From wellness culture and yoga influencers to QAnon forums and January 6, the pathways into conspiracy extremism aren’t always obvious — especially for women. Identity and meaning can quietly turn misinformation into ideology. Author and researcher Noelle Cook discuss did direct fieldwork with women involved in conspiracy movements and the Capitol attack. Extremism doesn’t always look extreme. Sometimes it looks like community. Radicalization — it’s not just for men.

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Our team gives their analysis of a disturbingly familiar year in power and politics, normalization and surprises. Much of it was predictable, some was worse, and some was worse that worse. Yet conspiratorial thinking cuts both ways, and 2025 illuminated some “theories” as being actual conspiracies. What trajectories might actually improve in 2026?

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We didn't always assume the government was hiding aliens. The Manhattan Project was a crash course in how to run a secret program. Some secrets were real and necessary. Some were real and needing exposure - The Vietnam War, The Pentagon Papers, Watergate. So now people distrust everything the government tells us -- from UFO's to 9/11. Bestselling author and historian Garrett Graff has been reporting on this phenomenon via oral histories.

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An expert on psychological manipulation and politics, including Nazi propaganda and Stassi, NYU professor Tamsin Shaw studies conspiracy theories and how they might be changing with the internet and A.I. 

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Organ transplants, ice baths, Russian propaganda, RFK Jr.'s science denialism... Scott Carney has investigated in depth about where lies the truth and who is taking advantage of our ignorance.

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"Leaving MAGA" is a community for those who have left the movement, or have doubts and remorse about staying in MAGA but are afraid to leave. Rich Logis and Erica Roach tell their stories of falling into MAGA and then climbing out.

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How CIA became the largest purveyor and owner of LSD in the world and, in the process, destroyed lives and introduced psychedelics to The Counterculture.

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" There are things we feel like we know that we we can't even say. It is even worse. worse. It is even more people."

Journalist Tara Palmeri and our own Adam Davidson have been writing and podcasting about the Epstein case since 2019. There's so much new Epstein news that it's easy to overlook the overwhelming, depressing, terrifying amount of crime and coverup that involves so many people besides just Trump. How is the worldwide intelligence apparatus involved? And how do you investigate a dead man?

On a macro leval... What are the limits of journalism? How protected from repurcussions are the rich and powerful? Why did they think they were immune? Is the social institution of shame obsolete? Is the legal bulwark against corruption just an illusion?

It's not an uplifting episode. But you will hear things you never knew about.

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The Curator of the NSA’s National Cryptologic Museum knows if the government is watching you. He knows how to tell who’s doing hidden nuclear testing. He’s written about some of the wilder (and unsuccessful) endeavors by the CIA, and how the CIA build Miami, the second largest hub of espionage in the world.

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Investigator Laura Krantz (the Wild Things podcast) knows about everything Bigfoot, including Bigfoot erotica, the CIA's supposed relationship with the cryptid, and how Bigfoot can be a gateway drug to other conspiracy theories.

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