This week I welcome Alanda Carter, @The Recovering Hunbot for a discussion about multilevel marketing and the coercive, cult-like tactics that are employed at every level to promote, recruit, retain and financially devastate their “members.” Alanda has personal experience to share about this and has been a staunch anti-MLM crusader who has helped educate me on the subject. Enjoy! The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #280: The Dangers (and Cultism) of Multilevel Marketing appeared first on The Sens...
Jan 16, 2021•1 hr 6 min
This week I welcome back Jeff Hawkins for one of the most fun and certainly interesting conversations I’ve had in a long while about Scientology, David Miscavige and the marketing and expansion of Scientology (or lack thereof). This is a wide-ranging discussion and we tie in some current events as well, which may help give some insight into why this last week was so mad. Enjoy! Jeff’s email: jeffersonhawkins1 (at) msn.com. The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #279: Scientology, Miscavige and Marke...
Jan 09, 2021•1 hr 58 min
This week we do our traditional year-end review of what happened in 2020, mainly in but also of course outside of the world of Scientology. There were some good and some bad, some ups and some downs, but certainly no shortage of things to talk about. Enjoy! The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #278: The 2020 Year in Review – In and Out of Scientology appeared first on The Sensibly Speaking Podcast ....
Jan 02, 2021•1 hr 5 min
This week I welcome Matan Schecter, a second-generation former Messianic Jew. As we clarify in this episode, that term is a misnomer of the highest order and Matan had to face a great deal of struggle to find his own voice and acknowledgement of his own identity. We talk about what the Messianic Movement is all about and how Matan had to undergo multiple attempts to “adjust” his gender identity because of religious belief. His story is quite something and I hope you learn as much as I did from i...
Dec 26, 2020•2 hr 12 min
This week I welcome back Jon Atack to discuss the problem of dealing with cults and how can we ever hope to solve this immense task, or should we even be trying? In this far-ranging conversation we cover answers to this and a lot more. Enjoy! The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #276: The Problem of Authoritarianism ft. Jon Atack appeared first on The Sensibly Speaking Podcast ....
Dec 19, 2020•1 hr 59 min
This week I welcome back my friend and DC lawyer Ciprian Ivanof to discuss Scientology lawsuits, both recent and old, and what lawyers for Valerie Hanie may have gotten wrong in their latest fight against the Church of Scientology. We recorded this last week and it was just yesterday that news came down that Haney’s appeal to the Supreme Court was rejected. That decision doesn’t change the opinions we offer here about what went wrong on her case and hopefully how we can make sure the same mistak...
Dec 12, 2020•1 hr 40 min
This week I welcome local Denver author Dylan Aames to discuss his book Lies Your Psychologist Told You, a critical take on some of the taller tales that have been accepted as literal or practical truth when perhaps they should not be, including in the very textbooks of psychology. We have some lively and interesting discussion in this one. Enjoy! The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #274 – Lies Your Psychologist Told You ft. Dylan Aames appeared first on The Sensibly Speaking Podcast ....
Dec 05, 2020•1 hr 16 min
This week we are doing a bit more of a raw interview than usual as I discuss the Scientology experience with former member Shane Rybacki, a second gen member from Detroit and Orange County who had quite a few wild experiences growing up in and around Scientology including a brief stint on the EPF and working for the Office of Special Affairs in Orange County. Now he’s ready to start talking about them. This is the first time I’ve had to bleep out content in one of my podcasts for legal reasons, ...
Nov 28, 2020•1 hr 19 min
This week I welcome Stacie and Jeff Mallinson to discuss how they have been pushing back from within the religious community against “religious wolves,” people in religious settings who engage in destructive cult behavior and abusive religious indoctrination of children. We found quite a bit of common ground and I hope you enjoy this talk as much as I did. Mallinson website Alfie Cohen – psychologist The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #272: Pushing Back against Religious Wolves appeared first on...
Nov 21, 2020•1 hr 44 min
This week I welcome back Dr. Jonas Kaplan to discuss the possibilities of neuralink or the melding of our brains with electronics, potentially launching us into a whole new sphere of existence in a digital world or using digital tools to assist every aspect of our thinking and our life. Sound like a transhumanist’s wet dream? Well, maybe we can temper all that with some reality. Enjoy! The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #271: Connecting Brains and Machines ft. Dr. Jonas Kaplan appeared first on ...
Nov 14, 2020•1 hr 10 min
This week I welcome Tim Ward, co-author of Pro-Truth, to discuss a grassroots social movement towards objective truth in politics, media and social forums. We discuss what this book and movement are designed to do, why this is more than necessary at this point in American culture and we even get pretty deep into the psychology driving so much of the divisiveness these days. I hope you’ll give this one a listen. Enjoy! Pro-Truth Pledge website What is the Pro-Truth Pledge? Click here . The post S...
Nov 07, 2020•1 hr 8 min
This week I welcome back Ciprian Ivanof, an attorney practicing in Washington DC, who helps me breakdown and understand some of the legal hurdles and difficulties that former Scientologists and other ex-cult trauma survivors experience in trying to bring their former abusers to justice. This is an incredibly frustrating topic for many and I tried this week to share some of your frustrations and see what do we need to change in how legal cases have been brought against destructive cults. Enjoy! T...
Oct 31, 2020•1 hr 43 min
This week I welcome Janice Selbie, a Canadian counsellor who specializes in religious trauma. We discuss a number of points about recovering from religious trauma, including Janice’s own story as a deeply devout believer and her journey out of religion and current views on the matter. Enjoy! Janice Selbie: @Wise_Counsellor Website: https://Divorcing-religion.com The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #268: Recovering from Religious Trauma ft. Janice Selbie appeared first on The Sensibly Speaking Pod...
Oct 24, 2020•1 hr 10 min
This week I welcome Mike Fallek, a journalist/documentarian who has been investigating the online or what he refers to as “hashtag” cult of MGTOW (“Men Going Their Own Way”), a men’s rights group that exists pretty much exclusively on the internet. We talk in detail about this, the cultic elements of it and even how to reach people in these kinds of groups. Enjoy! Mike Fallek My earlier podcast on MRAs The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #267: Hashtag Cults and MGTOW appeared first on The Sensibl...
Oct 17, 2020•1 hr 29 min
Two weeks ago I posted a podcast with Kat, a woman who had “infiltrated” the Church of Scientology of Austin and ended up having a bit more of a personal journey than she thought she would. We covered a lot of ground in her story but we wanted to give you an opportunity to ask her about the experience and what happened. We did a live stream this morning and got some great questions and feedback from viewers direct to me and Kat and had a great time responding. Enjoy! The post Sensibly Speaking P...
Oct 10, 2020•1 hr 12 min
This week I welcome back Dr. Jeff Wasel to discuss the detailed and necessary backstory to what could conceivably be thought of as one of the most heinous acts of the US government. We take a stab at explaining this in a different light, while understanding that this is a sensitive topic and we make no efforts to “apologize” for anyone or any group then or now. We are merely reflecting in this podcast on history as it happened, not how we might have wanted it to happen and in what light should o...
Oct 03, 2020•1 hr 20 min
This week I welcome Kat, a woman who purposefully became involved with Scientology in Austin three years ago but came away with a story vastly different from the one she thought she would tell. This is not a victim story and yet we see from this exactly how Scientology negatively influences almost everything it comes into contact with. This story is a good one. Enjoy! The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #264: The Scientology Experience with Kat appeared first on The Sensibly Speaking Podcast ....
Sep 26, 2020•2 hr 35 min
This week I welcome PhD candidate Deborah Powney from the UK, a 14-year veteran of the alcohol marketing business who is now studying psychology and domestic violence. She has a lot to say about how the marketing industry works for real and we get down and dirty on what they are doing and exactly how. This has been a topic that I have wanted to start exposing directly on my channel for some time, as many don’t realize how intensive or persuasive the advertising they see every day is, or how prop...
Sep 19, 2020•2 hr 13 min
This week I welcome back Dr. Jonas Kaplan, a cognitive neuroscientist in Los Angeles who has been helping us to deconstruct and understand the supercomputer in all of our heads: our brain. This week, we tackle the subject of memory and it’s a very interesting ride, especially when we make comparisons to what L. Ron Hubbard had to say about memory in Dianetics . Dr. Kaplan was quite amused and I think you will be too. Enjoy! The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #262: Memory (In and Out of Scientolo...
Sep 12, 2020•1 hr 30 min
This week I welcome authors Dr. Myke Merrill and Michael Wilson, who have written Why Do People Act That Way (And What Can I Do About It?). Both Dr. Merrill and Mr. Wilson are men of faith and feel they have found a system of ideas and techniques which can benefit people based on emotions, motivations, perceptions and behavior. We go into this a bit in the show and discuss some basic ideas of where emotion comes from and what kind of things can we do to perhaps curtail or control the unwanted on...
Sep 05, 2020•1 hr 36 min
This week I welcome author A.P. Sylvia to the show to discuss his book Vampires of Lore: Traits and Modern Misconceptions. He has traced the origin of almost all common myths and ideas about vampires back through history and we talk in this episode about quite a few of them and share our love for the genre. This is a very unusual podcast for my channel but one I really enjoyed doing and I think if you have any interest in vampires at all, this show will have something to teach you. Enjoy! Vampir...
Aug 29, 2020•1 hr 38 min
This week I welcome back Dr. David Kyle Johnson from Kings College to discuss practical critical thinking in the real world, including how we apply key ideas to debunk or help evaluate medical or science claims we are told all the time. We dive into some of the pseudoscientific ideas surrounding the current craze around masks to highlight some of these critical thinking principles. Enjoy! Article about masks The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #259: Critical Thinking, Science and Masks ft. Dr. Da...
Aug 22, 2020•1 hr 44 min
This week I welcome back Jon Atack to have a discussion about government morality and how the compares and contrasts with individual morality – a discussion that ranges far and wide and, if nothing else, I’m sure you will find as fascinating as I did. Enjoy! The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #258: Do We Need Authoritarian Governments? ft. Jon Atack appeared first on The Sensibly Speaking Podcast ....
Aug 15, 2020•2 hr 1 min
This week I am tackling Scientology’s Rehabilitation Project Force (RPF) in a way no one has before: a complete beginning to end explanation of the program using the inside Church documents which describe in detail how it is to be established and executed. The RPF is a grueling, hard-labor re-education camp and after hearing this podcast you’ll understand why I say that and what I actually got out of it, both good and bad. Enjoy! Truth Rundown video The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #257: Scien...
Aug 01, 2020•2 hr 36 min
This week I welcome Mark Turi, friend, former Scientologist and Canadian, to help me discuss a train of logic I have about critical thinking and the bubble worlds that we all live in and around. This is a non-partisan talk and I mostly dive into my Scientology past for examples of how our thinking, beliefs and emotions can betray our very perception of reality and ensure we are always at odds with one another. File this one under food for thought. I hope you will join us for what we thought was ...
Jul 25, 2020•1 hr 43 min
This week I am joined by Adrian Lee Oliver to discuss some concerns and issues he as a black man has with Black Lives Matter both as an organization and political ideology. While I can’t say for sure that this is the last thing I’ll ever publish on this topic, I think the four podcasts I’ve created on critical race theory and BLM cover this territory well. Like Scientology, there is a constructive and rights-driven outer layer to BLM and then there is a very nasty and cult-like inner set of teac...
Jul 18, 2020•1 hr 36 min
This week I am joined by former Pentecostal Alexis Arralynn to talk about estrangement from her family, and cult beliefs and practices she was exposed to as a child which forever altered her world view and ability to survive. We discuss our mutual difficulties growing up in a cult environment and get into why we believe religious indoctrination and child rearing do not go well together. Enjoy! When the Bough Breaks podcast The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #254: Surviving the Pentecostal Moveme...
Jul 11, 2020•1 hr 44 min
This week I am joined by Rick Lockhart II, co-host of “In Black & White” on the YFNANews as well as “Color-Full Circle with Rick & Al”. We discuss our mutual concerns and common ground on the topic of Black Lives Matter, both as an organization and a social movement and various reasons for why bias, perception and ideological pitfalls might get in the way of achieving human rights. YFNANews link The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #253: Rick Lockhart II and I Talk #BlackLivesMatter appear...
Jul 04, 2020•2 hr 25 min
This week I am joined by Benjamin Boyce, fellow YouTuber and alumnus of Evergreen State College in Washington. We get into some nitty-gritty discussion of Benjamin’s experience at the college and how much of what happened with Black Lives Matter there was a sort of precursor to what is happening now with BLM across the country. Benjamin Boyce on YouTube The post Sensibly Speaking Podcast #252: Why I Have Concerns about Black Lives Matter ft. Benjamin Boyce appeared first on The Sensibly Speaking...
Jun 27, 2020•1 hr 39 min
This week I welcome a wonderful and very special gust, Erin Louis, author Expose Yourself: How to Take Risks, Question Everything, and Find Yourself. We discuss her past as a stripper, she answers my numerous silly questions about the sex trade and her experiences in it and then we discuss critical thinking, which she has literally written a book about. I hope you’ll give this one a watch because it’s a lot of fun. Enjoy! Erin’s book on Amazon This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp BetterHELP L...
Jun 20, 2020•1 hr 54 min
