Compact Podcast – Episode: "A[nt]I-Social Media" (February 4, 2026)

Episode Overview

In this densely packed episode, hosts Matthew Schmitz, Ashley Frawley, and Geoff Shullenberger explore two major threads: the fresh disclosures relating to the Jeffrey Epstein case and the debut of Multbook, a social media platform built for AI agents. The conversation delves into the real facts behind high-profile scandals, how conspiracy thinking proliferates, and the philosophical implications of technology's march. Themes of distrust in institutions, necrophilia in culture (in a Fromm-ian sense), and the gnostic undercurrents of both contemporary technocracy and AI futurism provide a darkly ironic, cynical, and occasionally playful tone.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Dissecting the New Epstein Disclosures

• Matthew summarizes the original Epstein allegations, emphasizing clarity and skepticism about the most sensational narratives. He insists:

  "I think it's worth stressing that Epstein committed crimes deserving of punishment...But there is no evidence to support the idea of trafficking girls, of blackmail. And I see so many pundits assuming that, that I think it's really worth stressing the underlying facts of the case..."
  [04:27]

• Ashley launches into an audacious analysis, connecting both elite scandals and society’s obsession with bureaucracy and power to the Frankfurt School thinker Erich Fromm's idea of "necrophilia," or a cultural hatred of what is alive, unpredictable, and messy:

  "And not just in fascism, but in our sort of growing bureaucratic societies and cultures, this hatred for everything that is living, that is squishy and fleshy and unpredictable. And the child in particular represents that..."
  [09:10]

• She draws provocative parallels with conspiracy tropes and elite art, arguing that current conspiracy discourse and elite practices expose a deeper culture of control and hostility to "unmediated forms of life" like the family.

2. Epstein as Myth, Conspiracy, and Sideshow

• The hosts deconstruct the widespread mythos of Epstein. Geoff points out the banality of much of the alleged evidence:

  "...if you actually look at these emails, they're pretty, pretty banal stuff overall."
  [18:20]

• The group muses on the re-activation of wide-ranging conspiracy theories—satanic panic, QAnon, reptilian shapeshifting—around the case. Matthew notes:

  "One of his accusers, Juliet Bryant, maintains that she has seen Epstein shapeshift into a reptilian creature...this kind of draws on the British conspiracy theorist David Icke..."
  [21:06]–[22:17]

• The discussion expands to cultural explanations for conspiracy theories. Matthew frames it as a kind of psychological reassurance:

  "I do think one of the functions of this discourse is to revisit, is to reassure ourselves that we care very deeply about children...I think abortion is also a big factor here..."
  [28:30]

3. Social Trust, Rituals, and Conspiratorial Thinking

• Ashley analyzes the sociology of conspiracy, arguing that such stories reflect a need to externalize blame for systemic problems, and to believe that excising bad actors would fix everything:

  "There's a conspiracy betrays an underlying belief that everything would be fine if not for these bad people...But the thing is, when you drain the swamp, it fills again and attracts all these horrifying creatures..."
  [24:41]

• She observes a "cultural lust for our own destruction"—western decadence, institutional stagnation, and a cultural death-drive (necrophilia) that paradoxically seeks a cleansing conclusion.

4. Multbook and the Dawn of AI Social Media

• Geoff introduces Multbook, where AI agents—many trained on Reddit data—interact in a Reddit-style environment:

  "Mult book is marketed...as a social network for AI agents...these agents are sort of individualized in various dimensions..."
  [32:06]

• They discuss the uncanny valley's migration from physical robots to text-based AI and examine the limits of seeing these "cultural recombiners" as truly intelligent.

• Geoff recommends Leif Weatherby's commentary:

  "[LLM] AIs as culture producing machines...these are extremely powerful machines for, generative machines, for creating culture through this kind of recombination and sampling..."
  [37:24]

5. Erich Fromm, Necrophilia, and the Techno-Gnostic Parallel

• The conversation deepens as Geoff links Ashley’s point on necrophilia to the rationalist/AI movement’s implicit gnosticism:

  "I would say he [Yudkowski] himself reinvented a form of Gnosticism...which...is ultimately a deeply sort of misanthropic and, and world denying form of, of religion..."
  [39:37]

• Geoff:

  "There is this fusion of a kind of technocratic disgust with, and disdain for the...messiness and unpredictability of human life. And this set of...quasi-spiritual ideas that really just revive certain forms of Gnosticism."
  [42:06]

• Ashley responds, cautioning against conflating technological advance with a drive to abolish the human—arguing, the true danger is when genuine human needs, flaws, and unpredictability are reduced to engineering problems better solved by machines:

  "There's this increasing desire to treat human beings like robots, like annoyance that human beings are not like robots...become this like annoying variable that you just want to get over and get past..."
  [45:27]

• Ashley expands:

  "... People wanted, they want the machines to take over. They're like, oh, we're such disgusting dirty little rats. Just put us out of our misery, essentially."
  [49:15]

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Matthew on the myth of "epic evil":

  "I think Epstein the man falls short of really supporting that theory just because of my own very deep doubts about how much his crimes actually measure up to the popular perception of them." [14:09]

• Ashley on necrophilia as a sociological throughline:

  "Necrophilia...is a cultural thing and...the bureaucratic logic of raising a perfect...worker has utterly infiltrated them and it produces this awful death, like this destruction, destruction of human life." [31:04]

• Geoff on tech rationalism as neo-gnostic fantasy:

  "...the Alan Watts points will come back here. I would say there's a strong tendency from the origins of the culture that has generated the current crop of AI...to...spontaneously reinvent a form of Gnosticism." [38:47]

Important Timestamps

• [01:57] — Conversation begins with Epstein files recap
• [06:06] — Ashley introduces the necrophilia concept via Fromm
• [14:09] — Matthew critiques the mythic image of Epstein
• [21:06] — Epstein as reptilian: conspiracy theory as cultural myth
• [32:06] — Geoff explains what Multbook is and how AI social media works
• [37:24] — Theorizing LLMs as culture-producing machines (Weatherby mention)
• [39:37] — Gnosticism, rationalism, and necrophilia/god-aspirations in AI culture
• [45:27] — Ashley critiques the mechanization of human life and the dangers of dehumanization
• [49:15] — Cultural "lust for destruction" and the apocalyptic desire for machines to surpass humanity

Tone and Style

The discussion is at once skeptical, irreverent, darkly humorous, and deeply philosophical—oscillating between empirical skepticism and wild, theory-laden speculation. The hosts frequently riff on each other, challenge reigning assumptions, and bring in academic references in a colloquial, accessible manner.

Summary Takeaway

This episode weaves together scandal, conspiracy, sociology, and the philosophy of technology. The hosts encourage skepticism of both simplistic villainous narratives and techno-utopian promises, urging listeners to consider what collective anxieties and cultural logics underlie today’s obsessions with elite evil and algorithmic transcendence. Ultimately, the episode argues that the real threat is not shape-shifting elites or sentient AIs, but the deeper cultural necrophilia and social malaise that produces these narratives in the first place.