know, like they get naked, they get in the spa for 10 minutes or whatever. And then everybody kind of just conveniently leaves. It feels planned. It feels like the other, like based on some of these stories, I'm like,
00:56:08
Speaker
Is this like a group plan that he has? Like the one where he roofies the woman? the one what's like is it Are other people in on this? like He's like, hey, I really want to get on with this guy. can Let's do this. And then how about you guys all split? like It feels manufactured.
00:56:25
Speaker
I don't see how it couldn't be. Because this is one thing. But like you know some of these other allegations take place like on a tour bus. Like you're on a tour bus with a bunch of other people and stuff.
00:56:37
Speaker
And i mean, to, you know, cause you instantly think of like, well, this is a Christian space that they must be like very hostile towards, you know, like anything resembling gay stuff or whatever. But like, I don't know. I mean, he's bold enough to make those advances like in public on tour buses at parties, whatever, you know, with, with friends and stuff around.
00:57:02
Speaker
So I, people knew about this. I just can't understand. i can't buy a scenario where people didn't know about all this. A hundred percent. It feels completely ah like he was in, he was, they were, everyone just was running cover for this guy for a really long time.
00:57:21
Speaker
And I hope that shit comes out too. I hope it's like, you don't get to act like this and do this kind of shit for as long as he does it without, without, people being like, I didn't see anything.
00:57:33
Speaker
And why? Like, that's crazy because the dude's not someone massive. Like he's Michael Tate. Like I get that he's big in that world, but it's not like he, it's not like, it just feels like a weird name for him to have that much pull and power and over people where they would turn a blind eye, as opposed to like, you know, someone like, um,
00:57:57
Speaker
Garth Brooks, right? It's, yeah, it's like, it's hard to imagine if it's, cause obviously like there is something to gain from Tate, like taking an interest in you and stuff. If you're in that industry, in those circles.
00:58:11
Speaker
Yeah. Um, And that's sometimes where like some of the like stories like this, that's sometimes where they lose me a little bit because, you know, I think I think here in the in the allegations that I've read, the several that I've gone through.
00:58:29
Speaker
It seems like, yeah, there was a power dynamic to it because, you know, he's an important guy in that industry and stuff like that. But it almost seems more like situational pressure. And like ah um he leveraged like his friendship with these people to put them in uncomfortable scenarios, you know.
00:58:49
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. And like, this is just the people that have talked about it. I'm sure there was given how many of these are now popping up. This happened a lot, I think. and yeah He was working people left and right. There are situations like this, though, where like you hear stories about some of this and.
00:59:06
Speaker
You know, I was thinking about it today. but So think probably if you've been listening to the podcast for a while, you know that like my wife was pretty she was it for several years was into like cosplay big time, you know, and she traveled around and went to, you know, ah guested at Comic Cons and stuff, kind of built like a following and stuff in that realm.
00:59:29
Speaker
Yeah. And there's a lot of people in that space, a lot of girls that have decent sized pages and stuff. And then there's a few cosplayers that are like above the rest, like they've established themselves almost more as celebrities, you know, in that like Comic Con community.
00:59:45
Speaker
One of them is, ah her name's Jessica Negri. I've only met her once. She's pretty nice when I met her and stuff, but like, she's definitely the biggest person in that realm.
00:59:57
Speaker
Okay. And there was, you would you were talk you would talk to people, you would hear stories about her sometimes, where like, dude, I got really sick of the culture around all that Comic-Con stuff, just because like,
01:00:11
Speaker
it's it's It seemed like all of these people trying to climb a ladder that didn't matter. Right, and the ladder was made of the bodies of other people. Yeah, pretty much. It's like, ah human lot of i will do anything to get this guesting spot that doesn't pay this Comic-Con in like Hutchinson, Kansas. Great, okay, cool, whatever. like Nobody outside of this room cares about this. You realize that, Right, right.
01:00:37
Speaker
But so like Jessica Negri is like pretty big though. And you would hear stories sometimes about how like people would say that she was really nice, but then you'd also hear stories where they were like, yeah, you know, she, she's kind of known for like really pushing the boundaries of like friendships with her. And what it would sounded like is like, she would, if you were like friendly with her and trying to like get into her social circle or whatever, she would like,
01:01:07
Speaker
push you and make bigger and bigger requests of you, you know, it was almost like a litmus test of like, are you, are you going to debase yourself to maybe be a part of like my circle or you know, like, because i was around a lot of those people. I'm sure that it's nauseating to constantly have people like trying to like climb up your butthole all the time. Yeah.
01:01:34
Speaker
It's not nice. It's not right. That's not how you should treat people. But like you can kind of see some of that. And like sometimes people would talk about it in almost like a power dynamic sense of like, you know, like there was some abusive component to it. And it's like, we're but no, no, no.
01:01:50
Speaker
You're you're an adult. OK. And all of this is based around the fact that she has a thing that you want. So you debased yourself to try to get the thing that you want. Like that's not a, that i don't that's not the same as somebody's boss, like holding their living over their head, you know, in exchange for sexual favors. Manufactured power dynamic. it doesn't It's not real.
01:02:11
Speaker
It's a social status hierarchy thing that you've created in your mind based on the number of followers somebody has on social media. And it's also, like if you think about it from the other person's perspective, I don't know what kind of things happen. There is a line, of course, where you are now just the problem person who's taking things too far. But if from her situation, it's like people do view her this way and they're just a bunch of suck ups and they just suck ups and fuck ups that just want to move their way up the ladder where it's like,
01:02:42
Speaker
this fake manufactured social ladder that's doesn't exist. It's literally dependent on them and their creativity. So you go, all right, what am I going to do? I'm going to, maybe I could see why someone like that, who's probably been betrayed by a lot of people who didn't get what they wanted from her kind of going into some loyalty testing type behavior, which is not great, but it's not like she's it's a reality of being a celebrity though a lot of times is that like yeah that's a pattern of behavior that you would have to be careful not to like let yourself fall into yeah for sure and now of course i mean i think like asking you to do weird shit like but you know i'm sure people never got into the particulars it's just like it sounds like a lot of hearsay and
01:03:27
Speaker
i just kind of bullshitting. and Yeah, and like as far as I know, she's a nice lady that, you know, like I said, I only met her the once, and she was she was really cordial and nice.
01:03:39
Speaker
All that to say that there are times when people scream power dynamic, where I'm like, okay, well, it seems to me like you were just trying to get yours out of this situation, you were willing to humiliate yourself for it, you know, whatever.
01:03:54
Speaker
That... I don't I don't get that from these scenarios. And like when you hear somebody else describe these things, I think yeah there's there's a temptation to to see it that way.
01:04:06
Speaker
But I feel like if you read the article and you get to hear it from these these actual the actual like victims here. that's That's not what's going on here. This is like people who, yeah, there was ah there was an element of power dynamic to it.
01:04:22
Speaker
But I think more than anything, like he leveraged friendship with these people who admired him and looked up to him and stuff. and And that's how some of this stuff came about. I mean, I i really like...
01:04:35
Speaker
the The difference to me from hearing about it from someone else saying it versus actually reading it, like really changed my my perception of some of the allegations, you know? And now that there's more and more, I mean, it's it's clear that just we're we're dealing with a psychopath.
01:04:51
Speaker
Yeah. so So let's tackle the the the worst of the allegations here. We kind of alluded to it earlier.
01:05:02
Speaker
Um, so I'm, I'm going to jump into the middle of this
Nicole's Assault Story
01:05:06
Speaker
article though. Uh, it's, it's been 10 years since Nicole, not her real name, uh, as TRR has a policy of not sharing the names of sex assault victims.
01:05:16
Speaker
met the newsboys on tour. Then 23 years old, she had begun interview interning with Pulse Evangelism 22 months before and then was hired on staff. The Minneapolis-based ministry founded by evangelist Nick Hall does live events, digital ministry, local revival gatherings until 2023, an annual Christmas tour named The Reason.
01:05:36
Speaker
God's Not Dead, the film based on the Newsboys song and album of the same name, had just released in cinemas, and the band's present was a major coup for the organization. But nothing prepared Nicole for the early morning hours of just December 16th.
01:05:51
Speaker
Midway through the 12-show tour in December 2014, the Newsboys, their crew, and staff had three days off. All the band members except for Tate flew back home, but a small contingent stayed at the Ramada Inn and Suites in Fargo.
01:06:05
Speaker
Nicole, who was the only Pulse staffer on site, bunked in her own room across from musicians Jesse Jones and Elizabeth Chan, who played for opening act musician Mariah Peters, now now called Small Bone.
01:06:18
Speaker
It's weird name. This was Nicole's second tour with Jones and Chan, and they had become fast friends. They invited her to dinner at the hotel restaurant, Bassie's, at around 6.30 p.m. It was a cold night. Nicole was dressed in a bright pink beanie, a thick winter jacket, black jeans, and winter boots.
01:06:35
Speaker
Feeling a bit off due to her monthly period, her plans were to have a bite to eat, relax with friends, and call it a night. But at 9 p.m., the Newsboys crew began to stream in and order drinks. This included guitar tech Jack Campbell, um...
01:06:48
Speaker
related to our boy, Wes Campbell. We were just talking about. All right Second cousin of news boys owner, Wes Campbell tour manager, Steve Campbell, who's his brother, if I remember correctly and lighting a presence apprentice, Zach Germanis.
01:07:05
Speaker
Tate was one of the last to arrive, accompanied by Brewer and Newsboys merch guide, John Birch. Pulse allowed employees to drink on off days on off days, as this was personal time, and Newsboys band and crew were allowed to consume alcohol at any time, as long as it didn't affect their work.
01:07:20
Speaker
By the way, they drink a lot on these tours. that's That was very clear. I mean, it was an everyday occurrence that they were they were drinking heavily. By 11 p.m., Tate was flailing his cash around as he walked up and down the bar, telling the bartender what drinks to make, Chan told TRR.
01:07:38
Speaker
The party racked up nearly a $300 tab, according to the bartender. From what I saw, the gentleman at the bar... We're drinking the most and did I did not see anything that would make me believe otherwise, he told police later.
01:07:50
Speaker
With a free day ahead, the group remained at the bar until 1am when the bartender announced he would begin closing. Nicole told TRR she barely spoke to Brewer, if at all, as the distance and noise kept them in separate conversations. She was not friends with the lighting designer from Indiana, who was 11 years her senior.
01:08:06
Speaker
Over the course of six and a half hours, Nicole says she stayed well within legal drinking limits and was ready for bed, but when Tate saw her stand up at 1.17 a.m., he yelled for her across the bar. He wanted to buy her, Birch, and himself round of tequila.
01:08:21
Speaker
Tate says, here i have a tequila shot for you and we're all going to take it together because tate and the crew had been friendly in previous encounters i didn't think twice michael tate is a very charismatic personality he has a way of making you feel like you're the in the in the insider club calling you sister or brother wrapping his arm around you and making you feel special i did not know tate very well but he had always been friendly on show days So when Tate called me over to take a shot with him and Birch, it seemed harmless. I did not feel like I was peer pressured into it. But as a young professional in the industry, I wanted to be ah liked by these people. One shot seemed harmless.
01:08:57
Speaker
Unfortunately, i have next to no memory after that drink. After she took the glass from Tate, video footage taken at the hotel that night shows what happened next. After leaving the bar, video footage shows she left alone. She took the elevator to the third floor.
01:09:11
Speaker
Brewer had entered the elevator with her and footage shows them walking towards her room at the opposite end of the hall from Brewer's room. She pauses and turns back to Brewer, or turns to talk to Brewer.
01:09:22
Speaker
When they resume walking, she staggers briefly and goes to her door. Finding she can't get in, Nicole and Brewer turn back down the hallway towards his room. Footage shows Nicole stumbling again and she appears to fall.
01:09:34
Speaker
Brewer stands by and watches as she gets back up. On a second camera, she is seen entering Brewer's room with him at 1.23 a.m. They walk apart with no physical interaction.
01:09:46
Speaker
Tate appears at the door and knocks at 1.29 a.m. m The door opens slightly. The room's lights are now off. Brewer steps out, closing the door behind him. He and Tate draw close together, laughing and whispering. At one point, Tate runs his hand up Brewer's torso and face and gropes Brewer's crotch.
01:10:03
Speaker
where How do they have this information? the Security camera footage. In the room? This is in it. This is outside the room. So he steps out the room. they're doing this outside the room. To talk to Tate, yeah. Gotcha, my bad.
01:10:16
Speaker
After a few minutes, Nicole opens the door. She is fully dressed and moves away from the door into the hallway. The three converse, and then she latches onto Brewer as he carries her back into the room. Tate makes space for them to enter the room and follows, shutting the door behind them at 1.30 a.m.
01:10:32
Speaker
While viewing the footage, Nicole told TRR that she did not remember this moment, but said she unequivocally would not have wanted to be taken back into the room. She believes a date rape drug like Rohypnol, GHB, or ketamine mixed with alcohol lowered her inhibitions.
01:10:50
Speaker
The effects of date rape drugs mixed with alcohol can occur almost immediately. They allow a person to stay conscious and walk and interact with others, yet have no memory of the situation. To be knocked out by such a drug is known as roofing.
01:11:02
Speaker
This isn't the first time Tate has been accused of using drugs with an assault. In a June 13th investigation published by The Guardian, two of the men interviewed believed they were secretly drugged by Tate. This left them in a semi-conscious state, unable to fend off sexual advances, they said.
01:11:17
Speaker
However, Steve Campbell, the tour manager, told TRR that in his 15 years of working with Tate and the Newsboys, he has never seen Tate use illicit drugs. Thank you, Steve Campbell. Yeah, wow.
01:11:28
Speaker
Nice job. One of the Campbells. Yeah. Yet Tate admitted in his confession on June 10th that he abused cocaine and consumed far too much alcohol.
01:11:40
Speaker
vitage I'm sorry, I know this is long, but I think like this story is is bad enough that I think it's worth reciting here. and Video footage shows Tate leaves leaving Brewer's room at 1.35 a.m. m He returns four minutes later, then departs alone at 1.49 a.m.
01:11:57
Speaker
He returns at 1.57 a.m. with Jack Campbell, the 18-year-old drum tech related to management. According to Chan, Campbell was um was one of only two people in the band's entourage who were not drinking alcohol that night.
01:12:10
Speaker
whoa Footage shows Campbell following Tate, but after opening the door, fleeing after six seconds. Tate pokes his head out, seemingly to look for Campbell, then ducks back into the room. This is... God, dude, this is this is rough.
01:12:25
Speaker
By this point, Nicole's friends were concerned. The last they had seen of her was when she had taken the tequila shot, then left the bar. We were concerned because she didn't come back to her room that night, so we went looking for her, Jones told TRR.
01:12:38
Speaker
It is my belief that drinking and hooking up was completely out of character for her, and was definitely not her intent. Um, Chan and Jones asked Germanis and Jack Campbell if they had seen her. According to Germanis, Campbell told him had seen Nicole Brewer and Tate in Brewer's room 15 minutes earlier.
01:12:55
Speaker
I said, I'm pretty sure she went up with Brewer. I know Brewer was not a Bible-believing man, and they definitely had a couple of drinks. I know Brewer did, per the usual, and they were like, can you please help us find her?
01:13:10
Speaker
Jerminus chose to help the women and knocked on Brewer's door at 2.16 a.m. Video footage shows Brewer peering out of the darkroom to speak to Jerminus, then quickly shutting the door. Brewer is shirtless and only wears jeans.
01:13:22
Speaker
Jerminus told TRR, I saw his half-drunk face open the door and he was like, what's up? I was like, hey, have you seen Nicole? And he said something like, no, I haven't seen her.
01:13:33
Speaker
Jerminus told the two women that Brewer said Nicole was downstairs with John Birch. Hearing this, Chan left to search for her downstairs while Jerminus walked to the stairwell and spoke to Campbell, who was processing what he saw in Brewer's room.
01:13:45
Speaker
He was like, I saw Tate basically watching them have sex or something like that, Jerminus recalled. That's crazy. The whole Tate thing, hanging out, watching the Brewer, Brewster, Brewer, what is it?
01:13:58
Speaker
Yeah. Or rape this woman. And he's just there for it. Like, it's a like a bonding moment. Like, hey, let get you this. He's facilitating it. He it was like, let me get you this person.
01:14:11
Speaker
That's unbelievable. Like, I hope he goes to jail. I hope more shit comes out. I mean, what's crazy, i not to get ahead of the story here, but like... The cops basically were useless.
01:14:23
Speaker
They didn't, pro they encouraged her to like not get a rape kit done. They didn't process it. They ended up getting a rape kit done, but it was after the drugs. Like they were told her, Oh, don't bother. Cause it's going to take three to six months, which is pretty standard.
01:14:38
Speaker
And like, they just swept the cops swept the, like just botched the whole fucking thing too. Even though she was willing at the time to try to do some of the right thing, not right thing. I, I'm not trying to moralize her choices afterwards. I get all the factors that come into play when it comes to a woman wanting to report this stuff, but she was trying, it, I, it was suppressed.
01:15:02
Speaker
It was suppressed. um Bad policing was likely what it was, but you just go with all of that. Like, There's no chance that this is the, ah oh, this is the like one or two times this happened.
01:15:17
Speaker
You know? like You hear a story this cold and this like sick and this fucked up from a guy who brazenly roofies someone to take them back to a room so his buddy can rape them.
01:15:29
Speaker
It's like, this bitch has done this shit a lot more often than we know about. yeah And it's crazy. You have a wife, you got kids, like and you're going to try to play like the...
01:15:40
Speaker
I was cis sinner. I drank too much. There's no sad way out of this. There's enough reporting now. we're like any honest I get that family will just stick by each other because it's really hard to believe that the people you love that have fooled you for all that time are actual monsters. But, man, I hope everyone in his life fucking sees the light here.
01:16:01
Speaker
Oh, wow. I hope. Yeah. And see, I don't think this ah Jack Campbell, he's not participating. I'm sure there's a lot of family pressure on him to keep his mouth shut, you know, throughout this. he needs to He needs to be a man and step up and do what he you know do the right thing here.
01:16:21
Speaker
But so he said, so this is Germanis recalls. He was like, I saw tatee basically watching them have sex or something like that. So I said, are you scared? Tate's in there right now. And he's like, yeah, it was the worst thing ever.
01:16:35
Speaker
And we basically just sat there. We were just kind of like in disbelief, like what in the heck is happening right now? How are we in the middle of this? TRR reached out to Jack Campbell, who declined to comment on the record.
01:16:48
Speaker
Jones continued to pace in front of Brewer's closed door. After one minute, she knocked, and this time Brewer opened the door a little wider. He was still shirtless, and Jones told TRR he was sweaty. The lights were off.
01:16:59
Speaker
She says Brewer told her Nicole was downstairs with Birch having a cigarette, but Chan and Jones know knew knew Nicole didn't smoke, so Jones headed downstairs to report what Brewer had said.
01:17:11
Speaker
We knew in that moment that was probably a bold-faced lie, Chan said to TRR. But of course, what are we going to do? You know, us girls are going to push down a door for a guy that's six foot five or and strong.
01:17:24
Speaker
That's so crazy. Dude, I haven't watched the security footage, but this guy's kind of scary looking, too. he' is He's a big prick. Yeah. vitage proves nicole Video footage proves Nicole was still in Brewer's room because she left at 2.21 a.m. fully dressed but without shoes or glasses.
01:17:44
Speaker
Grainy footage shows her wearing her distinctive pink beanie, walking down the hall, and collapsing at her hotel room door. As for what happened inside the hotel room, Nicole told TRR that after taking the tequila from Tate, the next thing that I remember is being on a bathroom floor and feeling like a thousand pounds were on me.
01:18:03
Speaker
My body was so heavy I could hardly move. I hear Matt Brewer's voice and I remember Tate being in there. I remember the feeling of my head being pushed down so between someone's legs.
01:18:13
Speaker
I guess oral sex or an attempt, but I don't fully remember. Yeah, and then there's this whole deal about the the declining the rape the rape test. and Yeah, the rape kit. And then she eventually went and got it. But yeah, the whole thing got bungled after that. The cops just didn't want a cop.
Mishandling of Rape Case and Call for Justice
01:18:32
Speaker
They just didn't want to be police officers. They probably want to fucking sit and eat donuts and drink coffee. Yeah. not deal with rape because it's a he said she said situation even though there was like tons of evidence to support it that they could have figured out about but by you know whatever here we are um yeah all this shit is wild this is just this is so bad so is is Tate going to trial is there like any legal trials potentially for him or is this all just kind of building now I'm sure someone's trying to put a case together
01:19:09
Speaker
I don't know. Because this one seems like a slam dunk. Maybe. I mean, it's still... Yeah, I mean, there's security camera footage and stuff, but it doesn't necessarily prove that, you know, that that that happened. But what the rape kit bru said, like, the doctor said, yes, she was...
01:19:30
Speaker
like she was raped. It was too late to know if she, to be able to know if she was under the influence of any sort of drug. um It couldn't, it wouldn't be able to verify that due to the time that went by. But part of the reason she knew this is guys i again, it's rough, but um Part of the reason she knew she was raped was because they are they alluded to and mentioned her period but's beforehand.
01:20:04
Speaker
and Her tampon was pushed way far up into her vagina. And ah that's one of like that's how she knew something was very wrong.
01:20:16
Speaker
Like, God, it's just horrific. The whole story. probably like a real conservative girl. I mean, you know, I don't know. i You know, it's it's not that it matters, but I mean, if that was like her first sexual experience, too, on top of it, I mean, I just...
01:20:34
Speaker
Which it said, I read somewhere that it was the assumption was that she hadn't been with somebody before this. Like, yeah, awful. I mean, awful regardless if you've been with somebody, but it's ah like, yeah, but i so I think people understand what we're trying to say.
Tate's Manipulative Environment
01:20:51
Speaker
So on top of that, on top of all of that, you know, some of the other allegations that have come out since involve, you know, minors,
01:21:05
Speaker
Davis was 16 when he met Tate at a party in 2003. He considered Tate's former band DC talks as heroes because they were Christians, but they rocked out. um He told the Guardian that he... I don't want a victim point, but... I know, it's a bad sentence. It's a bad set it a's bad take.
01:21:26
Speaker
We went to bars and parties together where Tate was able to get him drinks underage. He was also introduced to cocaine by Tate, alone at the Superstar's home. That's crazy! That's so crazy, because how old is Tate at this point?
01:21:40
Speaker
Well, it's 2003, so what, he would have been in his 40s or something? Maybe. Bang. They were older. Okay. That's still unbelievable, dude. God.
01:21:51
Speaker
Just introducing teenagers to coke and shit is like... A 16-year-old? but it's That's what I'm saying, dude. is This guy is a psycho.
01:22:02
Speaker
We know this shit happens in the industry, but like there's something even... it's funny It's funny that it feels grosser coming from this like Christian context. And I think why it seems funny is because like, we, we kind of just know a lot of like the platitudes are horseshit. Like we know when push comes to shove, these people often, there's a lot of straight laced people that follow their convictions, of course, but like, this is also not uncommon.
01:22:36
Speaker
And it just like predatory on, on underage shit aside, like, That the, that it's just, it's funny that like the party scene in that world is goes as hard as it does when most of them would be like, ah find some way to like explain why what they're doing doesn't count as a problem.
01:23:00
Speaker
Even though by and large, that community has strong feelings about the consumption of they accept the, the exorbitant consumption of alcohol and illicit drugs.
01:23:12
Speaker
but they all do it and they're all just like rock trying to rock for Jesus afterwards. And you're like this, God, it makes it feel like such horseshit. Like if you liked the news boys and you connected with it and it made you like, you felt like it helped your faith or gave you something you needed for a time that sucks for you too, because it's going to feel like all of that was horseshit from them, that but none of it was real. Like it can't be, you can't live like that and do this bullshit.
01:23:41
Speaker
yeah can like You can say, oh, I sinned. I know we tried to say that. Like, oh, I've got the demons in me. i need to pray. it's like, no, dude. you'll and You can't say anything at this point that will ever convince me that you have authentically bought into any of this shit.
01:23:58
Speaker
I think you're a fucking fraud and a pervert and a freak, and you deserve jail time. What I don't know is like what – What was his relationship to the other members of the newsboys
Awareness of Band Members
01:24:11
Speaker
during all this? know. Because they're kind of conspicuously absent in all these stories, at least the ones that I've seen.
01:24:17
Speaker
But they had to know that this was going on. I mean, he's out constantly partying with their road crew and stuff like that. I mean, they had to be a part of it some way or another.
01:24:29
Speaker
It's possible Tate was like, i don't know. it I think it's within the realm of possibility that Tate was on his own doing this if the other three were not into it.
01:24:40
Speaker
Now, I don't believe that they hadn't caught wind of anything sketchy about his behavior. I'm sure they had heard, um but I don't know. I mean, I could see a world where the three, the other three, right? Was it four people in the newsboys?
01:24:58
Speaker
Yeah, i I can't remember. can see a world where the other members weren't, if they were like, no, that's not us. Um, But it's just annoying because if it's not them and this is their message and their witness and they really buy into this shit, then they should have been like, get the fuck out of here, Tate.
01:25:16
Speaker
You can't just go do coke on the weekends and fucking obliterate your brain with alcohol and then show up and be like, this is all for Jesus. It's like, go fuck yourself, dude.
01:25:27
Speaker
Yeah. Even in your like Christian corporate crap rock band of whatever you want to call it, like you're you're making like art with this person who's just a lunatic, you know? Yeah. Like he's so brazen about it too. Like in this, this story, this kid's 17 and ah he says one night at Tate's house, Tate mixed and served him a drink that tasted strange, feeling dizzy and sick.
Coercion by Tate
01:25:51
Speaker
He began going in and out of consciousness.
01:25:53
Speaker
I woke up in the closet and he had my pants down and was giving me a blow job. Davis told the guardian. I pushed him off as best I was able to in that state, but he pushed me down, and then I punched him twice and left.
01:26:06
Speaker
ah Davis was 17 when this occurred, and he said that Tate love-bombed him to try to reconcile. Eventually, Tate apologized, but convinced Davis that it was his fault. He was very manipulative, and I was trying to give him the benefit of the doubt, Davis said.
01:26:19
Speaker
Davis stayed with friends stayed friends with Tate and said in 2012, Tate tried to pay him for a sexual favor. He was sitting in Tate's kitchen. that's that's It's like, dude, this is how brazen he goes. He already he struck out and then managed to squeak by. Well, this is way later too. Yeah. This is 2010. 2003 is when the original incident happened.
01:26:45
Speaker
So seven years later, did you say? 2012. 2012. This is nine years i later. He's sitting in Tate's kitchen when he received a text message from Tate who was in his bedroom.
01:26:57
Speaker
The picture showed approximately $5,000 in cash. He said something to the effect of, this could all be yours if you let me suck you off and come at you. What?
01:27:08
Speaker
Davis quickly called his mother and was picked up before date Tate realized he had left. Davis's mother corroborated this. why God, dude. How do people like this get away with it for so long?
01:27:25
Speaker
That's what blows my mind. Because it's the same. But it's so people. It's the same thing, dude. it's It's like what you hear talk about, like churches or or or businesses, they get too big. Like past a certain point, the organism's first and only instinct is to protect itself.
01:27:46
Speaker
But like in institutions like a church and a pastor, and I know I'm already talking myself out of it based on what you said, but like there's an it there's a organization that's goes out of their way to protect this person and have conversations with the family about handling things in house.
Industry Enabling Predatory Behavior
01:28:06
Speaker
Like, yeah. This isn't... this As far as I can tell, like there's licensing by the people around Tate to be a fucking piece of shit. But there's no corporate... There's no...
01:28:21
Speaker
yeah centralized effort to try to protect Tate. It's just the fact that he's done this for so long and not one person was like, I'm going to tell the news. Like, I'm going to tell. I'm sure he has.
01:28:33
Speaker
I'm sure he has a very good idea of who he can, how much he can show to each of the people around him, you know? And I think these guys identify who's ah who's going to be a willing participant in their like debauchery.
01:28:49
Speaker
Yeah. That's why, like, you know, people talk about um people talk about like the the like douchebag, like game culture of like trying to just go to clubs and have sex with as many girls as possible and stuff like that. Like people always talk about that as being a, you know, a prominent thing that exists. But like, I just don't, I don't know anybody that does that, but I don't think that's because they aren't out there. It's because I'm not in a, I'm not, I'm,
01:29:21
Speaker
If you're not into that, they're not going to tell you about that. They're not going to try to get you to to partake in it, you know? So, like, you kind of get ruled out as a potential, like, close friend with those kind of people.
01:29:35
Speaker
It's also like you you you know, where you choose to spend your time and stuff like that. But I think part of how a guy like him, who's a charismatic guy that's like made a career for himself, you know, publicly and stuff, he, he's good at figuring out who is a safe person to be a scumbag around, you know?
01:29:56
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, he's gotta be, otherwise we wouldn't be having this conversation. So let me read one more here.
Public Indecency Incident
01:30:04
Speaker
because this one, i haven't I haven't read all of this one, and it's wild. so Israel Anthem, a national Nashville-based videographer, was also named in the report.
01:30:15
Speaker
states that Tate masturbated in front of him in public restroom when he was 13. Anthem, who is related to the late gospel music legend Dottie Rambo, grew up with Tate as a family acquaintance.
01:30:27
Speaker
He told TRR that his incident... with Tate occurred at Houston's now Brick Tops restaurant in Nashville's trendy West End. Tate came into the restaurant after my family had stopped by our table to and stopped by our table to say hi.
01:30:41
Speaker
He told TRR in a statement that matched his story shared in The Guardian. 45 minutes later, I walked to the male restroom. He said, "'We were both standing in front of the urinal making polite conversation.
01:30:52
Speaker
I finished, so zipped my sipped up my fly and walked to the sink to wash my hands.'" Tate kept talking, and then he and then and when I turned around, he was facing me with his dick out.
01:31:04
Speaker
He kept eye contact with me for 20 to 30 seconds and kept talking. I thought he was zipping up his pants, but he was rubbing his penis. It felt like an eternity. That's crazy. His family members of Anthem's told the Guardian that he was white as a ghost when he returned from the bathroom. That kind of brazen behavior in a public restroom, like, somebody could walk in.
01:31:26
Speaker
Like, there's something thrilling for Tate about about the risk. There has to be, right? His behavior seems to indicate that, like... It's so risky. It's so risky.
01:31:38
Speaker
It's crazy. He probably felt like a god after a while. like no one's No one's telling on me. i have total control. like It's not. It's like the psychopath cult leader mindset you know where it's it's The the like the the showcasing of power is what they get off on to some extent. And so like that's why they constantly like push it further and further. And so many like cult leaders end up... you know you You listen to cult documentaries and so many times it turns into...
01:32:15
Speaker
pedophilia or, so you know, rearranging marriages, taking people's wives as their own, blah blah, blah, you know, deciding when certain people in the church can have sex with each other and when they can't like, it's all just like the imposition of their power. And that's what they, that's what they really enjoy. There's gotta be an element of that to, to this.
Nashville's Perception of Tate
01:32:38
Speaker
And this kid, he, so he makes an interesting statement. you know, kind of to what we were talking about a minute ago. He says, there are three types of people in Nashville. Those who know the stories about Tate are survivors and are terrified.
01:32:51
Speaker
Those who validate the stories about Tate, believe them to be true and wait for the day justice happens. And those who will cash a check with Tate, despite knowing the truth. Damn. That's pretty, that's pretty serious statement. Yeah.
01:33:06
Speaker
I, I don't know, dude, the the whole thing. And, and, there's I didn't gather a lot of statements from anybody about this. I did listen to an hour of Cooper talk or whatever. John Cooper from Skillet's podcast today because he made an episode about it.
01:33:24
Speaker
Cooper stuff. Cooper stuff. That's such a bad name. He has the worst podcast name in history. the Just the least creative podcast. Cooper stuff. guy who's managed to exist in a creative space for a long time.
01:33:38
Speaker
Yeah, well, with a total lack of creativity for a long time. Right. But I think, I bet he's been using the term Cooper stuff for like 20 years. I bet it's like...
01:33:50
Speaker
I bet he has a sign. Like when you walk into their house and over their living room, it says Cooper stuff. I guarantee you, this is like their family thing. Like you like, it's not even like It's Cooper stuff, right guys? Like it's just dad shit. Times New Roman, like wrote that on a piece of paper and then get to the wall. Yeah. He, he gets, he has like a little, like,
01:34:14
Speaker
fridge magnet that says cooper stuff like that's when what he's been all about for a long time thinking it's like inside baseball on like his family like it means they're tight it's their slogan we do cooper stuff and then uh he had a podcast and he's so it's so he's so desensitized to how stupid it sounds because he's been saying it for so long he's like that's the perfect name for the podcast Yeah, we so ah Skillet has been a ah topic of conversation on the Discord because Sam put together this like album review club and you know we just rotate, everybody posts an album. So it was my turn this past week and I picked Revolution, the newest Skillet album.
01:34:59
Speaker
That's because you don't like actually being in this group. You just have to because you do this podcast. I feel bad because I have nothing smart to say about music. I just like have the worst 12-year-old music taste. like It's not that I'm withholding my views. I don't have anything smart to say about it.
01:35:19
Speaker
I'm trying to hide my cards a little bit so nobody knows how dumb I am. Yeah.
01:35:26
Speaker
but Yeah, because of, in ah in an expert act of trolling by me, everyone had to listen to the newest Skillet album at least once through. And shout out to Mike Falk for flipping through it like five times.
01:35:42
Speaker
Jeremiah had a hilarious review for it. He did have some really good feedback. Oops, sorry, Jay. um There's been some good, and
Skillet's New Album and Music Reviews
01:35:52
Speaker
then... um Reagan, our buddy Reagan, the Discord, had some great feedback.
01:35:57
Speaker
There's been a lot of funny. this is He's so funny, dude. he has a good He's got some good little jokes there. we This has been the most active. and The worst albums, I feel like, end up being the most discussed.
01:36:09
Speaker
I haven't made it through yet because I'm in, and speaking we talked about Madonna earlier, I'm in two album review clubs. Another one I'm in is the reason I got the idea to do this one. because it got us talking so much. i was like, that'd be super fun for our discord. Um, but I'm, I'm in like a double whammy of albums. I don't want to listen to.
01:36:28
Speaker
um One of them, the the one I'm, and I'm not working right now because ah it's summer and I do most of my music listening when I drive and I don't subject my family to but a lot of, to my album reviews because they don't want to listen to Skillet.
01:36:45
Speaker
And i don't want anyone to hear me listening to Skillet because that's embarrassing. Dude, it sucks so bad. I can't even remember some of the lyrics that we all highlighted, but it sucks so bad.
01:36:59
Speaker
It's just a piece of crap. Doing True Blue album by Madonna. Oh, boy. It's fine. like I don't have a problem with Madonna, but I don't want to listen to it, and I just have...
01:37:12
Speaker
So I'm like, I'm just sandwiched between two albums that I haven't worked hard enough to find the time to listen to. But I do owe everyone a review. ever So as as much as I would love to just crap all over John Cooper, he ah his statement is about an hour long. The podcast about it. I listen to the whole thing.
01:37:35
Speaker
55 minutes of it is is very good it's very good for somebody coming from that standpoint especially somebody like him who's such a like you know like uh who's wrong to be victim yeah yeah and it's like he really does a good job of calling it out and not making excuses for it he kind of like beseeches everyone else in christian music to do the same like don't hide behind this like we need to be, you know, we need to show grace and mercy and we need to, you know, he's a broken man, but we're all broken men and blah, blah, blah. He's like, no, we need to, this is bad.
01:38:12
Speaker
This is bad. And it hurts the body of Christ. And like, we need to call this out with everything we've got.
Accountability in Christian Music Industry
01:38:19
Speaker
It's only in about the last five minutes where he's really diagnosing the problems that led to this, where he gets into like,
01:38:27
Speaker
This is a, net you know, stuff like this. This is just a continuation of the fact that like, you know, there are people in Christian music that are, that are posting pro-choice stuff that are, that are, you know, that shame people like me for having like, you know, godly sexual ethics, you know, traditional views of, of sexuality and stuff like, um um like it all ties together.
01:38:50
Speaker
It's, it's because of people's cowardice and not calling out, you know, uh, abortion that yeah know Michael Tate gets away with like drugging and raping people for 20 years. so It's the woke mob's fault. It's the woke left always that allows rape like this to happen. it's du You know who Ted Cruz supported?
01:39:12
Speaker
You know who Michael Tate supported for president in 2016? Ted Cruz, I'm guessing. It really blew my reveal. your reveal. Yeah.
01:39:23
Speaker
yeah Ted Cruz is a load oh so i give ah i give John's response a 9 out of 10 it was pretty good considering what a a just a scum sucking loser he is um there was also a pretty a pretty ah heated response from Hayley Williams oh from Paramore So the clip that I saw from it here is it says the amount of things I have to say and the amount of people I know who are likely changed forever by this man and by the industry that empowered slash enabled
Need for Systemic Change in Industry
01:40:02
Speaker
him.
01:40:02
Speaker
And no one but the TikToker who broke this story has said a word about Michael Tate needing gay affirming support. Because this is a man whose entire faith identity is built upon a faulty structure of self-hatred to please a system that would rather cover up abhorrent behavior for 20 plus years and make money off it, rather than accept that being gay is not the problem.
01:40:23
Speaker
I grew up around this. I am not afraid of any of these people. Most of them have written me off by now anyways. I, that ain't it. Okay. That's, I get where she's coming from.
01:40:35
Speaker
That's not it. We didn't even talk about the TikToker that, that all that nearly screwed up a nearly three year long investigation by posting unsubstantiated claims with no, you know, sources or anything to back it up.
01:40:50
Speaker
It, it just happens to be the same guy for, for those of you who remember when we had Jonathan Merritt on, i don't know, maybe, maybe, Mid last year. Yeah, it wasn't super long ago, but pretty cool guy. He's a he was ah an evangelical kind of thought leader in a way and stuff. But he's gay. And in the course of him wrestling with the fact that he's gay and, you know, working towards changing his ideas about it and stuff like that. I don't remember the whole story, but basically there's a like a tick tocker blogger guy
01:41:27
Speaker
that outed him. And it was a really crappy thing to do. And this is like one of the the main things on this guy's resume. His name's Azariah Southworth. um But yeah, back in January, while they were still trying to put all these pieces together and release this in the right way because you have to do this in the right way.
01:41:46
Speaker
Because it's going to be very easy with no sources or anything to just write it off as like, you know, this is an attack on him. This is this is crap. Nobody you know, you can't prove any of this.
01:41:59
Speaker
there's a big industry behind this guy that could have easily like shuffled this stuff under the rug. And, you know, the Roy's report, the journalist that, that broke this story was really trying to do this through. I think she did a great job putting all this together, put a lot of time into it. She did the, she did this the right way.
01:42:19
Speaker
And, this Southworth guy really kind of, tried to spoil it. um He didn't try to spoil it, but he almost spoiled the whole thing. He wanted to take the credit. he wanted to be the He wanted his time in the limelight. And I think...
01:42:34
Speaker
I think early on, like Haley's reaction, I don't know when that post was, but that was my original thought too. As I mentioned at the top of the episode, when we started talking about this stuff is like, I think that was the initial thought because that's what we're used to the problem being.
01:42:50
Speaker
And that's how the story got broke. How the story broke where it's like, Turns out he was suppressing being gay and he did a little bit of gay stuff when he shouldn't have. And then we go, well, of course that makes sense. Like if only this world let him be who he was, we never would have had this problem. And that, that is not it.
01:43:09
Speaker
But I understand why someone said that at some point, I don't know when she said it. And if she said it yesterday, then I take everything back. But yeah, if it was shortly after the story broke still, you know, maybe shouldn't weigh in so heavily on big time things before we have more information.
01:43:28
Speaker
But I, I get that. I get, cause I felt that way. I heard had those thoughts when I um first heard the allegations as well.
01:43:40
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's natural to to to look at it that way at first. But and maybe she's amended some of this by now, you know, but I don't know. It's just this what what Michael neatt Tate needs is gay affirming care. That is not what he needs. He needs a jail cell.
01:44:00
Speaker
yeah I mean, I think that's clear at this point. You know, this is the the extent of his actions is not that like, oh, this was a gay man that just was fumbling through trying to find a, you know, sexual partner that, and yeah you know, he could connect with. like There doesn't seem like hated ah the rape of somebody like.
01:44:22
Speaker
And he's not, I don't, I'm guessing he didn't participate because he's not, because he's, I don't know. I'm surprised he didn't participate because he's married. We don't know that he didn't, honestly. Right. We don't know that. And we don't know if he's gay. We don't know if he's straight. Like,
01:44:37
Speaker
ah He might, it might not be, and it might be not have nothing to do with that. Like he might not, it doesn't have to be about that. And, uh, it's, I don't know. Yeah. If, if your real kink is, is just dominating person, you know, and putting them under your control, then, you know, maybe you're not super picky about whether it's a man or a woman, you know?
01:44:59
Speaker
Right. I don't know. I think he just likes heinous crap, you know, and that's why we continually find him in the middle of it. i you know what I don't see here either is any attempt to like find it like have a relationship with any of these people like.
01:45:15
Speaker
There wasn't like an attempt to like, like he secretly wants to find a boyfriend, you know, and true love and find a partner for life that values it. Like, I don't see any of that here. it just seems like a guy looking for people he can pressure into, into sex. Right.
01:45:31
Speaker
Right, because this is Michael Tate. If he wants to get his dick sucked by a man, he can get his dick sucked by a man. He wanted to pay someone $5,000 to blow him. That was probably uncomfortable with it because that would have been...
01:45:46
Speaker
ah some sort of feat for him. It would have been like... i it's a It's a game. It's like a challenge. And I think that that has to be part of it, right? Because we know Michael Tate can get his dick sucked when he wants to get it sucked. He wants to see the fear in your eyes. Yeah, there's something terribly creepy and scary and dark about the way he goes about this and the patterns that he's developed.
01:46:11
Speaker
But... Fuck, man. I know this this went All sorts of different directions here, maybe not the most organized thing. um And yeah, we we went into some pretty graphic stuff.
01:46:26
Speaker
um But boy, dude, I i think this this deserves a a thorough examination. And yeah, i was I think it's important that it be shown to be what it is. Like this is a psychopath that, you know, got off on hurting people.
01:46:44
Speaker
Right. Not a closeted gay man. I don't know how you can look through any of this and not come out on that side of things. And I'm hoping that that's where the majority of people people who are talking about it are coming out. Because I think the more people who talk about it, not... what I don't want to... There's no pats on the back here. We're not... We ebb and flow from having a serious conversation to making terrible jokes about serious things that we're talking about. Like, I'm not...
01:47:09
Speaker
But I think that when it comes to stuff like this, the more people that do talk about it and tackle it and the more it permeates the media, that it does help um in that and the this sphere as well. like It helps to...
01:47:24
Speaker
um but to create as as people you more and more unanimously come to this conclusion that it's not the initial reaction of he just needed gay if he was affirmed for being gay 20 years ago we wouldn't have this problem to no this is the problem this is his problem and now um in the ah the more inform information that comes out where it's talked about and the reporting is read uh Hopefully like that's just how it's seen because that's how he needs to be perceived in the court of public opinion.
01:47:59
Speaker
Yeah. And I hope Lee Campbell or Wes Campbell loses all of his money to to pastor scrum. The scrum master.
01:48:10
Speaker
Pastor scrum master.
01:48:14
Speaker
Scrum master pastor. I love it. Yeah, um I hope ah who whoever that six foot four ah sound technician was that we were talking about a second ago, I hope he gets thrown in jail or something worse.
01:48:31
Speaker
No shit. I don't need to see these people We need to see a bigger thing come of this. and i This can't be the end of allegations. he hasn't been selling get orders He hasn't been going 20 years like this, and this is it.
01:48:44
Speaker
This is just the fucking tip of the spear with this guy. We should have looked to see if Kevin Max made a statement about it. Oh, yeah. That would have been interesting, because he he doesn't mind ruffling some feathers.
01:48:56
Speaker
No, he doesn't. A guy we never got on the podcast. I had conversations with him years ago, and he tries to stay out of this shit, but don't know. I might try to reach out again.
01:49:09
Speaker
Let's see if anything pops up here real quick. um Nothing on Google pops up right away. I'm sure he said something about it, but don't know. I don't see anything right away. and Google's just giving me like every article about the allegations because Kevin Max's name is in all of them. so Anyways...
01:49:32
Speaker
um Yeah, what a crazy but a crazy episode. But ah we we did miss a week last week. We actually recorded an episode and then got to thinking about it and didn't think it was worth who didn't think it was worth everybody's time because it was just us complaining about political stuff, which we're trying not to do.
01:49:55
Speaker
Not that there's not stuff to be said, but it's just so easy to get into that like... political complaining circle jerk thing, you know, and it's, I don't know. There's smarter people you can listen to on that stuff. So exactly. I think that's why we try to avoid stuff like that. It's there's way smarter people talking about it.
01:50:13
Speaker
Whatever you hear us say is stuff we heard from those smarter people. We should probably be better at explaining, citing where we're gathering our information from and probably reporting it slightly inconsistently. And, uh, but like, yeah, we, there are times where, you know, I think just a normal passionate approach to those conversations is warranted. And other times where it's like, we're inundated. You could talk about it forever and ever on end.
01:50:40
Speaker
Um, and it just, we don't want to, we don't want to be, we don't want to be a podcast that divulges often into, ah the incredibly nuanced and complicated world of politics based on a few sources that we listen to regularly.
01:50:59
Speaker
Yeah, like you don't need a microphone in those situations. You need a scream pillow. Yeah. It'll come up. It'll always come up. We'll here and there. We'll share our feelings about it. And it's like, and that's fine. I'm happy. We're, we're not necessarily like worried about communicating how we feel about what's going on.
01:51:21
Speaker
But basing entire episodes around it ah it feels played out. It feels not ah on brand enough, I guess, for us. And it feels like I think we're probably too wrong to be that ah to talk that long about certain things. um Yeah.
01:51:40
Speaker
So too boring. And boring. Also boring. It was not fun. We just go, oh, this is just a fucking sock fest. Like, and not the good kind, not the kind Michael Tate likes, you know, its like, ah yeah, it's not a, it's not a, the, the pillar world tour bus sock fest.
01:52:00
Speaker
No. But
01:52:03
Speaker
but anyways, we skipped a week and now you got a longie guys. Yeah, enjoy. And we hope everybody has a great 4th of July. Hope everybody's fingers and hands survive.
01:52:16
Speaker
ah Just remember that fuse, it's too short. So you're too close to it. And yeah, thanks for listening. Have a good week.