There's a lot to digest here for me but I think I get the gist. Whole lot of kool aid being drunk, from the sounds of it! I had something published in Illumination and it got like 5 views, even as a new writer that was well below things I self published. Sure enough when I clicked on the homepage I saw how it's 99% DMY content, kind of a red flag. Sorry you went through this, sounds like you are better off out of it.