Conspirituality

MAHA isn’t a health movement. It’s a marketing engine driving activist propaganda. Derek looks at Tony Lyons, one of MAHA’s key architects, and his recent strategic memo sent to Republican leadership about how to use MAHA talking points to retain power in the midterm elections. 

Show Notes

Tony Lyons’s strategic memo to GOP leadership

Examining Who Benefits From Kennedy’s Anti-Science MAHA Push

MAHA Supporters Form New Organization to Boost RFK’s Goals in D.C.

MAHA’s money man has built a political machine. Will it matter for midterms?

The co-founder of the Robert F. Kennedy Jr. super PAC is a Steve Bannon and MAGA media ally

As MAHA turns 1, a fired-up movement is still figuring out how to fulfill its promises

Skyhorse Publishing: About Us

MAHA Action

American Values 2024

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In the wake of the DOJ’s dump of 3 million documents from the FBI’s Epstein investigation, journalists, content creators, and everyday people are forming narratives and schema for what it all means.

Social media is flooded with survivor stories, overwhelming disgust, rage and grief, and reports of anxiety, sleep disturbance, and difficulty functioning in the world (mostly from women). Pizzagate and QAnon conspiracy memes are being resurrected. Satanic Ritual Abuse materials are again circulating, which imbue sex trafficking and child abuse with sensationalized supernatural overtones.

The Epstein class must be held accountable. Alongside that, Julian explores how toxic masculinity teaches men to dehumanize women and girls, as evidenced by email exchanges that play along with misogynistic attitudes and objectification.

Making sense of the cultural and historical context for the global human trafficking trade, which extends far beyond movie villain elites, billionaires, and royal family members, requires that men speak up against casual everyday dehumanization of women and girls, while actively fostering relational intelligence within male culture.

Show Notes

50 Million People Suffer Today Under Global Slavery

Many Countries Still Allow Child Marriage

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Deepak Chopra is all over the Epstein files. Are we surprised? Nope. But we are interested in the various layers of his entanglement and what they say about the ethics and politics at play in the shadow of Big Wellness.

Show Notes

Self-Help Guru Sorry He Got Busted for Vile Epstein Emails

Deepak Chopra: New Age Guru, UCSD Prof – and Epstein Confidant

God Is A Construct, Cute Girls Are Real': Bestselling Spiritual Author Deepak Chopra's Emails To Epstein Revealed

Deepak Chopra told Epstein to 'bring your girls.' Here's their entire email exchange

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Mark Carney is a devout Catholic, and his economic vision came from a challenge posed by Pope Francis. Matthew walks through the contradictions of Carney’s economic spirituality. 

Show Notes

Values by Mark Carney | Penguin Random House Canada 

Pope Francis says he wasn't offended by 'communist crucifix' gift 

The Catholic Case for Communism - America Magazine 

Pope Francis: “If I See the Gospel in a Sociological Way Only, Yes, I Am a Communist, and So Too Is Jesus” - The American TFP 

Exclusive: Pope Francis disusses Ukraine, U.S. bishops and more - America Magazine

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Matthew pokes at the contradictions behind Prime Minister Mark Carney’s polished Davos attempt to distance Canada from U.S. chaos, while Canadian companies continue profiting from the U.S. domestic terror regime. 

Drawing on reporting by Rachel Gilmore, Matthew looks at how Canada’s “middle power” liberalism masks deep complicity with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement through arms, surveillance tech, and security contracts. 

Carney’s benevolent affect continues the tradition of obscuring a longer history of exclusionary border politics. He’s there to manage outrage without challenging the capitalist structures that escalate into authoritarian violence.

Show Notes

The Great White North: Canada’s New Border Bill Appeases the Trump Administration | TechPolicy.Press 

A list of Canadian companies profiting off of ICE and Trump's violent mass deportation regime 

If TikTok News Is the Future, Rachel Gilmore Is Living It | The Tyee 

Liberals Fear Closing Arms Export Loophole Would Anger U.S.

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Over 1,000 children and women were potentially victims of Jeffrey Epstein's trafficking and sexual abuse. It is not clear how deeply Peter Attia was enmeshed in Epstein's core activities, but we do know he belonged to an important tier of his operation: the influencer-celebrity-intelligentsia set that legitimized him as a sophisticate across a wide range of disciplines. 

We revisit Attia in light of his 1,700+ appearances in the Epstein Files.

Show Notes

285: Can Peter Attia Live Forever?

Longevity guru Peter Attia keeps CBS News role despite showing up in Epstein files

Peter Attia, the Epstein Files and the Lie Propping Up Big Wellness

Bari Weiss Attempts to Get Past Her Rocky Start At CBS News

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In the wake of ICE murders, some are calling for more protestors with guns, or at least to prepare to meet fire with fire. Julian examines the history of armed struggle in South Africa and Northern Ireland, as well as the arguments for nonviolent vs militant political movements. 

Is there a way back from the turning point at which people recruit their friends and families into neighborhood militias, learn to kill soldiers and civilians in the name of a cause, and construct chains of command that justify executing informants and collaborators from within?

Does this actually work? And do we risk becoming the very monsters we are fighting in the process?

Show Notes

The Role of Violence in Nonviolent Struggles

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Two new MAHA-approved bills would force insurance companies to cover supplements and shield homeopathic manufacturers from any liability while allowing them to make more health claims. As Derek argues, this is what Kennedy has always been aiming for: shuffle as many alt-med products into circulation as possible while ensuring they don't need any of those pesky regulations pharmaceuticals must endure.

Show Notes

West Virginia House Bill 4760

Texas HR 7050

Supplements Are a $70 Billion Industry. RFK Jr. Is Good for Business.

RFK Jr.’s MAHA Movement Picks Up Steam State by State

With RFK Jr. in Charge, Supplement Makers See Chance To Cash In

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Prior to last month’s killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, many white American citizens felt obligated to use their privilege to actively disrupt unjust ICE activities in their cities. But the stakes just got higher for everyone.

In the wake of these tragic deaths, we look at how the MAGA propaganda machine dehumanizes opposition and demands loyalists not trust the evidence of their own eyes and ears. In segment two, Matthew will look into how renegade religious leaders, then in segment three Derek discusses brave community organizers in Portland currently resisting ICE and the authoritarianism it advances.

Show Notes

Christians, Let’s Stop Abusing Romans 13 

As a resident of Minnesota—Bishop Barron

Bishop Barron's tendentious attack on Mayor Mamdani distorts doctrine | National Catholic Reporter 

Leo ally: defund ICE

BBC Audio US Military Archbishop, Faith and Gen Z, 'Understanding British Imams' project

Fact-Checking Trump Admin Claims of Paid Protestors

“Womanosphere” Influencers Urge Against the “Sin of Empathy”

‘Oregon was next’: Trump targeted state after Minnesota, report says

Feds at Portland ICE facility again deploy chemical agents against protesters

PDX ICE Watch

This nonviolent stuff'll get you killed : how guns made the civil rights movement possible : Cobb, Charles E., Jr., author : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming : Internet Archive

Brief: Beyond Violence and Nonviolence (Part 1) — Conspirituality  

Omar Wasow on Non-Violent Protest Effectiveness

Charles Tilly on Public Perception of Protest Movements

William Gamson’s Strategy Of Social Protest

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When videos surfaced of Alex Pretti kicking an ICE vehicle's taillight 11 days before his murder, claims that the video was AI dominated social media. Some commenters even posted articles that stated the opposite of what they thought they said.

Derek explores the necessity of curiosity when coming across information that contradicts what you want to hear. First, he explores it through his love of books before applying the skill to situations like the Pretti video.

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