Dismantling New Age cults, wellness grifters, and conspiracy-mad yogis. At best, the conspirituality movement attacks public health efforts in times of crisis. ...
Bonus Sample: Manners, the Machine, and Malaparte’s Technique de Coup d’État
What do we worry more about: the far-right beliefs of trolls, or the coding skills of the trolls?
The split focus on Marco Elez and Elon Musk—are they Nazis, or hackers, or Nazi hackers?— highlight two prongs of emergent fascism. The ideological/aesthetic/psychological on one side, and the technocratic on the other. We can call them the manners and the machine.
First, Matthew unpacks a century-old thesis by an OG fascist that says totalitarian regimes take shape when both are working together, but that ultimately, the coup d’etat is about seizing control of the machine.
Then he rounds off with a rant about how easy it is liberal-centrist discourse about manners to distract from the reality of the machine. Why? It’s because in the absence of a clear analysis of how capital and power work—it’s in the sphere of manners—that liberals feel they have a fighting chance. But it’s also exactly where Musk and Elez and Vance and Trump can ignore them.
Show Notes
A Doomed Democracy | STANFORD magazine
The October Revolution - Introduction | Marx Memorial Library
Alexander Kerensky Dies Here at 89 - The New York Times
Curzio Malaparte | Italian Author, Journalist & Politician | Britannica
Reading the Eccentric Italian Writer Who Tried to Cover Up His Fascism ‹ Literary Hub
Curzio Malaparte: The Illusion of the Fascist Revolution
The Californian Ideology
The Californian Ideology Personified - Truthdig
Cyberlibertarianism: The Right-Wing Politics of Digital Technology on JSTOR
175: Diagonalism (w/William Callison and Quinn Slobodian) — Conspirituality
Opinion | Don’t Believe Him - The New York Times
Welcome to Neokayfabe — Abraham Josephine Riesman // Writer
40 Ways to Fight Fascists: Street-Legal Tactics for Community Activists — Spencer Sunshine
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6:05
Brief: Antifascist Woodshed
Education / Public service alert:
Matthew critically reviews six books that define fascist eras and recount how they have been opposed. A kind of “here we are, now what?” episode that hopefully interrupts the doomscroll with the sobriety of some practical considerations.
Timothy Snyder, On Tyranny (2017)
Robert Paxton, Anatomy of Fascism (2004)
Paul Mason, How to Fight Fascism (2018)
Mark Bray, Antifa: The Antifascist Handbook (2017)
Curzio Malaparte: Technique de Coup d’Etat (1931)
Spencer Sunshine: 40 Ways to Fight Fascists: Street-Legal Tactics for Community Activists (2021)
Formats range from popular nonfiction to academic history to pragmatic field guide. Politics range from liberal to anarchist. More feminist and non-white sources to be reviewed soon.
Show Notes
On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder
Timothy Snyder’s Bad History | City Journal
Robert O. Paxton - The Anatomy of Fascism
Is It Fascism? A Leading Historian Changes His Mind. - The New York Times
How to Stop Fascism
Antifa: The Anti-Fascist Handbook
Curzio Malaparte - The Technique Of Revolution
40 Ways to Fight Fascists: Street-Legal Tactics for Community Activists — Spencer Sunshine
Joyful Militancy | The Anarchist Library
Let This Radicalize You | HaymarketBooks.org
Being Numerous: Essays on Non-Fascist Life — Natasha Lennard
DISCOURSE ON COLONIALISM Aime Cesaire Translated by Joan Pinkham
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35:05
245: Raw Dogging Wellness [feat Mallory DeMille]
Raw Milk. Raw Water. Raw Meat.
Mallory DeMille returns to break down the raw trend in wellness. We look at the science and cultural implications behind it.
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58:32
Relief Project #8: Blair Hodges
The eighth installment of Matthew’s Five Big Questions Posed to an Extremely Thoughtful Person.
Friend of the pod Blair Hodges joins Matthew to talk about how he’s transformed the teachings of his Mormon upbringing into inspiration for social justice, how he grapples with the limits of the nuclear family as he thinks about community building, and why James Baldwin is so important to him.
Blair has degrees in journalism, religious studies, and disability studies from the University of Utah and Georgetown University. He’s currently working on a research project on the history of intellectual disabilities in Mormon thought.
Show Notes
Relationscapes—with Blair Hodges
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26:39
Bonus Sample: Scientology’s Sci-Fi Religion
“You don’t get rich writing science fiction. If you want to get rich, start a religion.” With those words, prolific sci-fi pulp fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard prophesied the course of his life’s work.
The 1950s saw the emergence of UFO- and alien channeling-based spiritual groups, as postmodern religious syncretism transformed supposedly ancient angels and demons into benevolent and/or terrifying aliens. No iteration of this fantasy has been more financially fruitful, culturally impactful, controversial, or bizarre than Hubbard’s brainchild: Scientology.
In the latest episode of Roots of Conspirituality, Julian digs into the fascinating backstory of this prolific author, revered as prophetic by thousands, pursued as a fraud by the IRS for decades, described as a cult leader by church escapees, and called an abusive madman by his ex-wives. Allegedly…
The religion is a complex blend of self-help psychology, elaborate pseudoscience, high-demand paranoia, and alien mythology that, at its height, commanded 100,000 members—and is still valued at roughly $2 billion.
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Dismantling New Age cults, wellness grifters, and conspiracy-mad yogis. At best, the conspirituality movement attacks public health efforts in times of crisis. At worst, it fronts and recruits for the fever-dream of QAnon. As the alt-right and New Age horseshoe toward each other in a blur of disinformation, clear discourse, and good intentions get smothered. Charismatic influencers exploit their followers by co-opting conspiracy theories on a spectrum of intensity ranging from vaccines to child trafficking. In the process, spiritual beliefs that have nurtured creativity and meaning are transforming into memes of a quickly-globalizing paranoia. Conspirituality Podcast attempts to bring understanding to this landscape. A journalist, a cult researcher, and a philosophical skeptic discuss the stories, cognitive dissonances, and cultic dynamics tearing through the yoga, wellness, and new spirituality worlds. Mainstream outlets have noticed the problem. We crowd-source, research, analyze, and dream answers to it.
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