46: Back to the Vax (w/Lydia Greene & Heather Simpson)
Our EP10 guest, Center for Countering Digital Hate founder, Imran Ahmed, has been bringing the heat. His “Disinformation Dozen” white paper made a huge splash, prompting a conference call with Nancy Pelosi’s team ahead of their biannual grilling of Zuckerberg and Dorsey. Ahmed’s paper spotlights the fact that 65% of anti-vax content originates from just 12 social media figures. Conspirituality superstars Sayer Ji, Kelly Brogan, and Christiane Northrup hold positions 8, 9, and 10. Ahmed wants them deplatformed—and he’s making it happen. In response, the Dozen are raising money and having themselves caricatured as superheroes.Who have they been deceiving and emotionally abusing? This week Matthew interviews Heather Simpson and Lydia Greene from Back to the Vax, an anti-disinformation think-tank they founded after fleeing the online cult of anti-vax propaganda. In their first interview together, Simpson and Greene recount how mother-centered anti-vax social media spaces drew them in and exposed them to all manner of anxious conspiracism—and what it cost them to leave. They’ve got a very clear message about how public health communications can meet this entrenched challenge.In the Ticker, Julian tracks the Dozen’s emerging strategy, Derek finally addresses the English elephant in the room, Russell Brand, and Matthew takes an early look at the big reveal of Cullen Hoback’s Q: Into the Storm on HBO.Show NotesWhat “Causes” Covid? The Virus or The System?Decoding the Gurus: Russell Brand: Spiritual Transcendence and Anarchic Revolution is PraxisMike Rothschild on Hoback’s Q: Into the StormEpisode 136: Into The Storm feat Cullen Hoback by QAnon AnonymousI’m Cullen Hoback, the guy who made that QAnon series on HBO Max. AMA! : televisionRothschild on the HBO reveal: Ron Watkins QAnon: The Truth Has Always Been ThereBack to the VaxLydia on NPR: She Resisted Getting Her Kids The Usual Vaccines. Then The Pandemic HitHeather on CNN: Why this former anti-vaxx influencer is getting the Covid vaccine
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And on Clubhouse, where I host a weekly Clubhouse where we discuss every week's episode and other things.
There are great conversations.
I did take last week off for the Easter holiday, but we will be back in full force, and hopefully Julian will join again as usual this Sunday.
Yeah, it's a lot of fun.
Conspiratuality46, back to the backs.
Our episode 10 guest, Center for Countering Digital Hate founder Imran Ahmed, has been bringing the heat.
His disinformation-dozen white paper made a huge splash, prompting a conference call with Nancy Pelosi's team ahead of their biannual grilling of Zuckerberg and Dorsey.
Ahmed's paper spotlights the fact that 65% of Antivax content originates from just 12 social media figures.
Conspiratuality superstars Sayer G, Kelly Brogan, and Christiane Northrup hold positions 8, 9, and 10.
Ahmed wants them deplatformed and he's making it happen.
In response, the Dozen are raising money and having themselves caricatured as superheroes.
Who have they been deceiving and emotionally abusing?
This week, Matthew interviews Heather Simpson and Lydia Green from Back to the Vax, an anti-disinformation think tank they founded after fleeing the online cult of anti-vax propaganda.
In their first interview together, Simpson and Green recount how mother-centered anti-vax social media spaces drew them in and exposed them to all manner of anxious conspiracism and what it cost them to leave.
They've got a very clear message about how public health communications can meet this entrenched challenge.
In the ticker, I'll be tracking the Dirty Dozens' emerging strategy.
Derek finally addresses the English elephant in the room, Russell Brand, and Matthew takes an early look at the big reveal of Cullen Hoback's cue into the storm on HBO.
This is the Conspirituality Ticker, a weekly bullet point rundown on the ongoing pandemic of messianic influencers who spread medical misinformation and sell disaster spirituality.
Well, the Disinformation Dozen, identified by the Center for Countering Digital Hate as responsible for the bulk of online vaccine propaganda, is now wearing their notoriety as a shared badge of honor.
Here's Dr. Christiane Northrup talking about how they've responded to the CCDH report that names them.
The Disinformation Dozen has all gotten together.
And so what's so great is, just like with you and me, right?
We have found each other, and I've known about many of the people in the Disinformation Dozen for years, but never talked with them.
So we had a Zoom meeting.
So yeah, they've joined forces for something called Hashtag Truth Week, of course, without any trace of irony.
And they very quickly spun up a graphic that features them all gathered together as Marvel-style superheroes, complete with the outfits and They were more DC.
They don't have the chops to do Marvel.
Well, actually, I mean, it's kind of like it was a cartooning app or an avatar generator.
It was pretty cheap and quite friendly.
I really wonder about the street credibility they're going to gain from those images.
We'll put them into the show notes, of course.
You can let us know.
Yeah, it's something.
Whatever we end up deciding it looks like.
It raises this thorny question, though, about their efforts being potentially fueled by giving them such public outlaw status.
They've taken on this moniker of the disinformation dozen with some pride.
I still buy the argument that if, as is gradually happening, the identification leads to them being deplatformed, it's worth the risk.
What's happened?
Overnight, my Instagram reach was cut by half and I just found out that Ty and Charlene Bollinger just lost their Instagram account, The Truth About Cancer.
I also heard from one of my friends in Minnesota that I think Sherry Tenpenny has had her website Hacked or removed or something.
And so at any moment, I could be disappearing.
We can only hope.
But for now, they're still leveraging their combined social media audiences, what's left of them.
It's a great effect.
They've got this new campaign that, as Northrop says, seeks to flip the script.
We'll also be tracking the developing story that she hints at right here.
And it turns out that this is a wonderful opportunity for us to flip the script a bit.
In talking with Sasha Stone this morning and Robert David Steele, we were talking about the incredible upcoming tour that they're having through the United States.
They're going to be at Mount Rushmore July 4th.
They'll be coming to Bangor, Maine, somewhere in there, but Sasha would like to use this disinformation dozen as an opportunity to really flip the script.
So stay tuned, as long as I still have a channel, which apparently I do at the moment.
We got to get Conspiratuality co-host Stephen King up in Bangor to cover that for us.
I'd love to get his take on it.
We also need merch for sale at those concession stands.
Well, yeah, we could table.
Exactly.
At the Conspiratualist Roadshow.
You know, but the thing is, like, I wonder if Sasha is going to bring his, like, death metal band to Bangor and maybe Christiana is going to put them all up in her country house.
Oh, they are not death metal.
Well, whatever.
They are.
They are pop metal.
OK, pop metal.
All right.
Power pop.
Well, this is the thing.
It's it's it's power pop.
But with the Iron Maiden aesthetic from the from the mid 80s.
Right.
Is she going to take care of their dietary needs?
Is it going to be like, are the church ladies going to come over and deliver the sandwiches?
I'm sure they're going to get reiki before each performance.
Yeah, I mean the realities of what these people stand for in terms of being anti-vax, COVID deniers, terrorist sympathizers, I really do find myself wondering if some variation of the band name Grateful Dead might be appropriate.
Although it is very much like, I did a bonus episode on this, that Number of the Beast era Iron Maiden kind of artwork, you know, where everything is about Satanism and You take the bullets for us, I'll say that.
the strings from behind the scenes.
Now, Robert David Steele and Sasha Stone are doing this tour to support a series of four films that they've been producing, the first of which is already out, and it's called The Cult of Lucifer.
I have yet to enjoy it, but I will report back when I do.
You take the bullets for us, I'll say that.
You watch more content than anyone on this podcast, and you have a stronger stomach than I.
Spoiler alert.
Spoiler alert.
My my bonus this week for my bonus this week, I'm reviewing a lot of material on Gaia dot com.
Did you pay for the subscription?
I'm doing the seven day trial.
I want to just point out, I think Northrop used the phrase, we could be disappearing at any moment, and it just really highlights to me how essential these social platforms are, not only to the messages that these folks generate, but also it would seem to It would seem that the platforms are essential to their identities as people in the world as well.
And the kind of shoehorning that's taken place when somebody who could have published in medical journals or worked in research hospitals suddenly only really has a microphone into Facebook.
Yes, if she's deplatformed from Facebook and Instagram and so on, she's going to disappear because she's retired from regular medical service, but also she's not going to get published anywhere in the real world.
They definitely are scared right now.
I mean, it's their downline, it's all of their income, a lot of it at least, is probably coming through these channels.
It's everything.
And two things came to mind.
First off, you know, this This constant call that it's censorship when it has nothing to do with a government, they're private businesses and they're going against the policies that they signed up for.
People don't read when they click, I accept.
And so they're going against that and now they're claiming censorship.
So it's obvious they were going to make that pivot.
But looking at the website, which looks like it was spun up in 1998, which a lot of these people just have no aesthetic, and I think that's an important thing because it's rushed.
Because I looked at the week that they were doing this week, whatever the information, disinformation week, whatever it was called.
And first off, half of the links were broken.
Wow.
And then you go to Wednesday and the whole idea was every day we're going to give you some information about vaccines and medical freedom.
And Wednesday, it was just, give us money.
It was just links to their PayPals or to their organizations.
And it was just a blatant fundraiser drive because they know they're trying to get as much as they can.
It's like the whole, what's going on with Trump and the recurring donations right now.
It's just like, we are going to drain you while we have you because we're not going to have your attention pretty soon.
Yeah.
And we've been terribly victimized.
So please give us money to make us feel better and make sure that we don't disappear.
I think Northrop is in a somewhat unique position compared to others like, say, or Jane Kelly Brogan or even Sasha Stone, because they have very built out websites and sort of revenue streams where I feel like she has a fairly basic website I mean, she does have her presence in the world through Hay House, if they're still carrying her.
They are.
But she really she really invested in the Great Awakening video series.
And she and the thing about it is, is that she really interacts with the community that has sprung up around the Great Awakening video series through all the gifts they send her and all of the letters that she reads, you know, as part of her video so that she goes back and forth between unwrapping the essential oils and reading the lovely as part of her video so that she goes back and forth between unwrapping the essential oils and And then like these horrific, scary kind of conspiracy memes, right?
Well, and all of that content lives on Facebook and it lives on YouTube.
And so it's not being turned back around into some sort of capital asset that she can take with her.
That's right.
So you're right.
I mean, she is pretty, she is more vulnerable in terms of this kind of boomer naivety with regard to who owns her content.
Exactly.
Yeah.
But at the same time, she comes from money.
She's well set up.
She made her money in the New Age, kind of like Louise Hay boom time.
And so maybe that's not such a concern for her.
Yeah, which is probably why social media hasn't had that monetized loop with her other sort of forms of e-commerce.
I wanted to mention too, I keep forgetting to say this, in looking at her stuff last week, I went to her Twitter And I noticed that something like, you know, seven out of her 10 most recent tweets were about abundance and about a workshop she's doing with regard to how spirituality can help you to become wealthy.
And I was like, Oh, wow.
Okay.
That's always been there.
That's always, I think she's been doing that for the last, for a couple of decades at least.
Okay.
Okay.
I hadn't looked at her Twitter and I didn't see that on her other channels.
It was really interesting.
This is something I'm going to get into in my segment in a little bit on Russell Brand, but it's just how long are we going to keep falling for this recycling of content?
Like now I'm 45 coming up 46 now and after seeing it for a few decades, Now at this point, it's like, when are people going to realize that your thoughts do not create abundance?
And all of these things that they're just, they're constantly recycled.
And I have to say, you know, and I really appreciate how many things that listeners share with us in our DMs just to be like, hey, check this out, check this out.
And every day, there's just more of them.
Yeah.
With all these followers, and I'm like, how desperate are people to basically just not do a lot of work and get rich quick with your ideas?
And how long are people going to be susceptible and gullible to fall for these pivots that people keep doing?
It is kind of viral in the sense that the, you know, the ideas that are central to the secret or something like that seem to embed themselves within a particular population and then somehow five, ten years later you get a DM in your Instagram account and there's a link to an influencer who has 10,000 followers and they're quoting out of the secret.
Totally.
And everybody, everybody in the comments is like, Yeah, right on.
This is so revolutionary.
And it gives me this sense that the influencer has social capital to the extent that they have their particular wedge of a kind of isolated audience that might be related to their other goods and services.
And that audience wasn't exposed to the secret bullshit before.
Yeah, it's new to them.
It's new to them, and so the various memes work on the principle of novelty, and that can work within fragmented influencer landscapes where there might be crossover between audiences, but there also might not be.
And also, what's the longevity of anybody's secret grift, right?
Like, you know, if somebody picks up the secret ten years after it's published and starts pushing it out to their following, to their followers, For what, six months is it going to work?
Are they going to move on to something else?
So there's also, it's not just recycling, Derek.
It's like, um, you know, the, the, the folks are magpies, right?
And so the, the, there can be 20 bad ideas out there, but as long as you keep them moving, uh, you know, maybe the followers won't, maybe your retention rate won't suffer too badly when they, when people realize that you're repeating shit.
I know Julian brought up James Arthur Ray recently.
So yesterday I was like, where is he?
And I went to his website and it's, he's still going.
He's doing it again after getting out of jail, after getting out of jail for three people dying as a result of him applying the law of attraction.
In a completely self-serving, narcissistic way.
But to a sweat lodge.
Back to the disinformation dozen.
This week, it's hashtag truth week along with hashtag disinformation dozen because they have co-opted that as a hashtag for themselves as well as another hashtag more than 12.
And so they're really trying to build a groundswell of people.
And so far, I saw that it was actually garnering quite a bit less support than I thought it would, even though.
Each of the hashtags had more than a hundred posts, which typically is not a big hashtag, was how it was referenced on Instagram.
But then, there's this.
Why would we have, at a basketball game, a section for vaccinated and unvaccinated?
What I believe that is telling the public Is that there's the unvaccinated people over there are dirty and they are disease carriers and they are infectors of others and literally vectors of death.
They are to be avoided.
And I just wonder why, you know, does nobody look back in history and say, like, I'm equating this vaccine passport with a yellow star, saying this person is a yellow star.
And that started with saying that they were diseased and that they were lesser than.
And we seem to be Going back to something that we saw, you know, what was that 80 plus years ago or 80 years ago?
Having grown up in South Africa, this enrages me.
Like I have to, I had to breathe very deeply while listening to that because to hear these, these three white guys talking about the kind of situation we're in right now and comparing it to apartheid, which is, which is what the name of the caption of the video was calling this medical apartheid, which actually is the name of something that RFK has put out.
I woke up to a text from a good friend who we talk like almost daily actually on this chain and it was sharing Russell Brand's newest clip which you had mentioned about vaccine passports and he is, we'll say vax hesitant, not fully anti-vax but definitely on the hesitant tip.
It really got me thinking about this overall, and that's why I posted earlier on Instagram this long tweet thread that I wrote, because you need vaccines to enter so many countries in the world for decades.
Like, I can't go to Nigeria or Senegal without a vaccine.
If I want to travel to certain parts of India, I need a vaccine.
I got five shots before I traveled to India.
And never before have I heard an outrage about a vaccine passport.
And as I referenced, are you against the passport idea?
Or is it just purely the vaccine idea?
And if so, why haven't you been an activist before about all these other countries?
It's because this is the first time you are involved in any capacity.
And that just speaks again to this individualist mindset of the conspiritualists, where they talk about the collective a lot, but they don't give a shit about the collective.
They never look beyond their own little community and where they're monetizing to understand that these sorts of things have been happening.
They've paid no attention to public health.
They've only criticized a system that they don't understand has nuance.
And it is really frustrating.
And yeah, when I did watch that clip on the feed before you even played it here, Julian, and I can only imagine the apartheid reference being compared as you having have lived through it.
I mean, now the phrase vaccine passport does seem to be novel.
I can't recall hearing it before, you know, before the last few months.
So, and what's the origin of it?
What's the genesis of it?
I don't know where the origin is.
I mean, and it actually isn't.
It's not anything specific.
Like for me to go anywhere in the world, I need a passport.
Right.
And now it's just if I, again, if I, I almost went to Senegal for a conference once and I was getting ready to get my yellow fever shots and I would just have to show proof that I had the shot.
It's not like one thing is also being referenced in terms of potentially going to shows and entering certain places of business in the coming months.
Well, that's what they're talking about with regard to the basketball game.
So is that an active proposal somewhere?
That if an arena is going to host fully attended events now, that there's a proposal for different sections?
Is that, I mean, is that a thing?
Is that happening somewhere?
I only know of the consideration of entrance to certain places.
Them mentioning that, I'm not saying it's not true because I just don't know where they came across that, but I haven't seen that.
Yeah, I mean, I have a sense that there's a conversation about how to effectively manage gradually opening up different types of business, different types of travel, and that certain people are saying, hey, it would be good if we maybe had a way of seeing who was vaccinated and who wasn't, so as to do this more safely.
And then these kinds of conspiratorial folks are latching onto it as further evidence of a creeping tyranny and infringement on civil liberties.
And certainly, you know, a segregated basketball stadium would be something to grasp onto.
You can imagine sort of these water fountains for vaccinated people and those water fountains for non-vaccinated people.
It's not a good look.
The idea doesn't make sense, though, because if it's an aerosolized disease, it's not like having different sections in an arena full of 20,000 people is going to protect anybody.
The 20,000 who aren't vaccinated are going to breathe all over the 20,000 who are, or the vaccinated folks who are carriers, or who happen to be asymptomatically carrying.
The idea doesn't make sense.
Well, let me just say this too.
The metaphor is completely ridiculous too.
And he uses the word literally, and he means what he says, but that's what screws up the metaphor.
Saying that people actually are potentially vectors of disease because of an actual virus is 100% different than imputing some sort of essential dirtiness to a particular race or ethnic group.
Yeah, that was what got me the most because that has been used over and over again historically and problematically and this is not that.
They talk about history and they're trying to pull out historical instances to reference.
We have plenty of historical references of what happens when viruses ravage a population Why not point those out and then talk about the means by which we got through those viruses, but that's not what they're doing.
They don't actually want to reference actual data in any of these arguments.
Well, they do want to displace or reframe the shame of their views into this perception that they're being seen as dirty somehow.
Because we're talking about people who, because of their ideas about sovereignty or about the perfection of their immune systems, they're not going to submit to vaccination, and that's what will make them essentially and that's what will make them essentially dirty or bad people.
And I guess they have to do something with that shame and creating the scenario, the fantasy in which they are dismayed.
described as being you know the kind of filthy others uh really fits the bill i guess but that's not what the issue is the issue would be you know if if you haven't had this treatment you know this science shows that you might be communicable and so uh this is what we're going to do about it this is not persecution no you're not a sinner um But it's interesting because it does feel like these people are framing the...
The sense that they have a fundamental disagreement with reality as though they're being accused of sinning.
Well, in another development that's related, Children's Defense Fund, which is RFK Junior's organization, has a new documentary called Medical Racism, The New Apartheid.
And what they're doing for the amount that I was able to sit through is taking Gates and Fauci, trying to ensure that minorities and people at the greatest risk get vaccine access, and then flips that script into some kind of guinea pig narrative, right?
That poor people and people in India and people in Africa are being experimented upon instead of that, you know, there's a philanthropic medical attempt to save lives.
Here's RFK Jr.
underneath the film.
It says, together we can work towards ending racism in medicine as well as targeting people of color in medical experimentation.
So the co-opting and then attempting to frame this as some kind of progressive cause is just mind-blowing.
It only works because of abstraction.
It only works, I think, because he's talking about the Global South.
He's talking about places that people don't have social or actual access to.
Because the facts are that, you know, if we take the example of my home province of Ontario, The highest rate of vaccination uptake in the population, according to the rollout, the way the government has planned it, is in white affluent neighborhoods.
And it's the essential workers, it's the Uber drivers, it's the Amazon warehouse workers, it's Every basically everybody who is brown and black and in labor positions here in Toronto and greater Toronto and the rest of Ontario who are lagging way behind in terms of their access to vaccines.
And so it's actually the opposite.
Yeah.
I mean, we've known this from the beginning, that the COVID hits in disproportionate ways.
But if you were going to flip that around, you couldn't flip it around because it's actually the people who are dying in larger numbers are the ones who are not having access to vaccine here where I live.
You couldn't say that They were being experimented on, except in ways that epidemiologists could predict, which is if you don't vaccinate vulnerable populations, they're going to be hurt.
Yeah, I mean, two things.
One is that this kind of propaganda ends up hurting the very people that you're claiming you're trying to save and ends up perpetuating actual underlying racist problems that mean that those people are dying disproportionately and suffering disproportionately.
And the other thing is when you talk about how trials are run and how vaccines are developed, they're developed all over the world to try and get access to as broad a gene pool as possible to make sure that they work on people other than white college students in London, for example.
- Oh, stop with the science. - Okay, here's a spoiler alert.
I'm going to talk a little bit about the main reveal in the riveting HBO documentary by Cullen Hoback.
It's called Q Into the Storm.
I haven't watched yet.
I haven't finished, Matthew.
What are you doing?
You're spoiling it.
Well, you can go into the next room.
If you want to feel it unroll for yourself, you might want to bump forward a few minutes here.
So here's the spoiler.
Hoback shows rather than tells that from about January of 2018 onwards, during Q's most prolific growth and impact as an online fever dream, that Q was not only under the poster, Q was not only under the control of Ron and Jim Watkins, but
He also gets Ron Watkins to essentially slip up and disclose on Skype or FaceTime or whatever they're using that he was posting as Q. Now, he gives himself away.
It's about 99% a sure thing.
We're gonna put the spoiler clip into the show notes.
It doesn't Proof he didn't have collaborators, but the major pieces of the puzzle are coming together.
And what Hoback was able to show is that the original board owner, the QAnon board owner on 4chan, where Q ostensibly started posting in 2017, but probably as a collective of individuals, That owner knew that the poster had changed when they abandoned 4chan for 8chan, which belonged to the Watkins.
And then also, the language and diction changed during that shift between 4chan and 8chan from something that was, you know, aphoristic and pseudo-predictive to language that was clearly responding to daily events, or at least trying to reflect upon daily events.
Also, when 8chan was taken down after the shooters at El Paso and Dayton posted their manifestos, Q didn't post for the three months until the Watkins rebranded and then relaunched as 8kun, and when they did, Wouldn't you know it, Q was the first to be able to post, because it was likely the site admin who is Ron.
And then, Ron's Twitter posts after the election sounded a shit ton like Q. And it's kind of extraordinary that a documentary is able to trace this in an orderly fashion.
There's a lot of information.
It's presented very, very clearly.
But it's in discussing Ron's Twitter posts that Hoback gets him to say, quote, I've spent the past almost 10 years every day doing this kind of research anonymously.
Now I'm doing it publicly.
That's the only difference.
It was basically three years of intelligence training, teaching normies how to do intelligence work.
It was basically what I was doing anonymously, but before, never as Q. And through the sort of slip there, implying that this anonymous three years of work was intelligence training, and then comparing that to his overt work, or his posting under his own name on Twitter, he kind of gives the game away.
And then there's this point where he smiles and grins and the director and Ron, Hoback and Ron, know basically that it's been slipped.
And the fact that it's Ron Watkins is not that surprising.
It's a kind of Occam's razor proof.
As Mike Rothschild tweeted, he's a journalist who's covered QAnon for years now and his big book is due out in October.
He says, the lesson for me is that sometimes the most obvious answer to an obscure riddle is also the true one.
Ron Watkins being Q was always staring us in the face.
We just had to want to see it.
What's surprising to me and really an incredible tribute to the power of good journalism is how Hoback did it.
Now, everything I said two weeks ago, I feel vindicated about because Hoback's process is just fantastic.
And you can see it play out in the last two episodes.
He has incredible patience.
Yes.
Three years of intense embedding.
By the time he has that final conversation with Ron Watkins, he probably has hundreds of hours of film with him.
And, you know, as many people have pointed out, before this documentary, there were hardly still pictures, photographs of Ron Watkins available online.
This is a very private person.
And somehow Hoback earned his trust through a very long process and got him to a place where, you know, there's hundreds of journalists contacting Ron for an interview.
And he wanted to talk with Hoback.
More than that, he wanted to share the quote unquote brilliance and nerve of what he was doing with the QAnon story.
Ron almost couldn't resist telling him, and Hoback let him choke on his hubris.
So, we're going to dedicate an episode to this documentary and to the aftermath.
We're trying to book a really good guest for that.
And we'll do that in a few weeks, but I think what's most pertinent to the conspirituality beat is that now that Q is pretty much sunlit and bleached out, I think we can really turn our attention to how it caught fire.
Not amongst those who have already been thrown under the social respectability bus, you know, the stormers and the Qtubers.
But, you know, amongst the mainstream influencers and their markets, you know, on the podcast, we are never really dealing with anonymous actors.
We're dealing with deceivers.
Deceivers who are totally open and brazen, and the complexity of their networks remains lucrative.
The Watkins are unmasked now, and as Hoback says in a number of interviews, sunlight really does disinfect.
When you can see the Wizard of Oz behind the curtain, who's going to believe in the next thing that he does?
When you see a magic trick performed, and you see how it works, how are you going to be fooled again?
And I really think, you know, the Watkins are done.
But, you know, as we know, the disinformation dozen will keep making bank.
And also, we're going to have to dig more into Ron's meditation and martial arts background.
Well, right there.
I think you nailed it.
And let me start off by saying that a couple weeks ago, I am very glad that I was wrong, that it has unfolded this way.
I'm three in, but watching how you guys have been handling this in Slack all week, I'm like, wow, I'm really happy that it came together so well.
So I can't wait to finish it this weekend.
That being said, what you said about earning the trust and the hubris, because there's that Moment in episode three where he, where Ron, uh, the Auckland shooting had just happened and he talks about like, everyone's contacting me, but I only want to talk to you.
And then there's this montage right around that where, you know, he's, he carries a sledgehammer up to the top of a mountain.
Right.
And Hoback has this drone over him, and I'm like, wow, yeah, he really exploited his hubris.
He's like, here's this kid who's supposedly been practicing martial arts since he was two years old, and I'm gonna film him, and I'm gonna get him up on a mountaintop doing martial arts, and really show him the power of the media and what he can be, and then he slips up.
It's such a great story.
You know, and I think just to You know, go back into my early worries about the focus.
You know, is it really that important to unmask Q?
I'm really sold on the power of what Hoback has done.
No documentary can do everything.
He's not going to be able to, you know, it wouldn't have been appropriate for it to have been 10 hours long and to follow a bunch of QAnon survivors.
You know, the work on the documentary that somebody does on the QAnon Casualties Reddit is a different subject, really, and it's going to require a different kind of expertise.
And I just want to quote something from his AMA that he did the other day on Reddit.
He says that, I was blown away by that handful of critics suggesting that who Q is no longer matters.
Meanwhile, I know of journalists at most major outlets still on the case.
In fact, quote, it doesn't matter who Q is, quote, is a QAnon talking point, actually.
But I found deep down all QAnons wanted to know the truth.
I love this.
Like, he's spent three years with people who are at the sort of upper echelons of this conspiracy theory, and he says all QAnons wanted to actually know the truth.
That's a very hopeful statement to me.
Unfortunately, it seems audiences are getting the series, so whatever fears certain critics projected, they appear to be misguided.
Some of the reaction, I love this, reminds me of Harry Potter, where people accepted that you simply don't say Voldemort's name, but saying Voldemort's name takes power away.
I disagree with the worldview that we need to protect audiences from so-called dangerous ideas or people.
As we've seen, the antiseptic of sunlight isn't all that flattering.
Is there any research, I know it's early because the series just finished, but on the number of disaffected QAnon believers?
I know there was the pivot where last week people were like, there is no QAnon, there's Q and then there's Anons.
And I'm guessing that was sort of an emotional reaction to finding out this information.
I think that actually that's a quote from a Q drop that was issued sometime in 2020 when whoever was posting a Q, probably Ron, was actually trying to make that distinction and was trying to face within the movement this branding problem that they were increasingly encountering.
But yeah, no, I think that time will tell, and certainly Colin Hoback's DMs are going to be overflowing with people who are sending in their thanks and saying, you know, the spell has been broken.
I think that it was an incredible final episode and I agree with everything you've been saying.
I also have a little place in my mind that goes, maybe this was, in terms of the making of the documentary, maybe this was Ron's plan all along to either be found out or to reveal himself at some point because then he basically has a six-part documentary that has this maybe this was Ron's plan all along to either be found out or to reveal himself at some point because then he basically has a six-part documentary that has this footage of him on the mountaintop with the sledgehammer and punching the post and all of this stuff and sitting there, you know, looking at the camera with
I mean, what a poison chalice though because how long is he going to last out in the wild?
Mm-hmm.
How many lives has he ruined?
How many people, how many Americans with military training and the wherewithal to purchase firearms in Japan?
Are there who are going to hunt him down on that mountaintop?
I mean, the rage that people must feel towards this person, which is why, you know, I think he was really dancing on the edge with regard to this potential payoff.
You know, do I let this person in on my grift?
Do I tell them my secret?
Or will I only be the one who can enjoy my magnificence?
It's also fascinating watching the difference between how his father lies and how he, he has much more of that martial arts training.
I mean, you actually see it where he stops before he answers everything, turns it over in his mind and then replies very calmly.
Exactly.
Whereas, whereas Jim is just like, just straight out lies, like has no problem, which is more psychopathic behavior.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I feel like Ron's ticks.
Definitely seem to increase after each time he tells a lie, though.
Right.
Well, let me let me ask you this, though, a little bit of speculation.
But so now we know that the origins of QAnon, where the money were, come from the first porn site ever in Japan.
Right.
That's where they got their start.
So pornography and the Pokemon porn sites is where they initially got their funding.
So you can look back to that.
We have, you know, around the president who's obviously been accused of rape or molestation numerous times.
Now you have the president's biggest, the former president, thankfully, his biggest supporter, now accused of child sex trafficking with a 17-year-old.
At what point do these people who get caught up in these conspiracy theories, do they actually say, oh, there is an actual problem with sexual assault and trafficking.
Why don't I now look in the right places where it actually is?
Well, that's the question of the mirror, isn't it?
Because what is QAnon really for the normies and the boomers who picked it up, but an incredible offloading of cultural shame and projection?
Well, it goes to a whole argument you made about the satanic panic when we covered that on the podcast at one point, right?
That as long as it can be other people's children over there somewhere in some evil, very gothic, you know, bizarre kind of fantasy, then we don't have to face the reality that all around us there is, you know, these sorts of things are happening with people we know and it's not about some kind of... People we voted for.
Yeah, exactly.
You know, one thing I have to say about finishing the last episode is that I watched it early on Monday morning because I woke up, you know, Monday morning to the Twitter feed going mad over the revelations and I actually couldn't really work for the rest of the day.
I was kind of, I was stunned by Yes, so sunlight is an antiseptic, but what were we actually shown?
the, yes, so sunlight is an antiseptic, but what were we actually shown?
We were shown that a very small group of people and one in particular had the power, the technology and the, you know, the personality and, you know, the fascinations and the fetishes you know, the fascinations and the fetishes to wreak an incredible amount of havoc.
I mean, to have it, to have the content and the data of the QAnon fever dream and social movement pinned down to one laptop in Japan
And one guy who's constantly watching pornography, you know, on a screen across from him as he's typing Q-drops and then kind of wandering around trying out his martial arts skills on posts and whatever while going to bathhouses whenever he goes to Tokyo and kind of having this completely Disregulated, isolated life.
It's just kind of stunning to know that all of so many things that have captivated so many people came out of one person's body and the contact between their fingers and the keys.
There was just something uncanny about that, that I'm still wrapping my hands around because in a way it was almost more comforting To think, oh, we'll never know who it is.
It was networked.
It was almost like to actually not have the answer gave me the comfort of an unsolved conspiracy, actually.
Right?
Where I was able to say, well, you know, there are so many forces involved, and we'll never know, and that's just the way things go, and doesn't it make sense in late capitalism?
And then, you know, Hoback pulls back the curtain, and I'm like, oh, well, also, yeah, there are individuals who do individual things, and they have incredible impact.
It's almost like a conflict between a modernist view of the world, where there are great figures and great personalities and they write great books, and a postmodern view of the world, which I have been pretty much ensconced in, which really kind of places personal agency or the actions of individuals to the side and really looks at systems and networks instead.
I'm reading a book called The Evolution of Beauty right now, which looks at Darwin's descent instead of origins.
Origins is pretty established science, but people have always pushed back on descent because it talks about the fact that it's not just Adaptation is why we evolve.
It's also beauty.
And when it is beauty, when we are attracted to things that are beautiful, it is a feminine property, whereas the adaptation is a masculine property.
So it's a fascinating book.
But when I look at incel culture with the Proud Boys and how they are only allowed to masturbate once a month in the company of a woman, compared to Ron who goes to Soapland to get it off, And he's very blatant about his pornography uses.
He doesn't try to push it down, but he has the doll.
That's his only connection.
But all of these things funnel around sex trafficking.
And I can't help but think in some way, all of these things are occurring over and over just because men cannot deal with sexuality.
They can't deal with the lack of power that they have with their own sexuality when it's compared to the feminine, and that is what they are taking their aggression out on.
Again, Occam's razor, it sounds very simple, but when you look at the development of the species and all these pieces coming together around this fever dream, as you've often called it, Matthew, there is an element of that just disgust of the body or the feminine body to the point that the men don't know there is an element of that just disgust of the body or the feminine body And so this is what happens.
They take it out on everyone else.
There's a piece that's related here too that has to do with, I was just thinking of, Of Iran as kind of, you know, king of the trolls, right?
That troll culture and everything that comes out of the boards in this way, there's such a nihilism about it.
If incel culture is rejecting of romance and healthy sex and the possibility of having meaningful relationships and so much of political trolling and pornographic trolling and
Everything about it is seeking to undermine anything that is beautiful or true or matters about being human from this place, this very grotesque place, and also seeking notoriety through being grotesque in that way.
And that's how I see the Watkins.
Well, Hoback's, I think, final lines in the narration is, you know, a man in a green hat reaching for infamy.
A cynic.
Yeah, a cynic.
A cynic who treats the whole world as a game.
It really makes me want to understand Chan culture a little bit better to, you know, go back and read and reread Dale Barron's book.
I feel like, you know, as a 50 year old white guy in growing up in Canada, but then I moved all over.
It's like I missed that whole sort of experience or part of the world that so many men, white men of my age, of our age, grew up in.
It didn't touch me.
And so I feel like there's this whole culture that was parallel to mine that was also homosexual.
social and, but I didn't know anything about it.
And yet it has had such an impact on my world.
It has, you know, exploded into, you know, what, what, what we study on this podcast and, and, and what Hoback studied in his documentary.
Yeah, I agree.
I missed out on all of that too.
And I want to, I want to second what you said a little bit ago and you're kind of echoing it right now, which is that, that particular little world and this particular little man, what Hoback does is shows how from Pizzagate to the storming of the Capitol, you have this immense real world impact and everything in between, right? you have this immense real world impact and everything in That, that you, the, the, the, the different, the different murders and, and little terrorist attacks that happened or tried to happen along the way.
I had this really weird thought after watching this series, which is, I'm really glad I was recruited into brick and mortar pre-digital cults because, Because there was something about, I mean, I suppose I could have gotten out in 2003 and started becoming an internet troll.
But like, that wasn't really how my culture pointed me.
I was still firmly a pre-digital person, I think, and I didn't really have the, you know, I didn't grow up with video games, I didn't have the sort of access to the technology that I think a lot of these guys did, and so my life really kind of took place in almost an anachronistic way in relation to the people who now are wreaking havoc on the world.
So I kind of wanted to understand them.
Like, I think they are men like I am in some ways, but they grew up in a parallel universe.
And I want to know what that is because obviously it's fucked so many things up.
You know, my father was a computer programmer starting in the 1960s.
I did not know that.
I grew up with with computers my entire life.
I just played sports.
I just preferred sports than computers.
Wow.
So you could have.
So you could have.
Yeah.
You could have.
Oh, holy shit, Derek.
That's amazing.
Has that like blown your mind yet?
Yeah.
I mean, I moved to San Francisco in 1997 to do journalism.
And I was I was just really frustrated that everything was going toward this thing called the Internet.
So I moved back to the East Coast to be a print journalist.
That's a really interesting thing about all of us then.
There's something modernist about us that held back from falling off the deep end into internet land.
You know, falling off the deep end into internet land when it was, when it was, when it was, I mean, people talk about, oh yeah, you know, back in the late nineties, I was on the boards and I'm like, what the fuck was that?
What are you talking about?
I had email, maybe, on a dial-up in rural Vermont, and I hated using the internet because it was so slow and hokey and I didn't know anybody.
What was a board?
Maybe we were dating and playing sports and doing yoga and having a social life.
Yeah, we should stop complaining about the fucking yoga, right?
I should stop complaining about the yoga, right?
I've always seen the online world as a wonderful tool for facilitating things that can happen in the real world.
And I think this subculture only has the online world for the most part.
And this is their incursion into the real world, which is why it was so thrilling for them.
Over the past year, I've often wanted to discuss Russell Brand.
And we did, briefly, during the Kundalini episodes.
Brand has always been a play both sides kind of guy, yet as with many conspiritualists, he's hovered dangerously close to conspiracy land.
Unlike J.P.
Sears, the other comedian in this world, who did go all in, Brand shrugs it off with a, I'm just a comedian, what do I know?
Before, in order to skirt taking responsibility for his often asinine hot takes.
Which brings us to a recent Instagram video called, what causes, in quotes, COVID, the virus or the system?
He starts with the usual, I'm only here for the jokes, before imploring you to take his podcast guest, a real-life scientist, seriously.
But what drew my eye to this post in particular was that scientist in question, who was Northeastern psychology professor Lisa Feldman Barrett.
And I love Barrett's first book, which is called How Emotions Are Made, The Secret Life of the Brain.
And I had her on my Earthrise podcast back in 2017.
Great, actually one of my favorite podcasts that I did during that stretch.
And she has a new book out called Seven and a Half Lessons About the Brain.
I'm guessing the brand appearance is part of the press rush for that book.
As she says in this clip, this new essay collection of hers is, in part, an attempt to simplify points from her previous book.
So it appears that she's going all in on popular science, and nothing wrong with that.
The Memories, Dreams, Reflections remains Carl Jung's most famous book due to its accessibility, and if you don't know the backstory about that, you should look into it.
But it's really important to speak clearly about science, so I appreciate that.
And to be even clearer, nothing Barrett says in this clip is wrong.
In some ways, it's both obvious and benign.
Her sentiment toes a line I've often seen in the conspiritualist world.
Disease is not only dependent on the virus, but also lifestyle factors.
So we find ourselves in the midst of this entire germ theory versus terrain theory There's a lot of controversy that people like Zach Bush have been championing, which is really ridiculous.
Germs cause disease, but your environment plays a primary role.
It's never one or the other, and honestly, I can't believe this is even a debate.
But what frustrated me about this brand clip is that Barrett plays right into Russell's I'm just asking questions narrative.
So, to frame it, she cites a study in her book that was in a chapter called Emotion and Illness.
In the book, she writes, quote, "...the diverse set of symptoms that you collectively call a cold involves not just your body but also your mind.
For example, if you are an introverted or negative-minded person, you are more likely to develop a cold from a noseful of germs." End quote.
And in the interview, she discusses another factor determinative of whether or not you get sick—poverty.
And there are others from this particular set of research, like lack of sleep is a good one, but let's focus on what she tells Russell.
People from depressed economic conditions are more likely to get sick when a virus is placed in their noses than people who are financially stable.
As Bayreuth says, the virus is a necessary part of getting sick, just not the only factor.
Framing this specifically around COVID while on Russell Brand's podcast was destined to end in disaster.
For the past 13 months, we've been inundated with conspiritualists claiming that no one is talking about the immune system when all of them are talking about the immune system.
And of course, trying to sell you supplements marketed to boost it.
I've worked in fitness for decades, as we've all worked in this world, and the immune system has been discussed forever.
What I think these influencers really mean, and what Brand himself brings up in this clip, is that doctors tend to treat most diseases with drugs sold by a pharmaceutical industry that has a stronghold on legislation in the healthcare industry, and in many ways they are right.
Yet they lack even the simplest desire to inject nuance into the discussion, which is why I was surprised that Barrett never pushes back against Brand.
Her work is extremely nuanced.
Now, as I've long argued, two things can be true.
Pharmaceutical companies can be greedy and dishonest, and the current crop of vaccines can be safe and effective.
The problem is you can't sell supplements, courses, and coaching sessions if the latter is true, so the conspiritualists obscure the data and only present what they want to.
What I want to drill down on here is Brand's response to Barrett.
The guys over at Decoding the Gurus did a wonderful job breaking down Russell's rhetorical style a few weeks ago, so I highly recommend checking that out.
Right after Barrett says poverty is a leading indicator of who gets sick, which has massive social and political implications, here's how Brand replies.
If it's not economically led, it's ideologically led, and in a sense that speaks to some of the points that I'm making.
It's more favourable to have a solution that facilitates big tech having more access to people's lives and more access to track and trace data.
Our systems favour a solution where big pharma gets to benefit and profit.
These are the systems that we're heading towards, and what are these systems based on?
Individualism.
You are a separate animal running on these systems.
What you can remember, what stimulus you... So what we need to divide is a kind of a scientifically underwritten myth that brings to the forefront collectivism, unity, togetherness, reverence and respect for individual forms of identity.
But unless these myths are told, unless these stories are told, Lisa, we're in grave danger of... well, we're on the precipice of Armageddon, but the coronavirus is just But one example of how something that's apparently an objective reality, like you said earlier, you know, all the coronavirus is seeking is a nice wet pair of lungs.
But whose wet lungs?
How many times?
How often?
Because otherwise, why is there a difference in what's happening in New Zealand or Taiwan or the US or the UK or Germany?
Culture, culture, culture, culture, culture.
So there's so many things.
No objective reality.
We create reality through our imagination.
Julian, translate.
Translate for us.
Go.
The main thing I want to ask you here is would you like Caesar or ranch dressing with that word salad?
Right, exactly.
So yes, not one thought about combating poverty nor the importance of legislation or economically diversified reparations in minority communities that would actually address poverty.
In fact, Brandt famously urged people not to vote years ago.
Now, nearly half a million people have watched this clip and are left with no indication that anything actually needs to be done.
They just listened to him rant.
Now, in 2017, we passed a sales tax increase here in Los Angeles to raise $100 million to combat homelessness.
And to date, I believe one Shelter has been constructed in these four years.
Bureaucracy is rampant in the city, but another problem the task force is continually met with is fierce opposition from locals whenever they try to build in a new neighborhood.
And the same thing happens in New York City, where the homeless are shuffled around from hotel to hotel.
Residents complain that there will be an increased theft, even though the data does not support that.
And this NIMBY, the not-in-my-backyard problem, perfectly mirrors the conspiritualist fantasy world.
I want to complain about the problems and put forward my vision of utopia as long as I don't have to actually get my hands dirty.
And of all the figures we've covered on this podcast, Russell Brand has just about the cleanest hands that I've seen.
And I know he's donated to addiction efforts, he's done good work, and he's previously put his money where his mouth is, so I want to be clear on that.
But when it comes to this past year of watching his clips, his play both sides, and his COVID fantasizing, he's doing way more harm than good.
I'm still, my heart rate is still up from listening to that clip, and I'm really stuck on his affect.
And I think that we haven't really covered somebody, but I think we'll probably have to do a full episode on him.
Somebody who has made this full leap from, you know, straight entertainment world into pseudo-intellectualism and conspirituality.
Is there anybody who compares to that?
Well, that's why I brought up J.P.
Sears, because being a comedian who... Because, I mean, Russell, even in his earlier days of comedy, he always had an intellectual edge.
That's been his thing.
I know there's the Katy Perry marriage and all that, but he was always trying to, like, think smarter in some ways.
He's always had an incredible vocabulary.
that he uses to convey some sense of intellectual penetration, right?
If I'm not mistaken, he's often in LA and he's a yoga person, so I just wanted to ask you both, have you ever been in a room with him?
No, he's a kundalini yoga guy.
Okay, so you wouldn't have gone to Guru Jagat's place one day and Golden Bridge or anything like that?
I'm just, I'm really wondering what it's actually like to be in a room with him because there's this level of constant shouty extroversion that is the hallmark of his media appearances and like this endless Pressurized speech and inflation that is just this brick wall for like, like, regardless of the fact that he's talking shit.
It's like, it's like, I don't know, a fire hose trained out of the out of the screen straight at my forehead.
And I don't know, it's like, can he stop that?
Can he turn that off?
I sort of wonder, that's why I'm asking, what would it be like to be in a room with him?
Well, I've been in a room with him, just not in a yoga room.
I think it was one of the Wanderlusts where he was talking.
And I will say, he's one of those people where there could be hundreds of people in the room, he commands the room.
He owns that.
So he very much has that authority to be able to step in front of that many people and have everyone sucked into what he's saying.
I've seen him on stage, I've seen him on stage in a very small theater when he was working on stuff for a potential TV show that he ended up doing a few episodes of, and I actually used to follow him years ago and quite liked him.
Liked his comedy, there was some spiritual stuff that I think he made good fun of, and I think I think I liked him better when he was acting out his addiction.
As happens with a lot of people who have serious addictions who are very talented, on the other side of that there can tend to be a need to throw all of that energy into something else.
And I think for him it's been Kundalini Yoga and conspiracy theories and a kind of pseudo-political activist's role that he feels like he's playing.
And he's transparent about that, right?
Because I think I've heard remarks about how, you know, this type of yoga is like grass and this type of yoga is like MDMA and this type of yoga is like heroin or something like that.
So there's a kind of a spiritual recovery playmaking in a way that is also part of his brand, I guess.
When I was on that text chat with my friend, as I mentioned about the vaccine passports, his newest video this morning, I brought up amplificatio, which is a Middle Ages style of writing and oratory skills, which La Mort d'Arthur was written in.
And it's a hypnotic trance style of poetry where the meaning of the words is no longer that relevant.
It's the rhythm that you get people into, and whenever I hear him, it's very much that.
There's such emotionality coming out of him that you get just entranced.
He's one of those people, like Zach Bush, where if we transcribed a full talk and then tried to actually link ideas together, you wouldn't be able to.
But because of the way he delivers it, you just get wrapped up.
And then he hits certain things like, big tech is coming for you.
Is the passport, are we going to be monitored everywhere we go?
All these things, those become sticky and that's what stays.
And so any sense of nuance is lost, especially when he's talking.
And again, I'm just kind of bummed because Lisa Feldman Barrett is great, but she definitely was a little, I don't know if it was starstruck or she just kind of let him go on with that.
And then she pivoted to a different subject right after that clip I played.
No, OK, we are.
Have you seen that happen before where, you know, a legit author is offered a large platform and at least in this field and really is just doing sort of, I don't know, content management from their perspective.
Like, as you said, you know, she she speaks she speaks to her topic well and she doesn't make any mistakes, but she's really on the wrong platform.
But what did the PR for the book put her up to?
Well, I don't know how that process happened.
I was just speculating on that.
But anytime an author has a book out and they appear on podcasts, that's usually what happens.
What upset me about it was she kind of interjected, and again, this is an 11-minute clip I'm pulling from.
I didn't listen to the full podcast.
But she took the impetus to go and inject COVID on a research that I read in her book and elsewhere on the common cold.
Yeah.
And that kind of got to me because I was like, why?
Knowing anything about brand and knowing the current climate we're in, why would you need to put forward that and make that comparison?
Again, her data is correct.
relationship to the cold.
And she was really, I was happy she mentioned poverty as a leading indicator, but the whole setup just felt off.
It was kind of like she was just trying to get a talking point in to get him going.
And that's why I wanted to cover and discuss it.
Now, it is plausible that she doesn't use social media, that she's been buried in writing this book, that she doesn't need to be in the landscape that we spend our entire lives in.
Okay.
All right.
So she, so yeah, I mean, I was going to say she, she, if she had listened to our podcast, maybe she wouldn't have taken a risk with COVID comments, right?
No, she's, No, I've stayed in touch with her since, not recently, but we've emailed and she's great.
And again, her book, I recommend her book highly, at least the first one.
I've never read the new one.
But this whole episode, and again, what I had to explain to my friends on this text chain this morning, with the COVID, with the vaccine passport, was like, he's not coming across as anti-vax.
And I was just like, guys, I've been watching his videos for a year since lockdown, longer than that, but specifically in terms of this podcast.
And he just dances around it constantly without fully going there.
And in some ways, it's more disingenuous and it's more troubling because he riles people up without ever actually committing.
At least the disinformation doesn't, we're like, fuck it, we're going to make cartoons of ourselves and go all in.
Well, I mean, this kind of comes back to the intersection and brand that we have between entertainment and pseudo-intellectualism.
I mean, he's grown up on stages trying to get laughs, and so what's the feedback or validation now for content production?
Is it a kind of shock?
He's not trying to make people laugh with his Armegeddon comments, but he is trying to make an impact.
And you said, Derek, that he has bodily authority when he's in the room, but I mean...
It's, it would be, I'd like to see that too.
I felt that Jordan Peterson had that when I saw him in a room of about 500 people.
But I also think the line between authority and a kind of like high level anxiety management that then gets absorbed by the audience and and also is kind of an open doorway into conspiratorial dot connecting.
Right.
Because everything in that word salad was highly charged and kind of jagged.
And you're right, Derek, that that the rhythm was much more important than the data.
But the data points that do get sort of thrown out and hang in space are offered in a way that the listener is meant to or encouraged to anxiously put things together into a scenario that is obviously full of doom.
And so there's this, he might not even believe in what he's saying.
He might, if you sat him down and gave him some chamomile tea, and slowed him down a little bit and you asked him a straight question and didn't let him go on, then he might disclose that he doesn't actually follow the lines of thought then he might disclose that he doesn't actually follow the lines of thought that he throws out He's very much rooted in anarchy.
I mean, he said that when he was offered the editorial position on that political magazine in the UK a number of years ago, and then it came out he didn't vote, for example.
So he blatantly admits he wants to see systems crumble, and that's fine, but he never offers anything to replace them.
And that's why I think, for example, even in this conversation with Barrett, Like she's pointing out, hey, who gets sick?
Poverty is a leading indicator.
Let's look at that data.
And he just blows by that to go on his big tech fever dream.
I keep going back to the word that you use a lot, but instead of actually addressing something, and that's what really gets me about these people with these platforms, is they have an opportunity.
Oh, poverty.
Well, what can we do to do that?
How can we solve that?
It's like everyone immune system shames.
But their only offering is like, well, you should have took better care of yourself.
It's your fault that you're fat without actually looking into the systemic conditions that create obesity in a country like America.
Yeah.
And if poverty is a factor, the answer is not, well, don't be poor then, right?
Be spiritual like me.
And have enough money so that you feel confident in your life and then your immune system will be stronger.
The interesting thing is that he actually turns on its head the anti-vax arguments that we hear from most of the people we cover, right?
They tend to talk about the problem with a tyrannical collectivism that is stopping them from being their sovereign independent selves.
And he flips that and says, no, this is all about a narrative about us being separate individuals, right?
Right, which my big thing is individualism versus collectivism.
So even in the way that he framed it was weird to me.
But yes, you're absolutely right on that.
Because he's very much coming from the left.
I mean, he's sort of your typical English lefty intellectual.
I don't know.
He's an entertainer.
I mean, Matthew, in terms of his vocabulary, his pretensions are towards an academic leftist English identity.
What he really is at his core is much more of an entertainer, desperate narcissist, you know, loudly just trying to get attention and laughs.
The jab.
Our weekly segment on the crucial COVID vaccine and the misinformation conspiritualists love to spread about it.
Every now and again, someone really well-meaning and sincere on social media will point out to me that if I really want to be effective at changing anyone's mind about vaccines, I should perhaps reconsider my word choice, my overall tone.
You know, be more respectful, more cautious, less stimulating of shame or defensiveness.
They're probably right to some extent.
When they point this out to me, I usually respond by saying I appreciate the input and that I'm always working on this delicate balance.
But this week, having just received the Johnson & Johnson vaccine myself with tearful gratitude, I might add, that had me profusely thanking anyone in a 300-foot radius right afterwards, just bowing and with my hand on my heart, I felt so grateful.
I want to read some of the appreciative messages we've been getting from people who were actually either anti-vax or vaccine hesitant but have changed their mind and gotten vaccinated because of our work, so they say.
Before I do that though, I also want to suggest that encouraging more tolerance of robust discussion in the wellness space might actually be a good antidote to the kind of fuzzy relativism that enables pseudoscience and conspiratorial thinking.
So I'm going to read these all anonymously.
Some people wanted us to use their names and some said, please stay anonymous.
So I'll just do it anonymously to keep it clean.
The first one, thanks, ConspiritualityPod, for saving me.
I was reflecting on how much I've changed in a year.
Last spring, I was still in New Age Woo beliefs.
My friend was sending me Lori Ladd videos.
And for years, I was slowly coming to the conclusion from health slash spiritual people that vaccines were definitely evil.
This week I got my first dose.
I'm so happy.
The podcast definitely saved me from almost teetering too far into potentially harmful beliefs.
My friend, on the other hand, I think we lost her to cue adjacent people.
We no longer speak.
So that's the first one.
Happy and sad.
Second one.
Hi guys, I'm going to have my vaccine shot tomorrow and I wanted to thank you for your podcast because I don't think I would be getting it if I hadn't listened to all the info you have given.
I was programmed to believe vaccines were poisoned 30 years ago while in a cult.
The fear remains even today, but I'm going for it anyway.
I'm sure you've helped a lot of people like me.
Yeah, I wonder how many former cult members will have that as part of their vaccine story, actually, right?
Yeah.
Another one.
I got to jump on here and also say thank you from the bottom of my heart.
The podcast was a lifesaver.
I may have been able to edit these so that it was less stroking our egos, but anyway.
I got my first dose this week as well, though at the beginning of this whole thing I was listening to Kelly Brogan and practicing Kundalini Yoga.
I was also completely lost on the hamster wheel of never-ending self-help and new age gimmicks trying to heal and become whole, never quite able to achieve the shiny spiritual ideals the influencers touted.
I feel like I finally have my feet on solid ground now and I'm more self-accepting and clear-headed than I've been in years.
Your podcast has really helped me.
So these are great.
And as someone in the comment section saying, since I was able to snap out of it, my husband and I got back on track, stayed married, have gotten pregnant, had a baby, and we get our first vaccines tomorrow.
Thank you for doing this life-changing work.
Finally, recognition.
We're not responsible for a baby.
That's for sure.
So all of these are very touching.
The last one I'll read really, really struck a personal note for me.
This is someone I've been friends with for quite some time.
We actually had a rupture over this topic early on in the pandemic.
And then after not having talked for like the last maybe four months, this is a private message I got.
I wanted to check in with you.
Even though it impacted me and was very unsettling and provocative, I've spent many months researching vaccines again for my kid.
I'm also dating an ER trauma nurse.
He's been so instrumental in not judging me and helping me work through my perspectives and how I came to my conclusions honestly due to the bubble of naturopathic doctors and holistic health people, all very smart and educated, that I was in.
Anyway, you're poking me had me begin to question my choices.
I've decided to start to get my 6 year old child vaccinated for the major ones and start to build my confidence.
So I have, she's almost sick, so I have a lot of catching up to do.
I feel more peace in my heart now and realize that maybe I did make a mistake before, even though I was doing my best.
I'm in touch with a great public health nurse and she's walking me gently through my fears and answering all my questions.
Thanks for opening the conversation with me.
It took a while to process, but it has led me here, which I feel is good and right.
And then this last one, as a mom, I never want to put my child in danger.
And I hope this is the right choice.
I was really happy to sit down with Heather Simpson and Lydia Green.
They run a website called Back to the Vax.
Lydia was featured in an NPR story about resisting having her own children vaccinated and how that turned around for her.
And then Heather has recently appeared on CNN about her previous life as an anti-vax influencer.
So, Heather is a mom who was popular in the anti-vax community.
She dressed as measles for Halloween, which was the least scary thing she could think of.
This is from their website.
She also made multiple viral anti-vax polls on Facebook.
Now, Lydia was an anti-vaxxer for 12 years and wrote a story about her journey to changing her mind and bringing her own three children up to date.
She's now in nursing school to get into public health and to help deal with the problem of vaccine hesitancy on the front lines.
Here's our conversation.
Lydia and Heather, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us on Conspirituality Podcast.
Of course, thank you for having us.
Yeah.
Now, can we start with your personal stories about coming to anti-vaccine ideology?
Maybe, I don't know, Heather, did you want to go first?
I'm sure.
Yeah.
So I grew up pro vaccine.
I mean, I received all of my vaccines.
And I got my flu shot in 2015.
I got my tetanus shot a couple years before that, just because I thought I accidentally poked myself with rusty jewelry.
I mean, that's how Unscared I was.
Unscared, I don't know if that's a word, but I just rushed to get a tetanus shot.
So vaccines were never scary until I started, my husband and I started considering children and we were trying to get pregnant and we came across this ad for this docu-series about vaccines and we watched it, all nine hours of it, and it blamed Everything under the sun on vaccines.
And by the time we were done with it, we, at least I was just like, man, my child will absolutely die.
Like she'll just die if she gets a vaccine.
I just went completely 180 after that docu-series and I was terrified.
It sounds like, I mean, you said it was a nine hour series.
It sounds like a very immersive experience.
Was it something that you both kind of binge watched all at the same time or did it unfold slowly or?
It took a couple of weeks just because it was a lot.
But the thing that got me is that it was mostly doctors that they interviewed.
I mean, they interviewed a couple of moms and dads, but these were doctors.
So it was very hard for me to I don't think that it was not true.
Right.
And were their statements sort of unequivocally foreboding or were they just sort of hesitant and you inferred your sort of new vaccine stance from the inferences?
Oh no, they were definitely against vaccines and blaming the Issues that children face today completely on vaccines.
Wow.
Yeah.
Now some of the names we might be familiar with, I'm assuming that Andrew Wakefield was in this film.
Were there a number of other sort of famous doctors as well?
Yeah, I'm trying to remember.
Of course Wakefield was in it.
I think Dr. Tenpenny was in it.
Right.
Well, and I know RFK Jr.
is not a doctor, but he was in it.
Right.
Yeah.
Oh, and there was a pediatrician.
I think it's like Paul Thomas.
Paul Thomas, yeah.
Yeah.
And Lydia, how did you come to your anti-vax stance?
So mine started before this.
I know the series she's talking about, that's actually fairly recent.
I've been in the anti-vax community probably since 2008.
And it started when I had my daughter.
I took her to her two-month vaccines.
I used to be a quality control chemist actually at a pharmaceutical plant, so it's fairly pro-science.
Even during my pregnancy, I got a flu shot.
So for me, it was when I had taken her for her vaccines and she had a reaction.
That scared me.
She cried a lot.
She wouldn't nurse.
She wouldn't really look at me anymore.
She would sleep this really deep sleep.
And being a first-time mom, it terrified me.
I saw my baby literally change overnight from, you know, this happy, healthy baby to this A baby that just didn't want to be comforted and, and just didn't seem herself.
And when I called the public health nurse, she had tried to assure me that that was normal and I was not assured.
So, and actually I kind of felt blown off because she was like, well, you're a first time mom.
I understand it's a bit intense, but I assure you, like, this is, this is just a normal reaction.
And I didn't feel like it was normal.
It felt very not normal to me.
So, um, When we finally got through it over the next couple days, I started looking for answers on the internet and I found them in the anti-vax movement.
So then you find a way to, you feel like you have this way to never let that happen to your child again when they, you know, what I thought my daughter went through after talking to all these women was basically cry encephalitis.
And they'll show you things like vaccine inserts and, and as evidence.
And so you believe that your child has this horrible reaction.
And now that I, you know, Looked into it.
It's actually known as like a localized pain reaction.
It's quite common.
And obviously my daughter didn't have encephalitis.
There'd be a lot other, a lot worse things going on if that was the case.
So, but yeah, it's easy to get sucked in for sure.
So this was a very frightening experience, but it resolved in a couple of days.
But you still were driven to try to figure out what that response actually was.
I suppose the public health nurse, could she have told you more about it being a localized pain response?
Yeah, she didn't say that.
She didn't explain anything about it to me, just that it was normal.
And I'm like, well this may be common, but it's not normal to me.
Ridiculous that you find this normal kind of thing.
And I just felt very blown off by her.
Right.
Just kind of trust me, but not really explaining why.
I suppose if she had said, like, why don't you bring her in?
You know, that would have been nice.
But she's like, if you really believe this is terrible, like you should take her in.
And I was like, but you're telling me she's fine.
Like, it was very conflicting and a very, like, Very traumatic.
The whole thing was very traumatic for me and it stood with me for a long time, so.
It sounds like a very patronizing response too, right?
Yeah.
Right.
Okay.
Yeah.
And so, and then when you have like that coupled with talking to other people that are welcoming and warm and, and, you know, helpful, then you kind of start trusting them more than the person that, you know, blew you off.
Now, you were working as quality control in a lab setting for a pharmaceutical company, and I wonder, you said that you were in sort of a pro-science environment, but did that environment provide you with any resistance to anti-vax rhetoric, or were you suddenly in the position where you're getting this supposedly new information, and now you're questioning even your job as well?
Yeah well at this so when I had my daughter we moved away my husband got a job we moved away and so I had moved I'd left my job when I was about three months pregnant so I was no longer working in that setting and I was a stay-at-home mom and I was embracing that and and joining all these mom groups and in 2008 like That was when forums were really huge.
There was quite a few main forums that, you know, some were mainstream and some were crunchy.
I preferred the crunchy ones because it felt like that was, if you want your kid to turn out to be the best, that was the way to do it, even though, you know, that style of parenting has its difficulties, but it's worth it because you want the best kind of thing.
Right.
Now, did either of you hold any other kind of anti-authoritarian or skeptical or perhaps even conspiratorial views before your anti-vax days?
Or was this kind of new territory for you both?
Oh, wow.
That's a good question.
I was never a conspiracy theorist before all of this.
I honestly didn't know that conspiracy theories really existed.
I mean, the flatter theory was very new to me.
I mean, my mind was absolutely blown when I heard about that one.
I was a Republican, just in a political sense, and not because I viewed Democrats as some Evil conspiracy to take over the world.
But yeah, this was all new to me.
And I did toy around with the conspiracy theories once I was in the anti-vaxx world.
I tried to buy the conspiracy theories.
I tried to buy into QAnon and things like that.
Fall Cabal, but I just couldn't get there.
I mean, I bought it for, like, quite literally 48 hours, and then I just couldn't do it.
I couldn't do it.
So I never really became one, even with everything else, and I'm still not one.
Right, I mean it's kind of fascinating because I was going to ask whether in your sort of anti-vax socializing, whether you had bumped up against QAnon material and it sounds like, yeah, clearly you did.
Was it really rampant in those spaces?
Is that what you both remember?
I left the movement before they started really getting into QAnon.
The anti-fax movement has kind of shifted in a lot of ways over the years.
When I started in 2008, it was more liberal, it was more hippie-ish.
It was not really aligned with the Republican right like it is today.
But the same conspiracies are there, so they're just recycled.
The whole like baby eating cabal thing from QAnon and stuff like that was, that's very old.
It's not, I'm sure you've done some research on that, that it's not really a new thing.
It's just been kind of recycled.
into what you see in QAnon today.
I was into conspiracies for a bit.
I watched Loose Change and Zeitgeist and the Esoteric Agenda.
I was, in my young adulthood, like age 20 to 23-ish, I was really into them for a while and then I kind of resolved to go, well, we just don't know.
So, it's interesting because we've had a number of guests who describe going through this arc of being a young adult or a teenager and being very much captivated by the, you know, the sort of anti-textbook narrative around the World Trade Center, for example, and then realizing that the, you know, the
The information that they're taking in is not verified or it's not cited or it's, you know, it's not holding up in various ways and then slowly making their way back into sort of a more consensus reality place.
But I'm wondering, when you encountered this stuff in the anti-vax movement, did it bring you back to almost like an earlier time of fascination in your life?
Did it remind you of something that had been exciting?
Yeah, and it's not that I stopped believing in the conspiracies, I just kind of like, okay, they're out there.
But the seed is already planted that, you know, anything that is from an authoritative place is probably corrupt.
So then when you start hearing about, you know, vaccines harming kids, then you think, well, that could be corrupt too.
I wouldn't say that I gave up or stopped believing in the conspiracies, but I just kind of went through that phase and then just let it go because it's not like you can do anything about that stuff anyway, right?
Right.
And I think that's the whole point.
Puts you in a position where you feel powerless to do anything, really.
It's such a paradox because it's supposed to do the opposite.
It's supposed to, and according to the people who research how conspiracism works, it's supposed to give people a sense of agency, right?
Like, now I have some secret knowledge and now I'm going to be able to reorient myself towards a corrupt world in a way that's more noble or that it's on the side of righteousness or something like that.
But there's literally nothing that... Yeah!
That we can do about the QAnon mythos.
And in fact, that's baked into the rhetoric too, where Q will ask his followers to enjoy the show, to sit back actually, to be observed in a way.
It's really, really interesting, which is that, you know, you could buy into QAnon or follow the cabal for 48 hours.
And I'm just wondering like, what did the 48 hours feel like?
And what happened at the end of the 48 hours? - It was quite a trip.
That's it.
What is it called?
Pizza Gate?
Yeah.
Oh, Lord.
I mean, the evidence was so compelling.
So I just sat there and I was I was like, Oh, my God, everyone is evil.
And it just I was horrified for 48 hours.
I was truly horrified.
I think what kind of brought me out of it is that this conspiratorial worldview means that there are so many people that are so evil, that are so in on something.
It's like this underground network of evil, and it's so...
Almost impossible to believe.
And I just, it was almost like my brain broke.
I'm just like, I can't believe this.
This is, this is not, this is not true.
This is just ridiculous.
Oh my God.
I snapped out of it.
You know, you make a good point, which is that it proposes this overwhelming number of people who are involved, and they're involved in the most abject things, and there must be so many people enabling them and tolerating it.
But if your actual social and family experience Um, contradicts that in a way, right?
Like if, if you're still able to go out and do shopping and say hello to people and get, you know, a relatively, you know, friendly and community feeling from your daily activities, I'm imagining that would provide a bit of a buffer.
Was that a factor for you?
Like, did you have relationships that were relatively good?
And so how could this other thing be real?
Yes, I used to work in Hollywood and so I met a bunch of actors and actresses and they're apparently involved in this big cabal and these people are just really sweet people and they're normal people and my network
Should have supposedly been made up of these evil people, and once you're talking to them straight on, I mean, it's just very... Oh, and here come the conspiracies about you now, Heather, because you worked in Hollywood.
Yes.
Just so you know.
Like, it's coming.
They're gonna...
I'm sure they're already writing, like, your conspiracy backstory here.
Right.
Yeah, I mean, you'd have to, it's fascinating because you'd have to, if you were coming from a targeted population like that, you know, so you worked in Hollywood in some capacity, or if you had worked, you know, as a civil servant in DC under a Democrat administration or something like that, You would have to sort of rewrite your history of relationships and say to yourself, Oh, um, actually all of those people were doing something that I didn't see at the time.
And now I can see the truth and I can see how evil they were.
Uh, and that would be such an incredible leap leap and, and, uh, and a, uh, And a severance, really, of history and memory and your own sense of where you come from.
Yes, absolutely.
It would definitely rock my world and I just could not buy that.
Heather, when you said, you said it here, but I also heard you say on CNN, this fascinating thing that when you got into anti-vax stuff, you were convinced not just that vaccines would pose a risk to your babies, but would actually kill them.
And I just, I'm kind of taken aback at how intense that is.
Have you been able to understand how that became such a life and death idea for you?
It's almost like a light switch.
If the child gets a vaccine, it will be fatal.
Not just, you know, there might be injury, but it will be fatal.
Well, in that docu-series, they connected SIDS to vaccines.
Oh.
So, my daughter did have health issues and I just, I was already on edge due to her health issues.
But because all these doctors connected vaccines to SIDS, I basically formed this connection in my brain that a vaccine equals SIDS.
Wow.
That if she gets a vaccine, SIDS will happen that night.
And I know that sounds so intense, I can't even explain it.
I know a lot of people that also believe this.
I don't know, there's something that makes sense to me about it because SIDS is such a mystically horrific condition.
And, you know, as a parent myself, it's something that once I learned about it and I realized that, you know, there's no explanation for it and there doesn't seem to be, there seem to be protections against it with regard to sleeping positions and so on.
Like, it seems to be that SIDS and vaccines, if you were scared about them, would occupy this equal category of just a completely unknown danger.
And maybe the connection gets made that way?
Does that sound plausible?
I think people need to have a reason for something happening, and this offers a reason.
And so it's easy to latch onto it.
And then when I was in the anti-vaccine world, many moms would come forward saying, my child got their vaccines and then died of SIDS a few days later.
And what, I mean, we know that vaccines happen at the same time as life.
And unfortunately those connections can be made by these parents and it's, It's so horrific what happened to their kids, but I was in this state of fear already, this fear-based mindset.
So I was reading these stories and it just solidified what I already felt.
And it almost provides you with, like, a secret code to stop all these things from happening.
So you have this, like, tiny life you're responsible for and then these people, and a lot of them are, like Heather said, doctors, you know, they offer you a convincing argument as to why you shouldn't vaccinate and in that is this code.
That they've broken to prevent SIDS, to prevent autism, to prevent ADD, to prevent like allergies and autoimmune disease.
And so they present it like a cheat code in a way to like game the system, game the health system so that your child will never suffer these consequences.
And so it's easy to suck parents into that for sure.
Now Lydia, you've been, you were in the movement from 2008 and you watched a lot of changes.
CBC Marketplace has just reported on the fact that Sherry Tenpenny is currently charging people about 600 US dollars for an online training program that turns people into anti-vax recruiters.
That's disgusting.
And that never happened while I was in the movement.
Yeah, I was going to ask about that.
Yeah, yeah, no, no, that is, that is so deplorable.
No, when I was there, they would offer programs like how to detox, how to, like, there were more like, supplements and programs to like kill your candida off or detox the metals from your body.
Like they're really into these vague conditions that actually a lot of them don't even have a basis in the medical community.
Right.
So yeah they'll identify like candida overgrowth is a big one and you can not even really prove that short of like actually having an acute thrush infection like but they'll tell everyone that's their problem or and it changes there's like a different theme every couple years of what's causing all these problems but yeah they sell all these like kits and programs and stuff.
But it was really restricted to sort of personal wellness and healthcare thing, but now we have, it almost sounds like an MLM type structure where people are now being trained to produce propaganda.
I'm wondering, but they're not going to be paid, I suppose.
Just like an MLM.
Right, I guess so.
It's not a pyramid scheme!
Right, right.
So I guess my question is, is this an escalation?
And it sounds like yes, it is.
Heather, was that starting to happen in the groups that you were involved with?
I understand that you became quite influential as an influencer, and I'm wondering if There was a possibility at some point within your path towards monetizing that.
I was offered money by one of the more prominent anti-vaxx men and I declined.
The only money I received, I sold a shirt.
One shirt?
One shirt or a merchandise?
Um, it was one shirt that said, uh, global health threat because the World Health Organization listed anti-vaxxers as a global health threat.
So I was a horrible person and I made that a shirt and I, I think I made 350 bucks.
So that was, that was the big, uh, that was like your, that was like your bad-ass shirt that you would go skateboarding in or something.
Yeah.
But what happened, and this is gonna get me crucified, but the MLM business is booming amongst anti-vaxxers.
And so these influencers will post anti-vax propaganda and get a ton of reactions.
And then they'll post their MLM post right afterwards.
And so they are making a lot of money from MLMs.
It's fascinating, like, I've noticed some of the top influencers will post about me, get a ton of responses, and then immediately post their MLM product.
You mean they'll post criticisms of you?
Yes, absolutely.
Oh my god!
Wait, so wait a minute.
Okay, let me just put this together.
So, you've got MLM people who are gaming anti-vax social media algorithms.
Yes.
In order to sell their products they may not even, am I right that they might not even give a shit about vaccines?
I think they do care and um...
But a lot of them, they do care.
I would say they absolutely do care.
Okay.
Most of them, but they, they know what they're doing and they, I mean, and when I say they post criticisms about me, they know that post is going to blow up and I will literally watch as their very next post is an MLM product.
So I think they care, but they know how to monetize it.
So it's not just that the MLM upliner is parasitizing the anti-vax group.
Now they're trolling you within the anti-vax group for maximal engagement.
Yep.
That's an incredible, I'm so sorry, Heather.
I'm laughing defensively.
I hope you are too.
I am.
Oh my God.
How does it feel though?
Do you have to shut it off?
You know, I used to get so upset and it used to really freak me out.
But because I do view it as a cult and I left the cult, I know that they have to be defensive and they have to Stand up for themselves because if somebody that really bought into it could leave, then what does that mean for them?
And so my new response is to ask them if they are okay.
Because if you were that unhappy with your life, I have to ask, are you okay?
And then it, you know, it just kind of puts them on the defense and then I kind of sit back and laugh.
I can't let it get to me, you know?
Right.
My goodness.
Has it been, I mean, has it been difficult to lose the content or the contact that you had during that time that must have felt validating for a while?
You know what's more difficult is losing my real life friends.
Right.
I've lost so many of them.
I don't.
You know, that is harder.
I don't mind not having followers on the internet.
That's so fleeting.
But the real life people, that's a lot harder.
Right.
Right.
Lydia, did you experience anything similar?
Um, I was not, so I stopped being on the online community so much.
Like I got rid of my Facebook a couple years ago.
Um, so I did not experience like that side of things like Heather did.
Um, but, uh, For like online presence and stuff, I feel like I lost a lot of the people, like the moms I used to reach out to when it came to parenting in general, because there was like a tight community around that.
But now I also realize like I'm probably better off for it because a lot of these things I was into in terms of like evidence-based versus like, you know, crunchy mom-based care, like you're better off you know, following the advice of a doctor a lot of the time.
So, um, I don't think I'm missing out too much, but I do miss that sense of community for sure, where you have this like group of like-minded moms that you can turn to when things are not going the best in your parenting or whatever.
So Lydia, you're Canadian as I am, and you know, you and I enjoy almost universal healthcare.
And I would say a generally less antagonistic relationship to the medical establishment, because I think it tends to meet our needs in a, in a general sense.
But But, Heather, you're in Texas, right?
I am.
And there's like a ton of uninsured people who have, you know, a lot less reason to trust public health.
How do you both feel your political climates impact vaccine hesitancy or resistance and, you know, how these online groups function?
Oh, my gosh.
Well, I think because our health care system is such a wreck, We view it as this booming business that just wants to take our money.
So if they want to take our money, they must want to take our money with vaccines.
And this vaccine campaign must be all about money.
I think if it was universal healthcare, it would be, we would feel like it was more of a sense Of caring for each other and wanting the best for the patients instead of just wanting to monetize vaccines and get money from people.
And Lydia, did you have the sense that a kind of Canadian orientation towards health care was being influenced by... I think they don't push them here as much.
Like if you're going to your Where I live, you take your baby to a general practitioner unless your child has significant issues, then you go to the pediatrician.
So at the general practitioner visit, they weigh your baby and they ask, you know, I think it was just a brief five second question, you know, are you up to date?
And I'd go, yeah, yeah, pretend I didn't hear that kind of thing and mutter and not answer.
And then You know, if I didn't want my kid vaccinated, I just didn't have to go to public health visits because there's two.
It's like that the vaccination visit is at public health and then your doctor visit is your doctor and that's separate.
So it's easy for me to kind of avoid having that discussion very often.
And as far as like health care, like in Canada, we don't, I think in our constitution, there's like, you have the right to inform consent and a crisis of conscience.
So if you are opposed to vaccination for any reason, like they can't really, it's really hard to make vaccines mandatory in Canada because of the way our Bill of Rights and Freedoms is so, but every so often I would find myself writing letters to the health ministers and whatnot saying like you, I saw today they were talking on the news of mandatory vaccination.
And I just like to remind you that in this part of this code, you can't do that.
And then I'd get a letter back saying vaccines are safe and effective and you should vaccinate your children.
So, you know, like in the nicest, politest Canadian way possible.
So.
Right.
Yeah.
Did you find did you find, Lydia, that the that the online climate, though, was influenced by American politics in a way that made it difficult to sort of really.
Yeah.
In the way that a lot of the leaders that you know, like the doctors and stuff, they're all American.
Right.
So there wasn't really too many Canadian doctors, although we did have our own Canadian anti-vax group called Vaccine Risk Awareness Network and I think they've recently changed their name but that was a huge one for Canada with Canadian specific laws and ways to get around.
I think there's a few provinces that require vaccination for school and they would give you ways to get around that legally with forms and whatever else you needed.
Yeah, it definitely is different, but the influence is the same because the doctors and stuff that you're going to for your authority and your information is, they're from America.
It's like Ted Penney and Mercola and Humphreys, like all those doctors.
Right.
Heather, your story is out there now on CNN, which I imagine is giving you a lot more exposure online, both positive and negative.
And you're on camera now with a very pro-public health point of view, but they also interviewed you with your husband and he's not so convinced.
Now, do you mind me asking how that's working out?
Yeah, so it's not that he is afraid of vaccines per se.
He just does not believe that they are necessary.
He is of the mind that measles disappeared due to cleaner public facilities and things like that.
So as far as with our child, We have a lot of conversations, you know, okay, well, which vaccine are you okay with?
At what point are you okay with this?
And we go back and forth and it is hard.
I wouldn't say it's affected our relationship, but it is definitely hard because we very much disagree.
I believe that the tetanus shot is absolutely necessary.
And he believes that tetanus is just not a risk.
Right, but that the risk of the vaccine itself is something that he, that gives him pause when it comes to whether or not your child's going to get it.
It's so weird because when you straight up ask him, are you, are you scared of the tetanus vaccine?
He'll say, no, not really.
I really don't think anything bad would happen.
I just don't think it's necessary, but you have to understand the way he grew up was To let a fever run its course and, you know, not to take Tylenol and not to take things, you know, unless absolutely, absolutely necessary.
So he comes from a unique point of view where I view her running around barefoot as a tetanus risk because tetanus lives in soil.
He believes you would have to live on a farm and be working around manure to need a shot.
It's interesting, you know, as you're saying, growing up in a context in which, you know, medicines were taken as a last resort, I am familiar with that demographic and that subculture.
It's not what I grew up with, but I'm wondering, like, it's kind of, It's parsimonious and it can go back a long way in generations to a kind of just a conservative, I'm also not going to take resources where I don't need them.
There's something about it that seems class-based as well.
Like I don't, I'm self-sufficient and I will get by and unless I'm in deep trouble, I'm not going to take a handout almost.
Yeah, that is what he believes, that he is a very conservative person, and that does definitely align with the rest of his lifestyle and his beliefs.
But there's pride and self-sufficiency in that too, right?
It sounds like?
Yes.
I would say so, yes.
Now, I was gonna ask about, Lydia, in an NPR article, they covered a little bit of your story and you didn't use your last name.
And we're not gonna use your last name on the podcast here.
You've said that you'd like to avoid community backlash.
And I'm wondering, are you talking about fellow parents or people that you work with?
And is this still an ongoing concern?
A little bit of both, I think, because I haven't actually told too many people in my community what I'm doing now, because a lot of people didn't know that I was an anti-vaxxer.
Just a few of my close friends, but I live in a small community where everyone knows everybody, so I just kind of kept a lot of stuff to myself.
But it also comes from a fear of what I've seen anti-vaxxers do To other people that are leaving and how they swarm people like Heather is kind of going through that right now with her CNN thing but even in that NPR article I was with Dr. Nicole Baldwin there and and she she made a simple cute
TikTok video and she got death threats and they were harassing her at her place of employment and putting bad reviews up on her clinic and just like they get together and once they decide you know you're a target then they they put together a lot of energy to try to make your life a little miserable for a while and I figure if I stay a little anonymous that hopefully I can avoid that and just because
I do live in such a small community that it would be pretty easy to find out things about me that I just would rather not deal with.
Yeah.
Heather, was it a feature of your own online experience that if somebody was leaving the fold that you witnessed or participated in that kind of piling on?
When they left?
Yeah, or if somebody was doubtful or if they looked like they were being a turncoat.
No, I've always had the belief that you should treat people respectfully even if they disagree with you and so I never wanted to join in on the online harassment and I would
When I would see the anti-vaxxers gang up on some people, I would sometimes post things like, shame on you and kind of stand up for those people because I don't want to be a part of that.
That's, ugh, that's just ugly.
How did that go over when you actually appealed for, you know, etiquette?
They were mad.
They didn't like that.
Right.
I did this online debate with a pro-vaxxer and her and I were very polite with each other.
We did it live.
We had over 500 people watching and I was very shocked at the end of it.
The anti-vaxxers were furious with me because I was so polite to her.
Called me stupid.
They said I was weak.
They said I didn't stand up for them.
I was unfriended by maybe four or five hundred people that day because I was so polite to her.
But was there anybody who said that, who appreciated your manner from a strategic point of view?
A few people.
A few people.
But that was not the general consensus.
I mean, it just seems like if you want a, you know, an admittedly fringe perspective to gain more mainstream acceptance, that you would put the most diplomatic voice forward.
But it sounds like that's not what the group wanted.
Right.
They view you as weak if you are diplomatic.
And so they viewed me as weak.
They are so pro-medical freedom, but that's not what they're actually pro.
They're pro you not vaccinating, and God forbid you use that medical freedom to vaccinate.
They want you to suffer, and they will verbally abuse you.
They are not diplomatic people, for the most part.
Now, I'm not talking about all of them.
There are a lot of sweet ones that I still keep in touch with that have genuinely good hearts.
A majority of them want the drama and the harassment for these pro-vaxxers.
And it's also fueled by anger.
Really I'm not sure about the ones at the top how much they believe of what they say.
I tend to believe that they're probably grifters but the parents that actually believe that all their child's problems were caused by a vaccination or that all of the world's health problems are caused by vaccination every chronic illness like if you really believe that You're going to be a really angry person.
And so when you talk to people that don't agree with you about the cause of all the suffering in the world, then you're going to get very frustrated and angry and, and want to shut it down as quickly as possible, especially if they're trying to talk you out of that position.
So it's definitely a very, there's a lot of psychology involved, I think, in how these people act.
I can understand the anger, for sure, given the intensity of the belief.
I guess the strategic question that comes up for me, Heather, with what you're describing is, do you have the sense that the people that you're talking about who are angry at you because you're too polite, do they want to win?
Is that what they're in it for?
that what they're in it for?
Like, what's the, what's the, what's the end game or goal?
Do they believe they can win?
Thank you.
They do.
They do believe they can win.
And they have won.
I mean, in a few states, they've put together these grassroot efforts to abolish certain proposed legislation.
And so they believe that they can win over the country if they just are strong enough And get together and win enough people over.
This is a war for them.
This is, I mean, America is a battlefield for them.
This is not just fun and games on Facebook.
I mean, I've seen actual threats from these women and they're cheering each other on over these threats.
And it's a bit frightening.
This is war for them. - Well, it's incredible really that this issue has become the flashpoint that it is Of course, it's built up over the last 25 years or so.
It's just occurring to me to ask whether or not any of you are aware of any, I mean, you've discussed threats, and of course, some threats might be actually criminal in nature.
But have you heard any reports of, like, real-world violence or vandalism or property damage?
Or are pro-vax activists being doxed?
I know Senator Richard Pan was assaulted, right?
Um, and he's a very pro-vax, like he's a pediatrician and a senator in California.
And I know they got together and they pushed him and I want to say they poured something on his desk, but I'm not going to say exactly because I'm not sure I'm remembering how accurate it is, but I think they poured like red fluid or something.
I don't, yeah.
Is that?
Fake blood.
Heather, do you remember that?
It was fake blood?
Yeah, onto his desk.
There's some really, uh, irrational behavior, uh, when they get together in a mob.
I just read a post from an anti-vaxxer that said, and it was ambiguous, but it said, mark my words or something like that.
We will make sure that you never see the light of day again, and you can never expose your face again.
So it's very hard to know who they're talking about but it's it's very intense.
Yeah there's a lot of like innuendos in some of the comments Heather's even getting now and I've been trying to kind of help her like watch her page and say like hey that's not appropriate but there's a lot of them coming out of the woodwork now to try to Put her down.
Now, Heather, does this put you in the position where you have a fork in the road between timeline hygiene and blocking and leaving enough doors open to your former community that you're able to effectively communicate with them?
It is such a hard balance because I have so many people saying, why don't you shut your profile down on private?
You are just seeking misattention.
They also say that because it was on TV and I personally think that's ridiculous because I don't think they would say that to a man that was on TV.
But that's a whole other story for a different time.
I do struggle between blocking certain people and allowing them on my profile because I don't want echo chamber.
I don't care that people say that leaving my profile open is for attention.
It's not for attention.
It's for conversation.
Because that conversation is what makes change happen.
Now, if somebody... There is a line if somebody crosses it.
And if they are harassing someone or threatening, I will block them.
I will report them.
I will take note.
I will screenshot.
And it is stressful.
And you kind of have to be on top of it.
And then there's also the side that says, why aren't you standing up for us?
Well, because I just got 4,000 comments and I can't emotionally be healthy and read them all.
And Lydia helps me out a lot.
She jumps on the comments and defends me and things like that.
But it's a hard balance beam to walk on.
Do you feel, like, as you're describing this, it seems to me, I mean, from the comments that we've had from interviews that we've done with people like Imran Ahmed of the Center for Countering Digital Hate,
Who proposes that, you know, if anybody in your timeline or anywhere else is posting disinformation that, you know, in order to demote that actual data in terms of what the algorithm is doing, you really have to delete or block it, just like as if it were the virus itself, as if it were COVID.
Because, as he explains, the actual controversy within the Facebook comment thread actually makes that data, that content, more attractive to the algorithm.
And even if they come in and they use AI to comb through and try to remove disinformation, it's actually the emotional engagement that Mark Zuckerberg wants for, you know, It doesn't always work either.
Like I've had I got kicked off a Twitter because I said vaccines didn't cause autism to a person that was saying vaccines cause autism.
And they kicked me off a Twitter for for saying that.
I don't know.
I was going to fight it, but then it would have taken me days.
I was like, I just waited for my my suspension to be over.
And I was like, whatever.
But yeah, the algorithm also doesn't always work.
So it got it backwards actually.
It got it backwards and it kicked me off for actually trying to fight that misinformation.
But I'm just hearing about you talking, Heather, you're talking about like, you know, you've got 4,000 comments on a post and Lydia's, you know, helping you out with a comment thread and defending you and all of this time is being expended on
on social media and I know that that's where hearts and minds are being changed but I'm also wondering where else the action is like is is that where you know Provax or or or you know Diminishing vaccine hesitancy has to happen?
Or do you also think about other forums or sort of, you know, policy landscapes in which you could also be active?
I spoke to somebody about this and she, once COVID is Not over, but you know, things start opening up again.
I am going to be booked for speaking engagements and my goal is to speak with doctors about how they could speak with their patients.
Like someone like me could have been persuaded differently when my child was a baby and that would be more helpful than the comment section.
I'm doing a webinar on the 8th that is for doctors.
It's got, last I heard, 57,000 doctors invited to it.
It's the Indiana Coalition of Vaccination run by their university.
Can you just say that again, Lydia?
There's 57,000 people signed up.
That they've invited.
I don't know how you're going, but that's how many medical professionals they've invited to this.
And it's me and Dr. Nicole Baldwin, who we did the NPR segment together.
Right.
And yeah, it's just it's a webinar where they're just going to ask us questions on vaccine hesitancy and how to combat it and how doctors and medical professionals.
With that first contact, how can they, you know, prevent that from happening?
Is that like, well, you have this experience with a public health nurse, I guess by telephone, which was really significant for you, but are you, is it your understanding that the research on vaccine hesitancy now says that that first contact is crucial when somebody raises a concern?
Yeah, yeah I think that's what they're starting because they're they're really starting to investigate like how that happens and a lot of times it is it can be traced back to a specific encounter and even further back like I used to I used to think my that was the encounter that sowed the distrust but I can even take that further back to when I was pregnant with my daughter and I was coerced into a c-section that I didn't want
And then when I was breastfeeding her and a doctor said, Oh, you know, don't be so heartbroken if it doesn't work out for you.
And then like dismissed me that way.
And I had to go, I actually, that's when, that was my first contact with the mothering forum.
And they actually helped me get through my breastfeeding difficulty as opposed to like the doctor or the nurse that was supposed to help me but told me not to be so brokenhearted.
It's not a big deal if it doesn't work out, but it was important to me.
So yeah, those first contacts that a mother has with Their physician is so important to instill that trust.
Well, specifically, specifically mothers, because it sounds like my understanding is that it's it's it's mothers groups that are at the forefront of vaccine hesitancy in terms of social media, right?
Yeah.
And mothers need to feel comfortable turning back and trusting And it's a whole systemic problem, right?
Because they don't always have a lot of time either.
Doctors get burnt out, you know.
There's a lot of issues within the system that contribute to this, but definitely, you know, women need to feel like they can trust and have a rapport with their primary care physicians again.
Right.
Well, this is amazing to hear that you're going to be giving this webinar and it's outside of, like it's firewalled off from Facebook.
Yeah.
And that's going to be amazing, I imagine, for you to actually be in an environment where people are freely exchanging evidence-based ideas and you're not kind of, engaged in something that is much more like a psychological culture war than an endeavor in public health.
Heather, is there anything like that coming up for you?
I'm not of that nature.
Like I said, I'm just, I have someone that is going to book me for speaking engagements.
And so I'm hoping that I can speak to doctors.
I don't know what those speaking engagements are yet.
But that is, I mean, that would be the goal to, to Heather and I are also, we have a private support group that has very few people right now, which is how we want it.
It's a very vetted group.
We don't want to just let anyone in.
It's specifically for people that were in the anti-vax movement or Really on the fence and are moving toward vaccinating their children.
It's just a no judgment because unless you've been there, you don't know what it's like to make that phone call and take that first step to get your child vaccinated.
I couldn't sleep for a month.
And it really messed with me psychologically even though I knew I was wrong it still felt like it's like trying to train your brain like let's say you're driving and now all of a sudden red lights mean go and green lights mean stop and you have to like Train your brain to like accept that and it's the same thing with changing your mind on a long-held belief.
So it took a lot to get moving on vaccinations for me and I know that's a very difficult position and in Provax groups it seems to be like all or nothing like They want to tell people like, yeah, they're safe and effective.
And I believe that.
But like when your anxiety is so great, you might not be able to do all four shots that they're missing in that first visit.
You may only be able to start with one.
And and even in like some Provax groups, that's not acceptable.
And I'm not saying that there's like you shouldn't obviously delay or space out vaccines in a normal setting.
But when somebody's been living in that culture for so long it is so hard for them to vaccinate that they'll need a different kind of support than the average person would need to vaccinate their children so Heather and I've started a group for that we have a website called backtothevax.com
Where we're trying to compile stories of other parents that have left the anti-vax movement and share how they worked that out for themselves.
So it's not just like Facebook engagement that we're doing.
We're trying to start other little projects here and there to try to reach a broader audience and help the vaccine hesitancy problem.
Heather, well I guess one last question, but Heather I just wanted to note that I think earlier in our conversation you described the anti-vax movement as being cult-like and I just want to affirm as a cult survivor and researcher myself that you're describing a lot of elements that are very common.
The social isolation, the paranoia, the feeling that the group is kind of a safe haven that you couldn't possibly leave.
And then of course, all of the social punishment that goes along with leaving or considering leaving and then the abuse that follows you afterwards.
These are all big red flaggy things.
But Lydia, you said that it's kind of like red lights mean go and green lights mean stop when it comes to crossing that threshold over into trusting that the vaccine is going to be okay.
And I'm wondering, Maybe I'll just finish with, for each of you, was there a single moment in which you felt, you both felt yourself relax into a trust in the consensus reality science?
Was there one thing that really made the difference?
I mean, or was it just a combination of things?
For me?
Sorry, Heather?
Go ahead.
When I started reading one of Dr. Paul Offit's books and I started talking to a blood-brain barrier specialist and another scientist, it just suddenly clicked that the mechanisms of vaccine injury are not real.
They can't happen.
Anaphylaxis can happen, but this whole aluminum going into your brain can't happen.
And so once that science clicked for me, even though I still had that fear, that was that moment of relief.
Like, oh wow, this is impossible.
So it was like a chemical reality that really opened?
Yeah.
For me it was like researching, so there was a trope I believed for a long time like Heather, the blood-brain barrier thing, because I started to come around kind of like I was going to do like a
A slower or more delayed selective schedule and so I have a younger child that's under two and I was like well I could vaccinate the older two but I just have to see like what age the blood-brain barrier closes at and then when I read because I just really believe that trope with all my heart and then when I went to find like actual evidence of the age supposedly this happens I found out that babies are born with an intact blood-brain barrier
And I felt so dumb.
I was like, how did I miss this?
It was just one of the things that I heard over and over and over again that I just, I really believed with all my heart.
And then I realized, I'm really wrong about this.
What else am I really wrong about?
So I started kind of going through all these long-held beliefs I had, realizing I was wrong, and I was able to make that phone call.
But it really didn't feel okay until I saw for my own self that my children were fine.
So after that first appointment, They got their shots.
I brought them home and they were fine.
You know, in the days that followed that I was able to breathe that sigh of relief and say, okay, this thing I built up in my head is not what I thought and my kids are going to be okay.
And I was able to continue after that with no issue.
I can imagine, too, that there's a certain amount of self-trust that then kind of re-enters the picture, because in order to be able to say, oh, well, my kids are going to be okay, that also reflects on one's own parenting, too, doesn't it?
Yes, absolutely.
It's amazing that this blood-brain-barrier issue, which I hadn't really considered before, was so significant for both of you, because what's so amazing is that so much of the discourse around Vax hesitancy is about the
You know, the natural resiliency and the immunological smartness of the human body and how we don't really need to add anything, but if they're basing that on this supposed vulnerability that the vaccine can cross or the aluminum can cross the blood-brain barrier, They're actually saying the opposite at the same time, that the human body is much more vulnerable than it actually is.
It's a total contradiction because my baby is too weak to withstand, let's say, a tiny attenuated virus.
But my baby is also supposedly strong enough to handle a full-blown measles infection.
It doesn't make any sense.
It's totally contradictory.
And when you start looking at those kind of examples in the anti-vax community, they're everywhere.
Right, and they also give their kids a bunch of supplements for such a natural immune system.
They do rely on a lot of vitamins and oils and supplements.
Wow, yeah.
Well, just like their ancestors collected hundreds of years ago, right?
They came off the supplement tree in the backyard.
Sorry, I get a little sarcastic at times.
Yeah, I can imagine.
I mean, it's been a long journey.
I thank you both.
You've really helped me understand a lot about this particular media landscape, and I think it's going to be really valuable for our listeners.
And I also think that the work that you both have coming up outside of this mosh pit Especially is going to be really exciting to track.