TWIBS: This Navy Seal Wears Many Hats! (One is Transphobia!)
“Ben Richards” AKA Bryce Henson is a dad, a far right activist, a friend of the Proud Boys, and a Navy Seal. Is there anything he can’t do?
Hey, y’all ever heard of “Ben Richards”?
“Ben Richards” is a douchebag who operates an Instagram account called “SoCal Parent Advocates.” He’s used it for over a year now to harass LGBTQ+ strangers on the internet and organize anti-queer protests (including at the YMCA in Santee, California, after a teenager complained that she’d shared a changing room with a trans woman). “Richards” shows up at school board meetings and quivers and quakes in front of a microphone, pretending he’s nervous about speaking publicly because he believes “that there is a radical indoctrination system that has seeped from academia and now into K through 12.”
According to an L.A. Times piece on “Richards” from October, he’d like to be alerted if any of his kids “ever attended a meeting of the campus LGBTQ+ student club.” Information he wants for normal, non-abusive reasons, I’m sure.
Any good parent will tell you: Your kids deserve absolutely no autonomy, and must relinquish any and all secrets to you immediately… or suffer the consequences!
The concept of parental notification is super popular in Florida, too, where the vile “Don’t Say Gay” bill requires school staff to notify a student’s parents if they’re “open about their gender identity.”
Any queer adult who had to conceal their identity from their parents as a kid knows exactly why parents like “Ben Richards” want to be told if their kid might be gay or trans. And the answer is anything but pretty.
But hey, here’s a fun fact about “Ben Richards:” His name’s not Ben Richards! Oh, and also…
It turns out “Ben Richards” is actually active duty Navy SEAL Bryce Henson, and he’s under investigation by Naval Special Warfare Command for associating with the fucking Proud Boys, a violent alt-right group of neo-Nazis.
Oopsie!
Yeah, so, the Times reported Henson was an armed forces member, but they left out a key detail: Bryce Henson is a member of “Seal Team 6,” or the Naval Special Warfare Development Group, known colloquially as DEVGRU, or the guys who killed fucking Osama bin Laden.
Okay!
That’s a lot!
Task & Purpose reported that Henson served as a Marine between 2004 and 2009, leaving the Corps as a Sergeant before enlisting in the Navy and becoming a SEAL… and, apparently, devoting a huge amount of his time to combatting “critical race theory” and “vaccine/mask tyranny.”
Goodness me.
When the Times asked Henson why he previously operated his bigot mobilization Instagram (my words, not theirs) under a pseudonym, he initially claimed to have feared for his safety… because, let my tell you, all my iron-deficient chain smoking transfemme friends are just clamoring to go toe-to-toe with a Navy SEAL.
But he soon outgrew his cowardice and decided that he was actually using a pseudonym to “make a point.” That point being that he “[identifies] as a male lion, whose pronouns are Lion Daddy,” and—like any unfunny right-wing asshole—lion insisted that we are the true bigots if we don’t respect daddy’s wishes.
So I guess being a dipshit isn’t a disqualifier for SEALs.
But a spokesperson for Naval Special Warfare Command stated in no uncertain terms that “participation with hate or extremist groups of any kind is contradictory to the core values of the Navy and is not tolerated by NSW,” so I guess that’s nice.
It’s bad news for Henson, though, since in December of 2021 the Pentagon remembered a lot of active duty military members are Nazis and expanded DoD Instruction 1325.06 to broaden their definition of participation in extremist activities. They now include advocating for discrimination against gender identity and sexual orientation… and KBPS’s Andrew Dwyer has pictures of Henson rubbing shoulders with swastika-tattooed Proud Boys, who most certainly like to discriminate against gender identity and sexual orientation.
In response to Dwyer’s article, SoCal Parent Advocates released a statement insisting that the photos of Henson—who is pointlessly identified as Ben Richards, because Henson suffers from a medical disorder called Transphobic Shithead Brain Rot (TSBR), which is terminal—were doctored.
Which is super funny because like, obviously no they were not, dude.
Dwyer responded on Twitter by pointing out that he has filmed Henson associating with Proud Boys and “other far-right extremists” himself. He stands by his story, and obviously I believe him… because he has evidence! He has really clear evidence, Bryce! You just can’t bullshit your way out of photographic evidence, my guy.
This isn’t even the first time somebody has acquired evidence of Henson associating with the Proud Boys.
Photojournalist Kelly Stuart (who SoCal Parent Advocates refer to as a “known violent Antifa member”) confronted Henson in July about how chummy he is with neo-Nazis, and the man just outright admitted to being bros with them. In front of a camera!
These people are so emptyheaded it’s breathtaking.
Considering the evidence against him and the DoD’s newfound unwillingness to let blatant extremists parade about in their employ, let’s hope that this Nazi fuck’s time in the service is soon to be up.
You can blame that one on us, too, Bryce. Call it a freebie.
Alyssa Steinsiek is a professional writer and video games nerd who hails from Appalachia but lives, laughs, loves in Rapid City.