Conspirituality

Bonus Sample: Rational Emotions & Poetic Science

08 Nov 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Are emotions really separate from rationality? Is trusting science similar to religious faith? Do poetry and mythic archetypes disclose a reality beyo...

76: A Field Guide to White Supremacy (w/Kathleen Belew)

04 Nov 2021

Contributed by Lukas

There is no avoiding the fact that conspirituality plays out against a backdrop of racially-charged politics and the echoes of colonialism. And from t...

Bonus Sample: My Religious Attitude Toward Science

01 Nov 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Okay, maybe the title is overstated. But, as Matthew explores in this bonus episode: what are the contours of social comfort and habitus — supported...

75: How to Talk to a Science Denier (w/Lee McIntyre)

28 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

What happens when a philosopher of science shows up at a flat earth conference to test out his theories about changing people's minds? This story cata...

Bonus Sample: Charisma & Extroversion

25 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

It's been over a century since Dale Carnegie began teaching the importance of extroversion, bringing with it a cultural shift that champions an aggres...

74: Elena Brower Could Stop Selling doTERRA

21 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

What happens when MLM sales and neoliberal life coaching collide with a yoga charisma that oozes with pseudofeminism? Where do we even begin? Exploita...

Bonus Sample: Radical Denial

18 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

With a new variant of QAnon circulating through white evangelical churches, protests against masks and vaccines are becoming more aggressive around th...

73: Eating Disorders in Yogaland (w/Jason Nagata & Chelsea Roff)

14 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Meat is toxic. Dairy is toxic. Eggs? As dangerous as cigarettes. Garlic stokes the hormones. Avoid nightshades at all costs. Organic or bust. Eat acco...

Bonus Sample: Talking to Children About Conspirituality

11 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

An audio essay loosely based on conversations Matthew has while parenting. Content is possibly appropriate for ages 7 to 11 — although who really kn...

72: John of Fraud (w/Lisa Braun Dubbels and Mirna Wabi-Sabi)

08 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Whatever one’s conception of “God” is, “John of God” should now be a nauseating name. For decades, João Teixeira de Faria pretended to heal...

Bonus Sample: Flow States & Humility

04 Oct 2021

Contributed by Lukas

During Thursday’s episode, Derek briefly described Flow States in the context of a universal form of spirituality. He explores that concept in a lit...

71: So Do We Believe in Anything at All?

30 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

We’re grounding down. We’re letting go. We are going deep. We are finding the metta in our meta and tuning in to Source. This week we’ll either ...

Bonus Sample: Reality Bites: The Tragedy of Magical Thinking

27 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Julian traces the roots of today’s pandemic-era conspirituality back to What The Bleep’s quantum woo, The Secret’s privileged denial and grandio...

70: Conspiracy Theories Conceal a Burning World (w/Daniel Sherrell)

23 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Daniel Sherrell is the author of an extraordinary memoir and prayer book, Warmth: Coming of Age at the End of Our World, in which he recounts how, as ...

Bonus Sample: Spirit Island No Garbage

20 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

On his family’s yearly trip to Manitoulin Island, Matthew detoxes from conspirituality influencer garbage, and returns with parts of a new plan.Show...

69: Fascism Down Under!!! (w/Dr. Izzy Smith)

16 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

This week, California Governor Gavin Newsom rode sane pandemic messaging to victory against the Republican-led recall election by a huge margin. Unsur...

Bonus Sample: Mikki Willis Rewrites History

13 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In June, Planedemic creator Mikki Willis appeared on Living 4D with Paul Chek to discuss what “really happened” at the Capitol on Jan 6. During th...

68: The Jordan Peterson of Fitness Bros (w/Antonio Valladares)

10 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Paul Chek will tell you how much he’s influenced the fitness industry. He’ll tell you that he popularized Swiss Balls, and about his time working ...

Bonus Sample: Hollow Men: The QAnon Roadshow Flop

06 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

A QAnon-themed Stop The Steal, anti-vax, Covid-denial roadshow came to an untimely end in mid-August with their fearless leader succumbing to COVID pn...

67: The Promise & Peril of Psychedelics

03 Sep 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Psychedelics are all the rage in the investment world, with hundreds of millions of dollars pouring into research-based startups in the hope of findin...

Bonus Sample: I Don’t Know Who My Friends Are

30 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

After watching the Almost 30 podcast hosts bond over Zach Bush’s Jesus-like qualities, Matthew explores the barren friendship landscape of wellness ...

66: Spirituality & Status (w/Will Storr)

26 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Spirituality, ill-defined a term that it is, often implies both an emptying out and an addition. What leaves is the vacuous clinging to achievements t...

Bonus Sample: The Question of Consciousness

23 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

One of the most debated topics in spirituality (and beyond) involves the origins of consciousness. Most neuroscientists agree that it’s emergent—t...

65: Long-Haul QAnon (w/Rachel Bernstein & Jitarth Jadeja)

20 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Santa Barbara surf coach Matthew Coleman murdered his two young children in Mexico nearly two weeks ago. He told the FBI that he was “enlightened by...

Bonus Sample: Strongman Heroes, Barefoot Science, & Fake Victims

16 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Conspiritualists amp up their victimhood-fetish by comparing anti-vaxxers to Jim Crow-era African Americans and Jews under the Holocaust. Meanwhile, T...

64: Remembering Guru Jagat: a Panel

12 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

With guests: Philip Deslippe, Jules Hartley, Janja Lalich, and Stacie StukinWe’ve convened an expert panel this week to remember and discuss Katie G...

Bonus Sample: Wellness Pornography as Abuse

09 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

This past week, Matthew defined “Wellness Pornography”, working from the ideas of C. Thi Nguyen and Bekka Williams in their essay “Moral Outrage...

63: Yoga and the Jab (w/Colin Hall & Sarah Garden)

06 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

The YogaVaxGate Instagram post turns out to have been a bellwether for the $88B industry packed with science skeptics and spiritual bypassers. When Wo...

Bonus Sample: Vaccines Are Not the Holocaust

02 Aug 2021

Contributed by Lukas

A recent uptick in Holocaust-related memes around the COVID vaccine is fueling further anti-Semitic thought and behavior. Derek investigates a crop of...

62: Manifesting Something Awful (w/Dale Beran)

30 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

The genius parade continues this week with co-host Dale Beran, author of It Came from Something Awful: How a Toxic Troll Army Accidentally Memed Donal...

Bonus Sample: Digital Delusions: How conspiracy-fueled political religions like QAnon hijack our brains

26 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

QAnon emerged out of a perfect storm of evolving technology, social psychology, and global crisis. But it exploited pre-existing neural architecture a...

61: From Anti-Feminism to Anti-Vax (w/Dr. Annie Kelly)

23 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

It takes patience, empathy, and a steady hand to paint a detailed landscape of the politics and culture that connect anti-feminism to ethnonationalism...

Bonus Sample: Dear Raw Meat Guy

19 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

A closer look at the content and constellations of Josh Rainer Goldstein, who livestreams himself eating raw meat.Presented in three parts: An analys...

60: Crypto Dreamin’ (w/David Morris)

15 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Are you crypto-curious? This past year has shown that an increasing number of people are dreaming of becoming crypto millionaires. But what is blockch...

Bonus Sample: The Future of Psychedelics

12 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Derek investigates a recent NY Times essay by Michael Pollan as an entry point to discuss big questions in psychedelics and conspirituality: How do we...

59: Is Rudolf Steiner Dead Yet? (w/Jennifer Sapio)

08 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

What should a global network of popular and private schools do when faced with evidence that the foundation of their pedagogy was laid by a racist, pr...

Bonus Sample: True Colors

05 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Julian reflects on unchosen racial complicity and how moments of moral courage in the face of oppressive power can reveal one’s true colors. He trac...

58: NXIVM: Recover & Educate (w/India Oxenberg)

01 Jul 2021

Contributed by Lukas

How do we avoid being the subject of—and feeding the market for—trauma porn? If anyone knows, it’s India Oxenberg, who in less than two years (w...

Bonus Sample: A Conspiracy Theory of Everything

28 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Matthew debriefs after the Mike Rothschild interview, looking at QAnon’s “Conspiracy Theory of Everything” as a hyperobject and spiritual dilemm...

57: The Storm is Mutating (w/Mike Rothschild)

24 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

It’s only been eight months since Q stopped posting, but Mike Rothschild has been able to corral the firehose of data into the first major journalis...

Bonus Sample: Playing Shaman

21 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

The race to capitalize on the world’s wellness needs in a post-pandemic society—well, at “post” as we can pretend to be—was unavoidable. Der...

56: Critical Race Theory in Real Life (w/Dax-Devlon Ross)

17 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In June 2020, equity consultant and journalist Dax-Devlon Ross—who you might remember from Conspirituality 4 that very same month—published an ess...

Bonus Sample: Doomsday Prophecy & Spirituality Porn

14 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Humanity has an apocalypse fetish. But wrapped up In the doomsday death wish is a utopian fantasy of the ascension that comes after a fallen and sinfu...

55: Games Against Humanity (w/C. Thi Nguyen)

11 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

This episode is co-hosted by Dr. C. Thi Nguyen, a philosopher who teaches at the University of Utah. His breakthrough book is about agency in games, i...

Bonus Sample: What Will Yoga Do to Our Children?

07 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

News from Alabama: after a 23-year ban on yoga in schools, generated by a Republican moral panic, Governor Kay Ivey signs a bill that lets kids do yog...

54: Māori MAGA (w/Joe Trinder and Anke Richter)

03 Jun 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Matthew sits down, across 9,000 miles of mostly ocean, with journalist Anke Richter and reporter and Māori rights activist Joe Trinder to discuss the...

Bonus Sample: How Many Monuments Must Fall?

31 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Derek looks back at three important historical figures with unsavory pasts to ask the question: who gets to decide who gets canceled, and why?Show Not...

53: Learning Cultish (w/Amanda Montell)

27 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

We’re extremely pleased that someone who isn’t a Boomer  — and is younger than us — is making a serious but accessible contribution to this g...

Bonus Sample: Loaded Language & Productive Discussion

24 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Julian and Matthew discuss words, world views, and how productive disagreement can lead to mutual understanding. In today’s overheated discourse, so...

52: The Clerical Class of the Right (w/Alex Ebert)

20 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

This week we learned that Melinda Gates was disturbed by Bill’s men’s-club relationship with Jeffrey Epstein all the way back in 2011. And for fuc...

Bonus Sample: No Moral Outrage Porn, No Punching Down

17 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Matthew had a plan for this week — a 4K word essay on what could be learned from studying the content of an outrageously offensive conspiritualist…...

51: You Can’t Force It (w/Devendra Banhart)

13 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

As our access to vaccines eases the pandemic in the Global North, U.S.-based conspiritualists keep riding the wave of covid-denial influence—all the...

Bonus Sample: On the Anxiety of Death

10 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Derek discusses a forthcoming interview with Alex Ebert, which will be featured on Conspirituality 52. They discuss the dearth of death rituals in Ame...

50. Sellouts & Zealots (w/Sheena Sood)

06 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

When the drones hum over the improvised cremation grounds of Delhi, what will the conspiritualist see in the livestream—if they even look? Will thei...

Bonus Sample: The God-Man & His Enabler: How Ken Wilber Got Adi Da All Wrong

03 May 2021

Contributed by Lukas

By the 1990s, the sadistic cult leader who claimed to be God on Earth had already fled the United States to avoid a stack of lawsuits and potential cr...

49: Tik Tok Fulfillment Center (w/Abbie Richards)

29 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

On the road to the screen, a rich story can flatten into propaganda. On the road to the influencer economy, a complex teaching can degrade into a cons...

Bonus Sample: Post-Cult Shame

26 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Survivor shame over what has been lost, and how one has been complicit. Apologist shame: turned inside out and externalized as aggression. Popular s...

48: Traumatic Influence (w/Kyra Haglund & Hala Khouri)

23 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Teal Swan’s suicide-teasing trauma pseudo-therapy has cast a spell over millions. Kaia Ra is an up-and-coming contender, selling divine jewelry and ...

Bonus Sample: Vanillaroma

19 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

We don’t get “well” until everyone has an opportunity to tap into the resources needed to live. This week, Derek reads a 2006 essay from one of ...

47: Is An Ethical Cult Possible? (w/Jamie Wheal)

15 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

How do we tease apart the gold from the dross? What can be salvaged from a subculture marred by charismatic con-artistry, power abuses, and the toxic ...

Bonus Sample: Gaia & The Map to Nowhere

12 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

With over a half-million paying subscribers, Gaia is the world’s largest spiritual media streaming service. Have they have played a role in redpilli...

46: Back to the Vax (w/Lydia Greene & Heather Simpson)

08 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Our EP10 guest, Center for Countering Digital Hate founder, Imran Ahmed, has been bringing the heat. His “Disinformation Dozen” white paper made a...

Bonus Sample: Pray & Work

05 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Matthew offers a meditation on Brandolini’s Law — “the amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than to produc...

45: Theatre of the Transferred

01 Apr 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Conspiritualists hide their grifts in mantras. MLMs market themselves as communities, while cults preach freedom. When a research firm spotlights Saye...

Bonus Sample: The Role of Intuition

29 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Social psychologists and evolutionary psychologists have been studying the origins, neural networks, and role of intuition for decades. Wellness influ...

44: Netflix & Pill

26 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

It was inevitable: QAnon has stormed HBO. Less inevitably, Conspirituality Podcast has been invited to an academic conference Down Under. In this epis...

Bonus Sample: This is NOT Just a Drug!

22 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Julian recounts the wild and touching journey of four close friends in a self-directed spiritual group therapy session—super high on Ecstasy.Content...

43: How to Redpill a Yoga Podcaster

19 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Back in December, a certified anesthesiologist named Dr. Madhava Setty posted a long critique of our podcast to the New Age website Collective Evoluti...

Bonus Sample: “CIS White Man” Means So Many Things

15 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

This episode follows up on earlier discussions on the podcast about how we manage privilege. Our exploration of cancel culture — specifically that p...

42: Deradicalizing From Digital Hate (w/Caolan Robertson)

11 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Imagine that you’re 25 years old. You grew up Irish, gay, and online. When the Orlando Pulse massacre explodes, you go to YouTube for the news. You ...

Bonus Sample: Cats and the Meaning of Life

08 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Humans will never be cats. In his new book, Feline Philosophy: Cats and the Meaning of Life, the philosopher John Gray argues that we can learn a lot ...

41: Snark Tank

05 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Two episodes in our catalog haunt this podcast. In episode 6, Steve Hassan advised listeners to treat people under the undue influence of QAnon and co...

Bonus Sample: Stranded On The Lifeboat: Escaping The Large Group Awareness Cult

01 Mar 2021

Contributed by Lukas

One-hundred-and-twenty seekers filled the LA hotel ballroom. We sought the life-changing experience that could only happen by holding in our pee, bein...

40: White Supremacy: Grift and Gravity (w/Michelle Cassandra Johnson & Daniel Lombroso)

25 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Around 2015, the alt-right movement erupted online to both provoke and monetize MAGA momentum and distort and defame the real-world progress symbolize...

Bonus Sample: Anti-Masker at the Skating Trail

22 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

One of the precious bright spots for our family in this long dark winter of COVID has been outdoor skating. Other than the walking trails, it’s the ...

39: How to Talk about Conspiracy Theories (w/Anna Merlan)

18 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

What are we learning about conspiracies, conspiracy theories, and those who hold them? How are we maintaining our optimism that facts are real, that t...

Bonus Sample: How to Debate on Social Media

15 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

The medium of social media is both relatively new and socially challenging. But this doesn’t mean we can’t have healthy debates. In this sample fr...

38: Natural Hopes, Natural Fallacies (w/Drs Juniper Martin & Adriana Berusch)

11 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Many of us came to yoga and wellness spaces to heal or flee from the alienation of modernity. We wanted something untouched by our cities and factorie...

Bonus Sample: The Devil & The Arrow of Time

08 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

In this sample of our weekly Patreon bonus episode, Julian travels back in time to the 80s. He finds that when it comes to the fear of diabolical evil...

37: Guru Jagat Cultjacks Kundalini Yoga (w/Philip Deslippe & Stacie Stukin)

04 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Today we forge ahead with part 2 of Matthew’s interview with Kundalini Yoga scholar Philip Deslippe and journalist Stacie Stukin on the tragic past,...

Bonus Sample: Michael Roach Meditates COVID Away

01 Feb 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Episodes 36 & 37 cover how Guru Jagat (Katie Griggs) and her Venice Beach RAMA Institute have pivoted in the COVID era to a new area of focus: anti-lo...

36: Guru Jagat’s Pandemic Brandwash (w/Philip Deslippe & Stacie Stukin)

29 Jan 2021

Contributed by Lukas

What happens when a charismatic yogalebrity rises to prominence in LA’s fashion and wellness scene, gets exposed as an inheritor of a notorious cult...

Hearing Voices, Seeing Colors, & Fighting Phantoms

26 Jan 2021

Contributed by Lukas

We decided to release this Monday patron bonus episode publicly after receiving a great response on Patreon. Julian draws heavily on the work of neuro...

35: Séance Science (w/Susannah Crockford)

22 Jan 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Joe Biden was inaugurated as the 46th President of the United States yesterday, proving the long-awaited QAnon prophecy false. It’s the perfect time...

34: Insurrectionist Influencers (w/RP Eddy)

15 Jan 2021

Contributed by Lukas

It’s been eight days since the Capitol was ransacked by a mob of MAGA supporters, Proud Boys, ex-military with tactical gear, and Nazis wearing disg...

33: Manipulating the Hero’s Journey

08 Jan 2021

Contributed by Lukas

Christiane Northrup addresses her followers as “angel warriors.” JP Sears counsels his supplement customers to never “outsource their own truth....

32: Both Sides Pt 2: Healing & Sense-making in the New Year (w/Charles Eisenstein)

31 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

A rough tally of our labor from the inception of this podcast in May puts us at over 1,100 hours of treading water in the content sea of JP Sears, Mik...

31: Bro Science: Anti-Vaxxers (w/Jonathan Berman)

24 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

As two coronavirus vaccines roll out we’re being flooded with more disinformation than ever. Wellness gurus are cashing in on home-made “natural”...

Bonus: Solstice Light in the Man Cave

22 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

This episode dropped for our Patreon supporters on the darkest day of the year. We’re unlocking it as a holiday gift to all of our listeners.In this...

30: Are There Really Two Sides? (w/Charles Eisenstein)

17 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Who gets to take up space in critical times? How do we orient ourselves toward expertise? In a culture dominated by “experts” on social media, do ...

29: Bro Science (w/Dr. Dan Wilson)

11 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Here’s an episode that’s been micro-brewing for a while: Bro Science: where conspirituality meets the manosphere. We’ve even got a working defin...

28: Resurrection of Jordan Peterson (w/Jeff Brown)

04 Dec 2020

Contributed by Lukas

This week we inaugurate “The Conspirituality Ticker,” a weekly bullet-point rundown on the ongoing pandemic of influencers who spread medical misi...

Bonus: Yoga Teachers Are Not Doctors, Doctors Are Not Priests

30 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Do famous people become famous for staying in their lane? Do some find fame by carving out a lane that never existed before? What is the disruptive pr...

27: Finding Meaning (and Laughs) in Crisis (w/Alex Auder)

26 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Though we’re all staying put this holiday season, we continue to super-spread our conspirituality vibes. This week we’re fielding listener questio...

Bonus: Diversity Has Always Mattered

23 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Diversity has lost some of its strength as a term in our bifurcated world, and yet in nature diversity has always mattered. Our apprehension of using ...

26: Return of the Repressed, Or The Drugs Paula White is Not On (w/Brian Muraresku)

20 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Trump’s personal pastor Paula White seizes the podium to speak in tongues and prophesize that angels from Africa will certify her master’s elector...

Bonus: Digital Soldiers, Purity Tests, & Word Magic

16 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

As more of the world has gained access to mobile internet, populism, and the perception (rightly or wrongly) of government, corruption has steadily in...

25: Waking Up from Cancel Culture (w/Clementine Morrigan & Jay from F*cking Cancelled)

13 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

On Election night, Mikki Willis, JP Sears, Del Bigtree, and the conspirituality glitterati gathered in Austin for a prayer meeting for Donald Trump. W...

Bonus: Sh*tposting and The Embodiment Conference

09 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

Mark Walsh, the proprietor of The Embodiment Conference, was recently challenged by cultural somaticist Tada Hozumi in an Open Letter, penned by Hozum...

24: Body Politic Recovery (w/Tada Hozumi)

06 Nov 2020

Contributed by Lukas

This week could have been worse; what comes now must get better. If we’ve learned anything over these six months, it’s that QAnon is to conspiritu...