What does J.K.Rowling’s Harry Potter function as an “Intuitional Religion?" How might "fandom" be scratching our itch for community, ritual, meaning, or purpose? Is “hustle culture” our striving to achieve The Good Life (TM), or a symptom of having given up hope of ever receiving it?

In this wide ranging conversation with Tara Isabella Burton, we explore the slow boil shift of American religious identity from Institutionalism to Intuitionism, and how the vacuum of institutional trust has been flooded with every kind of “weird internet, horseshoe theory land mine.” 

Plus: why we should ALL “touch grass.”

CORRECTION: At one point Brad said that Hogwarts Legacy was on track to be "the best-selling video game of all time." That was only kinda accurate: it has already broken the best-selling INITIAL RELEASE of a video game of all time (not total sales). A minor distinction, but we care too much about getting the facts right not to correct the record.

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Resources

(BOOK) Strange Rites: New Religions for a Godless World, by Tara Isabella Burton

(BOOK) Self-Made: Creating Our Identities from Da Vinci to the Kardashians, by Tara Isabella Burton

(PODCAST) The witch trials of JK Rowling

(ARTICLE) Hogwarts Legacy Breaks Release Records