And yet as I grow closer to these people, it becomes clearer and clearer that each theist has a certain personal sequence of Dark Arts-ish levers in eir head, the flipping (or un-flipping) of which would snap em out of faith.

Have you tried this? I've talked a number of people out of theism before, but even after observing and following deconversion extensively, I could never manage, nor would I expect, to be able to change the beliefs of most theists, using any of the persuasive techniques available to me.