August 20, 2024 • 34 mins
Tenderfoot TV's Laura Benson takes you inside “To Die For” with host Neil Strauss. Go behind the scenes into the making of the podcast - from Neil’s first discovery of Aliia Roza's unfathomable story to the lengthy and emotional twists and turns that led both Neil and Aliia on a very different journey than either expected.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
All eight episodes of To Die For are available now
to bitch absolutely free, but for ad free listening and
exclusive bonuses, subscribe to tendorfoot Plus at tenderfootplus dot com
or on Apple Podcasts.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Hi everyone, and welcome to Inside Tenderfooit TV. Today we're
going inside to Die For and I'm sitting down with
award winning author and journalist Neil Strauss, who's the creator
and host of To Die For. I like, I imagine
many of you went on quite a journey with this show,
and I'm really looking forward to sitting down with him,
(00:38):
talking to him about some of the behind the scenes
that might be a little unexpected for listeners, and hearing
more about his process and journey in building this show
and telling Aleija's story. So, without further ado, welcome Neil
to Inside tenderfoot TV and let's dive into it.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
Awesome. Thanks for having me on, Laura. I didn't tell
you before we talked, but I definitely have like a
lot of reluctance to do this interview, and I'm to
tell you why.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
So, I think when we create a podcast, we're almost
trying to create this magic spell that when you listen
to it you're just drawn into the story through voice,
through music, through the reporting. I'm not a fan of
pulling back the curtain on that and breaking the spell,
and it's not like it's magic, but there's something about
(01:22):
the storytelling I think in this podcast and in so
many Tenderfoot podcasts that makes it work. And I just
I don't like demystifying it. But I'm going to do
this and we'll see how it goes. No one has
to listen, all right, stop now if you don't want
to ruin it.
Speaker 4 (01:37):
Well, thank you for going out on a limb.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Then there's actually a great segue into your process working
on this show in general. Can you talk a little
bit about the production process itself and how you went
about building To Die For.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
Yeah, it's like it's sort of a band, and the
band is myself. Tristan Bankston, who worked on the second
season of To Live and Die in LA with me,
Donald Albright and Payne Lindsay is the producers and then
make up in Vanity set MAVs, who is the composer,
and then there's Dayton Cole who mixes it and makes
(02:11):
it sound great. It's really like a garage band that
puts this together. And one of the reasons I do
these with Tenderfoot is that there's a lot of creative
freedom within it to tell the story in the way
that the story wants to be told, versus other podcast
companies that seem to have a formula, and I hear
(02:31):
so many frustrated creators where they are not able to
share their experience because it has to be ground into
the formula.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Well, and with a story like Alyah as I imagine,
there is so much discovery as you went through the
process of talking to her that I couldn't even imagine
trying to put her story into a formula. Can you
share kind of what the journey was like for you
from the what you expected at the beginning when you
first heard about Aliah met her, and then just how
(03:02):
things might have shifted over time and the process of
interviewing her.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
Yeah. I think for meeting Aliyah and the way she
showed up at that first meeting, I really just thought
it was gonna be like a spy movie but real life,
and instead it was really about trauma and healing and
her own experiences. The biggest danger wasn't the enemy the
foreign country. The biggest danger was being a woman in
(03:29):
a military system run by these predatory men with no
accountability or consequences.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
As a listener, coming in with no expectations and no background,
I was really surprised by the shift, like the from
the first episode kind of the expectations I had to
then where you end up. I really appreciated, actually that
you talked about trauma informed interviewing, and I'm very curious
to learn more about that. Can you talk a little
bit about the training that you did for this interview
(03:59):
process and how that was different from other interviews you've
conducted in the past.
Speaker 3 (04:04):
Sure, I think that the interview was also not what
Aleah expected. I think she expected the sizzle, glam stuff,
And partly through studying trauma informed interviewing, we were able
to create a safe space for her to really share
her story. And I think that so much of healing
is through sharing and being heard and being seen and
(04:24):
being understood. And so as we started to realize that
this was a story of not survival from people shooting
at you, but survival from predatory, exploitative men in power,
I realized I needed to really be thoughtful about the
way I spoke to her and to be conscious of
the experiences she's been through. So I studied trauma and
(04:45):
form interviewing from a few places. I got to certified
in it. There's something called the Peace Model for Interviewing
I looked into and there's a great book for the
World Health Organization called Psychological First Aid. That's great, and
the importance is creating a safe, supportive environment that at
least prevents them from being traumatized further will really allowing
(05:07):
them to tell their story with their truth even throughout this.
That went beyond the process and making sure that she's
getting support throughout the process she needed. And I think
she always said her memories were locked in Pandora's box.
I think she even says it on the podcast. There's
a saying what we repressed controls us, right, we will further,
(05:29):
we will press it. It's like pushing back on a
spring that eventually that's just gonna snap. And so whatever
we're rere pressing eventually takes over, because that's how force works.
But however, if we can set them free in a sense,
to let them out in a way while we're getting healing,
while we're getting supported at the same time, and integrate them,
(05:51):
I guess integration is the word. We can lessen the
charge and the power they have over her, and unexpectedly
that's part of what the process created for Leah.
Speaker 4 (06:00):
That's really awesome.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
Is there anything that you've taken from that training that
you've actually incorporated into your day to day life, not
just in an interview setting.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
For sure? For sure, I mean think about it for
being a parent, right as a parent, active empathic listening,
valuing someone's feelings and experiences, not being judgmental, All those
things make you a great parent or a great partner.
Did it allow you because to be really pressing for
someone else's reality. There's a quote I love that says
(06:32):
listening is so close to being loved that some people
can't tell the difference.
Speaker 4 (06:36):
Oh, I love that.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
It's great, right, So I think about that all the time.
Speaker 4 (06:42):
That's really beautiful.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
So so part of the traumaform listening was not about
sitting down, And we did a lot of due diligence
at the beginning as far as the least story, but
in the end it wasn't to put her story on trial,
and to put her narrative on trial. I thought maybe
at the beginning was a possibility, but by the end,
it really felt that that's not the job of this podcast.
(07:08):
It's to really give someone the space to tell their
story and to listen for the human being underneath it.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
That actually sort of points to something that I did
want to ask you about, because you talk in the
beginning about this dynamic of you know, her using like
certain tactics that pickup artists had used, and that you
had this kind of fear of being played. And by
the end of it, that's completely gone from the tone
(07:39):
of the podcast and from the tone of her telling
her story. And I would love to know if there was,
you know, a moment that you shifted over from what's
going on? Is she for real? Into this is definitely real?
That was a very leading question.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
But so I was curs about that question, so I
called it on the podcast. I called Chris Vall, who's
a good friend, has helped with the other podcasts, who
is the famous FBI negotiator and he wrote the book
Never Split the Difference, And Chris, I said, how many
times have people asked you to prove whether you're really
in the FBI or not? You just say it? Who knows?
(08:15):
And he goes never. Maybe once someone jokingly at a bar.
But that's about That's it, And like, well, how interesting
is this that here's a woman saying this and presenting
herself in a clamorous way on Instagram and all of
a sudden, everyone's prove it, you're lying, you're fake And
would it be the same it was a male of
you know, in a suit who presented another way, and
(08:41):
I don't think it would be And so I thought,
I don't want to be part of that part of
the culture. And this speaks to creating a safe space.
We got to know who she really is. And at
the end, she literally says like, I create this fake world,
in this fake life on Instagram because a I want
(09:01):
to please my father and show him that I was
a success in life. And so there's still that child
trying to please the parents. So many of us have
this on some degree, right or our family message becomes
what we think are life purpose is. The second thing
also is just feeling like she won. When you go
through these really disempowering experiences, there's a need to empower
(09:24):
yourself and to feel empowered because so often in these
stories there isn't a happy ending, and so maybe we
make one or create one. Or do something that allows
us to go on living right.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Yeah, and I really appreciated in the I think it
was the final episode, had you brought her therapist back
in and she talked about that. She talked about the
aspirational element of social media, which, to be honest as
a listener, kind of blew my mind open because we
do employ all these judgments and all this kind of
criticism to how people present online. And it was really
(09:59):
interest staying to have that perspective brought in of look
at this through a trauma lens. So yeah, I just
wanted to call that out and give you kudos and
give the whole team kudos because it was really cool
to have a perspective shift.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
I also think in terms of narratives, it's interesting to
hear read the reviews. For example, I really love reading
the reviews, positive or negative. They give me really valuable data. Yeah,
I really look at reviews as a valuable source of
feedback about what's working and what's not working. And I
thought a lot about narrative during the telling of this,
and I think everybody, everybody has three forms of narrative
(10:33):
they're telling, or there's three forms of truth in any story.
One layer is what really happened, what a camera would
have recorded if a camera was there. In the second
layer is what we remember happening. Some people are really
extreme in the stories they tell themselves. Other people are
semi close to the truth. Other people are always the
(10:55):
hero in their own own story. Other people are always
the victim in their own story. Other people are whatever,
always the one who's forgotten about, always the one who
led the group. You know, people have their own way
of their own filter through which they see themselves or
almost need to see themselves to prop their ego up.
So there's what really happened objectively, what we remember happening.
(11:17):
And then the third layer is then what we tell
other people. And that layer is that mask we wear
for social acceptance. And some people there that second and
third layer close. Some people they're more distant. So every
story has those three layers, no matter what, right And
the question is what is the gulf of separation between
those three layers. And maybe when we're do investigation or something,
(11:41):
we're trying to figure that out. Right, So a witness
may have a false memory and the perpetrator may straight
up be putting on the mask. So I find memory
story narrative really fascinating, and a Lee is sort of
like a very lightning rod for this in some ways
because she shows on Instagram things that really.
Speaker 4 (12:04):
Aren't real, right, right, Oh that's so interesting.
Speaker 3 (12:09):
And those are all the things that kind of went
on in my head through this, just trying to see
the commandity and people instead of objectifying.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
Them, right, absolutely, Yeah, especially when you're talking to somebody
who's so much of their experience has been acting as
an object, right, being objectified, And yeah, I just.
Speaker 4 (12:30):
I don't even know what.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
To say what we're about to say.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
I just appreciate that nuance, and I appreciate you know,
pointing out compassion as the first lens that you look
at anyone through. I think, is it's so important, and
like you're saying, we live in a very judgmental world,
and definitely for me as a listener, like there is
this tension between that presentational element and then the vulnerability
(12:56):
of her story. And like I said, I'm really glad
you took a full sixteen episodes and the story shifted
as much as it did, because it felt like these
layers and I definitely had doubts that I think a
lot of people share it in the beginning because it's
natural to be a little bit uncertain.
Speaker 4 (13:16):
And then by the time.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
Aliah's like really, she gets very emotional, you know. And
I was amazed at the journey that she took that
I felt like I could follow along with her as
she opened up and it was just really powerful. So
what was the timeline of recording? And you said you
(13:41):
had about thirty or forty hours.
Speaker 4 (13:43):
Of raw interview?
Speaker 3 (13:46):
Maybe more wow?
Speaker 4 (13:47):
Maybe more wow.
Speaker 3 (13:49):
Yeah, I'm a super thora interview or her in the
sense that I really do, because I care. I really
want to know everything, whether we use it or not.
And so a year and a half ago, I think
it was January. It was when I've first met her,
and then we got together, we discussed doing the podcast.
I talked to Donald a tenderfoot about it, and then
we just started recording just her story and sitting down
(14:12):
day after day and time and time again. And sometimes
when she'd share these stories, it got so quiet you
could hear like a pin dropping. And that's why I
tried this experiment on episode fifteen. I don't know if
you noticed when you're listening, I'm curious if you did.
On episode fifteen, I did no voice over. I just
let her tell her story without any interruption, and only
at the end did I say, you've been listening to
(14:34):
chapter this, episode this, and so I wanted just to
hear her voice, let her speak, and just stay out
of it. And I think most people listening may not
have missed me.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
I didn't consciously notice that, but I'm sure that I
noticed it in part of observing this shift, you know,
like that's definitely a deepening of her presence, I guess,
which is an odd word to use, but it felt
like she got more and more present.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
Yeah, and I felt like, I really, when I do
these as the storyteller, I try to think what hasn't
been done? And I've never heard so for Tristan and I,
it was like a really exciting experiment, I think on
a deeper level, discussing trauma informed interviewing and everything we said,
just allowing someone to tell their story without jumping in
and explaining.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
So you started a year and a half ago, you said,
so was the interview process over three months? Six months longer?
You talked about taking a break for a while when
she was going through a really intense moment in therapy.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
Yeah, but the interview process probably went on the whole time,
So whatever what you heard in the last episode was
recorded in the week or two before the last episode dropped.
Speaker 4 (15:46):
Oh wow.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
And that's the other thing I love about the podcast
I've done with Tenderfoot is they're all very live and
in the moment. Like with the first season of To
Live and Die in La, that investigation was ongoing, even
with the police. As each episode is coming out, right,
there were parts, I don't want to say anything people
haven't listened, but there are parts where very intense things happen,
(16:08):
and those literally happen between one week of the podcast
and the next week.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
I mean, it feels very alive, so it translates to
the storytelling component of it as a recorded piece as.
Speaker 3 (16:19):
Well, exactly. And I think there's an element of that
that transfers into it, of it being very alive and
being very present. I used to be a music critic
in the New York Times, so I'd see bands play,
and when the band stopped getting along and still play
this music, it didn't sound as good anymore. It's the
same songs, the same notes, the same lyrics, and yet
(16:40):
because it's not alive in them, it ends up sounding.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Lifeless given the kind of top secret nature of a
lot of what she's talking about. I know that, you know,
Alia changes the names of people and doesn't really disclose
exact people places, things in a way that I guess
would be incriminating. But she is speaking out about the
system that is very corrupt at a time that political
(17:07):
tensions are very high. I'm curious to hear, you know,
if she expressed any concerns about her safety as she
was going deeper into this story and kind of unveiling more,
and also if you experienced any internal concerns around being
present within this kind of espionage world that she's talking
about that's also very alive.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
Very much true. So I definitely, I definitely think that
I don't know why I do this, but I think
everything I do, a lot of what I've done in
the past, there's a danger element. If you're outing a
murder or someone who conspired with the murder, there's a danger.
Speaker 4 (17:44):
Absolutely.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
I've done folks with really dangerous people, projects on really
dangerous things that I absolutely should not be doing. And
so for sure, while I was doing this, especially at
the beginning, I had a lot of nervousness she had
some nervousness, and however, I think it's interesting, especially with
this podcast and the narratives people tell versus the truth
(18:05):
and the idea is well, she's talking about that she'd
be killed, and I think her thought was, all this
stuff happened around the year two thousand. I'm not mentioning names.
I'm not revealing state secrets. I'm not saying anti Putin,
anti Ukraine war things. Maybe a touch, but nothing more
than everyone else is saying. And so I'm not a
threat to power. It's different than other people who are
(18:29):
speaking out with the intent to overthrow the Putin or
overthrow the regime or create systemic change there. So I
think her thought was because I'm not revealing sensitive information,
because I'm not a threat to what's happening, it's okay.
And there are other former KGB agents who speak out,
who've written books. Jack Barski is one of them who's
(18:50):
out here and doing podcasts, and that's okay. So I
think her thought was, I'm just talking about stuff that
people don't talk about, but I'm not sharing something it's
a threat to those currently in power. I think, if anything,
everyone else in the podcast, who I interviewed as guest
was more negative about things and reveal more and through
(19:11):
all these voices and experts, I really feel like the
listener and myself learned so much about Russia and the
Russian mafia and the Russian military and the way of
thinking Putin has. So I feel like I was such
an education for me researching all the context. I probably
like consumed like at least ten twenty history books along
(19:35):
the way. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (19:37):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (19:38):
Can you talk a little bit about how you found
the people that you brought onto the show? Because I
loved having all of these experts pop in, and I
felt like you did a great job of whenever Aleah
would say something that was kind of hard to believe
at first, you know, like you would immediately bring in
somebody who would back that up and be like, yes,
these actually structures do exist, or this something that we
(20:00):
know happened. How did you find the people that you
ended up bringing in as these experts?
Speaker 3 (20:06):
First of all, thanks for saying that. I really did
feel that there were Each episode ended up having a theme,
and then I wanted a deeper understanding of that theme.
So whether it was bringing in Holly McKay, a war reporter,
to talk about women's treatment in the Russian military, or
bringing in the different Russian mafia experts to talk about that. Literally,
when you talk about the Russian government, you talk about
(20:28):
the mafia, you're kind of talking about the same thing.
That was just shocking. It was shocking, but it's funny
because when it sounded incredible that the Russian is training
these seducers, I realized that having written that book The
Game many years ago, that I forgot or didn't make
the connection till I started thinking about it, that the
FBI had brought me in many years ago to train
(20:50):
them in seductions. Uh huh, And that could sound preposterous. However, However,
I called someone who was there at that train, Robin Drake,
and just had him confirm I was there, because that's
a that's a hard one to swallow.
Speaker 2 (21:07):
And you didn't trust your memory because it might.
Speaker 3 (21:09):
Have been exactly change exactly. So I had him confirm it,
and then he became such a great expert to call
on throughout the podcast. So while you're working on a project,
or while I'm working on a project, I try to
talk about it everywhere I go with everyone I meet,
because you never know when a resource is going to
pop up. And so I'd be out at a conference
(21:32):
and meet somebody used to be in the CIA, and
I'd say, what do you know about these Russian swallows?
And he'd tell me something. I'd be great. Can I
call you back about that? I mean, my transcriber who
was transcribing the audio said, oh my god, I used
to work for a secret aerospace program where they trained
us and warned us about these type of women. So
(21:52):
I think by just putting your antenna out there, all
of a sudden, the information starts coming to you. And sometimes,
of course, if I couldn't find someone saying expert on poisonings,
I just research online and try to find some great
people to interview. But I was so grateful for those
speakers because they brought such important context to it, and
I think that was part of the narrative. Is just
(22:17):
you're learning so much and not even realizing you're learning it.
Speaker 4 (22:20):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
Are you allowed to share anything about your training with
the FBI in seduction or.
Speaker 3 (22:26):
Is that yeah? I can't think I can try it. No,
I asked them. I asked them, and they said, I
can share it. I just can't share where I went
to do the training all right, So basically what they
do is the same as a seduction, but just the
outcome is different. So the outcome is not a relationship
or a romantic experience or a physical experience. Their outcome
is how do I get this person to be an
(22:48):
informant on their boss?
Speaker 1 (22:49):
Ah?
Speaker 3 (22:49):
Okay, how do I get this personal work for our
governments s out of that? But the process is the same,
which is you're meeting someone, You're building trust, You're trying
to understand what their value system is so you can
speak to them in terms of what their values are.
And then when you built enough trust and rapport and connection,
you're starting to plant the seed for the offer you're making.
(23:14):
So what I've discovered was there's really very little difference
and these pickup artists who I wrote about in the game,
because they did it so much like had as sophisticated
a knowledge of human behavior as the FBI's behavioral analysis units. Right,
these guys are talking to whatever, five, ten, fifteen people
(23:34):
a night versus you have one target and that's a
one year project or something or a three year project.
So it was very surreal, it's very serial. It's definitely
the last thing I expected when I wrote that book,
but then it made me realize it's not ludicrous. A
government will do any means necessary that they can get
away with to accomplish.
Speaker 2 (23:51):
Their objective, right right, Like you said, it's studying human
behavior more than seducing, almost like seducing is the word.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
But yeah, and yeah, and at the same time, like
in the past for other projects, I've interviewed government psychics
who were trained by the government like to do spying
as psychic spies. That literally, that's like a real thing.
It's not a conspiracy theory. It's called remote viewing.
Speaker 4 (24:13):
Remote viewing.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
Yeah, I remember reading about that and thinking it was
just so interesting.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
Yeah, I went and got trained by the guys to
learn how to remote view cool.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
Yeah, that should be another podcast.
Speaker 3 (24:28):
That should be another podcast. It was awesome. So the
point being is any government won't try anything to see
what works, right, whether it's induction or ESP.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
So with u Aliyah and with the pickup artists that
you'd you know, worked with and interviewed, were there any
times when she talked about these tactics that were either
really similar or really different from the pickup artist tactics
that you'd beenamiliar with before.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
Yeah, it was super weird because she'd be talking about
things that she was doing as seduction techniques, and I
was like, oh, wow, this was exactly what the pickup
artists were doing. It was the exact same period of time,
the early two thousands.
Speaker 2 (25:15):
Wow. Interesting. We were talking off Mike for a second
and I was mentioning to Neil that there was actually
a question that has been on my mind that I
didn't want to put him on the spot about, and
he said, put me on the spot. So one thing
that came up for me a lot in listening to
this podcast and learning about the way that information has
been used by Russia to essentially, you know, brain rush
(25:38):
and radicalize people. I was really reflecting a lot on
what I've been seeing happening in the US. And I
was hesitant to ask this question because I don't want
it to be a divisive or super politicized question. But
I'm curious if you, in the process of learning about
how Russia's government works and how information can be used
(26:01):
to kind of weaponize people against one another, if you
reflected on that in the US, and you know, have
any observations about that kind of radicalized thinking that Aliah
talks so much about.
Speaker 3 (26:13):
For sure, there's a fault line in our society, and
I think everyone can agree on that, and that for
a government that wants to take down the US, the
best way to do it is from the inside. And
again there's interviews with Russian defectors who've been saying this
(26:36):
for years, going back to and again haven't been killed.
It's so much easier to destroy a country from the
inside and everybody fighting each other and not focusing on
the external. So it's one hundred percent happening. And even
Aliyah said, and also someone I talked to from the
CIA said as well, that there's so many people over
(26:58):
here and that's their job to do this sort of
there's even a name for it, but to do this
kind of sabotage from the inside. And so I think
I really learned that a there are a lot of
people we meet who are just ordinary people living here
who report back to handlers and talk about what they're hearing.
They're called eyes and ears. Then the ore the people
here who are actively creating relationships with other people and
(27:20):
in power and putting these ideas in their head and
fanning the flames of division and discontent and then absolutely
they're softwares and armies of individuals who are creating this
on social media. It's such a effective way to hurt
a country from the inside and no one checks. You
(27:41):
see these news reports that are covering an issue and
they just quote Twitter accounts, not even knowing if these
are real people or what's called sock puppet accounts.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
Right, especially with our election cycle, what do you recommend
for people to, I guess be aware, but not necessarily
be completely afraid of what you just said.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
I asked someone who runs a social media company what
countries were responsible for the most fake propaganda accounts and
fake sabotage accounts, and the three were, not surprisingly China, Iran,
and Russia. But even if they're real people, it's only
a specific kind of person who posts a lot of
activity on social media. I haven't mete you, Laura, but
(28:22):
I know you don't, and so what you're hearing is
a people who are working out their trauma through social
media or b countries that are working out their domination
land through social media. And my advice as the antidote
is expand your peer group. Talk to more people who
you disagree with to understand and empathize with other perspectives
(28:45):
and get your information from the street, not from a
place where anyone can create an account and post anything provocative.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
Yeah, absolutely, thank you. It's good advice. I have a
couple kind of wrap up questions. Sure, So what do
you have will be the lasting outcome of this show?
Speaker 3 (29:03):
I think that the intention, the goal is a deeperdstanding
of Russia, a deeper empathy for trauma and a woman's
experience there, and hopefully just really just caring about other
people through their stories. I think the third thing is
(29:25):
just there's something about telling a compelling story that takes
place in a world that no one else has been
to that enriches us all and gives us greater empathy.
So maybe that's the point that's really beautiful.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
Is there anything that you've noticed that feels like a
lasting impact of working on the show for you, Like,
did this change you in any way that you've been
able to put your finger on yet?
Speaker 3 (29:52):
I think exactly what I just said is what it
did for me that I see I understand history in
a way I never did before. I understan stand government
intelligence in a way I never did before. I understand
that these that let me try to say this because
we haven't voiced this, but that sex fanage is not sexy.
(30:13):
That we want to make things sexy that are actually
almost always traumatic for those experiencing them. And so I
think that was another big takeaway, that we want to
glamorize some of these things that than to live them.
It's not very glamorous. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (30:31):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
Is there anyone that you think really needs to hear
this podcast or a specific listener you kind of had
in mind while you were sculpting it.
Speaker 3 (30:41):
I mean, I think Eliah's father needs to do so
he can see the damage he's done, and so many
parents do this. There's something I said at the very end,
and it was that these are the results of growing
up in a totalitarian system, whether it's a country or
a family, because many people living in so called free
countries grew up in a totalitarian system, which was a
(31:04):
parent or parents whose word was the law, who didn't
respect your needs, who wanted it their way or no way,
who always had to be right, and so understanding that
some of us have grown up in not just countries
like this, but families like this, can help us better
understand ourselves. So I sort of put that in the end,
(31:25):
because I think the damage came out from the country,
but from a father whose it doesn't matter what you
want to be, You're going to be what I want
you to be. And that is so repressive of the
spirit of an individual. It's like stepping on a plant
and saying you're not going to grow right. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
Absolutely, Yeah, I think that's really valuable. And there's so
many Something that I've learned working at Tenderfoot and being
adjacent to a lot of the shows that we put
out there is exactly what you're saying is you never
know where someone has come from and what kind of
environment they grew up in or what kinds of stories
(32:03):
they have, just behind the masks that we put on
every day.
Speaker 3 (32:08):
Yeah, And I think that's the hardest thing as a
creator of any of these shows, is that people have
a filter through which they see the world and it's
like this or it's not like that, and they're convinced
of it one hundred percent, and nothing you could say, do,
no story you can tell we'll change their mind. That's
just the way it is. That's how people are, That's
how that person is. And I think it's not just
(32:29):
a sad way to live, but a dangerous way to live.
And I think that it's a slippery slope from that
to war or genocide when we start to feel like
we're right and other groups of people are wrong. And
so I think somehow my next Tenderfoot podcast to close on,
I think, you know, we thought these podcasts are about
(32:50):
one person did something to another person, or one person
something to ten or twenty people. But what happens when
you have one hundred thousand people doing something to a
million people? Right? And that, to me is the next
quote unquote true crime podcast I want to do. And
instead of maybe rescuing one person or giving one family closure,
(33:11):
is there some way we can do this on a
broader scale.
Speaker 4 (33:14):
That's really beautiful.
Speaker 2 (33:15):
Thank you so much for sharing that vision with us,
and just so much about the show and about Aliyah
and your journey with it.
Speaker 4 (33:23):
And I could pick your brain.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
For thirty more hours, I'm sure, but we'll go ahead
and wrap up. Is there anything else you'd like to
share with everybody before we go?
Speaker 3 (33:34):
No, I just if you're listening to this episode, that
probably means you listen to all the rest of the episodes.
So I want to just thank you for listening. Feel
free to contact me on social media or through Tenderfoot.
I'd love to hear your thoughts overall. And also I
really want to know did this episode ruin the podcast
for you or did it support and help you're listening
(33:56):
and understanding of the podcast. I truly mean that because
that'll allow me to do less or more of these
in the future.
Speaker 2 (34:01):
Awesome, and you heard it from him. He reads the comments,
he takes them to heart, he collects the data. It
will definitely be taken to heart.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
Yeah. So thank you Laura for a great interview and
for listening and ask him great questions.
Speaker 4 (34:13):
Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
Thank you for doing this, especially because it's something that
you were resisted to and I really loved it.
All eight episodes of To Die For are available now
to bitch absolutely free, but for ad free listening and
exclusive bonuses, subscribe to tendorfoot Plus at tenderfootplus dot com
or on Apple Podcasts.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Hi everyone, and welcome to Inside Tenderfooit TV. Today we're
going inside to Die For and I'm sitting down with
award winning author and journalist Neil Strauss, who's the creator
and host of To Die For. I like, I imagine
many of you went on quite a journey with this show,
and I'm really looking forward to sitting down with him,
(00:38):
talking to him about some of the behind the scenes
that might be a little unexpected for listeners, and hearing
more about his process and journey in building this show
and telling Aleija's story. So, without further ado, welcome Neil
to Inside tenderfoot TV and let's dive into it.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
Awesome. Thanks for having me on, Laura. I didn't tell
you before we talked, but I definitely have like a
lot of reluctance to do this interview, and I'm to
tell you why.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
So, I think when we create a podcast, we're almost
trying to create this magic spell that when you listen
to it you're just drawn into the story through voice,
through music, through the reporting. I'm not a fan of
pulling back the curtain on that and breaking the spell,
and it's not like it's magic, but there's something about
(01:22):
the storytelling I think in this podcast and in so
many Tenderfoot podcasts that makes it work. And I just
I don't like demystifying it. But I'm going to do
this and we'll see how it goes. No one has
to listen, all right, stop now if you don't want
to ruin it.
Speaker 4 (01:37):
Well, thank you for going out on a limb.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Then there's actually a great segue into your process working
on this show in general. Can you talk a little
bit about the production process itself and how you went
about building To Die For.
Speaker 3 (01:50):
Yeah, it's like it's sort of a band, and the
band is myself. Tristan Bankston, who worked on the second
season of To Live and Die in LA with me,
Donald Albright and Payne Lindsay is the producers and then
make up in Vanity set MAVs, who is the composer,
and then there's Dayton Cole who mixes it and makes
(02:11):
it sound great. It's really like a garage band that
puts this together. And one of the reasons I do
these with Tenderfoot is that there's a lot of creative
freedom within it to tell the story in the way
that the story wants to be told, versus other podcast
companies that seem to have a formula, and I hear
(02:31):
so many frustrated creators where they are not able to
share their experience because it has to be ground into
the formula.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Well, and with a story like Alyah as I imagine,
there is so much discovery as you went through the
process of talking to her that I couldn't even imagine
trying to put her story into a formula. Can you
share kind of what the journey was like for you
from the what you expected at the beginning when you
first heard about Aliah met her, and then just how
(03:02):
things might have shifted over time and the process of
interviewing her.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
Yeah. I think for meeting Aliyah and the way she
showed up at that first meeting, I really just thought
it was gonna be like a spy movie but real life,
and instead it was really about trauma and healing and
her own experiences. The biggest danger wasn't the enemy the
foreign country. The biggest danger was being a woman in
(03:29):
a military system run by these predatory men with no
accountability or consequences.
Speaker 2 (03:36):
As a listener, coming in with no expectations and no background,
I was really surprised by the shift, like the from
the first episode kind of the expectations I had to
then where you end up. I really appreciated, actually that
you talked about trauma informed interviewing, and I'm very curious
to learn more about that. Can you talk a little
bit about the training that you did for this interview
(03:59):
process and how that was different from other interviews you've
conducted in the past.
Speaker 3 (04:04):
Sure, I think that the interview was also not what
Aleah expected. I think she expected the sizzle, glam stuff,
And partly through studying trauma informed interviewing, we were able
to create a safe space for her to really share
her story. And I think that so much of healing
is through sharing and being heard and being seen and
(04:24):
being understood. And so as we started to realize that
this was a story of not survival from people shooting
at you, but survival from predatory, exploitative men in power,
I realized I needed to really be thoughtful about the
way I spoke to her and to be conscious of
the experiences she's been through. So I studied trauma and
(04:45):
form interviewing from a few places. I got to certified
in it. There's something called the Peace Model for Interviewing
I looked into and there's a great book for the
World Health Organization called Psychological First Aid. That's great, and
the importance is creating a safe, supportive environment that at
least prevents them from being traumatized further will really allowing
(05:07):
them to tell their story with their truth even throughout this.
That went beyond the process and making sure that she's
getting support throughout the process she needed. And I think
she always said her memories were locked in Pandora's box.
I think she even says it on the podcast. There's
a saying what we repressed controls us, right, we will further,
(05:29):
we will press it. It's like pushing back on a
spring that eventually that's just gonna snap. And so whatever
we're rere pressing eventually takes over, because that's how force works.
But however, if we can set them free in a sense,
to let them out in a way while we're getting healing,
while we're getting supported at the same time, and integrate them,
(05:51):
I guess integration is the word. We can lessen the
charge and the power they have over her, and unexpectedly
that's part of what the process created for Leah.
Speaker 4 (06:00):
That's really awesome.
Speaker 2 (06:01):
Is there anything that you've taken from that training that
you've actually incorporated into your day to day life, not
just in an interview setting.
Speaker 3 (06:10):
For sure? For sure, I mean think about it for
being a parent, right as a parent, active empathic listening,
valuing someone's feelings and experiences, not being judgmental, All those
things make you a great parent or a great partner.
Did it allow you because to be really pressing for
someone else's reality. There's a quote I love that says
(06:32):
listening is so close to being loved that some people
can't tell the difference.
Speaker 4 (06:36):
Oh, I love that.
Speaker 3 (06:39):
It's great, right, So I think about that all the time.
Speaker 4 (06:42):
That's really beautiful.
Speaker 3 (06:43):
So so part of the traumaform listening was not about
sitting down, And we did a lot of due diligence
at the beginning as far as the least story, but
in the end it wasn't to put her story on trial,
and to put her narrative on trial. I thought maybe
at the beginning was a possibility, but by the end,
it really felt that that's not the job of this podcast.
(07:08):
It's to really give someone the space to tell their
story and to listen for the human being underneath it.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
That actually sort of points to something that I did
want to ask you about, because you talk in the
beginning about this dynamic of you know, her using like
certain tactics that pickup artists had used, and that you
had this kind of fear of being played. And by
the end of it, that's completely gone from the tone
(07:39):
of the podcast and from the tone of her telling
her story. And I would love to know if there was,
you know, a moment that you shifted over from what's
going on? Is she for real? Into this is definitely real?
That was a very leading question.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
But so I was curs about that question, so I
called it on the podcast. I called Chris Vall, who's
a good friend, has helped with the other podcasts, who
is the famous FBI negotiator and he wrote the book
Never Split the Difference, And Chris, I said, how many
times have people asked you to prove whether you're really
in the FBI or not? You just say it? Who knows?
(08:15):
And he goes never. Maybe once someone jokingly at a bar.
But that's about That's it, And like, well, how interesting
is this that here's a woman saying this and presenting
herself in a clamorous way on Instagram and all of
a sudden, everyone's prove it, you're lying, you're fake And
would it be the same it was a male of
you know, in a suit who presented another way, and
(08:41):
I don't think it would be And so I thought,
I don't want to be part of that part of
the culture. And this speaks to creating a safe space.
We got to know who she really is. And at
the end, she literally says like, I create this fake world,
in this fake life on Instagram because a I want
(09:01):
to please my father and show him that I was
a success in life. And so there's still that child
trying to please the parents. So many of us have
this on some degree, right or our family message becomes
what we think are life purpose is. The second thing
also is just feeling like she won. When you go
through these really disempowering experiences, there's a need to empower
(09:24):
yourself and to feel empowered because so often in these
stories there isn't a happy ending, and so maybe we
make one or create one. Or do something that allows
us to go on living right.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Yeah, and I really appreciated in the I think it
was the final episode, had you brought her therapist back
in and she talked about that. She talked about the
aspirational element of social media, which, to be honest as
a listener, kind of blew my mind open because we
do employ all these judgments and all this kind of
criticism to how people present online. And it was really
(09:59):
interest staying to have that perspective brought in of look
at this through a trauma lens. So yeah, I just
wanted to call that out and give you kudos and
give the whole team kudos because it was really cool
to have a perspective shift.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
I also think in terms of narratives, it's interesting to
hear read the reviews. For example, I really love reading
the reviews, positive or negative. They give me really valuable data. Yeah,
I really look at reviews as a valuable source of
feedback about what's working and what's not working. And I
thought a lot about narrative during the telling of this,
and I think everybody, everybody has three forms of narrative
(10:33):
they're telling, or there's three forms of truth in any story.
One layer is what really happened, what a camera would
have recorded if a camera was there. In the second
layer is what we remember happening. Some people are really
extreme in the stories they tell themselves. Other people are
semi close to the truth. Other people are always the
(10:55):
hero in their own own story. Other people are always
the victim in their own story. Other people are whatever,
always the one who's forgotten about, always the one who
led the group. You know, people have their own way
of their own filter through which they see themselves or
almost need to see themselves to prop their ego up.
So there's what really happened objectively, what we remember happening.
(11:17):
And then the third layer is then what we tell
other people. And that layer is that mask we wear
for social acceptance. And some people there that second and
third layer close. Some people they're more distant. So every
story has those three layers, no matter what, right And
the question is what is the gulf of separation between
those three layers. And maybe when we're do investigation or something,
(11:41):
we're trying to figure that out. Right, So a witness
may have a false memory and the perpetrator may straight
up be putting on the mask. So I find memory
story narrative really fascinating, and a Lee is sort of
like a very lightning rod for this in some ways
because she shows on Instagram things that really.
Speaker 4 (12:04):
Aren't real, right, right, Oh that's so interesting.
Speaker 3 (12:09):
And those are all the things that kind of went
on in my head through this, just trying to see
the commandity and people instead of objectifying.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
Them, right, absolutely, Yeah, especially when you're talking to somebody
who's so much of their experience has been acting as
an object, right, being objectified, And yeah, I just.
Speaker 4 (12:30):
I don't even know what.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
To say what we're about to say.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
I just appreciate that nuance, and I appreciate you know,
pointing out compassion as the first lens that you look
at anyone through. I think, is it's so important, and
like you're saying, we live in a very judgmental world,
and definitely for me as a listener, like there is
this tension between that presentational element and then the vulnerability
(12:56):
of her story. And like I said, I'm really glad
you took a full sixteen episodes and the story shifted
as much as it did, because it felt like these
layers and I definitely had doubts that I think a
lot of people share it in the beginning because it's
natural to be a little bit uncertain.
Speaker 4 (13:16):
And then by the time.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
Aliah's like really, she gets very emotional, you know. And
I was amazed at the journey that she took that
I felt like I could follow along with her as
she opened up and it was just really powerful. So
what was the timeline of recording? And you said you
(13:41):
had about thirty or forty hours.
Speaker 4 (13:43):
Of raw interview?
Speaker 3 (13:46):
Maybe more wow?
Speaker 4 (13:47):
Maybe more wow.
Speaker 3 (13:49):
Yeah, I'm a super thora interview or her in the
sense that I really do, because I care. I really
want to know everything, whether we use it or not.
And so a year and a half ago, I think
it was January. It was when I've first met her,
and then we got together, we discussed doing the podcast.
I talked to Donald a tenderfoot about it, and then
we just started recording just her story and sitting down
(14:12):
day after day and time and time again. And sometimes
when she'd share these stories, it got so quiet you
could hear like a pin dropping. And that's why I
tried this experiment on episode fifteen. I don't know if
you noticed when you're listening, I'm curious if you did.
On episode fifteen, I did no voice over. I just
let her tell her story without any interruption, and only
at the end did I say, you've been listening to
(14:34):
chapter this, episode this, and so I wanted just to
hear her voice, let her speak, and just stay out
of it. And I think most people listening may not
have missed me.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
I didn't consciously notice that, but I'm sure that I
noticed it in part of observing this shift, you know,
like that's definitely a deepening of her presence, I guess,
which is an odd word to use, but it felt
like she got more and more present.
Speaker 3 (15:06):
Yeah, and I felt like, I really, when I do
these as the storyteller, I try to think what hasn't
been done? And I've never heard so for Tristan and I,
it was like a really exciting experiment, I think on
a deeper level, discussing trauma informed interviewing and everything we said,
just allowing someone to tell their story without jumping in
and explaining.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
So you started a year and a half ago, you said,
so was the interview process over three months? Six months longer?
You talked about taking a break for a while when
she was going through a really intense moment in therapy.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
Yeah, but the interview process probably went on the whole time,
So whatever what you heard in the last episode was
recorded in the week or two before the last episode dropped.
Speaker 4 (15:46):
Oh wow.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
And that's the other thing I love about the podcast
I've done with Tenderfoot is they're all very live and
in the moment. Like with the first season of To
Live and Die in La, that investigation was ongoing, even
with the police. As each episode is coming out, right,
there were parts, I don't want to say anything people
haven't listened, but there are parts where very intense things happen,
(16:08):
and those literally happen between one week of the podcast
and the next week.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
I mean, it feels very alive, so it translates to
the storytelling component of it as a recorded piece as.
Speaker 3 (16:19):
Well, exactly. And I think there's an element of that
that transfers into it, of it being very alive and
being very present. I used to be a music critic
in the New York Times, so I'd see bands play,
and when the band stopped getting along and still play
this music, it didn't sound as good anymore. It's the
same songs, the same notes, the same lyrics, and yet
(16:40):
because it's not alive in them, it ends up sounding.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
Lifeless given the kind of top secret nature of a
lot of what she's talking about. I know that, you know,
Alia changes the names of people and doesn't really disclose
exact people places, things in a way that I guess
would be incriminating. But she is speaking out about the
system that is very corrupt at a time that political
(17:07):
tensions are very high. I'm curious to hear, you know,
if she expressed any concerns about her safety as she
was going deeper into this story and kind of unveiling more,
and also if you experienced any internal concerns around being
present within this kind of espionage world that she's talking
about that's also very alive.
Speaker 3 (17:29):
Very much true. So I definitely, I definitely think that
I don't know why I do this, but I think
everything I do, a lot of what I've done in
the past, there's a danger element. If you're outing a
murder or someone who conspired with the murder, there's a danger.
Speaker 4 (17:44):
Absolutely.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
I've done folks with really dangerous people, projects on really
dangerous things that I absolutely should not be doing. And
so for sure, while I was doing this, especially at
the beginning, I had a lot of nervousness she had
some nervousness, and however, I think it's interesting, especially with
this podcast and the narratives people tell versus the truth
(18:05):
and the idea is well, she's talking about that she'd
be killed, and I think her thought was, all this
stuff happened around the year two thousand. I'm not mentioning names.
I'm not revealing state secrets. I'm not saying anti Putin,
anti Ukraine war things. Maybe a touch, but nothing more
than everyone else is saying. And so I'm not a
threat to power. It's different than other people who are
(18:29):
speaking out with the intent to overthrow the Putin or
overthrow the regime or create systemic change there. So I
think her thought was because I'm not revealing sensitive information,
because I'm not a threat to what's happening, it's okay.
And there are other former KGB agents who speak out,
who've written books. Jack Barski is one of them who's
(18:50):
out here and doing podcasts, and that's okay. So I
think her thought was, I'm just talking about stuff that
people don't talk about, but I'm not sharing something it's
a threat to those currently in power. I think, if anything,
everyone else in the podcast, who I interviewed as guest
was more negative about things and reveal more and through
(19:11):
all these voices and experts, I really feel like the
listener and myself learned so much about Russia and the
Russian mafia and the Russian military and the way of
thinking Putin has. So I feel like I was such
an education for me researching all the context. I probably
like consumed like at least ten twenty history books along
(19:35):
the way. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (19:37):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (19:38):
Can you talk a little bit about how you found
the people that you brought onto the show? Because I
loved having all of these experts pop in, and I
felt like you did a great job of whenever Aleah
would say something that was kind of hard to believe
at first, you know, like you would immediately bring in
somebody who would back that up and be like, yes,
these actually structures do exist, or this something that we
(20:00):
know happened. How did you find the people that you
ended up bringing in as these experts?
Speaker 3 (20:06):
First of all, thanks for saying that. I really did
feel that there were Each episode ended up having a theme,
and then I wanted a deeper understanding of that theme.
So whether it was bringing in Holly McKay, a war reporter,
to talk about women's treatment in the Russian military, or
bringing in the different Russian mafia experts to talk about that. Literally,
when you talk about the Russian government, you talk about
(20:28):
the mafia, you're kind of talking about the same thing.
That was just shocking. It was shocking, but it's funny
because when it sounded incredible that the Russian is training
these seducers, I realized that having written that book The
Game many years ago, that I forgot or didn't make
the connection till I started thinking about it, that the
FBI had brought me in many years ago to train
(20:50):
them in seductions. Uh huh, And that could sound preposterous. However, However,
I called someone who was there at that train, Robin Drake,
and just had him confirm I was there, because that's
a that's a hard one to swallow.
Speaker 2 (21:07):
And you didn't trust your memory because it might.
Speaker 3 (21:09):
Have been exactly change exactly. So I had him confirm it,
and then he became such a great expert to call
on throughout the podcast. So while you're working on a project,
or while I'm working on a project, I try to
talk about it everywhere I go with everyone I meet,
because you never know when a resource is going to
pop up. And so I'd be out at a conference
(21:32):
and meet somebody used to be in the CIA, and
I'd say, what do you know about these Russian swallows?
And he'd tell me something. I'd be great. Can I
call you back about that? I mean, my transcriber who
was transcribing the audio said, oh my god, I used
to work for a secret aerospace program where they trained
us and warned us about these type of women. So
(21:52):
I think by just putting your antenna out there, all
of a sudden, the information starts coming to you. And sometimes,
of course, if I couldn't find someone saying expert on poisonings,
I just research online and try to find some great
people to interview. But I was so grateful for those
speakers because they brought such important context to it, and
I think that was part of the narrative. Is just
(22:17):
you're learning so much and not even realizing you're learning it.
Speaker 4 (22:20):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
Are you allowed to share anything about your training with
the FBI in seduction or.
Speaker 3 (22:26):
Is that yeah? I can't think I can try it. No,
I asked them. I asked them, and they said, I
can share it. I just can't share where I went
to do the training all right, So basically what they
do is the same as a seduction, but just the
outcome is different. So the outcome is not a relationship
or a romantic experience or a physical experience. Their outcome
is how do I get this person to be an
(22:48):
informant on their boss?
Speaker 1 (22:49):
Ah?
Speaker 3 (22:49):
Okay, how do I get this personal work for our
governments s out of that? But the process is the same,
which is you're meeting someone, You're building trust, You're trying
to understand what their value system is so you can
speak to them in terms of what their values are.
And then when you built enough trust and rapport and connection,
you're starting to plant the seed for the offer you're making.
(23:14):
So what I've discovered was there's really very little difference
and these pickup artists who I wrote about in the game,
because they did it so much like had as sophisticated
a knowledge of human behavior as the FBI's behavioral analysis units. Right,
these guys are talking to whatever, five, ten, fifteen people
(23:34):
a night versus you have one target and that's a
one year project or something or a three year project.
So it was very surreal, it's very serial. It's definitely
the last thing I expected when I wrote that book,
but then it made me realize it's not ludicrous. A
government will do any means necessary that they can get
away with to accomplish.
Speaker 2 (23:51):
Their objective, right right, Like you said, it's studying human
behavior more than seducing, almost like seducing is the word.
Speaker 3 (23:59):
But yeah, and yeah, and at the same time, like
in the past for other projects, I've interviewed government psychics
who were trained by the government like to do spying
as psychic spies. That literally, that's like a real thing.
It's not a conspiracy theory. It's called remote viewing.
Speaker 4 (24:13):
Remote viewing.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
Yeah, I remember reading about that and thinking it was
just so interesting.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
Yeah, I went and got trained by the guys to
learn how to remote view cool.
Speaker 2 (24:25):
Yeah, that should be another podcast.
Speaker 3 (24:28):
That should be another podcast. It was awesome. So the
point being is any government won't try anything to see
what works, right, whether it's induction or ESP.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
So with u Aliyah and with the pickup artists that
you'd you know, worked with and interviewed, were there any
times when she talked about these tactics that were either
really similar or really different from the pickup artist tactics
that you'd beenamiliar with before.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
Yeah, it was super weird because she'd be talking about
things that she was doing as seduction techniques, and I
was like, oh, wow, this was exactly what the pickup
artists were doing. It was the exact same period of time,
the early two thousands.
Speaker 2 (25:15):
Wow. Interesting. We were talking off Mike for a second
and I was mentioning to Neil that there was actually
a question that has been on my mind that I
didn't want to put him on the spot about, and
he said, put me on the spot. So one thing
that came up for me a lot in listening to
this podcast and learning about the way that information has
been used by Russia to essentially, you know, brain rush
(25:38):
and radicalize people. I was really reflecting a lot on
what I've been seeing happening in the US. And I
was hesitant to ask this question because I don't want
it to be a divisive or super politicized question. But
I'm curious if you, in the process of learning about
how Russia's government works and how information can be used
(26:01):
to kind of weaponize people against one another, if you
reflected on that in the US, and you know, have
any observations about that kind of radicalized thinking that Aliah
talks so much about.
Speaker 3 (26:13):
For sure, there's a fault line in our society, and
I think everyone can agree on that, and that for
a government that wants to take down the US, the
best way to do it is from the inside. And
again there's interviews with Russian defectors who've been saying this
(26:36):
for years, going back to and again haven't been killed.
It's so much easier to destroy a country from the
inside and everybody fighting each other and not focusing on
the external. So it's one hundred percent happening. And even
Aliyah said, and also someone I talked to from the
CIA said as well, that there's so many people over
(26:58):
here and that's their job to do this sort of
there's even a name for it, but to do this
kind of sabotage from the inside. And so I think
I really learned that a there are a lot of
people we meet who are just ordinary people living here
who report back to handlers and talk about what they're hearing.
They're called eyes and ears. Then the ore the people
here who are actively creating relationships with other people and
(27:20):
in power and putting these ideas in their head and
fanning the flames of division and discontent and then absolutely
they're softwares and armies of individuals who are creating this
on social media. It's such a effective way to hurt
a country from the inside and no one checks. You
(27:41):
see these news reports that are covering an issue and
they just quote Twitter accounts, not even knowing if these
are real people or what's called sock puppet accounts.
Speaker 2 (27:49):
Right, especially with our election cycle, what do you recommend
for people to, I guess be aware, but not necessarily
be completely afraid of what you just said.
Speaker 3 (28:01):
I asked someone who runs a social media company what
countries were responsible for the most fake propaganda accounts and
fake sabotage accounts, and the three were, not surprisingly China, Iran,
and Russia. But even if they're real people, it's only
a specific kind of person who posts a lot of
activity on social media. I haven't mete you, Laura, but
(28:22):
I know you don't, and so what you're hearing is
a people who are working out their trauma through social
media or b countries that are working out their domination
land through social media. And my advice as the antidote
is expand your peer group. Talk to more people who
you disagree with to understand and empathize with other perspectives
(28:45):
and get your information from the street, not from a
place where anyone can create an account and post anything provocative.
Speaker 2 (28:52):
Yeah, absolutely, thank you. It's good advice. I have a
couple kind of wrap up questions. Sure, So what do
you have will be the lasting outcome of this show?
Speaker 3 (29:03):
I think that the intention, the goal is a deeperdstanding
of Russia, a deeper empathy for trauma and a woman's
experience there, and hopefully just really just caring about other
people through their stories. I think the third thing is
(29:25):
just there's something about telling a compelling story that takes
place in a world that no one else has been
to that enriches us all and gives us greater empathy.
So maybe that's the point that's really beautiful.
Speaker 2 (29:41):
Is there anything that you've noticed that feels like a
lasting impact of working on the show for you, Like,
did this change you in any way that you've been
able to put your finger on yet?
Speaker 3 (29:52):
I think exactly what I just said is what it
did for me that I see I understand history in
a way I never did before. I understan stand government
intelligence in a way I never did before. I understand
that these that let me try to say this because
we haven't voiced this, but that sex fanage is not sexy.
(30:13):
That we want to make things sexy that are actually
almost always traumatic for those experiencing them. And so I
think that was another big takeaway, that we want to
glamorize some of these things that than to live them.
It's not very glamorous. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (30:31):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
Is there anyone that you think really needs to hear
this podcast or a specific listener you kind of had
in mind while you were sculpting it.
Speaker 3 (30:41):
I mean, I think Eliah's father needs to do so
he can see the damage he's done, and so many
parents do this. There's something I said at the very end,
and it was that these are the results of growing
up in a totalitarian system, whether it's a country or
a family, because many people living in so called free
countries grew up in a totalitarian system, which was a
(31:04):
parent or parents whose word was the law, who didn't
respect your needs, who wanted it their way or no way,
who always had to be right, and so understanding that
some of us have grown up in not just countries
like this, but families like this, can help us better
understand ourselves. So I sort of put that in the end,
(31:25):
because I think the damage came out from the country,
but from a father whose it doesn't matter what you
want to be, You're going to be what I want
you to be. And that is so repressive of the
spirit of an individual. It's like stepping on a plant
and saying you're not going to grow right. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
Absolutely, Yeah, I think that's really valuable. And there's so
many Something that I've learned working at Tenderfoot and being
adjacent to a lot of the shows that we put
out there is exactly what you're saying is you never
know where someone has come from and what kind of
environment they grew up in or what kinds of stories
(32:03):
they have, just behind the masks that we put on
every day.
Speaker 3 (32:08):
Yeah, And I think that's the hardest thing as a
creator of any of these shows, is that people have
a filter through which they see the world and it's
like this or it's not like that, and they're convinced
of it one hundred percent, and nothing you could say, do,
no story you can tell we'll change their mind. That's
just the way it is. That's how people are, That's
how that person is. And I think it's not just
(32:29):
a sad way to live, but a dangerous way to live.
And I think that it's a slippery slope from that
to war or genocide when we start to feel like
we're right and other groups of people are wrong. And
so I think somehow my next Tenderfoot podcast to close on,
I think, you know, we thought these podcasts are about
(32:50):
one person did something to another person, or one person
something to ten or twenty people. But what happens when
you have one hundred thousand people doing something to a
million people? Right? And that, to me is the next
quote unquote true crime podcast I want to do. And
instead of maybe rescuing one person or giving one family closure,
(33:11):
is there some way we can do this on a
broader scale.
Speaker 4 (33:14):
That's really beautiful.
Speaker 2 (33:15):
Thank you so much for sharing that vision with us,
and just so much about the show and about Aliyah
and your journey with it.
Speaker 4 (33:23):
And I could pick your brain.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
For thirty more hours, I'm sure, but we'll go ahead
and wrap up. Is there anything else you'd like to
share with everybody before we go?
Speaker 3 (33:34):
No, I just if you're listening to this episode, that
probably means you listen to all the rest of the episodes.
So I want to just thank you for listening. Feel
free to contact me on social media or through Tenderfoot.
I'd love to hear your thoughts overall. And also I
really want to know did this episode ruin the podcast
for you or did it support and help you're listening
(33:56):
and understanding of the podcast. I truly mean that because
that'll allow me to do less or more of these
in the future.
Speaker 2 (34:01):
Awesome, and you heard it from him. He reads the comments,
he takes them to heart, he collects the data. It
will definitely be taken to heart.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
Yeah. So thank you Laura for a great interview and
for listening and ask him great questions.
Speaker 4 (34:13):
Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
Thank you for doing this, especially because it's something that
you were resisted to and I really loved it.
Host
Neil Strauss
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