‘I’d have to kill someone’: Mel Gibson gives a fearmongering speech at a gala for QAnon-adjacent nonprofit
Mel Gibson recently appeared at a Mar-a-Lago gala for America’s Future, a conservative nonprofit that has increasingly promoted QAnon conspiracy theories, and gave a fearmongering speech where he said he’d “have to kill someone” if his children were “stolen.”
It’s not surprising that Gibson appeared at Mar-a-Lago and attended America’s Future gala alongside Donald Trump and other prominent MAGA figures. Leading up to the presidential election, he endorsed Trump for president and levied sexist insults at Kamala Harris. He also endorsed the Sound of Freedom film, which many have accused of stoking QAnon conspiracies. Gibson’s decision to align himself with MAGA has eyebrows, especially since he’s only recently started to make a Hollywood comeback after his past controversies. For a short period, he shied away from the spotlight after going on an antisemitic rant when arrested for a DUI, facing a domestic violence investigation, and pleading guilty to a battery charge against his ex-girlfriend.
However, in 2016, he made a filmmaking comeback with his movie Hacksaw Ridge. His return led to several actors, including Andrew Garfield, vouching for him and insisting that he had changed. Instead of working to prove he has changed, Gibson continues raising concerns about whether he should have a platform.
Mel Gibson speaks at America’s Future gala
Recently, Mar-a-Lago threw a gala for America’s Future. The conservative nonprofit run by Trump’s former security advisor, Michael Flynn, has increasingly been tied to QAnon conspiracies. Several of the board members are prominent QAnon influencers, such as Ben Moore, who goes by Sun Tzu online. Moore claimed that he and his fellow board members were investigating QAnon leads. So, MAGA threw a gala to celebrate the organization that has increasingly pushed dangerous and outlandish claims about an elite cabal of child sex traffickers and cannibals that Trump is trying to fight.
Among the attendees was Gibson, who gave a speech thanking Flynn. Gibson stated, “He and his sister Mary were exposing all these wolves in sheep’s clothing that prey upon our young.” He went on to insinuate he was concerned about his own children being “stolen,” stating, “I mean, I got nine kids. I don’t know, if one of them got stolen or trafficked or something, I’d have to kill someone so…” His speech aligned with the conspiracies pushed by America’s Future and the conservative hysteria that someone is coming for their children. During his speech, Gibson also claimed the Biden administration was four years of “thinly veiled Marxism” and used a Biblical analogy to describe how Trump’s administration would “claw back from the Philistines.”
Gibson’s praise of prominent conspiracy theorists and fearmongering about “wolves in sheep’s clothing” and children being “stolen” and “preyed upon” raises concerns that he has fallen down the QAnon rabbit hole. People like Gibson need to understand that there’s a vast difference between raising awareness and education for child trafficking and inhibiting anti-trafficking efforts by trying to raise hysteria and push conspiracies. Like all of those who tout QAnon theories, he relies on vague fearmongering and can’t even say who he thinks is preying on or wanting to steal his children. The threat of violence is especially concerning, considering that QAnon conspiracies have sparked numerous incidents of violence and murder.
As Hollywood continues perplexingly vouching for Gibson, it needs to consider whether it should be giving someone a platform who has likely fallen for dangerous conservative conspiracy theories on top of a bevy of other controversies.
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