Conspirituality Awakener

Following up on our Long COVID episode with Tara Haelle, Matthew will be expanding the Listener Stories portfolio with stories from listeners about navigating Long COVID. Why? Because there’s nothing like a mysterious disease, denied by some, stigmatized by others, and politicized by multiple interests, that will bring a person closer to the appeal of alt-med conspirituality.
Matthew Stillman is our guest today. Author, documentary filmmaker, and lifelong New Yorker, Stillman grew up in an eccentric family of spiritualism and alternative medicine, but which also fostered a healthy respect for evidence-based medicine. So what happens when experts at Mt. Sinai Center for Post-COVID care reach the end of their capacity to help him with not one but two strains of Long COVID? Red light therapy! Chinese herbs! And a bracing contemplation of what it means to explore the tension between hope and knowledge.
Show Notes
Matthew Stillman
The major genetic risk factor for severe COVID-19 is inherited from Neanderthals | Nature
How Genes from Neanderthals Predispose People to Severe COVID-19 | The Scientist Magazine
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Following up on our Long COVID episode with Tara Haelle, Matthew will be expanding the Listener Stories portfolio with stories from listeners about navigating Long COVID. Why? Because there’s nothing like a mysterious disease, denied by some, stigmatized by others, and politicized by multiple interests, that will bring a person closer to the appeal of alt-med conspirituality.

Matthew Stillman is our guest today. Author, documentary filmmaker, and lifelong New Yorker, Stillman grew up in an eccentric family of spiritualism and alternative medicine, but which also fostered a healthy respect for evidence-based medicine. So what happens when experts at Mt. Sinai Center for Post-COVID care reach the end of their capacity to help him with not one but two strains of Long COVID? Red light therapy! Chinese herbs! And a bracing contemplation of what it means to explore the tension between hope and knowledge.

Matthew is joined by historian Neil J. Young, co-host of the excellent Past Present Podcast, to talk about his new book: Coming Out Republican: a History of the Gay Right.
Young’s riveting storytelling shows how, beginning in the aftermath of WWII, many American gay men—born into socially conservative and religious families from which they had struggled to individuate—hitched the wagon of their political hopes to a Republican party they believed would champion their privacy and individual civil rights. 
Ground zero for their fiercely libertarian clubs and action committees was San Francisco, where a culture of rugged entrepreneurship fostered the slogan “Keep the government out of our bedrooms, and out of our wallets.” It was an individualist politics that looked to Civil Rights and women’s rights movements for inspiration, but not allyship. 
In time that same GOP would lead a culture war against everything queer—paradoxically led by closeted gay politicians who, with deeply conflicted motives, legislated against their fellows. But even as the tide turned, many gay Republicans kept their shoulders to the unforgiving wheel of respectability politics.
Young illuminates the flashes of bravery and self-reliance in these men’s stories, but also shows what happens when a marginalized group seeks acceptance and political power—instead of liberation—within a culture built on exclusion.
Neil writes for WaPo, the Atlantic, CNN, the Los Angeles Times, Vox, Politico, Slate, and the New York Times. 
Show Notes
Coming Out Republican: A History of the Gay Right, Young
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When Moms For Liberty attacks libraries with demands to ban books about MLK Jr and age-appropriate sex education, and claims that librarians are grooming their children into the trans agenda, they’re enacting the worst forms of neo-fascist bullying. But they’re also paradoxically defending a troubled American legacy against a librarian culture attempting to course-correct towards greater inclusion.
To discuss this problem, Matthew talks to Heath Umbreit, a reference librarian who works at a public library in the northeastern U.S. Mis- and disinformation has been a professional and personal interest of theirs for several years; Heath's study of the phenomenon focuses on a critical examination of popular narratives about disinformation, the concept of epistemic supremacy, and the ways in which information and disinformation intersect with systemic power differentials in American society.
Show Notes
Derek gives the Keynote Address at the 2023 Oregon Library Association's Annual Conference
Library Bill of Rights | Advocacy, Legislation & Issues 
Students, authors fight censorship in PA schools 
Kuo & Marwick, "Critical Disinformation Studies"
Morales & Williams, "Moving Toward Transformative Librarianship: Naming and Identifying Epistemic Supremacy"
danah boyd, "You Think You Want Media Literacy... Do You?"
PEN America, 2023 Banned Books Update: Banned in the USA
Kelly Jensen, Trauma, Book Bans, and Libraries: A Resource Guide for Library Workers, Library Supporters, and Beyond
Kristen Browde, Who's Making News for Sex Crimes Involving Children?
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Project 2025 is the libertarian conservative Heritage Foundation’s systematic governance plan for the next Republican president. The 920-page plan aims to implement the "unitary executive theory," which would give all of the power of the US government to the executive branch—Donald Trump, if he wins in November. 
Derek and Julian read the chapter on the Department of Education, which focuses on unlocking public funds for Christian schools while banning any discussion on DEI, CRT, or gender theory.
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Project 2025 is the libertarian conservative Heritage Foundation’s systematic governance plan for the next Republican president. The 920-page plan aims to implement the "unitary executive theory," which would give all of the power of the US government to the executive branch—Donald Trump, if he wins in November.

Derek and Julian read the chapter on the Department of Education, which focuses on unlocking public funds for Christian schools while banning any discussion on DEI, CRT, or gender theory.