@TS Baum:
Perhaps we can address the fundamental question here.
There are Jews who are sharing views that are at the least very mistaken and problematic (meshichisters) and at worst actual apikorsus and minus (elohists).
And these same Jews are very publicly claiming to represent Judaism to the outside world, and they are often accepted as being legitimate.
So there’s a major question here: what should we do?
it doesn’t help to say they are a minority, or they are not following “true” Chabad teachings.
Practically, if you are at Ben Gurion airport (or the Kotel, or Central Bus station, or many other locations) and ask where you can put on tefillin, you will be told to find the “Chabad rabbis”.
This is despite the fact that many of the people manning the stations are (at least) meshichisters, based on their kippas and paraphernalia they share.
Likewise, many Chabad houses around Israel are run by meshichisters, and public farbrengens are run by even the Tzfas elohists, all in the name of Chabad.
“Dvar Malchus” and other pamphlets are spread in all the shuls and in all locations, and they almost all contain meshichist ideas and slogans.
So practically, when this ideology has become the prominent face of Chabad- at least in Israel- there is a need to figure out how to stop this massive Chillul Hashem.
It sounds like you are saying that non-meshichist Chabad don’t want to publicly reclaim the title of “Chabad” and are willing to let them represent Chabad, out of fear of machlokes.
I’m not sure if that’s really the proper attitude, but I understand why a chabadsker would be afraid of division within the Chassidus (even though they are not following the Chassidus anyway).
But for the rest of us, we don’t want secular Jews learning that belief in the rebbe as Moshiach is a fundamental Jewish teaching.
Why shouldn’t we take a stand?
Whether we should try and rebuke them privately, or protest them publicly, we should let people know that they don’t represent Judaism!