Conspirituality

Dr. Taslim Alani-Verjee joined us last January for a Brief on Jordan Peterson’s professional status as a shitposting registered psychologist. She returned for Episode 141 on whether it makes sense that the Canadian Medical Assistance in Dying act is fuelling conspiracy theories about state neglect. 

Today she returns, as a psychologist and as a practicing Muslim, to discuss with Matthew how it feels to see her community drawn into culture war territory over sex ed and gender issues. Matthew also asks about her clinical practice with Muslim and Jewish clients in the shadow of the current Israel-Gaza war. This episode was recorded in November, but the themes are as current as ever.

Show Notes

Dr. Taslim Alani-Verjee 

Brief: Is Jordan Peterson Really a Licensed Psychologist? — Conspirituality

141: Does Canada Want Suffering Citizens to Die? (w/Taslim Alani-Verjee)  

Hate on Display at the 1 Million March 4 Children Rally in Calgary

Cross-country rallies against 'gender ideology' in schools meet with counter-protests

Statement by MAC on Statements by Canadian Leaders and School Boards on Recent Protests

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Nothing will stop Republicans from lining up behind Trump. But the left? It's in crisis. Fragmented. Perhaps in times of great flux fascists reflexively double-down while progressives slide into a cloud of self-doubt. There, strange bedfellows are sometimes found in the dark.

To help us understand this territory—what it is and how to navigate it—we're joined by journalist, professor, and documentarian, Jeff Sharlet. His books, The Undertow: Scenes From a Slow Civil War and The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power are field guides for understanding modern America.

Show Notes

Losing the Plot: The “Leftists” Who Turn Right

The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War

The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power

The Family on Netflix

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Control the Court. Overturn Roe. Funnel anonymous donations and shady gifts. Deregulate for Jesus. Roll back the cultural clock. Celebrate. Rinse and Repeat. 

Leonard Leo’s libertarian Catholic agenda has made him a preeminent power-broker in right-wing American politics. He’s reshaping society while enjoying the pipeline of cash and influence that connects billionaire GOP mega-donors and the SCOTUS judges he helped install. 

Julian tracks how Leo’s Federalist Society used Trump as part of a decades-long systematic takeover of the judicial system that culminated in the current ethics and corruption scandal in the SCOTUS.

Show Notes

ProPublica “Friends of the Court” investigative journalism series

The Guardian Club For Growth GOP Insurectionist Support

Open Secret 2022 Donor List

Dark Money Spending After Citizen’s United

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse “The Front Group Swarms”

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The online pseudoscience clearing house, Human Garage, treats fascia as a cure-all to nearly every disease imaginable. Yet as today's guest, David Lesondak, Senior Structural Integrator and Fascia Specialist at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center’s Center for Integrative Medicine and author of the bestselling Fascia: What It Is and Why It Matters, tells Derek, they begin with a little bit of truth before going full Quantum nonsense.

David breaks down fascia this week: what it is, how it functions in the body, and why fascia pseudoscience is so dangerous.

Show Notes

David Lesondak's website

The Tissue That Connects Our Muscles May Be a Key to Better Health

Harvard scientists closer to solving centuries-old heart mystery

Human Garage: Manifesting Through Fascia

Human Garage: Anti-Gravity - Full Spinal Decompression

Human Garage: Autoimmune Diseases

Human Garage: Erectile Dysfunction

Human Garage: Anal Sphincter Release

Human Garage: Ileocecal Valve

Human Garage: Trauma Stored in Fascia

Human Garage: Trauma Release Maneuver

Human Garage: Fascia Work Cures Hives

Human Garage: Fascia Facial Release for Acne

Human Garage: Heart is a Vortex

Human Garage: Movement Instead of Medicine

Human Garage: Faith Healing

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What happens when white knights role-play at saving all the children? What impacts do they have on the actual realities faced by trafficked children and adults? And how does their propaganda—rolled out in blockbuster trauma porn events like Sound of Freedom—stigmatize and endanger adult sex workers, especially those who are already marginalized? Esme Providence Brown returns as our correspondent to run it down.

Brown retired from professional sex work in 2021 after twenty-year career in Manhattan. She first joined us on Episode 169 to talk about the strange overlaps between sex work and the neo-tantra yoga movement. In this richly-researched report and discussion with Matthew, she examines the history of and present-day ramifications of anti-trafficking movements—projects that often scapegoat women who are secretly desired but publicly hated.

“Everybody wants to save the children,” Brown says, “but very few people want to step into the tangled web of what this actually means or the history of how ‘salvation’ movements - hobbled by grandiosity, white knighthood, and patriarchal ignorance—have incurred collateral damage while failing in their ultimate mission of liberation.” 

Show notes for this one are extensive, and won’t fit into most pod apps. You can find them here.

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Rightwing activist Chris Rufo recently led the charge in helping oust Claudine Gay from the Harvard presidency. While the charge is plagiarism—a charge Gay herself acknowledged—the reason for Rufo’s intense focus on her has little to do with academic pedigree.

Rufo, a former vegetarian yogi, is leading the right-wing charge against DEI trainings, LGBTQ+ rights, and any mention of critical race theory. Rolling off his "victory" of Gay's resignation, he's published a blog post that he hopes will become the guiding manifesto for the "New Right." As Derek breaks down, this means returning America back to 1776 in many ways.

Show Notes 

The New Right Activism

How We Squeezed Harvard to Push Claudine Gay Out

Claudine Gay: my part in her downfall

Bill Ackman’s wife is accused of plagiarizing part of her dissertation

Contracts Between Hungarian Nonprofit and Christopher Rufo, Others, Raise Foreign Agent Concerns

The Plagiarism War Has Begun

A lesson in persuasion — Loretta Ross

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On January 6, 2021 Del Bigtree took the stage at the MAGA Health Freedom Rally a few blocks away from where Donald Trump had just instigated a riot. He joked about how the former president was a hard act to follow. 

But he dug deep and persevered by stringing together key dog whistles of Trumpian disinformation and resentment: public health officials are corrupt, COVID is a scam, and the election was probably stolen.

Such performances have gotten Bigtree’s Highwire show nuked by YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. But they’ve also made him wealthy, and with his new appointment as RFK Jr’s new Director of Communications, his political star is now rising.

Matthew runs down what we know about Bigtree, and what he thinks this appointment will bring.  

Show Notes

An Important Message To The Medical Freedom Community from Del Bigtree 

RFK Jr. hires top anti-vaccine activist as campaign communications director 

The Disinformation Dozen — Center for Countering Digital Hate | CCDH 

Brief: RFK's Health Propaganda Roundtable — Conspirituality 

Brief: RFK Jr Loses New Age Support Over Israel — Conspirituality 

Pandemic Profiteers — Center for Countering Digital Hate | CCDH 

Tracy Beanz - The HighWire 

How three conspiracy theorists took 'Q' and sparked Qanon 

Anti-Vaxxer Del Bigtree’s Unhinged Quest for Unvaccinated Blood Leads Him to Mexico

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Last year, the Heritage Foundation published a 920-page document that lays out the conservative organization’s road map for the next Republican president’s first four months in office, which could very well be Donald Trump. Project 2025 rests on four pillars devoted to the implementation of the unitary executive theory—basically, all levers of the American government bowing down to the executive branch. If this sounds like a roadmap to authoritarianism, that’s because it is.

With 54 conservative and religious organizations signing on and over 450 contributors, as well as untold millions in dark money, Heritage is leading the charge with this anti-abortion, anti-LBGTQ+, anti-DEI, anti-civil liberties game plan. To date, they’ve interviewed thousands of prospective candidates for the next administration, with the goal of hiring tens of thousands of subservient bureaucrats ready to implement this Christian Nationalistic plan.

Today we break down what the document says and how it could rapidly erode American democracy. And if that sounds like hyperbole, it isn’t.

Project 2025

The Power Worshippers | Katherine Stewart

Behind the Curtain — Scoop: The Trump job applications revealed

The Conservative Plan to Take Over the Country (you need to know about this)

The '3.5% rule': How a small minority can change the world

Dr. Kevin Roberts | Catholic Citizens Annual Banquet

Living a Life of Catholic Integrity in a Hostile World | Roger Severino

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Friend of the pod and Straight White American Jesus host Brad Onishi returns to pick up with Matthew where they left off in their discussion of post-religious spirituality. They discuss what happens after disenchantment, the spirituality of boredom, and why, as we hurtle into the coming chaos of 2024, it’s good to keep an eye out for new allies in unlikely places. 

This is Part Two of two-part conversation. Look for Part One in your pod feeds, dated December 30. 

Show Notes

Brad Onishi 

Straight White American Jesus 

Axis Mundi Media

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Friend of the pod and Straight White American Jesus host Brad Onishi joins Matthew for a New Year’s discussion of post-religious spirituality. Onishi fills out the details on a nascent identity that many of you might resonate with: the “secular person of faith.” They talk about the false choice of Max Weber’s fork in the road: that either we commit to the sciences or languish in the churches. They discuss Jeffery Kosky’s idea of “disenchantment with disenchantment.” And they try to figure out what Thomas Altizer was going on about when he proposed a “Christian Atheism.”

This is Part One of two-part conversation. Part Two drops Monday, New Year’s Day, on Patreon. 

Show Notes

Brad Onishi 

Straight White American Jesus 

Axis Mundi Media

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