119: We Are Slenderman (w/Kathleen Hale)
Conspirituality8 Sep 2022

119: We Are Slenderman (w/Kathleen Hale)

On May 31st, 2014, Morgan Geyser stabbed her onetime best friend Bella Leutner nineteen times, while her new best friend, Anissa Weier, looked on. All three girls were twelve years old. Geyser was living with schizophrenia, and Weier had introduced her to the crowd-sourced internet phantasm known as Slenderman, who first appeared on Something Awful, the message board at the root of chan culture. Together, Geyser and Weier came to believe that Slenderman was demanding a sacrifice in exchange for his protection. Their crime, at once naïve and brutal, sparked a moral panic. Author Kathleen Hale joins Matthew to discuss her reporting on this story in her riveting and compassionate new book, Slenderman: Online Obsession, Mental Illness, and the Violent Crime of Two Midwestern Girls.Slenderman is brimming with tenderness for these girls, who are all creative, confused, scared, and ultimately bound to each other through social contagion and mental illness. Hale's writing is accessible but elliptical as it uncovers jagged details, but never easy answers, about a world that predicts our own. On this podcast we spend a lot of time on the virtual demons that animate conspirituality and QAnon, driving some devotees to violence. Hale's work is good medicine for those who know that internet chaos and mental precarity will remain locked in feedback loops for the foreseeable future. Her meticulous investigation—enriched by hours spent interviewing Morgan Geyser—shows that the road to understanding is always paved with empathy. Show Notes Slenderman — Kathleen HaleAm I being catfished? An author confronts her number one online critic | Books | The Guardian Folklore, Horror Stories, and the Slender Man: The Development of an Internet MythologyThe Slender Man Wiki | Fandom -- -- --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

Episoder(773)

Bonus Sample: Peptides: Wellness’s Experimental Jab

Bonus Sample: Peptides: Wellness’s Experimental Jab

Listen to the full episode The wellness industry has been repeating marketing strategies used by the fashion and diet book industries for decades. Influencers are just exploiting novelty-seeking cogn...

30 Mar 7min

Brief: Eulogy for Joseph Baker, Faithful Listener

Brief: Eulogy for Joseph Baker, Faithful Listener

Matthew eulogizes longtime Conspirituality listener Joseph Baker, who died on February 4 at the age of 51. They became online friends when Joseph reached out to say that maybe Matthew was being too ha...

28 Mar 31min

301: Gen X Meets the Manosphere

301: Gen X Meets the Manosphere

Did we all need a streaming manosphere documentary? Many did. Did we need one made in the GenX stop-and-mug slacker analysis-avoiding style of Louis Theroux? Debatable. Today we review Theroux’s Insid...

26 Mar 1h 12min

Bonus Sample: The New Age Muslim Apocalyptic Prophet

Bonus Sample: The New Age Muslim Apocalyptic Prophet

From a repurposed orphanage in the North of England, Abdullah Hashem tells his audience in five languages, across two satellite TV companies, and multiple social media channels that he is the successo...

23 Mar 8min

Brief: The Book Men Actually Need

Brief: The Book Men Actually Need

There's been talk about the "male loneliness epidemic" for years. Yet what about women? Derek reviews economist Corinne Low's recent book, Having It All, in light of this question, contrasting it with...

21 Mar 29min

300: Farming Ballerinas

300: Farming Ballerinas

When Hannah and Daniel Neeleman recently went on camera to explain their position on raw milk, they assured their 22 million-plus following that they were going to follow regulations—with a bit of a g...

19 Mar 56min

Bonus Sample: Anxiety is The Pitt(s)

Bonus Sample: Anxiety is The Pitt(s)

The Pitt recently exposed fans to the complexities and reality of panic attacks. Derek uses that moment in the exceptional show to discuss his own longstanding struggle with anxiety, exploring the lat...

16 Mar 6min

Brief: The Stepford Wives Conference

Brief: The Stepford Wives Conference

Turning Point USA's Women’s Leadership Conference returns to Dallas in June. Derek and Julian take a look inside. Show Notes Antifeminist women’s summit: ‘The kitchen is where the real revolution s...

14 Mar 29min

Populært innen Vitenskap

fastlegen
rekommandert
jss
tingenes-tilstand
liberal-halvtime
sinnsyn
rss-rekommandert
forskningno
tomprat-med-gunnar-tjomlid
rss-nysgjerrige-norge
villmarksliv
dekodet-2
fjellsportpodden
rss-paradigmepodden
smart-forklart
kvinnehelsepodden
tidlose-historier
nevropodden
utenrikshospitalet
rss-lundqvist-podden