Former Members of Online Cult Say Leader is ‘Swatting’ Them
A cult that has so far flown under the radar is allegedly targeting ex-members.
Defectors of an online “cult of reason” say the leader of the group has been sabotaging their lives by “swatting” them, filing false police reports against them, and otherwise wrongly accusing them of violent tendencies.
Most people haven’t heard of Hyperianism, a cult launched by a former reality star who calls himself “Morgue,” but it has tens of thousands of dedicated adherents. For those unfamiliar, the community purports itself to be an intelligent group based on reason and logic that understands the harms of Abrahamic religions. While this might sound great at first, the teachings seem to twist these concepts using an anti-science philosophy that could even be considered by some to be dangerous.
I first encountered Hyperianism in 2017, when I wrote a brief article about it for my old blog. At that time, I explained that the cult was founded by a “shock artist” who left his life swallowing swords to preach his “knowledge system” (as opposed to belief system) that promotes pseudoscience surrounding a “mathematical reality.” (Sidenote: I met Morgue when he was still at the freakshow on Venice Beach, and quite enjoyed the experience.)
What stood out to me at the time was not the nonsensical philosophy, but what happened once I published the piece: it was overrun by hundreds of pro-Hyperianism comments from members of the insulated community. There are currently 640 comments on that thread, and the vast majority were from Hyperians – many of these comments were threatening in nature, while others merely proclaimed that I am ignorant about the true nature of reality. Do you think they thought of that themselves? The answer is no, and I have the receipts. Here is Morgue himself calling on his massive following to “leave a comment defending” Hyperianism on my blog post:
Nearly a year after that incident, I began to get some messages from people within Hyperianism who wanted to expose Morgue for being controlling, manipulative, and lacking any financial transparency. I did an investigation, and wrote a follow-up piece called “Former Members Speak Out Against Internet Cult Led by Ex-Reality TV Star Morgue.” During the course of writing that article, I was able to uncover a spy sent from Morgue to find out more about my research.
That was almost five years ago, and I thought I was done with Hyperianism. I wanted to be done. I vowed I was done. But once again I began getting messages from current and former Hyperians who made some pretty serious allegations. I’m not talking about online drama – I’m talking about accusations of “swatting,” lawsuits, and serious charges that could even be considered criminal.
One of several examples is the story of Rowan James Bjarnason, who alleges Morgue – whose real name is Corey Rebhahn – engaged in a massive swatting campaign against him. I spoke with Rowan, who explained how he got involved with the group:
“Hyperianism was initially supposed to be a movement geared towards getting the work of Mike Hockney (The God Series) and Dr. Thomas Stark (The Truth Series) into the mainstream, and Morgue had their blessing to do so. He was granted this task under the condition that he would stay true to the ideals of these authors. Of course, this would not be the case, and Morgue would twist their work over the years to suit his own agendas and money making schemes. I became a moderator and content creator for Hyperianism around late 2019, just before these authors pulled their support for Morgue. Of course, I didn't know this, not until the David Sinclair book 'Without the Mob, There is No Circus' was released… totally denouncing Morgue as a plagiarist of their work (all these authors are pseudonyms written by a secret society known as the Pythagorean Illuminati).”
The doubts about Hyperianism eventually crystalized for Rowan, who said Morgue had failed at promoting the original authors, and “doubled down on shying away from” mentioning them. Upon leaving, Rowan says Morgue took several online comments Rowan had made and weaponized them against him, especially a comment concerning "POTUS." Here’s how Rowan describes it:
“What finally did it for me was the release of the Sinclair book, then I duly left Hyperianism and resigned in July, 2022. This was a very tumultuous time in my life as I had devoted my life to Hyperianism at great sacrifice (time, relationships, money). Also, Morgue was denouncing anyone who left him and spoke out as bigots, nazis, transphobes, you name it. So upon my leaving I knew that was coming to me. Also, I always felt disdain for the pacifist nature of Hyperianism and this is all reflected in my resignation statements, which were entirely hyperbolic and not literal. Morgue and the mods weaponized these statements against me, then Phillip S--pe, a moderator, went back two and a half years and cherry picked the 'POTUS' statement I made and tacked it onto my resignation, a statement I still don't remember making. Morgue and the mods took these statements of mine to the FBI to try to brand me an imminent, violent threat. This resulted in two cops coming to my door and then a 90 minute interrogation with a detective of the Vancouver Police Department a week or so later.”
When he did some digging, Rowan discovered that he actually made this POTUS comment two and half years earlier, on 30 March, 2020, when Donald Trump was president, and the comment had the words "Never harms self or others" at the end. The full comment was:
“Almost missed my turn off the highway because I was daydreaming so hard of all the ways one could execute the current POTUS. Never harms self or others.”
Rowan say that this comment was “mindless banter in a private chat with a ‘friend’ who spoke of guillotining Trump and burning his family.”
“But two and half years later, the ‘friend’ gave this comment to Morgue, who then removed the date and all context from it and also the words ‘Never harms self or others’ and presented it to the FBI as a current, viable, online death threat against President Joe Biden,” the ex-adherent added. It’s worth noting that Rowan isn't an American. He's a Canadian citizen.
Rowan isn’t the only one making similar allegations. Another former member named Apollonius (he asked to use this pseudonym for his safety) says he was also swatted by Morgue and his team. Even worse, according to Apollonius, is that a retired pre-school teacher received the same treatment.
“In addition to SWATTING Rowan and myself, another person was put in the firing line: Karen Shaw. Karen Shaw is a seventy year old retired pre-school teacher who began publicly leading a whistle blowing campaign against Rebhahn,” Apollonius told me. “Karen immediately responded to Rebhahn’s cheap intimidation tactics with a response letter of her own to his lawyer, and the ridiculous and absurd lawsuit was subsequently dropped.” Here is part of the cease and desist letter purportedly received by Shaw:
I spoke with Shaw directly, and here’s what she had to say:
“I, Karen Elizabeth Shaw, have been the subject of unwarranted, and malicious harassment by Corey Rebhahn and his Hyperian moderators because of my whistleblowing activities concerning their dangerous cult. I received the following certified letter from Corey Rebhahn’s attorney on Sept. 9th, 2022, “Cease and Desist; Demand; and Intent to Sue.” I emailed my response back to her on Sunday, Sept. 11th, 2022 which I have also included. I went to the Redmond Police Department and explained that I was now the target of a bizarre cult called Hyperianism because I was warning the public about them on Facebook. I said my concern was that Corey Rebhahn and his cultists had my address and were very angry at me. I wanted to make sure the police knew about my situation. I felt unsafe.”
This is only a small sample of the messages I’ve received from concerned former members, and there’s no telling how many people are afraid to speak up based on these allegations.
I contacted Morgue to try to get comments from him regarding this alleged behavior. Although he granted me an interview in the past, he did not respond to my request for his side of this particular “swatting” story. Readers should know that Morgue has recently rebranded Hyperianism as The Neogenian (the "New Beginning”).
If you have stories you’d like to get out – about this specific group or anything else – you can contact me by emailing me at David@DavidGMcAfee.com.
Stay Reasonable!
David G. McAfee