There Are No Girls on the Internet.

As a production of iHeartRadio and unbost Creative.

I'm Bridget Todd and this is There Are No Girls on the Internet.

When the Trump administration claimed that tilernol during pregnancy could cause autism, the science really didn't matter.

Doctors pushback, but the damage was already done and wellness influencers had already pounced.

They didn't just spread fear, they profited off of it, and suddenly one of the only safe pain relievers to take during pregnancy became just the latest weapon in a war over reproductive health.

Now, this is not just about tilnol.

It's about how wellness influencers turn a misinformation into an online business model, and how their influence helped shape a dangerous narrative coming right out of the White House.

It's something Mallory de Mille has seen a lot of.

Mallory makes content about the health and wellness industry.

She's a correspondent on one of my favorite podcasts, Conspirituality.

I'm Malorie de mill and I guess the title I would use is content creator create content on Instagram and TikTok that talks about influencer culture, specifically in the wellness space.

Nobody skewers the wellness influencer grift quite like you.

You're such a good social media.

Follow Thank you so much for saying that.

So how did this come to be something that you pay attention to?

Why are kind of wellness influencers on social media?

Why is that your beat?

Yeah?

I think the short answer probably is that I used to follow willness influencers.

And granted this was, you know, almost a decade ago.

I was in my mid to later twenties, and I was following a number of wellness influencers.

After I completed business school, I went to college for fitness and health promotion.

Thought it one day, I would, you know, combine those passions and open my own gym and come to fruition.

But have always been pretty interested in health and wellness myself had a background in teaching fitness, and I was definitely following a number of wellness influencers for a few years there and realized at one point that following them had nudged me in a direction of having like a pretty terrible relationship with food and fitness and my body that was like not really there before.

And so luckily, you know, unlearned and unpacked that many of books and documentaries and resources and following other folks online, and I was mostly just really upset that as someone with the background in marketing, I got swindled by really clever marketing.

And I guess I'm in a place right now where I always come back to creating content that I wish there was more of when I was following those influencers.

I do think that there is a misconception that people who call out wellness scripters and these these influencers don't care about fitness or don't care about health.

You your way through this was caring quite a bit about health and fitness, and.

I still do.

I think, you know, I think that these wiless influencers that I cover in a lot of ways and like not in other ways, we actually have more in common than I think they realize.

I love working out, I love going to the gym.

I cook most of my own meals.

I diffuse essential oils.

I just don't think they cure cancer.

And I have often described myself as like an evidence based wellness curly as opposed to a wellness curly, lower case wellness as opposed to upper case wellness.

Oh we are in the same sort of then diagram because I love a lot of woo woo stuff that, but I have a sense, you know, if I had cancer, I would not turn to homeopathic cures or remedies, right I would.

I would, I would do what my doctor said to do.

And I think what you just said is so interesting of you can, like essential oil, just don't just don't think that they're going to cure cancer, and then don't make money telling people that they maybe cann.

And I always like to make very clear too, like I am someone in a fairly like privileged position in a lot of ways, one of being that I have never experienced or had to navigate a diagnosis or chronic illness, and I don't know how like that path may have changed, you know where I find myself right now.

I do see in my own work, like a lot of the folks who are really keen to take advice and buy products from these wallness influencers are in a space like that.

And so I do think that, you know, there is a space where I think we're all like a little bit susceptible to something like that.

If we're like in a vulnerable enough or like desperate enough place.

But yeah, my approach to wellness right now is very skeptical, incredibly skeptical.

And it makes me a bit sad seeing all this like anti even anti wellness stuff, because I'm like, well, this is great, and I love aspects of wellness, and there's all these influencers that I think are ruining it for everyone.

Oh that's such a good point.

And you know, I'm bram the same Instagram.

I'm sure that you're Instagram algorithm might look like mine.

So often I think that the people, oftentimes women, who are representing wellness, it's a particular kind of woman, right, conventionally attractive, very fit, thin.

I do you, is there something where what they're actually selling is not just the idea of being healthy and well, it's an entire lifestyle and identity that comes along with it that if you just buy this supplement or just do this thing that they're doing, your life can look like my life, which is which comes off as very idealized.

Yeah, I think like the lifestyle marketing aspect is beyond wellness influencers.

I know it's fairly popular in multi level marketing advertising as well, from influencers about like look at this lavish lifestyle that I have, and then the reality is that they're kind of unfortunately living paycheck to paycheck in that business model.

I also really love the motto or the phrase of your body is not your business card.

And so this idea of you know, not you using your body to market particular supplements or like anything, really because there's a huge component of like genetics, and you don't actually know what someone's lifestyle is like they could be actually very sick and you don't know that.

And so I think it goes back to that whole piece of like social media being a highlight reel, and unfortunately a lot of social media right now is just direct advertising and anything that might impact someone's bottom line, they're probably not going to share that.

Why should you care what wellness influencers are hawking on social media?

This vast network of health and wellness personalities is increasingly stewing people toward extremist ways of thinking, and they're making a fortune doing it.

All about putting people's real health at risk.

Why do you think what's happening in this sort of wellness content creator influencer space.

Why is it important to be paying attention to yeah.

The I would say, like, we are carrying around these influencers in our pocket all day, and there's so much Can I swear on this podcast?

Can I say there's so much shit online?

Absolutely?

Okay, there's so much.

You can keep that in.

There's so much shit online these days that I think this is so important to pay attention to.

From just like a media literacy perspective of you know gone, I think are the days of when I first downloaded Instagram in twenty thirteen, where we were sharing square photos with really terrible filters, just like about our life.

I think a lot of these social platforms are propped up by like a financial funnel now, and so just knowing that you're carrying that around in your hand and in your pocket or in your purse all day.

And I also think it's important to pay attention to.

Like I mentioned before, I think anyone is susceptible to these things, and I think with specifically with wellness influencers quite different than someone who is for example, I don't know, like an your interior designer influencer, your influence to buy a particular I don't know, like blanket or vachure, like while art or something like that doesn't really impact you beyond like a financial aspect, really, But when it comes to wireless influencers, there's the financial component, of course, but there's also like they are playing with your health and your body and your perception of your health, and I think that makes the wellness space the crossover with wondness and influence her culture like quite remarkably different.

Oh my gosh, I'm glad that you said this, because I do think there's this attitude that none of this stuff really matters.

That these health decisions and health choices that folks are making that they're being kind of prompted to make through these influencers.

They don't even know that it's the same kind of decision as buy this couch or don't buy this couch.

These decisions can be life or death.

Just look at Ananda Lewis.

Ananda Luis on MTV was one of my idols growing up.

She got to talk to young people about news and real issues on MTV and I basically just wanted her job.

She's probably one of the reasons why I host this very podcast.

Years later, Ananda's mother was diagnosed with breast cancer.

Her mom went through mammogram after mammogram, and those screenings do involve some radiation, and yet her mother still developed breast cancer.

So Ananda came to believe that the mammograms themselves caused her mom's cancer.

So in Ananda's own doctors recommended regular mammograms, she refused, and by the time Ananda's own breast cancer was discovered, it was far more advanced and if she had just had the mammograms.

And the irony is that once she was diagnosed, she ended up undergoing pet scans and other procedures that exposed her to even more radiation than the mammograms would have.

Ananda followed a lot of wellness claims, like that your body can heal itself through things like cold plunges and diet alone.

When her doctors recommended a aseectomy to treat her breast cancer, Ananda once again went against their advice, choosing instead to pursue alternative healing and ridding her body of toxins.

She told People Magazine, my plan was to get excessive toxins out of my body.

I felt like my body is intelligent.

I know that to be true.

Our bodies are brilliantly made.

Ananda died of breast cancer earlier this year, and she left behind a very young child Before she died.

She made a video reflecting on those choices, saying that she regretted not listening to medical science and warned others not to follow her path.

In her own words, she said, I decided to keep my tumor and try to work it out of my body a different way.

Looking back on that, I go, you know what, maybe I should have.

I don't know if you're familiar with the mtvvj Ananda Lewis, who passed away recently of breast cancer.

I was very moved by her story, and one of the things that she said was that she regretted not listening to medical science and following the guidance of the actual trained health professionals.

Instead, she really thought, oh, I can cure things on I own through diets, through homeopathic remedies.

And I think that there's this attitude that I'm just this is just a personality branding thing.

I do my own thing, and part of that is not listening to doctors when in reality it is life or death.

Because she passed away from cancer which would have been treatable had she listened to her doctor, and she really was open about regretting that fact, regretting the fact that she listened to people who maybe didn't actually have her real life and her real health at the forefront of their minds.

Absolutely, And I often get asked like so what, like so what somebody wants to buy supplements, like why do you care so much?

And my response is usually I think that the best case scenario is that someone just wastes their money.

The worst case scenario is that something actually impacts their health in a really negative way, or they're influenced by following particular people online to forego evidence, evidence based treatment when it's really needed.

And unfortunately, like you just mentioned this one particular story, there are more and more stories like this coming now out now and like making it to the headlines.

And it's so unfortunate, and I don't want to see any more of these stories, but I think we will, And all we can do is like just amplify them and show them that this is actually the real harm of what's happening here.

How did we get to a place where folks are more comfortable taking medical advice from some influencer on Instagram rather than an actual medical professional.

I think there's probably a few different things from my own observations and like my own brain here, but I think first and foremost, there is like a fairly I think warranted distrust or like complicated relationship with conventional medicine or like western medical doctors.

In a lot of the work that I do in observing the wellness space, there are predominantly women sharing stories about how they were dismissed by their doctors.

They're said were not taken seriously, and it was that that prompted them to seek out alternatives.

And so I do think there are gaps in medicine for sure, Like I don't think anyone who is critical of the wellness space would deny that.

I just think that these wellness influencers, they will tell you that they're filling those gaps, but my view is that they're actually exploiting them.

And so I think that's one piece of it.

And I think another piece of it is if you are navigating something and you go to your doctor and they're talking to you based on evidence and statistics and probability, and there's no one cure or like one piece that will fix everything that makes you feel a particular way.

But then you go online and there's an influencer that is speaking in absolutes, where like medical profession very regulated can't speak like that, wellness base unregulated can speak like that.

And so if an influencer is telling you that they like for sureseys you know, have this cure that will help you, you're probably more inclined to go with them.

I also think too, and I hear this a lot from you know, again, predominantly women.

They're like, well, you only get fifteen minutes with your doctor, which I don't know about you, but that's true for me, Like I only get fifteen minutes with my doctor, but they frame this as a negative.

That's also if you have access to a doctor in the first place.

But these you know, alternative practitioners or influencers will give you much more time and they will claim it's because they care about you more and they will, you know, help you.

They will offer to you what will help you, like for sure.

And I think that goes back to what you were talking about earlier.

Off especially if you're vulnerable, or you're going through something, or you're navigating a health challenge or trying to navigate a health challenge on behalf of a loved one, you are in such a susceptible position.

I very recently was caring for my dad before his death, and it was this issue where he had several chronic health issues and he was host like long term hospitalized for many months, and the doctor twice a day, the doctors would do their rounds and come into the ICU room and like talk to me about what was going on, and they what I First of all, what I wanted if those doctors had spent two hours with me, that would not have been enough time.

What I wanted was doctors to come in, hold my hand and say, we have figured it out.

It turns out it was this one easy thing and he's one hundred percent going to be okay.

But I never goot that.

What I got was fifteen minutes of very good you know, no shade to the doctors, they were great, but fifteen minutes of being like, oh, well, you know, we asked this problem and that problem and this problem and jargon and words and me having to be like, stop, back up, what does this mean?

And it was an incredibly frustrating experience, and in that moment of vulnerability, had an influencer online said I hear you, I see you.

The answer is this miracle cure in your dad is going to be fine.

I would have absolutely been susceptible to that.

It is that that experience has really showed me how these influencers are so good at targeting the very real vulnerabilities that really do exist in.

US vulnerabilities and also specifically like right now with tail and all being in the news, but I also had a project earlier this year in January with the fires in La.

Wiless influencers are incredibly skilled at leveraging tragedy or crises, whether that's like a personal tragedy, so like you just said, when you're personally like very vulnerable, you or a loved one are navigating something or perhaps a community tragedy, so the city that you live in is on fire.

And in that experience or like that, at that time, I was watching observing willless influencers just ready to pitch you their supplements and detoxes for like, if you live in La and you are, you know, breathing in this air, you need to detox and yours a discount God for twenty five percent off.

And so I think they are very good at leveraging those feelings around things.

And I also think for listeners and maybe you have seen the show as well, The Apple Cider Vinegar on Netflix.

It came out this winter.

I think that experience that you just described of, you know, this hypothetical alternative practitioner or influencer coming in versus an experience with the Doctor.

I think that show did an incredible job depicting those differences for anyone who's familiar with the show.

It's based on the true story of Bell Gibson.

But I think they did a really good job.

Even like you know, the scenes with the Doctor, there is like this blue kind of like filter over top of it.

I thought they did a really good job.

Are you very institutional, very cold?

Yes?

Yep, that very like quick timely turned around.

That's just the reality I think that a lot of people have.

Let's take a quick break at our back.

Let's talk about what RFK Junior called his big autism announcement last week, when the Trump administration announced that taking thailanol during pregnancy causes autism.

As soon as the administration went public with this claim, wellness scripters were already on it, hockeying supposed thailan al alternatives and supplements online.

So you mentioned thailanol, and the Trump administration, as we know, is saying, oh, we've unveiled the cause of autism, and it's Thailand all taking Thailand al while pregnant.

Something that you really were on is how these grifters were so on it.

People already had their a supplement.

It's like, oh, here's if you're not taking thailol anymore, because you're not, you don't want your kid to be autistic, Good on you, mama, bear, take my supplement.

How were they on it so fast?

It's practiced like it's it's I think it's like rinse and repeat every single time.

There is something that feels similar to this, where there is a headline that stokes fear and they have something to sell you.

So you're right, Like, within a day I saw influencers selling various supplements, some that are involved in multi level marketing companies, whether that's like alternatives to tile and all that they just so happen to have a discount code for which makes me leave me there.

It's so convenient.

There's always a financial incentive, it seems, or you know, using a bit of mental gymnastics to somehow promote their supplements that maybe aren't alternatives necessarily, but you still need them in this case.

Like it's so quick, and I wasn't even surprised at this point.

I was just honestly just waiting for it.

For so long.

These influencers have been saying, you can't trust the FDA, you can't trust the government.

But then they turn around and say, oh, the government just just pointed out this link to tailant all and autism.

I take I take that to the bank by my supplement.

If you're gonna avoid tilt all.

What's going on there?

Like that?

Does that seem like a switch up at all?

I've seen it before.

I mean, I think with the tail and all thing too.

I've seen a lot of these influencers be like, well, the study was from Harvard, and I'm like, I have a hard time believing that you would take on, you know, belief with every other study that has come out of Harvard, and so why is it this particular one that you're so passionately defending.

I also find it really interesting, you know a few years ago, in observing these Wallness influencers, they had this motto of I don't co parent with the government, and they even had like a bunch of merch made and yeah, and the Mama Bears I don't co parent with the government.

And now I just sick.

Kind of seems like they're really keen to co parent with the government, and I'm like, where's that merch gone?

Like what are we doing here?

So yeah, I think that like their switch up is pretty predictable.

A number of years ago, I was tracking influencers who were selling a frequency medicine device through again a multi level marketing company, and one of their pieces of marketing in promoting that opportunity and that device was that it was FDA cleared, which is obviously different than FDA approved, But they were using that as a proof point of why you should buy it.

But then on their own socials, like within the same day, sometimes they would turn around and make a video talking about how you can't trust the FDA, vaccines, masks, all this kind of stuff, and it's like, but just a second, you just used the FDA to promote this thing you're trying to sell.

So I think it will always be confusing and self serving.

Yeah, the FDA is good when it benefits me in my marketing.

It's bad when it doesn't.

That's literally always what it is.

And about that Harvard study, I wanted to bring in our producer, Mike, because Mike is a scientist.

Yeah, you know, I'm not a medical doctor, but as a scientist, I did want to weigh in about the quality of that piece of alleged evidence from Harvard that the administration and MAHA people keep pointing to to support these dubious claims about talentanol and autism.

For one thing, it was not a new study out of Harvard.

It was a review paper, which will be fine.

There's nothing wrong with the review papers, except this one has been criticized for leaving out important studies.

The senior author, doctor Andrea Baccarelli, who is dean of faculty at Harvard THH.

Chan School of Public Health, has previously been paid to testify in support of an association of talent al with autism, and so the review has been criticized both for its methodology and for having that conflict of interest.

But even if we set those concerns aside, the paper itself does not claim that Thailand all causes autism.

I think this is an important point for this piece of evidence that is supposed to be supporting that because it doesn't say that.

It goes out of its way to not say that.

It reports finding an association, which is very different from a causal connections.

You know, our listeners are pretty savvy folk, and so I'm guessing they've heard the phrase correlation doesn't equal causation, and I think that caution very much applies here.

There are many, many reasons that an association might exist if it does other than a causal connection.

And this isn't just my opinion.

I've seen a lot of takes over the past week from important, respected public health officials saying similar things.

Tom Frieden, the former director of the CDC, published a long post on LinkedIn reiterating that tailand all is safe.

The balance of evidence suggests pretty clearly that it is.

Doctor zay and Lu, professor at the Yale School of Public Health, gave an interview in which he reiterated that there is no proven causal relationship between tail and all and autism, and so the balance of evidence is pretty clear here.

And it's really unfortunate that because the author of that one review paper is from Harvard, it's giving the MAHA crowd license to run with the Harvard name and make their unsupported claims seem weightier than they are, even though they're claiming things that the study itself does not say.

And it's also unfortunate that that same researcher has taken payment for his testimony, because that raises questions, I think about the independence of the research and potential conflict of interest.

Did he really need the money that badly?

You know, I don't know.

But the whole thing fits awfully, neatly into this same pseudoscience grifter model that we've been talking about.

Sometimes it feels like the grift goes all the way up.

And again, I'm not a medical doctor and this isn't my area of expertise, but as a researcher and a consumer of science, I wanted to offer that perspective and just make sure that all of our listeners know that the vast majority of people who are medical doctors and who do specialize in this topic agree that tail and all is safe.

And it goes back to what Mallory was just saying about how association with an institution like Harvard or a study or something like that, it's good when it benefits me, but other times, oh, you can't trust those institutions, they don't know what they're talking about.

You going to trust the government totally.

And I also think too like a part of this now playing into like the social media and the technology part, Like we're living in an age where your belief systems are broadcast online for everyone to see, and oftentimes these influencers have thousands, tens, hundreds of thousands, up to a million followers, And I just all I think about sometimes is like, how hard would it be for you to admit that you were wrong or that you changed your mind when you have all of these folks following you and paying you in a lot of ways?

Probably, And it reminds me of something that I read in a book called How to Talk to a Science Denier by Lee McIntyre, which I recommend, love, I love it and I always recommend it.

But he talks about this idea of asking someone about any particular belief that they have, what information would make you change your mind?

Because if the answer is nothing, first of all, you're about to have a very unproductive conversation.

But like, second of all, what does that say to you about your belief system that if nothing could change your mind?

That sounds pretty closed minded and just not I mean, like I see things through like evidence and science and really support that, and other people don't.

And I understand that.

But I just think in terms of like having a conversation with someone, especially me and my comment section, like just getting a gauged for like good faith conversations.

I always like to start with something like that because if the answer is nothing, then I don't really know what we're doing here.

You know, when you post your content on social media about the wellness space, what kind of conments are you getting?

You know, It's funny.

I've been creating content for a few years now.

My following has grown.

I actually got a lot more pushback and hate when I had an incredibly small following, like less than five thousand followers than I do now.

Sometimes I'll have videos end up on the wrong side of the algorithm, and that will elicit what I think are a lot of like bought comments, because they're all the same.

They hate my dangs, they hate my nose ring, I have tattoos, I have pronouns, I look vaccinated.

It's predictable.

It's all the same stuff, and it's nothing that I don't already know about.

Myself, but I know I have beags.

Yeah, I got them trimmed.

I know that I know I have my nose ring.

I paid for that, and so it is one of those things where I think the algorithm is driving alive.

Now.

I also know, because I have my followers send me videos that I cannot see, that I have been preemptively blocked by a lot of influencers who I've never heard of before.

And so I think there was probably some sort of Mallory memo that went around continues to go around at some point.

Yeah, how does that make you feel?

Pretty?

Like not terrible?

To be honest, I was gonna say, you're like the like Omar from the Wire, but for the wellness space of like watch out for Mallory.

If she gets you, she's gonna blow your cunt up and point out all the ways that it's a grift.

I also, like have rarely had folks who I have included in my videos have a what I would describe as a productive conversation, like I'm not going to make a video unless it's like pretty.

I feel pretty good about it, and there's not a lot of wiggle room for you know, them to be like, actually, like, I will collect content and feel really good about something before I publish it to the Internet, and so oftentimes if those folks come across my content, I think they just block me.

I don't think that they engage in conversation or try to.

Very often, I have gotten a lot of, you know, very empty legal threats where they're like, that's defamation, and I'm like, I don't think so.

When the Trump administration announced that kilol during pregnancy was supposedly linked to autism, pregnant women pushed back hard because here's the thing right now, thy lil is pretty much the only safe option for pain relief during pregnancy.

It's what doctors recommend.

So of course women started speaking up.

They were saying, look, I'm going to keep following the advice of my doctor, and I'm going to take tilamal for pain if I need it.

But here's where the social media outrage machine kicks in.

That very reasonable, measured pushback suddenly gets spun into something kind of wild online.

It morphed into this completely fabricated story that pregnant liberal women hate Trump and RFK Junior so much they're filming themselves overdosing on Thilo mal in mass just to spite him and winding up in the hospital.

Now that's not really what's happening, obviously, But this is how misinformation spreads.

Take a kernel of truth, twist it, blow it up, and suddenly becomes a viral culture war talking point.

Do you see outrage marketing or outrage culture and weaponizing and sploiting outrage online as part of this, because sometimes I'll see well, miss influencers saying things and doing things.

I think you are saying this because you want to get people riled up, because you know that it's going to have a positive impact on your engagement.

Is this something that you see it all while looking at this kind of content.

Yes, absolutely all the time.

I mean, I have another thing that I can talk about.

But because Thailand All is so topical right now, you may have seen there's a number of conservative content creators who are outraged by this Thailand All a TikTok trend where apparently pregnant liberal women are guzzling Thailand All on TikTok as some sort of gotcha to Trump and RFK Junior The Cut reported and this is my own observation as well, that that's not actually happening.

There's a handful of you know, women who are trolling on TikTok.

It's the same I don't know, like four to five tiktoks that these conservative content creators are clipping, I think, and they're taking a single tile in all on camera.

And I just think that if this TikTok trend was actually happening where you know, pregnant liberal women were taking Thailand all by the fistfuls, that they would be including those videos instead.

And I just haven't seen them.

And so you want to talk about like driving engagement and outrage, I think that's a perfect example.

I have seen tenfold more videos in response to this alleged trend than I have actual videos that would be a part of this trend.

Yeah, not only would you like see more of those women guzzling handfuls of fellow, but they would be showing up in emergency rooms with like liver failure.

Yeah.

Well, there is a particular woman.

She is the founder and executive director of American Frontline Nurses.

She is alleging that she received a phone call about, oh, these redoces are happening and people are in hospitals.

I have not seen any reporting on this, and I think that if it was inspired by a TikTok trend, Unfortunately, like harms from TikTok trends, fatalities from TikTok trends has been reported on before.

Unfortunately, that's something that has happened, and so you know, if this does get reported on, I will eat my words.

But for now, I haven't seen anything, and I do think in my personal opinion at this point, I do think it is to drive engagement and that outrage aside from Thailand, although like I think another really good example beyond outrage, I think algorithms really favor content that is extreme, and so even in videos that I stitch, there are certain videos that I come across where I'm like, it doesn't even matter what I say or what I do, this video is going to take off because what this influencer has portrayed or said is so extreme.

And I think I've covered parasite cleanses before, and I think that's a really good example of these folks who have these cleanses to sell you.

They can't just say take my cleans and you'll feel better.

They have to say you're filled with worms.

Everyone is it's the root of all disease, and doctors are lying and the government is suppressing it, and so you need to buy my tincture in detox three to four times a year.

And also, here's one hundred photos of people's poop with like alleged parasites in them.

Meanwhile, medical professionals are coming out and saying, actually, like, those aren't parasites.

It's undigested food matter, maybe undetermined matter, or also maybe the lining of your own intestines.

But they're like, Nope, it's worms.

And the government's lying to us.

And that's the extreme claim that they use to push their supplements because you can't really sell stuff being like I made this thing in my back shed and I think it'll make you feel better.

I also think there's just no comparison, Like the people who are saying it's worms are definitely selling the more compelling story.

What what Like For sure, yeah, I could sort of understand why, oh my poop looks like that because I have undigested food matter in it maybe and not because I'm actually full of secret worms.

But government is lying to me about I can understand why a certain kind of person is always going to go with the more compelling story.

Yeah, especially when they have something to sell and they're like, I had no idea I had this many worms in me, and like you probably do too, and here's my discount code.

Like there was one woman who was I think, financially tied to a particular product that on its own website does not describe itself as a parasite clons, but on social media she would describe it that way, and she claimed that in I think it was sixty days that she shit out like eight hundred worms, And I'm like, first of all, who is counting?

Second of all, how did you care?

That works absurd?

Like who is believed?

But people are believing it.

And so I think there's that, like the conspiracy element is compelling, and the you you don't know this about your body, but I'm telling you because I have privileged knowledge, Like that's really compelling to There's also.

I think a little bit of like the truth is in the middle here, Like oh my god, she's saying I had eight hundred worms.

That's probably extreme, but like maybe I have two hundred that's still bad.

Mm totally yeah, And like also there's a weave of truth in a lot of these wellness things, so they parasites and worms exist for sure.

I don't think anyone is denying that they don't.

But it's this idea that everyone has them.

It doesn't matter where you've traveled too, and you're being lied to by the medical system, but you can trust me a random woman on TikTok who has a cleanse to sell you.

And I do think that part of this is, I guess, a reaction to feeling out of control, you know, I if I I almost wonder if this is why RFK when he first got into office, when it, you know, is a big thing, was I'm going to eventually I'm gonna do a countdown to what I unveil the cause of autism.

I feel like it's exploiting parents who have concerns about their kid, right, and I wonder if those parents feel out of control and so by telling them like, oh, here's the thing, here is the thing that you need to avoid, that will the old one hundred percent make it so that you don't have to worry that your kid might have autism?

People are going to jump on that.

I feel like it's Oftentimes the causes of health issues are systemic or institutional or we don't know a ton about them, or they have no easy fix and that people can just fill that fill that space with a bunk because of it.

Totally.

Yeah, I think well in terms of like the autism announcement.

I know, so I'm a correspondent for the Conspiratuality podcast and after the election, the American election because I'm Canadian and so I see all this like very like just watch observing from the side.

But after the American election in November, we did an episode called Maha Mamas.

I was just looking to that, yes, and so it was very much so You're right, like I think very strategic, Like there are these mothers who are concerned, They are you know, looking to RFK Junior.

They like what he stands for.

They may have not voted for Trump otherwise, but as soon as they you know, partnered together or RFK Junior was endorsed, that pushed these women to you know, maybe vote in that way.

And I think it's a lot easier to digest saying I'm voting for making America healthy again than I'm voting for like the convicted felon.

So I think that that was these like very real I think concerns that mothers have and questions and you know, these things that they feel very deeply and are very valid.

I think that that was leveraged in a very strategic way.

And in terms of the out of control feeling, I mean I only started really observing this space during the pandemic.

But you know, as someone with a fitness background, I used to be a fitness instructor, these things were never talked about in these spaces.

It was just it was science, like fitness and health is a science, and so that's how we spoke about these things.

And it wasn't until the pandemic where I saw a number of my fitness peers sharing conspiratorial content and I was like, what is happening here and just seeing a lot of folks really fall into conspiratorial thinking, I think as a result of feeling out of control.

And it's nice to have or at length, to feel like you have knowledge and you know what's happening for sure, and you know what is causing what, even if that's not substantiated, it makes you feel better and like in more control.

Yeah, I noticed the same thing.

I mean, do you think it was the feeling of lack of control?

And fear and not knowing what was going on that we all experienced during the pandemic.

Do you think that was what was driving this change?

I think a lot of it.

Like in my own observation, I'm like, they're so and again only started tracking for my own content during the pandemic, and so I can't really compare it to pre pandemic, But like it does seem even just as someone who digests news and is like on the internet every day, like it does seem so much more amplified than it ever was.

And I think that there are folks even you know, that I work with and they're like, oh, I don't need a parasite cleanse, And I'm like, you're not someone who strikes me as someone who would think that you do.

And I think that we're just in a place now where we don't really know what to believe.

There's so much online.

And the way that these algorithms get you when so like I also like fitness, I enjoy yoga, I enjoy weightlifting, and trying to use the internet to get information about these two which should be like fairly commonplace interests.

It's like the algorithm says, oh, you're into weightlifting.

Huh, you're trying to eat more protein.

Huh, well, certainly seed oil it's got to get those out of the mix.

Huh.

Right, certainly you don't want to be vaccinating your family.

Right.

The way that when you just have this one interest that whatever algorithm has decided, oh well, then you probably feel x about seed oils X about vaccines.

The way it's sort of done as a digital package deal, I think is really insidious totally.

There's this phrase called crank magnetism, and it's this idea that science deniers or conspiracy theorists often don't believe one wrong thing, they believe many wrong things.

And so if you are already in the anti vaccine camp, you are more likely to believe that sunscreen is actually causing cancer and not the sun.

And you are now also more likely to like homeschool your children, and you are more likely and like just it becomes like you said, a package deal, where it's like you kind of believe this one thing, and it's usually not just that one thing.

And especially when you're following influencers, like if you follow a particular like homesteading influencer, because you have an interest in that, you are now all of a sudden fed you know, anti vax or you should be using tallow instead of sunscreen stuff.

More.

After a quick break, let's get right back into it.

Women are the primary health decision makers for their families, and people like RFK Junior know it.

That's why targeting women, especially moms, with health misinformation is so powerful.

Enter the Mama bears, the moms who say that they are the only things standing between their kids and industries full of corruption.

It seems to me that sort of the connecting thread on some of this is, as you alluded to earlier, not just women, but moms, Maha moms, they call themselves mama bears.

How has moms and motherhood?

How has that kind of been the Maha secret weapon?

Like when I did the Conspiratuality episode, it was really just an observation of like how folks who were already in the Maha sphere were calling on mothers to be engaged and be interested and vote a particular way, and so you know, they would never say it was strategic, but it certainly was.

Like in the episode, I referenced RFK Junior's website and how he sold merch that referenced like mahamas, mahammas.

But there was no like dad equivalent, like Dad's got t shirts about I don't know, I forget now, but like probably not eating sale oil steak in Tallo, yeah, make tallow Grady.

I forget, but it was probably something really ridiculous like that.

And I'm like, oh, it seems really intentional from a merch perspective anyway, which maybe some might see as you know, not significant enough, but I certainly do because merch now you can see it as like identity.

You wear it around, this is who you are, and if you're wearing merch that says maha mamas, that is who you're identifying as.

And I think so it was absolutely strategic I think on their part to pull on mothers, and Kelly means even how to tweet their references.

In the episode where he calls on mothers and a woman responds to him and says, well, I'm not a mother, Like what did you mean by this?

And he's like, oh, nothing like It's like no, I think it was actually something.

It's just it would be harder to digest if you actually called it what it was.

Yeah, And I think you're so spot on that for a lot of these people.

I can't remember the I that might have been the influencer.

There's an influencer that you that you hear from in that episode where she talks about how, oh, generally I'm in the middle of the road politically, and you might even say that I lean more toward Democrats, but I am happy that Trump is in the White House because I am I want to make America healthy again.

I am one hundred percent on board for that.

I do think that a lot of these moms might have a harder time getting behind somebody like Donald Trump, but then would say like, oh, well, I didn't vote for all the trumpy stuff.

I voted for the health stuff with the RFK.

Is that what's going on?

I mean, that's my observation for sure, and I certainly think again, in my observation, there seems as time passes to be a really big difference between upper case make America healthy again and lowercase make America healthy like it's a movement, not necessarily this like more of like a conceptual idea of like there are My understanding is, you know, there are folks who are always trying to make America healthy.

But it's this very particular politically motivated movement.

And I will say thank god I listened to the Conspiratuality podcast, because obviously there's nothing about this administration that I'm that I am for.

But I caught myself saying the thing that some of those influencers say, which is, well, I don't agreeing with the administration, but you know, there are some things that RFK is trying to do that I'm aligned with.

And I said that about the ideas of removing or banning food dies.

Then I listened to the Conspiratuality podcast about it.

Come to find out, this motherfucker it wasn't even a band.

It was a how did they put it, It was a voluntary understanding that these companies were going to remove some dies with no kind of enforcement mechanisms.

And I'm saying, I literally from my mouth, was like, well, this administration can't do anything right, but at least they're trying to ban these food dies.

It was never even a ban.

I cannot believe how effective it was at getting into even the consciousness of somebody like me who can't stand any of this administration, that oh, well, there are some good things they're doing that when you actually look at what they've done.

It's actually a lot of smoke and mirrors, totally.

Yeah, and like I'm far from an expert on any of that, but the creators that I follow who are experts, are calling it just a mirror distraction from issues that really matter, and a distraction so that you look away from various cuts in funding that are happening in the same administration.

And the ways that our health is being sort of given over to Charlatan's and private companies that might have friendly and cozy relationships with the administration.

They made a really good point.

I swear I'll stop like plus plussing the Conspiratuality podcast.

Conspirituality.

Yeah, it is one of my favorite podcasts, Like I remember what you'd be listening to it, And I almost never recommend other podcasts on this show because if if you gave you open the door to that, I would the whole podcast episode would be my rex.

But if there was one show that I would suggest folks listen to you to understand this, it would be Conspirratuality and the ways that like people who own private testing company so you know it's so it's not me going to my doctor or going to an actual clinic and getting testing done, having that testing being covered by insurance and all of that.

It's no spend five hundred dollars out of pocket for this private company that runs tests that will tell you the same thing week.

It won't that my buddy owns all of that.

I mean, I just never realized how much all of this is just the same old crony politics being repackaged as something that is good for us.

And I think that speaks to the very real gaps in like the American medical system.

And oftentimes I think with those companies that you're talking about that conspiratuality often talks about, is it's not just these tests that you pay out of pocket for, it's also the supplements that they recommend after that their own company owns.

Often Yeah, I mean, I guess my big question of this is we are people who are health conscious.

We care about our health, we care about fitness and wellness.

I use guasha, I drink mushroom coffee, all kinds of weird little things that I'm sure I'm wasting my money on.

I do and it makes me feel warm fuzzies, and that's that.

Are there ways to be interested in these things?

And into these things without it leading into a more dangerous, sometimes extremistic pipeline, Like, is there a way to be interested in these sort of alternative health practices but be sane and safe about it, especially online?

Yeah, I mean, I think there's probably a lot of folks out there who have tips on this, but like my own opinion is just to like constantly be checking in with yourself.

There are people online who are acting in various nefarious ways to get you to believe something.

Like I said before, you know, with certain other niches of influencers, they do not need you to change your entire belief system in order to influence you to buy something.

But the wellness space is encroaching more and more on that where they're not just selling you brands, they're selling you belief systems and so checking in with yourself.

I think it's totally okay to participate in things that you know, like the mushroom coffee not totally my thing, but if you like it, then why wouldn't you just do it?

That's fine, I think, but where did you hear it?

Who did you hear it from?

What are your motivations around continuing a particular practice?

Is there a pipeline that exists around this particular path that could have you going further down into something.

I know.

Derek Burris, who is one of the co hosts of the Conspiratuality podcasts.

He recently worked with The New York Times on a video that talks about a funnel but it is happening that they've identified where it takes someone from being helf conscious, following these particular influencers all the way down to rejecting medicine and holding this conspiracy theory that the healthcare system is like knowingly harming people to keep them sick and make money.

And I think that this, you know, video really depicts that well around like you can have these like scrunchy I think that's a phrase that's online where it's like kind of crunchy, these you know, lifestyles and these practices and just checking in with yourself around like how you might be falling down a particular pipeline or funnel.

Got a story about an interesting thing in tech, or just want to say hi, we just said hello at tangodi dot com.

You can also find transcripts for today's episode at tengodi dot com.

There are no girls on the Internet was created by me bridget Tod.

It's a production of iHeartRadio and Unbossed creative.

Jonathan Strickland is our executive producer.

Tari Harrison is our producer and sound engineer.

Michael Almato is our contributing producer.

I'm your host, bridget Todd.

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