Beliebers, like any online fan army, are a very passionate bunch. But late Saturday night, many of these acolytes of Justin Bieber, the chiseled and oft-naked Canadian pop icon, appeared to renounce their deity.

It began innocently enough. You see, The Biebs has been on a bit of a summer tear of late, as he was first rumored to be dating Hailey Baldwin (daughter of Stephen, niece of Alec), then was pictured nude on a Hawaiian vacation with the Instagram model Sahara Ray, and then confirmed his predilection for celebrity offspring when, for the last week or so, he’s spent time hangin’ with Sofia Richie—the 17-year-old (Bieber is 22, so this is technically illegal in their home state of California) daughter of crooner Lionel Richie and sister of Nicole (RIP The Simple Life). Hey, it’s summer after all.

All of this conscious coupling and uncoupling has apparently given his fan army whiplash, causing their heads to spin around like the little girl in The Exorcist, and when Bieber posted a series of photos to his Instagram page of him and Richie, they e-vomited all over them, posting a series of snake emojis and harassing, hateful comments directed at his new squeeze.

Bieber addressed the fan hullabaloo in the early hours of Sunday morning, posting an Instagram photo of the newly-minted couple along with the caption, “I’m gonna make my Instagram private if you guys don’t stop the hate this is getting out of hand, if you guys are really fans you wouldn’t be so mean to people I like.”

The Beliebers, who’ve stood by their Pop God through arrests, eggings, and monkey abandonment, took this warning as a message that he was choosing his girlfriend of one week over them, and the hashtag #RIPBeliebers began trending worldwide, with fans of Bieber posting images of themselves unfollowing him on Instagram and proudly touting their abandonment of their precious.

The Beyhive would never do this to Queen B, that’s for sure.