Brief: Ground Zero Grifting

Matthew sits down, across 9,000 miles of mostly ocean, with journalist Anke Richter and reporter and Māori rights activist Joe Trinder to discuss the mind-bending rise of Māori MAGA in the COVID-free sanctuary of Aoteoroa, aka New Zealand. Led by former blues musician Billy Te Kahika, conspirituality has seeped from music and cultural festivals and straight into national politics, where white supremacists manipulate Māori post-colonial distrust of settler governments to boost vaccine hesitancy and milk paranoia.In the Ticker this week, Derek dunks on Deepak Chopra’s “Lovetuner” penny-whistle, which will change your DNA for $58 and a few toots. Julian reports on Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying as they drift farther into conspiratorial pseudoscience and advocate for whiz-bang COVID cure-alls over vaccines.Show NotesExploring the Actual Science Behind Why Music Makes Us Feel GoodAnke Richter bioAnke Richter on cultsAnke Richter on conspiracy theories in New ZealandHow alternative festivals became platforms for conspiracy theoristsLuminate Festival organisers criticised for promoting far-right conspiracy theoristsAnti-conspiracist campaigners take aim at ‘Mothers for Freedom’ eventThe self-proclaimed ‘political prisoners’ in managed isolationAnti-lockdown group of academics criticised for promoting conspiracy theoristsThe scientist and the rabbit hole: How epidemiologist Simon Thornley became an outcast of his professionE-Tangata The rise of Māori MAGABilly TK: False ProfitSue Grey -- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | Canada Follow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

3 Kesä 20211h 59min

Derek looks back at three important historical figures with unsavory pasts to ask the question: who gets to decide who gets canceled, and why?Show NotesGreat Soul: Mahatma Gandhi and His Struggle with India How would Gandhi’s celibacy tests with naked women be seen today?John Muir Is Canceled. Who’s Next?Don’t Cancel John MuirI’m an MLK scholar – and I’ll never be able to view King in the same lightA judge gave a drug dealer a second chance. Sixteen years later, he swore him in as a lawyer.Sponsored Content: Last Week Tonight with John OliverThe Unbearable Feelings of the Anti-Masker -- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | Canada Follow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

31 Touko 20219min

We’re extremely pleased that someone who isn’t a Boomer  — and is younger than us — is making a serious but accessible contribution to this golden age of cult literature. Linguist Amanda Montell joins Julian for an engaging interview about her new book, Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism, which examines the power of language in high-demand groups, from The People’s Temple to the local Young Living dinner party. In a debrief, we discuss not only Montell’s study, but also our own run-ins with spiritual mumbo-jumbo.In the Ticker, Matthew wonders what Sayer Ji does when he loses his Facebook privileges and is relegated to the armpit of Telegram. Why, he goes full Satanic Panic, of course!Show NotesDeplatformed for Anti-Vax Propaganda, Sayer Ji Turns to Satanic Panic ContentAmanda Montell’s website -- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | Canada Follow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

27 Touko 20211h 49min

Julian and Matthew discuss words, world views, and how productive disagreement can lead to mutual understanding. In today’s overheated discourse, social media posturing can make the culture wars feel like pro wrestling and political conversation like tip-toeing through a hair-trigger minefield. While these two co-hosts share a healthy skepticism for conspiracy theories, pseudoscience, and New Age grift, some of their underlying philosophical and political beliefs hold interesting tensions. On the table this time: postmodernism, science, cultural sensitivity, Enlightenment values, social constructionism, and grand narratives about the arc of moral history. -- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | Canada Follow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

24 Touko 20219min

This week we learned that Melinda Gates was disturbed by Bill’s men’s-club relationship with Jeffrey Epstein all the way back in 2011. And for fuck sake: when Bill visited Epstein’s Manhattan lair, reports say, he counseled the predator on image rehab while Epstein counseled Bill on his loveless marriage. Are the conspiritualists right, and about what? Matthew will revisit an earlier essay on Gates, and fill in some blind spots.Derek tackles the obscene co-optation of trans activism by anti-vaxxers who now pledge to lie about their status by “identifying as vaccinated.” In keeping with our musical theme, Julian reminisces about playing protest rock under an assumed name and the threat of a bomb under the stage during the Apartheid years in South Africa.In our feature interview, world-weary rock star Alex Ebert—frontman for Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros—joins Derek to map out the late 20th-century slide into infinitely co-opted creativity and revolution. They discuss the reasons America could use death rituals, the rise of Trump as the ultimate New Ager, wellness influencers as “the clerical class of the right,” and to ask if critical thinking and open-eyed spirituality are the new punk rock—and for how long.Show NotesThe NYT reported in the fall of 2019 that Gates was a frequent guest of Epstein in ManhattanA description from Town and Country of Epstein’s mansionSources at many meetings describe the Gates-Epstein vibeSex Redefined: The Idea of 2 Sexes Is Overly SimplisticThe Gene: An Intimate History | Siddhartha MukherjeeInside the Republican Anti-Transgender MachineGender-affirming surgery linked to better mental health, study finds“Identify As” Twitter thread -- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | Canada Follow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

20 Touko 20211h 35min

Matthew had a plan for this week — a 4K word essay on what could be learned from studying the content of an outrageously offensive conspiritualist… but then he shelved it. Why?A last-minute, off-the-cuff discussion on what it means to indulge or not indulge moral outrage porn. What it means to punch up or down, and how we decide. How we might confront an influencer who has managed to monetize mental illness.Produced with an enormous debt of gratitude to the work of C. Thi. Nguyen.Show Notes“Moral Outrage Porn“: Nguyen and WilliamsNguyen’s public scholarship on gamification, value capture, narrowed morality, and the seductions of certainty.Nguyen on the gamification of public discourseAaron Rabinowitz on cheap talkMatthew’s elegy for Michael Stone -- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | Canada Follow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

17 Touko 20219min

As our access to vaccines eases the pandemic in the Global North, U.S.-based conspiritualists keep riding the wave of covid-denial influence—all the way to the bank. This week, Julian reports that Gen-Z spiritual entrepreneur Jason Shurka has launched a new media hub, The Academy of Divine Knowledge, and affiliating with the predictable rogue’s gallery—Christiane Northrup, Del Bigree, Sayer Ji, David Icke, and Judy Mikovits among them. This confederacy of dunces charges a $33 monthly membership because “33 is a Master Number that holds many divine meanings” that leads to “infinite possibilities,” such as magically draining your bank account. Of course, the pandemic is far from over. India is still going through the worst of it, and as Matthew discusses, one reason appears to be the influence of astrologers on Narendra Modi’s decision-making. Meanwhile, Derek unpacks the repeated fat-shaming being done by conspiritualists when boasting of their awesome immune systems. In this week’s interview, Derek talks with Venezuelan-American singer/songwriter Devendra Banhart about global music, anti-vaxxers, conspiritualist ideology, and paying $24 for a smoothie in Malibu. Next week will continue the theme, as we look at music’s influence in cult worship and indoctrination, with Alex Ebert of Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros joining the discussion.Show NotesThe Racist and Problematic History of the Body Mass IndexFat shaming, BMI and alienation: COVID-19 brought new stigma to large-sized peopleFat-shamers have felt enabled by Covid, and it’s hard to fight backCDC: Obesity, Race/Ethnicity, and COVID-19The Bizarre and Racist History of the BMIUncovering and Destigmatizing Male Body Dysmorphia in Popular CultureJewish Star article about Jason Shurka’s “miracle Torah”Signature Investment Group team page w/Jason Shurka as VPMatthew on Modi and the starsThe Indian government is cracking down on harrowing -- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | Canada Follow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

13 Touko 20212h 19min

Derek discusses a forthcoming interview with Alex Ebert, which will be featured on Conspirituality 52. They discuss the dearth of death rituals in America. In this bonus episode, Derek meditates and, more to the point, our anxiety around aging, including a modern incarnation of that age-old fear: the quest for perpetual youth through wrinkle-free skin.  -- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | Canada Follow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

10 Touko 20215min