Cults, Culture & Coercion with Dr. Steve Hassan
Steven Hassan, PhD, is one of the leading experts on cults and undue influence in the world. A former member of the right-wing Moonie cult, Hassan was deprogrammed 45 years ago and has dedicated his life to helping people out of cults and destructive situations. Dr. Hassan is a licensed mental health professional and has written four books, including The Cult of Trump and the seminal book Combating Cult Mind Control. On this podcast, Steve will explain HOW mind-control works, and how to protect yourself from its grips. He will also address ethical influence as the podcast will address the entire Influence Continuum. He’ll interview the biggest names in this field.
Episodes
Detransitioning, a term for stopping, shifting, or reversing an initial gender transition, is a word that has been stripped of its human meaning by the political forces fighting over it. Last week, I shared my interview with Dr. Kinnon Ross MacKinnon, a trans researcher at York University whose landmark DARE study surveyed 957 people who had detransitioned. MacKinnon’s data show that the detransitioners he interviewed are not...
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Trans healthcare is an evolving discussion, and the implications greatly affect those in the LGBTQ+ community. At its heart, this is a conversation about the science meant to inform transition-related healthcare care, and what happens when politics deliberately distorts it.
On March 31, 2026, The Supreme Court handed down an 8-to-1 ruling that conversion therapy, a practice every major medical and mental health organization has co...
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Ian Wilks was a high-ranking leader of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He is a former bishop, a former branch president, and a member of the stake presidency in British Columbia, with responsibility for shepherding twelve congregations and thousands of members. Then-apostle Dallin H. Oaks, now the 18th president and living prophet of the LDS Church, personally recruited him, interviewed him, called him, set him apa...
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May 25, 2026 • 69 mins
From Richard Dawkins to Larry Summers, brilliant minds get pulled in.
I sat down with the journalist Virginia Heffernan for a recent conversation on Cults, Culture & Coercion to talk about who falls for the Trump cult and why. Virginia spent time inside a group of academics and intellectuals sponsored by Jeffrey Epstein, called Edge, run by literary agent John Brockman. She wrote about involvement in the Epstein cult for The N...
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Scientology recruitment rarely looks the way people imagine. There is no shadowy figure pulling you into a back room. The process is warm, and, for a curious young person, entirely easy to be “handled” and sucked in. Amir Essalhi was 18 years old and studying film when he first walked into the Edinburgh organization in late 2022. He had never heard of Hubbard. He did not know who David Miscavige was. He knew one thing: ...
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May 11, 2026 • 66 mins
She Sought Out the People Who Threatened Her
Deeyah Khan was editing a film when the BBC called. The threats were serious enough the police were already on their way. “Stay where you are,” they told her. “If there are windows in the room, move to a different one. Wait for us.” She had given an interview saying Britain would never be all white again. White supremacist sites in the United States picked it up ...
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The Community of Jesus was founded in 1970 by two housewives, Cay Anderson and Judy Sorensen. They told members they were "God's anointed" with a direct line to God. Any authority figure they appointed carried that same divine authority. Members were taught to obey without questioning the leadership’s authority. I spoke with former member and award-nominated writer Ewan Whyte. His fifth book, Mothers of Invention: Essays on t...
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April 27, 2026 • 66 mins
Missionary kids often carry the weight of their parents’ choices. They are inculcated into the faith without opportunity for independent thought, according to author, historian, and former intelligence analyst Holly Berkley Fletcher, PhD. Her parents were Evangelical Christian missionaries in Kenya, and she speaks about that and the experiences of other children with similar backgrounds through her book, The Missionary Kids: ...
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As the United States remains stalled on full disclosure and holding Epstein file perpetrators accountable, the Parliament of Victoria, Australia, has launched an inquiry into the recruitment methods and societal impacts of cults and organized fringe groups. Maria Esguerra is one of the directors of The Olive Leaf Network who testified and presented a written submission at the public hearing of this inquiry in November 2025, alongs...
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April 13, 2026 • 62 mins
Tracing the roots of Christian Nationalism and the New Apostolic Reformation is no longer a fringe concern. It has become one of the most urgent forces reshaping American political life, and most people still do not understand where it came from, how it operates, or what it ultimately wants. Keri Ladner, PhD, does. A scholar of fundamentalist politics, she has spent years tracing the theological roots of movements like the New Apos...
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Melissa Duge Spiers was raised as a several generations Seventh-day Adventist. It wasn’t until years later, when she discovered information about her father, who had been both a youth pastor within the Adventist church and a Loma Linda-educated doctor, that Melissa would be called to deconstruct her entire relationship with the organization. “In my early middle age, I found out that my father, during his youth
Co-foun...
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Christianity has been “hijacked” by Christian Nationalists, right-wing Conservatives and Dominionists, according to John Fugelsang, author of the 2025 book Separation of Church and Hate: A Sane Person’s Guide to Taking Back the Bible from Fundamentalists, Fascists, and Flock-Fleecing Frauds. “The entire history of the organized religion has been authoritarian control,” he said on our interview for the ...
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March 23, 2026 • 62 mins
Bill Eddy has authored more than 20 books on high‑conflict personalities and disputes. He wants Americans, and societies everywhere, to keep a simple mantra in mind: “fantasy crisis, fantasy villain, fantasy hero with fantasy solutions.” Whenever we encounter another wave of chaos from the Trump administration or any potentially abusive elected official, this phrase helps us recognize the manufactured narratives at play...
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White Christian nationalism is not an abstract political concept. For Adam James, it was the air he breathed from birth. Adam, who goes by @epistemiccrisis on Instagram with well over 700,000 followers, grew up in the Pentecostal and charismatic church culture of Augusta, Georgia, was raised inside the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR), served as a worship leader and helped plant a church that is still operating today. He is also a l...
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Holly Pivec and Doug Geivett on Two Decades of Tracking the NAR’s Apostles and Prophets
You walk into a church on Sunday morning. The worship band plays songs you’ve heard on Christian radio for years. The lyrics feel familiar, uplifting. What you don’t realize is that the words you’re singing were written to export a specific theology from a single church in Redding, California, one whose leadership claims...
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March 2, 2026 • 75 mins
Pam Hemphill has been fighting MAGA propaganda since the day she realized it nearly killed her. A retired substance abuse counselor cancer survivor and one of the most visible former participants of the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol Pam served a 60-day federal prison sentence for her role that day.
Her decision to reject Donald Trump’s presidential pardon and become a prominent activist exposing the cult dynamics o...
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February 23, 2026 • 65 mins
Rachel Bernstein is a licensed marriage‑and‑family therapist in Los Angeles and a seasoned cult specialist with more than 35 years of experience. Rachel specializes in helping individuals exit authoritarian cults and narcissistic relationships and begin healing. She works on a one-on-one basis, hosts group therapy sessions, and speaks more broadly through education and media appearances. Rachel also hosts the weekly podcast, Indoct...
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With speculations by experts that Donald Trump’s health appears to be deteriorating regularly noting bruises on his hands occasional stumbling or slurring in his speech and gait. The White House has denied these claims. As vice‑president JD Vance born and raised in Middletown Ohio stands to assume the presidency should Trump become unable to serve. Vance author of Hillbilly Elegy a memoir that chronicles his working‑class upb...
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February 9, 2026 • 58 mins
For many Americans, untangling today’s U.S. politics feels especially tough because the rise of religious‑right conservatism can seem sudden and ominous. Without a grounding in religious history and its influence on American political development over time, sweeping dominionist initiatives like Project 2025, fringe movements such as QAnon, and shadowy organizations like the Heritage Foundation may appear to come out of thin a...
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NEST Harm Reduction: Licensed Clinicians Delivering Psychedelic‑Adjunct Care With Erica Siegal, LCSW
February 2, 2026 • 67 mins
Research on psychedelics has shown that one of the most profound effects of the experience is how it places people in a more vulnerable, highly susceptible state. Along with creating time dilations, this powerful period is also capable of establishing new thought patterns surrounding trauma or addictions. For those who aim to support healing, this moment offers tremendous opportunities to empower individuals and help them reset tem...
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