Latest Abuseofpower Podcast Episodes
R. Derek Black, Part 1 - Former White Supremacist & Leading a Double Life
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - June 26, 2024 08:00 - 57 minutes ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsToday our guest is R. Derek Black, former poster child for white supremacy (now turned antiracist advocate) and author of the new memoir The Klansman’s Son. Derek, who came out as trans in this book, walks us through the white supremacist movement, where it stands now, what it was like growing u...
Ian Rafalko, Part 2 - Son of a YouTube Scientologist Health Guru
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - June 19, 2024 08:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsIn part two with Ian Rafalko, we go deeper into how he left Scientology, what that meant for his family life, and how his dad's lucrative online presence and supplement company tows the line of multi-level marketing. Ian will talk about the viral TikTok video he posted in which he said he was go...
Ian Rafalko, Part 1 - Former Scientology Auditor
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - June 12, 2024 08:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsToday is part one Ian Rafalko, a former scientologist from a prominent scientologist family AND son of a prominent YouTube health guru. We explore how his family joined Scientology, what it was like growing up in a group where children are treated as adult spirits in small bodies, whether Scient...
Aliia Roza - Former Russian Secret Agent and Sex Spy
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - June 05, 2024 08:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsSubject of the new Neil Strauss podcast "To Die For", Aliia Roza shares about her childhood in Russia, her father who worked for the government, the training school and how she was coerced into joining a secret program for sex operations, the seduction and manipulation techniques she learned, ho...
Rabia Chaudry - Serial, True Crime, & Countering Violent Extremism
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - May 29, 2024 08:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsLawyer, advocate, podcaster, writer, and the reason you know about Adnan Syed from Serial, Rabia Chaudry, talks about her experience advocating for him, what it was like entering the true crime world, why Adnan is free now, what disappointed her about the coverage of his story, her work in CVE (...
Jessica Kahn - Y2K Cult
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - May 23, 2024 08:42 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsToday we chat with Jessica Kahn, former member of a group we're calling "The Narrow Road." She'll tell us about being born into this isolated fundamentalist Christian sect that was originally formed as an addiction treatment program, the leader's connection to the founders of AA, how every part ...
Madi Stroud - Daughter of a Cult Leader: Love Has Won & Amy Carlson
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - May 16, 2024 08:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsToday our guest is Madi Stroud. She was featured on the HBO docu series Love Has Won, and is late cult leader Amy Carlson’s daughter - the one whose mummified body was found wrapped in Christmas lights in Colorado. Madi shares what she remembers of her mom as a kid, how it felt after Amy suddenl...
Dr. Inna Kanevsky - Pseudoscience, TikTok Psychology, & Culty Psychologists
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - May 09, 2024 08:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsDr. Inna Kanevsky, psychologist, professor, and debunker of pseudoscience psychology TikToks, discusses the misinformation videos that got her started on the path of debunking, why mental health labels can be helpful but can also lead us to incorrectly self-diagnose and take on labels that do no...
Warren Kohl, Part 2 - The Pressures of Preaching in a Secretive Cult
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - May 01, 2024 23:33 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsToday is part two with Warren Kohl, former member and religious leader within the 2x2s (Meagan's secretive childhood group that technically has no name). Today we'll hear how Warren left behind his dreams of medical school to become a "worker" (a minister who stays in people's homes). He'll talk...
Warren Kohl, Part 1 - Preparing to Preach in a Secretive Cult
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - April 25, 2024 08:00 - 48 minutes ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsToday's guest is Warren kohl, a fifth generation member and former “worker” (or minister) in the 2x2’s, the group that Meagan grew up in. Warren shares how devout he was to the group at a very young age, having your entire life controlled, and how utter heartbreak in high school led him to celib...
Nadine Macaluso - Recognizing, Escaping, and Healing from Trauma Bonds
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - April 17, 2024 08:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsPsychologist, trauma bond expert, and author of Run Like Hell: A Therapist's Guide to Recognizing, Escaping, and Healing from Trauma Bonds, Nadine Macaluso share about her relationship with ex-husband Jordan Belfort (aka The Wolf of Wall Street) and how it led her to become a therapist with a fo...
Zoe & Lillian, Part 2 - Troubled Teens, Midwest Academy, and Solitary Confinement
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - April 03, 2024 20:00 - 53 minutes ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsIn part two with Zoe and Lilly, survivors of Midwest Academy, one of the abusive troubled teen programs in the same organization that was spotlighted in the docuseries The Program: Cons, Cults, and Kidnapping, we dig deeper into Lily’s experience. She’ll tell us how she was in solitary confineme...
Zoe & Lillian, Part 1 - The Program, Ivy Ridge and Casa by the Sea
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - March 27, 2024 18:00 - 55 minutes ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsSurvivors of the infamous WWASP schools, Zoe & Lillian, share about their experiences being forced to join Ivy Ridge, Midwest Academy, and Casa by the Sea; All schools featured in the current Netflix docudrama, The Program: Cons, Cults, and Kidnapping. Lola & Meagan dig into how these programs w...
Roberta Blevins, Part 2 - Leaving The LuLaRoe Family
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - March 21, 2024 17:00 - 58 minutes ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsIn part two with former LuLaRoe seller, Roberta Blevins, they discuss everything about LuLaRoe's founder DeAnne Brady and her family, the mother figure role DeAnne provided in Roberta's life, dealing with toxic positivity, and a thorough list of MLM red flags to look out for. Plus, how Roberta f...
Roberta Blevins - Inside LuLaRoe
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - March 13, 2024 08:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsIn part one with former LuLaRoe seller and Life After MLM podcast host, Roberta Blevins, she'll share how she first got involved in MLMS, what LuLaRoe was like, what the deal was with the wet smelly leggings, and what made realize that she did not want to be a part of MLM life anymore. We'll dis...
Roberta Blevins, Part 1 - Inside LuLaRoe
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - March 13, 2024 08:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsIn part one with former LuLaRoe seller and Life After MLM podcast host, Roberta Blevins, she'll share how she first got involved in MLMS, what LuLaRoe was like, what the deal was with the wet smelly leggings, and what made realize that she did not want to be a part of MLM life anymore. We'll dis...
Lola & Meagan - Am I in a Cult (or Just a Group)?
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - March 06, 2024 20:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsThis week, Lola and Meagan's guests are... Lola and Meagan! They talk about the cult of seeing everything as a cult, discussing how things that might seem a little culty don’t necessarily inherently mean that a group IS a cult. They’ll discuss political polarization, online miscommunication, gro...
Katelyn Jade Hlavaty, Part 2 - Satanic Ritual Abuse & Becoming a Spokesperson
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - February 28, 2024 10:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsIn part two of this listener story with Operation Light Force survivor, Katelyn Hlavaty, Lola and Meagan unpack how the leader's bogus healing protocol, which involved digging into old trauma, eventually led to Satanic Ritual Abuse. Katelyn shares how isolation from her family and a period of sp...
Katelyn Jade Hlavaty, Part 1 - Joining Operation Light Force
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - February 21, 2024 23:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsIn part one of this wild listener story, Katelyn Hlavaty chats with Lola and Meagan about her experience in the evangelical healing ministry group, Operation Light Force. Katelyn shares how she joined the group when she was isolated and struggling with Crohn's disease, and how the group's promis...
Sara Gorman - Science, Healthcare, and Why We Ignore Facts
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - February 14, 2024 21:14 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsSara Gorman, public health expert, CEO & founder of Critica, and author of Denying to the Grave: Why We Ignore the Facts That Will Save Us, joins Lola and Meagan to discuss the importance of the scientific method, why presenting evidence can feel like an attack, common debunked beliefs that pers...
Jenna Miscavige, Part 2 - Escaping Scientology
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - February 07, 2024 10:00 - 51 minutes ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsFormer Sea Org member and niece of Scientology leader David Miscavige, Jenna Miscavige, talks about leaving "The Ranch" in order to join the Sea Org, getting involved in higher level management, how she barely knew her own parents, the constant level of paranoia she saw from everyone at all leve...
Jenna Miscavige, Part 1 - Growing up in Scientology's Sea Organization
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - January 31, 2024 10:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsFormer Scientology Sea Org member and niece of current Scientology leader David Miscavige, Jenna Miscavige, talks about being a third generation member, growing up in the infamous Sea Organization, doing child labor in a place called The Ranch, the strong snitching culture and knowledge reports ...
Crystal Hefner - Surviving The Playboy Mansion
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - January 24, 2024 20:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsCrystal Hefner, former Playboy Playmate, Hugh Hefner's widow, author of Only Say Good Things: Surviving Playboy and Finding Myself shares how she ended going to the Playboy Mansion for the first time, getting invited by Hef to stay, her tightly controlled lifestyle and the weekly rituals that we...
Michelle Dowd, Part 2 - From the Mountain to the Hospital to Forging Her Own Path
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - January 17, 2024 10:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsIn part two of their conversation with Michelle Dowd, Lola & Meagan dig into when Michelle and her family moved to the mountain, why discomfort was considered a virtue, getting sick with an autoimmune disease at the age of ten, spending many months in the hospital away from The Field and her fam...
Michelle Dowd, Part 1 - Becoming a Forager in The Field
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - January 10, 2024 22:00 - 57 minutes ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsProfessor, survivor of The Field, and author of Forager: Field Notes for Surviving a Family Cult, Michelle Dowd, discusses growing up in the cult founded by her grandfather in the 1930s, how it started as an after school program for boys and evolved into something more sinister, the wild claims ...
Thomas & Micah, Part 2 - Mormon Mission, Scientology, & Disney Adults
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - December 27, 2023 21:44 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsTwo formerly closeted religious men, Thomas and Micah, share how they came out to their families and left their beliefs behind. Thomas talks about going on a Mormon mission as a gay man, Micah shares how learning about scientology was a turning point in his life, the group shares their thoughts ...
Thomas & Micah, Part 1 - God, Goofy, and Growing Up Gay in Religion
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - December 20, 2023 10:00 - 48 minutes ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsOne is a former Mormon. The other was a child of evangelical missionaries teaching a doctrine called Accelerated Christian Education. Both of them were closeted gay men growing up in strict religious households. Today, Thomas and Micah share about their upbringings, how they met working at Disne...
Marji Mozart, Part 2 - Life After the FLDS
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - December 13, 2023 10:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsMusician and former FLDS member, Marji Mozart, discusses her wedding day as an underage bride who had never been taught about sex, her multiple marriages including one to her sister's husband, the pain of feeling that her dreams of becoming a musician were dead, how spending time in the hospital...
Marji Mozart, Part 1 - Growing up in the FLDS
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - December 07, 2023 20:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsMusician and former FLDS member, Marji Mozart, shares about her childhood in Colorado City, living with a rebellious mother within a high control community, how she dreamed of being a musician instead of someone's wife, getting married to a grown man when she was only 17, and how that impacted h...
Barak Hardley - Where Belief Intersects Creativity
Trust Me: Cults, Extreme Belief, and Manipulation - November 29, 2023 23:00 - 1 hour ★★★★★ - 224 ratingsLola's friend, actor, artist, director, and the next Bob Ross, Barak Hardley talks about his previous life as an evangelical pastor, getting kicked out of the church, and transitioning to life as an actor in LA. Lola and Barak dive into the philosophy of art, the creative process, skepticism, se...
Related Abuseofpower Topics