KALISPELL, Mont. (AP) — The eldest son of one of America’s most infamous seditionists is building a new life since breaking free from his father’s control — juggling work, college classes and volunteer firefighting.
And Dakota Adams has tossed one more ball in the air this year: a Democratic campaign for Montana’s Legislature.
He also plans to sell the rifles, body armor and tactical gear he used to wear to anti-government protests alongside his father — Stewart Rhodes, founder of the Oath Keepers. It’s all part of an effort to push away the last vestiges of what Adams describes as an isolating and abusive upbringing that nearly ruined him, his mother and his siblings.
“I decided that I’m going to double down on betting on the electoral process,” Adams said in a recent interview.
I used to feel a lot more strongly about Christian indoctrination until I realized the majority of my fellow atheists were raised Christian but escaped from the indoctrination anyway. I mean… the indoctrination can’t have been that successful if so many people are willingly leaving the church.
I think it’s actually normal for this to happen to religions, and it’s why some more extreme religious countries have rules against apostasy. Harder to leave a religion when the legal rules around it will literally ruin your life. The US and other secular nations have slowly become less and less religious as time has gone on, it seems like a natural progression to me.
I have the feeling that most online atheist groups are actually self-help groups for people traumatized by evangelical Christians.