Behind the Bastards - Part Five: Is Oprah Winfrey a Bastard?

Episode Date: January 28, 2025

Today we talk about Oprah's involvement in a self help guru who killed three people in a sweat lodge, and how it goes into a shift in American culture driven by The Oprah Winfrey show.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Call zone media. Welcome back to Bastards, the Behind podcast, Robert Evans A. Your brain will put that together in the right order. Or maybe that only works with written words. Maybe it just sounds like I had a stroke. I don't know, let's ask our guests today. Bridget Todd, Andrew T, does it sound like I had a stroke?

Always. Thank you, thank you. As a long time friend of mine, Bridget Todd, Andrew T. Does it sound like I had a stroke? Always. Thank you, thank you. As a long time friend of mine, Bridget, that really helps. As a long time friend of mine, thank you. That actually felt pretty coherent. That felt just like lag. It didn't feel like you were having a stroke.

It just felt like there's just a wee bit of a transmission problem, but it's fine. I just realized. If that was your parent, you'd be like, let's keep an eye on it. He doesn't need to go to a home yet. Let's keep an eye on it. There's just some some lag a bit of a transmission problem, but it's fine You'd be like let's keep an eye on it We need to take the keys away though. Yeah. Yeah, they shouldn't be driving that car anymore We got to get the f-150 away from grandpa He's gonna go right through a fucking farmers markets. Oh Shit I just occurred to me actually cuz I met you both right around the same time and like mid

2018 to late 2018 It's been like six years that we've we've all been buddies We should go to Vegas You was it 2016 I Think I think I've known Sophie, but I think I met you Sophie before I met Robert Yeah, Robert and I went to a like you went to a Nazi That was a great weekend Boy, I remember no cuz I'm the one that was like no Robert you're going to DC you have to hit up Bridget No, huh? Yeah, we had a great time.

We had a wonderful time. It honestly was great. Yeah. You know, I had to yell. Come back to... There'll be opportunities to go to Nazi marches in DC ample, I'm sure, in the next coming years, unfortunately. Oh, God.

I'm so... I don't... Yeah. That's a subject for another day. I will say, I gotta give a shout out because as we're talking right now, the US Marines have entered the California-Mexico border. And there's footage of them with V-22 Ospreys. So we are just hours away from the first time a V-22 Osprey wipes out a squad of Marines on US soil yet again.

If you're not aware, these are aircraft that exist almost entirely to kill United States Marines that the Marine Corps continues to use for reasons that make complete sense if you know a lot about the US Marine Corps. So I'm very happy to say that we're about to be suffering severe casualties in a war without anyone to fight, but our own aircraft.

The reason we use them is because they make the coolest G.I. Joe toys. They look awesome. They're so cool looking and it's just they're just death traps. They're just horrible death traps. Like if you actually care, you would do more reducing American fatalities abroad, stopping the V-22 Osprey then wiping out isis It's it's just it's like a it's a drop ship, but with it's like a helicopter with like twice as many points of failure Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's it's like what if you know how helicopters are absolute death traps

What if we made it twice as much of a trap? Yeah Speaking of getting lots of people killed y'all ready to get back to Oprah? Wow. Wow. What a transition. Lately on the NPR Politics Podcast, we're talking about a big question. How much can one guy change? They want change. What will change look like for energy? Drill, baby drill.

Schools. Take the Department of Education close it. Healthcare. Better and less expensive. Follow coverage of a changing country. Promises made, promises kept. We're going to keep our promise. On the NPR Politics podcast, listen on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts.

Beautiful young women full of life and dreams, murdered or vanished without a trace. Their families left with nothing but heartbreak, questions and memories. I'm Nancy Grace. This week on Crime Stories, we uncover the truth behind these unsolved cases. We work to bring justice and answers to grieving families. Please don't miss Crime

Stories with Nancy Grace. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to the Criminalia Podcast. I'm Maria Tremarchi. And I'm Holly Frye. Together, we invite you into the dark and winding corridors of historical true crime. Each season we explore a new theme from poisoners to art thieves. We uncover the secrets of history's most interesting figures from legal injustices to body snatching. And tune in at the end of each episode as we indulge in cocktails and mocktails inspired by each story. Listen to Criminalia on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

It was big news. I mean, white girl gets murdered, found in a cemetery. Big, big news. A long investigation stalls until someone changes their story. I like saw. Nothing to happen. An arrest, trial, and conviction soon follow. He did not kill her. There's no way. Is the real killer rightly behind bars or still walking free?

Did you kill her? Listen to The Real Killer, Season 3 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. We're going to get sued. You're going to get sued. You're going to get sued. You're going to get sued. Once again, I challenge you to do the same.

You're going to get sued. You're going to get sued. You're going to get sued. You're going to get sued. You're going to get sued. You're gonna get sued. You're gonna get sued. You're gonna get sued. Once again, I checked under my chair and there was nothing there. No, this is, I gotta say, people online were like, oh, only a matter of time before Oprah sues them. We've had, not to mention anybody, litigious subjects in the past.

We are so far under Oprah's radar. Like again, this is, the only people who have ever been more famous than her are certain pharaohs and Greek gods. Like she does not give a shit about this podcast, people. Wow. So kind of pivoting off of that statement, I do suspect some of the youngins in our audience

may be incredulous at me crediting Oprah with so much influence in trends that today seem like just like massive societal swings, stuff that's too big for one person to have incited. And I have to assure you, Oprah really was that influential. There is in fact a direct line from Oprah to the sort of media that utterly dominates the digital attention spans of people today, particularly Gen Z kids, right? If you spend any time looking at surveys of what Gen Z claims to look for and value in media figures that they follow, you'll come upon one word over and over. Authenticity.

Now I'm not saying they actually like authentic media figures because authenticity is a costume that media figures put on. Nobody's really authentic, right? Because that's just not the way the media works. It's all some sort of dress up, it's all some sort of glamour, but it's the ability to play at being authentic. I want to quote now from a 2024 study by the NIH surveying the media diet and preference of Gen Z viewers. Quote, the qualities that young people wish to find in media,

especially on social media, revolve primarily upon spontaneity and authenticity. Quote, nobody has a perfect life. I would like to see a real life that does not come from social media or reality shows. And this is them quoting a female Gen Z survey person. They seek a life without filters, much like what is portrayed by influencers like Emily Polini, who despite having acne chooses to show herself without filters and accepts herself as she is. And I'm not saying anything about that specific influencer, but that's the idea, right? They're moving away from the super airbrushed and touched up, mass marketed celebrities

of the past, which is again, not true. There's more ability to filter yourself than ever before thanks to social media, but that's the impression that people think that they want. That impression really gets started. Authenticity becomes a virtue for media figures in the age of Oprah. More than any other single person, she sparks the shift towards relatable, authentic media influencers who deliberately sought

to inculcate and feed a parasocial relationship with their audiences. Oprah did this in part by being open about stuff like her struggles with weight loss, which made people think, oh, she's dealing with the same shit I am, right? She is the same kind of person I am. This is like, I like her because she's authentic.

And that cuts out a lot, including the fact that like, Willow has billions of dollars and enough money to hire personal chefs and personal trainers and take all of the different rich people drugs that make it a lot easier to lose weight and whatnot and stay youthful, right? But again, it's perception. It's really pretty impressive how easily

everyone is fooled, I think, by this. The difference between authentic and authenticism is... It seems big to me. Maybe, am I just an idiot like I'm just like This is still very fake guys No, I think there's a degree to which I mean you write for TV Andrew like you're in media like Bridget You would be like we're all in media. So we all have experiences of like

This is the product that people say is authentic and we are aware of the degree of work that goes into the background of like, this is the product that people say is authentic. And we are aware of the degree of work that goes into the background of like, make, I mean, part of why I have the attitude I have on this is that like, I have the life experience of turning myself into a public figure and deliberately figuring out like, which aspects of my personality are more relatable and marketable to an audience.

That's a thing that I did. It's part of my business, right? But I would just argue that every child I know with a phone knows the difference between use this pic, not this pic. Right. Which is the exact same thing. Like, oh, I look good in this one. You also, everyone sees some, the person,

well, I like that they're honest. I like that they seem like a really honest person. It's like, well, the person. Well, I like that. They're honest. I like that They you know, they seem like a really honest person's like well, but you're you are seeing what they've curated You know, and I'm not even making a moral judgment about it, right? It's not bad as a public figure you have to curate yourself, right? Like one thing you'll go insane if you don't have a part of you That's actually like your private human person, you will lose your mind, right? We we see this in certain public figures that happen to be the richest man on earth, right? Not even that but just like like the alternative would be a what?

360 Spherical constant surveillance, which is yes, I believe, a form of torture. It's a form of torture and also how a number of people, a number of people get rich at least doing that for limited periods of time, right? What is like a lot of the streaming ecosystem is I have for four hours a day, I make a Panopticon in my gaming chair, right?

Like that is one of the most profitable forms of entertainment on the planet right now. And I think when the, because the alternative is like airbrushed and perfect and unattainable visions of people, especially for youth, I can understand why maybe deep down, you know, it's it's like manufactured authenticity in scare quotes. But because the alternative is so clearly manufactured, it's easy to think to think like well this at least feels a little more authentic Even if it's bullshit. Yeah. Yeah, exactly and you know it may feel like especially because of how Universal that that kind of talk about I like authentic You know people in my media is that it may it may feel like a thing that people have always wanted

But it really is not I mean, if you remember the 90s, that was not like people were obsessed with guys like Tom Cruise. And the last thing anyone would ever say about Tom Cruise is like, that man is authentic, right? Like, no, Tom Cruise is like a fucking like a mirror that we project onto, you know? But he's like his popularity came from his fundamental emptiness, right? And like Arnold Schwarzenegger was a guy who was like actively created during the period of time that he was like in the public eye.

If you look at early Arnold and, you know, to the point where he kind of figured out who we was as a human being, like this is not the way we thought about celebrities the entire time that that has been a concept in, like, our culture. And Oprah plays a huge role in this stuff. Reality TV is in many ways downstream from Oprah. TikTok is downstream from Oprah. And the Trump presidency is downstream from Oprah. Now, I'm not saying Oprah is to blame for this.

I'm saying is downstream from, right? In that I'm saying the things that she did helped prepare the culture for that. That's not implying a sort of moral responsibility for Donald Trump, a guy she doesn't like and didn't want to be the president. It's saying that the changes that she helped rot in our culture were part of why we are where we are today. And you can just see that at the level of influence. This is a person who at her peak,

30, 40 million people are tuning into her show. Like the degree to which she has changed the composition of our cultural soil can't be overstated. I hope that people can take what I'm saying without it being like Robert saying we should blame Oprah for Trump. I really don't think that's the case. I'm just saying part of why people like Trump is his authenticity, quote unquote. You listen to his supporters, that's what they will say. And that being a huge virtue.

Oprah isn't the only person who started it or the only person who led to that being the way that it is. But Oprah being Oprah was a massive part of why that shift occurred. Yeah. I also think something that she does so well that has really been made clear from the last few episodes is that idea of the personal being the political, like really being able to blend those things in this way that's just irresistible. It's the reason why her audience was getting up and sharing like their sexual assault stories

without even really being prompted like me too before me too was me too, you know, like this idea of really being able to blend those ideas in a way that make people want to connect and engage Yeah, yeah, I think that's that's a great way to point and it's also weird that you you make that comment about the personal being Political because we're about to we're about to read a quote. That's right along those lines So in 1998 jet magazine defined Oprah the word as a verb meaning to engage in persistent intimate questioning with the intention of obtaining a confession. Now a good example of how pushy she got with this and this is I tried to find this clip.

Every a lot of the bad Oprah clips that have gone viral have been purged from the internet as we'll talk about. But in 2004, Oprah has the Olsen twins on her show as guests. Now at this point, they are both 17 years old. If you are on the younger side and you do not recall it or you recall the Olsen twins as adult movie stars, which they are today, let me kind of walk you through who the Olsen twins are culturally. These were two of alongside Macaulay Culok and probably the two, like two, like of

the three or four biggest child stars this country's ever had, right? They are famous from the point that they are very little kids and they are famous. And this is kind of unusual the entire time that they're children effectively. This is not a thing where like they're in one big movie and then they kind of drop out of cultural awareness, like, you know, Jake Lloyd or someone like that. They are in full house and they remain in movies that are very, stuff like The Parent Trap, all the way up until they are adults. And some of this is just, people like them,

they're good child actors, but also there's a lot of very creepy pedophile stuff in here. A significant number, a shocking number of adult men will openly admit to keeping track of when the Olsen twins are turning 18. This was a big deal on the internet in the early aughts. Ew. It is as gross as it sounds, but it was not a fringe thing. Like I am telling you right now,

this was not a tiny number of weirdo pedophiles. A lot of men were willing to put their names to keeping track of that. Eww. Yes, ew. Yeah. What a fucked up time to be a young woman on the internet. Like this is the internet we all came of age in.

Yeah, it's good to remember that as we talk about how bad it's gotten. Like, well it wasn't great back in 2004. Yeah. Yeah. God. Yeah. There's like this trend that's going around

on TikTok right now, but it's like, it's like, oh, you're so beautiful. And then it's like, thanks. And then you list something that you grew up with that made you the way that you are. And it's like, this is exactly what that is. It's like, oh, you're so beautiful. You're just like, thanks.

I grew up in the era where grown men tracked how old the Olsen twins were. Yeah. Like, oh my God. We talk about thought crimes. That's like a fun little joke. I'm generally against thought crimes. All of those men should have been arrested.

That's, that's, fuck. So as a result of all this, the bodies and the weight loss or gain of the Olsen twins became regular fodder for tabloids. It should not be shocking that I think both of them developed eating disorders. Not really surprising.

So during their interview with Oprah, this comes up. And the interview starts with some pretty anodyne stuff. Part one, you can still find unedited online. And they're talking about like who's messier in terms of keeping their room clean, what's their allowance that their dad gives them, et cetera. Later on in the interview though, Oprah starts to probe the two about tabloid rumors that they had and eating, that one or both of them suffered from an eating disorder saying, quote,

I know a new rumor that's recently surfaced has really upset you, right? You know, the one about eating. The girls get visibly uncomfortable, and Ashley immediately tries to shut the topic down. She replies, yeah, you know, people are going to write what they're going to write. We try not to read the good or the bad because it just comes with the territory. Either you're too fat, too skinny, and people are just going to write what they... And then Oprah interrupts her asking What size are you by the way?

now Oprah you have dealt with some of the most Unhinged fucking obsession with your body weight that like we've tried we were I think quite sympathetic of in previous episodes You should know that's fucked up. She's 17. God damn it like you should know that's fucked up. She's 17, god damn it. Like what's- Oh my gosh. I mean, not to like, I know you've already,

you've probably talked about this when you did his episode, but like Dr. Phil taking teenagers up on stage and like asking if they had breast implants. Like this was like- Right, no! Yeah, this was like what was okay on like mainstream daytime television? When we talk about modern social media

being downstream from this, think of all of the different parents who we now know were, who got famous as mommy bloggers or like, I've got a YouTube channel featuring my kids and their development. And it comes out three, four, five, six years later, oh, that was an incredibly abusive situation

where they were basically turning their kit, like mining their children for money and deeply psychologically and often physically abusing them to make them more profitable. Right? I mean, speaking of thought crime, the internet, one of the internet's sort of positive things is at least there's a paper trail for all this shit. Yeah. Jesus Christ. Yeah.

You know what's crazy? You were saying, so that part of the clip is scrubbed from the internet where Oprah asked their size. It is very hard to find. So I want to finish the scene. Oh, sorry, yeah. So the girls respond after Oprah interrupts them to ask their size.

Like, well, like, you know, we're celebrities. We get our clothing tailored. Like, I don't know what my size is, right? I don't like go to a store and buy clothes, right? And Oprah responds, that's so interesting. I'm obsessed with size. And you're like, I really don't know. There's a lot there?

I don't know. I don't know. Like, you put a team of psychiatrists on that two sentences. It was more just what I was curious about was like, cause in the last episode We watched a clip of Joan Rivers doing a version of this to Oprah right and Hands on misery to man it builds up like a coastal shelf. Yeah, it's like it's It is wild to for Oprah to have been upset by the Joan Rivers version of this and then I mean

it's not surprising, but it is really like remarkably unself-aware or unempathetic. When we talked about how much she regrets her wagon full of fat incident, I really think that what she regrets is making like a lot of speculation about her weight personally.

I don't think she has any problem with the way that she has like foisted that same level of scrutiny about weight onto others I think that she is perfectly fine And if that's complacent in that dynamic that has been so unhealthy for so many people Yeah, I would agree a hundred percent Bridget now as we talked I talked about a bit ago with you Andrew We're not watching this clip. I would have preferred to play it because it's been pretty well expunged from the internet.

Now I'm not going to say I did not spend hours on this, but I spent a good like 20 minutes or so trying to find this clip. And all that I was able to get are like viral clips on TikTok that are heavily edited because a couple of years ago, this particular chunk of the interview went kind of viral on TikTok because people have been one of the things that's been happening for the last two years or so on social media, TikTok primarily, but not exclusively is people have been like kind of re litigating some of Oprah's worst moments and she has been receiving some criticism. So this went viral and people are like, rightfully, this is pretty fucked up. As a consequence though, damn near every pure clip, I have not been able to find a pure unedited clip of this moment.

I'm able to find TikTok videos where the audio is overlaid with some shitty AI voice or asshole narrating that like makes me want to nuke every data center on earth, like the way these things are like edited and put together and like the whole screen is covered with text and I just hate it. I hate the way this stuff looks and I haven't found a clean clip of it. That's what I'm saying. And that's often the case with some of Oprah's like worst moments.

You know, a lot of this stuff has been purged and because most of her stuff was on daytime TV in the eighties and nineties, a lot of it is effectively lost media for our purposes. Anyway, I just found that interesting. There's someone's parents have this on VHS somewhere. Next time you're home for any holiday, check the tapes. Yes. Probably my late mother because she did tape Oprah's and she would watch them on VHS.

I have so many like burned in my memory clips of Oprah being not great, but like I probably could not find them. Like I think Nathan Lane has talked about how when him and the late Robin Williams were on the show, Oprah was really grilling him about his sexuality and that luckily Robin Williams stepped in to make a joke out of it and take the heat off of him

because he wasn't out. She did the same thing that Dennis Rodman, like she really, when it came to men and their sexuality, she did some like, I think we would look back at some of those clips, the way that she was grilling these people and think like, well, that really wasn't cool. But all of those clips are so difficult to find. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, I think it's a little bit too, speaking of the political that like, because she's a black woman, we make assumptions of what her like politics and values are that don't have to be true. And we see this in like the actual questions and like her the editorial span, which is like fine, she's obviously allowed to have those opinions. But it's I think there's there's big, like, we build up as a culture

like who we think Oprah ought to be. And the bastardy happens in the difference between those two things. Yeah. That's, I think, actually a very good way of talking about it, Andrew. Also, shout out to the late Robin Williams. You do, like, moments like this do, like,

reveal character on behalf of some people and it's always nice to get like, okay, he was a really nice man. That's good. I rewatched Good Will Hunting, I think it may have been for the first time. I had like, vague memories of it. And that like, scene where he's hugging Matt Damon,

I just had the thought like, God damn, there's not a problem in my life that wouldn't be fixed with a good Robin Williams hug. That man looked like he gave great hugs. Anyway. Yeah. RIP. We should probably talk about Oprah more.

Around the same time Jet Magazine made Oprah a verb, the Wall Street Journal introduced the term oprification in order to complain that political discourse in the country had become, and this is what you had mentioned, Bridget, public confession as a form of therapy. So great minds. Well, actually, I think you're considerably a better mind than anyone at the Wall Street Journal, but you guys had the same basic take. And this is kind of noteworthy because therapy is at the core of Oprah's appeal and the growth in our understanding of not just the value of therapy, which I think is generally good, but in the use of like therapy speak in everyday life and to some extent, the I think massive overuse of therapy speak in everyday life.

This is very much tied to Oprah. And the way in which therapy is tied to Oprah is not actual clinical therapy, which is of course, potentially extremely valuable for people, but a simulacrum of therapy. One that apes the definitions and terms used by clinicians and often apes actual clinical expertise by bringing in oaths like Dr. Phil,

who are in no way actually doing good therapy. And in fact, they're doing things that the ethics of the discipline condemn pretty strongly, but are doing it in such a way that people believe this is what therapy, this is medical work, right? This is somebody actually like functioning as a mental health clinician. And I think that does so in a way, again, a lot of dialogue of discourse on Twitter

is downstream from this, this birth of understanding that there's a value in talking about mental health in a clinical way, but also None of us are clinicians and none of us are doing it right And so we're like medicalizing shit in ways that are in a lot of instances deeply toxic And damaging to people a lot of that is tied directly to Oprah Spoken like a true gaslighting narcissist spoken like a true gaslighting narcissist, Robert. Yes, thank you. If you ever want to win an argument in a certain kind of group house,

you know what I'm talking about, just be like, he's gaslighting me into taking up the garbage. And you'll win. Yes, I'm being abused into doing the dishes. It's also like, even in the absence of the perversions of it, just the simple act of doing it in public or as a performance, even if it were otherwise largely fine, which it isn't. I just I always think back to this happens every so often.

There's one like six months ago, tens of thousands of people like liking and sharing it of someone being like, you know, people with ADHD have no sense of object permanence. Yes, they do, man, that's not, that's not, five-year-olds have object permanence, bro. That is not ADHD. You are in an attempt to create empathy for people suffering from severe ADHD.

You are dehumanizing them. This is actually quite bad. Oh, my God. That's like that's like medieval, like layman's understanding of the world. Like, that's just like burn the witch type. Yeah. Yeah. We're back. Can we stop? Can we stop with some of this? I saw one that said people that have ADHD

can never pick a Halloween costume because there's too many choices and then the reply on Twitter was like damn can't y'all do anything Again my life is filled with and I have ADHD The stuff people say about it online just feels like someone talking about aliens I don't mean to like harp on it so much but this is one I have so much personal experience with that I really... I don't want to get lost in a rabbit hole here, but there's a very complicated issue in... It's good for people to have an understanding of mental

health and to have an understanding of therapy and there's value in some of those discussions becoming more a part of common parlance. Also, it can be very, very toxic because people use it and weaponize it to an extent. A lot of the irresponsibility that we see now reflected down in social media and the way people talk about this stuff really gets launched by Dr. Phil on the Oprah Winfrey Show, where you are using actual clinical psychology as a costume as opposed to as a way to actually help people. You are dressing that way so you can say whatever and do whatever. And in this case, it was for entertainment purposes.

And a lot of this ties in directly to the self-help movement. And this is, I think, a toxic thing for therapy, because therapy should not be a thing that you do instead of helping other people and trying to better the world. And that's kind of the message of a great deal of like the way in which therapy is discussed

on the Oprah Winfrey Show. And you even see stuff like Jordan Peterson saying, like you can't fix the world until you fixed yourself, which is simply untrue. And this ties into this kind of American civil religion of self-help. If you remember the Woody Guthrie episodes, we talked about how during the Great Depression,

starving farmers and their kids were listening to prototypes of Norman Vincent Peel's The Power of Positive Thinking, right? Which is basically, this shares DNA with prosperity gospel stuff, with The Secret and Marianne Williamson. The core of it is this idea that like attracts like. So if you're negative thinking,

that's what's bringing bad things to you. And if you want to be wealthy, you have to think like a wealthy person, right? And some of the ways in which this gets passed down like prosperity gospel, if you wanna be wealthy, you need to give money you don't have, go into debt to give money to God. And then that kind of thinking

will attract wealth towards you, right? Alternatively, if you put down $5,000 for this seminar on how to like automatically generate books and put them on Amazon, you know, in order to make money, that will attract wealth back too. You have to make, the universe needs to see you make a sacrifice in order to know that you're serious about this

before you can start attracting the money, right? All of this stuff is, it doesn't start, obviously. Again, as we talked about, this has been going on since like the early 1900s. It doesn't start with Oprah, but by bringing on Marianne Williamson and then by pushing later The Secret, she supercharges this shit.

And she supercharges it at the same time as she is continually on the show, pushing this, pushing therapy and a specific attitude towards therapy, right? Which the overall thing you're supposed to take away from this is you can fix every problem in your life by changing your attitude. Now that is simply untrue, right?

There are social problems and like issues that affect people's ability to be happy that are rooted in politics, that are rooted in history, that are rooted in things you have no control over. And it is true, obviously, your own attitude can matter a lot and your resilience. But there's this big thesis of like, every problem can be fixed by altering your attitude. You can even change the way the universe works by altering your attitude that gets wrapped up

in the kind of pro-therapy ethos being pushed with Oprah in a way that warps what therapy is. And yeah, it's just it's it's it's complicated, but I think very profoundly toxic. Yeah, it turns therapy into like telekinesis magic. Yes. Yeah. And that's sort of best where it's just like. And I guess to me, it's like all this shit. It's like. Do you never consider the counterfactual of any of this?

Like, just like, oh, sorry kid, sorry about all your cancer. You should have had a better attitude. Like it's so fucking disgusting when you think about any failure case of this. And it's, I don't know. It's so hard to argue against, but it's just like, it's so gross for that reason to me. any failure case of this. It's so hard to argue against, but it's so gross for that reason to me. I completely agree. It's gross, it's toxic. I completely agree.

I'll give myself as an example. I've been a little down in the dumps, shall we say, since January 20th. And, you know, I, like, you can feel very out of control. And there's so much happening that I really can't control. Somebody coming in and saying, actually, you can control it. Don't be afraid because it's all in your head. And if you just did X, Y, Z, or got right in this way,

you can control it. That is so intoxicating and especially as people feel out of control. Like I get why people like Oprah turned to this because it works and I have to say like I get why it works. I get why it's effective. Yeah, well, because there's like a germ of truth. Like speaking of like Jordan Peterson, I did have a moment where I was like, you know, most of these boys that listen to him really could clean their room more. Like, and that would immeasurably improve their lives. And then getting some sunlight might help. Yeah. But then once once the little amount of information,

like actual value of value that they've imparted has paid off, everything subsequent to that is complete bullshit. Yes. And it's just like the line of like how valuable this is. But it's such a, even as we're talking, you see how you lose this argument. Because it's like, well, okay, some of this works, but like not all of it, but I can't prove that none of it works and da da da. And you just, you become a dithering idiot

in the face of all you have to do is be positive. Like a simple lie is always going to be better than a laborious refutation. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's right. And I think fundamentally, you know, part of, part of what's so poisonous here is that it's taking therapy and it's turning it into magic, right? That like, this is a thing you can magically fix and have a breakthrough

in 25 minutes sitting on a couch in front of an audience with Dr. Phil. Like, that's the way therapy works. And also, that's the way fixing the world works, is if you change your attitude, all of these good things will come to you. You don't have to worry about dealing with structural problems in legislation and the government and all all of this shit. Like, it's just you. When reality therapy and making the world better

work the same way, which is slowly doing laborious work consistently over long periods of time, right? That's the problem, you know? It's like that episode of Rick and Morty when Rick goes to therapy and the therapist is like, I get that this is like flossing for you and it's like not exciting and it doesn't happen all at once.

And it's just boring maintenance. But like, that's the trick. Like that's the magic is you do it a lot and you get small gains and maybe over the course of years, you feel a little bit better consistently. And like, ta-da, like people do want that magic solution and that magic bullet.

I get why that's really enticing, but that's just not the way it works And I think this is as someone who is in psychedelic culture 15 years ago This was one of the issues that we had with it, which is psychedelics particularly LSD mushrooms MDMA have massive potential as a is therapeutic aids But they aren't magic and there's a degree to which people treated them both as magic and also as inherently positive. At this point, I have gone through enough self-described radicalization

journeys by Nazis who credited it to an LSD trip. No, no, no, no, no. This is a knife. What cuts both ways, my friends? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's just a big old scramble and you just wish it works. And also it's such an insidious grift because it's so easy then when it doesn't work for you to point out that you didn't magic hard enough in various ways.

Yeah. When your kid actually dies of the cancer they had because their vibes were off, you can just be like, oh, he didn't want to live enough or whatever. Yeah, it's so tragic. It's like never the Huckster's fault. Yeah. Now, speaking of your children dying, they never will if you purchase the products and services

that are advertised on this podcast. It's the only way to keep your family safe, probably. Lately on the NPR Politics podcast, we're talking about a big question. How much can one guy change? They want change. What will change look like for energy? Drill, baby drill. Schools.

Take the department, education close it. Healthcare. Better and less expensive. Follow coverage of a changing country. Promises made, promises kept. We're going to keep our promises. On the NPR Politics Podcast, listen on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Beautiful young women full of life and dreams murdered or vanished without a trace.

Their families left with nothing but heartbreak, questions and memories. I'm Nancy Grace. This week on Crime Stories, we uncover the truth behind these unsolved cases. We work to bring justice and answers to grieving families. Please don't miss Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey, listeners. I'm Lauren Bright-Pacheco, host of the Murder on Songbird Road podcast. Murder on Songbird Road revisits a controversial 2020 murder that occurred in Southern Illinois. It divided a community and pitted families against one another, but questions remain as to whether the mother of four serving time for the crime is actually guilty. I'm excited to tell you that you can get access to all episodes of Murder on Songbird Road, 100% ad-free and one week before anyone else with an iHeart True Crime Plus subscription. So don't wait. Head to Apple Podcasts, search for iHeart True Crime Plus, and subscribe today.

Maria Tremarchi Welcome to the Criminalia Podcast. I'm Maria Tremarchi. And I'm Holly Frye. Together, we invite you into the dark and winding corridors of historical true crime. Each season, we explore a new theme, everything from poisoners and pirates to art thieves and snake oil products and those who made and sold them. We uncover the stories and secrets of some of history's most compelling criminal figures, including a man who built a submarine as a getaway vehicle. Yep, that's a fact.

We also look at what kinds of societal forces were at play at the time of the crime, from legal injustices to the ethics of body snatching, to see what, if anything, might look different through today's perspective. And be sure to tune in at the end of each episode as we indulge in custom-made cocktails and mocktails inspired by the stories. There's one for every story we tell. Listen to Criminalia on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. We're back. So in her book, The Age of Oprah, Janice Peck quotes a history of psychotherapy by Philip

Cushman. He wrote in 1995, quote, every era has a particular configuration of self illness healer technology. They are a kind of cultural package. They are interrelated, intertwined, enter penetrating. So when we study a particular illness, we are also studying the conditions that shape and define that illness and the socio political impact of those who are responsible for healing it. Janice continues, Winfrey's identification as a spiritual healer, her diagnosis of what

ails us, and her prescribed cure are rooted historically in the therapeutic enterprise that emerged in the 19th century and was fully institutionalized in the United States by the mid-20th century. Debbie Epstein and Deborah Steinberg suggest that the centrality of therapeutic discourse to the framing of the Oprah Winfrey Show issues from the increasing ubiquity of therapy as a language of self and interpersonal relationships of therapy as a language of self and interpersonal relationships, and even as a way of life. Winfrey's media enterprise draws heavily on a self-help model of therapy, with its

peculiarly American belief that the individual's power to initiate a renaissance of self, of nation, of other. This promise of individual efficacy and liberation is the ground upon which Winfrey stakes her claim to empower her followers. It is also the basis of observers' claims that she is an inspirational phenomenon, a public leader, and quote, almost a religion. Yeah. Yeah.

You know, as we're talking, I just had the realization that like, what kind of, what Oprah offers is kind of like those like right wing pregnancy crisis centers near like abortion clinics because it's like it's a simulacrum of the thing that you actually need. And it just serves these horrible ends like yeah, I guess those are at least directed and intentional and full of lies. And throughout all this, I will say, the thing that is still kind of there is like, it still doesn't seem like Oprah is being intentionally, or anyway, there's enough plausible deniability here. Oh yeah, yeah.

I mean, there's a ton of it, and it's important not to, as we kind of litigate bastardism. Like this is not an attempt by Oprah to shift to the culture. This is just sort of, I think a mix of what she really believes, she really feels like personally, she had so much stacked against her. It was her attitude that allowed her to be successful. Whereas the reality is, I mean, among other things,

Oprah has said, like she was an affirmative action hire, that those programs and policies function the way they were supposed to, which was a person who maybe wouldn't have gotten that opportunity because of racism, got some opportunities that she proved to be excellently suited for. In addition to that, she had the fortune

of like having a father who chose to be her father, did not actually have to take that role upon himself and provided her with a lot of resources she otherwise wouldn't have had. And it's not just, it wasn't just her attitude that led to her success, right? And this is the case for everybody, right? But even what you're describing,

among her peers, she at least will acknowledge things like affirmative action. Whereas like every single billionaire, you know, got to where they are with immense moments of chance. They high-rolled many times in a row and like the overarching like common commonality between most of them is they believe that none of that was chance. Yeah. And Oprah at least has a little bit of like, like giving difference to someone else.

She's still the least toxic billionaire. Yeah. Absolutely. So there's an interesting bit about, cause I think it is important the degree to which she was talked about as like a religious figure is kind of significant. And to kind of make that case,

there's a chunk in the age of Oprah that talks about an expensive self-help speaking tour when free launched in the early 2000s, the personal growth summit. And through that, I found a review of the personal growth summit in the LA Times, which is a real newspaper that was purportedly reputable, at least in that era.

This is what- Oh no. This is the reviewer. A prophet walks among us and her name is Oprah. You know her as a television talk show host, one of the most popular, successful, and recognizable women of our time. But make no mistake, she is also a healer, sent to earth to spread the word.

Perhaps it is only fitting that a 21st century wise man is a woman and that her chief medium is electronic. Buddha might have taken to the airwaves had they been available. Gifted with a profound moral insight and exceptional rapport with her followers, Oprah Winfrey has grown from a masterful communicator into an inspirational phenomenon.

I need to know who wrote that and where they are now. I can pull that up, absolutely. Yeah, let's check this out. Flocking to the Church of Oprah, June 25th, 2000. Time staff writer, they took a name off it. Oh, you sons of bitches. That's when you know, it's like somebody was embarrassed by that

and it was like, look at me pull my name down. I can't have this detached to me. I've done that. Now, one thing that's really interesting to me about Oprah is that she demonstrates how quickly the worm can turn for a celebrity once they leave the public eye. Cause like 2011, I think is when her show stops being on the air as a daily thing.

And QAnon starts about a decade later, right? So she is, she stops being a daily figure for most Americans about a decade before QAnon. And yet in 2020, a sizable chunk of the QAnon movement starts spreading rumors that Oprah has been secretly arrested for sex trafficking. Now this is obviously untrue, but there are some things that fuel the allegations. One of them is Oprah's long-standing professional relationships with two men who definitely did sex trafficking, Harvey Weinstein and our old friend P. Diddy.

Now for Weinstein's case, there is a photo of Oprah kissing Weinstein on the cheek, which you can find without much effort. I have found zero solid information that implies anything beyond a professional relationship between Oprah, who stars in one movie produced by his company, and Weinstein. However, there have been allegations made by other celebrities. I should note that when interviewed about Weinstein by Gwyneth Paltrow, Oprah said, what I knew about Harvey was that Harvey was a bully and that if Harvey's on the phone, you go, God, you don't want to take the call because you're going to get bullied in some way.

That is probably true in that a lot of people talk about a lot of people who worked with Harvey talked about him that way. He's kind of the archetypal dick producer. That said, people have alleged that Oprah knew more and was aware of a lot of the illegal bad stuff Weinstein was doing. I think that's also very likely. A great deal of people in Hollywood knew something. And someone as powerful as Oprah was probably,

to some extent, aware of Weinstein's problematic behavior. Now that does not mean she was directly enabling or helping to hide it. It's just the kind of gross thing that a lot of people in the industry did, right? I mean, Seth MacFarlane came out and made some joke about Weinstein during one awards ceremony or the other that was like a deal, because everyone was aware of the fact that Harvey was, you know, certainly not the extent of what he was doing, but everyone knew he's not a safe guy to leave a young woman alone with, right?

To the extent that like, someone would make a joke about that, and I think it was the Oscars, the Emmys or whatever, and people got it, because he was that much of a famous creep. In the case of Rose McGowan, who called Winfrey as fake as they come as a result of her condemning Weinstein Her issue with Oprah comes from the fact that Oprah had been set to produce a movie about famed sex abuser Russell Simmons and then resigned from producing that movie Oprah claimed she had creative differences

I'm not interested in litigating that in part because that's all I can find on the matter. And that's not conclusive. There's a lot of reasons why you would drop out of producing a movie that doesn't really count as like you're trying to cover it up. I haven't found any evidence she tried to stop the thing from being made, right? Rose is not the only celebrity who was alleged

that Oprah knew more about Weinstein than she let on Seal came out the guy who wrote kiss from a rose and has made allegations that basically you knew a lot more than you're saying Again, this may be true seal has also been accused of and investigated for sexual battery. So You know, I don't know where we want to go there. I mean, it is sort of that like not mud slinging because it's factual. That's like I mean, again, you're we're barely past the era of or not even. We're still within the era of. Men on the Internet being like, oh, I can't wait till they're, you know, X, Y, Z, like

a young woman is 18. I it's it's a little bit of that, like, this shit was definitely happening, by the way, definitely is happening. And there's whispers about it. But like, you kind of just like there's there's a limit to what you can do. So like, yeah, it's that kind of thing where like every time, like, like Democrats go after Republicans and they're like, Oh, you wouldn't want this turn back on you. Like, oh, we're going to we're going to go after your heroes.

And it's like, truly, like, yes, they're all fucking horrible people. Get them all out of there. If you've done crime, I don't care what political party or like who you are in the culture. This does though, there's also a murkier aspect of it where again when we say Oprah probably knew something about Weinstein, I'm not saying Oprah knew Weinstein had committed a litany of felonies, Oprah knew he's kind of like, he's like, he'll sexually harass you,

he'll make gross comments, you know, he might like. Or it's like Hollywood in that like, you heard a bunch of stuff, you don't have evidence of anything. And like, there's legal consequences for just like accusing someone powerful and wealthy without evidence of like being a sex offender. And this is the kind of thing where it's like, okay, so we're attacking Oprah for stuff like

her involvement in Weinstein. I don't know how extensive it was. Everyone kind of involved in the mudslinging has ulterior motives and it's weird. What I can prove is that Weinstein and Oprah worked together at some point and that likewise, Oprah went to a number of Diddy's parties and these are specifically the white parties, right? The ones that were not exclusively devoted to sex crimes. So part of the issue is that these two are both very famous people and in the industry Oprah was in. And so obviously she had personal and professional connections to them. But again, when it comes to actual crimes, there is zero evidence of Oprah directly enabling or directly

covering up either of those men's crimes. That evidence does not exist. And from what I've seen, it looks like she's probably guilty of the same thing most people at her level in Hollywood are, which is being like, that guy seems fucked up. I'm just not going to get too close. Yeah, I do want to give a plug to the documentary that she pulled out of because it did end up getting produced. It's called On the Record. It tells it features Drew Dixon, who is this like very iconic hip hop producer who her entire career was almost derailed because of people like Russell Simmons. And so, yeah, I also agree that I think that when it comes to Oprah and these powerful men,

I think that like, I understand why it lends itself to conspiracy theories because powerful, rich, famous people know each other, they work together, they're photographed with each other. Like that doesn't mean that Oprah had a direct hand in enabling Weinstein's sex crimes, but that's just how it works. Weinstein wouldn't need her for that.

There's no line between the women that he abused and Oprah, unlike, for example, as we'll talk about, Oprah told women John of God was a safe guy to fly to fucking Brazil and get treated by. And a number of women got raped because they took the advice of the Oprah Winfrey show endorsing this man.

That is something that she should be held accountable for. I just don't have any evidence that she's done anything in the Weinstein case or in the P Diddy case. Now, the most bullshit thing she gets accused of by the QAnon types is involvement with Jeffrey Epstein. If you Google Oprah Winfrey Epstein, you will also come across this randomly. You will find articles and viral tweets and TikToks,

all of which have some variation of the sentence, Oprah Winfrey mentioned five times and files related to the Epstein case that sounds bad, right? Let's look into What that means? So one of the things that turned me out of this was a viral post on Facebook with the title Justin Oprah has been revealed as a client on the Epstein list, capitalizing the first letter of each of those words. What's your reaction?

And that's complete bullshit. Oprah's name shows up five times in documents for the Epstein case. The first two times are because the files include screenshots of articles, one from Radar Online and one from the Daily Mail. Those articles in the bottom of them have a suggested other reading.

You know how articles work. You finish an article and say, hey, you might be interested in this article on a different topic. Those articles that were suggested by the articles relevant to the Epstein trial mentioned Oprah. That's two of the five mentions, right? Is something completely unrelated to the case

that just because somebody fucking screen grabbed the whole page, Oprah's name winds up on it. The other three times come from emails introduced as evidence where a journalist working with one of Epstein's accusers on a book tells a book agent, I think this book will sell well to Oprah's audience. Now if you're keeping track, what does that mean? What means Oprah has nothing to fucking do with Jeffrey Epstein? I mean, the other just like heuristic way to look at it

is if these fucks had concrete evidence on a black woman, you sure as fuck, we would know about it. Yes. Oh my God, would there be pictures, there'd be screenshots, there'd be emails, timelines, the whole works. Like there'd be no need for insinuation if any evidence existed.

It's, this is where you have to be- I do have a question. Oh, sorry, yeah, yeah. What, like, when, so there are documented connections with Oprah and like men who turned out to be creeps who were not safe to be around. He did it, you know? Yeah, you can see, and she's, there's a picture of her

kissing Weinstein on the neck. But why do you think people obsess about these bullshit claims about her connection to people like Epstein when there are documented connections between her and people who were genuinely like, that is a smoking gun where she said this guy was safe and endorsed him and then he wasn't. Why do people focus so much on the ones that are bullshit?

Because the people who hate Oprah and are making stuff up about her primarily hate her because she is a liberal figure and the celebrity is the same reason they're going after like Tom Hanks, right? Cause he was pro-vaccine. The other thing is the stuff she's done that's bad is stuff they do and love and don't think is bad, right?

Yeah. You know, like that's what it, it's why when people talk about the problem of child sex abuse and child sex trafficking, they obsessed with this largely fanciful idea of like three and four year olds being trafficked around the world in large numbers and abducted from their fucking white families,

which is not really the issue. The issue is primarily adult men related to 16 and 17 and 15 year old girls molesting them. You know? And part of why they don't like to do that is that an awful lot of the guys who obsessed with shoot your local pedophile think it would be fine if they married a 16 year old. As long as, you know, they did it in a church and their parents were okay with it. Yeah. That's why. You know? Well, and then also, the other big portion of it is in the fucking church itself. Right, right. Where you can marry 14-year-olds in a lot of US states, as long as you do it, you know,

through God and their parents. Anyway, we don't need to make that the subject every time we talk about this shit, but I think when it comes to, like, properly criticizing her, one thing you have to note is that Oprah has made child abuse and child sex abuse, constant obsessive focuses with her fundraising activities. She has done harm through spreading misinformation about child abuse, but she's not a sex criminal. This is something she puts a lot of,

she very much actively has tried to reduce, again in imperfect ways, but she's put her money where her mouth is a lot. And one of the things she is really consistently puts effort into is trying to help underprivileged at-risk kids. And again, this is always a mixed bag. And this brings me to the story

of the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls, or OWLAG, as we're gonna be calling it. Bridget, you were excited to get into this topic. What have you heard of OWLAG? This're gonna be calling it. Bridget, you were excited to get into this topic. What have you heard of OWLAG? This is her South African school. I remember it very clearly because my mother and my grandmother and I watched these episodes like it was a special family event

to get together and watch Oprah in Africa. Like, y'all, this was a big deal. I remember this like it was yesterday. Yeah, yeah. And it was, you know, this starts, it opened, the school opens in January of 2007. It is inspired the year before she's vacationing in South Africa. She's hanging out with Nelson Mandela because when you're Oprah, you get to hang out with Nelson Mandela. And she decides on the spot to, while they're talking

and like looking, you know, going through, she's seeing the poverty of a lot of the poorest South African children. She decides on the spot, I'm going to create a school for very bright and very poor South African kids. These are kids who are at the top of their public schools in terms of test scores and come from households that make less than $950 a month. The project is instantly controversial among the wealthy neighborhood where the school is built. They do not like that a bunch of poor black girls are going to be going to school in this

largely white neighborhood. The administration is deluged with complaints. Neighbors begin staking out the school during recess, watching the few girls in this white neighborhood as they play soccer. Oprah has the school put up hedges to block the field from view. And so as we talk about the things that are criticizable about this venture, I don't wanna lose the fact that like,

she is really pissing off a lot of South African racists, which again, are the most racist racists. Like if we're ranking the racist, the very top of that pyramid is South African racists. No one's ever been better. Speaking of South Africa, I'm fairly certain none of our sponsors are based in South Africa. Lately on the NPR Politics podcast, we're talking about a big question. How much can one guy change? They want change. What will change look like for energy?

Drill, baby drill. Schools. Take the Department of Education close it. Healthcare. Better and less expensive. Follow coverage of a changing country. Promises made, promises kept. We're going to keep our promises.

On the NPR Politics podcast, listen on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. Beautiful young women full of life and dreams murdered or vanished without a trace. Their families left with nothing but heartbreak, questions and memories. I'm Nancy Grace. This week on Crime Stories, we uncover the truth behind these unsolved cases. We work to bring justice and answers to grieving families. Please don't miss Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, listeners. I'm Lauren Bright-Pacheco, host of the Murder on Songbird Road podcast.

Murder on Songbird Road revisits a of the murder on songbird road podcast. Murder on songbird road revisits a controversial 2020 murder that occurred in southern Illinois. It divided a community and pitted families against one another. But questions remain as to whether the mother of four serving time for the crime is actually guilty. I'm excited to tell you that you can get access to all episodes of murder on songbird Road, 100% ad-free and

one week before anyone else with an iHeart True Crime Plus subscription. So don't wait, head to Apple Podcasts, search for iHeart True Crime Plus and subscribe today. Welcome to the Criminalia Podcast. I'm Maria Tremarchi. And I'm Holly Frey. Together, we invite you into the dark and winding corridors of historical true crime. Each season, we explore a new theme, everything from poisoners and pirates to art thieves and snake oil products and those who made and sold them. We uncover the stories and secrets of some of history's most compelling criminal figures,

including a man who built a submarine as a getaway vehicle. Yep, that's a fact. We also look at what kinds of societal forces were at play at the time of the crime, from legal injustices to the ethics of body snatching, to see what, if anything, might look different through today's perspective. And be sure to tune in at the end of each episode as we indulge in custom-made cocktails and mocktails inspired by the stories. There's one for every story we tell.

Listen to Criminalia on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. We're back. Partide's not around anymore, so I guess we probably shouldn't have a blanket band on South African sponsors. But you know. Those guys are still doing. I would say whoever the sponsor is, high chance some South African racist has a stake in that company.

There's a very good old British song, I've Never Met a Nice South African, that gets into some of these issues. So Oprah is incredibly integral to the design of this school. She is not just, this is not just a case for good and for ill. Oprah is not just somebody who like throws money at a problem to like have her name attached to it. This is a personal focus and she pours hundreds of hours of her own personal labor into making this school.

I want to quote from an article on Forbes. Winfrey severed ties with the state and decided to go it alone, hiring the architects behind Johannesburg's famous apartheid museum. She donned jeans and a hard hat and oversaw every aspect of construction. She thought of the little things, the tubs of umbrellas outside each building, for use during South Africa's rainy season, when it pours almost nonstop for 40 days. Their green, her favorite color, to match the girls' uniforms. At the school's first convocation, Winfrey took the stage to address the girls and their relatives, bussed in from across

South Africa. For many years, people always asked me why didn't I have children, she told the crowd. Now I know." And you know, that's largely good, but you can also see a little weird. Although again, in a very sympathetic way, Oprah is by this point very rich, and being very rich also means you're coming increasingly unhinged as you age. Some of the evidence for that is that in addition to the stuff that is pretty fine, like, okay, yeah, give them green umbrellas because that's your favorite color, whatever, you're paying

for it, that's your right. During the big opening event for the school, because they're having a bunch of celebrities Nelson Mandela and like Diane Sawyer Are showing up she has the groundskeeper because it's during the dry season. She has the groundskeepers paint the yellow grass green Which is Again, not evil just kind of like oh, yeah, that's the kind of thing you get to do and you have Oprah money Yeah, and the kind of thing you get to do when you have Oprah money. Yeah. And the kind of thing you worry about. It's just like, I guess. Yeah.

The school's not going to look good enough if the grass is yellow. Now, Oprah has to date spent more than $100 million on both the school. This is initially, I think, supposed to be like a $6 million project. It balloons to $40 million. And again, she's paid over like $100 million at this point. So for one thing you cannot falter for is dedication. This is not something she is casual about. This is not something where she was just kind of like siphoning some money off for a tax

break. She's personally involved in this. And this school has provided an excellent education for a lot of, I think a couple hundred girls have graduated at this point. And Winfrey is also committed to pay for the secondary education of any girl who graduates from this school, which is where a lot of the cost comes from. She's not just paying for this school, she's paying for these kids to go to college. And in fact, recently the first of these girls received a PhD.

Oprah showed up at her graduation ceremony. And this is good. This is broadly speaking, a thing that has done good. This is, broadly speaking, a thing that has done good. There are valid criticisms of it, like the fact that Oprah's focus on luxury means that this one school, which again has only graduated a couple hundred girls, could have paid for a lot more schools that had a similar educational quality, if not for some of the expensive things that are largely a result of Oprah's sort of...focuses. An article on the school in Reuters notes, Action Aid, a global development group, said

the school exposes the stark disparities in South Africa's education system, still haunted by the legacy of apartheid, and is an insult to millions of poor children worldwide wanting a decent education. And that is harsh, but there's a segment from Forbes Africa, based on an interview with Sam Blake, the director of operations, that does kind of back that up. Quote, why were the girls sleeping on 200 thread count sheets? Why were there chandeliers hanging from the library ceiling and brightly colored mosaic tile pillars outside of the cafeteria?

Blake grimaces when he's reminded of those early articles. When you walk into a beautiful place, you think better of yourself, he explains simply." Again, I don't know that you would call, I don't think it would be right to call that evil, but it is like, this is what you get when you have a very serious problem and somebody who is not an expert on education, but has several billion dollars goes in to fix it. You can sometimes get a good thing to happen. And I think overall the school is a good thing, but it's so much more expensive than it needs to be.

And a lot more girls could be helped if, for example, that money had been like, like if overpaid correct taxes and then went into the education system. And since she's not South African, I think more to the point, if that money, if that 100 million had been handed to a group of actual education experts in order to build a system to improve educational quality for underprivileged kids in South Africa, probably would have helped a lot more kids, right? And that's not bastardism, right?

Any more than you're not a bastard if you ordered takeout last night. That's like a waste of money, right? But like it helps kids. It's just an, it's an example of like what's problematic about even good billionaire charity. Yeah. It's the same reason like Batman is a bastard because Batmanning is by far the least effective use

of your billions to keep crime down. Yeah. Like it's vanity. And it's just like, it's not bastard-y, but it's like, come on, how dumb are you? Evidence of like, yeah, we really ought to just tax these people a hell of a lot more so they can't exist as billionaires. But anyway, moving on. When it comes to this school, what it's most famous for outside of South Africa is the

allegations that have come out from within it that are problematic. And those, yeah, I'm just going to list what's happened. So within months of the school opening, there were allegations that the matron of the dormitory, of the dormitories for the kids, Tiny Makopo is her name, had attempted to kiss and fondle as many as six teenage girls at the academy. Now, Oprah acted very quickly. As far as I can tell, as soon as evidence came out, there are allegations that she tried

to hide it before it came out. I haven't seen anything that actually backs those up. What I have seen looks like she acted as quickly as possible. Who knows if there's stuff that's not public, but that just seems to be people at this point kinda talking shit. She acts very quickly. She fires Makopo.

I should also say Makopo is tried and is found not guilty three years later. So again, I can't say, I'm not gonna do the Oprah thing and say, she definitely did it. I don't know. I'm not going to do the Oprah thing and say she definitely did it. I don't know. I'm not an expert on this case, right?

The incident does, however, leave a stain on the school that deepens in early 2009 when seven students are expelled for bad behavior that includes sexual harassment of classmates. At around the same time, a 17-year-old student is found with a dead infant child in her handbag. Yeah. And this is like, I think she had a stillbirth or something like that. This is a case of somebody who gets pregnant very young and the baby doesn't make it. And these are all of this stuff. The fact that you have a bunch of the kids there who are abusing other kids.

And the fact that there's these allegations from this teacher, this has led to accusations, and you'll get this a lot in like the QAnon side of things, that Oprah started like a sex abuse factory to molest kids in South Africa. And as a guy who has told stories about schools that were sex abuse factories for the express purpose of allowing certain people to molest children,

I have to tell you, that's not what's happening here. Outlag is a school for underprivileged kids living in a country where the deepest poverty is unimaginable to most Americans. As Winfrey herself said, by the time a girl gets to my school, normally she suffered on average six major life traumas. They've lost a parent or both parents,

multiple accidents, death in your family, AIDS, rape, sexual molestation, all of it. Unimaginable things have happened. Creating an institution where these students are taken in away from their families, I should note you, supported and asked to live together is a huge, messy, complicated thing. There's no way stuff like this wouldn't happen to some extent. So what you have to judge the school on is, did they set up guardrails to make it possible to report this stuff, to make it less likely?

And did they act quickly when evidence came out? And as far as I can tell, more or less, yeah. Again, there's some critiques there. It certainly was not a set up perfectly, but like generally, yeah. Again, there's some critiques there. It certainly was not a set up perfectly, but like generally, yeah, it seems to be the case. Well, this is exactly why I think the point that you two are making a moment ago is so salient because I don't think that Oprah should have been involved

in a school like this to begin with. I think that's the fundamental criticism. Like you cannot take extremely at risk girls who have been living in extreme poverty. It doesn't matter how nice the sheets are or how the chandeliers are. These are going to be girls who probably have problems. And it's like, of course this is the kind of thing is going to happen when they're all taken away from their support systems and their families and all of that. I think it's the pinnacle of narcissism and vanity to be like, oh, well, certainly my money

can foster an environment of safety for these girls. If you care so much, just give the money to people who know what they're doing, who are already doing this. Don't try to set up a school with your name on it. It's one of my biggest pet peeves, people who think like, oh, I've got money and my heart's in the right place, so I'll start my own nonprofit.

It'll be in my image. And it's like, no, people have been doing this. People know what they're doing. There are people who specialize in working with at-risk youth. Give the money to them. Like, don't do it on your own. For all the billionaire classes railing against the inefficiencies of bureaucracy, like, their own vanity and hubris is so much more wasteful and

disgusting and damaging and there's no way to make them see it. I mean part of what like is here it's like there's because I was I was almost gonna say like you know what is the comparison between you know between what happened at the Oprah Academy and a baseline when when you realize there is no baseline, there's nothing to compare this to. Like, nothing like this exists for a good reason. Yep. And I really, there is a thing,

this needs to be studied, wealthy people trying to open schools, like Kanye West doing it. Yeah. Like, there's something, I mean, I say this as a former educator, where when you are an educator, everybody thinks they know how to do your job better than you.

People who have never been in a classroom before, people who have never been involved in education before somehow are all, you know, know exactly what to do. There's something about education that I think makes rich people who got successful in one lane feel like they could open a school or that they know how to do it. It's very frustrating. Well, because it's partially my guess is that like everyone's like, well, I've been to school. I've been a student before. I know what I did.

And that's really where a lot of this comes from with Oprah, where it's like you I had a lot of trauma as a kid. I was abused and like, but also very smart. And I got an opportunity and so I succeeded. So I know how other smart kids that are suffering in like difficult circumstances, I know what they need. And like, no, every kid's different, Oprah. Yeah.

Like, and also you don't fully understand all of the things that helped you because you weren't one of the, you weren't your dad, right? Yeah. Like there's things that, you because you weren't one of the, you weren't your dad, right? Like there's things that just like all of us, we all, and this is part of the process of like reconciling, oh, my parents did this stuff that was fucked up and also realizing, oh my God, I never realized my parents did this thing that was like absolutely crucial in me turning out, like having these positive traits that was, must've been really hard

for them. That's just like Yeah, I don't know how difficult it is. Like oh I was fucked up by this but like you're not aware of the choice That had to be made like yeah, it's a little bit like being like oh I've eaten at a restaurant before therefore I can be a chef like right What the fuck are you talking about? It's just more complicated than that Yeah, and like this should not have been your gig.

You know, every now and then you get one of these, really the only time it's worked is like James Cameron becoming a deep sea explorer, but nearly every other time. I guess she is second, because at least the school is a good school, but. And having, I remember her so viscerally watching the Oprah in Africa specials, and again, like, I remember so viscerally watching the Oprah and Africa specials.

And again, like I want to give her grace because I get it, right? Like it's like the most beautiful, precocious little girls in green uniforms and like smiling ear to ear. And it's shot with that, like, that like filter on it, that everything looks kind of like, you know, like the, like the glazy

filter. It was beautiful. I remember crying. Like I get why this is more why she would rather do this than just send money to somebody who's already doing it. But it goes back to that idea of like the thing that is boring and the kind of like commonplace isn't what you want. You want your name on a school, girls in uniforms lined up smiling from ear to ear. Like that's the thing that gives you the warm fuzzies. Yeah. Well, and also it's like making one perfect school is something you can do. Making a dozen pretty good schools for the same money.

Fixing the system is a lot harder. No, I mean, it's like when I started my summer camp to teach kids how to blow up trains and effectively conduct counterinsur- or insurgent operations, I wanted to teach them, but I had to eventually accept that like, look, I'm not an expert educator, which is why I trained in LLM on Lawrence of Arabia's book, Seven Pillars of Wisdom,

and I've just let that loose on the kids, you know? Now this AI is teaching them everything and it's gonna be fine. Robert, stop trying to recruit for your boy army. They're not all boys. There's a lot of girls, not binary kids. Look, we don't discriminate as long as you're willing to man. What?

Wrap it up. If your fingers are nimble enough to get into the little grenade pins, your finger, you're it. Exactly. If you know how to mix gel ignite, I don't care about anything else. Just like the, no, okay, we should probably stop at this point.

Anderson says stop. Also, are you preparing to wrap the part? God willing. Great. So there are some valid complaints about the school. Parents have voiced frustration that their time to see their children is unfairly curtailed. Restrictive rules for kids have been compared to some as prison-like.

An article for the Atlanta Black Star notes, there's also the recent firing of the former head of operations, Simon Metico, after one year was reported in December of 2023. Court documents reveal complaints about abuse of authority, intimidation, and victimization, as well as the mistreatment of learners. Matiko alleges he was fired for his non-performance during private arbitration at the school. Further investigation found other employees who voiced their difficulty with management. One said, working under pressure, threats, and other issues. We don't discuss issues with our management as we fear we will lose our jobs as we are

not given clarity or relevant answers. Another said, Outlag used to be a place where one contributed more than required because there was a culture of working together, listening and respecting professional opinions. That has changed. There is a culture of distrust and fear. And I don't know the perfect reality here, but again, I think we've litigated this more than enough.

The broader problem here is that like the issue of rich people launching into crusades to fix major problems without knowing much about them. And that's an issue that goes right to the top of this country. And probably the best example of Oprah contributing to this in a really toxic way, because ALAG at least has given a couple hundred kids a very good education. Probably the best example of her diving into something she was not really competent to handle that had a toxic knock on effects is her support of orphanages in Haiti. She has, there's one specific orphanage that she's devoted a massive amount of attention

and money towards. And this is an orphanage that was started by an American family to protect and shelter some of Haiti's hundreds of thousands of orphan kids after a massive earthquake. Oprah has repeatedly highlighted and supported the work of missionaries operating adoption services to help these orphan kids get connected to people who will adopt them and bring them over generally

to the United States. That sounds great. Unproblematic. What could be bad about supporting an orphanage? This is where we get to talk about the problems with the international adoption industry. And largely the problems of the international adoption industry is that it is an industry that profits off of facilitating the adoption of, in this case, poor black children by white foreigners with money.

In many cases, who are more interested in converting the child to their specific brand of Christianity or showing the child off to their friends than raising a traumatized child. Now, to make this even worse, many, if not most of these orphans aren't actual orphans. Yes. Jesus. many if not most of these orphans aren't actual orphans. Yes. Jesus. After the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, the number of orphanages in the country more than doubled

from 200 to 752 by 2013. Now, Oprah was just one of the media figures making documentaries about these generally operated by foreigners orphanages. And really it's one of these like these heroic white missionaries coming to this dangerous place and really risking themselves in order to help these poor, underprivileged kids. Oprah is again not the only person doing this, but her sheer popularity gives her an outsized

role in making this a popular cause. At least 30,000 children wound up in Haitian orphanages, and about 80% of those 30,000 kids had one living parent at least, from CNN. Quote, unable to sustain their children's wellbeing, these parents are persuaded to relinquish them to privately run orphanages that promise the children will receive shelter, food, and education. This is often not the outcome.

Instead, the children living in Haiti's orphanages face exploitation and trafficking unintentionally funded by foreign donors. Jamie Vernalde of Lumos, an NGO advocating for the institutionalization of children, says this, this orphanage business where orphanages are established and recruit children to raise donations from foreigners is becoming increasingly recognized globally as a form of trafficking. These Haitian orphanages employ people called child finders who seek out struggling families

and bribe them for their children. The going rate is around $75. The money to pay these child finders to bribe families for their kids comes from the hundred million dollars a year in mostly faith-based donations sent to these orphanages. This is a much larger issue than Oprah, but she plays a significant role in it and this whole period of time she's running all of these teary stories praising missionaries who take children away from Haiti and actively defends a system that is desperately broken. A good example of this comes in February of 2010. A group of 10 Baptists, mostly from Idaho,

were arrested in Haiti with 33 children who were absolutely not related to them. When confronted by authorities, these Baptists assured them the kids were all orphans being taken to loving homes in the United States. The Haitian authorities looked into this for three seconds and realized, no, they had no permission to be doing this and also a lot of those children were in fact not orphans. Here's how CNN describes the way those kids wound up

in the care of missionaries. Most of the children appear to be from Cabelas. Parents there told the Associated Press they had surrendered their children on January 28th, two days after a local orphanage worker acting on behalf of the Baptists, convened nearly the entire village of about 500 people on a dirt soccer pitch to present the Americans' offer. The orphanage worker, Isaac Adrian, said he told the villagers their children would be educated at a home in the Dominican Republic so that they might eventually return to take care of their families. Many parents jumped at the offer. The village school had collapsed and their homes were destroyed at Haiti's catastrophic January 12th quake.

They had no money to feed the children, they said. It's it's truly like, you know, you said earlier, but it's like. They're looking for child trafficking. Here it is. They just don't like it because it's Christians. Yeah, yeah, because this is the child trafficking. Now, it is unclear to me how much the American missionaries and their leader, Laura Silsby, knew about what the Haitian parents had been told. Laura had met the child finder who got them these kids two days earlier, and it's possible

he did the bulk of the lying. When questioned by authorities and the news later, Silsby and the missionaries insisted the kids had all been handed over by distant relatives who were frightened the kids might starve to death. Now that's their side of events. The child finder, Adrian, for his part says he had no idea that the entire point Silsby and the Americans were in Haiti for was to take children back to the United States. He thought they were trying to take them to an orphanage in the Dominican where their families would still have access to them and be able to get them back at some point when

conditions were better. And I tend to think he may be the one telling the truth because of lines like this from that IP article. The parents of four children taken by Silsby said the Americans took down contact information for all the families and assured them that a relative would be able to visit them in the Dominican Republic. So again, when questioned by authorities, Silsby and the missionaries are like, oh, distant relatives handed them over because obviously they don't have parents. When questioned, the parents say,

no, no, no, like they gave us, they took our contact info and said we'd be able to visit their kids. They were just going over the Dominican Republic. So if that's true, this really does sound like child theft, uh, on behalf of the missionaries and Silsby. Now, I'm going to spoil the end and say everybody but Silsby gets off scot-free, although thankfully not with the kids. Silsby did do time in Haitian jail, but it was essentially knocked down to like a misdemeanor basically,

even though the evidence I think might suggest something more nefarious. NPR dug into Laura Silsby and described her in an article as a woman who found, a woman who arguably found a lot of society's rules optional. Silsby lied, both in interviews and to the Haitian government about having proper paperwork. Back home she ran a personal shopping internet business and was being actively pursued by creditors for failing to pay her employees or any of the other people she owed money. Despite this, Silsby convinced her church

that she was in the process of putting together a Shangri-La in Idaho for the lucky Haitian kid she was about to rescue. The Wall Street Journal writes, "'Ms. Silsby and Ms. Coulter traveled to the Dominican Republic and Haiti last July and late last year. They were laying the groundwork then for opening an orphanage, said Mel Coulter, Ms. Coulter's father.

They coordinated with people who they thought weren't handling necessary details and running interference for them, he said. So they thought they had everything they needed in documentation, Mr. Coulter said. Ms. Silsby had an equally grand ambition greater to home, according to a local builder. The Idaho plan called for a multi-million dollar complex for runaway children on a 40-acre lot in Kuna County, Idaho, according to Eric Evans,

owner of Evans Construction in Meridian. Ms. Silsby told him it would have an indoor swimming pool, tennis courts, and dormitories for the children, said Mr. Evans, adding that she had discussed having him build the project. Ms. Silsby's mother said that she had never heard of any such plan. Oof.

I have to say, as someone who grew up in the church, so I can say this, you can get like church folk to hand over money and believe anything. Like if you're like, I, oof. Yeah. Now, to get back to where you're like, I, ooh. Yeah. Now, to get back to where Oprah is involved, I'm not reading this for no reason. Oprah and her website and O magazine,

Oprah goes to bat for these specific missionaries, writing very, having very sympathetic articles written, doing features on how these people are, they're just trying to help. They got caught up in this corrupt government and it's just a big misunderstanding. But like these people are, they're just trying to help. They got caught up in this corrupt government and it's just a big misunderstanding. But like these people are really good people trying to help, you know?

Here's a quote from Oprah's write-up, the Oprah.com write-up, I should say. Jim said he traveled with his group to a number of orphanages around Port-au-Prince. During those visits, Jim says they were introduced to children who were said to have no home or parents to go home to. He says one of the orphanage directors asked if they could take the children to try to help them.

As we got their name and birth dates, we wrote those down and they got on our bus and we started taking care of them basically, he says. The plan, he says, was to take the children to a restored hotel in the Dominican Republic that had been set up as an orphanage. Now, maybe Jim is unaware, but as we know from Sillsby's account, she was not planning to take these kids to the Dominican Republic. And also a lot of the parents say,

no, it wasn't an orphanage director that handed them over, they got them from us, right? The closest we get to scrutiny of any of this in that Oprah.com article is this paragraph. Since the story broke, there have been allegations in the media that the group leader, Laura Sillsby, intended to make a profit on the children

by charging large fees to get them placed. Jim says he doesn't know anything about those claims. I hope that not. Come on. Open and shut case, that one. Open and shut case. And I know Sophie's fuming right now because this has gone very long,

but that is the end of the episode. I just felt we had to, we really had to end this one on the Haitian orphanages. Makes sense. Thanks, man. Yeah. Oh, Oprah, why'd you get mixed up with these people? Why indeed.

And we have one more part left, don't we, Robert? We sure do. We have a sixth parter. There are still 10 pages left in the script which has finally come down to 24,468 words. Oh. That's like a novel. It's half of what is generally considered to be the length of like a book right 50,000 is like kind of the cutoff now that said I don't want to make it out to like I wrote half of a nonfiction book here.

I'm taking other people's original reporting and like chopping it up and remixing it. That's what a lot of this is, is oh, here's three different accounts of this thing. Well, I'm going to tell you the similarities and the differences between them. Here's different attitudes these different people have about stuff, right?

Like I'm not doing, I didn't go to Port-au-Prince. I didn't do the original reporting on this kind of stuff. But this is one of the longest scripts we've ever done. This is a Kissinger-linked script. It's wild. How are we all feeling? Oh, I'm honored to be part of this like mega episode. This really is just, I mean, at least now we're really getting into like,

having gotten the early biography out of the way, it's like, oh, Jesus Christ. This is fucking horrible. Yeah, yeah. This is the behind the bastards I'm used to. I still think it has like, I don't know, find it's so weird. I find myself rooting for her I would I hear the thing about like the Haiti thing. I'm like damn. I I was rooting for you Oprah I wanted to be the voice of like no guys. It's really complex and nuanced, but here's shit like that And it's hard to say that yeah, yep

Alright everybody well. This has been behind the bastards you guys guys want to plug your plugables before we roll out here? Yeah, you can listen to my podcast on I Heart Radio called There Are No Girls on the Internet. Check it out. And you can follow me on Instagram at Bridget Marie in D.C. My podcast is Joe's Is Racist. I don't know. Do it. Do whatever you want. People have been finding me on Blue Sky. Yeah. Nice. Find Andrew on Blue Sky, you know, stalk him a little bit.

Send him pictures of your food and see if he'll send you pictures of his food. They did. Oh, well great. That might've been off a daily like ice appearance, but definitely someone did. Excellent. All right, everybody.

Go to hell. I love you. Behind the Bastards is a production of Cool Zone Media. For more from Cool Zone Media, visit our website, coolzonemedia.com. Or check us out on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Behind the Bastards is now available on YouTube. New episodes every Wednesday and Friday. Subscribe to our channel, youtube.com slash at Behind the Bastards.

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