By Rev. Richard Dalton — LookUpDetroit.com
(sorry but before reading this post you need to watch this video:
When most people think about Metro Detroit’s exports, they probably think about automobiles, Motown music, manufacturing, or perhaps some of the remarkable people who have come out of this region.
The Babylon Bee has Detroit roots.
The enormously successful Christian and conservative satire publication was founded in March 2016 by Adam Ford, a Christian cartoonist who was living in the Detroit area. Early national coverage described Ford simply as a 32-year-old “Detroit dad.” Before creating the Bee, he had developed an audience through his Christian webcomic, Adam4d.
Ford had been thinking about Christian news satire for years. He saw something powerful in the format made famous by publications such as The Onion: create a completely fictional news headline that exaggerates something happening in the real world—and sometimes the joke makes the point more effectively than an editorial ever could.
Ford explained at the time that his purpose was to use satire to communicate truth. Christianity Today interviewed him shortly after the launch, and Ford described satire as something like an overhead projector: it enlarges something people might otherwise overlook and makes them examine it.
From Detroit to a National Audience
The idea took off remarkably quickly.
The Washington Post reported in April 2016 that more than one million people visited the Babylon Bee during its first three weeks. What began largely as affectionate satire of evangelical church life soon expanded into culture, politics and current events.
Some of its early humor was distinctly church-insider material—worship leaders, Calvinists, church programs and the peculiar things Christians sometimes do. Ford said the Bee was quite willing to satirize its own evangelical community while also addressing politics, culture, other religions and current events.
That may be one reason it worked. The humor wasn’t originally just Christians laughing at somebody else. Christians were laughing at themselves.
L-to-R, DV, publisher of The Aquila Report, Kyle Mann, editor of The Babylon Bee, and Richard Dalton, publisher of LookUpDetroit. What a fun night. at
Keynote Speaker: Kyle Mann
Kyle Mann is the editor-in-chief of The Babylon Bee. Previously, he attended The Master’s College in Southern California and worked in the construction industry for 11 years. He also pastored a church in San Diego for several years before leaving to run The Babylon Bee full-time.
A prolific comedy writer, public speaker, and podcast host, Kyle has written thousands of Babylon Bee headlines and articles, along with the published works he’s authored or co-authored: The Sacred Texts of The Babylon Bee,
The Bee Changes Hands
Ford eventually discovered something many creative people discover: creating something and running a rapidly growing company are two different jobs.
In 2018, he sold The Babylon Bee to entrepreneur Seth Dillon. Ford explained that he wanted to concentrate on publishing satire rather than hiring people and operating an expanding business. Longtime writer Kyle Mann moved into the editor-in-chief role.
There’s even another Michigan chapter in that transition. Dillon recently recalled that Ford invited him to fly to Michigan, where the two spent a couple of hours talking in a pub about Christianity, culture and the Bee before agreeing on the sale.
Today, the Bee identifies Seth Dillon as CEO, Dan Dillon as CTO/lead developer and Kyle Mann as editor-in-chief. Its wonderfully tongue-in-cheek description calls itself a source of satire about “Christian stuff, political stuff, and everyday life.”
Detroit Has Been Part of the Joke, Too
The Bee certainly hasn’t forgotten Michigan as subject matter.
Detroit, Dearborn, Lansing, Michigan politics and the state’s personalities have appeared repeatedly in its satire. Like all satire, some of it can be pointed and controversial; the joke often depends upon exaggerating a real political or cultural disagreement until it becomes absurd.
That is also an important reminder when sharing Babylon Bee stories: they aren’t news reports. They are deliberately fictional satire commenting on real events.
Something Worth Remembering About Detroit
I find the origin story particularly interesting because it demonstrates something about our Internet age.
A man in Metro Detroit didn’t need a television network, newspaper printing press or Manhattan publishing office. He had an idea, a computer, a website and the ability to make people laugh.
Within three weeks, a million people had visited.
Ten years later, The Babylon Bee is still publishing.
That’s a pretty remarkable Metro Detroit Internet story—and one I think deserves to be better known around here.
Sometimes something that reaches the world begins with one person, one idea—and one website.
