Conspirituality

"Cleansing is no longer an option, it's a necessity.”From wellness influencers obsessed about the meat-body, to Christofascists obsessed about the body politic, rhetoric bombards us from all sides.Professor of Rhetoric Colleen Derkatch joins Julian to discuss the techniques of the meaning miasma. Her focus is on wellness rhetoric specifically, and how it points to incipient illness, encourages recreational diagnostics, and describes daily routines as liturgies that grant membership in divine communities.Also we can't avoid talking about Russell Brand on Bill Maher. Sorry. Show NotesMeet Colleen DerkatchGish Gallop: When People Try to Win Debates by Using Overwhelming NonsensePharma Wants In - Rina Raphael-- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | CanadaFollow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Can Marianne Williamson maintain street cred as a progressive while promoting New Age Jesus? Can she hammer out functional policy while preaching out of A Course in Miracles—the most anti-political pseudospiritual text on the planet? Can she advocate for public health despite a history of waffling on vaccine science? Can she make a strong argument for health care reform while giving sermons from a book that says people get sick because they are not spiritual enough? Can she really help fat people with her book that says that fatness is a "repository of twisted thoughts and feelings?" Matthew doubts it, but hey—miracles happen! Show NotesWilliam Thetford's CV (MKUltra reference)Marianne Williamson's Democratic debate performance raised eyebrows. But she's no friend of the left. Marianne Williamson is a controversial AIDS-crisis figure for gay men.Kevin Sessums on MW, FB post: "I am an HIV+ man who lost lots of friends to AIDS and I know the harm she did conning many into believing they deserved their biological condition - and even their deaths- because they weren't spiritually fit enough to visualize the AIDS virus away." Marianne Williamson on Twitter: "Let’s not forget that masks aren’t our only protection against Covid. Strengthening the immune system is also very important: recommendations like vitamins C and D, healthy food and exercise, positive/spiritual consciousness." / Twitter A Course in Weight Loss: 21 Spiritual Lessons for Surrendering Your Weight ForeverMarianne Williamson promoted anti-vaxxer theories on her radio show in 2012 episode | CNN Politics -- -- --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

Answering the current wave of confusing vaccine misinformation. Julian is joined by molecular biologist Dr. Dan Wilson. "Died Suddenly," correlation vs. causation, the vaccine court, and the recycled anti-vax tropes gaining fresh traction are all addressed in this succinct PSA.Correction: Julian incorrectly calls Dr. Dan a "microbiologist" at the start of this Brief—but he actually holds a PhD in molecular biology.Show NotesVaccinated/Unvaccinated Viral Load StudyVaccination Reduces COVID TransmissionStandard Child/Adolescent ScheduleWhat is Gene Therapy?Accelerating Vaccine Trials"Died Suddenly" DebunkVaccine Court and Lawsuit Realities-- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | CanadaFollow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

So much suffering occurs because we romanticize a past that never actually existed in the belief that it's destined to become the future. In the middle we sit, here, now, with time marching forward. Derek explores how wellness influencers weaponize this psychological phenomenon and describes his personal remedy for such thinking. -- -- --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

Continuing a conversation from EP142, Derek looks at the cultural damage done when musicians co-opt musical styles to promote their own propaganda, which is often at odds with the social struggles of the oppressed class that created the music. After briefly investigating the history of reggae through the lens of indentured servants from India, he discusses artists using two genres—reggae and hip-hop—in such a way that strips the original intention of the music of all value.-- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | CanadaFollow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Do visiting inter-dimensional spirits and stowaway UFO passengers use the LAX Airport to touch down among us? Well they do if they're in town for the Conscious Life Expo, conveniently located at the LAX Airport Hilton for those who rely on otherwise mundane modes of travel.The Valentine's Day weekend crystals and angel cards fest of disjointed spirituality meets dodgy science just celebrated its 21st year as the premiere gathering point for awakened seekers choosing to come out of sovereign superposition and manifest in space-time reality.But, as visiting Vice News correspondent Anna Merlan tells us, it turns out the organizers have grappled for years with how to reconcile the tensions between obvious charlatans and those who really, truly can talk to the dead, psychics who can diagnose your dog's mystery ailments, and those making artificial claims about all-natural elixirs, prophets of light and love, and QAnon promoting anti-vax conspiritualists.This year's solution? Tuck the most radicalized New Age hate-preachers away in the Rabbit Hole Room, and charge top-dollar for the red-pilled faithful to swoon at their feet.Show NotesThrive review by Eric JohnsonCOVID-19 misinformation contributed to 2800 Canadian deaths, report suggestsFault Lines Report: Canadian Council for Academics-- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | CanadaFollow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How does it feel to grow up in a back-to-the-land house that vibrates with the anxious passion of conspiracy theories? What would happen when the world began to disconfirm the conspiratorial lore? How would you maintain your relationships, nurture the good, and gently let go of everything else?Maggie joins Matthew for this Listener Story to explore these questions in relation to her journey from childhood to today. Note: my question about conspirituality being an ethnicity was inspired by a conversation with listener Lilium Rajan, a writer who I hope to learn more from.-- -- --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

Is Canada trying to euthanize the mentally ill?Self-professed "theocratic fascist" Matt Walsh says so. So does the OG anti-woke agitator, James Lindsay. Both cravenly distort Canada's proposed expansion of its Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD) laws to include people suffering from mental illness.But are they entirely wrong? From the left, Jeremy Appel writes in Jacobin:I’ve come to realize that euthanasia in Canada represents the cynical endgame of social provisioning within the brutal logic of late-stage capitalism — we’ll starve you of the funding you need to live a dignified life, demand you pay back pandemic aid you applied for in good faith, and if you don’t like it, well, why don’t you just kill yourself?Psychologist and ethics professor Dr. Taslim Alanii-Verjee joins Matthew to discuss the ethical labyrinth of MAiD expansion, and how the altruistic quest for patient autonomy and dignity can run afoul of the neoliberal state's failure to provide the necessaries.Show NotesDr. Taslim Alani-VerjeeFederal government moves to delay MAID for people suffering solely from mental illness | CBC NewsThe Problems With Canada’s Medical Assistance in Dying PolicySpecial Joint Committee on MAiD - Dr. Sonu Gaind-- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | CanadaFollow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hot yoga tycoon and sex offender Bikram Choudhury was set to teach his sweaty pseudoscience in Vancouver starting on February 20th. But a team of yoga allies, led by a woman who has sued Choudhury for rape, said "Fuck off."So that's that.Or is it? We have many questions.Why was this cursed event planned in the first place? Who on earth is continuing to support this clown, and trying to make money off of him? Who would cover themselves in sweaty shit in order to prop up this Simpsons-level caricature of a yoga megalomaniac? And how did Bikram Yoga become the de facto exercise method and spiritual practice of "Freedom Convoy" supporters?Matthew takes a sweaty tour through a land of pseudoscience and rape culture, hot yogis and truckers, anti-vaxxers and frog-lickers to find out.Big thank you to Colin Hall of Bodhi Tree Yoga for stopping by!Show NotesCanadian yoga competition stretches into Edmonton | CBC NewsControversial Bikram yoga founder's planned Vancouver workshops raising flagsJill Lawler's 1st-person accountPetition · Stop Predator Bikram Choudhury from hosting Yoga Seminar in Vancouver · Change.orgWoman speaking out against Bikram Yoga event gets disturbing pushback from organizerBikram yoga event no longer planned for Vancouver hotelBikram Yoga Creator Loses It When Asked About Sexual Assault Allegations | HuffPost WomenSponsor: https://www.gardomlakeyoga.ca/WATCH: Justin Trudeau cross-examined by Convoy lawyer-- -- --Support us on PatreonPre-order Conspirituality: How New Age Conspiracy Theories Became a Health Threat: America | CanadaFollow us on Instagram | Twitter: Derek | Matthew | JulianOriginal music by EarthRise SoundSystem Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Twitter Files are the grift that keeps on giving. This week, Derek and Julian look at Alex Berenson's recent appearance on Russell Brand's Rumble channel to talk about the conspiracies that only exists in their heads—and the misinformation they share along the way. Show NotesThe Pandemic’s Wrongest ManRussell Brand: Elites Are Using Liberal Ideas to Justify InequalityHow anti-vaxxers monetize misinformationURGENT: A federal database offers more evidence the mRNA Covid jabs may have serious cardiovascular risksFor red and blue America, a glaring divide in COVID-19 death rates persists 2 years laterScathing evaluation of Sweden's COVID response reveals 'failures' to control the virusLarge, real-world study finds COVID-19 vaccination more effective than natural immunity in protecting against all causes of death, hospitalization and emergency department visits-- -- --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