69. UnCULTured with Daniella Mestyanek Young

Summary

Flipping Tables, Ep. 69: UnCULTured with Daniella Mestyanek Young

Date: July 27, 2026
Host: Monte Mader
Guest: Daniella Mestyanek Young (US Army veteran, Harvard-trained organizational psychologist, cult survivor, author)

Episode Overview

In this powerful, wide-ranging conversation, Monte Mader welcomes Daniella Mestyanek Young—survivor of the notorious "Children of God" sex cult, decorated army intel officer, and bestselling author of Uncultured and The Culting of America. The episode explores Daniella’s traumatic upbringing, her escape, her journey of deconstruction and healing, and her expertise in recognizing and unpacking the structure of cults in American society, including their presence in churches, the military, and politics. Additionally, Daniella previews her upcoming cult musical, discusses the 10 key ingredients of cults, and gives advice for those on the path of deconstruction.

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Daniella’s Story: Surviving & Leaving the Children of God

[01:21–05:19]

• Children of God Overview:
  • A global sex cult advocating "religious prostitution" and pedophilia ("They trafficked us around the world in plain sight, performing as these happy little children."—Daniella, [09:12]).
  • Pop culture connections: Joaquin and River Phoenix, Rose McGowan, Jeremy Spencer (Fleetwood Mac).
• Personal Trauma:
  • Daniella was third-generation; her mother was impregnated at 14 by a 43-year-old. "My father is older than my grandfather is. Sex cult math, I call it." ([01:49])
  • Grew up in literal communes worldwide, always under authoritarian control.
• The Breakout:
  • Excommunicated at 15 for “fellowshipping with an unbeliever.” "I literally scaled the commune wall to go hang out with a boy and got caught. That was my break." ([02:46])
  • Mother, still a true-believer at that time, urged her to go: "She gave me this getaway, didn’t shun me, and has actually sort of stuck with me through deconstruction." ([05:07])

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Core Beliefs and Daily Life in Children of God

[05:19–15:51]

• Theology & Expansion:
  • Started as evangelical Christianity; founder David Berg pivoted into "free love"/forced polyamory via supposed biblical justifications.
  • Built by aggregating other cults: "He just culted better than everyone else." ([06:37])
  • “Sacred assumption”: Berg as indisputable prophet, allowing followers to rationalize extreme behaviors.
• “Flirty Fishing” & Labor:
  • Women (and girls as young as six or seven) instructed to recruit via prostitution. "He called it flirty fishing… They called themselves Heaven’s Harlots. Hookers for Christ." ([08:19])
  • Cult always about exploiting bodies/labor: "Cults are always organized crime." ([10:51])
  • Continuous cycle: when sex work became too public, the cult morphed into performing and entertainment.
• Child Trafficking & Abuse:
  • Systemic institutional harm included sexual and psychological abuse, starvation, and deprivation of joy: “No spontaneous moments of joy in your whole childhood. You were just—always had to be a perfect soldier.” ([09:32])
  • “At 13, he—the leader—calls all the leaders' daughters to him, ranging from 14 to 3 years old, and has a marriage ceremony with all of them. He marries a fucking three-year-old.” ([13:31])
• Cult Connections & Societal Complicity:
  • Performed at the White House in the 1990s; direct political connections (e.g., Marcos in the Philippines, government corruption in Brazil): "It’s American exceptionalism to think that it wasn’t in America as well." ([15:06])
  • American society’s indifference to child sexual abuse (“We’ve never, as a country, decided to care about when children are raped.”—Daniella, [15:45]).

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The Mechanisms of Cults: “How Do People Stay?”

[15:52–24:10]

• Normalization & Denial:
  • Children had no language for abuse; told “this is how so-and-so loves.” ([20:18–20:53])
  • Adults—brainwashed or coerced into enabling/committing abuse.
• No Statute of Limitations:
  • "Sex crimes against children should have no statute of limitations. And we have that in two states right now, California and New York." ([21:28])
• Neurodivergence & Questioning:
  • Daniella credits her (suspected) ADHD and early logical questioning as key to resisting internalization (“I was just that person. I didn’t believe it. I knew we were playing a game. I just had to survive it and get away and get out.” [24:10])

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Life After the Cult: From Masking to Military

[25:37–35:01]

• Exodus:
  • Dropped in Houston at 15 with no resources or formal education ("Never been to school a day in my life." [25:45])
  • Masked to fit in; academic excellence as defense ("I will not let 10,000 people … hoping and praying for me to fail. I will not fail." [28:03–28:34])
• Army Journey:
  • Married to a controlling partner, later joined the army for autonomy (“I have just fought so hard to be free. And now I just trapped myself… I'm not going to do that. I'm going to go into the army too.” [32:09])
  • Military’s own cultish systems paralleled her upbringing: "Day one … holding this duffel bag above your head for hours … It's impossible. Cults need you to be striving, giving you an impossible test, telling you you're not good enough." ([33:27])
  • Weaponizing trauma: extreme endurance and work ethic ("I can do it with a broken heart, right? … We can work fucking hard." [35:01])
  • But workaholism as “running” from the trauma: “If we do it all the time, we die by 36.” ([36:17])

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Processing Trauma & Pursuing Healing

[42:24–48:33]

• Burnout & Collapse:
  • Trauma manifests in physical symptoms ("I go from winning a marathon in April to being evacuated with all symptoms of a brain tumor in July… No spoilers, but it was trauma." [42:24])
• Deconstruction & Community:
  • Writing memoir as a path to healing and connection: “Getting my story out… What I didn’t count on was the community… I’m not like, alone anymore.” ([45:22])
  • The value of sharing stories and breaking secrecy ("The entire goal [of abusers] is: you gotta keep it a secret. Don’t talk about it. … If you keep it a secret, it'll kill you." [46:08])

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• On cult entry/exit: "My first rule of cults is you're never in a cult. My second rule of cults is they will forgive any sin except the sin of leaving." — Daniella ([03:07])
• On “good group” commandment: “My rule number one is don’t rape the children.” — Daniella ([86:19])

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The Culting of America: The Ten Ingredients of a Cult

[56:18–85:25]

Monte and Daniella dissect the toolkit from The Culting of America—how every cult, from religious groups to the military to MAGA, operates with the same basic structure.
Each ingredient gets a brief explanation, with examples from Daniella's life, US politics, and more.

1. Charismatic Leadership

• Cult leaders as "influence professionals"—charisma (for good or bad) is the catalyst.
• “There’s a reason the world produced a Hitler and a Churchill at the same time, but we look at Hitler and say ‘bad,’ so we pathologize. We look at Churchill and say ‘good’ and don’t talk about how toxic of a leader he was.” ([56:32])
• Cults can also be led by ideas or dead people.

1a. “And His Skinny White Woman”

• The “validity mascot”: White women as the visible validators and recruiters for patriarchal and authoritarian movements.
• "White women have been used in American culture as the stamp of validity." ([61:55])
• Cites works like Jesus and John Wayne.

2. Sacred Assumption

• An unquestionable core premise ("This man is the prophet of God") justifies all actions.
• "As long as the sacred assumption held, they could justify anything." ([65:41])

3. Transcendent Mission

• "Nobody joins to worship a dude. They join to save the world." ([66:42])
• Philanthropic/charitable/religious cover is common ("But we're saving lives. But we're saving the children.").

4. Self-Sacrifice

• Continual personal sacrifice is normalized.
• "Constant self-sacrifice harms individuals. It cannot be good." ([69:36])

5. Isolation

• Isolation is both physical and informational/cultural.
• “If you didn’t get to engage in the culture you were growing up in without any limitations, you’re not from that culture.” ([27:24])
• Fundamentalist tactics: media control, restricting relationships, discouraging contact outside the group. "[Isolation] is to isolate women from each other, isolate women from community. Because when women get together and they talk and they share secrets … it's safety." — Monte ([70:24])

6. Language / Distinguishable Vernacular

• Cults develop unique language, coded terms, and family labels (“anything that calls itself a family wants to overwork you, underpay you, expect you to put up with more bullshit than you would otherwise.” ([73:12]))
• Thought-stopping clichés: “The Bible says,” or “boys will be boys,” etc.

7. Us vs. Them Mentality

• Creates internal cohesion and justifies hostility to outsiders.
• "Us versus them is how you make people really, really care about the group." ([75:24])
• Used in American history from Puritans to MAGA.

8. Exploitation of Labor

• Always about extraction—of body, time, or money.
• "Getting paid does not mean your labor is not being exploited." ([77:37])
• Patriarchal hierarchy ensures women and children are most exploited.

9. High Entrance and Exit Costs

• Sunk cost fallacy and entanglement keep people in.
• Cults want members enmeshed—familially, financially, psychologically.
• "Whenever someone says, you’re free to leave anytime… it’s always a lie… It's a tether." ([82:53])

10. Ends Justify the Means

• At the heart: mission excuses all harm—no atrocity is too great if “it saves the world.”
• "Cults want to exploit your labor and turn you into a deployable agent for their transcendent mission." ([83:51])
• Political implications (e.g., “Vote for our guy because the other guy is worse” is cult logic, not effective strategy).

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“Cults Always Promise Space Travel” & The Cult Musical

[85:52–92:54]

• Daniella is developing an original musical that weaves cult survivor stories—from the Children of God to the US military—through performance, humor, and biting critique.
• Songs parody cult rationalizations ("Drink the Kool-Aid", “Cults Always Promise Space Travel”).
• The musical is intentionally inclusive; fellow survivors want to contribute ("All the cult babies and all the veterans want to come sing and dance out their trauma onstage." [89:53])

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Advice for Deconstructing Listeners

[93:57–98:08]

• "Keep going. It’s so worth it.” ([93:59])
• Daniella compares deconstruction to moving rocks in a cave: "Eventually it’s all going to be behind you and you get to go forward and you actually get to be free." ([94:47])
• Signs you're healing: "I spend more time now living in the beautiful life that I've built … than I spend dealing with my trauma.” ([95:20])
• Encouragement to embrace your weirdness, echoing Dolly Parton: “Figure out who you are and then do it on purpose.” ([96:23])
• Healing is possible: “You’re still going to be a healed cult baby. But it gets better. Stay the course. Find your community. And, like, there’s so many of us out here." ([98:08])

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Further Resources, Notable Plugs, & Contact

[98:15–end]

• Daniella’s books: Uncultured, The Culting of America, and the Unculture Yourself workbook.
  • Available from all retail outlets, also at knittingcultlady.com (signed copies).
• @knittingkultlady on all social platforms, where Daniella knits and discusses cults, trauma, healing, and organizes community.

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Noteworthy Quotes with Timestamps

• “My first rule of cults is you’re never in a cult. My second rule of cults is they will forgive any sin except the sin of leaving.” — Daniella ([03:07])
• “Cults are always about labor. Cults are about exploiting bodies.” — Daniella ([08:52])
• “The entire goal [of abusers] is, you gotta keep it a secret. Don’t talk about it. … If you keep it a secret, it’ll kill you.” — Daniella ([46:08])
• “Anything that calls itself your family wants to overwork you, underpay you, and expect you to put up with more bullshit than you would otherwise.” — Daniella ([73:12])
• “Figure out who you are and then do it on purpose.” — (Dolly Parton quote, endorsed by Daniella, [96:23])
• “My rule number one is: don’t rape the children.” — Daniella ([86:19])

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Key Timestamps

• [01:21–05:19] Daniella’s origin story and escape
• [05:19–15:51] Explaining Children of God's doctrines, labor and abuse
• [15:52–24:10] Mechanisms for maintaining cult loyalty; neurodivergence and resistance
• [25:37–35:01] Transition to “the outside,” masking, military parallels
• [56:18–85:25] Detailed breakdown of the 10 “cult ingredients” in The Culting of America
• [85:52–92:54] Cult musical preview and themes
• [93:57–98:08] Advice for deconstructing listeners; hopeful closure

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Summary Takeaway

Through captivating stories and expert analysis, Daniella Mestyanek Young lays bare the universal structure of high-control groups—from sex cults to political movements—showing how sacred beliefs, charismatic leadership, relentless mission, and cycles of isolation and exploitation persist in American life. Her journey embodies the difficulty and necessity of deconstruction, and her fierce, hopeful message is: keep going, build community, and claim your freedom.

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For more conversation, resources, and Daniella’s ongoing work, follow @knittingkultlady or visit knittingcultlady.com.

Transcript

[A]

Ladies and gentlemen, today we have a US army veteran, a Harvard trained organizational psychologist, and a survivor of the Children of God sex cult on with us today. And I am very excited to talk about her story and what's going on with the cults in America. You know her as the knitting cult lady. Daniela Mestanek Young is joining us, talking about both of her books, her memoir, Uncultured, a best selling memoir, and her latest book, the Culting of America. We're gonna talk about her story, surviving a cult, how she got out, and what it looks like for the cult that we have created in America, and how we can participate in unculturing America today on Flipping Tables. Thank you so much for being on the show today.

[B]

Thank you so much for having me. I am so excited.

[A]

I'm so excited. This is our third conversation in 24 hours and it has been fabulous. The more I learn about you, the more excited I get. And you're just, you're my people now. So I really want to start this episode because there is so much even in the conversations that we've had that I've been learning about your life and how unbelievably qualified you are to have these conversations around cults. So I would love to just start with your life. Let's go through Uncultured, how you grew up, what happened, and how you eventually got out.

[B]

Yeah. So I was born and raised three third generation in the Children of God. And you've probably heard about the Children of God because it's the cult that Joaquin and River Phoenix survived and Rose McGowan, a founding member of Fleetwood Mac, Jeremy Spencer joined it. And we've also heard of Children of God because it is the one that advocated first religious prostitution and then pedophilia for God.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And so, you know, as a third generation, I mean, my mom was a 14 year old girl impregnated by a 43 year old man. And my father is older than my grandfather is. Sex, cult math, I call it. Whoa. And I have 25 siblings. Whoa. And I grew up all around the world, like in these communes, and I mean literal communes. Army of God, 10,000 people all around the world.

[A]

And you said you were born in the Philippines.

[B]

I was born in the Philippines and then I was in Japan, Peru, a decade in Brazil, both the Philippines and Brazil, just coming out of authoritarian governments. Like at the time I was living there. I end up at 15, getting myself excommunicated from this cult by literally fellowshipping with the unbeliever.

[A]

Oh, no.

[B]

But very dramatically Scaled the commune wall to go hang out with a boy and then got caught. And that was my break.

[A]

So did they, like, was this kind of a single infraction and that's it, you're done?

[B]

If it was sex with an outsider, yes.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

But the thing about cults is, like, they'll always take you back. Yeah. You know, so my first rule of cults is you're never in a cult. My second rule of cults is they will forgive any sin except the sin of leaving.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So as long as I was willing to humble myself, do six months of being broken and retrained and re brainwashed and all of that, I would have been able to come back. But you didn't want to. I was actually kind of in the middle because I was 15. Yeah. Going to just be thrown out into a literal different country.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Like Houston, Texas, with a stepsister that I didn't know. And I was scared, like I was literally going to lose every single thing at once. So I was scared as much as I wanted to go.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And it was my mother, who was still herself, very much true believer at the time, who took me on a walk outside the commune and was like, go.

[A]

Wow.

[B]

So, you know, wow. And I, years later, once she got away, she got out with all her children.

[A]

Wow.

[B]

But I asked her why, you know, and she was like, you were just. You were miserable. Right. And I. I think it's one of those things that's hard about deconstruction when we look at our photos. Like, I did not want them to put my face on the COVID of that book because I was like the dissociated eyes. Right. I'm two years old in the COVID of that book, performing in Japan, and I look so sad. I don't even understand how a baby could look that sad. And I'm that baby, you know? And fortunately, my mom, you know, herself a victim of all of this, wasn't able to see it for herself yet, was still caught in that belief system, but did want the best for me. And, like.

[A]

Because you're her child ultimately.

[B]

Yeah. And gave me this getaway, didn't shun me, and has actually sort of stuck with me through deconstruction and all of that and writing a book, which is pretty great.

[A]

And I am not an expert on child of God. Can you go over some of the beliefs and how that translated, like day to day in your growing up life and whatever you feel comfortable with? Because I know some of it is just so traumatic because pedophilia is A core tenet of their belief system. So only what you feel comfortable, but I would love to know some of their core beliefs and how that shows up in day to day life.

[B]

Yeah. So it started as evangelical Christianity. And in fact, David Berg's mother was trained by Amy Semple McPherson, that lady who have lots of opinions about and was originally in Christian Missionary alliance and was kicked out of them for being a psycho.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Like a sexually abusive psychopath. And so then he starts Children of God. And one thing that's very interesting. So Children of God starts in 1968 in the era of cults. Right.

[A]

The era of time.

[B]

Cults pop up in times of social turmoil. And what David Berg did is also what Trump did is he showed up and he pulled all of these other cults into his cult.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

That's how he built 10,000 people in less than four years, which is so

[A]

fast when you look at cult growth. That is astronomical.

[B]

He just culted better than everyone else. And his, you know, I've spent a lot of time in entrepreneurship and his unique value proposition, what made him stand out was I'm going to take evangelical control of sex. Right. Purity culture, and I'm going to flip it.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And he called it free love, and I call it forced polyamory.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And so. But what, what they were told it was about was love, faith in Jesus.

[A]

Yeah, of course, that's. That's always the baseline.

[B]

And he was the prophet of God. And I call this the sacred assumption.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

That a term I came up with after having to explain to people like how. How could 10,000 people buy into this? The pedophile prophet. Right. But it's because he believed, they believed that he was the prophet of God sent here to prepare us for the end of the world. And so they would justify anything. Right, The King David justification. Right. Well, King David was a flawed person and God used to.

[A]

He raped Bathsheba and he was still a man after God's own heart, which

[B]

again, we've seen Trump's followers use. Right. So it was, it was evangelical Christianity. And then it just, you know, over a period of 10 years, he then starts releasing these sexual doctrines. And first it's him pimping out his own wife and then it's everyone. And it was an actual theory from the Bible, I will make you fishers of men. And so the women in this cult are literally supposed to be fishers of men.

[A]

Cause didn't they call it like. Cause he instituted cult wide prostitution and they called it cult fishing cult flirty Fishing, Flirty fishing. There it is.

[B]

And they also called themselves Heaven's Harlots. Hookers for Christ. Like, they were just straight open about it. Right.

[A]

And the whole premise was, we're gonna use these women to hook people into this cult.

[B]

Yes, yes. And here's something really, really important that I didn't even understand about my own life, even after I'd written this book, is that cults are always about labor.

[A]

Always.

[B]

Cults are about exploiting bodies. And as soon as I heard Dr. Jana Lalitsch, cult experts say that I was like, oh, I understood my life. I was trafficked around the world. We were a. You know, I always say people stop at the. What about cults? What you believe, What? And they don't get to the why.

[A]

Yeah, why do you believe?

[B]

And the why is they had an army of 10,000 singing, dancing beggars, 7,000 children for God. And they trafficked us around the world in plain sight, performing as these happy little children. Meanwhile, we are literally being raised, institutionalized.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Sleeping in dorms, being subjected to punishment that can only be called torture, you know, being starved, being. I say, like, of all of the abuses, it was no spontaneous moments of joy in your whole childhood. Right. You were just. Always had to be a perfect soldier, which is also great for performing kids because the only time I was allowed to scream at the top of my lungs is when I was opening busking on the street. Right. So of course I throw myself into that. And I love that.

[A]

That's the only expression of God.

[B]

It's the only thing that you can do. And I hope we'll get around to talking about the musical. But I've written a cult musical. We will, but, you know, so the labor is really important. So in the 80s, they are in Time magazine. Sex cult. Right. Full harem, photo, profit, beard, 13 scantily clad women.

[A]

Yep. Right.

[B]

So they stop doing the prostitution and they just switched. Right. And they just became an entertainment cult. And when you understand the labor, you understand cults are always organized crime.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

Like, that's what they are.

[A]

Well, it is, because it's either. It's. It's either sexual exploitation of a body or it's, you're going to go work at this place, but you're going to give the cult leader all your money or you're going to work around the commune. We're going to keep you tired so that you don't have time to think and reflect and question things. And so I love that because it really does simplify all of those things. Cause you look at so many cults that, you know, it's always the cult leader trying to get kids. Right. Sleep with kids. It's always sleeping with kids.

[B]

Oh, no.

[A]

You know, and then it's. Or it's money or it's this. It's always sex and money. And when you can really boil it down to that phrase, I've never heard it put so succinctly. How young were children being integrated into this lifestyle when. When pedophilia enters the chat?

[B]

I mean, there wasn't really an age.

[A]

Yeah. It was just kind of whatever the circumstance was, it was just the waters

[B]

that we swam in. Right. So like just being exposed to adults having sex all of the time in a commune. You know, we lived in commune with hundreds of people and they had a sharing schedule. Literally the leaders would decide who was going to sleep with whom that night and put it on the schedule. And in the beginning.

[A]

Yeah, that's a way to get you hot and heated. Like it's on the schedule that you have to sleep with your neighbor. Ew.

[B]

In the beginning, girls as young as six and seven.

[A]

Oh my God.

[B]

Were being put on this. My mother at the age of 13. So my mom actually, when she turns 12, right. Comes down the stairs on her birthday and her father toasts her with a glass of wine. And then the aunties tell her to make a list of the uncles that she wants to have sex with first. And this was just to her true believer, this is what she was supposed to be doing. She was waiting to be an adult at 12. Because he said when women menstruate, when girls menstruate, that's when God intends you to start having babies.

[A]

Fuck, dude.

[B]

And so at 13, he then he calls all the leader's daughters to him. So he gets 14 girls ranging from 14 years old to 3 years old, including his own daughter and granddaughter, and he has a marriage ceremony with all of them. And the three year old's mother, a former Dallas Cowboys cheerleader, the three year old's mother runs the ceremony.

[A]

What marriage ceremony? To him.

[B]

To him? To a 75 year old man? Yeah. And he marries a fucking three year old. And he gives a three year old an adult sized ring wrapped in tape so that she can wear it her whole life as she grows up.

[A]

Oh, my God.

[B]

And I mean, my mom wore that wedding ring her whole life. And I heard the story of. Yeah, we were married to. It was symbolic. We were married to Jesus. But of course, the part they don't tell the average cult member Is. Yeah. But then there was Love Uptime. Right. Like, it was. It was obviously sexual abuse.

[A]

Obviously.

[B]

And all of this. What is so crazy? Right? So. So 1983, Time magazine, sex cult, and in the 90s, the children of God or the Family International. I remember that performs twice in the White House. Jesus Christ. So also, like, Epstein list surprises me. Not at all.

[A]

No.

[B]

I'm like, we have always have pedophiles in the White House.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

From Thomas Jefferson.

[A]

Yep. And honestly. And, like, it's. It's. I think the Epstein files just show so blatantly that, like, who has been in power this whole time and what they will do to protect it. I did not realize they had been in the White House.

[B]

Yeah. And people actually try to tell me that I'm crazy for saying no. It was connected, you know, it was sinister. Like, we also wrote a marching song for Marcos in the Philippines. We were involved in government corruption in Brazil.

[A]

Like, and then this.

[B]

It's American exceptionalism to think that it wasn't in America as well.

[A]

Of course it's here. I mean, I think that's easily reflected in the. You know, when the super bowl happens, it's the biggest day of sex trafficking in America. Like, that means it's already there. It's already ready. It rolls into that city for the super bowl because there's demand for it and because we have never had a justice system that is at all interested in justice for sexual crimes against women and children. Doesn't fucking care at all.

[B]

Like, honestly, the Epstein situation really kind of triggers me and pisses me off.

[A]

Yeah, I bet it does.

[B]

Because people are like, why isn't anybody doing anything? I'm like, nobody.

[A]

We.

[B]

We've never cared.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

We've never, as a country, decided to care about when children are raped.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

We just haven't.

[A]

It's just always been a talking point.

[B]

Right.

[A]

And then, you know, and I. And I think that's why we see, you know, we see so many, you know, politicians, priests, pastors. Every day, it's somebody new getting arrested for child porn, you know, trying to do something with a minor. Because it's everywhere. It's everywhere. And we have collectively decided we don't care.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

There was a recent one. I. I'm actually getting ready to do a video on it. I can't remember the name of the church off the top of my head, but the pastor knowingly hired a sex offender, put him with kids, and then was shocked when the guy got arrested because he violated his. His. His probation or whatever. It was that he's not allowed near minors. But then now the pastor and his wife are also being arrested because they enabled it and they lied to police and they lied to their congregation. That pastor knew this was not. Oh my God, he changed his name. I didn't know it was. No, he knew. And the pastor thought it was hilarious that people would have a problem with this sex offender around kids.

[B]

Right. And you know, something else is sex appeal is always part of recruiting in these scenarios too, you know, and so like, the children of God technically officially stopped their flirty fishing policy. And they love to stand on that. Well, like we, we changed our mind in 1987. Jesus changed it. But like I always say, like, they never stopped prostituting us. No. From the age of four and five, I was being hung out as this little white girl to pull people in. I mean, 14, 15 years old in Mexico. And the aunties are giving us the push up bras and teaching us how to dress to let men grab us while we're performing in these crowds because they'll give us money.

[A]

Right. Jesus Christ.

[B]

And yeah, so it's just, you know, it's one of those things that has never stopped.

[A]

Just rebranded.

[B]

Definitely plays into why I do whatever the hell I want with my body these days. Right. And like the way that I dress, I'm like, no, you taught me this tool. This is my tool, my tactic.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

But, and then, you know, like, performance is just such a brilliant way to traffic children.

[A]

Such a way, it's such a good way to hide. Hiding.

[B]

Because when people think, you know, so I, I share this video on my social media every once in a while. There's a video, it's on YouTube if you, if you search Family Fun End time Rap. And it's me and six other white children rapping apocalypse bible verses in downtown Rio. And I shared this and like millions, millions of people around the world, including in America, all watched these videos, read this stuff.

[A]

Right?

[B]

Like, we made religious and non religious entertainment so we could get everybody. Yep. And so this woman, she says to me, she says, oh my God, I watched this growing up and I always wondered how they got you to do this. And I was like, what do you mean how they got us to do this? They imprisoned us from birth and raped us and starved us and exploited us, and this is what we did. But that's not what it looks like.

[A]

Yeah, because you look happy.

[B]

You look like you love dancing fees, bebopping kids that are having a great time. And I mean, if you watch the quiet unsaid documentary about kids in Hollywood. I'm like, we were just on the least paid end of that, you know, but it's kind of like, this is what's going on. And so, you know, this performance aspect is so important because, you know, this is the stereotype about brainwashing, first of all, that it makes you robot, mindless automatons. And all they have to do is produce smiling five year old children that speak three languages and can quote the King James Bible.

[A]

And they're like, see, everything's fine, Everything's fine.

[B]

And like the Children of God was raided by authorities in four countries. And every single time, the children were legally given back to the pedophile cult. Because we were trained to deny it.

[A]

Right?

[B]

Like, we were trained as hard as you were trained in purity culture and in Christian nationalism to like be the defense against the abuse. And, you know, you're. We didn't even have the language that it was abuse.

[A]

Right.

[B]

It was a lot.

[A]

You don't know what that means. Like, that's love. That's the way that God shows love. Like, that's why so many people, especially that experience child sex abuse. They don't realize they were abused until they get out. Because whoever their abuser is, because it's typically a family member or a close friend says, well, this is just how so and so loves. You know, this is how fathers love their daughters. Or this is how. This is how people show love to each other. And then they get out and they realize, oh, my God, I didn't realize this was wrong at the time I was told that it was love. And how would you know? How would you know when you're a child, you. You don't know. You're figuring out the world for the first time.

[B]

And this is also part of why it's so important for sex crimes against children to have no statue of limitations 100%. And we have that in two states right now, California, New York. And this is why the men in power fight against that so hard, you know, because you don't generally have the ability to push back.

[A]

You have no power.

[B]

That's also part of why it always comes down to raping children. Right. And it is exploiting children. Children are the easiest demographic to exploit because we cannot, literally cannot protect ourselves. And we don't even know that we're being exploited.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Like, adults have to be sort of brainwashed to go along with their own exploitation. Mm. But children don't even know. You just, you just.

[A]

This is the world you live in.

[B]

It's Just life. Yep.

[A]

It's just the way that life goes.

[B]

I, at the age of six, however, was experiencing some very, very, very serious abuse and torture and was like, I don't care if this is love. I don't care if this is God. If I'm going to hell for not being in the children of God when I grow up, well, hell's gonna suck.

[A]

Yeah, I'm not gonna enjoy that, but I'm not doing this.

[B]

Yeah, I was, you know, from a very early age, kind of like, I'm not doing it. I honestly don't know that I ever believed in any of it. Yeah. You know, I'm like, I. And the children of God actually came up with a term or the survivors. We came up with the term cult babies. Because cult survivors is different. Right. It's like the joiners, the ones that bought in. And we were just, you know, I was saying, like, I was just those people's prisoner for almost 16 years.

[A]

And what do you think at six? Because I remember, like, growing up having a few moments of, like, this is wrong, this is wrong. And I, you know, I experienced a lot of physical abuse, but nothing to the degree of what you're experiencing in this moment. What do you think it was at 6 that says, mm, I don't think this is right? Or was it just that it was so fucking awful? You're like, I don't care. I don't want to live like this. I don't care if it's true or not.

[B]

So I think there's a couple things. I think that the first, literally, the first 10 readers of Uncultured, well before it came out, were like, hey, sis, do you know your A dhd?

[A]

Yeah. Neurodivergence is a gift in many ways.

[B]

Honestly, I think it's part of that, you know? Like, I have this scene in my book, one of my first memories at the age of three, and my mom's teaching me how to read, and she tells me, books are great. Books are where we get ideas. But then for the rest of my life, books are banned. You know, we didn't read anything from the outside world. We created all of our own literature, all of our own stuff to watch, all of our own music. But my little, like, logic brain was just like, nope, you're lying. Like, my mom told me books were good.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And now you're telling me questions are bad. And that's the other thing. It's like I just could not help myself. And there was almost, like, no amount of beating it into me that would get me to stop being like, but why?

[A]

Yeah, why are we doing this?

[B]

You know? So I think, like, in a way, I'm just that person, you know, Like, I was always just that person. I didn't believe it. I knew we were playing a game. I just had to survive it and get away and get out.

[A]

Yep. And I remember having kind of the same feeling around seven or eight, just this moment of, I'm getting out, I'm getting out. Like, I felt so trapped in my life, and I just knew that I couldn't live that way. I didn't have all the vocabulary of, I don't believe this is true. I believe that this is abusive. Or I didn't, you know, I didn't understand all of that. Especially around, like, purity culture, the treatment of women. And purity culture is. And we've talked about this briefly, but purity culture is absolutely pedophile culture. It is the exact same thing with a different brand. It is all about controlling the sexuality of women. It is about getting them as young as possible, you know, encouraging women as young as possible. And. But I remember having this feeling of, I'm going to get out. And I remember laying in bed and I was like, I knew I was smart. I wasn't confident in any other way, but I was new. I knew I was smart. And I was like, I'm going to think my way out. And that was the last thought I had before I fell asleep that night. It's like I knew I was going to get out someday. And I do think that the neurodivergence, especially like ADHD or a lot of these things, you just. Your brain works so uniquely that again, people can't rewire you because you're wired that way. So what happens when you leave?

[B]

So I'm. I'm summarily excommunicated. Right. I'm dropped off in Houston, Texas, with $0.

[A]

By the way, I'm so glad you went out to see that boy, by the way.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, me too. Never saw him again. Looked age of connection. But, yeah, you know, he was my way out. And I'm so grateful. Yeah. And. And I just got to have a.17. He was 17. I was 15. Normal experience, like, normal kid experience. So I'm just dropped into Houston. I'm in a school with 4,000 students. Never been to school a day in my life. Right. And I just. I remember this scene is in the book. Like, these two students are just talking and I think they're debating, like, evolution. Like, I was so shocked. Even just Hear the word evolution and Darwinism, and I'm here hearing them have a debate. And in my mind I was like, oh, I don't even know how to think like that. Right. And my next thought was, oh, I'm not from another country, I'm from another planet.

[A]

Planet.

[B]

Like, I just can't fit here. So the results of that, though was I went super hard into masking.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

Right. And I think that, you know, I always say, like, the one thing I did absorb from the cult was, you're not gonna fit anywhere in the outside world. You know? And so I just went into trying so hard to be like, what. What the mirror or the world told me I was supposed to be, which is like, white blonde girl from Texas. Yep. You know, and it would take me a decade to understand that. Like, I'm. I'm not.

[A]

That's not me.

[B]

One of the things I tell people is like, whatever version of being withheld from the world. Right. In the world, but not of it. Like, if you didn't get to engage in the culture you were growing up in without any limitations, like, you're not from that culture. Yeah. You know, and for me, it was a little bit easier because I could be like, I'm literally not from America, even though my only passport is American. Yeah. But the way I presented. Right. So, like, first test I take in school, I take a scantron test or bubble sheet test with a pen.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And so I get back a test that has a zero on it. And I have no idea. Like, I'm in just full panic mode. But what the teacher is seeing is a 16 year old high school girl who speaks English and seems like a normal American pretending that she doesn't understand how a test works, you know, and you, you talked about yesterday, Tara Westover's educated, which, by the way, is what made me write my book. When I read that such a.

[A]

It was. That was such a. A pivotal book in my deconstruction was Tara Westover.

[B]

She had the same detail about not understanding bubble sheets. And I was like, boom. You know, and honestly, it's one of the things I wish someone had just told me, like, you're not gonna pass. Like, you're not gonna pass. Just be you. So I went super hard into masking and also into like. I was like, I will not fail. I know that I'm smart and I will not let 10,000 people. I was kind of a famous cult member. I was a child actor and performer. My dad wrote all the songs and I was like, there's 10,000 people hoping and praying for me to fail. Right. And come crawling back. And I will not fail. So I went so hard into school. I did two years of high school, four years of high school, in two years, got into college thanks to an amazing black woman counselor who saw me. And I emphasize black women because there have been four times in my life that other women have seen that I needed help and reached out and helped. And zero of those times was it a white woman. And she put me on the path for college. And so I go to college and I am working three to four jobs. I graduate valedictorian, majoring in literature and history, Just trying to learn the world, but also relying on like my verbal ability, my reasoning ability and my argument ability. Sort of all the things we were taught in the cult. You know, I could just read the headlines of the prophet stuff and then bullshit an answer that they wanted to hear.

[A]

Gosh, you get so good at like regurgitating information and presenting it and bullet pointing it and.

[B]

Exactly. And so, you know, had to stick with the soft, soft skills because didn't have the math or science background but you know, get my degree in literature and then go into the army.

[A]

What made you do that? Why the army? Was it financial?

[B]

No, this was the actual hardest chapter of my book to write. And it seems like nothing to an outsider, but like I said, was targeted by a 1:1 cult dude. And I, 10 years later, a decade after I've divorced him, the army will reach out and ask me to testify against him for white supremacy. Wow. And he was like pickup artist guy that went into. I didn't even understand because I was like, he has all the incel ideology but he's not an incel. It's pickup artists. Same pick up artists.

[A]

Pick up artists and sells are the exact same person.

[B]

And so I was targeted by this guy who wanted his perfect little white blonde Texas. He was himself an ex gay. And so I think part of it was, you know, he found white supremacy world that would accept him and the only thing you can't be is gay.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And so he was like, okay, no one's gonna suspect you're gay if you're married to Barbie. Right. And I was working so hard to be Barbie. So I fall into this relationship. I marry him in college still. And I so lucky get the opportunity to go to Germany and study abroad for a semester. Which of course he tried to tell me not to do. And I was like, sorry, thank you. Another thing that makes me well placed to talk about Germany Literally studied empire in Germany in college. Yeah.

[A]

It's like, understand this very well.

[B]

And while I'm there, I'm like, I have just fought so hard to be free. And now I just trapped myself into being like an army wife who's going to teach English on bases. And, like, I'm not going to do that. I'm going to go into the army too.

[A]

Yes. I'm sorry. I kind of love that pivot.

[B]

And so I. And he was fine with it. But I think looking back, it was from like a Nazi women in uniform are hot sort of way.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And so I go into the military. I go into military intelligence. But my. You know, the prologue of the book, I'm in basic training and literally day one, this drill that they do, you're holding this duffel bag with all your new stuff in it, and you've got to hold it above your head for about two or three hours, weighs about 50 pounds and they're yelling at you. And it's really significant because there's two things about this is it's impossible. No one can do it. No one can just hold 50 pounds up in the air for three hours without dropping it. And cults need you to be striving, right, pushing, telling you you're not giving you an impossible test, telling you you're not good enough.

[A]

And then when you fail, they can say, see, we told you that you're

[B]

broken and sinful, and it's also irrational. You've probably never just gone outside and held 50 pounds above your head for three hours.

[A]

I couldn't hold it cradled in my arms for three hours.

[B]

It's irrational. And there's interesting research about cults that tells us that the first time you do a wacky thing for a group, you're kind of like in. And sure enough, that day, after that duffel bag challenge people with all the respect to suicidal ideology. I have battled it my whole life. But people will either be all in, in the group, just commit and do it, or they will sort of like performatively do a suicide attempt.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Like really carefully draw with a razor and then be like, send me home.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

You know, And I was, oh, I'm going to do this. So I'm in to the scene in my book. I'm holding this stuff back up, I'm getting yelled at and I'm like, oh, I just joined another cult. Crap, Right?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But then my next thought off screen, as it were, was like, oh, I'm going to be better at it than all of these bitches right?

[A]

I've been trained in this my whole life.

[B]

I know what to do. I can just commit. I mean, Monty, I quit chain smoking in college, never worked out a day in my life. And within a few years, within a few months, I was running six minute miles. Within a few years, I was running a 5, 15 mile. That's fast.

[A]

Like those of you that don't run, that's fast. That's fast.

[B]

It's faster than 96% of the men I served with, yes, they hated it. But it's also cult baby. And it's a thing I've seen in cult babies and veterans and Taylor Swift named it for me. I can do it with a broken heart, right? And I think that we have this thing where first of all, we can work fucking hard. You know, like, that's what I was trained to do, was work hard. That's what I did.

[A]

That's the thing that like, I still have not been able to deconstruct in myself is the workaholism. Constantly working, constantly busy, constantly striving. It's better. But that's the one thing that I have not been able to like rip out from the root in me. It's such a core teaching.

[B]

And the thing is, because it's not just workaholism, right? It's what I notice is no matter what is going on mentally, physically, emotionally, when it's go time, we go, we go. You know, I went to sleep at 2am last night and I'm here, here we are. There was no way that I wasn't going to be here doing it.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And that's a skill. And like in, in the apocalypse, in war, that's a skill. But if we do it all the time, we die by the age of 36.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You know, you die so young, you can't do it.

[A]

Your. Your system can't handle it.

[B]

Which is sort of ultimately what happens to me in the army is I just, you know, literally at the age of 15, I was like, nope, I'm not gonna deal with it. I'm not gonna think about it. What trauma?

[A]

What trauma? Not here.

[B]

I'm just gonna go. I'm just gonna go. And I think, you know something else that's interesting is I think I truly believed that I could just outrun trauma with success.

[A]

Someone said something horrific to me the other day, and I'm being a little facetious using that word, but it hurt me. Cause I've been talking about my journey with this specific thing. This is the biggest thing my growing up impacted on me. Someone commented, busyness is still running. And I was like, cause it is. You think I can out achieve it, I can outrun it. I can prove I'm worthy and I can finally prove to myself that I'm successful and I'm smart and I'm good enough to the point that this doesn't bother me anymore.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. And you run and, and what's hard is that we're good at it. So great at it. Like, I literally heard uncultured in 2018, barefoot on my kitchen, no platform. And I said, or sorry, heard educated. And I said, I'm gonna write the next one of those. And I did. In the blurbs. I was like, I'm gonna sell it. I'm gonna do this at a high level. And I did. Because we know how to work. We know how to mission plan, reverse engineer, right? All of these things. So here I am in the military. I am super soldier, super intel officer, using all of the skills I've got from my whole life to perform, to perform perfection. I was one of the first women on a deliberate ground combat team. I could outrun all the men, literally raced them to earn privilege on the team.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

On my first patrol, I jumped off the helicopter and knelt right on a cactus and I did not say a word for 10 hours of patrolling. Right. Full on, spines in my knee. I can do anything. Right. Like, my skill, including in physical fitness, wasn't that I was super fit. It was that I just don't stop when it hurts.

[A]

You just keep going.

[B]

Just don't stop. I mean, I, on my second deployment to Afghanistan, won a marathon, well deployed. And I remember I was like, oh, as I was winning, I was like, oh, they're gonna do articles on me, like, women's running did a national article on me and they're gonna ask me how I did it. And my response is just, I scoff at the idea that doing anything for three hours and 12 minutes is hard.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

Right.

[A]

Like, I'm just not going to stop.

[B]

I just didn't stop. I once did 92 pushups in a row to prove to my now husband that he wasn't just automatically better. And I just did push ups till I fell on my face and tore a ligament in my wrist. But I won.

[A]

Yep. And he was like, holy shit, that's so, that's. I resonate so deeply with that because even when I look at my life and like my platform now, but even my album, my success, and people ask me, you know, because nothing is an overnight Success. I chose when I. Especially when I started deconstructing. But when my dad died, I chose that I was gonna have my life because his influence was finally fully gone. Like, it had started to shrink as I got older, but it was finally gone. And I was like, I am going to live my life, no matter the cost. And the secret to now, I'm writing a book, and my album's coming out, and I have this amazing platform and I work for myself, is I just didn't fucking quit. But not just that. It didn't occur to me to. Yeah, I was like, no, I'm not gonna do that. Absolutely not. Like, what's the alternative?

[B]

Just stop, right?

[A]

I'm not gonna just stop.

[B]

It's kind of like when people are like, you know, how did you survive? And it's like, well, my other option was dying, and I didn't want to die. Like. Like, what. What else was I gonna do? You know, I was gonna be successful or. Or die. And. And that's pretty relevant because, I mean, for a decade, that's kind of where I was. It was like, well, I didn't kill myself today, so I'm going to work hard tomorrow, and maybe I'll kill myself tomorrow. And, you know, I have this moment in Afghanistan where I'm literally on top of a tower deciding, like, which way am I going to kill myself? You know, am I going to jump and I'm going to do this or. And I didn't. And I had someone soon thereafter tell me something really important, which was, you know, with all the army hard love in the world. Daniela, get the fuck over yourself. You're not as different as you think you are. And that was so helpful for me at the time. It felt like a punch in the face, and it took me four years to find it helpful. But I tell everyone that now. And I was like, I was kind of giving myself the permission to be outwardly perfect, but inwardly, like, suicidal and depressed because, of course, nobody could understand my life, right? I grew up in a sex cult, right? Like, of course nobody can understand what this is. Anyway, I become an army captain, right? And, like, the percentage of people that become army captains, right? Like, that's success. Yeah, that should be success. And I was like, why am I not fixed?

[A]

Why is it not better yet?

[B]

This song in the musical, by the way, is called Skinny, Skinny Blonde Woman. And I'm so excited about it, but basically, I get pretty disillusioned, and then I break down physically just really, really fast. And I go from winning a Marathon in April to being evacuated with all the symptoms of a brain tumor in July.

[A]

Wow.

[B]

And no spoilers. But it was trauma, right? It was. The trauma was just breaking me, and I kind of doubled down so hard on my trauma, you know, being in Afghanistan on a commune again with walls that I can't escape, surrounded by men who are dangerous to me. Just, you know, 23 years old, but I might as well be five again in a call, right? Just reopened everything re triggered everything. And I was so sure I could just not deal with it. I could just push and push and push.

[A]

Your body really does keep the score, and it will only keep that trauma stored for so long. One of the best things someone ever said to me again early in my deconstruction was right after my dad died. And also the first time I was realizing about my childhood and about what I was taught and realizing, oh, this is wrong. And a woman said to me, she said, you will choose to face the darkness, or down the road, the darkness will turn and face you. And that was one of the most powerful things someone has ever said to me. So, Heidi, if you're listening to this, thank you for that.

[B]

But, yeah. And, you know, this chapter in my book is literally called Running for My Life, and it ends with the phrase, the body keeps the sore. You know, and it's like, it didn't matter how good I was, how fast I was, like, I could not keep running from my life and my trauma, and I had to face it because it was facing me. Breaking me. Literally opened my eyes and was just blind one day, you know, So I. I left the military, and I recovered and, you know, met an amazing partner. And it's so funny, too, because when we're writing the book, you know, they're like, this book is really like a feminist manifesto, and it cannot end with a man riding in on a white horse.

[A]

Yeah, we can't do that. We cannot do that.

[B]

Right? But when I thought about it, my response was, actually, he didn't save me. I saved myself. He was just on my team when I was ready to save myself and has always been. And I'm married to my best friend. We just do life together. We had about three years of patriarchal marriage before I was, like, not. Not working for me. We're not doing that. We're not doing that. Sir, we're gonna need to get you fully on board with the feminism. And it's been amazing. And it's a. Like, we're at 11 years of marriage now, and I don't worry at all. Cause we're just like, we're gonna change a thousand times, and we're gonna do life together. And I will also say that writing uncultured was a huge part of dealing with the trauma. Like, putting it all down, getting my story out there. You know what's so interesting is at the time, I was like, I need to turn my trauma into something, right? That means something that helps other people. That can, like, be the map, right? I want to write the next educated, like, help them the way this helped me. But what I didn't count on was the community, right? What I didn't count on was my whole life, I was alone in my head while I was surrounded by people in a cult, military, top of a tower, right? In a recording studio with a pedophile, just alone. But now it's like 85,000 people have literally held my hand and walked through this story with me. And I've met a bunch of them, and I know their names, and I'm not, like, alone anymore. When it happens to me, when the triggers come, when, you know, that kind of stuff happens. So it's really kind of like, helped me back and transformed my life as well.

[A]

Right. Yeah. It gives and it's. We talked about this yesterday at your event was, like, when we tell our stories and we realize that we're not alone, it gives us community. And instead of, like, struggling with that pain in the dark, thinking, no one's going to understand this, no one sees this, or feeling the shame and the guilt that accompanies so much of it, especially in religious cults. Like, all of the sudden, you have all these people that are like, oh, well, I didn't know that anybody else felt like I did. Thank you for seeing my story. I can see myself in you. And all of a sudden, we now have this community that helps us heal and shows us that a better world and a better future is possible because we are a communal species, and we've lost that. But also, when it comes to abuse and trauma, their entire goal is, you got to keep it a secret. You can't talk about it. Don't talk about it. Anybody outside the group, because they know what they're doing, but they also know, like, the thing is, is that it'll kill you if you keep it a secret.

[B]

And I was even told this by, like, professional mentors. Everyone was like, don't talk about the cult. You know, only talk about the army. And, of course, only tell good stories.

[A]

Yeah, don't say any of the bad ones.

[B]

Like, you did something really cool. And I'm like, no, but it's all of it. Right. We're doing all or nothing in this book. Like, you see me going out on patrol as the only woman with 25 men into war. You also see me being pulled aside and told to watch my back against 25American soldiers that are supposed to have my back. Yep. And both of those stories are just as important as each other. And it's real.

[A]

It's real to our everyday experience. Yeah.

[B]

And, you know, to your point, like, the number one thing that I hear from people is, well, nothing like your story, but.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And then they tell me their story, and I'm always. I mean, it's almost like part of how I have built my platform. And I call it the benefit of the extreme story.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

Right. Like, if you call what you grew up in a cult, people might try to disagree with you.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

But nobody tries to fight with me.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

About the children of God being a cult. Right. And so when I, like, I don't have to define cults. I have in my next book, but I can just tell you my story. And if you're relating. Yes. You know, Tara Westover's book is not called a cult book. The name cult doesn't appear anywhere in educated. That's what it is.

[A]

That's exactly.

[B]

Single family cult. And so that language, you know, and what I've really learned is, like, when people hear the high, high notes, Grew up in a sex culture, woman at war, People are like, oh, I can't relate to that. But when I tell the actual stories in detail, almost everybody relates, you know, and kind of like, so then I. During COVID I go to Harvard and I get a degree in organizational psychology and a master's. And while I'm doing this, I realize, first of all, I'm an expert on bad guys. Yep.

[A]

I really know bad guys.

[B]

Studying them my whole life. Right. I mean, I'm a trained anti terrorism officer in the United States army. And, like, terrorist groups are the same as cults. You know, they really are. And I think we always. We always say there's a spectrum of cults, but I like to say there's a spectrum of groups from most extreme and controlling to least extreme and controlling. And cults and terrorist groups and gangs are sort of the three that we have up here as the least controlling. And so I was like, I'm gonna focus on bad guys. I'm gonna keep doing that. I'm just gonna keep being the expert on bad guys. That's what Your military intelligence officer does. And I see the value in this because that's what we do. And this is what we do physically, too. Like, when something breaks, your computer breaks, you take it to go get diagnosed, and then you don't get mad at the tech for telling you the problem. But when it's an idea, and groups are an idea, our country is an idea, Getting killed in war is an idea. When it's an idea, we get mad at the person diagnosing the problem saying,

[A]

there's a problem with this idea.

[B]

And so. And it was so interesting too, because all of my colleagues in organizational psychology school are like, what are you going to do with that? What are you going to do with bad groups? And I was like, all right, so you're assuming that all the groups you're going to go work for are the good guys. Meanwhile, we're all just here studying cult tactics. Like that's what organizational psychology is. You're studying influence tactics, and you can then choose to use any tool of influence as a weapon. I think that's what cult leaders do.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And I was just like, yeah. And there's a very interesting moment where Harvard denied my request to take their class on psychology of cults, which was in regular psychology, not organizational psychology. And their only explanation was, it's not enough about groups. What? And I said, oh, y' all don't think that cults are successful groups?

[A]

That's a mistake.

[B]

You know, and as I started doing this leadership talk where I would say, you know, if I told you about a group that had over 10,000 people whose members tended to stay dedicated for life, ran high risk missions all around the world, and brought in millions and millions of dollars and lasted for 50 years. You would not tell me that that is an unsuccessful group until I tell you that I'm talking about the Taliban or the children of God. Yep. Right. And as soon as we call something bad, we stop looking at why it works. Yep. Right. We all hate Christian nationalism, but their tactics are working.

[A]

Their tactics are extremely effective. And knowing them is hugely important. Knowing and borrowing them, it's like, okay, this actually works. How do I reverse engineer this to take it away from these cartoonish supervillains? Yes.

[B]

So what I decided to do in my book, first of all, is to do it outside of academia. I was not gonna go into another high control system. And I have a free four year GI Bill still. Like I could have done. Ben. Doctor. But I. I researched it. Right. Wrote it on everyone else's. I think I've read Everything I've ever written about cults out there. 400, 400 endnotes. I'm so proud of it. So I came up with a 10 part definition of cults. Just my own definition that I didn't, you know, feel like anyone had done it the way I wanted to do it. I just did it. Don't actually have to ask permission if you're not in academia. So I just did it. And I have 10 things that make you a cult. And it's like they're all organizational behavior. It's a journey that you go on and you have to understand that too. It's like this, this, this, this, this, this, this.

[A]

Oh, we're gonna go over these. I'm gonna have you nutshell these for me.

[B]

And what I do in the book is I show it to you in real cults, right? In quotes accepted. Cult in the United States military and then in regular American groups. And then right as I'm 2/3 of the way done with the book, the 2024 election happens. Oof. And I mean, so there's a great final chapter that's called ends justifies the means mentality. And it's sort of like, hey, y', all, this is all about been about MAGA and the country and where we are right now. Like, we are here because a cult has done this for 50 plus years. I mean, you said going all the way back to 1920.

[A]

Yep. Right.

[B]

Organization.

[A]

Opposition to the New Deal through the family. Their organization started in the 30s, so like it's been, it has been a structured, organized takeover. Such a long time. The families in the family's what the

[B]

children have got to rename themselves to. And I have a whole section on familial language and how cults like to use it. Cults love it.

[A]

Before I, I want to dive into this and over the 10 things. But first, because I love this story. When you got your advance for uncultured, I want you to share the thought that you had and part of the reason you are this gorgeous ball of sunshine and color now.

[B]

So I got an advance. It's a really nice advance. And I have to say I sold my cult book and I bought my pilot husband an airplane called a Mooney.

[A]

I love it.

[B]

But my first thought with like financial freedom, Right. Like, it gave me like five years to keep doing this.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And I did. And I figured it out. Now I can keep doing it forever. My first thought of freedom was, oh, I'm gonna wear whatever the fuck I want for the rest of my life.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

And specifically, I got to. And I never have an excuse to wear anything boring, so I don't. I'm always very intentionally expressing exactly what I want to express.

[A]

I love it with my clothes. For those of you that are listening and you can't see her, she's got this beautiful butterfly hairpiece and rainbow hair and this gorgeous red crocheted necklace and this red outfit, and it's amazing. It's perfect. And I've never seen you dress boring, and I love that. That was such a big part of deconstruction for me, was like I had spent so many times, so much time painting myself, shaping myself into this thing you wanted. I just want to be myself. It's my body. I'm going to dress it the way I want. I'm going to express myself the way that I want. I'm done performing for your prescription of this is what a woman looks like, and I love it.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

And I wanted to share that. So we're going to go through the 10 parts of the book, the culting of America. These 10 ingredients that create this culture. Culture. Chapter one, charismatic leadership. Yes.

[B]

And subtitle of this is a Hitler and a Churchill. Because again, we don't look at those two men and say, why did it work? You know, why did. Hitler and Churchill are very similar people, very similar personalities.

[A]

Yeah, right.

[B]

And what I say is, like, there's a reason that the world produced a Hitler and a Churchill at the same time, but we look at Hitler and we say, bad. So we only study to pathologize. And we look at Churchill and we say, good. We don't talk about how toxic of a leader he was. And I just say, let's look at all of it. Why did it work as leaders? Charismatic leaders. I think we're influence professionals, and I think there's a spectrum of charisma. Right. And then there's people who are not on the spectrum. They're over here with J.D. vance.

[A]

Got the riz of a baked potato.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. The. The charisma of a man who puts his cast iron in the dishwasher. Yes. As I like to say, pats his

[A]

wife very viciously on the leg.

[B]

But influence professionals, charismatic people, whole spectrum. I'm charismatic, you're charismatic. Donald Trump is charismatic. And I think probably 80% of us, when we learn a new tool of influence, which is what the next 10 chapters are about, we are like the Chinese with gunpowder. Right? We're like, how can we use this in a socially acceptable way? That helps me. Brings joy, doesn't harm others.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And makes everyone happy. And then. But then when white men found gunpowder, they said, how can we use it as a weapon?

[A]

Yep. How can we use it to take over?

[B]

And I think there's, like, probably a 20%. The 80, 20% principle just goes so hard in almost everything.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

There's like a 20% of people who join cults or create cults because they want to weaponize influence. So. So we look at that, and we look at, you know, charismatic leaders, of course. Tyrants, of course. Cult leaders like Jim Jones, you know, the big guy, but also Adam Newman of WeWork.

[A]

That's amazing. Was not expecting that name. I haven't gotten to read the book yet. I just got it today.

[B]

So. Charismatic leader. And one thing I didn't do well in this chapter is talk about. The whole thing is about the charismatic leader. A cult can also be led by an idea.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And a cult can also be led by a dead person.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

So children of God, cult of personality. Cults of personality don't pass down. But the children of God did. But I'm here to say it didn't. We just believed that we could talk to him every day.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

So she just kept leading through him. Same for the Jehovah's Witnesses with Ellen White. Right. Same for Mormonism. Meanwhile, interesting cult of Joseph Smith. Right. Cult of personality. And then what Brigham Young does. Yes. I said Brigham Young on purpose, is he turns it into a cult of an idea. Right. This is the one true church. And that it's cults of idea are more stable and they're more easily able to read.

[A]

As long as the idea doesn't change. Right.

[B]

Donald Trump went the other way. He took these cults of an idea that were already building. I call the idea racist conservatism or Christian nationalism. And he pulled them into his cult of personality, which I think is good news, because that means the power structure right now is going to shatter when we get the big, beautiful burial. But as we know, ideas cannot be killed.

[A]

Right.

[B]

So, like, everything you talk about is not gonna go away. They're just gonna have to, like, regroup and mutate. And there will be future leaders. But Maga, I do believe, will sort of be no more. Shady Vance is not gonna be able to take over. You have to have a personality to take over a cult of personality.

[A]

And it just doesn't work that way.

[B]

So that's charismatic leadership.

[A]

But you also had. In chapter one, there's a part two that is titled. And his skinny white women. White woman Excuse me.

[B]

So this is probably my favorite contribution to cult studies. So I'm looking at Alison Mack of Nexium, and I'm going, why? Why is it always these skinny white women? Right? And then three or four years later, I'm looking at Ghislaine Maxwell, and I'm like, oh, oh. So the skinny white woman is a validity mascot. Yep.

[A]

Right.

[B]

The cult leader usually is not actually capable of recruiting people. Cult leaders are usually horrific. They don't know how to treat people. They're super flubby. Like, if anyone's ever seen Keith Ranieri, he's, like, one of the ugliest men in history. Yeah. Just gross.

[A]

You're like, what is that?

[B]

But white women have been used in American culture as the stamp of validity.

[A]

Right?

[B]

White women sewed the hoods for the Ku Klux Klan. White women were just as much a part of slavery enslaving people as the men. Right.

[A]

Have you read Jesus and John Wayne?

[B]

Oh, yes.

[A]

Yeah. So she's got one coming out in September.

[B]

So excited.

[A]

I'm so excited. But it's called I'll just shout this out for her. It's coming out in September called Live Laugh Love. But it's specifically about how white women have sanctified and validated these movements, that these movements do not exist, do not function, do not survive without white women's participation.

[B]

And so, again, when I call it my theory, it's just bringing it into cults and calling it the Skinny White Woman. Because it's actually intersectional feminist theory of how white women uphold patriarchy. Right. And white supremacy, like, that is a role that we have played. And, I mean, my first realization was, like, oh, that was how the US army used me. Right? Like, I thought I was doing these great, cool things for women, but I was used just as often as well. Like, but the army can't be toxic for women because look at Captain Daniela Mystinek, right? Like, look how great she did. And, yeah, I mean, a big part of the appearance, again, is, like, not playing that game, not playing the skinny white woman game. Even though I'm in the body of a skinny white woman.

[A]

Yeah. But it's the difference of, like, again, like, that conformity of, like, you're gonna be our little patron saint. We're hang you on the wall. We're gonna have you facing forward. But you gotta be blonde and have blue eyes. You gotta dress a certain way, and you don't want crazy nails. You want, like, short ones, maybe a nice French tip. But, like, be bland.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Be Pretty, but be bland. Don't taste like anything. Don't get too loud. Don't voice note. Don't have. Don't have opinions, preferably don't think.

[B]

One of my, one of my favorite lines in the book we say is that good women are supposed to be quiet, skinny and a light shade of beige.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And there are a million ways to push back against that.

[A]

Yeah. So many ways.

[B]

I start with rainbow hair and boobs, you know, so that's part of why

[A]

these groups get so mad about blue hair and nose rings and te and like any form of self expression because you're refusing the structure by refusing the conformity.

[B]

And it's also been really fun for me because, you know, obviously like you and I are the ones that have to push back against white supremacy and white women doing this. Right. And so I, it's so fun because I'll get a. Why does it always have to be about race? And I'm like, I've got 25 pages of research here.

[A]

Here you go.

[B]

To read to you about it from my own book.

[A]

Let's talk about it, guys.

[B]

Here's why. Here's why. So. And you know, basically Ghislaine Maxwell and also the woman who we talked about married her own three year old daughter to a pedophile.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Those are exactly who you want beside you when you are sex trafficking children.

[A]

Yep. That's your protection. Yeah.

[B]

Because people look at them and go, oh, a mother would never. A mother would never. Yep.

[A]

A mother would never. Chapter 2 Sacred Assumption this one was so dramatic.

[B]

I swear I sat up in the middle of the night and was like, hold nothing sacred. And I've been being asked for 15 years how, how anyone in the Children of God could have gone along with it. And it is the sacred assumption. There's something in a high control group that you must believe in order to be a member in good standing. Right. I think you talked at our event yesterday about motherhood just like not even understanding that you could opt out of that.

[A]

Yeah. Right. So that's your number. That's your only purpose.

[B]

The sacred assumption there. And the sacred assumption in Children of God was that this man was the prophet of God. And as long as the sacred assumption held, they could justify anything in the United States military, the big military, because there's cults inside of cults inside of cults. The sacred assumption is that the American flag is worth dying for.

[A]

Yep. You know, and I think of, I'm thinking of so many from growing up, like, but we're saving Kids, we're defending the unborn. We're saving lives. We're building the kingdom of heaven. We're guaranteeing ourselves heaven. There's so many.

[B]

Yes. And the next chapter, by the way, is called but no, this chapter is called But We're Saving Lives.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

But We're Saving Lives.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

But We're Saving Lives. And the next chapter is called do it for the Children.

[A]

Yeah. Because chapter three is the transcendent mission.

[B]

Yeah. So, you know, the sacred assumption pulls you into the worldview and brings you to the transcendent mission. The mission is why people join cults and stay in cults.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Like, nobody joins to worship a dude.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

They join to save the world. Yep. Right. And this is why I always side eye. Save the children.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

Because, you know, one thing I say in uncultured is they were so busy saving the world that they forgot to save the children of the children of God. Right. Like cults. Cult leaders almost always pick something religious, something political, or something philanthropic because that gives them cover. It gives them a way to interact, gives them a way to raise money. And it's how you get people in. And most of the people you get in, probably full 80% are the true believers. And they really think that they're doing this and people will devote their whole lives. And it's a transcendent mission because we're gonna. The world is broken, we're gonna fix it.

[A]

We're gonna save the world.

[B]

And it's worth all the sacrifice. And. Which is the next chapter. But it's also usually only delivered to you after some space travel.

[A]

Yeah, after the space travel. So chapter four is self sacrifice.

[B]

Self sacrifice. And this is how they do it.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Okay. These next three chapters are how they brainwash you. And like, self sacrifice is not part of cults. It's how they work. How they break you is breaking you from having a personal identity. Right.

[A]

And so gotta be a unit in a conformed line.

[B]

And because the mission, the transcendent mission is so good and so important, all of the sacrifice will be worth it in the end. Right. After some space travel.

[A]

After some space travel, we keep bringing. We gotta mention the song.

[B]

It is. It is sacrifice. It is taking you away from your own identity. Right. And it is just take one for the team. Always about the good of the team.

[A]

Kingdom of heaven.

[B]

And you as an individual never matter more than the group or the mission or the team. And so you just whittle yourself away. And because all brainwashing is. Is getting you to stop asking questions. And what cults want is for you to stop asking questions. And then you're just a little meat puppet for them to work.

[A]

You're just a little. So the self intended soldier for them.

[B]

The self sacrifice is so important. And also there's two things on my list which I say cannot be good. You cannot have a good cult because constant self sacrifice harms individuals.

[A]

Yes, Right.

[B]

It cannot be good. And self sacrifice leads to chapter eight, which is exploitation of labor, which also is not good.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

So, okay, so then chapter five.

[A]

Isolation.

[B]

Isolation. And this is a very, very, very important part of cults. Getting you isolated, right? Getting you isolated. They love bomb you. They've got you all in on the mission, and now comes the bait and switch, right? And they take you off to a commune or a retreat or US army basic training, and you are now isolated.

[A]

This is also such a. In Christian nationalism, because this is like my radar. If you grew up in any form of fundamentalism, this also includes controlling what media you listen to, what you can watch, what you can read, who you can talk to. I see this in my own life because I was in a Christian nationalist church, but also Christian nationalist schools. It was about isolating all of the information. I wasn't isolated in a commune, but I was isolated from the world around me. I was separate from the culture that I was growing up in completely. And also this is the teachings, the way that they teach traditional family values, which is bullshit because it's not traditional. That's nobody like the single family household is a 20th century invention. But the purpose of that, the purpose of this hierarchy and this ideology of make sure you get married and submit to your husband, you're going to be with your family and you're taking care of the home and you're taking care of your kids, is to isolate women. Isolate women from each other, isolate women from community. Because when women get together and they talk and they share secrets and they share what's going on, they rebranded that as gossip. It's not gossip, it's safety. But then they can isolate you. And now all of a sudden, you're in this hierarchy. You're trapped in this hierarchy now, believing this is the will of God and you don't have anyone to sit across from and say, this doesn't feel right.

[B]

Yes, exactly. And so, you know, to your point, if you didn't grow up in a commune, in this chapter we go into, it's not just commune isolation, Right. It's isolation of thought. It's isolation of the Internet isolates us.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

There's a thing called algorithmic radicalization.

[A]

Yep. Big part of January 6th pushes us

[B]

to the extremes, you know, so there's so many ways to be isolated and, like, you know, I think the Mormons really taught us that you can be seemingly just functioning in the world, but can be completely inside of a closed system.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And one of the ways you can tell the people inside a closed system brings us to the next chapter. Language.

[A]

Yes. Distinguishable vernacular.

[B]

They say things the same way all the time, and they have words that mean something that don't mean something to the outside. I mean, the chapter on language is the longest chapter because it's so significant. You've got familial language.

[A]

Give me a little bit of that.

[B]

It's like what? They call themselves a family.

[A]

Right.

[B]

They're your friends. And cult leaders are always the mother and the father.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

Brothers and sisters. We do all this in the military, by the way. You know, I say anything that calls itself a family wants to overwork you, underpay you, expect you to put up with more bullshit than you would otherwise.

[A]

That is okay. Anyways, thank you for joining us. I'm just kidding. That is so good. Say that again one more time.

[B]

Anything that calls itself your family wants to overwork you, underpay you, and expect you to put up with more bullshit than you would otherwise.

[A]

That is excellent.

[B]

You know, and so. So. But there's also thought stopping cliches. You know, right now I'm seeing people use it with. Oh, but the government has jets and drones. Yep. And I'm like, no, don't stop that me with your. With your jets and drones. Like, because they're just saying that because there's, like, there's nothing we can do. Yep. Like, no, there is. Jets have to land somewhere.

[A]

Yep. Jets have to get fuel in Christian nationalism. It's the Bible says.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

From people who never actually read it.

[B]

You know, I mean, thoughts stopping cliches. There's just some boys will be boys, you know, so all of these ways to shut down and shut down questions. Because again, when a question gets through, that's the crack in the brainwashing. Yep. Right. Brainwashing is to get you not ask questions.

[A]

You got thrown out of Sunday school growing up. You understand?

[B]

That's the crack. So very important chapter on language. Dehumanizing language, all of this stuff. But also, language is part of isolation. Right. Part of why veterans struggle so much is we don't know how to tell our stories in a language that civilians understand because we are given Our own language. And I'm very, very proud of Uncultured because I wrote 150 pages about the military, and I did not use not one. Not one acronym. Yes. Or military term that I don't give you. There's no glossary. It's just all translated into civilian language for you.

[A]

That isolating language also helps keep people in the cult because you feel like you're part of a club. You feel like you belong. You feel like you're a special insider into this system, and it gives you that sense of belonging. It's like having a tree fort and only you and your friends have the password. It's exactly that.

[B]

Yeah. And. And nobody likes to say this out loud, but the reason people join cults is because it makes you feel special. Yeah.

[A]

It makes you feel loved.

[B]

That's what it is.

[A]

Makes you feel like you belong.

[B]

Special. Yep. And so isolation goes into us versus them mentality.

[A]

Just chapter seven.

[B]

Yes. And this is the chapter where we actually give you, like, the whole history of America. Like the Puritans. Yep. Puritans in Jonestown.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

They're coming to persecution. Not a lot of difference.

[A]

They're coming to persecute us. They're coming. The world hates you.

[B]

So us versus them mentality. You know, we talk about fraternities and sororities. We see it all the time. You know, military branches. Right. Like, I will make jokes about Marines eating crayons all day long because I was in the Army.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Us versus them mentality is how you make people really, really care about the group. And there's this very interesting drill that you can do with a large group of people, which is just. You just. Everyone picks a partner, and then they play paper, rock, scissors. And then whoever wins gets to keep going. And whoever loses stands behind them and is on their team. Cheering loudly yeah. And within about five minutes, you have polarized the entire room.

[A]

Wow.

[B]

And they're just shouting at each other. And they're so in it. And it feels so good to be so in it. Right. To just like. To just be so in it. Which then, of course, gets you to exploitation of labor.

[A]

Exploitation of labor. Chapter eight.

[B]

And this is the big. Again, like, people understanding this is so important. Right. That's why Mormons have more money than

[A]

the Catholic Church, which is crazy.

[B]

The Mormon Church has more money than the Catholic church, which has 1.3 billion members, because Mormons are exploiting labor from day one all the way up. The Mormon Church, very specifically, you know, Service.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

Volunteering.

[A]

Right. Women. That's how you serve God, remember, by serving the church for free, where we're not going to pay you, but we do plan you on making. Like to make all the bulletins and plan the potlucks and orchestrate the revival, make sure the church is clean, but you can't preach.

[B]

And we always, and I mean always, find. Because cults are patriarchal. Right. Everything with a hierarchy is patriarchal. And women and children are always the most oppressed classes and most exploited in the cults.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And then everyone just keeps exploiting everyone else and telling each other it's normal and it's fun because people like to come at me with this. Well, then how can you call the military? They get paid. Getting paid does not mean your labor is not being exploited. Yeah.

[A]

And also, how many active military members are on snap? Mm.

[B]

And. And if the US Military had to pay overtime, they would shut down tonight. Tonight, soldiers make about 27 cents an hour when you actually count all the amount of labor we are allowed to get. Like, when I left the military and worked at Microsoft and things didn't get done and people were just like, we'll get to it next week. I was like, do what? In the army, you just don't go home or go to sleep until it's done.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

I have stayed up for 72 hours once working through a training mission. You know, like, it just. It just has to get done. The German army, by the way, pays overtime. Oh, look at that. Yeah, look at that. It's really fun for me when people say, you have to be a cult. And I'm like, if you really care

[A]

about the military and veterans, you would fund their paychecks and their health services.

[B]

Yes. Yeah.

[A]

Controversial opinion. Chapter 9. High entrance and exit costs.

[B]

Yeah. So everyone talks about high exit costs. I started with, well, if you have high exit costs, just sunk cost fallacy. A lot of times that means you have paid a lot to be in. Right. Like, by the time you get to army basic training, you have done so much work, you have given up so much. You've told all your family goodbye. You've publicly said you're gonna go do this thing. Yep. You don't wanna go home as a failure.

[A]

Right.

[B]

You know, people now, you know, I think you were saying about your brother earlier, who's at 17 years of service. I mean, my husband at 16 years of service was done, but he sure as hell stayed in for those four more years. Yeah.

[A]

Because at this point, I mean, and my brother has kids.

[B]

20. Yeah.

[A]

Why would you not stay in for your 20 and thanks to what's going on with this administration, he's headed to the Middle East.

[B]

And speaking of having kids, there's a reason cults always want you pregnant because it's a high exit cost. When you're a sergeant with a wife and five kids, you're going to stay for the 20 out of the military and going to no health care and America. Like, you're going to stay.

[A]

Yeah. And the same as if you're, you know, a woman in a. In a high control, hierarchical situation and, you know, leaving, you're going to lose your kids.

[B]

You're going to stay, you're going to stay.

[A]

Or if you're so impoverished because you don't have any work experience, you don't have any education, you have six kids, you're going to say like, and actually, this is such a. I'll share part of my story on this. So my mom left my dad when I was six and left all six of us kids with my dad. And of course he demonized her. She's the adulteress. It's me or it's her. And I used to hate her growing up. I just couldn't understand, like, how could you do that? But I realized she fled the cult and she knew she couldn't take us with her. And looking at it now, and I had a chance to speak to her when I was 23 about it. I was like, she's like, listen, it boiled down to, I couldn't stay, but I couldn't feed you either. And she's like, he could feed you.

[B]

And she fled the cult and she stopped being an abuser because every adult in a cult is a perpetrator. And there's this term, it is my favorite term in cults. I yelled out loud when I found it. It's called performative regulation.

[A]

Oof.

[B]

It is a horizontal power structure and everybody is watching everybody else and keeping everyone else in control.

[A]

All cults have a kgb.

[B]

When y' all see people pop up on my social media and tell me to put my boobs away. Performative regulation.

[A]

Right.

[B]

Another person, look at how good I am.

[A]

Look at how well I'm behaving.

[B]

That can tell me stay in. Right. So, like, when, you know, and I always say, like, there's. Especially in single family cults. Right. There's the, like, narcissistic controlling cult leader and there's the enabler.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And both of these people are abusers.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

You know, so when a woman runs.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Leaving kids behind, sometimes you don't have a choice.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

But you have chosen to stop perpetuating abuse. Their abuse and perpetuating their abuse. You know, it took me an interesting

[A]

perspective to learn that and about my mother.

[B]

But everyone says, well, this is not a cult. You're free to leave anytime. About exit costs. So we really get into. It's not money. It can be. Money can be. But it is everything you give up to be in the group and everything you lose when you leave the group. Right? And it is everything. And I give all my crafts cult names and so I'm doing these crochet cell phone holders and I'm calling them. You're free to leave anytime. Yeah, because it's always a lie. Right? It's a tether. Right.

[A]

It is a tether too.

[B]

And like, you know, I always say, like, if someone walked up to me in a Costco and was like, ma', am, you're free to leave any time, I would be like, what? Why am I in prison here?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

You know, and why did you just say that to me? Is when they say, this is not a cult, I'm like, like imagine you're at your favorite restaurant and the mater d walks up and it's like, ma', am, I just want you to know this is not a brothel.

[A]

Then you're just like, wait, what? Like, why would you even say that?

[B]

When you're free to leave, you don't have to be told you're free to leave, right? Like, you just don't. So, so exit costs, so, so, so important. Right? Because that's what keeps us in. And then finally ends justifies the means mentality. Right? And this is what cults are trying to get you to. Right? Cults want to exploit your labor and turn you into a deployable agent for their transcendent mission. Right? And this is where you make the final sacrifice for the cult.

[A]

Right. And if the mission transcends all, then the self sacrifice is no problem. Then when, you know, the leaders get caught for CSAM or all these other horrific things happen, or like you just, you just continue to justify.

[B]

But, but, but, but, but, but.

[A]

We're saving the world. We're saving the world. We're saving the world. Imperfect ve Cyrus. We're saving the world. We're saving the world. We're saving the world.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

We're saving the country and turning it back to God.

[B]

We saw this real recently, relevantly with one Graham Platner.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And I was, from the beginning, I was like, your Nazis are not better. Our Nazis are not better than they're Nazis. Right. Like, it's. He's not. Okay. You know, as a veteran woman, when. When men speak flippantly of war, they're not good men.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And everyone was literally. And justifies the means mentality. And one thing is.

[A]

And they were even that way when the allegations came out. And I was like, guys, what?

[B]

And one thing is, it makes me ragey. But the other thing is, it's a cult tactic. It only works if you have a cult. The Democrats don't have a good cult right now.

[A]

We don't have a good cult yet.

[B]

Telling us to vote for someone because the other guy is worse. It doesn't actually work. So it's not even a good strategy. But really, there's so much ends justifies the means mentality in everything, and that's the one I really want people to sit with at the end of the book and figure out ways to stop doing that.

[A]

And it's also such a big part of. A lot of people ask me, how do these. And usually they're asking about family. They're like, how do these good Christian people that I've known my whole life, they've always been kind, They've always been loving, and how do they still support this? And it's because the end justifies the means. And so I'm telling everyone, you need to buy uncultured and the culting of America. But before we wrap up today, I want to talk about the musical because, oh, my God, I'm so amped.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

So you're so talented and so gifted and so smart.

[B]

So one of the things I realized. Thank you. One of the things I realized from writing this book was, oh, all the cults are the same.

[A]

They're all the same.

[B]

Many experts say that in a lot of different ways, all cults are the same. You know, you just probably haven't gotten to raping the children yet.

[A]

Yes.

[B]

Which, by the way, I have 10 commandments for good groups that are not cults in the back of the book. And my rule number one is don't rape the children.

[A]

Yep. Like, don't rape kids.

[B]

Yeah. Epstein files or support those who do. Like, just.

[A]

Just don't feel like that should be a bare minimum.

[B]

And that's. And justifies the means mentality. So I realized that one of the things that I'm really good at. Okay. So if all cults are the same, that means there's a generic experience. Right. Like, you and I were not cult babies in the same cult, but we have the same experience, which is why one of the number one things that I get told when people read or hear my story is, well, nothing like yours, but. And I'm always like, yes, say more. Right. So I realized that one of the things I'm good at doing and part of why we write memoir is putting language to our experience. Right. So I'm going to help with the generic language to experience. And also, us as deep level Swifties found out a few years ago that Taylor Swift is the sixth cousin of Emily Dickinson. And I thought about that a lot and I was like, but Taylor Swift's rhymes get known because she sets them to a beat.

[A]

Right.

[B]

So anyway, I met Hamilton a year and a half ago and I'm just like, oh, I have to be on that stage. That's the culmination of my life in the performance cult is I have to be on that stage.

[A]

That was the first thing I thought of is, is there this redeeming kind of arc, this healing of being that child perform?

[B]

Absolutely.

[A]

And then getting to write your own.

[B]

Oh, my God. And I can't wait to tell you that part. So I. The next day I'm like, well, I guess I'm gonna have to write a musical. Right. Because obviously I'm not a Broadway trained actress or singer, but you know, Lin Manuel Miranda is both the most and the least talented man on that stage. So if I write it, I can get there. So I started writing it and I was like, is it going to be the Book of Mormon but for all cult babies, or is it going to be women soldiers on the stage? And I was like, oh, it's both. Yeah. Right. So it's a fantastic three hour show that is teaching you how programming works, how deprogramming works and how healing works, but also giving you all the tips. Right. So like, right before the basic training song, which is called Drink the Kool Aid, we're gonna have the sexy youth pastor and the sexy marine recruiter come out and give you their pitch.

[A]

Oh, amazing.

[B]

But then they're gonna look at each other and look at you and go, well, don't, you know, sex appeal is always part of recruiting, you know, and just give you that. And just like I have a cell block 6 tango parody from Chicago and it's my third rule of cults. Even if he did it doesn't mean he's guilty, which is the deification of idiosyncrasy.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

But I'm going to set it to a sick beat. Even if he did it doesn't mean he's guilty. And he'll never have to pay. Mm. My God. And these are rifles, by the way, and military burlesque, and it's the deification of idiosyncrasy, and I will make that a household name.

[A]

Amazing.

[B]

So I started talking about it with my audience and most of my art. My audience loves it. They're like, take my money, take my ideas, build it. This time, they're like, how do I be in it?

[A]

Yeah. How do I take part?

[B]

How do I do it?

[A]

How do I. I want to be in it.

[B]

I want to help you write songs. I want to be part of it. I don't take free labor. So I've been, like, batting away free Mormon music labor.

[A]

Yeah. Like, no.

[B]

And I realized, like, oh, all the cult babies and all the veterans want to come sing and dance out their trauma on the stage. That's so cool. And performance is a huge theme of the performance. Right.

[A]

So good.

[B]

So I spent a year writing this. I'm good at art because I always crowdsource it. I surround myself with experts. I listen to them. So I wrote the whole thing in a year and a half. And then I was like, now I'm gonna have to raise money, hire musicians, and work on this. And that is when I remembered for the second time that the Children of God was a performance cult. And my own personal father had written all of these songs for the cult that we'd sold millions of around the world. So can I give you my elevator pitch for the musical right now?

[A]

So in.

[B]

So on the first half, we bring out 10 cult members and put them on a chessboard. The last one is trump, and, yes, he's on a pawn square. And then they sing the opening. And these first two lines are the real song of the cult. I cannot express that enough. Right. And it's heavens girls and heavens boys making such a joyful noise. Is it a cult? Is it a creed? Is it the truth or what we need? Is it devotion or control? Will it save? Spit or swallow your soul? Follow the leader, don't ask why Raise your hands and testify Is it freedom or a gilded cage? Is it peace or righteous rage? Is it family or is it a cult? Is it really all your fault? That's amazing. Okay, then we have the intermission where we have the first done song right now that we just wrote with Candy Carpenter called Cults always promise space travel because they do so good. And I will tease it with saying we do a play on Jesus loves Me. This I know for all you exvangelicals. So in the second half, we bring out 10 military members and put em on a stage. And they're all women, even the ones in male bodies. And they sing the drink the Kool Aid song. Armies girls and armies boys. Yes. Quit making such an awful noise. Recruiter said you would have fun. Nope. Basic training has begun. We will set your world aflame Then we'll play our little game we will smoke you till you cry Then we'll teach you how to die Marching running under control the more you whine the faster we roll this is too easy. Welcome to the show in the United States Army. Amazing.

[A]

This is gonna be so good.

[B]

Thank you.

[A]

I cannot wait. And also I have heard the all cults. Every cult. What's the title?

[B]

Cults Always Promise Space Travel.

[A]

Cults Always Promise Space Travel. And it's amazing. It is so good. Also, I forgot to show as well. Before we get off. She also has an Unculture Yourself workbook. So if you are someone who is questioning or deconstructing or maybe you're like, do I need to deconstruct some things? You now have a workbook that you can take yourself through to reclaim your mind. Because your mind is yours, your faith is yours, your spirituality is yours, your sexuality is yours. It doesn't belong to anybody else. Doesn't belong to a performance requirement of somebody else. It belongs only to you.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And so before we wrap up, if you could give advice to someone on the deconstruction road. Various and this could be religious, it could be cults, it could be politics, it could be all kinds of things. And they're hitting that moment of my world is going to collapse if I walk away. What would you tell them?

[B]

Keep going.

[A]

It's so worth it.

[B]

You know, it's great to be on this side, you know, of. I call it the decade of Deconstruction. Mine took me about 13 years. And like, I run a book club now and I have people that I talk to that are further back and they're like, I'm breaking. I'm breaking from this. And like, yes, keep going.

[A]

Yes, please, keep going.

[B]

You know, I describe deconstruction as you're in Eugene and Rapunzel's cave. The water's filling up. There's all these rocks in front of you, Right. And you have to pick up every single one. You have to name it to lift it up over your head. And you have to put it back here.

[A]

Yep.

[B]

And that's gonna take you a really long time. And it's gonna be really hard. You're Gonna get really tired and you're gonna give up, but eventually it's all gonna be behind you and you're gonna get to go forward and you actually

[A]

get to be free.

[B]

And you know, people ask me how I know I'm done with the decade of deconstruction because obviously it doesn't really end. You know, we're going to keep learning and these things all our whole life. And I said, you know, I spend more time now living in the beautiful life that I've built for myself on this side than I spend dealing with my trauma, you know, and that wasn't true. Five years ago I had a really beautiful day where I graduated with my master's degree from Harvard. Twenty years after I left occult on my birthday.

[A]

Ah, amazing.

[B]

And was like, I'm done with imposter syndrome, doing my thing. Right. And my beautiful family there with me. My like 10 year old little girl who doesn't know anything about high control and is amazing. She wasn't 10 then, she's 10 now. And yeah. So just keep going. And then the other thing for people, when you're just coming out of a cult, especially if you're a cult baby, right. You were born into it, it's like, you're not gonna pass. You know, I worked so hard and then when I started telling people about my background, the number one response was, you know, I thought you were so weird, but now it makes sense. And you're so, and you're so normal.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And so like I was passing, I wasn't passing. And I do wish that someone had just hugged me at 15 and been like, just, just be your weird self.

[A]

Just be weird and it's fine.

[B]

Just, just. You know, Dolly Parton has a phrase since we are in Nashville, figure out who you are and then do it on purpose.

[A]

Yep. And do it better than anyone else because you're the only person that can do it.

[B]

The only you. Yep. The best you.

[A]

Life is so short. And I will, I will resonate with that as we end here. The same of like the freedom that I have now, the self expression, the knowing of who I am, the having a voice. I would do that decade again to still like, to have this feeling, it is so worth it. And I remember like for me, my core, my most important value in life is freedom. And it always has been since I was little. And I felt so trapped growing up, I felt so trapped and I couldn't articulate it and I didn't know how to get out. And now to actually have that freedom and to grow old. Yeah, right? Grow old knowing who I am, knowing who I want to be, knowing how I want to show up in the world. That is like, I couldn't ask for a bigger gift.

[B]

And, you know, something that has come really full circle for me is that quote. Like, I wouldn't change anything because it made me who I was, who I am, you know, because at first I used that to avoid the trauma. I was like, nope. But look, I'm so cool, right? I speak three languages. I can do all this stuff, whatever. And then in my deconstruction, I was like, no, fuck that. I would trade it all in for a childhood, right? Or for, like, a different thing. But now I'm in such a beautiful place in my life where I'm like, no, I couldn't change anything, right? Because then I wouldn't have what I have now. And so, you know, I like to say healing is very, very possible. Like, you're not gonna be normal. You're still gonna be a healed cult baby. But it gets better. It gets better. Stay the course. Find your community. And, like, there's so many of us out here.

[A]

So many. So, so many. And then lastly, shamelessly plug where everyone can find you.

[B]

Yes. So you can get my books anywhere. You get your books also at www. Knittingcultlady.com, i sell signed copies. I'm also on pretty much every social media knittingkultlady, K N I T T I N G. And I'm there five days a week at least, knitting and talking about cults and tyrants and bad guys. And we're all building the language for this together so that we can get out of it.

[A]

Thank you all so much for listening. Thank you for being here. These conversations have been so cool. Buy the books, read the books. We're a big book culture here. Pun intended. And I will see you next week on Flipping Tables.