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

Episode Date: January 21, 2025

Oprah's career is on the move now, and Robert tells the gang about her coke filled early years in local TV, her rise to stardom and how she helped spark the Satanic Panic.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Callzone Media Welcome back to Behind the Bastards. We're on page 18 of 52. I know. A podcast where Robert Evans accidentally wrote almost 24,000 words about Oprah for these episodes. Jesus fuck, Robert. The normal length of a book is 50,000 words. So half of a book about fucking Oprah. And like, I was having panic attacks at the end of this of like, oh my God, I'm leaving so much out. I'm leaving so much from like this, this, this really

good book, Age of Oprah out. Cause like, I just don't even know how to like fit everything in, but I have to start this episode with our wonderful guests. the inimitable Bridget Todd and the glorious sainted, I don't know, Andrew T. I'm trying to think of new adjectives to praise y'all with as we come in. What do you have to do to become a saint? What's a saint? Do I have to die?

I think you actually have to die. No, you don't, no, you don't. I think you don't have to die. I'm down. You're probably okay. Just let me know, I'm down. Bridget, you could also, but I'm not I just don't get major Catholic vibes from you. Oh I actually did go to Catholic school. Oh you did Okay, I'm gonna I'm gonna redirect the the habit that I've got headed for Andrew and it's gonna go to you You have to sorry, you're not saying to me anymore. You have to you know live virtuously

You have to die for the faith. saying to you have to you have to you know live virtuously You have to die for the faith so like you have to martyr perform miracles He's performed a miracle. I don't know if all of these are required at once I think there's every everyone who's made it on time for behind the bastards recordings and that sat through a whole episode as a guest Has performed a miracle I? But yeah recordings and sat through a whole episode as a guest has performed a miracle. I was going to say it has been a martyr, but yeah. My most miraculous thing since we're doing video is I'm holding up my favorite coffee cup. Wow, I love that. You didn't get by chance to buy that in Maryland, did you?

That's giving me big Maryland vibes. I'm sure it's from Maryland. Maine. Oh, they have, they do out there, too, no? Not good. Oh, could they? I can't imagine. I'm thinking lobster and getting my crustaceans.

It's so hardcore lobster territory. I don't know if lobsters and crabs fight. Sorry for we're already over. We were the whole discussion has been how long this is going to be. And I just tried to figure out if there's crabs in Maine. Yeah. Listen, listen. Oh, there's for sure crabs in Maine. They've got lobster at McDonald's in Maine.

Part that's my whole point. Part three seems normal. Part four is. I there's there's there's no logic to the number of parts. This might may wind up more episodes than we thought. I have to start with something, which is a mea culpa. I made some mistakes in the last episodes, guys. Tell us. Oh, nice.

I'm so, so sorry. So here's the thing. When you're doing a podcast like this, like it's a mix of you do a bunch of research and you write a bunch of things to get a bunch of facts out that are as accurate as you can, but you're also having a conversation. So you do stuff like,

oh, I'm bringing up the biblical story of Ruth. I don't know much about Ruth. I only included it in the episode to make a bad joke about Star Wars, the Phantom Menace. And so I made a comment about, I don't know, I think she's got something to do with Moses. She does not. And all of the Bible people got onto me for that one. And I'm sorry. What? How big a part of your audience is the Bible people?

A shockingly large number of. Well, I think it's because we have a lot of like ex-vangelicals in the audience. Yeah. A lot of people who were raised evangelical. Yeah. And then got better. I'm just going to throw this out there. That wasn't an error. That was a fucking dork trap and they all fell into it the same the same cannot be said for my heinous and unforgivable comments about the March of dimes because

I made a comment that like I don't know I guess it's probably a cancer charity and then a bunch of people popped in being like no It's for this and then other people were like actually when Oprah was a kid. It didn't do that It was a for a completely different thing so we're all wrong Although again it had nothing to do with cancer So I was wrongest but like you guys were wrong to most of you who criticized me because it wasn't about that then so fuck You I love you. I'm sorry. What is it for I it's it's right now. I think it's for like let's look up the March of Times Let's get it right this time. Is it premature for like let's look up the March of Dimes

Yeah immature babies, but it was like about polio before that and then I Try to correct Robert that is my motherfucking job the health of mothers and babies, right? I'll just throw this out there Robert Robert is never wrong. He's perfect Yeah, I never like you know stuff during like one of the things you learn about yourself Yeah, I never like say stuff during like one of the things you learn about yourself During doing this is like how often in daily conversation and we all do this You just like say things that are a part of your understanding of the world that are not right Because that's like life. We all pick up a bunch of bullshit like the number of times I just don't think you should have to apologize right now. I I take that burden from you But he's innocent all I'm saying is record everything you've ever you ever say in a single day of

Conversations with people and then run them by a fact-checker and you will be amazed at how much of like the load-bearing Pillars of your reality are things you absolutely believe without thinking that are not true. It's amazing. It's the worst part of being a podcaster is like having a public record of stupid shit that you thought, or if you're me, shit that you thought was pronounced one way and it's pronounced another way.

The pronunciation, like, so for this episode, I spent almost three hours looking at Oprah's, one of her charity's tax returns. None of that made it into the episode. Turned out not to be interesting. But you know what I didn't remember to do was look up whether or not Ruth had anything to fucking do with Moses.

Like, I, I just don't. I think you just you're you're doing great, pal. I fail to see how this is a problem. I think also I just wanted to jump in March of Dimes previous Polio charity. The way things are going, they might need to go back. I know, again, I love Polio and I feel like, because we got a lot of my favorite writers from Polio.

Once again, Robert wrote 52 pages. Okay, let's get into this. John Stewart is back in the host chair at The Daily Show, which means he's also back in our ears on The Daily Show Ears Edition podcast. Join late night legend, John Stewart and the best news team for today's biggest headlines, exclusive extended interviews and more. Now this is a second term. We can all get behind. Listen to The Daily Show, Ears Edition on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your

podcasts. Lauren Bright-Pacheco Hey listeners, I'm Lauren Bright-Pacheco, host of the Murder on Songbird Road podcast, and I'm excited to share this riveting story with you. I'm also excited to tell you that you can now get access to all episodes of Murder on Songbird Road, 100% ad-free and one week early through the iHeart True Crime Plus subscription, available exclusively on Apple podcasts. Plus, you'll get access to other chart-topping true crime shows you love, like Betrayal, The Girlfriends, Paper Ghosts, Murder Homes, Unrestorable, The Godmother, and more. So don't wait. Head to Apple Podcasts, search for iHeartTrueCrime Plus, and subscribe today.

Maria Tremorchi Welcome to the Criminalia Podcast. I'm Maria Tremorchi. Holly Frye And I'm Holly Frye. Together, we invite you into the dark and winding corridors of historical true crime. Maria Tremorchi 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 happened. 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. So when we left off, Oprah had gotten her first radio gig with a radio DJ who was surprisingly not problematic. John Heidelberg, people online have been pointing out other stuff about him, apparently fine.

So congratulations, John Heidelberg. When we're talking about DJs being problematic, I'm talking about old timey radio DJs. Because if you look into the history of very famous old-timey radio DJs, not a lot of them were great people, but apparently John was. So good for you, John Heidelberg. You win our Behind the Bastards Award for not being a sex best as a DJ in the 1970s. You're the only person who's won that award, by the way. Yeah, that's got to be a club of one.

Yeah, that is a club of one. You are the loneliest man in history. So the next several years of Oprah's life involved a pretty boring time in college We're not gonna get into it But she starts doing beauty contests and she's very good at beauty contests One of the biggest moments in her early life is she wins the Miss Fire prevention contest Now I Know what you're all saying. What the fuck is misfire prevention?

And to understand this, you have to know that back in the 1970s, everything was flammable. People only wore petroleum products. Every couch was made out of petroleum products and everyone fell asleep with a lit cigarette in their mouth. So everything and everyone was constantly on fire. Yeah, so this was a real problem. Also, everyone was on Benzos. So you would, it was like every week in your neighborhood,

either a drunk day labor, like either the husband would come home from like his work in a fucking law factory and pass out drunk with a cigarette in his mouth and wipe out the entire family. Or the housewife would take too many Benzos and pass out with a lit cigarette in her mouth and wipe out the whole family. But either whatever was happening,

fire was killing absolutely everyone. And so we were like, we have to find the hottest person in order to represent not burning your family to death because you fell asleep with a lit cigarette in your mouth and Oprah was that person isn't that nice fun fact about that that's why we have like flame retardant couches now because the cigarette industry was like we can't keep getting popped for this we're fine with killing people so many other ways but all these house fires are really cutting into our business.

Please tell me the first fire-retarded couches were just made of asbestos. It probably was. God, I'd better go for a nice asbestos couch. To know that I'm both sitting down on the couch to watch horrible news happen and also shortening my time on this earth. Beautiful. Oprah was the first black woman to win the Miss Fire Prevention Contest. And that's great.

During questioning by a panel of judges, she said that she wanted to be a journalist like Barbara Walters. She was asked what she would do if she was given a million dollars. And everyone else in the contest expressed kind of like, I'll help the poor. I'll help my family. Whereas Oprah just admitted, I would spin, spin, spin. I'd just be a spinden fool. Awesome. Actually, love that. Yeah be a spinden fool. Awesome.

Actually, love that. Yeah, you gotta respect that. Like, when I grew up poor as shit, I would spend it. Ha ha ha. Now, this was definitely a legitimate win, Miss Fire Prevention. However, her next big contest win, the Miss Black Nashville contest,

was a little bit shadier. Everyone involved about it seems to agree that another girl, Maude, had been a better contestant, but Oprah shocked everyone by winning and the promoter of the event would later claim that several people complained to him and so he did a recount of the votes and found out that Maude had in fact been the rightful winner, but her name had gotten switched with Oprah's by somebody for unknown reasons. Yes. Now, we don't know what happened.

Some people have theorized Oprah set the whole thing up somehow. I think there's at least an equally good probability based on just like the vibes I get that the promoter of the event kind of had a weird thing for Oprah. His name was Gordon L. Greco Brown and I don't trust that name. I just don't trust that name. I just don't trust that name. Like, that is the name of like a used card dealer from fucking Encina who also happens to be a neo-Nazi.

I'm not saying that's Gordon El Greco Brown, I'm just saying that's the name Gordon El, that's what that conjures. Gordon L, like the letter L? El Greco Brown. El Greco, so he's Gordon Gecko, El Brown. Yeah, yeah. That man has so many different opinions

on the various Coke dealers in his area that he has to keep track of them in a notebook. Anyway, when Oprah was notified, I'm not saying that about the literal, I'm not slandering the actual man, I'm just saying that's how his name sounds. Anyway, Oprah gets notified of this error that Maude really won and she says like well fuck it. You guys gave me the award I'm not giving it back

In kitty Kelly's kind of mean biography a lot is made about the fact that Oprah like doesn't give this up And I don't know. I don't really care Like you handed her the award so she's not wrong to be like, fuck you guys. Oprah goes to Tennessee State University or TSU, which is a black college. But she doesn't go to the more prestigious and nearby Fisk University, known locally as the Black Harvard. I think this is just a matter of expense. Oprah seems to be insecure about this later.

She spends her social time hanging out at Fisk. Her dad is like, look, I could afford to send her to TSU and so I did. I will say, because Kitty Kelly makes a lot about like, yeah, Oprah couldn't get into the good school. She couldn't hack it. I've read from the anecdotes we get about TSU, it doesn't sound great. There's a good one from one of her professors, Dr. W.D. Cox.

This is what this guide, Dr. Cox, this actual professor says later about teaching Oprah. I think he thinks this makes him sound funny. During our stay in the city, a girl was reported raped on the second floor I told a lie on Oprah if Oprah had known about the rape she'd have shouted you who I'm up here Oprah didn't take too kindly to that joke. She was quite provoked you guys catch that He is saying a girl got raped and I said hey Oprah you would like that That's the talking about this decades later being like, can you believe she didn't find it funny?

That's nuts. That's insane. You just know somebody laughed at him though, and he didn't like encourage that shit. Maybe, or the whole, like, I don't know what things were like in the 70s. Don't laugh at men's jokes that aren't funny. Just don't.

You should get fired for that. I mean, period. Period, yeah. Like, the whole joke is I bet you'd like get, like that's wild stuff. And it's wild to me that he like, even in retelling that he's like, and she didn't even find it funny.

She wasn't amused, can you believe it? He describes it as enjoying a little foolishness at Oprah's expense. Oh, he's still going. That's not what that is. A little foolishness would be like, you know, talking about, I don't know, the fact that she's obviously wants to be a star,

making a little bit of joke about how she likes attention. Not like that, this is not that. Yeah. Like. And this dude has been holding onto that joke for, presumably. Yes, he tells this to Kitty Kelly in 2010. The decades.

Jesus. 2010. Jesus Christ. Oh man, you just know, I'm guessing based on his age, that she goes to see him in an old folks home and his fucking kids come in, they're like, oh no, get her out of here. We can't let dad be talking to a journalist. Oh my god. So Oprah, the big standout detail from her college years is she plays Coretta Scott King

in a local production of the tragedy of Martin Luther King Jr. And the main reason this is relevant is that a reviewer for the school paper reviews this play by saying Martin Luther King murdered twice. Cold! I do love how bitchy that is. That's good. Like, holy shit. Imagine, cause he had to have sat with that review title

just being like, I can't say this, can I? I'm so glad he went for it. Fuck it, I'm doing it. Near the end of 1972, Oprah gets her first TV gig when her boss at WVOL called a local TV station WTVF TV and told them that he had a girl who was interested in broadcasting. This was during a period where the FCC had just introduced diversity requirements for on-air talent and Oprah was hired quickly. She generally describes this as an affirmative action hire.

Again, the guy who hires her is like, no, she was the best qualified candidate. You know, I don't know. Either way, it doesn't really matter because this proves to be a very good hiring decision. The truth, Oprah was a skilled performer and had experience both on the radio and as a pageant winner. That said, she was hired to be a journalist, which she had no experience doing, and she winds up reporting on City Hall.

She cheerfully admitted as soon as she starts the job, she tells all her coworkers, I lied during my interview. I don't know how to do this job. Like her first day, she tells the crew, I don't know what I'm doing. Please help me because like I told the director I understood how to do this job.

And it's a remark, it's a mark of her charisma that everyone on the crew is like, well, yeah, okay. That's kind of nice. Yeah. Like what a, it's not even a Hail Mary, but what do you like high variants play? The, hey, by the way, what's up? How do you do this job?

I mean, that is how entertainment works, right? Like everyone I know in this industry has a story of like, yeah, I talked myself into a room that I probably didn't have the right to be in, and then it worked out. Oh, that part, yes. The B side of admitting it, I would say a lot less. Yeah.

Again, we're about to get into all of the horrible things Oprah's been involved in. But one thing that I do consistently admire about her is that she doesn't dress up this aspect of her life. She's like, yeah, man, I lied, cheated, and stole until I could be on TV. I mean, I have to say, that is how I.

Which is everyone who gets famous on TV. You know, I mean, I think that's how everyone who gets famous on TV, right? Yeah. I got my first podcast job lying about knowing Final Cut Pro, and then I had to like go on YouTube and learn how to use Pro. Yes.

That's how look, kids, if you're looking at getting entertained into entertainment, get good at lying because that's the job. Oprah experienced this is an uncomfortable transition, but a lot of racism on the job. A large part of it was like she's the first black on-air talent that they have.

She winds up interviewing a lot of people who they see a black journalist and just start calling her slurs to her face. She won awards, though. She won awards though. She's very ambitious. Her colleagues, that's the primary thing her colleagues from this period remember about her is that Oprah is a climber. She is somebody who is like crawling up to the top, right?

At one point she takes over for a producer who like she gets on set, he's clearly doesn't know what he's doing for this black history week, and she directs the entire segment herself. She is also, by everyone's admission, doing hella drugs during this period. Although everyone at the TV station is doing hella drugs. This is a local TV station in the 70s. I want to read a paragraph from the book Oprah, a biography based on a conversation with her former colleague, Patty Outlaw. It was just nuts working at that station. Drugs, drugs, drugs all the time, drugs all over the place. They were even selling window panes

of LSD in the hall. Drugs were so prevalent that the new staff gave Vic Mason, Oprah's co-anchor, a Coke spoon as a gift. Chris and I looked the other way, said Jimmy Norton, who confirmed that station management removed a vending machine once they discovered It had been rigged to dispense marijuana That sounds pretty cool In Chicago where was this? Yeah, no, no, they're not even in I think they're in that. Yeah, they're in Nashville national Yeah, they're in Nashville still

She does move it up to the big leagues pretty quickly, but she doesn't go straight to Chicago after a few years in Nashville She gets a job in Baltimore She's not really happy there even though this is a big step up Baltimore Obviously being a bigger city because she feels like she's on a ticking timer, right? But like by the time her attitude is like by the time I'm 24 I have to be where I want to be because then I'm like too old and washed up, which you know, that's the, that's the way a lot of people feel. That's the way TV is for a lot of women, unfortunately, but like it's certainly not going to be that

way for Oprah. Baltimore turns out to be a disaster though. The longtime anchorman for the station, who she is made to be like the co-anchor hates her. Uh, and she's not really experienced the co-anchor, hates her. She's not really experienced enough. He's been doing it for decades. She doesn't really know what she's doing yet, so she very quickly gets demoted, but she's still on contract. It's one of those things where she's getting a lot of money, but she's basically not doing the job that she got hired to do. She's instead getting all these terrible little human interest stories that she considers

beneath her. This is a frustrating period, but her saving grace is always her ambition. During that denied advancement at the station, she starts performing at churches, schools, and different black community spaces, building a fan base locally the hard way. She also has a series of interracial relationships while she is working at the station, which is noteworthy because that is not a common thing at the time. And the fact that she is dating white guys

in her personal life becomes public news. A bunch of local white radio DJs make it like a reoccurring thing that they talk about on the air. Like Oprah is dating. I don't just bring that up to be like, wow, and it's like, no, no, no, this is like, she has to deal with this being part of like local news. Can I say something?

Because I do think it highlights how unequal the playing fields are for black women in media. I mean, black women across the spectrum of any profession, but like local radio DJs, so people who ostensibly are also colleagues or also in media making it a joke segment about who she is dating romantically, privately, like that, having to contend with that on top of having to do your job with all these eyes on you, I mean, like it's completely ridiculous.

Yeah. Yeah. Like it's, it's nuts. And like for an example of how fucking insane it is One of these local radio DJs described she's dating like a Jewish Reporter, right who works at a competing station one of these guys on the radio Describes their relationship as Omar Sharif is dating Aunt Jemima Jesus Christ. Oh Boy, you should just explode when you say something like that.

So she had always been something of a binge eater, largely as a response to stress. And as is probably not surprising, the stress of being in the public eye and having all of this shit about you be public discussion causes that to be even more of a problem. In 1977, she starts paying a diet doctor to help her drop weight for the first time, and she starts attending over-readers anonymous courses. A mixture of stress and starving herself causes her hair to fall out. Or at least, that's one story. Oprah later is going to insist that she lost her hair because executives at the station

demanded that she go to New York for a French hairdresser to quote, make me a Puerto Rican by bleaching her skin and changing her hair. I don't know the like, because you get these two different versions of how she loses her hair. It's very hard to say what the truth is. The news producer is like the company didn't have the budget to send her to New York. She also claims that the former news director tries to get her to change her name to Suzy. He denies this. I don't know. It's all a little muddled. It doesn't, I don't know how much like where the truth lies here super matters, right?

There's definitely some stuff that she's like exaggerating, but she's also like literally people are talking about her relationships on the air in a very racist way So like I don't know I I I feel like you get the general gist which is that she isn't an incredibly stressful and unfair Situation here at work. Yeah. Yeah, like the public record is like even if she's straight-up lying about literally Yeah, like here say like who cares? Yeah, right, right. That's kind of where I land on this. That said, I will say the station allows her to work her way, she is not locked out of moving back up and she works her way back up to reporting the news over the next couple

of years in Baltimore. In fact, she rebuilds her reputation with her bosses well enough that in 1977, the new station manager, William Baker, gives her the big break that is going to lead her to the position of kind of impossible wealth and cultural power that she's going to attain. He had been brought on to the station after creating in another station, a morning talk show called Morning Exchange. His job was to do the same thing for Baltimore. Morning shows are a new concept. This is the guy playing a video game while ranting about politics on a stream of 1977.

People waking up in the morning to see one to two charming, handsome people talk about bullshit while you get the kids' breakfasts ready. It's the hottest new thing in entertainment. Phil Donahue had helped to kick off the trend of talk shows in 1968. His show, which was just named Donahue, had become the most popular thing on television. Morning shows were a refinement of this idea. You generally have a male host and a female co-host. This is how you lock in viewers who are either getting ready for work or stay at home moms

starting their day. Baker's wife, Jean-Marie, was the one who recommended Oprah to be the female co-host of this new morning show. Apparently at some sort of work event she sees Winfrey and she says to her husband, that's your host. Baker listens to his wife, which proves to be a wise decision because for whatever, I mean, there's a number of reasons, but tens of millions of American women feel the exact same way that the first time they see Oprah, like, oh yeah, this is somebody I want to

watch every morning. Right? So Jean-Marie was definitely keyed into something there. Oprah does not like that she's been picked for this job. She's horrified at first actually, because in her attitude, she sees this as another demotion, right? She had been a co-anchor and then kicked down to doing these human interests kind of like, oh, there's a new... It's the kind of stuff they make fun of at Anchorman, right?

There's a new puppy parade or some bullshit. And she's like, that's this, this is like fluff. I wanna be doing like, I think that the, I wanna be Barbara Walters. I wanna be doing something more hard-nosed. Part of what disgusts her is that a big thing on this morning show is dialing for dollars, which is a way that new stations would keep people watching

because you don't want anyone to switch to another channel if they get bored for a second. so you have this thing where periodically throughout the day people submit their phone numbers to the station and we randomly Oprah draws one out of a bowl and the station will just send money to that person yeah that's how they and you have to be watching constantly to know if your number gets picked like that's literally how they they're like bribing people please keep watching the show I, gambling has never not been the underlying driver of everything.

All of American society. Yes. Yes, this whole country is one big roulette wheel and Oprah didn't want to be the croupier. It's a croupier for roulette. Is that how you say it? It is. About to get another people being like,

actually you said it wrong, Robert. It's this. I'm sorry. All of the people who would correct me on that will die if they spend more than 11 seconds away from a slot machine. You know, right? Those are life support systems for a chunk of the populace.

Krauts is a croupier. I think roulette is also a croupier, but I don't know. I think I got it. I don't know. I don't care. I like the word croupier. Speaking of gambling, gamble on whether or not these products actually do what they say they are. They do probably.

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 subscription. So don't wait. Head to Apple Podcasts, search for iHeart True Crime Plus and subscribe today.

Catch Jon Stewart back in action on The Daily Show and In Your Ears with The Daily Show Ears Edition podcast. From his hilarious satirical takes on today's politics and entertainment to the unique voices of correspondents and contributors. It's your perfect companion to stay on top of what's happening now. Plus, you'll get special content just for podcast listeners, like in-depth interviews and a roundup of the week's top headlines. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

podcasts. 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. It was big news. I mean, white girl gets murdered, found in a cemetery, big, big news.

When a young woman is murdered, a desperate search for answers takes investigators to some unexpected places. He believed it could be part of a satanic cult. I think there were many individuals present. I don't know who pulled the trigger. A long investigation stalls until someone changes their story. I like saw what would happen. An arrest, trial and conviction soon follow.

He just saw his body just kind of collapsing. Two decades later, a new team of lawyers says their client is innocent. He did not kill her. There's no way. Is the real killer rightly behind bars or still walking free? Are you capable of murder? I definitely am not. Did you kill her? Listen to The Real Killer Season 3 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back. So Oprah's got this job offer to host this morning show. And she's like, this sounds like death, right? This sounds like the end of my career. Like you're trying to

fob me off on this thing and I will be locked into this, you know, doing something nobody respects for the rest of my life. The thing that she tells Baker is I'm a news person. I don't want to do a talk show. Then she films her first episode and her mind completely changed. The way she describes this is as soon as she sits down and makes an episode of the morning show her opinion on it changes on a dime. And the reason why is because she gets to hang out with famous people. And she's like, Oh, wait. Oh, and I'm going

to read a quote now from the People Profiles biography of Oprah. This she told herself is heaven. She recalled, I interviewed Benny from All My Children and the Carvel Ice Cream Man and thought heaven because you get to say whatever you feel, you truly get to be yourself. Within a year, People Are Talking, which is the morning show, was beating Donahue in Baltimore, the only show in America to do so. Winfrey would never read another headline. The minute that first show was over, she told Good Housekeeping, I thought, thank God, I found what I was meant to do.

It was like breathing for me. And that's like very interesting to me because it's hard to get across. Like Donahue is, he's like the Mr. Beast of his era, if you'll forgive me for trying to like make, he is like the biggest guy on daytime TV. And Oprah is the, like, this is the only local show that beats Donahue anywhere in the United States. It's due to the fact that Oprah is on it. She has this absolutely unique electric connection with her audience. This is recognized by people with money and television and things start to move very fast

for Oprah after this point, as Pell scholar Amanda Colon writes in her thesis paper on Oprah's role in American culture. In 1984, Oprah moved to Chicago, Illinois, to host WLS-TV's morning talk show, AM Chicago, which became the number one local talk show, surpassing ratings for the most popular show at the time, Donahue, just one month after she began. The show earned national syndication in 1986, becoming the highest rated talk show in television history. In 1988, Oprah established Harpo, Oprah Backwards Studios, a production facility in Chicago, making her the third woman in the American entertainment industry after Mary Pickford

and Lucille Ball to own her own studio. AM Chicago became the Oprah Winfrey Show and remained the number one talk show for 20 consecutive seasons. So this is like a very rapid explosion in popularity. She goes from getting the show to becoming number one to it being entirely reframed to being just around Oprah. And she establishes a production company and gets like a significant degree of ownership in her own show.

Which is like this is one of the things that's most interesting about Oprah is especially and gets a significant degree of ownership in her own show. This is one of the things that's most interesting about Oprah is, especially for somebody who was raised without any access to money, the sheer degree of business savvy that she has. The fact that she owns a large piece of everything she's involved in and eventually owns all of it. She kind of has this, probably because of how she got fucked over with that first job, this understanding that like, if I don't own it, it's not worth shit to me, right?

Anyway, Oprah. So. I just realized something crazy, which is that Oprah, the character that Oprah plays in the color purple, she's married to a character named Harpo. Really? It's like, isn't that crazy?

I had no idea. Wait a second, because I started rewatching it, but I'm going to be honest, I didn't finish it. Because I was tired. Harpo is his name? Yeah, she's married to a character named Harpo in the movie. That's why I just realized that it's also the name of her,

it's also her name backward. Yeah. Crazy. Yeah. I wonder, that has to, because she already had Harpo the studio at that point. We're going to talk a little bit about the color purple. And Steven Spielberg comes in. I don't know if he's a hero, well, he's not a hero.

He's a weird kind of villain in this story, but we'll get to that in a second. I can't wait. Yeah. So for about a full generation after 1984, Oprah's fame is a rocket ship. It just keeps going up and up and up. But what made her show so special? Colin's argument is that she offered, quote, despair disguised as entertainment. In other words, she sensationalized and repackaged human suffering for an audience.

Quote, when Oprah came on the scene, she mirrored this Donahue formula, but with a unique twist she sensationalized and repackaged human suffering for an audience. When Oprah came on the scene, she mirrored this Donahue formula, but with a unique twist of her own. She, unlike Donahue, revealed her own personal struggles and stressed a self-help mantra. The audience loved it, and the Oprah Winfrey Show quickly surpassed her predecessor's ratings. Commonly referred to as trash TV, Oprah transformed the talk show genre by turning trash into treasure.

And that's kind of, she starts out and she is viewed as like trash. She's viewed as Jerry Springer, right? For a while, because she's doing that stuff. She's bringing on like, I'm going to bring on a bunch of single unwed mothers who are fighting with their dads. I'm going to bring on like some Klansmen to have an argument with like, you know, whoever on stage and like hope that there's a fistfight or some shit. She's doing pieces of that.

But kind of what shifts the meaning of what she's doing is that unlike a Springer or a Donahue kind of character, she's not standing back and being like, look at this zoo I've brought to you. She's like opening up her own difficult, troubled past, which kind of adds this, this like shot of vulnerability into the whole mixture that makes it unique. And you can see an immediate, that's why it stands out, right? That's why she rises above these other figures so quickly. Right.

The most significant springer and Donahue, you never got the impression. Their point of view was like, look at this shit, look at this crazy shit. Yeah. Yeah. As opposed to like, this shit. Look at this crazy shit. Yeah. Yeah. As opposed to like, I have an opinion on this crazy shit. I have an opinion and also like like you people, like all you troubled people that I bring on the show. I also have had my like troubles and I'm not too big to like admit them.

Whereas like Jerry Springer would never like break down and cry in front of his audience. Right. Even though he could have. He didn't remember Jerry's final thought? Oh, God. Yeah. Sure. Of course.

The one thing I remember from that show is when Geraldo got his nose broken by a chair. I think that was on Jerry. Was that on Geraldo or Jerry? I thought it was Geraldo. Oh, I think it was. That might have been Geraldo. Is that just on Geraldo? Whatever the case, Geraldo's got his nose broken by a chair, everybody.

Never forget. But I think your point about this setting Oprah apart, I think it really is a testament to how her troubled background really is something that she draws from and is able to... I think that is the secret sauce of what made this connect in a different way. Yeah, because it's the same kind of quote unquote it's the same kind of like quote unquote trash, but there's less of a voyeuristic attitude because like, anytime it starts to lean too much Oprah will drop some sort of anecdote about her own background and you're like, oh, okay, so she's really, she's on the same level as us, right?

Which she's not, but that's how it feels to the viewer at least. The most significant moment for her career in this period came right after she moved to Chicago to start the Oprah Winfrey Show. On Thursday, December 5th, 1985, at 9am, Oprah started her morning show by bringing on a young white abuse victim named Lori. She opened up by reading some statistics about sexual abuse, namely that one in three women in the United States had experienced it, and then asked Lori, your father started out fondling you. When did it lead to something other than fondling? She pressed with more and more detailed questions, asking what did he say to you?

How did he tell you? What did he tell you? And this is all very uncomfortable to see on TV, right? And even especially like reading the transcript, there's an element of it that seems a little bit exploitative, kind of constantly pushing for those details in front of an audience. That said, it also, this is kind of how interviews work. It's just usually when journalists interview people about these kinds of experiences, you don't get the direct interview transcript.

You get an article where they've kind of the details, but also softened aspects of it so that it doesn't feel that uncomfortable. Oprah is giving you the raw feed and seeing something like this, which is normally a private process rendered as public entertainment, is a new thing. Particularly what's new about it is that because of the way Oprah does this, rather than people feeling like, oh, she's kind of exploiting this woman, people from the audience start to join in, spontaneously sharing their own stories of sexual abuse as children. People in the audience start breaking down into tears.

And then Oprah starts talking about her own sexual abuse, telling everyone, the fact that I had all these unfortunate experiences permeates my life. I'm going to quote from Kitty Kelly's book here. For the next few seconds, Oprah appeared to be discovering for the first time that what she had experienced as a nine-year-old child was indeed rape, a defilement so unspeakable that she had never been able to put it into words until that very moment. Her audience felt as if they were watching the fissures of a soul split open as she admitted that her shameful secret.

And nothing like this had ever happened on daytime TV. There had certainly been like people talking about sexual abuse. But the fact that an episode interviewing a survivor would lead to both members of the audience breaking down and sharing their own stories and then the host doing it. That's a totally novel thing, right? That has never happened before on television. And it creates a firestorm. The fact that Oprah does this on air becomes national and then international news. And it is people, like the people running the station, are not happy. Like the actual executives at the station are like This is supposed to be a happy morning show. This is this is like this is like for people like watch while they're drinking

What's that? What the hell is going on here? Right? Like why are we do? Why are we having stories of child sexual abuse, but the ratings are off the charts? it's one of those things where she both gets in trouble with the people running the station and also This makes her too big to fail. Like this is this this is it's impossible to overstate what a massive moment this is for both television as a medium and also for Oprah's career. Yeah, it's I mean, there's also just that.

Yeah, like what a. I guess risk or like, thank God the ratings worked out. It's a huge risk because like if the ratings had like her, her, the people running the station are not happy. If the ratings had not been there, like she could have gotten fired for this. Yeah. And it's also, there's, it's such a complicated thing to parse out because one thing she's doing is this is one of the very first times in a public space with this much exposure that you have victims of rape talking about it, not in a way that's mediated by psychiatrists or law enforcement

or anything like that, but is just like survivors talking about it. And at the same time, Oprah sees the reaction to this sees how well it does and her immediate takeaway is like sex sells We need all of the sex episodes every kind of sex not just like this where people are talking about You know their trauma, but like whatever we can get that involves sex That's what's going to make this show keep it on top, right? So like after this episode, she starts, she invites a bunch of female porn stars on to talk about the penises of her co-stars, of their co-stars. That episode gets a 30% share of the Chicago audience and provokes even more news articles

about Oprah because people are now like, is this smut? Like how do we talk about what she's doing? Nobody's done anything like this before. And a lot of the coverage is super critical, super like this is incredibly irresponsible. People shouldn't be doing this, but it all just drives viewers, right? More and the more stuff that she puts out there

that gets people shocked and like angry or, you know angry or titillated the more people watch her show. When reporters interview her about this, Oprah tells them, my mandate is to win, admitting that her overriding purpose and bringing victims of sexual violence and sex workers onto her show is to draw eyeballs. Kitty Kelly quotes her former producer, Debra DeMeo, paraphrasing the way Oprah pitched show ideas to her team. I'd love to get a priest to talk about sex. I'd love to get one to say, yes, I have a lover. I worship Jesus and her.

Yes, I love her and her name is Carolyn. I love how like that's like pretty twisted. Oprah was like, I want some freaky deekies in here Find me a priest who's fucking some lady named Carolyn and get her on get him on Man so yeah, that's like I don't you you can I guess Moralize that however you want. It's so fascinating that it goes from, I have shared my own horrible experience and people connected with that to like, so we gotta get some priest who's fucking a lady

on this show, right? Like that's where this has to continue going, you know? It is also weird to conclude, not weird, but I mean, I guess more media savvy than I am to conclude from that first show that sex sells rather than like vulnerability sells or authenticity sells or whatever. But also all of them sell because her vulnerability and authenticity keeps her pie. It's a huge part of her ongoing popularity, but so is the sex.

So is the really sleazy stuff. They never stop doing that. Right? I guess the answer is all of it sells and Oprah has very good instincts. You know, wherever we want to land morally on what she's doing here, this shit works. Now it is worth noting that she is depicted in the media. This is very hard for like, I had trouble grasping this because by the time I was aware of Oprah, she had such a different reputation. In the 80s, in late 70s and 80s, she's Jerry Springer. She is not a respectable media figure to a lot of people.

That is not how she's talked about to a lot of people. Around this time, an article in McCall's Magazine on the Oprah Winfrey Show described what it did best as, quote, get them in the gut show topics. Sexual disorders, battered wives, self-mutilation, overweight people and the people who hate them, you know, all that kind of stuff. Oprah often would say nothing is taboo and she meant it. Winfrey's own struggles with weight loss and gain quickly became a central part of the show as well. We opened this series with the infamous wagon of fat incident from 1998. That was gross and bad, but it's also worth noting if you want to

put that into the context, like how we could get to something that gross, it comes after a decade of constant public obsession with every pound Oprah lost or gained. And this is where we're going to talk about the color purple again. So as I've noted, Oprah struggles with binge eating, with her body self-image from adolescence on like a lot of us, like maybe everybody. She has a habit of stress eating and was noted by coworkers to binge to really uncomfortable levels during parties and the like. When she becomes a TV star in the mid-80s, people start talking about this.

It becomes both in gossip columns and shit like the fucking National Enquirer and stuff. There's articles about stories of Oprah and eating and whatnot. She pivots on this to become radically open to her audience about her dieting and her struggles with weight gain. Now this helps drive her popularity, but it's also, it both is in part a reaction to and also helps lead to shit like this 1985 appearance on the Tonight Show with Joan Rivers,

which I'm gonna play for you now. This is one of the most uncomfortable things I've seen on television. Oh my God, Joan was such a bitch. I can't wait to see how mean this is. Oh, she sucked so bad. I mean, I like, low-key love her, but like, that has to be real.

Oh yeah, yeah, this is not great. But you went into beauty contest, they told me you were a beauty contest winner. Yeah, I'm the 50 pounds a go or so. Yeah, but so what'd you win? Well, I won the Miss Fire Prevention contest. Was that a who? Miss what? Fire prevention.

So how'd you gain the weight? I ate a lot. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no to you know what we are now am Chicago in Chicago we're we're starting a diet with Oprah grace yes and in conjunction with the Tribune so that I have been put under pressure to finally do it I am trying to lose five pounds when you cut back with me in March when I'm back and you lose 15 I lose five listen that's the only way I'll do it I'll keep keep thinking that bitch is losing and I'm not. I'll do it if you do it. You will? Yeah.

It's a deal. It's a deal. It's a deal. Five pounds for me. Yes! It's great. Yeah, that's great. That's great. I'm excited about it though because I've gone up and down and up and down. I've been on every diet.

Have you tried the banana, weenie and egg diet? Oh. Has anybody done a banana, weenie and egg where you eat a banana, a weenie and egg and I've done the pickles and peanut butter diet? Oh I just eat cookies but I only eat like 800 calories worth of cookies. See I figured you'd do it that way. Oh yeah I saw Nell Carter on here last night who'd lost. Yes but you couldn't tell she's still very chubby. She's Lose More. People go oh are not people that help friends with diet. You must tell a friend the truth.

You must say, you are still a pig. Lose more weight. That's the way to die. OK. Well, why are eating disorders so rampant? Is it because these are our parents? Effectively? Come on.

Although, I gotta say, though, like, that was not as vicious. That was not as bad as I thought it was going to be. It could have been so much worse to Joan. That is just like how people talk to bigger people. Like people feel totally comfortable saying shit like this to people's faces and they don't even think twice about it. This is like totally how people talk.

Part of what you're seeing there is like Oprah being a professional because when she describes this moment she's like, yeah, like I was not happy. Like this was that like the laughing and stuff was all faked. I was very unhappy that we were having this conversation. Right? Like, obviously. So rude. Yeah, no, it's like, I can't believe the kind of shit that Joan said there. It was made like this whole situation was made worse at the time because like not long after this,

while she is like doing this very famous publicized diet that gets announced on the Joan Rivers show, like the first big thing she does after this is she sent to Ethiopia to report on Chicago's efforts to help the famine. So the story is simultaneously Oprah trying to lose 30 pounds and Oprah reporting on a famine in Ethiopia. Not great vibes. One of her colleagues asks like, is this kinda gross? And Oprah replies, you're right, it's sick, isn't it?

It is sick. It is kinda sick. Now, one fair critique of these episodes is that we're not gonna go into super clinical detail about all of the different fad diets and dangerous weight loss misinformation that comes out of the Oprah Winfrey Show. Part of why is because the podcast Maintenance Face

has done a ton of that, so you can check all of that out. show. Part of why is because the podcast, Maintenance Face has done a ton of that. So you can check all of that out. I think part of it is just that like, you get the idea here, right? It's both important to note that like Oprah, like that clip there, there's a lot of pushing on everyone listening to that. Feel bad about your body.

Be ashamed if you've gained weight. Embrace dangerous strategies to lose it. Oprah has a lot, and Oprah will admit it today, a lot of guilt and spreading that. But also she is in such a unique position where like, I don't know if there's ever been a single person that so many Americans have been so obsessed with their body size. Like it's kind of hard not to, not, not for that to affect you in a bad way like we we really were un insane about Oprah yeah I don't know what else to say about that I will say in order to kind of point out the way in which people talked about her one of the

most prominent TV critics of the day Richard Richard Blackwell, described Oprah as bumpy, frumpy, and downright lumpy on the cover of TV Guide. Jesus. So, right around the time this is all happening, Oprah is on the Tonight Show, like right around when she's on the Tonight Show, she is auditioning for a role in the color purple. After the episode, where again, this is not as friendly a situation as it appears on the air, she's very unhappy about this. She's stress each, she gains more weight, and then she checks herself into a fat farm,

an emergency weight loss bootcamp type program to lose the weight. Steven Spielberg, who had directed the movie, finds out and he calls Oprah. And Spielberg says, I hear you're at a fat farm. You lose a pound, you could lose this part. Here you're at a fat farm. You lose a pound, you could lose this part. So she's like, she's fucked no matter what.

I don't love anybody like micromanaging somebody else's weight, but the color purple is based on a novel by Alice Walker and the character she was portraying. Like I get, it's not something I think he should have said, but I get where he's coming from. It's, yeah, I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know where I should, yeah, yeah. It's uncomfortable. Does Oprah talk about like, like not, not like to, well, yeah, I mean, I guess what I'm about to say is going to sound victim blaming, but I'm just curious because part of the like this like like attention to her weight, she even if it was like going to happen anyway, she did profit from like it was like a part of the like editorial strategy of her show. Right.

Like does she talk about leaning in on that business? She hugely leans in, right? She does, in part she makes the specifics of like how much she's gaining or how much she is losing and what diet she is doing part of the show. A lot of the money that comes in is as a result of diet advice. She has deals and gets millions and millions from groups like Weight Watchers, right? Pushing a lot of different diets. She gets paid and also just like fills airtime and makes money that way, putting on different

diet experts and diet books and a lot of that stuff is extremely dangerous. It is both, she is being victimized by the whole media environment and also profiting on that by pushing the same poison on everyone else, right? Like that's what's happening here, right? Like it is a story of both victimization and profiting off of putting some pretty toxic, and the thing she's doing right now

is at least copying to some of that, right? Now copying to some of that while also getting money from Weight Watchers. So I don't know. I don't know where we wanna put that out. The one thing I am curious about is when we as a culture made the transition from saying weenies to hot dogs.

You wouldn't get a hot dogs Base diet today Which you should never have had a hot dog base diet, yeah, that's Jamie I guess I guess not Yeah anyway, so She gives up after Or at least the way that Oprah tells the story after Spielberg's's like, if you lose a pound, you could lose this part. Oprah decides like, fuck it, and gives up on getting the role, and keeps the role.

And yeah, she winds up doing very well. She gets like, it's like massively, you know, one of the interesting things about Oprah is, she could have had just a whole career as a major Hollywood star. Like, she just decides to keep being Oprah Winfrey because that turns out to be much better for her than being like a movie star.

But she's very like, has a very successful acting career starting out. Oh, I mean, Color Purple is like, it is a classic. It's probably the movie I have seen the most times in my life. Like, it is like a, like, and the way that she was in that movie, it was a revelation.

Like, even thinking about it now, as good as like Whoopi Goldberg is in that movie and Danny Glover is in that movie, Oprah is the standout character even. So probably her big scene in The Color Purple is when she gives the speech to Sealy, All my life I had to fight. If you've heard that Kendrick Lamar song,

all right, that's where the beginning of that song comes from, is Oprah's big scene in that movie. That movie, the way it shifted the culture, we really cannot be overstated. Yeah, yeah. And it's so fascinating to me that that would be for most people, like, oh shit, I've made it.

I've been in this highly praised Hollywood, that's the rest of my life, is I'm gonna be in movies. Oprah's like, no, no, I know a better way to get really famous. So while this is going on, her movie career is starting, Oprah is continuing to be trash TV, right? That's really this era. And sex is not the only thing that she finds out that sells.

Racism gets people to tune in. So during Black History Month in the 80s, Oprah started booking KKK members to show up wearing sheets and hoods. Intermittently, she would book guests with something important to say too, like when she did the Women with Sexual Disorders episode and talked to a woman who had never orgasmed. Oprah brought in a sex surrogate to coach her on air, which elicited a flood of complaints as Kitty Kelly documents.

Yesterday's show was gross, said one woman. I don't know how else to describe it. Absolutely degrading. There are millions of women who never experienced sexual pleasure, said Oprah. We had 633 calls from women yesterday after the show on the computer. We made lots of women feel they are not alone. And this is what makes, especially in this era, it's always back and

forth, right? Cause there's this mix of like, oh, that's some of the grossest TV I've heard about and like, oh, you're really pushing out some very unhealthy attitudes towards dieting into society. And also it's incredibly important for people to know about stuff like sexual dysfunction and that there's like coaching for that and to not feel ashamed. Like this is a thing that we can talk about in public. And Oprah's always so much of both of those things. That said, when for every episode like this, you'd get where it's like, yeah, I'm glad someone in the fucking eighties was talking about like sexual dysfunction and the fact

that there are treatments available that you can and should seek. You go right from that to Oprah being like, also the devil is coming for your children. And this is going to get us onto one of my favorite subjects, how Oprah Winfrey helped start the satanic panic. But first. Ah, mm, yes. But first, you know who else is the devil?

But like the sexy devil. Like the devil, when he's played by that guy who also played the president and the command and conquer red alert to, you know, that guy is nodding. He's nodding. Everyone's just nodding. Nobody else remembers that guy. He played the devil once. Look him up. 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. Catch Jon Stewart back in action on The Daily Show, and in your ears with The Daily Show Ears Edition podcast. From his hilarious satirical takes on today's politics and entertainment, to the unique

voices of correspondents and contributors, it's your perfect companion to stay on top of what's happening now. Plus, you'll get special content just for podcast listeners, like in-depth interviews and a roundup of the week's top headlines. 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 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. That was big news. I mean, white girl gets murdered, found in a cemetery, big, big news. When a young woman is murdered, a desperate search for answers takes investigators to some unexpected places. He believed it could be part of a satanic cult. I think there were many individuals present. I don't know who pulled the trigger. A long investigation stalls until someone changes their story. I like saw what they were happening. An arrest, trial and conviction soon follow. He just saw his body just kind of collapsing.

Two decades later, a new team of lawyers says their client is innocent. He did not kill her. There's no way. Is the real killer rightly behind bars or still walking free? Are you capable of murder? I definitely am not. Did you kill her? Listen to The Real Killer, Season Three, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcasts. We're back. Four people are so happy I just made that reference. Everyone else has stopped listening forever. So, satanic panic. In 1989, a Canadian psychiatrist and con man named Lawrence Pasder wrote a book about his patient, who he later married, Michelle Smith, claiming he'd recovered her memories of participating in elaborate, impossible satanic rituals while being abused for the devil's gain.

This book, Michelle Remembers, helped launch the satanic panic, a religious moral panic that ruined hundreds of lives and laid much of the groundwork for QAnon to take off today. We maybe don't get the Trump presidency without the satanic panic. That was some necessary groundwork, right? You gotta put in those load bearing pillars. And this is where that's coming from. And Oprah helps get it off the ground. She brings Lawrence and Michelle onto her show

along with several other prominent. If you are a satanic panic con person, right? Who is like, I worship the devil, I sacrificed babies. Oprah will let you say whatever to, at this point, literally tens of millions of people are tuning into her show. I wanna start with a clip of a 1986 episode, which wasn't about the satanic panic,

but contained a sting for their upcoming episode on devil worshipers. And I wanna play this just because, you know, I throw the ads in a lot of, you know, different ways here, but I got to bow to the master class here. All right, we'll come back and we're going to talk about Sex some more back in a moment. The devil.

The screen after she says that is just a picture of the devil on a TV screen holding his own tail with a, Thursday, victims of satanic worship. I love that. Iconic. Iconic. Coming next, the devil. Oh my God.

Also, we're gonna talk about sex some more. We should have thrown to ads now, Sophie. Sorry. That would have been the way to do it. Next time, bud. You gotta learn from the masters here. Now, I'm going to play, or I'm going to have Sophie play another clip. I think from closer to 1989 or 1990.

Most of Oprah's early shows are not preserved in a convenient way, so I did my best here. My next guest was used also in Worshiping the Devil, participated in human sacrifice rituals and cannibalism. She says her family has been involved in rituals for generations. She is currently in extensive therapy, suffers from multiple personality disorder, meaning she's blocked out many of the terrifying

and painful memories of her childhood. Meet Rachel, who is also in disguise to protect her identity. You come from generations of ritualistic abuse? Oh yes, my family has an extensive family tree and they keep track of who's been involved. So she's in disguise? Yes. Really?

Yes. Okay, what's the disguise? She just looks like the lady. I mean, I thought we were gonna find out. Is it the boot in there? She's wearing a wig and glasses, disguise. Okay, okay, yeah, they Clark kinted her. Yeah, she takes those glasses off,

her family's not gonna recognize it. The devil can't catch her. Sorry, presuming, just was very thrown off by them being out-brooking, like, this lady's in disguise. It's impossible to tell. They zoom in on her. And I don't say this to shame her, I'm shaming the 90s.

You can't tell a bad wig from normal hair in like 1990. No you can't. Like there's no way to do it. But that brooch is long. That brooch is something, yes. ...who hasn't been involved. And it's gone back to like 1700 and so you were right I was born into a family that believes in this and this is it this is does everyone

else think it's a nice Jewish family from the outside you appear to be a nice Jewish girl definitely and you all are worshiping the devil inside the home. Right. There's other Jewish families across the country. Not just me and my mom. Really? Ugh. So, I don't think I have to tell you why this is dangerous. Eee.

Eee. That's a real bad thing to have 20 million people watching. Like, ugh. Oh my God. Not great. That's a real bad thing to have 20 million people watching like All the Jews are secretly worshipping the devil Appear as like wholesome normal family, but yeah and closed doors So yeah Oprah is literally just doing the blood libel on daytime TV on the most popular talk show in the country. And we're gonna continue here because it just gets, I am shocked that this was allowed.

What kinds of things went on in the family? Well, there would be rituals in which babies would be sacrificed and you would have to, you know. Who's babies? There were people who bred babies in our family. No one would know about it. A lot of people were overweight

so you couldn't tell if they were pregnant or not or they would supposedly go away for a while and then come back. The other thing I wanna point out, not all Jewish people sacrifice babies, I mean. Okay. It's not a very simple thing. I think we kinda know that. Just wanna point that out. It's a personal out not all Jewish people sacrifice babies. I mean, it's not a very, we kind of know that. I just want to point that out.

This is the first time I've heard of any Jewish people sacrificing babies, but anyway. So you witnessed the sacrifice, right? When I was very young, I was forced to participate in that, in which I had to sacrifice an infant. And the purpose of sacrifice is to what? Is to bring you what? are you sacrificing for for power? Yeah, I have a lot of questions

First off do we think it makes it better for Oprah to offhand it They'd be like I've never heard of Jewish people sacrificing babies before anyway. Tell me about these Jewish babies God Tell me about these Jewish baby sacrifices. Oh God also this this does get closer to her future crimes of like Like clearly if even even if you want to remove like the any sort of like willful Malice from Oprah like a pretty shameful credulity is on display here. Yes like yeah, like my as a Middling journalist my first question would be are you not worried you're gonna get arrested because you just admitted to murdering a baby on television

You know, that's a crime, right? There's no statute of limitations on killing a baby So I have a question. What is the production of this behind the scenes? Where did they find this lady? And is it just like, oh, you've got a story about killing babies and sacrifice? Come on on the air. Tell us about it. You get pieces of this.

Nobody will directly say, we're full of shit. We just lied. But you can tell that what's happening you get this like that previous clip rope was like I want a priest Who did this and this and this right because it'll it'll sell an episode She's like I want someone talking about sacrificing babies and you know, it is Exists in the world and you don't have to coach people on this if you let enough people know You can get on TV in front of 20 million people, if you talk about sacrificing a baby, there will be someone whose desperation for attention is so high that they will come on television and claim to have sacrificed

a baby. That's the way people are. That's the person you should give a platform for sure. That's a healthy person, well adjusted. Help them spread their message. Yes. We love Oprah Winfrey doing things that are, again, as a guy who's read a lot of Nazi propaganda, almost indistinguishable from Nazi propaganda. Like, this is specifically one of the major justifications of the Holocaust.

Jews are abducting Christian babies and sacrificing them to the devil. Like, that is really bad to do. I really can't emphasize enough how dangerous this thing is. And if you look at shit like in QAnon, right? Where there's a, like a third of the country believes that the democratic party are literally eating babies to gain everlasting youth, which like,

just look at Nancy Pelosi, guys. She's not getting everlasting youth. Like like just look at Nancy Pelosi, guys. She's not, she's not getting everlasting youth. Like her hip just broke. This is unequivocal bastardism, right? Like this is a bad thing to be doing. Um, yeah. And you know, I mean, it, presumably the thing was like, wink, we're not going to ask you any hard questions, right?

Let's just get the rating. Just tell me, give me some details. And it's, it's so fucked up that like, on one hand, when you're doing this about like you are talking to someone about their, their difficulty, you know, I've never experienced an orgasm, you're asking these kinds of questions to get them to say more. That is making other people with the problem of whom there are many feel less alone. Same thing with like sexual assault survivors. And then the fact that you have absolutely no compunction with like, I'll do the same

thing for lies about Jews sacrificing babies. Fascinating stuff. I'm so curious if she, because it sounds like at one point in her career, she really thought of herself as like a news person, a journalism person. What does she think about her career now? You know, here's the thing, because Oprah never really trained in journalism very much. I don't know if she maybe believes this,

if she thinks these are the same. Like, that's kind of the thing to me. But also I wanna be like, you are clearly brilliant. You are a once in a lifetime genius, at least at some things. But also as we've all seen, we've all become increasingly aware of people who are like, well, you're clearly brilliant at one thing. And now your access to Twitter has made us all aware that you don't understand anything else.

The evidence seems to be that people who are brilliant at one thing may actually be terrible at everything else. Some standard at most other things. It may just be that Oprah is a once in a lifetime mind when it comes to the business of entertainment and also honestly believed this woman was sacrificing babies with her family. I don't know. Now, that said, the fact that we have quotes from her being like, hey, get me a priest who said this, makes me kind of lean more in the direction of, no, Oprah knew, right?

Some of this, a lot of this is bullshit. And it was just trying to get eyeballs on the TV. I think it's often a mix. I don't know how much she's able to parse it herself. I want to talk about another incident that kind of really makes me go back and forth, which is the McMartin Preschool Satanic abuse scandal. Now, we cover this in our episodes on the Satanic panic, but the gist of the case is that a bunch of parents became convinced that their children, more than 300 of them in all, had been systematically abused by a satanic cult headed by the McMartin family who ran a private preschool.

The initial allegations, which included claims that one of the alleged molesters could fly, were made by Judy Johnson, who suffered from schizophrenia and was a hardcore alcoholic. From her allegations, a community hysteria developed, which was stoked by an abuse therapy clinic run by Ke McFarland who provided investigations that pushed children with leading questions towards generating allegations. A whole lot of people had their lives ruined by this. Despite the fact that the investigation literally dug up the ground around the school to try

to find secret satanic torture tunnels, no one was ever convicted of molesting any kids. I hate relitigating this because people are always like, well, but they did find tunnels. No, they didn't. They found trash buried underneath the school because a farm had been there and people bury trash. All of the shit that was buried in there was stuff from the era at which there was a farm there where people were burying trash. of the shit that was buried in there was stuff from the era at which there was a farm there where people were burying trash. The dead animal bones. That's just what happens in

the ground, guys. That's just how things are. It's not they weren't running tunnels to molest toddlers for the devil. It's also just like the logistics of like running a fucking satanic cult. Like, what the fuck are you talking about? Again, it's one of those and like, I'm not saying no kid ever got molested at this or other preschools. Like, that a lot of times the satanic abuse does come from there's a real sexual abuse problem and then it gets turned into something that absolutely isn't happening.

And again, shitloads of innocent people get wrapped into it too. Yeah. I don't think I'm not saying that was happening at McMartin because again, nobody got convicted of anything. Um, so it's not highly correlated with Satan. No. In fact, it might be higher correlated with Satan's old friend. Yeah. And in fact, church leaders,

Southern Baptist leaders, Catholic priests, police officers, these are the people who are molesting kids. And honestly, more than any of those, their own parents and relatives. That's who does it. That's who molests kids. But it's so much more satisfying

to believe it's some like big conspiracy. And Andrew, to your point, look at Oprah's own case. Why would they even need at look at the tunnels a cousin and an uncle, huh? Sorry what they can fucking fly. What do they need tunnels for? Yeah. Yeah, what do they need? Why why are they doing this in tunnels? Yeah, so as this in this case winds on for like couple of years. Oprah, it is constantly on the show. They are following. This is like the O.J. Simpson trial, before the O.J. Simpson trial for Winfrey and her. They are following every twist and turn in this case, breathlessly.

When these people don't get convicted, Oprah and her audience are outraged. She refuses to accept this. She brings a bunch of the children and parents and even some of the jurors onto the show to relitigate the case. And she's not the only person doing this. She's part of a trend in daytime TV. Geraldo Rivera does the same thing. So does Sally Jessie Raphael.

But as LA Times columnist Howard Rosenberg noted, compared to them, Geraldo was as judicious as the Supreme Court. In other words, he's saying, Geraldo's coverage of this was responsible next to Oprah's, and Geraldo Rivera is not a responsible man. I don't know how else to describe him. Again, when he got hit in the nose with that chair, it was the best thing that ever happened to this country.

Quote, and here's Rosenberg, the level of fairness here was typified by Winfrey's admission that she would have made a poor McMartin juror because I would say The children said it. All right. You're right. The studio audience applauded You see pieces this to that like if the children say it it's true. If a mom says it it's true It's like no you have to have a an evidentiary standard when you are accusing Huge numbers of people of hideous crimes. You can't just say, we put a bunch of kids in a room and wouldn't let them leave until

they told stories of satanic molestation tunnels and then lock people up forever. That's a bad way to run a society. Yeah. I, I, I dunno. It's good stuff. Uh, so while she's doing this, she has all these people on. She tells a former McMartin student to tell the audience what she told the jury over 16 days of testimony. And while this is happening, you're getting these frequent shots of the audience

shaking their heads and listening to these horrible stories. One of the moms tells Winfrey, I'm outraged at this verdict. And yeah, it's it's just, it's very irresponsible. I don't know. I think it's probably bad for there to be a case where all of these people are rung through the mud on television, then acquitted, and then have a whole show where you're like, but actually they were still guilty. These people molest these innocent people molested a shitload of kids are running us A tip like they've their lives are already ruined Oprah. What are you doing? I don't know. I don't like I don't like this

She ever spoken about any of that. No No, and I'd have to imagine if she did the answer would be like well everybody was doing it like this is what people But you were the most popular of them like, well, everybody was doing it. Like, this is what people did on TV. But you were the most popular of them. Right, right, right. Yeah. It is this thing with I mean, even the most popular shows, though, it's like you are still following trends. Like you may have a hand on the scale for sure. But there is a point to where, you know, the

as we've seen multiple times, like the snowball gets out of control and you are simply regardless of your size, you are along for the ride. Yep. Well, how's everyone feeling so far? Oh, finally got bad. It did. It did. We finally bad before, but finally Oprah's doing some evident bad. The worm has turned you would say

Anyway bugs Yeah, I know that was like a like a tough spot to end at I will say I'm still thinking about that headline or that title of her review of the review MLK shot twice That I'm gonna be thinking about that one for a long time. That's that is a level of petty. That is very beautiful Yeah, very nice. I Don't know I got a podcast called yo, this racist. It's fine I don't know. I got a podcast called Yo Is This Racist. It's fine. Check out Yo Is This Racist.

Check out There Are No Girls on the Internet and find our hosts online and let them know your favorite moment from the Oprah Winfrey Show. Bombard us all on blue sky with your favorite Oprah clips. Don't do that. Do it to me. I mean, I've had to like bite my tongue because I have so much to say. Go ahead and spam me on behind the art on blue sky.

I want to hear your favorite Oprah takes. I'll tell you mine. Don't bite your tongue. Oh, it would just be me talking about and another time on Oprah, she did this. And then another episode, she did that. Like it would be so unfun to listen to. Well, part four, we're gonna take-

Yeah, we'll find out. We'll find out how much fun it is. We're gonna supercharge Bridget. Just let you loose. Until next time, folks, don't put people up in front of the country and tell them that you sacrificed babies for the devil. Avoid that.

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exclusive extended interviews and more. Now this is a second term we can all get behind. Listen to The Daily Show, Ears Edition on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey listeners, I'm Lauren Bright-Pacheco, host of the Murder on Songbird Road podcast. And I'm excited to share this riveting story with you. I'm also excited to tell you that you can now get access to all episodes of

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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 happened.

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 three, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts,

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