Editing Heaven's Gate (religious group) (section)

=== Contemporary media coverage ===
[[File:HeavensGateRecruitmentMeetingFlyer (cropped).jpg|thumb|Title of a flyer for a Heaven's Gate recruitment meeting, Berkeley, California, May, 1994]]

Heaven's Gate received coverage in [[Jacques Vallée]]'s book ''Messengers of Deception'' (1979), in which Vallée described an unusual public meeting organized by the group. He expressed concerns about contactee groups' authoritarian political and religious outlooks, and Heaven's Gate did not escape criticism.<ref>{{Cite book |author=Vallee |first=Jacques |author-link=Jacques Vallée |title=Messengers of Deception: UFO Contacts and Cults |date=1979 |publisher=[[Ronin Publishing]] |isbn=978-0-915904-38-9|language=en}}</ref> Known to the media (though largely ignored), Heaven's Gate was better known in [[UFO]] circles, and through a series of academic studies by sociologist [[Robert Balch]].

In January 1994, ''[[LA Weekly]]'' ran an article on the group, then known as "The Total Overcomers".<ref>{{Cite news |last=Gardetta |first=Dave |date=1994-01-21 |title=They Walk Among Us |url=http://www.laweekly.com/general/features/they-walk-among-us/15922 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070328230411/http://www.laweekly.com/general/features/they-walk-among-us/15922/ |archive-date=2007-03-28 |access-date=2007-08-23 |work=[[LA Weekly]] |language=en-US}}</ref> Richard Ford, who would play a key role in the 1997 group suicide, discovered Heaven's Gate through this article and eventually joined them, renaming himself Rio DiAngelo.<ref name="laweekly2007" /> ''[[Coast to Coast AM]]'' host [[Art Bell]] discussed the theory of the "companion object" in the shadow of Hale–Bopp on several programs as early as November 1996. Speculation has been raised as to whether Bell's programs contributed to Heaven's Gate's group suicide. ''[[Knowledge Fight]]'' host Dan Friesen blames more on [[Courtney Brown (researcher)|Courtney Brown]] rather than Bell.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.csicop.org/si/show/art_bell_heavenrsquos_gate_and_journalistic_integrity/|title=Art Bell, Heaven's Gate, and Journalistic Integrity|last1=Genoni|first1=Thomas Jr.|website=Committee for Skeptical Inquiry|date=July 1997|access-date=3 September 2015}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|author1=Dan Friesen|author2=Jordan Holmes|title=Project Camelot's War on Heaven|url=https://knowledgefight.libsyn.com/knowledge-fight-project-camelots-war-in-heaven|date=January 30, 2018|website=Knowledge Fight|access-date=January 12, 2021}}</ref>

[[Louis Theroux]] contacted Heaven's Gate for his [[BBC2]] documentary series, ''[[Louis Theroux's Weird Weekends]]'', in early March 1997, weeks before their mass suicide. In response to his e-mail, Theroux was told that Heaven's Gate could not participate in the documentary: "at the present time a project like this would be an interference with what we must focus on."<ref>{{Cite book|url=http://www.veoh.com/videos/v266439DxcWKyTx|title=Louis Theroux's Weird Weekends: UFO|author=Louis Theroux|publisher=Veoh|archive-date=May 20, 2007|access-date=April 23, 2008|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070520012406/http://www.veoh.com/videos/v266439DxcWKyTx|url-status=live}}</ref>