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A special Patreon bonus unlocked episode as we enjoy the holidays with our families and friends.
Matthew got The Question on the morning after the election. At that moment, he came up with nothing but a hug. But then he chewed on it for days, and came up with eleven things to consider.
So here are some notes for possible conversations with tweens about anxiety, bullies, fascism, friends, mutual aid, and love.
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“If you grow up with it, religion is real until you realize it is also imagined. And after a period of disenchantment or even depression that associates imagination with lies, you might then sense that the imagined part was also real, but because it’s imagined, you know you can change it.”
Matthew reflects on how Santa becomes more real in the home after the kids know he’s just a story, but a story of unbridled love and causeless generosity they can now participate in telling.
Happy holidays, everyone!
Show Notes
A Christmas Carol: Dedicated to Scrooge, And His Art Collection—McKenzie Wark
Ringmaster: Vince McMahon and the Unmaking of America — Abraham Josephine Riesman
Welcome to Neokayfabe—Jodie Reisman
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Saknas det avsnitt?
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Jeffery Tucker is the founder of the MAGA thinktank Brownstone Institute. In 2020, Brownstone published The Great Barrington Declaration, with lead author Jay Bhattacharya—now the nominee for head of the NIH.
Jeffrey’s daughter, Julia, joins Matthew to discuss her dad’s rise through the punditocracy, through decades of fringe libertarian publishing, working for Ron Paul, boosting anarcho-capitalism and crypto, writing for the Epoch Times, and asking such daring questions as: “What’s so wrong about child labour?”
Show Notes
Patreon: Post-Catholic Music (w/Julia Tucker)
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The murder of United HealthCare CEO Brian Thompson has set off shockwaves across America. This week we look at the story’s online impact, people mythologizing the alleged killer, its intersection with conspirituality, and the healthcare system in America writ large.
Show Notes
Jen Gunter on insurance denial for her premature babies' oxygen needs
Exclusive: Luigi's Manifesto - Ken Klippenstein
Savings: Quarter of Americans Have Few, One in 10 Have None | Statista
The Burden of Medical Debt in the United States
View of U.S. Healthcare Quality Declines to 24-Year Low
MDVIP/Ipsos poll shows Americans are struggling with the healthcare system
UnitedHealthcare CEO gunned down in Manhattan sold company stocks just before DOJ probe made public | The Independent
Conservatives Face Backlash From Followers Over UnitedHealthcare Murder - Newsweek
Before fatal subway chokehold, Jordan Neely was on NYC’s list of homeless individuals with dire needs | CNN
Kaiser Study on Health Insurance Satisfaction
NIH Debunks Myth that 60% of Bankruptcies are Medical in Nature
Luigi Mangione’s Anger Wasn’t Neatly Ideological
Gallup Poll on Health Care Satisfaction
Ipsos Poll on Health Care Satisfaction
Mental Illness is 13.5 times More Likely In Lone Wolf Shooters
Narcissism, Fame Seeking and Mass Shootings
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The fifth installment of Matthew's Five Big Questions Posed to an Extremely Thoughtful Person.
Dr. Annie Kelly joined us in Episode 61 to lay out her research on the manosphere-to-conspirituality pipeline. Today she joins me to discuss the trouble and joy of balancing extremism research with stories of hope and solidarity.
Show Notes
Annie Kelly
Vaccine: The Human Story - YouTube
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Extremely online, bearded, Millennial pastors in tailored suits want to repeal women’s suffrage, criminalize gays, and Make America Christian Again. These “TheoBros” even have a guy on the inside: JD Vance. Trump’s Dept of Defense nominee, Pete Hegseth, attends an affiliated church.
Julian tracks their genealogy and ugly ideas, as well as their parallel reactionary theocratic visions wreaking havoc elsewhere in the world today. Stay tuned for conversational reflections and wholesome holiday wishes at the end!
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Journalist Talia Lavin joins Derek to discuss her recent book, Wild Faith: How the Christian Right is Taking Over America.
Show Notes
Wild Faith: How the Christian Right is Taking Over America
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As we ride out the aftershocks of the election and prepare for Trump 2.0, it’s as if nothing is bolted down. Trump’s cabinet appointments signal a disregard for competence or temperament as he seems to prioritize fervent deep state conspiracism and anti-woke aggression in his choices. The chattering classes (both legacy and new media) are on the front lines of having to adapt in real time.
What to do? Double down on anti-fascist resistance, turn the disinformation detection devices up to 11, chart a course for sanguine neutrality, normalize the chaos as the world burns, or maybe give this rag-tag group of billionaire outsiders a chance to move fast and break things—in the hope that some of it was not working anyway?
We look at three different modes of damage control currently ripping through American discourse.
Show Notes
There’s a conspiracy theory that the CIA invented the term ‘conspiracy theory’ – here’s why
87: The Aubrey Marcus Spectacle
107: An Open Letter to Aubrey Marcus
214: Aubrey Marcus is Totally Not a Cult Leader
Winning the Fight for Reproductive Rights in Mexico - Open Society Foundations
Madres de Plaza de Mayo | Learning for Justice
Adweek article on Rogan and MeidasTouch
Kash Patel QAnon Appearances
Kash Patel Seal Team 6 Endangerment
So Marianne Williamson Really is the Peace Candidate—Patreon
“You Feel Like You Are Subhuman”: Israel’s Genocide Against Palestinians in Gaza | Amnesty International USA
NLG and Other Legal Groups Send Letter to ICC Urging an Investigation into Potential War Crimes Committed by Israel and US in Gaza under “Operation Protective Edge”
Russell Tribunal on Palestine, 2014
Friday 17 November: Twenty thousand Palestinians believed to be killed in Israel’s genocide of Gaza
Campus Protests Led to More Than 3,100 Arrests, but Many Charges Have Been Dropped
Harris campaign rejects claim vice president thinks there is a genocide in Gaza
A Study Reveals CNN and MSNBC’s Glaring Gaza Double Standard | The Nation
Morning Joe: Dems’ Favorite Show, Blatant Pro-Israel Propaganda
The Intercept: Israel-Palestine Coverage
US MSM downplays Amnesty report
TIME on Iranian Foreign Influence Methods
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Researchers in California recently warned that just one mutation in H5N1, the bird flu virus, could make the disease transmissible between humans. While the virus was first identified in 1959 (and became globally significant in 1996), they’re also concerned that increasingly damaging effects of climate change could make us more susceptible to such viruses. The same week, California-based raw milk manufacturer, Raw Farm, was forced to recall its products due to third-party testers discovering it contained H5N1.
Derek looks at these converging trends—the wellness-driven fervor over the safety and health benefits of raw milk and the chances of another pandemic—with an investigation into why this matters from a public health perspective. Along the way, he’ll define the three often-confused forms of health in public discourse—individual, population, and public health—and why influencers often confuse them.
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Exvangelical author Tia Levings joins Matthew to discuss her harrowing memoir of indoctrination, abuse, recovery, and advocacy, The Well-Trained Wife: My Escape from Christian Patriarchy. It’s a wild GenX journey that tells us a lot about the logic of evangelical support for Trumpism, and how those caught within it can see their way clear the gender terror, rape culture, and fantasies of retribution.
Show Notes
Tia Levings
This season, Patreon is checking some big things off your wish list
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If you’ve spent one minute on social media in the last few months, you’ve probably heard that seed oils are extremely toxic, food dyes are the reason for rising obesity rates—oh wait, that’s glyphosate—and vaccines are still causing autism. Nevermind the fact that the supposedly criminal preservative, thimerosal, was removed from almost all vaccinations in 2001. Clinical research is irrelevant in MAHA, RFK Jr’s Make America Healthy Again MAGA ripoff.
Wellness acolytes have found a champion in Kennedy, who’s going to immediately end chronic diseases and reduce obesity rates by…checks notes…making sure every American has a gym membership. We’ve covered Bobby a lot on this podcast, so today our fearless correspondent, Mallory DeMille, returns to investigate one very vocal and very relieved cohort, the MAHA Mamas. They just know Kennedy is going to truly save the children, science be damned.
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An essay from Matthew on how MAGA religiosity obscures the religious nature of liberalism, and how both obscure the underlying religion of capitalism.
Inspired by Walter Benjamin, who in 1921 wrote:
One can behold in capitalism a religion, that is to say, capitalism essentially serves to satisfy the same worries, anguish, and disquiet formerly answered by so-called religion. Capitalism is a pure religious cult, perhaps the most extreme there ever was. Within it everything only has meaning in direct relation to the cult: it knows no special dogma, no theology.
Show Notes
Mutual Aid Hub
Martin Luther King Jr: Dialectics, Materialism, and the Black Radical Critique of Racial Capitalism with Andrew J. Douglas and Jared A. Loggins
230: How Did We Get Here?
Walter Benjamin, "Capitalism as Religion [Fragment 74],"
Max Weber and Walter Benjamin
Without Dream or Mercy
Has Capitalism Become Our Religion?
On the Concept of History - Walter Benjamin
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The Free Press founder, Bari Weiss, recently hosted Peter Thiel on her podcast. While The FP markets itself as as a return to independent and non-partisan real journalism, Julian and Derek point out that's not the case at all—especially when the organization's $15M in funding comes from rightwing and libertarian VCs. Will Weiss factcheck Thiel's misinformation in real-time, as a "non-partisan" outlet should?
Show Notes
Lapdogs Of The "Counter-Elite" Authoritarians
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Since the election, Democratic voter disbelief and despair has alternated between grief and rage. We watched some erstwhile vociferous critics of Trump in the legacy media, like Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski, kiss the ring and bend the knee, while others adopted a contorted posture of seeming legitimization, like NPR hosting Leonard Leo for a nice long sit-down interview.
Meanwhile, the big egos of MAGA 2.0 seem to rise like Soviet propaganda banners over the American landscape. Trump has named his cabinet picks at lightning speed. His list includes a pro-wrestling executive, a Hare Krishna cult member, a tech billionaire, an anti-vax conspiracy peddler, a FOX News host with far-right tattoos, an alt-med snake oil salesman, two sex offenders, a COVID-contrarian doctor—and, contrary to his claiming to know nothing about it during the election, prominent Project 2025 authors.
What most high profile nominations all have in common is being completely unqualified for the job. Maybe that’s the point. We look at the cabinet picks that intersect with our beat, as pseudoscience conspiracism now completes its journey from the social fringes to deciding White House policies—and all the consequences that entails.
Show Notes
Conspirituality’s Project 2025 coverage
Everything You Need to Know About Donald Trump’s FDA Pick
No, Medical Errors Are Not the Third Leading Cause of Death
Dr. Oz Shilled for an Alternative to Medicare
Trump picks former Florida Rep. Weldon to lead CDC
13 things everyone should know about Pete Hegseth
Trump reportedly plans to kick trans troops out of the military within days of inauguration
Transgender Military Service in the United States
Did RFK Jr. eat McDonald’s in that viral pic aboard Trump’s plane? Here’s the answer
Part One: Vince McMahon, History's Greatest Monster - Behind the Bastards
C-03-CV-24-004019 — John Does suit against WWE, trigger warning.
Case 3:24-cv-00090 Document 1 Filed 01/25/24 — Janel Grant suit, trigger warning.
152: Tulsi Gabbard’s Krishna Consciousness (w/Nitai Joseph)
Tulsi Gabbard's ties to the Science of Identity Foundation, a controversial religious sect that some call an abusive 'cult'
Tulsi Gabbard Had a Very Strange Childhood
What Does Tulsi Gabbard Believe?
Tulsi Gabbard’s ties to secretive cult may explain her perplexing political journey
Islamophobic World View of Tulsi Gabbard's Guru Revealed in Unearthed Recordings – Can she Still Run for President?
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Matthew here with the fourth installment of Five Big Questions Posed to an Extremely Thoughtful Person.
Rob Schenck joined me in Episode 199 to discuss his deradicalization from the Evangelical anti-abortion movement. Today he joins me to discuss some things he’s learned about hope, faith, resilience and building community in hard times.
Show Notes
Costly Grace - Rob Schenck
199: Inside Anti-Abortion Christian Nationalism (w/Rob Schenck)
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The climate denialist who exposed the so-called “censorship industrial complex” returns, this time at another congressional hearing. Michael Shellenberger has come to blow the whistle on Big Government’s UFO cover-up.
Nancy Mace, Lauren Boebert, and Anna Paulina Luna alternate between showing off their knowledge of fantastical History Channel “documentaries” and playing bad cop interrogators.
Reverse-engineered UFO’s! Recovered alien “biologics!” Interdimensional beings! Organic machines that defy the laws of physics!
Shellenberger and his fellow “witnesses” provide precisely zero evidence for any of these earth-shattering claims.
Welcome to the Government Oversight and Accountability Committee circus.
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AG1 built a billion-dollar brand in large part by tapping into the fitness and wellness podcast and YouTube markets. Recently, AG1’s founder, Chris Ashenden, resigned after a decades-old real estate scam in his native New Zealand came to light. While Chris has mentioned it in passing, he’s always claimed to have paid full reparations for his crime—and it was a crime.
Turns out that he hasn’t paid it all, as uncovered by New Zealand journalists Jonathan Milne and Mike Wesley-Smith. They join Derek to discuss their year-and-a-half long investigation that resulted in a billionaire founder leaving one of the most well-known supplements brands in the world. They also talk about why journalism still matters in a world seemingly run by billionaires.
Show Notes
AG1 founder Chris Ashenden resigns amid scrutiny of NZ criminal history
DELVE: Powder Keg podcast on Apple Podcasts | Spotify | iHeart
Trump sues for billions from media he says is biased against him
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Josemaria Escriva founded Opus Dei, an ultra-conservative, high-demand, secretive Catholic organization in Madrid, Spain, after receiving a supposed vision from God in 1928. His small inner circle initially initiated university students into strict obedience, celibacy, medieval practices of self-flagellation, and deceptive recruitment techniques to convert their friends.
Operating outside of the mainstream church, Opus Dei rose to prominence under Spain's authoritarian dictator, Francisco Franco. Escriva was eventually canonized as a saint while the group amassed enormous wealth and influence around the world.
Today, their reactionary religious and political mission has established a foothold in Washington DC through the Catholic Information Center—the tabernacle closest to the White House.Bill Barr, Leonard Leo, and Project 2025 mastermind, Kevin Roberts, all visit for spiritual guidance. Meanwhile, scandals and lawsuits involving child sex abuse, money laundering, and human trafficking plague Opus Dei's reputation. Gareth Gore joins us to discuss his controversial new book on the past and present of this secretive organization, Opus.
Show Notes
Pew Research Center: America’s News Influencers
How Opus Dei Converted DC
Gareth Gore Author page for his book, Opus
Opus Dei Paid $900K to Settle Sexual Misconduct Claim
Argentine Prosecutors Accuse Opus Dei of Human Trafficking
Maria del Carmen Tapia Book Summary on Opus Dei
Financial Times on Opus
Biblical omen uncovered in aftermath of Hurricane Helene | Daily Mail Online
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A personal journey through health describing what led Derek to focus on health, science, and healthcare as a career and, eventually, this podcast.
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The post-election online chaos has a lot in common with what can go wrong in online survivor groups. Matthew tracks how opportunities for connection and solidarity can crater into gravity wells of recrimination, trauma-dumping, moral outrage porn, and the rise of new influence hierarchies. Not just because of differences in politics and values and temperament—but because of inequality and privilege.
A meditation on the difference between building a boat to sail in vs. a boat in a bottle, on considering the second arrow, and on when to log the fuck off.
Show Notes
Mutual Aid Hub
MORAL OUTRAGE PORN C. Thi Nguyen and Bekka Williams
The Second Arrow — Sutta Central
Log the Fuck Off with Amber Frost, Matt Christman, & Ben Fong
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