This week, Nikki G., host of Surviving the Black Church and survivor of FIVE different high-control groups, discusses joining the first church on her cult-hopping journey, how she got initially pulled down the rabbit hole by conspiracy theories and the Book of Revelation, and the intensity and community that drew her to each group.

She tells the girls about her second and more radical group, IHOP (International House of Prayer), how she eventually learned the term “religious addiction,” and why the idea of “waiting for your Boaz,” or your perfect husband, can be so harmful for women in the church.

SOURCES

Surviving the Black Church Podcast

Black Religious Trauma Recovery Network

Nikki G.

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This week, Lola and Meagan are joined by comic, actor, and author of Sure I’ll Join Your Cult, Maria Bamford. The girls discuss Maria’s childhood OCD, intrusive thoughts, and the ways those experiences primed her to seek support, structure, and belonging through a variety of groups later in life. They explore culty (but helpful!) aspects of 12 step programs like Debtors Anonymous and Al-Anon, along with the many other communities she’s loved and joined along the way.

Maria also shares her experience with eating disorders, going to treatment in her twenties, and the controversial Suzuki Method through which she learned violin as a child.

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This week is part 2 with Sarah Edmondson, NXIVM survivor, author, and host of A Little Bit Culty. The girls pick back up as Sarah goes deeper into the organization, eventually entering DOS and confronting the growing contradictions inside NXIVM. She’ll discuss the emotional grip of the group, the normalization of control, and the psychological unraveling that began once the cracks became impossible to ignore.

Sarah also opens up about loyalty, fear, cognitive dissonance, and the terrifying process of realizing the self-help system she devoted years to was built around manipulation. The conversation explores deconstruction in real time, what finally pushed her to question Keith Raniere, and how leaving meant rebuilding her entire sense of self.

SOURCES

A Little Bit Culty

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This week is part 1 with, at long last, Sarah Edmondson, NXIVM survivor, author, and host of A Little Bit Culty, a podcast and now book, co-hosted and authored with her husband, Nippy Ames. She’ll tell the girls how she first joined the self-help group—which turned out to be a sex cult—starting with a comment by Mark Vicente that shook her worldview. She’ll discuss why she was drawn to the goal-oriented framework and define some core tenets of NXIVM, including what it means to be “at cause" by demonstrating the exercise on Lola and Meagan.

Sarah will explain how tenets like being "at cause" were actually tools for manipulation used to deflect from the group’s wrongdoings. She will also discuss feeling starstruck when she first met leader Keith Raniere, who claimed to be the smartest man in the world, and the idea of “spiritual wives” (and how he may have stolen that from Lola’s prophet).

Next week we’ll get into her later years in the group, DOS, and how she left.

SOURCES

A Little Bit Culty

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In part 2 with Nomzia aka Nomz Bistline, from Netflix’s docuseries Trust Me: The False Prophet (with Lola’s mom), Nomz shares what it was like getting raided by the FBI, how she felt about Lola’s mom when she learned Christine was the FBI informant, and why the “prophet” Samuel Bateman was obsessed with marrying the queen of England.

She discusses the events leading up to her time in jail, how she began the painful process of deconstructing while in prison, and what life has been like since getting out–and finally being free of Samuel Bateman.

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This week is part one with Nomzia “Nomz” Bistline, from the Netflix docuseries Trust Me: The False Prophet (with Lola’s mom, Christine!). Nomz joins the girls to talk about what it was like growing up in polygamist group the FLDS after leader Warren Jeffs went to prison, how she was raised in poverty and taught to be paranoid about the outside world, and how many of the fathers in the community were sidelined and sent away.

She explains how Samuel Bateman began claiming that he was the new prophet, and what it was like when he started targeting her and wearing her down over time, threatening her salvation and ultimately coercing her into becoming one of his wives.

And next week, she’ll talk about the raid, Sam’s conviction, and her relationship with Christine now.

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Lyndsey Burr, longtime reality television producer who worked on America’s Next Top Model for years, joins the girls to talk about her experiences working on the now-controversial hit show. She talks about what the team looked for when casting, some of the more problematic challenges the show used, and the time she lost the models in Thailand.

They discuss how it was the wild west of reality TV, with every show in the early days trying to outdo each other and often not considering the consequences for the folks on the show, and Tyra’s own arc and whether she was perpetuating the harmful cycle she’d been trying to stop. Plus, why Lyndsey thinks unscripted television has–hopefully–been getting more ethical.

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In part two with Matthew Remski (author and host of the Conspirituality podcast), Matthew shares how he cult hopped from his first guru to his second, the moment that disillusioned him, and the cultural patterns he's seeing—including a resurgence of the Satanic panic—that most alarm him as he follows conspiracies and spirituality on his podcast.

He’ll talk about how the importance of addressing the root economic causes of why so many people are looking to snake oil salesmen for answers, pointers from his upcoming book (Antifascist Dad) for how to navigate this fraught information landscape, and why it’s important to create healthy organizing spaces–since all sides of the political spectrum are susceptible to cultish behavior.

SOURCES

Conspirituality

Antifascist Dad

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