As fallout from dueling protests at Kansas’ Capitol Building in Topeka continues, a new video is dividing Christians over the culminating acts of violence in which the leader of Satanic Grotto twice punched a Christian for interfering with his remarks inside the statehouse. The Christian Tribune reported yesterday on Michael Stewart’s aggression which led to his instantaneous arrest.
Early footage from the Friday gathering of a small number of satanists, led by Stewart, and a larger counter-protest comprising of larger number of Christians, estimated in the hundreds, showed a clip of a young man trying to grab some papers from Stewart’s hands and resulting in two successive punches to his face. A large contingent of police immediately brought him to the ground.
Today, however, and while not exonerating Stewart for neither his aggression nor his trespassing (indeed, Stewart knowingly and intentionally violated Kansas Governor Laura Kelly’s prohibition of demonstrating from inside the Topeka government building), a longer clip shows the young man interfering not once, but twice, with only the latter attempt being met with physical resistance.
In the more recently released video, the young Christian man can be seen circling among a group as Stewart rants and appearing to plot a move toward him. He spots his moment and lunges towards the materials in the Satanic Grotto leader’s possession. A brief tussle ensues but the young man is thwarted. Undeterred, he again tries to take the papers away, and it was in this second instance that his own act led to the subsequent viral clip of receiving two fists in his face.
Take a look at the new video that has divided commenters, for while it doesn’t condone any of Stewart’s actions that day, it does contextualize perhaps why he reacted the way he did.
With the emergence of the new video, commenters on the social media platform X presented competing views. One prominent account named Protestia, normally dedicated to capturing wokeness and failings within churches, presented the video by writing: “Grok says it best ‘Michael Stewart, the leader of the Satanic Grotto, was arrested at the Kansas State Capitol on Friday for assaulting a Catholic protestor during an attempted ‘Black Mass’.’ Notably, the Catholic protester kept on grabbing and trying to steal his stuff, prompting the swing.”
A top response to that post retorted, “A man tried stealing his private property and he defended himself Tyrant cops enforce the law when its something they agree with They have a duty to protect all rights. Then the police tackled the assault victim and arrested him for defending himself.”
Another responded with anger, saying: “;Trying to steal his stuff’, you mean taking the satanic prayer he was trying to read out of his hand? You’re a joke.” To which the original poster replied, “That constitutes as trying to steal his stuff.”
“Sad that we have to rely on this in the black shirt kid to stop this mockery… The kid should be given some sort of award,” said yet another user. “You sure that Protestia wants to be known for defending the property rights of Satanists?” echoed someone else.
Featured image: Screen shot from embedded video