Goop, Teens, and Wellness Myths with Hayley Krischer

[00:00:00] This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered legal, medical, or mental health advice. The views and opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the podcast and are not intended to malign any religion, group, club, organization, business, individual, anyone, or anything. I'm Sarah Edmondson.

[00:00:25] And I'm Anthony Nippy Ames. And this is A Little Bit Culty. Cults are commonplace now. From fandoms to fads, we're examining them all. We look at what happens when things that seem like a great thing at first go bad. Every week we chat with survivors, experts, and whistleblowers for real culty stories told directly by the people who lived through them. Because we want you to learn a few things that we've had to learn the hard way.

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[00:01:41] Today we're diving into an industry that's been around since forever and has probably exploded more since social media took over our lives. You know, the one that throws around buzzwords like body positivity and self-care and collagen while making millions off our insecurities. Especially when it comes to us ladies and teen girls. We are talking, of course, about the wellness and beauty industry. Think goop, vagina candles, and every celebrity with a new skincare line. Or wellness tea.

[00:02:11] Or protein powder. Or hydrogen water. Or that boot camp. It's everywhere. Yes, it is, Sarah. I think we should definitely do another episode on the masculinity boot camp things. A Little Bit Culty meets bro culture? Yes. Yeah. I'm with you. Seriously though, a lot of these products are easy to laugh off. But there's also something potentially a little darker lurking beneath the surface. This industry is basically the Wild West. Unregulated and preying on our fears of aging and not being enough. And don't forget the fucking price tag.

[00:02:40] These products are not cheap. But hey, what's a little bit culty about exploiting our desires to be better, feel better, and look better? It's a perfect follow-up to our recent episodes with Brandon Guffey on the dangers of social media and Mara Einstein on culty marketing practices. So, to help us unpack all this, we've got Haley Krischer on the show today. Anyway, she's a culture journalist and a fiction author whose new novel, You Belong to Me, dives deep into the impact of the beauty industry on women and teen girls. She's here to spill that tea on the cultiness behind wellness and beauty culture, especially online.

[00:03:09] Let's give a warm welcome to Haley. Yeah, thanks so much for having me.

[00:03:28] I've watched a lot of the documentaries and what you guys have been through, and it's just amazing to hear your podcast and just how many people you're helping and how much you're able to just delve into this world. Thank you, Haley. Appreciate that. That means a lot. I can tell by your book that you've clearly done your cult research. So, this is going to be a fun episode for us.

[00:03:52] As I mentioned in our voice note exchange, a little bit different off our normal type of interview, but I think this is a really important one and will be interesting and we'll have a good time. And Sarah told me Van Douch was an influence for the cult. Oh, there's a lot of influence. A lot of influence in there that I saw. Yeah. We'll get into all of it. Tell our audience a little bit about you. What's your career trajectory? How'd you end up here?

[00:04:15] So, I have been writing sort of all of my life and I also worked at health food stores when I was younger. So, I had like sort of this world of wellness that I was surrounded by for many years while I was doing a lot of freelance writing. And then I became a journalist, started just writing a lot about pop culture, a lot about women.

[00:04:39] Then I got my MFA in creative writing and just started working on books and found myself really drawn to writing about teenage girls, especially. And the vulnerability, but also the power of teenage girls and how scary and terrifying they can be and also how incredibly insightful they can be. I have a 16-year-old daughter, so I'm in it. You're in it.

[00:05:03] And Haley, I don't know if you know this, but Keith's first venture or the venture before personal professional development was in health and wellness and he sold vitamins and various things like that. I believe it because it can be so sketchy and there's just so many people who just – I mean, he's just a perfect example of that kind of person. He has all the answers. No one else has the answers. He's going to make you well. He's going to make you whole.

[00:05:33] And that's sort of what I wanted to do in this book, in my book, You Belong to Me, just sort of going into this world of wellness and how it can be such a – it can be one place that can really heal you and it can be also a place that can completely destroy you. So there's a very fine line. Absolutely. I'm just curious, does your 16-year-old daughter like your books and read your books? You know, she hasn't read my books.

[00:06:01] And I think it's just because it's too close to home maybe. But she really wanted to read this and she just hasn't yet. But it's kind of funny to see her be as interested in this as she is. She's just like every other kid who is on TikTok, on Instagram. And they're just getting bombarded by images of girls and women and people who are doing makeup. They're professionals.

[00:06:27] They're making videos over and over again in this kind of perfect way. They don't show all the takes. They don't show all the bad videos. They just show what they are saying is going to work, whether they're getting paid or not getting paid. And my daughter is vulnerable to this. I am as well. You know, my stomach was hurting the other night. I'm scrolling in the middle of the night. I got a TikTok ad for some kind of digestive thing. And I'm like, this sounds great.

[00:06:57] I'm going to buy it. And I – why not? And I got it the other day and I thought, I cannot even believe that I bought this at 2 o'clock in the morning. But of course I did. I can't even tell you how many times I've made it to the checkout and been like, what am I doing? Haley, I have to introduce you to Mara, who I texted you about, Mara Einstein, because she wrote this book, Hoodwinked, about how marketers use the same strategies as cults. I just feel like, A, you would be friends.

[00:07:18] B, actually after she was on our podcast, which will probably air just before this one, I messaged her this like ad for a liquid collagen thing that I almost bought. And I was like, I need this. Tell me I don't need this, please, because I'm going to buy it. I was totally hooked by the videos. And everyone's powder is backed by research. And how do you – Yeah, research. Yeah. It's not – and the wellness world actually has a lot more room.

[00:07:46] It's very loosey-goosey about what you're allowed to say, which is why celebrity brands like Poosh and Goop and so many of them. I don't know Poosh. Poosh is Kourtney Kardashian's vitamin supplement brands. Yeah. Clearly I'm not on TikTok. Yes. Well, the idea is that two O's can make a very successful name for an internet brand, which is why Gwyneth Paltrow – she did the play on her name, you know, GP, but in the center it's two O's like Google.

[00:08:15] So Poosh is kind of the same thing. But it's ridiculous. That's a branding trick? Two O's? It is a branding. Poop. It is a – yeah. That's the next one. Toop. Toop. Back – and we're going to totally deep dive into wellness, but just the thought I had about the girls thing. We have two boys, five and ten, so – and I always thought I would have girls. And just recently I hung out with a friend of mine whose daughter is I think the same age as yours. And she was with maybe like six to eight of her friends at this music festival.

[00:08:45] And I was just staring at them as shocked at how identical they all looked. Like I could not tell them apart. They had the same haircut. They were all wearing jean shorts and like cute little – it was summer – cute little white variations of the same white tank top. And their makeup was the exact same. Like their eyebrows were the same and it was that same kind of like no makeup, natural, glowy vibe with like – you know what I'm talking about?

[00:09:13] Like perfect mascara and brushed eyebrows. Yes, yes. Maybe looking at me like I'm crazy. You've got a lot of detail there. Well, I'm a woman and I was – that's not what our makeup – I love it, but that's not what our makeup looked like in the 90s. No, no. No. My daughter came home the other day with a eyebrow scissor to cut her eyebrows. I'm like, dude, your eyebrows are perfect. Why are you using this to cut your eyebrow hairs?

[00:09:39] It's like I could see, I could understand, but you know why you would use like a brush for it. But why do you need to like go that far? And it's because she saw something and she saw some tutorial and how this is how your eyebrows are supposed to look. It's like any kind of look, right? We had like say Farrah Fawcett in the 1970s of like, you know, waved hair or whatever it was, feathered hair. And blue eyeshadow, that was the big thing.

[00:10:06] But now they're just seeing it on such a different level because it's constant. We thought we were being played back then because we were getting commercials and posters and magazines. But magazines don't even have nearly the reach of social media, not even a little bit. Right. And it's not just for women. Like even with our boys, Troy is 10. He wants a baseball bat. It's all about the gear, the sports gear. They see it on YouTube. They see it wherever they watch stuff. But they also have the same haircut. Have you noticed that the boys have that poof thing? The poof.

[00:10:36] The broccoli. The broccoli poof. Yes. What do you call it there? Yeah. I'm not sure what they call it, but I know exactly what you're talking about. And I have a 21-year-old son and mullets are still very big right now because that came back all of a sudden. And you have these guys – well, it's done ironically. There's a lot of irony that goes on in a lot of these trends, which is kind of interesting. That my son – something – I was talking to him about something and I said, oh, demons. People have their demons. And he said, oh, demons.

[00:11:05] And, like, it was a joke. And I said, what do you mean? Like, why are you saying it like that? And he said, oh, because, you know, everybody says, oh, you have demons. You're demons. And so these kids, like, take this sort of irony, you know, in haircuts or makeup and memes. And they use it, like, constantly because they're constantly being fed this information. And so, of course, all the girls look alike, you know. And the boys, too. And the boys, too. I was shocked with the poof.

[00:11:33] Like, I thought it was just an Atlanta thing and I went back to Vancouver and they all had the – Teenage boys, when they walk – they're just, like, little replicas of themselves. Yes. With the hoodies. And maybe it was like that, but – Yeah, the hoodies. Well, the hoodies. Yeah, the backpack and the – yes. Oh, and the Uggs, the slip-on Uggs. Who's wearing those? I mean, I also have a pair. But all the kids and the Crocs and – Yeah, the slip-on. I got to step in here. Anyway, why are we talking about this on a cult podcast? You tell me.

[00:12:03] I mean, you guys are the experts, really. I'm just an author, so – but this is what I think. I think that inevitably something happens where these brands can be predatory on the fact that people want to be in groups and people want to feel accepted and people want to – inevitably, people like to sort of look alike. Even if you're sort of an outsider, you kind of have a group of people that you have a similar vibe with. And middle schoolers, I mean, this is their thing.

[00:12:31] They don't want to be sort of the odd person out. They want to feel belonging. And they want to feel like they belong among their peers. And so I think that that has an enormous amount to do with it. And it's always been this way. But now it's just so much more prevalent. Now the words and the messaging about, like, how to feel good.

[00:12:54] And, you know, it sort of becomes this dangerous thing when it has great intentions of feeling good. I want to feel good. I want to look good. You know, that will make me feel good internally. But I think at the end of the day, you have to really be able to look at it and say, well, how much of this is me and how much of this is somebody else? That's where the manipulation comes in. That was going to be my question because a lot of it, to me, and give me your impression, feels like concentrated.

[00:13:23] Like, here's the Polaroid. And instead of going through some sort of, like most teenagers do, self-reflection, here's how I want to express myself. It's like, here, this is what's acceptable. And the next thing you know, you see the puffy hair at the gym and what you saw with the kids. And it feels, what's the word, like plastic in a way. Right, because it feels fake. Like, are you, is this really authentically, and authentic is another, like one of those, you know, eye roll words.

[00:13:52] But is it authentically you? And there's, there's an element of like, of course, we all want to be able to belong. We all want to belong. But how much of it is real? How much are you able to separate it out? I think that's really the question. I would throw that back to the two of you because I'd be fascinated to hear what your thoughts are about the wellness industry as former cult members and being so knowledgeable about this subject.

[00:14:20] Because, I mean, I could see it as a journalist and I could see how I'm being preyed upon. And I still will click the button and say, yes, I'm buying that. Yeah, as though we're smarter. I do, I do have a lot of thoughts on that, but let me ask you first and we'll come back to us. As a journalist, what were some of the things, because as you're talking, I'm realizing, of course, there's always fads. There's always fashion trends. There's always ways that we have our lipstick or eye shadow. See 1980s. Yeah, look at, yeah, 1980s, extreme.

[00:14:47] But like social media and the internet and branding and marketing and all the things that we'll have just talked about with Mara Einstein. Yeah, when did you start to see it get worse or like what kind of things did you see? What were your warning signs? Well, I think that studies have really shown that once the internet took off, that's when the wellness world exploded. I did work at a health food store in San Francisco in the 90s. So it sounds so cliche, like I wasn't this hippie person.

[00:15:16] I had a parent who my dad was very, very into vitamins and he was like this super just buttoned up business guy. But he wanted to live longer. His parents died when they were young. And that I think is where inevitably all of those feelings come from. You want to feel better because we want to live longer and we want to feel good about ourselves. And so maybe doctors aren't giving us those answers.

[00:15:45] And so if that's the case, well, maybe lots of vitamin D and lots of vitamin A. And I could take these supplements because this person said, take this, you'll feel better. So my dad was really one of those people. And he followed these two scientists, actually, who were kind of, I hate to use the word strange, but there's really no other way to put it, is that their names were Dirk Pearson and Sandy Shaw.

[00:16:08] And if you look them up, they wore these like little leather outfits on talk shows and they would bend iron bars. And they had... Because they were so healthy? They were so healthy. And wearing their tiny little outfits on talk shows. And people were basically making fun of them. But they were these sort of brilliant people who realized that vitamins were a way for them to feel better. And they had lots of other thoughts as well.

[00:16:38] But this is sort of what I saw when I was a teenager. My father, who was, again, this kind of buttoned up businessman and just started taking all these vitamins. And so I think my mind was always kind of open to this world. And so when I started working, I worked at a couple of different health food stores. And when I did that, I just started seeing a lot of people who just were so desperate for answers. You know, you just... You feel bad. Your doctor is just telling you to stop drinking coffee or eat better.

[00:17:08] Especially in the 90s, there were just a lot more vague recommendations to people. And so people would come into the health food stores saying, I have this problem. I have that problem. Now, I was in my 20s. I wasn't a doctor. I'm not a doctor. And the kind of desperation that I saw people having and wanting answers, it started to creep me out a little bit. You know, I started to wonder, why are they listening to me? I'm like, you know, I have an English degree.

[00:17:37] And I'm a writer. I happen to work at a health food store. I did my homework about like why you need acidophilus and why you need vitamin C. But I saw this wellness world just getting bigger and bigger. And then, you know, once the aughts hit, you know, the 2000s, it just blew up. And that really has to do with people sharing information and wanting and desperate for answers.

[00:18:04] And so I think that was the answer to your question in a very long roundabout way about the wellness world. Yeah. You know, I follow some business ideas on just on Instagram, just kind of scrolling. And there's this one person who just said, if you're going to start a business, women always want to look good. Sick people always want to feel good. And it gave a couple categories. And if you look at, I'm mostly on Instagram, but if you look at what comes across most people's feed is those demographics.

[00:18:33] Especially if you start searching them, the algorithm will give you more. No, I mean, I looked into one. Gary Brecka is a guy that's out there right now that's very big with like his like hydrogen water. And then there's this guy, Ryan Johnson, who's like got that company Don't Die. Have you seen him? No. Oh, and he says he's going to live to like 200. Oh. Claims he has all the best biomarkers. Like, why do you want to live till 200? That's another story.

[00:18:59] Well, he's not going to live to 200, but like he's got every monitor on him and to the point where he actually monitors his semen count and all that stuff. New York Times is getting ready to do a hit piece on him and he got ahead of it. And I was reading about it yesterday about like what they're doing and all that stuff. So it's, it's all the like kind of patterns of cult leaders that I've seen when they start to get held accountable, they get ahead of it. And it's just, here we are again, except it's health and wellness.

[00:19:25] And to your question, Haley, Nippy and I are definitely on the, if there's a spectrum, we're more into it than not. Like if you have been listening to our podcast from the beginning, I am a self-proclaimed, like let me put it this way. If I had read your book or if I had been the main character in your book in reality, I would have joined that group. Like all the things from the turmeric shots to the probiotic matcha smoothie or all the things. I'm like, I'm actually drinking matcha right now, by the way. I have kombucha in the fridge.

[00:19:54] I take my vitamins. I'm not obsessive about it. I don't think anymore. I definitely was. And in fact, I was probably the most obsessive about it when I was in NXIVM because it was so much about being fit and well and thin. Right. So that was a big part of the image of it. But we're, you know, we both love to cold plunge. I love to infrared sauna. I just feel good when I'm. But like, I'm not going to start a podcast about it. You know what I mean? Or sell them. I'll destroy a pint of ice cream on the weekend. No problem. Right.

[00:20:22] And you guys, I do Reiki. I'm not even sure why I do Reiki, but it feels good. And I'm like handing over $150 to this Reiki master. And it feels great because I'm going through like a, there's a lot of stressful things going on in my life right now. And I thought, okay, what else can I add to this? And I, I've never done Reiki. I meditate. I, I do all the things as well. You know, my daughter makes me matcha lattes in the morning.

[00:20:50] I mean, I'm fully in it, but I think. Feeling good is a tangible result though. Like, so yeah. What's wrong with feeling good, right? When does it become culty? When does it become culty? I think that's the thing. I think once you get hooked on something to the point where it's dangerous or where you're like spending all of your money. I think it's when you lose your autonomy and you start following somebody completely. And it's not even just about wellness. You know what I mean? Like it's beyond wellness. It's a, it's a lifestyle.

[00:21:20] It's about, then it becomes like a cult of personality. It's like, okay, I'm just following this person because that's what they say to do. And, you know, in today's world, it's just so easy to do that. It's very easy, even if it's not social media, because I think that we're so connected, especially to celebrities in such a way. We feel like we know them because they have their own social media accounts. I mean, I just got an email from Kelly Wurstler this morning because I get her email on her sub stack or her newsletter.

[00:21:51] She's a designer, but I'm fascinated by her as a person and how fit she is. And she did an entire newsletter today on everything that she eats all day. She shows exactly the recipe for her smoothies. She shows exactly how long she's in her sauna for, how she's working out, how she's meditating. And I thought, oh, this is what I want to do all day. This, I want to be exactly like Kelly Wurstler. And then I thought, okay, wait, stop, stop, stop, stop.

[00:22:20] I'm about to go on a cult podcast. I mean, but that's like a cult of personality. I think that that's like, how could we not be attracted to feeling better? Yeah. Yeah. I'm tossing this around in my mind because as somebody who would also follow, I don't know who that person is you just mentioned, but I want her email. So I want to be on that list. Not even questioning it? No. No. You have to be. You have to. That's great. I want the smoothie recipe. There you go. There's your answer.

[00:22:48] She's a designer and she's, but so like, she's just a designer who happens to also like a interior designer and she makes furniture. But like, so that's cool, right? I see that as a cool thing. But now she's also even going further into like, here's what I do to make myself fit. Here's what I do to make myself feel well. And so you buy into that. It's impossible not to.

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[00:27:06] So how do you navigate this without joining a cult or doing something culty? Like when does it become not good or culty? Yeah. What's the line? Yeah. I mean, I'm probably not completely supposed to talk about goop in connection to this book, but I did do an enormous amount of research about goop when I was writing this book because how can I not?

[00:27:30] I mean, it's a celebrity, like say 10 years ago, Gwyneth Paltrow was creating yoni eggs for people to use. Do you know what I'm talking about? Yes. The yoni eggs? Tell our audience because you're going to say it, not me. Okay. She's Joe Rogan for women. Is that right? That's the joke. Gwyneth Paltrow is Joe Rogan for women. Okay. So the yoni egg is, I guess, this crystal stone. Jade, right? Jade. Thank you. That you place up your vagina.

[00:28:00] And the claims were that it was going to help with hormones, that it was going to help with stress, and that it was going to help with menopause. All these different claims. And instead, what started happening is that women were getting urinary tract infections, and there were a lot of problems that came about with this yoni egg. And a lot of gynecologists came out and said, do not use this. Do not put this in your vagina.

[00:28:29] This is a very bad idea. And I believe she was sued maybe by, and I'm not sure it was over the yoni egg, but it was over a number of different things that she claimed were things that were scientifically proven. And maybe they were Eastern medicine. Maybe it started from Eastern medicine, but then the way that she was marketing it. So she was profiting off of this.

[00:28:53] And I believe that she was sued by the state of California to take a lot of these claims off of her website. And they settled. They had no problem saying, okay, I'll pay this fine for $150,000 or whatever it was, and I'll take down some of the wording. And then they just went on and continued to sell these products. And so I think that that's when you're talking about these wellness companies, when they become dangerous, when it can actually hurt you.

[00:29:24] So my goop exfoliating scrub that I love so much is going to be okay, but not the yoni egg. Was there any sort of recourse amongst the goop headquarters to say, hey, maybe we should have some more checks and balances here? We should investigate the people that were promoting more? Was there any sort of self-awareness check? No. This came from an article written by Taffy Broaddus or Akner. I think it was a number of years ago.

[00:29:52] And she said she reported that Condé Nast and Goop, Condé Nast being the magazine publisher who publishes Vogue and, you know, many other magazines, or they were supposed to go into like a partnership, but it didn't work out because Goop refused to do any fact checking. And they didn't want to fact check their sign. They didn't want to. Why? Why would they do that? If they started doing that, they wouldn't be able to sell products. So Condé Nast said, okay, we're not going to be able to go into this partnership with you.

[00:30:21] Now, fact checking used to be something that magazines had. Like one of my first jobs in the journalism world was I was a full-time fact checker. I mean, that's all I did. I'd made sure that what the authors were saying was, the journalists were saying was correct. And writing for the New York Times, you can't just write something in the New York Times and it's a lie. You know, you can and there'll be a correction made and there'll be a lot of problems with it.

[00:30:47] But a company like Goop, they don't have to adhere to those kinds of standards. And they don't want to because that would infringe on their business. Now, do I think that they're trying to go out and hurt people? Absolutely not. I don't think that Gwyneth Paltrow is sitting around saying, I want to hurt all these people and make women have these infections. No, she seems like a good person. They're trying to make money. Yeah. They're a business. Yeah, it's a business. And it's their business and they have luxury items.

[00:31:15] But, you know, for instance, something happened also years ago where they recommended a bee sting therapy, where you get surrounded by actual bees. They sting your face so that it can create collagen. And therefore, then it would like help sort of be like a facelift. And a woman died. Now, maybe she didn't do it in the way that some bee practitioner said to do it.

[00:31:45] You know, that's entirely possible. A BHD? A BHD. No. Dad joke. Thank you. You're welcome, everyone. But the truth is, is that once you put that out there and say, oh, this could work, and then not say anything else, you have to kind of take responsibility. There's a responsibility there. Yeah. And so I actually use that as an example in my book.

[00:32:11] Yeah, because one of the cult leaders, she's a wellness guru, and she has lots of claims that she says are things that are going to help people, like that nap dresses will help people sleep. For instance, $300 nap dresses will help people sleep. And they know that people are going to buy them because the minute you put these teenage girls all wearing these white, beautiful, flowing nap dresses on social media, everyone's going to snap them up.

[00:32:39] And so there's just a lot of that kind of, you know, fringe messaging. So I think that's the thing you have to be careful of. Yes. So the dangers of the claims that are not backed up. Let's go back to the teenagers for a second, because this is a particularly vulnerable time and something we talk about in our upcoming book, and Mara talked about in her book with Hoodwinked, is just like cults preying on vulnerable people, that the beauty and wellness industry preys on vulnerable people.

[00:33:08] What do you see in terms of that and teenage girls specifically? Yeah. I go into like a Sephora with my daughter, and she already knows exactly what she wants to get. And you see there's so many kids in Sephora. And you see how many kids are being preyed upon. And I think that it's very hard to limit that as parents, because you're like, okay, well, makeup is sort of harmless, right?

[00:33:35] But why are you trying to put more collagen in your face when you're 14 years old? I'm not really sure why you need to do that. What made you think that you have to adhere to any bullshit anti-aging product? You're still growing. You're not even on the other spectrum like the rest of us. I mean, if you have acne, I mean, that's a different story. And you're going to a dermatologist or whatever.

[00:34:02] But there are just such basics that you really can buy in the drugstore that are a million times better than half the stuff that you can find in spending all of your babysitting money or wherever you're working to buy these products that you don't need.

[00:34:21] And then on top of it, it goes even a layer deeper, which is something that, you know, is, of course, that we've been battling for lifetimes is looking at how girls are supposed to look or people who like makeup or who care about their skin or how people are supposed to look. And what's the perfect skin type? And what's the perfect body type? And what's the perfect hair?

[00:34:48] And it starts going down into all of these other levels about anxiety and depression and looking at yourself. And there's a lot of self-hatred when you start going so deep into this world. And that's why the studies show that teenagers are most susceptible to this kind of messaging. And this is why there are suicide rates, you know, for teenage girls who are looking at all of this kind of stuff.

[00:35:16] And it's also why their anxiety and depression numbers are higher than they ever have been. And I hate to keep saying over and over again, social media, social media, but it's what they see on social media. It's not just like you could look at artists and quilters and people who are knitting. I mean, my daughter looks at all of that kind of stuff, too, which is really cool. And there's bookstagram and booktalk. And those are all fantastic.

[00:35:40] But the minute you start having a book person and they're doing a get ready with me because they know that that's someone's going to get looked at. They want to see how is this book person getting ready? And I like your outfit and it looks cute. And then you start looking back at yourself. You know, how do I look? And I think that's a huge issue with teenagers today. It's a really huge issue. Yeah, I agree. And that's what the studies show, you know. Yeah.

[00:36:09] I don't know what it is or who started it. Maybe the Kardashians. But like why? Because obviously, you know, fitting into the. Well, they just bought new faces. Yeah, well, that too. But like they bought new faces that look the same. This is what I'm saying is that like, yes, the body type thing has always been an issue since beginning of millennia. That's my non-scientific thing. Like whatever the societal thing is, whether it's voluptuous in certain times and super skinny like in the 60s and whatever. But there's a body type right now, but there's also a face type. Yes.

[00:36:37] And I don't know, Nippy doesn't know this, but like with the highlighters and the bronzers and the cheeks and the, like I said, with those teenage girls that I saw, there's a look. It's a dewy, glowy, non-makeup look, but requires a shit ton of makeup to get it right. And Nippy, I'm going to show you later and you can comment on the outro just to show you what women do to their faces to make it look like they're a Kardashian filtered perfect. Snatched is the word. Snatched.

[00:37:07] Snatched is the term for all of what I just said with the highlighter and the bronzer and. I think so. Oh, God. I could have done better with that. So snatched means that you look like a Kardashian or snatched means that you're just perfectly perfect. You've got the look. Your cheekbones are cheekboning, you know, your eyes are popping. You're all the, yes. Snatched. Snatched, I think. And maybe that has to do with body. I don't know.

[00:37:32] I'm going to text my cousin who's my gateway into all these things who's much more cool than I am. Okay. So we talked about young women. Can I just say one thing that I'm not against plastic surgery. I'm not against Botox. I'm not against fillers. I'm not against any of these things. I'm not against makeup. I'm not even against wellness products.

[00:37:54] I just think that there are predatory behaviors for a lot of these companies and a lot of doctors and a lot of pseudoscientists and a lot of celebrities because they want to make money. And it's very, very hard right now as the consumer to purse through that. And as a woman, as a 53-year-old person. And for, you know, kids, it's just, it's so much more.

[00:38:22] I mean, in my book, there's murder. There's a thriller. There's a lot more that goes on. But the core takeaway is that this teenager doesn't feel like she belongs to anybody. And she's trying to feel like she belongs. And so when she falls in love with someone who happens to be in this wellness world, you know, she's being lied to and she's being groomed.

[00:38:46] And it's really, really hard, I think, for especially for if it's hard for adults, then it's got to be even more difficult for teenagers who are being groomed and to be able to parse this kind of stuff out because the insecurity levels are just are so much more intense, you know. Exactly. And they don't have a sense of self yet. Yeah. I'm 47. I feel like I'm just developing my sense of self. Yeah. Also, too, like with girls, it just seems it just has the capacity to be exasperated way more.

[00:39:14] Like if you go to wanting to look as good as you can, if Gwyneth Paltrow is Joe Rogan for girls and teenage girls, then it seems like that has the capacity to go off the rails more than someone listening to Joe Rogan who's about working out and protein powders. Do you know what I mean? So the extreme of that seems like, well, you might get a little big and obsessed with your six pack. Yeah. Or in Troy's case, he's obsessed with what bat to get. Like he literally woke up this morning and he's like, Mom, can we get the Rollins icon?

[00:39:44] Which are all utilitarian pursuits. He's obsessed with his baseball gear thanks to social media. Which isn't to say that, you know, men looking at themselves as tools and utilitarian pieces isn't as bad as a girl looking at herself as a beauty object, too. I mean, it's just it seems that the female version, for whatever reason, to me, seems way worse. Yeah. I guess we don't really even know what the male version is yet because it's just burgeoning. It's just seeing yourself. Well, it's that whole like hyper-masculinity and like bro culture.

[00:40:11] And I guess that's sort of the downside of like these bro podcasts like Joe Rogan. Which I grew up in, like job culture. Right. And I think I merged out okay. Yeah. We'll talk about that later privately. Okay. Jesus. Footnote. But going back to like we say, we look at- Can't give yourself a compliment on this. No, you're doing great. You're doing really great. By the way, we were trying to find a Cold Plunge sponsor for our podcast because we were- Yeah.

[00:40:42] I mean, look- Cold Plunge is great. I'm a sucker for those. I'll die on that hill. I'll go there with you because it's great. My son said, who's 21 after he did it the first time, he said, Mom, it was the most amazing dopamine rush I've ever experienced in my life. And I thought, oh my God, it's really funny. Like just the words he was using to- Dopamine. It's just, you know- Yeah. My dad had the best thing. Are out there. Do you ever think maybe it's not the Cold Plunge?

[00:41:09] It's that you feel good because you're not in the cold anymore and you just feel good because it feels relieved? And I was like, shit. But- It could be that. He's right. Still worth it though. But I was thinking about what you just said about, you know, sort of the dangers of it because I look to somebody like Gwyneth and I, it's all very appealing. I think she looks lovely. I feel like we could be friends. And I know she got shit a while back for sharing like some of her dietary things. I can't remember what it was specifically, but it was like some celery juice and bone broth and- I remember what it was.

[00:41:39] What was it? It was take this lemon water and then like afterwards she has her coffee. And someone, the comment was like, oh, so you're going from alkaline to acidic, right? I don't remember what it was specifically, but I know she got a lot of shit for it. And I, a lot of the things she talks about, I also do. Like I start my day with the celery, ginger, lemon juice. I used to do Bulletproof. I don't need more long when I hit perimenopause. Anyway, but I love my bone broth, but I don't feel comfortable sharing that as like,

[00:42:08] this is the way because I know so many bodies are different. You know what I mean? And like, I know that when I was in NXIVM, I very much thought this is the way, right? And this is actually something we're talking about in our upcoming book is that as a red flag, when someone's saying, this is the way, this is the path to X, whether it's wellness, to spirituality, to connecting with God, whatever it is. Anyone claiming that, that's a red flag. And I don't ever want to say that to anybody about anything anymore.

[00:42:35] Like even when I tell someone about the yoga studio that I go to here in Atlanta that I love, I'm like, this is what works for me. And if they say, I don't like to be hot and sweaty, I go, okay. But in the past I may have been like, well, but you should, because hot and sweaty is the way to do it. Otherwise, like you're not doing it properly. You know what I mean? I do. I do. Because I feel the same way. It's like, this is what works for me, you know? And I'm taking all of my vitamins every day and doing my Reiki and putting my crystals outside to bathe in the moon.

[00:43:04] And I mean, you know, that works for me. And that's my own stuff. That's my own personal stuff. Your spiritual smorgasbord, we can call it. That's my, yes. Yeah, I like that. It's a little bit of everything. You're not following a particular person or way. And I'm not saying to someone, you have to do this, you know? And I think that that's like a huge piece of that. And I think that places like Goop, they've scaled back on a lot of that because they don't want to get sued.

[00:43:32] And they want to be able to sell their stuff. And they want to be able to make lots of money. But I think you have to have a lot of money to follow someone like Gwyneth Paltrow. Or if you want to go to one of her events, I think it's like these Goop events where, you know, it starts with turmeric shots and then it ends with like plastic surgery. And it's like, okay, well, you're there for a weekend and you're paying thousands of dollars and you could pay a couple of thousand dollars more just to meet her.

[00:44:01] So I think it's yucky. You're talking about like real fan behavior. It's like, okay, so you're just going to do anything that she says? Well, maybe I'll do some of the things. But how far are you going to go? And I think that's the key. Is that one of the features of her events? Like you paid attention to meet her? Yes. Yes, it was. Yeah, I mean, because they're fans. That's bizarre to me. We have not done any research on that particular topic, us personally, so I can't comment on it.

[00:44:29] But as we're talking, I'm trying to like come up with what are the red flags? So one of them is being like paying extra to meet the person is something that would be for me. Like if you're, because I don't, I'm not against. Events are red flags for me now. Yeah, I mean, I will be very skeptical to attend any kind of event just because of our experience in that setting. But I'm not against them in theory. It's just like, what are you paying for? What are you getting? Are you going to be upsold? And who's regulating it? And in answer to your earlier question about like, where are we on it?

[00:44:58] I think I started to be a little more skeptical when we interviewed Jane Marie from The Dream. Did you ever listen to that podcast? No. Oh, you'd love it. It's so good. She's great. First season's about MLMs. I might be butchering this. Second season, I think, is about the supplement industry. And then third is about coaching. I might have that reversed. But like it all overlaps. And she talks a lot about like all these powders and all these supplements that are not regulated properly, which I didn't know. No, they're not.

[00:45:24] That anyone can say that, you know, this is even that this is a pure vitamin E oil or whatever. Like it's not. Who's testing that? No, it's not regulated by the FDA. And you have to use certain words. And people can get away with a lot just saying that the language. Yeah. That these are claims that are not founded as long as you say something like that. Like there's, you know, that these are not founded.

[00:45:53] Then, you know, you're on your own. Collagen is like a perfect thing. Like I remember a year ago or two that that was like the really big thing. Put collagen in your coffee or, you know, collagen powder and everything. Because that will help sort of like the collagen in your skin. But you look at the studies that are like this does absolutely nothing. You just poop it out. Yeah. So why am I putting this in? Because I want my skin to be different. I want gravity to stop. Yes. But at what cost?

[00:46:25] For more background on what brought us here, check out Sarah's page turning memoir. It's called Scarred, The True Story of How I Escaped NXIVM, The Cult That Bound My Life. It's available on Amazon, Audible and at most bookstores. Highly recommend, of course. Because she's my wife. And now, a brief message from our Little Bit Culti sponsors. Remember, when you support our sponsors, you support our podcast. Spring is here. Not a lot of time to make all the meals with baseball practices, school, etc.

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[00:49:16] I guess overall we're looking at the health and wellness, looking at the vulnerabilities, and exploiting it for monetary gain, right? Yeah. How do you know in that space what is actually good? Like, I'm not going to stop putting moisturizer and eye cream on. I'm just not. So... And I'm never going to start. I actually got Nippy a, like, kit for Christmas. I'm like, you are looking dehydrated. I'm putting a couple of, like, dab eye cream on his beautiful face. Beef tallow. He does beef tallow.

[00:49:46] He just smothers his face in beef tallow. After I shave. There you go. That's a crazy person. It's cheaper. Super cheap. Well, my husband goes... One jar. Yeah. Wow, really? One jar. I do it, like, once every two weeks after I shave. Wow. Okay. What did your husband do? I'll tell this to my husband. He goes for medical facials. Oh. So it's not, like, very woo-woo. It's just very, like, okay, we're going to make these pores smaller, you know, kind of thing. Like micro-demanded or something?

[00:50:13] Yeah, you know, just sort of without all the relaxation things. Just under a bright light, getting what needs to be done, walking it out. That sounds like I would do something like that. I'll get you that for Christmas. All right, cool. I think we need a wellness sponsor. Sounds like it. We're doing an episode to warn people. Shit. Maybe the right wellness person. Right. We'll find the right one. It has to be the right one.

[00:50:43] And you can bet it, Haley. You can bet it for us. Yeah, there you go. Listen, if Goop wants to sponsor this podcast... We're deleting this episode? Yes. I'm deleting the episode and saying yes. For sale. 100%. Pretend like you never met me. Yeah. Yeah, and I just want to say, too, just, like, going into, like, the aging women in the wellness world. Because that's, like, such a huge new area, which is, like, sort of the menopause

[00:51:07] area of helping women who are going through perimenopause and menopause, which is so fantastic for, like, women our age that we haven't been represented in that way, or at least our mothers weren't ever represented that way. But there's also a lot of predatory stuff going on there, too, because how do you know what's real and what's not? How do you know what's real? And what do I need to take? And, like, there's this whole new thing about, like, putting estrogen on your face. I don't know if you heard about this. Estrogen face cream.

[00:51:37] And I really don't know a lot about it, so I can't really say very much. But I've started getting ads. And the algorithm is like, you, I know you're in perimenopause. I'm going to get you. All the people are doing this estrogen face cream. Can it really work? I just don't know. And, like, who do you ask? Can I ask my GYN? Like, would she know? Do you, dermatologists, would they know? Probably a dermatologist, you know? But also, I'm skeptical, right?

[00:52:06] I'm skeptical also of people who don't, like, I've always been more on the alternative side of things. So when people who are maybe backed by big pharma, and that's a whole other episode, we're not going to get into it, and there's pros and cons there. But, like, other people have their own vested interests in us not being healthy, right? And there's a whole industry around, I mean, this is another conversation. It's a vicious cycle. Like, you just don't know who to trust. It's almost like media right now, like, in general. It's so different whether you're watching CNN or Fox and you hear a particular thing that happened.

[00:52:36] It's big pharma versus my holistic functional medicine doctor. Well, there's no middle ground. Yeah. Like, what is actually going to help you versus what's going to help their bottom line? Yeah. Well, I think, Fox, you definitely know you're being lied to, just to say. I think that's been proven in court. But, like, and maybe people don't want to hear that. But I think that... Honestly, I don't trust any of the media right now of both sides. Like, I've seen... I understand. Yeah. Well, Fox invented the model. Yeah. Right? It did. And actually, there's a documentary in 2003 called Out Fox.

[00:53:06] That basically gets into how the model works. Yeah. And then I think everyone's kind of followed suit. In terms of being, like, it's not about presenting the news anymore. They need eyeballs. Yeah. Anyway. That's another... Again, another episode. But the point is, who do you trust? Especially if the influencers are also being monetized now. Right?

[00:53:24] Like, if the influencers are dermatologists and they're the ones who want to sell you the estrogen face cream, then is this something that you want to put on your face and spend a couple of hundred dollars for some exorbitant price? When is it really going to work at the end of the day? Well, there's a particular product now. I think it's NAD and NMN that I see a lot of... It's your algorithm. It's my algorithm. Yeah. And conveniently, they say, you have to take it for three months to see results.

[00:53:54] So the buy-in now is a three-month commitment for you to see results. So it's getting more clever. Or if that's the actual case for that product, I don't know. What is NAD supposed to be? NAD is a precursor for something in the search to end pathways, which there's seven of, and they do things to help you benefit your aging, particularly skins in some cases, depending on some of them. You normally would do it through an NAD push, which is intravenously. But now they have it in pill form, which is the same things they have with the peptides. They're doing it with peptides now.

[00:54:23] So there's a whole kind of movement to take things that were intravenous, right? And the only way you could do it was through injections and sometimes injecting yourself. Well, that's a limited market. So now they've got it in pill form. And I've seen that in the last three to four months, the pill form of things that you should be doing intravenously, which to me is like bullshit. But I don't know, and I'm not going to take the time to know. Right, right. Peptide stack. I did a peptide stack. And my nails and my hair grew. That was the only thing I noticed.

[00:54:53] It didn't address the things that I wanted, like aches and pains in my hands, my grip strength. That's why I did it, because I was having stuff going on in there, and it didn't do that. But I didn't notice my hair and my nails grew. We're not getting marketed the same way, Haley. No, we're not, because I don't get that on my algorithm. Well, I pursued that stuff because I was interested in it. In Vancouver, when we were living there at the time, it was kind of ground zero for health and wellness. And a lot of what I would say is grifters. I'll give you an example of Vancouver.

[00:55:22] Most cities have a beer crawl, right? Yeah. When they have like a festival and you go around and you taste beers. Which Vancouver also does. Yeah. But Vancouver had a health and wellness crawl. And you went to certain things and you could have tests done and you had coconut water and all that stuff. And it was great and it had a lot of things. But Vancouver has, would you say it's ground zero for a lot of that stuff? Yeah, I mean, Vancouver is very much like San Francisco. It's like California. It's very Pacific Northwest, healthy, crunchy, granola, vegetarian, all the stuff. Better than you. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:55:52] I'm better than you. The same text. I'm better than you. Yeah. Well, that was the other red flag I was going to mention. And I think you do this really well in your book is that once you've really committed to a particular line or way of doing all of this, whatever it is, whether you're our age or you're a teenager, is that there is a righteousness that comes with that commitment.

[00:56:39] Yes. And that was a self-righteousness was just unbelievable of how he had all of the answers. And then the manipulation, which turns it around to like- The gaslighting. That's the gaslighting. The gaslighting was just like top tier gaslighting. Next level. It really was. Oh, my God. Because when you listen as an outsider, I mean, when you're in it, it's impossible to see what's going on until you break away as you guys did.

[00:57:06] But as an outsider, when you're like, oh, my God, like is this, this guy is saying to her, she's asking him, Alison Mack, for instance, in these tapes was asking him a question about how to handle something. And when she said the word I, he immediately just started going after her about how she was a narcissist. Yeah. And it's very hard not to say the word I. I'm curious about how to handle this situation.

[00:57:33] And immediately just started saying, well, that's your poster child for narcissism. So then you can't help but question yourself. Yeah. Especially if you've given him the authority. That's what I was going to say. The reason why we couldn't say when we're in it is because we had committed to the fact that he knew better than us. Right? So in those moments, if he did something like that, then even though it didn't feel good and you felt ashamed or like icky, like I didn't have that particular conversation, but I had things like that with him where I'd be like, wait, am I being?

[00:58:03] Self-involved or am I being? For me, it wasn't that. It was like that I was being controlling. Like if I asked a question, well, you're doing your thing again. You're doing your control again. That was the culture. Oh, I am? Oh, shit. I'm, fuck, I'm doing, but I don't feel like I'm being controlling. But he knows, like, one of the things I really like about your book is that you really showed the inner dialogue, I think, quite well as somebody who was grappling with some of those things in terms of trying to make sense of what was happening in the environment.

[00:58:29] And our audience knows that we don't normally cover fiction, but I feel like what's great about this book is that it's a good book to give a young person for them to have a, you know, a young adult thriller-esque captivating fiction book that could also teach them about some of these red flags.

[00:58:48] So that was one of the things that I was sort of excited about because there's a lot of people who listen to our podcast who want to educate themselves and not only are just rubbernecking, you know, because we all do a little bit with cults and sensational things, but they want to protect themselves and protect their families. And we're hoping to do that also with our book. We really want to aim it for the younger generation, but it is still, it's not a fiction. Fiction is easier to read, I think.

[00:59:10] I mean, to Haley's point, I think she captures, you know, just so you know, we didn't see Keith one-on-one with Allison and see how abusive it was. And obviously that was overtly abusive. When you see it in the vow. When you see it in the vow. But we weren't there. It doesn't start like that. Right. It starts with the health and wellness. Hey, you know, something's coming to help you. Two more shots. You know, and so the abusive person can have the abusive intent the entire time, but understands that they got to hook you somehow.

[00:59:38] And health and wellness seems to be fertile ground for a lot of teenage girls. Yes. And I think any of this stuff, to degrees, really applies to abusive relationships just in general. Because I was in an abusive relationship when I was younger. And, I mean, the love bombing that went on at first, which is very similar to sort of the grooming, you know, of any kind of cult leader. And you're great. You're perfect. Putting you on a pedestal. You know, I have all of the answers.

[01:00:08] And then they start to take you down a notch. And you keep pulling you down so that they're the only person that you really think you should be listening to. And isolating you from your family. And isolating you from your friends. And there's just a lot of similar threads to how cult leaders groom people. And so I think it applies to, in lots of ways. Because when you're talking about cults, you're talking about emotional and physical, possibly physical abuse too.

[01:00:37] But that's the nature of an abusive relationship. So I just hope that kids who are reading it and they see the gaslighting that goes on, that they could say, wait a second, this isn't healthy behavior? I thought that this was okay for someone to talk to me this way. Right. In real time when it happens. And you obviously did a lot of research. I know you just shared that you listened to the tapes. What else? Did you watch a lot of documentaries? And what else did you do? I watched so many documentaries. Yeah. I mean, Teal Swan and... She's the worst.

[01:01:06] Oh, God. She is the worst. I mean... God. Yeah. I mean, just people just giving up their entire lives for her. And she is the only one who has the answer. And she's going to just take you down. I mean, I think she got a couple of people to said, okay, well, if you want to commit suicide and you're done with this world, go ahead, kill yourself. I mean, that's just unbelievable that anybody in that kind of power would do that. And she did. And got away with it.

[01:01:37] And still allowed to keep practicing. And she's thriving too. Yeah, because I think it all starts the same way that these people are so good at what they do that at first they sound practical and they sound normal. And like she does this all this therapeutic talk. And so you want to listen to her and say, okay, that actually makes sense.

[01:02:00] But then it's when you start giving up your entire life or when you start questioning yourself and giving up all of your money and leaving your life and she isolates you from everybody. I mean, that's the real problem. But I also watched the Sarah Lawrence documentary. Yeah, that was. Did you guys see that? Oh, yeah. It was close to Keith Hussain. In terms of behavior. Yeah. We've done an episode with Daniel Levin. Oh, okay. On him. Yeah. Yeah. What was your favorite cult doc? I could say that.

[01:02:30] Favorite. Air quotes. I would say probably the most disturbing was the Sarah Lawrence one because they just, I mean, and the vow, obviously. And I also, the book, The Girls by Emma Klein. It's about the Charles Manson. Like it's sort of like a fictionalized version of somebody who joined the Manson family and got left behind. Instead of going forward with the murders, this person got left behind.

[01:02:58] And so she really did such an incredible job of just showing what the thread line looks like for a young girl and how she delved into that. And how. It's called The Girls? I've not read that. It's called The Girls. Yeah. It's fictionalized. That sounds interesting. It's excellent. It's so disturbing, but it's excellent. Yeah. Fun fact. Did you know that Angela Lansbury's daughter was caught up in that, with the Manson group and then saw it and pulled her daughter out of Hollywood and moved to Europe?

[01:03:28] That's a fun fact. Fun fact. Did you not know that? You know what? I have not fact-checked that, though. I saw it on Instagram, so. There you go. I do not stand by those words. Pulled in again, Sarah. I really enjoyed your book. But is there anything that we missed that you feel like is important that you've learned that you want to share with our audience? Yeah, I think that you just really sort of have to trust your gut, right? That if something doesn't feel right, probably isn't.

[01:03:54] And I think specifically for teenagers, because as parents we still have some element of control over them, that I think it's very hard dealing with teenagers and putting your foot down because then they just want to rebel from that. But I think having talks, like, okay, so this is how, like for your son, for example, and I'm sure you guys probably do this, but just for an example, like, so you were being marketed this baseball bat. And here's how you were.

[01:04:23] And here's why they want you to buy it. Because you're like the age group that everybody wants. And, you know, for the makeup industry, teenage girls, that's the, you know, or teenage kids who use makeup, that's the age group that will just fork over their money with absolutely no problem. They're the best advertising demographic. And so I think having those conversations and saying, okay, this is the best thing for your skin. What's the source?

[01:04:52] You know, that's what I always say to my kids. What's the source? Who's the source? And they'll tell me, oh, did you know that this happened? Even like the political world or culture. Well, where'd you read that? Oh, okay, Newsmax. Okay, that's not a real source. You know, or where did you see it? Oh, I just, I saw it on TikTok. Well, where did you see it on TikTok? Who was saying it? So I think that that's really important just across the board. I think that's the best thing I could say.

[01:05:19] And I do want to connect you with Mara because one of the things that I wasn't even aware of is a lot of these influencers, like the fact that it's advertising or that they're getting paid for it isn't actually obvious anymore. Like it used to say hashtag ad, but they don't have to, or they can hide it. They can hide it through. Yeah. Oh, is that right? Yeah. Like they, yeah, I'm not totally sure of the- Anything to discredit them is going to be buried. Yeah. I mean, sometimes they do, but they don't have to. I don't know the details of it, but it's like the regulations on that are also not strict.

[01:05:48] And even for us with sponsors for our podcast is something that we have to be really careful of. Who's representing us? Who are we representing? Right. Lots of things to think about. And I hope that this conversation leaves people with some tools to think a little more critically and before they press purchase. And hopefully if they have teenagers to give your book, You Belong to Me, to them. And yeah, thank you. Yeah. Thanks for shining a light on this. Well, I just want to say thanks so much.

[01:06:18] This has been such a great conversation. I really appreciate you guys having me. Thank you. Appreciate you doing the research to, yeah, shine light also. It's important. Look out for those double O's, everybody. Welcome to a little bit cool tea. Cool. Yeah. Super cool. Amazing. Thank you, Haley. Do you like what you hear on a little bit culty?

[01:06:46] Then please do give us a rating, a review, and subscribe on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you listen. Or even better, share this episode with someone who you think needs to hear it. Maybe they're in a cult. Maybe they're a little bit susceptible. Just share the love. Thanks. Thank you so much for coming on the show, Haley. It's really interesting to see how these companies will promote self-acceptance on one hand with peddling beauty creams with the other.

[01:07:15] And that's the conversation that we shall keep on having as we explore this murky, murky waters. And one thing we didn't record, but I wanted to share with you, the irony of it all is that I got this in a PDF, not a hard copy. And I was listening on Speechify, which is an AI app that you can listen to websites and articles and emails. So I listened to the PDF like it was an Audible, and you can choose the voice. And guess who read it to me? Goop herself. Gwyneth Paltrow. And you can have Snoop Dogg or some- Snoop. Some British dude. Two O's.

[01:07:45] There it is again. Oh, yeah. Snoop. Oh, Snoop. See what he did there? Yeah. So I had Gwyneth read this book to me. I mean, Gwyneth reads all my books to me, so that's why I think I feel so close to her. I'm actually going to admit and confess to that as well. So, Nippy, are you going to buy me a $75 vagina candle for my birthday? Does it come with anything else? Make sure to check out Haley's new novel, You Belonged to Me, when it comes out in April.

[01:08:11] Oh, I like this episode because it kind of confirms our pull towards teens. Yeah, I agree. We're getting a lot of signs. I'm doing my woo-woo thing. I'm getting a lot of signs. That's our next pivot in some shape or form. Plus, our kids are entering that age. Yes. And we need to get this education to the teenagers. Yep. And seriously, get this. If you have a teenage, especially a daughter, You Belonged to Me is a great present. I think it'll teach them of the ways and also it's just a great read. I also think people need to start taking responsibility for how this influences other people's kids too.

[01:08:41] Yeah. When they put this shit out there. Like when I have like our friend's kids over, I'm like, I protect them the way I protect my kids. Don't you? Nippy also drives our friends to jujitsu and various basketball practices. He is the coach dad. That's great. No, that's the time you get to, that's valuable time with your kids. You can kind of get a pulse on. What they're up to. What they're up to. Just sit and kind of listen. What kind of riz they're dropping. If they're mewing. Skibbity. If they even have riz. And if there's. Most of them don't. Which is good. I don't know what we're talking about. Skibbity. Toilet. No.

[01:09:11] Sagma riz. You might be Delulu. You might be seriously Delulu. Yeah. Stop the cat, brah. Seriously, brah. Get with the program. All right. Until next time. Sinking down to the depths of the ocean. A Little Bit Culty is a Trace 120 production.

[01:09:40] Executive produced by Sarah Edmondson and Anthony Nippy Ames. In collaboration with Amphibian Media. Our co-creator is Jess Temple-Tardy. Audio engineering by Red Cayman Studios. And our writing and research is done by Emma Diehl and Kristen Reeder. Our theme song, Cultivated, is by the artists John Bryant and Nigel Aslan.