Was I in a Cult?

Four years after we first met her in our studio - just days after her victim impact statement in Alison Mack's NXIVM trial -  Jessica Joan  is back. Since we last spoke, Jessica shared her story on the Hulu docuseries  "How I Escaped My Cult" , and a lot has shifted: in her healing, in what "justice" means, and in what accountability  actually  looks like over time. This follow-up conversation was...

**NOTE: This episode originally aired in 2021** Welcome to the worst cult ever (in our humble opinions). This is a story of incredible resilience, bravery, and inspiration. Being born into a cult always comes with its challenges, but learning how to have an original thought in your mid-20s is a rare struggle that most people are fortunate enough to never have to face. This is just one of many obst...

A comet. A cultural fever. And a cult's failed prophecy.  In 1973, as the holidays approached and the world felt increasingly unstable, a comet named Kohoutek was predicted to light up the sky in way never seen before… right at Christmas. The media obsessed. The artists sang. And David Berg, an apocalyptic sex cult leader, saw confirmation that judgment was imminent. Christmas would be the end. In...

This week we head to Nashville, Tennessee — where a cosmetology school promising structure, opportunity, and "professionalism" turned out to be something else entirely. Our guest, Sophia, thought she was paying over $20,000 to learn how to do hair. Instead, she walked into a system obsessed with obedience, image, and silence — where being late cost money, smiling was mandatory, and your body, time...

This week, Liz and Tyler head straight into the sweaty "this-is-definitely-not-a-cult-except-maybe-it-definitely-is" world of Ashtanga yoga.  Our guest,  Magnolia Zuniga , was  one of only 20 women in the world  to become a Certified Ashtanga teacher. She spent  22 years  inside the system — traveling to India, waking up before the crack of dawn, giving up apartments, and building her entire life...

When we got the email inviting us to interview journalist  Natalie Robehmed  about her new CBC + Campsite Media podcast,  Allison After NXIVM , we weren't sure what to do. Talking about  Allison Mack  — someone who caused very real harm, including to people we've had on this show - is complicated.  And honestly? We didn't want to accidentally platform or sanitize that harm. But then we listened. A...

She survived a violent polygamist cult. She survived a husband who collected wives like property. She survived the blood atonement doctrine that stalked her childhood like a shadow. But this is the part of Pamela Jones's story where she does the impossible: she runs. In this final chapter of our three-part series, Pamela plans an escape nearly as dangerous as the life she's leaving behind—nine chi...

In  Part Two  of Pamela Jones' extraordinary story, the so-called "escape" she dreamed of at fifteen turns into a new kind of prison. After growing up under the violent rule of the LeBaron brothers — a murderous offshoot of Mormon fundamentalism — Pamela marries young, believing it will be her salvation. Her husband David doesn't just take her innocence — he takes her freedom, her home, and her di...

She was born into one of the most dangerous polygamist cults in modern history — led by the infamous Ervil LeBaron, aptly nicknamed  "The Mormon Manson,"  a man who believed in murder for salvation. Her father had eleven wives, fifty-seven children, and a thousand secrets. This is Pamela Jones. She was six when she became a caretaker. Eleven when she learned to fear bullets. And fifteen when she t...

**Note: This episode originally aired in September 2021. Stick around til the end for a catch up interview with Daniel 4 years later.** With rockstar aspirations, Daniel O'Brien wasn't looking for anything but a good time. But when heartbreak rocked his world, he tripped into something that lifted his spirits and rallied his hopes - the Jehovah's Witnesses. Before he knew it, Daniel had traded his...

When Raidah left medical school in Sydney to spend the summer at what was promise to be an Islamic utopia in Jordan, she thought she was taking a break to heal. Instead, she found herself inside a high-control religious community led by Nuh Ha Mim Keller — an American-born Catholic convert who reinvented himself as a Sufi sheikh and built a devoted following of Muslims living in Western countries....

Today's story isn't about a reality TV show—though a lot of people think it starts there. In truth, it began long before the cameras, before the matching outfits and the too-perfect smiles. You know the TLC series 19 Kids & Counting—the Duggars and their seemingly perfect world built within the IBLP. But there was another Duggar—of sorts. Not a sibling. The cousin. Amy. Or as America came to know...

Nine years. One strip-mall church. A duffel bag full of cash, a freezing pool full of goldfish, and a pastor who convinced everyone he had a direct line to God. This week, Alisha takes us inside Church of the Harvest — a charismatic California congregation that promised purpose, purity, and a path to the pulpit… but delivered something far darker. Hazing disguised as holiness, unpaid labor disguis...

Last week, we met Paige: a bright-eyed engineer who joined SpaceX believing she was helping to save humanity. In Part 1, we followed her through the seduction — the mission, the 80-hour weeks, the Elon slogans on the walls, the slow loss of self until the job became the identity. This week, the mission meets the myth. Paige helps organize an open letter — a polite but radical act of collective dis...

An ex–SpaceX engineer asks our favorite question: when does mission become mindset—and then eventually something more? Paige was convinced she was helping save humanity by working at SpaceX. In Part 1, she traces the seduction: the purpose, the perks, the "Elon Algorithms" plastered on the wall, the complete devotion, the loss of individuality into one group identity, the isolation, the uncompensa...

What if the yoga class you signed up for wasn't yoga at all, but the doorway to something much darker? In this episode, Angel takes us inside Body & Brain Yoga and Tai Chi — a strip-mall wellness studio that seemed harmless enough. Until it wasn't. Instead of stretching, you're told to march in circles, punch your stomach, chant about your mother's failings, and spill your deepest traumas to a roo...

She thought she was enrolling in a Bible college. Instead, she was signing up to give her identity, her labor, her choice—and her fire—to a man who called himself the Holy Ghost Bartender. At "River University," worship looked like laughing fits and collapsing bodies. Romance was arranged. Submission wasn't suggested—it was glorified. And your soul? That was just a tally mark on a clipboard. For S...

A limo to Atlantic City. Pizzerias with back rooms. Garbage bags vanishing across boroughs. Comedian Barry Rothbart grew up believing his dad didn't just live large—he made life larger. Then the tapes surfaced. This isn't a mob story. It's what happens when your identity is forged from someone else's legend—only to discover the legend was a lie. As Barry unravels the mythology, his father's world...

What happens when your entire life revolves around likes, follows, and perfectly staged smoothie bowls? For Lee Tilghman — better known as @leefromamerica — it meant rising to the top of Instagram's wellness world… and losing herself in the process. This week, we explore what it means to devote yourself to the cult of social media: when every thought and action becomes about what to post, when fri...

Michael grew up believing his hometown in Germany was just that — a quiet, picturesque community with cobblestone streets, tidy homes, a school, and a grocery store. At its heart stood the church, looming over daily life. But what looked like small-town order was really something far darker. Built in the aftermath of World War II, by leaders with lingering Nazi ties, the town was engineered for co...

It was one of the coolest jobs you could get in the 2000s. The swoopy bangs. The gold lamé leggings. The sexually charged ads. American Apparel wasn't just a brand — it was a vibe. And today's guest, Zsuzsi was on the front lines of it all. From art school to assistant manager to overseeing a hot New York City store, she was living the dream… until it started to feel more like a fever dream — and...

**Note: This episode originally aired in February 2022** COME SEE US LIVE!!! In LA on Sept 9, 2025 with special guest, comedian Moses Storm @ Dynasty Typewriter. LINK TO TICKETS!!  A humble upbringing is an understatement for Dan McIntrye. Canada born and bred, Dan's cult journey took him from guitar god, to free desserts to cult escape, only to land him right in the arms of... another one? A doub...

This week, meet Jim Picariello, who, in the early '90s as a hopeful college kid hyped up on way too much coffee, thought he was signing up for a meditation class… and ended up in a tech-driven, enlightenment-seeking, quasi-Buddhist spiritual cult. Yeah… this one was a new one for us too.  Led by Frederick Lenz - aka Rama - aka Zen Master Rama - aka the most spiritually enlightened dude who could g...

Last week, we met Jorjina Broadbent — mother of twelve, former sister-wife, and low-key badass hiding in plain sight. This week? She stops hiding. We pick up where we left off: deep inside the world of Warren Jeffs' FLDS cult — a place where girls are married off as teens, obedience is salvation, and hairstyles left something to be desired… like choice. But for Jorjina, something inside her starts...

Before he was your favorite podcast host, Tyler Measom was… just a dude with a camera and a crush. It was 2005, and Tyler found himself driving deep into FLDS polygamist territory - with his co-director-slash-maybe-love-interest (hey, Jennilyn) - to make a documentary about the "Lost Boys" exiled from a fundamentalist Mormon cult run by none other than slimeball Warren Jeffs. That little film? Son...