Miranda Derrick has spoken out about the barrage of online hate she has been receiving after she found herself as the subject of the hit Netflix documentary Dancing For The Devil: The 7M TikTok Cult.
In case you haven’t seen it, the three-episode docuseries is told from the perspective of Derrick’s family and former members of the 7M influencer and TikTok management company, a church-turned-management agency run by Robert Shinn. They allege that the church is a cult, and that members of the church — including Derrick — have found themselves being distanced from their families and expected to return big chunks of their income back into the church and Shinn himself.
On Tuesday, the dancer and TikTok influencer took to her social media accounts to share the impact that the documentary has had on her life and the terrifying threats she has been receiving since.
“Before this documentary, my husband and I, we felt safe. Now that this documentary is out, we feel like our lives have been put in danger,” she began.
“We have both been followed in our car, we have received hate mail, death threats. People have been sending us messages to commit suicide. We’ve been stalked.”
Derrick also detailed some of the scary messages she had been receiving on social media, including someone who threatened to “gut her” or another who said they’d shove her in the boot of their car if they saw her on the street.
“These are just some of the messages I’ve been receiving behind the scenes,” she continued.
“I honestly don’t understand how my parents and my sister thought that this documentary would help me, or help our relationship in any way. I don’t understand that.
“I have been getting together with my family for the past couple of years privately to work on our relationship to make things right to mend what has been broken, and I’ve been loving it. Getting together, laughing, just enjoying each other’s company.
“This documentary has made it very difficult to continue doing that. Honestly, I think my parents and sister have focused so much on this documentary that they’ve forgotten about working on any relationship with me. And that hurts — that hurts me to say,” she said, concluding the video by thanking those who have sent kind messages her way.
You can watch the video below.
Just over a week after the documentary was released, Derrick posted a lengthy written statement on her socials. In the statement, Derrick confirmed she’d seen the documentary, and slammed claims from her family that she was part of a cult. She also mentioned she was the plaintiff in a defamation lawsuit.
“I love my Mum, Dad and Melanie and they will forever be a part of my life. The truth is, we just don’t see eye to eye at this time. I believe that this documentary is a one-sided story,” she wrote.
She went on to say that her portrayal on the series was incorrect.
“No one likes to be portrayed as their brainwashed, not in control of her own life, shell of herself, human trafficked daughter [or] sister when that just isn’t the truth,” she said, finishing the statement by refuting claims she was in a worrying situation.
“I am not a victim, I am not in any harm, I am not being abused… respectfully, what I choose to do with my life is up to me,” she concluded.
Since the documentary, 7M Films have also released a statement to Instagram where it slammed Netflix and called the documentary a “slanderous work of fiction born from a failed extortion attempt, and invested for the sole purpose of gaining fame and fortune”.
Robert Shinn and 7M Films was launched into the spotlight in 2022 when Derrick’s sister Melanie Wilking and her parents Dean and Kelly Wilking posted a video to Melanie and Miranda’s joint Instagram page alleging that she was in a cult. In the clip, they claimed they hadn’t been allowed to contact her for over a year.
