‘Speakeasy Reminder’ - Sunday with Mia!

Reminder to join Bette’s ‘Speakeasy’ with Dr. Mia Bloom Sunday, April 23, 4 pm PT. Registration link included, along with a bit of earthy positivity <3

Registration link is at the bottom of this missive, below the paywall. If you would like to join the Bette community with a paid membership, you will be able to register for tomorrow’s ‘Speakeasy’ zoom forum with Dr. Mia Bloom! Looking forward to seeing those planning to attend tomorrow, Sunday, at 4 pm PT.

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I must tell you for the past 24 hours, the birdsong has been exquisite. Right outside my windows on all sides, multiple species are singing their hearts out. I have written volumes about how wild birds banded together to get me out of corporate broadcast news (true story), and I will forever be indebted to them.

Things with wings are commanding my full attention this morning, and it is part of the magic of spring. Growing up in San Francisco, I was not fond of spring. I associated it with a cold sun, and too much wind.

Living in SoCal has changed my mind. I now cherish spring for all the living things - the lush Huntington Gardens is my ‘office’ - but particularly I cherish those birds. We have so many things worth protecting. I have a gorgeous pair of red-whiskered bulbuls right outside my bedroom window as I am typing this, and they appear to be having so much fun. And as you know, cheeky wild parrots are my besties - they throw wild parties every morning and every afternoon in the palm trees on my block.

‘A Better Future’

Bette member, writer Audrey Peterman, who writes the beautiful substack Audrey’s Joy Train from Jamaica - one of my favorite places in the world - sent me an article yesterday that showed a future of possibilities if we act on climate change now:

“As climate futurist Alex Steffen says, ‘The big secret here is not how bad things are but how good they can get – if we move fast enough.’”

Rather than view things through the dystopian lens we are continually force fed, imagine a future based on action.

What if? What if we rediscovered our empathy and togetherness and worked toward a better future? What if? What if we stopped being bullied by corrupt men with hearts of darkness, and rediscovered our passion for all living things? What if?

How can I be down?

In the words of David Bowie as remixed by Air, I demand a better future.

There is still time to become a Bette member and join us for tomorrow’s brilliant ‘Speakeasy’ zoom forum with Dr. Mia Bloom!

One of the perks of being a paid member to Bette Dangerous is our ‘Speakeasy’ zooms, which feature the greatest minds of our times helping us understand how we fight the fascist creep.

We have had riveting conversations with bestselling authors, filmmakers, a former extremist, an ex-fed, and experts in psychological warfare. And what do they all have in common: they are writers.

Writers are the salvation of our times.

Our guests - David Pepper, Dr. Ian Garner, Jason Van Tatenhove, Craig Unger, Jen Senko, Martin Sheil, Wesley Clark Jr. - each rose to the challenge of our times and fought the authoritarian right with words.

I am so pleased that our community will have the chance to meet Mia - who co-authored the pivotal book ‘Pastels and Pedophiles: Inside the Mind of QAnon.’

She was featured in the documentary film, ‘Dis/Informed’, by RadPod guests Dr. Charles Kriel and Kat Gellen, who reveal how the wellness community is being infected with disinformation.

To watch RadPod’s interview with Dr. Bloom, please go here:

To learn more about Mia, please have a look at her bio:

Mia Bloom is the International Security Fellow at New America and a professor at Georgia State University. Bloom has conducted research in Europe, the Middle East and South Asia and speaks eight languages. She has authored several books and articles on violent extremism including Dying to Kill: The Allure of Suicide Terror (Columbia 2005), Living Together After Ethnic Killing (Routledge 2007) Bombshell: Women and Terror (UPenn Press 2011) and Small Arms: Children and Terror (Cornell 2019) and Pastels and Pedophiles: Inside the Mind of QAnon with Sophia Moskalenko (Stanford 2021). She is publishing Veiled Threats: Women and Jihad (in 2023). Bloom is a former term member of the Council on Foreign Relations and has held appointments at Princeton, Cornell, Harvard and McGill Universities. She serves on the Anti-Radicalization advisory board of the Anti Defamation League, and the UN Counter Terrorism Executive Directorate (UNCTED) and a member of advisory board of women without borders. She has a PhD in political science from Columbia university, a masters in Arab studies from Georgetown university and a double honors degree in Russian history and Islamic studies from McGill university in Montreal.

With Pastels and Pedophiles, Mia Bloom and Sophia Moskalenko explain why the rise of QAnon should not surprise us: believers have been manipulated to follow the baseless conspiracy. The authors track QAnon's unexpected leap from the darkest corners of the Internet to the filtered glow of yogi-mama Instagram, a frenzy fed by the COVID-19 pandemic that supercharged conspiracy theories and spurred a fresh wave of Q-inspired violence.

“Pastels and Pedophiles” connects the dots for readers, showing how a conspiracy theory with its roots in centuries-old anti-Semitic hate has adapted to encompass local grievances and has metastasized around the globe―appealing to a wide range of alienated people who feel that something is not quite right in the world around them. While QAnon claims to hate Hollywood, the book demonstrates how much of Q's mythology is ripped from movie and television plot lines.

Finally, Pastels and Pedophiles lays out what can be done about QAnon's corrosive effect on society, to bring Q followers out of the rabbit hole and back into the light.

In this work I do which I consider civic duty, I meet people all around the world, who then blessedly become my friends and allies.

Mia is such a person. She is brilliant, she is kind, and she is incredibly funny.

Looking forward to seeing paid members tomorrow, Sunday, April 23, 4 pm PT.

I reduced the annual membership to an affordable rate so as many people can join us as possible.

Thanks to some very generous Bette members, we gifted a eight memberships in recent days. If you would like to give or receive a gift, here’s how:

Gifting Bette

Memberships not only gain you access to our ‘Speakeasy’ zooms, but also all archives (my reports are paywalled after two weeks), podcasts, and private author-member chats. To everyone who has taken out a membership, I am grateful.

Your words of support and wisdom give me endless hope.

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Bette Dangerous is a reader-funded magazine. Thank you to all monthly, annual, and founding members. Thank you as well to all those who support my work with your generous coffee tips and who buy my ebooks. A private link to group activist discounts available upon request by emailing bettedangerous@gmail.com.

More info about Bette Dangerous - This magazine is written by Heidi Siegmund Cuda, an Emmy-award winning investigative reporter, author, and veteran music and nightlife columnist. She is the cohost of RADICALIZED Truth Survives, an investigative show about disinformation and is part of the Byline Media team. Thank you for your support of independent investigative journalism.

Save the date! The next Bette Dangerous ‘Speakeasy’ Zoom for paid members is Sunday, April 23, 4 pm PT, featuring ‘Pastels and Pedophiles - Inside the Mind of QAnon’ author Dr. Mia Bloom.

Registration link for paid members below. Please do not share or forward the link. All registration emails will be vetted, so please use the email address associated with your account. If I have any questions, I will reach out. And do take advantage of my activist rate by reaching out to me directly at bettedangerous@gmail.com for a group activist discount. Looking so forward to seeing many of you tomorrow!