Conspirituality Awakener

What is the distance between spiritual practice and social action? Derek has weighed this question for decades. This unscripted meditation on the topic uses Aubrey Marcus's new "documentary," Anti-Cult, as a jump-off point. 
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What is the distance between spiritual practice and social action? Derek has weighed this question for decades. This unscripted meditation on the topic uses Aubrey Marcus's new "documentary," Anti-Cult, as a jump-off point.

A Deep Cut from January's Patreon.
Control the Court. Overturn Roe. Funnel anonymous donations and shady gifts. Deregulate for Jesus. Roll back the cultural clock. Celebrate. Rinse and Repeat.
Leonard Leo’s libertarian Catholic agenda has made him a preeminent power-broker in right-wing American politics. He’s reshaping society while enjoying the pipeline of cash and influence that connects billionaire GOP mega-donors and the SCOTUS judges he helped install.
Julian tracks how Leo’s Federalist Society used Trump as part of a decades-long systematic takeover of the judicial system that culminated in the current ethics and corruption scandal in the SCOTUS.
Show Notes
ProPublica “Friends of the Court” investigative journalism series
The Guardian Club For Growth GOP Insurectionist Support
Open Secret 2022 Donor List
Dark Money Spending After Citizen’s United
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse “The Front Group Swarms”
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Acclaimed actor Terrence Howard has a new role playing a heroic Galileo-like character on the YouTube and podcast stage, where he fearlessly points out the flaws in mainstream math and science.
Howard's recent appearance on The Joe Rogan Experience gave him three hours to explain how his dreams and spiritual visions, along with his own research and deep study of maverick experts, have revealed unique answers to the deepest unsolved mysteries of physics. Turns out that none of this is new, the actor actually unveiled his discoveries in a surprising lecture at the Oxford Union in 2017.
Today we'll break down these two cosmic events in space-time and discuss what it all means, and whether it's just a bit of fun or something more dangerous.
Show Notes
5 Craziest Moments from Terrence Howard on Rogan
Prophetic Charisma By Len Oakes: A Brief Overview 
Terrence Howard's Dangerous Mind 
Terrence Howard Patents Debunked
Howard Virtual reality Patent Claim
John Keeley and The Etheric Force Machine
Walter Russell Society, now named The University of Science and Philosophy
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Six chapters on approaches to prospirituality, now that we know (or think we know) what the hell conspirtuality is. This is a long episode, but there are evenly-placed breaks for you all to pause on!
Chapter 1: Positions
After 4 years, we’ve come to a natural question at the end of defining the problem of conspirituality. How do we orient ourselves towards possible answers?
Chapter 2: The Prospirituality Challenge
If you’re clear on how spirituality—including beliefs in the supernatural—can be medicine, you can be clearer on where it becomes poison.
Chapter 3: I did not expect to be friends with Joseph Baker
I never thought I would be friends with a student of A Course in Miracles: maybe my judgments about its inevitably bad impacts are misplaced. Also: it’s not a good idea to dismiss anyone on the basis of religious belief if you don’t know how that belief actually operates, and you won’t unless you talk to them. 
Chapter 4: Buddhist Tolerance, Buddhist Repair
Conspirituality is right at home within high-demand groups or cults. Paranoid and controlling social structures feed on paranoid and dissociative emotions and ideas. For members and observers alike, it can become difficult to tell whether the content of the religious group is intrinsic to its cruelty, or whether these can be separated. Surprisingly, some high-demand groups can foster reforms from within, with members reframing the very concepts that had been weaponized against them to liberate themselves. In that sense, the doctrines and beliefs can be part of the problem, but also part of the solution. 
Chapter 5: Eve Sedgwick
Cynicism about religion is an occupational hazard of this beat. It’s also popular. At times it’s worth questioning the critical economy focused more on deconstruction than on generating ideas and solidarity. 
Chapter 6: The Trouble and Joy of Belief and Silence
“You will know them by their fruits. Do we gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles?”
Matthew 7:16
Show Notes
Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People
Survivors of an International Buddhist Cult Share Their Stories
Paranoid Reading, Reparative Reading
Baylor Religion Survey: 3 graphs
On the Relation Between Religiosity and the Endorsement of Conspiracy Theories: The Role of Political Orientation
Anxious attachment and belief in conspiracy theories
There are higher levels of conspiracy beliefs in more corrupt countries
The impact of economic inequality on conspiracy beliefs
To trust or not to trust in the thrall of the COVID-19 pandemic: Conspiracy endorsement and the role of adverse childhood experiences, epistemic trust, and personality functioning
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Six chapters on approaches to prospirituality, now that we know (or think we know) what the hell conspirtuality is. This is a long episode, but there are evenly-placed breaks for you all to pause on!

Chapter 1: Positions

After 4 years, we’ve come to a natural question at the end of defining the problem of conspirituality. How do we orient ourselves towards possible answers?

Chapter 2: The Prospirituality Challenge

If you’re clear on how spirituality—including beliefs in the supernatural—can be medicine, you can be clearer on where it becomes poison.

Chapter 3: I did not expect to be friends with Joseph Baker

I never thought I would be friends with a student of A Course in Miracles: maybe my judgments about its inevitably bad impacts are misplaced. Also: it’s not a good idea to dismiss anyone on the basis of religious belief if you don’t know how that belief actually operates, and you won’t unless you talk to them. 

Chapter 4: Buddhist Tolerance, Buddhist Repair

Conspirituality is right at home within high-demand groups or cults. Paranoid and controlling social structures feed on paranoid and dissociative emotions and ideas. For members and observers alike, it can become difficult to tell whether the content of the religious group is intrinsic to its cruelty, or whether these can be separated. Surprisingly, some high-demand groups can foster reforms from within, with members reframing the very concepts that had been weaponized against them to liberate themselves. In that sense, the doctrines and beliefs can be part of the problem, but also part of the solution. 

Chapter 5: Eve Sedgwick

Cynicism about religion is an occupational hazard of this beat. It’s also popular. At times it’s worth questioning the critical economy focused more on deconstruction than on generating ideas and solidarity. 

Chapter 6: The Trouble and Joy of Belief and Silence

“You will know them by their fruits. Do we gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles?” -- Matthew 7:16