62 - Elections and Cults

[00:00:01] Hi everyone, welcome to The Cult I Left Behind podcast. I'm your host, Amanda Briggs, and I'm here to tell you my stories of growing up in the IBLP cult, which you might know from the Duggar family.

[00:00:15] And I'm your other host, Kyle Briggs. I'm Amanda's husband, and I have not heard most of these stories before, so stay tuned and we'll all get traumatized together.

[00:00:29] Hey everyone, welcome back. We have had a big week here in the United States. We had our election and former President Trump and his running mate, J.D. Vance, are now the president and vice president elect in our country.

[00:00:49] And that's brought up a lot of stuff for a lot of people. Of course, those who support or supported the Trump Vance ticket are experiencing a lot of joy.

[00:01:01] And those who did not vote for the Trump Vance ticket are experiencing an overwhelming sense of grief and fear as we look at some of the issues that have clouded the last, what is it, Kyle, like what, nine years in our country since...

[00:01:20] I think so, that's right.

[00:01:22] Yeah. First time Trump ran. He's a very controversial figure.

[00:01:27] Yeah. I mean, it's definitely been one of the most controversial elections, in my opinion, you know, in my lifetime.

[00:01:33] Same. Yeah. And I think there are a lot of folks who are trying to figure out like how this, like how is their third election with Trump in it?

[00:01:43] And so we, not for the purpose of discussing anything political, put out a poll over the weekend asking folks, you know, what do you, what do you want us to do an episode about?

[00:01:56] And we got some fun replies, but one person asked if we could talk about the election and cult correlations.

[00:02:06] And then it quietly got a lot of likes on the back end.

[00:02:09] And so we decided that, yeah, y'all voted.

[00:02:14] So we'll honor that.

[00:02:16] And we're going to talk about some of the, the cult and election correlations.

[00:02:20] Um, but I don't actually want to talk about Trump and Vance at the moment.

[00:02:25] I want to take us back to Cabbage Patch dolls.

[00:02:29] Um, do you guys remember, I don't even know how, like how long ago this was.

[00:02:34] It's been a while.

[00:02:35] It was a long time ago.

[00:02:36] Um, we talked about how I had to burn my Cabbage Patch dolls growing up and my little ponies because once upon a time, a very long time ago, but not in a galaxy far, far away.

[00:02:49] Unfortunately, it was right here in the United States.

[00:02:52] There was a woman in the cult who was in labor and her midwife wrote bill a letter after the birth, explaining that this woman, this cult mom.

[00:03:06] Who was having a home birth had a stalled labor.

[00:03:11] And in a moment of panic and trying to figure out what to do with this stalled labor, the midwife asked the parents, the mom and dad in the cult, husband and wife, do you have anything in your house that is like causing you to sin before God?

[00:03:28] And they were like, Cabbage Patch dolls.

[00:03:32] So they ran and they threw them out into the yard and promised before God to burn them later.

[00:03:37] And the laborer miraculously proceeded and a healthy baby boy was born.

[00:03:43] And this midwife sends Bill a letter describing all of this.

[00:03:47] And Bill goes on from there to declare to everyone in the cult that we must burn our Cabbage Patch dolls because they are sinful and God will bless us.

[00:03:58] And you can go back and you can listen to that episode.

[00:04:01] And I think any reasonable person would be like, what the fuck?

[00:04:06] Based on one piece of evidence, y'all decided to burn your kids' toys.

[00:04:12] And that this is how you fix everything from sin to stalled labors.

[00:04:18] And I think most of us would be like, what?

[00:04:20] That's weird.

[00:04:21] That's not credible.

[00:04:23] That's one instance.

[00:04:24] That's not good enough.

[00:04:25] That's not good enough evidence.

[00:04:27] Yeah.

[00:04:28] That was a little wild.

[00:04:29] I remember recording that episode and thinking, what the hell?

[00:04:33] What is going on?

[00:04:34] That's just so, I don't know, a little too...

[00:04:38] That's too far out there for me to believe that there was any actual correlation there.

[00:04:43] And they just, you know, it was coincidence or something.

[00:04:46] Or it was just her time to finally start finishing that labor.

[00:04:51] And you can't say correlation to a scientist in training, particularly a public health scientist in training.

[00:04:56] Because I'm going to be like, what's the R value?

[00:04:58] Was it a positive direct relationship?

[00:05:00] Was it negligible or strong?

[00:05:02] Or was it an inverse relationship?

[00:05:04] Or did it have an R value of zero, in which case there is no correlation?

[00:05:09] So, like, you got to be a savvy consumer of data.

[00:05:14] But how many times over the last, I don't know, what are we at?

[00:05:18] Like 60-something episodes?

[00:05:21] Have you heard us say, there's this one piece of evidence.

[00:05:24] Build a whole ideology off this one thing.

[00:05:27] And that's what cult leaders do.

[00:05:29] That's what narcissistic leaders do, is they find any little piece of evidence that supports their agenda.

[00:05:37] And then they turn it into this whole big thing.

[00:05:40] Yeah, because all they have to do at that point is just get you to buy the story.

[00:05:44] And then, like, then their members or their followers or whatever are now hooked into it,

[00:05:51] even though the story might have been false.

[00:05:54] Like, it doesn't matter.

[00:05:56] Like, the objective is just get them hooked and attached to the story and then just, like, let it play out.

[00:06:02] I think it's even more insidious than that, though.

[00:06:05] They don't have to hook you to the story.

[00:06:06] They have to hook you to them.

[00:06:08] And then you'll believe any story they tell.

[00:06:10] I want to walk through eating the dogs and cats in Springfield next.

[00:06:16] Okay?

[00:06:17] So we just talked about...

[00:06:18] I think everybody thought that was wild.

[00:06:20] I don't know, but I thought that was wild.

[00:06:22] Like, what the hell?

[00:06:23] Like, why is this a topic for...

[00:06:25] Why is this even a topic in the United States?

[00:06:29] Like, is that real?

[00:06:30] Well, we can get into that more.

[00:06:32] I did actually do a little bit of a nerdy deep dive into, like, urban legends around immigrants and migrants eating pets.

[00:06:40] It's an urban legend.

[00:06:41] And I found stuff from the 80s, like, documents that this is something, like, people have historically freaked out about.

[00:06:50] But anyways, we look at how we got a national...

[00:06:57] A nationally televised presidential debate that devolved to they're eating the dogs, they're eating the cats, and we have a bunch of memes about it now.

[00:07:06] This all starts when J.D. Vance typed up an ex-post that said, reports now show that people have had their pets abducted and eaten by people who shouldn't be in this country.

[00:07:23] Who does that sound like?

[00:07:25] I mean, it sounds like something Bill would say, because it was just, I guess, factually based off of this specific instance.

[00:07:32] Like, the Springfield Police Department was like...

[00:07:36] Nope.

[00:07:36] We haven't heard that.

[00:07:37] So, less than 30 minutes after he posted it, they debunked it.

[00:07:40] But that's what I want you guys to hear is reports now show.

[00:07:45] Okay, what reports?

[00:07:47] When?

[00:07:48] What was the significance value in the reports?

[00:07:51] Were they credible reports?

[00:07:54] From when they came?

[00:07:56] Like, there's nothing in this statement that shows, okay, this is a credible report.

[00:08:05] This is a credible report.

[00:08:07] Which is exactly what Bill did.

[00:08:09] Someone said, we're getting reports.

[00:08:13] And then he's got one.

[00:08:15] And then he's got one.

[00:08:15] Maybe two.

[00:08:16] Still a significance value that means there is no statistical significance.

[00:08:24] So, reports now show that pets are being eaten in Springfield.

[00:08:29] This is what Vance says.

[00:08:30] Less than 30 minutes later, it gets debunked by local law enforcement.

[00:08:34] So, a credible source.

[00:08:36] They have gotten no reports of people's pets being abducted and eaten by Haitian migrants.

[00:08:45] But, Representative Tom Tiffany, a Republican from Wisconsin, gets on Twitter and writes, cat lives matter.

[00:08:53] And then, Representative Andy Biggs, a Republican from Arizona, gets on Twitter or X and says, protect America's pets.

[00:09:03] So, they have done no research, right?

[00:09:06] They haven't looked into this.

[00:09:07] They haven't gained the credibility.

[00:09:09] They're bought into Vance.

[00:09:10] Vance says it.

[00:09:11] So, it must be true.

[00:09:13] Or, Vance says it.

[00:09:14] So, we're going to.

[00:09:14] Whether or not it's true, we're going to carry it out.

[00:09:17] Like, our marching orders are in, folks.

[00:09:20] Cat lives matter.

[00:09:21] Which is just so disrespectful in so many ways.

[00:09:24] I can't even.

[00:09:24] That's a topic for another day.

[00:09:25] Okay.

[00:09:26] So, we look at that and it's like, okay, where did this even come from?

[00:09:30] Like, how did this start?

[00:09:32] How did this start?

[00:09:33] Okay.

[00:09:34] So, I did some digging and I found some news articles.

[00:09:38] And the one I'm going to reference the most is Michigan Public NPR did a nice article about this where they, like, laid out the timeline and the players and everything.

[00:09:47] And then, I found another article on Forbes that laid out what happened and then kind of checked that more historical approach as well, Kyle, about, like, where did this come from with urban legends?

[00:09:55] So, let's start with the Michigan NPR.

[00:09:59] So, oh, and then this is the Springfield News Sun as well.

[00:10:05] I looked at that.

[00:10:06] It said that reports of pets being eaten might have been confused with an unrelated allegation of a cat eating in Canton, Ohio, 175 miles away.

[00:10:15] So, people are trying to figure out, like, where did this come from?

[00:10:18] A credible news source is like, this is unrelated.

[00:10:21] It's an allegation.

[00:10:22] It's 175 miles away.

[00:10:23] This is, like, the closest thing we can find.

[00:10:26] Okay.

[00:10:27] But then back to Michigan News.

[00:10:31] They said that it all seems to have started with a neo-Nazi white supremacist user on a far-right social platform called Gab.

[00:10:40] So, this user commented, and I think it was, like, Bryony, B-R-I space O-N-Y, I think, was the handle.

[00:10:51] This user commented on a photo of a neo-Nazi group called Blood Tribe marching through Springfield protesting Haitian migrants while carrying swastika flags, which is another topic for another day.

[00:11:10] And so, this commenter says, once Haitians swarm into a town, animals start to disappear.

[00:11:16] And that goes from, like, random user, one random user commenting on a Nazi campaign photo on a far-right social platform to President-elect Trump now saying they're eating the dogs and cats in Springfield.

[00:11:39] Like, this is the most bill thing I've ever seen.

[00:11:44] Yeah.

[00:11:44] I mean, I definitely feel like that's something you would not expect to show up on the campaign trail for the United States presidential election.

[00:11:52] But it did make an appearance in one of the debates.

[00:11:56] In a major way.

[00:11:56] Like, it's all, you get on Instagram, they're eating the dogs, they're eating the cats.

[00:12:00] Eat the cat.

[00:12:01] Eat, eat the cat.

[00:12:02] Like, if you haven't seen that at this point, you've been living under a rock.

[00:12:06] Mm-hmm.

[00:12:07] And it's, it, it, one stalled labor, and we're all burning our cabbage patch dolls in the driveway.

[00:12:16] One user says Haitian migrants come into a town and animals start to disappear.

[00:12:25] And Vance is like, reports now show.

[00:12:28] And then Trump's like, hey, America, they're eating the dogs and cats in Springfield, Ohio.

[00:12:34] The, the, the spiral of all this is like so fascinating to me from like a, a social aspect, like a social plague, or I don't know what you want to call it, but like just the, how quickly these things just like roll and spiral and like snowball into this huge thing.

[00:12:52] And it's like one person says something and now it's showing up in a presidential debate.

[00:12:58] Mm-hmm.

[00:12:58] And it's like not even, like, how is it even relevant to a presidential debate?

[00:13:04] Well, it isn't, but it's fear mongering, which is how, which is how, how shall I say this?

[00:13:12] Um, dangerous leaders gain a foothold.

[00:13:17] Because again, people didn't believe the, the eating the dogs and cats thing because it was a credible report with receipts.

[00:13:28] They believed it because someone they're bought into said it.

[00:13:33] And they don't demand receipts from that person.

[00:13:37] And by receipts, you mean like references?

[00:13:39] Yeah.

[00:13:39] Like show the proof, show me the proof.

[00:13:40] Because like when you are reporting something, I don't know a lot about journalism.

[00:13:46] So I'm just going to pull from like things I've, I've observed, um, reading articles and like the news, watching the news.

[00:13:56] They'll say, you know, this person on this day said blah.

[00:14:00] This was confirmed by this person from this town who on this day also said blah.

[00:14:06] Or this was disproven by blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

[00:14:10] Okay.

[00:14:11] So like even in the article I referenced, they were like, this is what Vance said.

[00:14:15] Less than 30 minutes later, it was debunked by local police.

[00:14:18] Then this specific person said this at this date on this platform.

[00:14:22] Then this specific person said this thing on this date on this platform.

[00:14:27] They hold these positions, blah, blah, blah.

[00:14:28] Like there's precision to the reporting.

[00:14:31] Now in my work as a public health scientist in training, I'm literally taking doctoral level classes on how to not only do credible research, but how to report it in a way that demonstrates its credibility, the measures, like all of these things.

[00:14:47] So it's very complicated as you're writing these things out.

[00:14:51] There is a proper way to show like this is how we collected the data.

[00:14:56] This is, these are the, this was our hypothesis.

[00:14:59] This was the dependent variable.

[00:15:01] This was the independent variable.

[00:15:03] Here's how we conducted the study.

[00:15:05] I'm going through ethics courses right now on like how to, how to do all of this properly.

[00:15:09] And then you have like specific values for every type of test that you run.

[00:15:15] So if you're running an analysis of variance, you're going to report it differently than a correlation or a t-test.

[00:15:20] There are different types of t-tests.

[00:15:22] Each t-test, you're going to report that differently.

[00:15:24] But there are certain numbers you have to present to show the credibility of your work.

[00:15:29] So when I say receipts, I'm like, you're demonstrating that you've done the work and you can prove it.

[00:15:34] Like proving a math problem.

[00:15:37] If you, if you remember that from growing up in school, which, you know, I don't because I didn't grow up in school, but that's what I'm told you had to do.

[00:15:44] It is.

[00:15:45] You always had to work your show, show your work and show how you got to the end result.

[00:15:50] That's the phrase I'm trying.

[00:15:51] Yeah.

[00:15:51] And then, yeah.

[00:15:53] And even with, even in like public education, I think most people can relate to this.

[00:15:57] If you went through public education system, like even when you're learning how to write papers.

[00:16:04] Cite your sources.

[00:16:05] Yeah.

[00:16:06] Well, you only have to cite your sources when you're making an argument.

[00:16:09] And I probably should have looked this up before I even started saying this, but like there's certain types of, of writing styles that you do have to cite your sources.

[00:16:19] And, you know, you put those sites, citations down at the end.

[00:16:22] If you're doing an opinion piece, you don't need that.

[00:16:25] But it's clearly an opinion piece.

[00:16:28] Right.

[00:16:28] Yeah.

[00:16:29] But there's a difference between making a factual statement and saying, here's my opinion.

[00:16:34] And I think specifically in these cases, at least for me, like when someone's getting up there on a stage and saying like, here's what's happening.

[00:16:43] In our country.

[00:16:45] Yeah.

[00:16:45] Like I expect there to be in, in nobody really does this.

[00:16:51] True.

[00:16:51] That's why we need more scientists in government.

[00:16:53] Well, I just, I feel like it's the responsible thing to do is if you're going to stand on a stage anywhere for any reason and say, here's what's happening.

[00:17:03] You should follow that up with like, I got my information from, you know, X, Y, and Z places.

[00:17:09] Like you don't have to go into that, but say like, you know, I've got all those citations for this.

[00:17:14] Like here's a printout of it or something like just provide a little more context other than just like making a statement.

[00:17:22] With no, nothing to back it up.

[00:17:24] And it needs to be a statistically significant statement.

[00:17:27] Like that was Bill's huge downfall, right?

[00:17:30] We're going to do this thing because one person, okay.

[00:17:33] I can tell you the significance value in that was nowhere near credible or statistically significant.

[00:17:39] The same thing with they're eating the dogs, they're eating the cats.

[00:17:43] Okay.

[00:17:43] We have one random user who's like, we don't even have the real name.

[00:17:47] We have a handle on a neo-Nazi on a far right social platform promoting a neo-Nazi protest.

[00:17:56] One, one person comments that once Haitians swarm into a town, animals start to disappear.

[00:18:04] And that turns into Vance and Trump saying immigrants are eating your animals, your pets.

[00:18:15] There is no, like there is no line of credibility through that.

[00:18:20] And where this comes back to with cults.

[00:18:22] So like, what can I offer as a cult survivor in this moment in our nation?

[00:18:28] Um, I can tell you how to be savvy about people like this.

[00:18:33] Uh, I can tell you how to intellectually conduct yourself for the next four years.

[00:18:39] Um, and the biggest thing is you need to realize that a narcissistic leader or someone with a cult-like mentality,

[00:18:47] they, they're not going to care about the facts or getting them right.

[00:18:50] All they care about is, are you so bought into me that you will do anything I say and you will believe anything I say.

[00:18:57] That's exactly how Bill was.

[00:18:59] Bill never had receipts.

[00:19:00] He never showed the proof, but people were so bought into him and thought that he was the way, the truth and the life.

[00:19:06] And no one comes to anything except through him.

[00:19:09] I'm, I'm taking the Bible there and, you know, manipulating it for my own purposes.

[00:19:14] Um, but like, that is how people perceive Bill.

[00:19:19] You know, I, I hear like, oh my God, my friend's friend says she was raped by Bill.

[00:19:26] Like I'm concerned.

[00:19:27] I take that to wrecking Chris.

[00:19:29] Bill is a guy who hurt someone in that way.

[00:19:34] Okay.

[00:19:34] I didn't know if I had a credible report or not, but it was serious and I was concerned.

[00:19:39] And, and I will caveat that this doesn't really help the argument I'm making right now, but this is important to me as a sexual assault survivor.

[00:19:47] It, I was very certain it was credible based on meeting this individual.

[00:19:53] And I don't know, like, I think if you survive a sexual assault, you just like, you know each other when you see each other.

[00:20:00] Like there's something that just connects there.

[00:20:03] So to me, it was a very credible allegation, um, for that reason.

[00:20:08] You know, you take it to Rick and Chris and they're like, no, he's a godly man.

[00:20:11] He would never do that.

[00:20:13] Um, and I, I see that.

[00:20:15] I do.

[00:20:16] I, I'm afraid of that in people who follow Trump blindly.

[00:20:19] Um, I understand that there are people who think he's a horrible human being.

[00:20:23] Um, but they really like his, his, some of his policies and that is your right as an American.

[00:20:32] So I'm, I don't want to talk about that today.

[00:20:34] I want to talk about like, how do we as Americans, like, okay, even if you are someone who follows Trump, you've got to be smart and you've got to be savvy because you're dealing with a Bill Gothard here.

[00:20:43] Whether you realize it yet or not, like you're dealing with a Bill Gothard.

[00:20:46] This is someone who, who's never going to care about showing you how they got to where they got in terms of like logic and reason and credibility.

[00:20:54] They are going to rely 100% on, I gotcha.

[00:20:59] You believe in me, you're mine now, and you're going to follow me blindly.

[00:21:04] So what I can bring to this conversation is don't follow blindly.

[00:21:07] Demand receipts.

[00:21:09] Like demand that the people you elect into office remain accountable to you.

[00:21:15] Um, you've, you've got to, you, you can't just say like, okay.

[00:21:21] Um, another big one is, you know, Trump got on national television for the debate and said that, um, people are, I forget his exact words.

[00:21:32] So I want to be very careful here, but he made some, some significant claims about abortion, especially late term abortion.

[00:21:39] And, um, I do remember that vice president Harris stopped and was like, whoa, that's an insult to the American women.

[00:21:45] Like that, that's not a credible accusation.

[00:21:49] And the day of the election, I was watching coverage.

[00:21:52] I watched CBS for a while.

[00:21:55] And maybe the, some of you saw this as well.

[00:21:56] There was, um, one of the news anchors was out like interviewing people on the streets.

[00:22:01] And there was a lady who was like, Democrats are using second and third trimester abortion as birth control.

[00:22:07] And, and she was quoting it.

[00:22:09] Like she got it from, you know, the Trump campaign.

[00:22:12] I'm like, okay, show me your sources then.

[00:22:16] Cause that's not my experience.

[00:22:18] Second and third trimester abortions are from what I understand as a public health professional, because there's a significant threat to the life of the mother, or they found out that they had to do a DNC cause the fetus or the baby died in utero.

[00:22:38] So like, I saw Bill do that too, where he would take, you know, one or two instances of maybe something truly happening that was, that wasn't great.

[00:22:48] But then saying like, everyone is doing this.

[00:22:52] Everyone is doing this.

[00:22:54] Um, so you need to, my point with all of this is you need to be a savvy consumer of information, even from your favorite political figures.

[00:23:02] I mean, I feel like most people, I don't know.

[00:23:05] I feel like it's a common feeling among Americans, at least that like the news sensationalizes things like that.

[00:23:12] Well, and, and people like Bill and Trump will sensationalize things for their own games.

[00:23:18] But I'm just saying like, they're like, people don't believe the news or they, they're like against the news because they just feel like they're being sensationalized.

[00:23:29] And it's not for those specific reasons, like one thing happened.

[00:23:33] And then all of a sudden it's like this huge ordeal and they don't have any trust.

[00:23:37] It's not statistically significant though.

[00:23:39] I think that what people need to understand is that folks like Bill and folks like Donald Trump, um, they're out there living a life.

[00:23:50] No one like I got them.

[00:23:52] They're following me.

[00:23:52] They're listening to me.

[00:23:53] Doesn't matter what I say.

[00:23:54] They'll believe me.

[00:23:55] They'll trust me.

[00:23:56] They'll do what I say.

[00:23:57] And that's, that's dangerous.

[00:23:59] That's dangerous.

[00:24:00] Oh gosh.

[00:24:01] For so many reasons.

[00:24:02] Um, but I'm not like, that is a whole problem.

[00:24:05] I'm concerned about.

[00:24:06] I'm more concerned about people getting sucked into that because I've been there and I've lived in that.

[00:24:13] Like I've lived under people.

[00:24:14] I wasn't ever bought into Bill in any hardcore way.

[00:24:18] I thought he was a creep and I've talked about that, but I, I was raised by people who were hardcore bought into him.

[00:24:25] And he did not have to prove anything to them ever.

[00:24:29] They just blindly followed him.

[00:24:30] So I think that's, that's my big concern here is I, I've seen this and I've seen the damage it does when people just blindly follow someone.

[00:24:38] Um, because they're so bought into that person.

[00:24:40] Doesn't matter what that person says.

[00:24:41] They're going to believe it.

[00:24:42] Um, and I think that it's also, it's also kind of interesting how people like Bill Gothard and Donald Trump attract a demographic that has very specific agendas.

[00:24:57] And like Christian nationalism is, is a big one that I'm, I'm pretty upset about, especially as someone who served in the military, um, and sort of defend our constitution.

[00:25:09] Our constitution is opposed to Christian nationalism.

[00:25:12] Um, but I think it's interesting that like those, those like high power narcissistic leaders attract folks with big agendas that are often harmful.

[00:25:26] I think there is a group of people like, I mean, the first amendment is freedom of religion.

[00:25:32] And that government cannot establish.

[00:25:36] A religion.

[00:25:37] Yeah.

[00:25:37] And it definitely seems like there are large, again, I don't have, this is, this is my opinion on what I see, um, personally and like online.

[00:25:49] Like there's, there's a large portion of people that are Christian.

[00:25:53] Our citizens in the United States are primarily Christian at this time.

[00:25:59] And there's nothing wrong with that.

[00:26:02] Like there's a freedom of religion and that's like the long established religion in this country.

[00:26:09] Um, but you don't have people that are so bought into the religion.

[00:26:15] Then now what they want.

[00:26:19] Is for those religious ideologies and values.

[00:26:26] Good, like good or bad.

[00:26:28] Like they want those to be the law.

[00:26:31] Yeah.

[00:26:31] Yeah.

[00:26:31] And I see that in the way people talk is like, this is my religious belief.

[00:26:39] I'm going to make sure that I elect people into office that believe the same thing I do.

[00:26:45] So that their religious beliefs make it into law some, somehow.

[00:26:52] Mm-hmm.

[00:26:54] And, you know, we've talked about the Joshua generation and how their highest goal was to sit on the Supreme Court.

[00:27:00] Um, and, and something that's very interesting is that the Supreme Court has oversight of the First Amendment.

[00:27:05] They are the ones, uh, the Supreme Court is supposed to ensure that I think there are like three, um, three things they check for to ensure that they're, we don't get a state religion or that the, um, the government isn't imposing a religion.

[00:27:25] Like through its, like through its laws and stuff.

[00:27:28] So that's like, make that connection too, folks.

[00:27:31] Like that's scary.

[00:27:34] Um, if, if you have Christian nationalists trying to infiltrate the Supreme Court, um, and the Supreme Court has oversight of ensuring that we don't have a state religion.

[00:27:44] Like this is, this is insidious.

[00:27:48] Um, and, and we need to, again, like be savvy, be, be smart consumers of knowledge or of not knowledge of data.

[00:27:59] Uh, don't just believe it.

[00:28:02] Don't just believe it because a charismatic person who knows he's got you is saying it and doesn't have to prove anything.

[00:28:12] Yeah. And like, I'll admit, like, I'm not super savvy on government stuff.

[00:28:17] Like even though I went through public education and I've taken, I don't know, five, six classes over civics or, or government.

[00:28:26] Like I was taught all that stuff, but I've told you this before, like outside of the podcast, I was like, I've taken so many government classes like throughout my education, but I took them at such a young age, like fifth grade or sixth grade.

[00:28:40] You don't care about it at that age.

[00:28:41] I mean, you learn it, but like, I don't think I was capable of like understanding it.

[00:28:46] And I feel like government, at least in the United States is like so complex that you, like you have to spend an enormous amount of time to try to understand all of that.

[00:28:56] And I feel like it's also detrimental to me that like, I learned it at such a young age that like, it's confusing to me to like, learn about it now.

[00:29:06] Because how I, how I learned it and how I like piece that together when I was 13, it's hard to like, well, was that right?

[00:29:18] Or did I just misunderstand it?

[00:29:20] Because I was only 13.

[00:29:21] I was trying to understand this complex political system.

[00:29:23] And so like, even for me, like, I don't, I don't know who controls what and who has the power to change these things unless I like sit down and specifically look at it.

[00:29:34] And I like, again, I don't understand all of that.

[00:29:37] And you've, you're, you're electing people that understand these nuances and they understand how to game that system.

[00:29:45] It's the same thing with like finances and stocks, like people that are so involved in that, like they know how to play it.

[00:29:52] Tax evasion.

[00:29:53] Like they know how to play that game.

[00:29:54] And like the average person doesn't.

[00:29:57] And so it's like, it's very prudent that you understand who you're electing, what their agenda is, what power will they assume if they get there?

[00:30:06] And like, what is their motivation?

[00:30:09] Cause it can get real dangerous.

[00:30:11] And like, I don't, I don't know, at least for me, as I get older, I'm like understanding that and understanding the importance of understanding the government system that you live in and who those people are in those offices and what they're trying to do.

[00:30:28] And like, what are the second and third order effects that like the potential outcomes of that?

[00:30:34] So a couple of things.

[00:30:36] Number one is I've got a literature review.

[00:30:38] I need to finish up.

[00:30:40] So I think we're going to have to cut this conversation a little bit short this week, but I think for me, the bottom line with this isn't like, did you vote for Trump?

[00:30:51] Did you vote for Harris?

[00:30:52] Cause like, it's done now, you know, like the people elected Trump advance to the highest offices in our nation.

[00:31:00] So we've got four years now, what are we going to do?

[00:31:03] And I know that there are people like Trump won the electoral college and the popular vote.

[00:31:09] More than half of our country bought into this person enough to cast their ballot for him.

[00:31:15] I don't think more than 50% of our nation thinks he's a great guy.

[00:31:19] It would, I would, I would just give up right now if I thought that.

[00:31:24] Um, I do think that more than 50% of our nation voted for him because of a mixture of things like Christian nationalism, white supremacism, neo-Nazism.

[00:31:36] And then on, on the less dangerous side of things, like they liked his economic policy.

[00:31:41] They liked his geopolitics, um, things like that.

[00:31:44] And, and to the folks who did not vote for Trump because of white supremacism and, you know, Nazism and, and horrible things, um, and hate and bigotry.

[00:31:54] If you voted for him because you like his, his policies around, you know, economics and geopolitics and stuff like that, be a demanding consumer of data from that administration.

[00:32:08] Cause Trump's out there thinking, okay, I got him.

[00:32:11] Like whatever I say now they're reading the elephants in the zoos.

[00:32:16] Like he's gonna like, there are people who would just take it at face value because Trump said it.

[00:32:21] Don't be that person.

[00:32:22] You will, you will unintentionally have joined a cult at that point.

[00:32:27] Cult leaders don't have to prove anything.

[00:32:30] Like they get, like I said, I've said this again and again in this episode, they get you to buy into them so that they never have to prove anything to you.

[00:32:36] And then they can do whatever the fuck they want.

[00:32:38] So be a demanding consumer of data.

[00:32:41] Make the administration give you the receipts and prove it.

[00:32:45] If they say it, okay, show me, show me why, show me how, show me the significance.

[00:32:54] Don't like, it'll piss them off too, which would be fun.

[00:32:56] Like, don't just believe everything Trump says.

[00:33:01] Don't just believe everything Vance says.

[00:33:03] Don't just believe everything the Trump administration says.

[00:33:05] Demand receipts, be a savvy citizen, be a savvy consumer of, of data.

[00:33:11] Um, and, and that's, that's how you don't join a cult.

[00:33:15] Like, that's how you don't join a cult.

[00:33:16] If you were demanding that the leader prove it to you, you're, you're not a cult follower.

[00:33:22] So.

[00:33:23] No, at that point you're making informed decisions.

[00:33:26] It's just very, I feel like we're entering a very unique time in which there's social media and you've got the, you know, the, the longstanding news and newspapers.

[00:33:35] And then you've got like TikTok coming around and like, there's a million ways in which data are flowing, like hit through our screens and into our brains.

[00:33:45] Uh, and it, it's, it's complex and it's confusing and you're just getting inundated with information.

[00:33:51] And it's very easy, um, to get bad information.

[00:33:56] Mm-hmm.

[00:33:56] And there are state actors out there that are, that are fabricating information and you've got AI on top of that that can make it look like somebody is saying something.

[00:34:06] That's not actually them.

[00:34:07] Like it's so easy to be misinformed.

[00:34:10] And I think, yes, all of that.

[00:34:14] Um, and I think that making leaders prove the statistical significance is a form of resisting cults.

[00:34:25] Um, because if Bill, like if Rick and Chris, if other cult men, if the board had been like, okay, Bill, how many people stalled pregnancies or labors were fixed by burning the cabbage patch?

[00:34:38] Right.

[00:34:39] Show us, give us the statistical significance.

[00:34:42] He would have been like, well, there was one and she wrote a letter about it and they would have been like, come on, you know, but no one was doing that.

[00:34:49] No one was putting pressure on this guy to prove statistical significance of his claims.

[00:34:54] Mm-hmm.

[00:34:55] It is the same thing with dating, same thing with courtship, same thing with his fucking Zeta water, same thing with abstinence and, you know, in marriage and all of these things.

[00:35:06] No one was pushing back.

[00:35:08] Push the fuck back.

[00:35:09] Mm-hmm.

[00:35:10] And then you are less likely to be swept into a national cult.

[00:35:15] Well, we'll wrap this up.

[00:35:17] Uh, we'll let you get back to doing the homework.

[00:35:20] We did.

[00:35:20] I hope this was helpful.

[00:35:21] Yeah.

[00:35:21] Like, so we talked about this when we were planning the episode and you took this like a completely different angle than I was expecting to.

[00:35:31] And it's very interesting to see your insights of like, I lived in a cult and the behaviors that you saw from a cult leader.

[00:35:42] Mm-hmm.

[00:35:42] And just like, you know, thanks for kind of showing the cult, like the similarities there and like what a cult leader will do and how they operate so that people can understand that, like that pattern.

[00:35:59] And, and use that information as they will and like, and just understand like, this is, that was your experience living under it for, you know, most of your childhood.

[00:36:08] For like almost 20 years.

[00:36:10] Yeah.

[00:36:10] And like what, what that looks like.

[00:36:12] Yeah.

[00:36:13] And, you know, I think that's the power of information of just like, here's, here's a data point for you to use in your decision making process.

[00:36:21] And this is, this is one opinion from one person in a cult, but like, I don't know anybody else that was in a cult.

[00:36:28] Uh, not that I know of, but you know, obviously get, you know, aggregate your information and make informed decisions.

[00:36:36] So thanks for giving us one more piece of data.

[00:36:40] And I'll say we posted that poll on our social media yesterday.

[00:36:43] Um, asking folks like, what do you want?

[00:36:46] I, I let the poll run overnight.

[00:36:48] I saw which one had the most support.

[00:36:51] I put this together in like, what, 15 minutes or something over coffee this morning.

[00:36:55] So I recognize that this is not the most complete answer, um, for this, or this isn't the most complete conversation, but this is like, Hey, election happened this week.

[00:37:05] We didn't want to wait another week.

[00:37:07] We wanted to address this.

[00:37:08] Y'all seem to, um, care about this topic and we care about you and I care about this nation deeply.

[00:37:14] Um, and I know Kyle does too.

[00:37:16] So this is, this is the first stab at it and hopefully it was a very informed stab, but also recognizing like it, this wasn't a complete conversation.

[00:37:27] We didn't, we couldn't go as deep into the weeds and I do have a paper to write.

[00:37:30] So we couldn't sit here and talk about it as long as, as I think both of us would like to.

[00:37:34] Um, so if, if you want more about this, make it known, put it in the comments, send us a message, contact us through the website, um, quote, quote, I left behind.com.

[00:37:45] You can, you can reach out that way.

[00:37:47] Um, the other, the other response that got some love was doing a Q and a, so we'll, I think we've got like four of those planned in the coming months.

[00:37:59] And then we also, I can't announce anything yet, but, um, we might have a very exciting guests on the podcast.

[00:38:06] We're meeting in a, in a couple of weeks to look over like the possibility, um, with this individual.

[00:38:12] And if that happens, we will start promoting it and I'll be like over the moon and I might never come back down to earth again.

[00:38:21] So it's nice knowing you guys love you.

[00:38:23] I'll be in space from now on if this happens.

[00:38:26] Um, but yeah, just let us know if you want us to talk about this more.

[00:38:30] And if yes, like specifically, what do you want us to talk about?

[00:38:33] Cause I will create time to like do some deeper dives and, and do more prep work and stuff.

[00:38:41] If, if there are like specific things about this whole environment in which we in the United States find ourselves that you would like to, um, have a conversation about.

[00:38:51] I mean, I enjoy hearing from people cause you know, you and I try to come up with ideas for episodes and then we get people asking information and questions.

[00:39:00] And I'm like, I never thought of that.

[00:39:02] So yeah, keep them, keep the comments and questions coming and we'll be back next week.

[00:39:07] Thanks for listening to another episode of the cult I left behind until next time.

[00:39:13] Don't join a cult.

[00:39:14] If you enjoyed this podcast, please like share and subscribe, and we will catch you on the next episode.