What does it feel like to spend 10 years of your life pursuing an uncertain dream when the chances of breakthrough success are one in a million?

What does it feel like to—finally, at long last—be “the one”?

Caro Claire Burke, one-half of your favorite podcast, is publishing her debut novel this Tuesday, April 7. Yesteryear is mouthy, thrilling, important, ambitious, and, as one of my favorite reviews said, “moves like a freight train.”

Sound like anyone else you know?

Today, I finally get the opportunity to talk to caro claire burke about:

* whether publishing your debut novel is a dream come true or a nightmare

* who she was before she wrote Yesteryear

* her seemingly endless years writing clickbait for a paycheck in the content coal mines of various aggregators

* how she felt when we met 🥰

* how I felt when we met 👹

* the psychological experience of feeling like everyone’s looking at you (Professionally™️) and knowing the precise dates and times when your life’s work will be dissected for sport in public lol

* to what extent it’s fair to infer someone’s politics from their fiction (a la this piece)

* her Official Stance on separating the art from the artist (compelling tbh)

* a spoiler-frenzied discussion of the Next Great American Novel

* and a very personal, very special update for Caro

If you’ve already pre-ordered Caro’s debut novel Yesteryear, or wish to do so now, Knopf wants to thank you. They’re sending custom, limited edition bandanas to DL Substack subscribers — all you have to do is input proof of your order in this link here, and they’ll ship you the bandana, clean and simple. (This is only for US subscribers.) Thanks so much for the support, y’all!

Jeffrey Epstein got away with it because he was richer than God. No — he got away with it because he had a rolodex filled with the most influential and powerful people on the planet. No — he got away with it because of his wiliness, and his almost preternatural ability to charm people.

All of these claims have been discussed to death in both mainstream and alternative media, and continue to serve as the prevailing theories for why this man was able to abuse young women at a terrifying scale for decades without suffering legal repercussions for it.

Today, we discuss an alternative hypothesis.

”A Young Jeffrey Epstein Made An Impression On His High School Students,” by Cat Schuknecht for NPR

“Scams, Schemes, Ruthless Cons: The Untold Story of How Jeffrey Epstein Got Rich,” by David Enrich, Steve Eder, Jessica Silver-Greenberg, and Matthew Goldstein for The New York Times

“The Talented Mr. Epstein,” a March 2003 profile by Vicky Ward for Vanity Fair

“Jeffrey Epstein: International Moneyman of Mystery,” a 2002 profile by Landon Thomas Jr. for New York Magazine

Here’s one of the many, many early pieces of reporting I leaned on from The Palm Beach Post; not going to link all of them because it would fill Substack’s word count limit but highly encourage poring through their 2005/2006 archives

And here’s a pretty interesting FBI transcript of an interview with former Palm Beach Police Chief Michael Reiter, conducted in 2020

And here’s the deposition interview between unproblematic king Brad Edwards and World-Renowned Fucking Loser Epstein:

Highly encourage anyone and everyone to read Virginia Roberts Giuffre’s memoir, Nobody’s Girl

Here is the deposition Katie and I role-played where a Very Smart Lawyer played Very Smart Gotcha with Giuffre about, checks notes, whether or not she was a bartender in 2007

Here’s where a federal judge decided that Giuffre’s testimony about Epstein’s sex trafficking ring was not relevant to a case about Epstein’s sex trafficking ring

Here is a timeline from the Miami Herald on all this gruesome shit; cc looking through their archives, too, as well as the archives for The Tampa Bay Times for any interested armchair sleuths

If you liked that timeline by reporter Julie K. Brown, consider reading her book, Perversion of Justice: The Jeffrey Epstein Story

”How JPMorgan Enabled the Crimes of Jeffrey Epstein,” by David Enrich, Matthew Goldstein, and Jessica Silver-Greenberg for The New York Times

“Newly Unsealed Epstein Records Shed Light on Years of His Financial Transactions with Wall St. Figures,” by Kara Scannell for CNN

Here’s a link to the Epstein email dump, neatly organized in this little faux-inbox

Here’s the meta study elaborating on the justice gap, which highlights precisely how fucked survivors of sexual assault are in their efforts to seek justice

Read Jessica Knoll’s phenomenal book, Bright Young Women, if you want a highly entertaining and cathartic literary experience to exorcise the fury from your body

Thanks (and also sorry???) for listening!

If you pay attention to political commentary, you’ll often hear a few pieces of conventional wisdom:

— America is “too polarized”

— “Both sides” are “too extreme”

— Or, most innocuously, that politicians should simply do that which is “popular,” which is itself code for policies that are considered “moderate”

But do voters really punish candidates for being extreme? Are most “popular” ideas the “moderate” ones? And, moderate or not, does popularity necessarily indicate merit?

The supposed antidote to this handwringing about political polarization is, more often than not, the mythical “centrist” candidate who will appeal to the even-more-mythical “ordinary American.” Centrism is, as the name implies, an ideology that lacks an ideology.

Today, Diabolical Lies investigates the myth of centrism.

[Full references and citations can be found in the show notes at www.diabolicalliespod.com.]

But first, some housekeeping:

As a reminder: Caro’s debut novel, YESTERYEAR, is coming out this spring (April 7th, to be exact), and she would love to see you all at the evening launch event in NYC. One can reasonably assume there will be laughter, tears, a book signing, and Caro on a stage looking incredibly sweaty while she talks about all things America, womanhood, tradwives, writing sex scenes in fiction, etc. She’ll be joined on stage by the famed pod duo Claire Parker and Ashley Hamilton as moderators for the evening, which essentially means we have finagled this book launch into a pseudo Good Noticings/Diabolical Lies crossover event. Ur welcome.

Also, we’d be so grateful if you humored us with a little anthropological insight by letting us know how you found the pod. Quick survey here.

Now, onto the show notes.

The Usha-Verse

“What Is Usha Vance Thinking?,” by Irin Carmon for The Cut

“From Yale to Newsmax, Usha Vance Has Helped J.D. Vance Chart His Path,” by Joseph Bernstein and Katherine Rosman for The New York Times

“Usha Vance Tries to Defend her Husband’s ‘Childless Cat Ladies’ Comment,” by Eric McDaniel for NPR

“The One Thing You Need to Know to Understand Usha Vance,” by Susan Matthews for Slate

…and of course, If Books Could Kill’s Coverage of Hillbilly Elegy

The Rama-Verse

“The Artist in Gracie Mansion,” by Danya Issawi for The Cut

“Artist Spotlight of Rama Duwaji,” by Nasri Atallah for YUNG

“Mamdani Names an All-Woman Transition Team,” by Nandika Chatterjee for TIME

The Tragedy of Heterosexuality

Read the book

“The invention of ‘heterosexuality’,” by Brandon Ambrosino for the BBC

Note: This episode was filmed on Monday, January 19 and the edit was finalized early on Saturday, January 24, before news broke about the second (known) ICE execution in Minneapolis of 37-year-old Minneapolis resident Alex Pretti.

Today, we’re talking about a beloved American pastime: killing civilians in the name of public safety.

On the right, you’ll watch JD Vance and his trademark charmless sneer explain that this is only happening because civilians are being disorderly. Kristi Noem will tell you—straight from her lying bitch face—that ICE agents are being assaulted every day.

And on the liberal side of the aisle, you’re more likely to hear that the problem is that these agents aren’t “trained” to “follow the law.”

This conversation examines how media has traditionally been used to manufacture consent, and where new media might be used to undermine its efficacy; where individual identity does and does not matter when it comes to state violence; and what “public safety” and “order” really mean, and what these concepts serve to justify.

Strap in.

Enter, stage left: one Scott Galloway.

Enter, stage right: two extremely hot and horny hockey players.

WHICH OF THESE HEROES WILL SLAY GLORIA STEINHEM RESTORE GLOBAL DIGNITY TO THE MEN?

Today, we find out.

A note from Caro before we begin: If the details within this episode cause your brain to overheat, I recommend pausing and listening to one of two auditory meditations:

* any live version of Praying by Kesha

* the West End Girl album from start to finish

Worked like a charm for me!

Below, you’ll find a summary of the three major debates we wish to have with Galloway, as well as an additional list of resources to pad your intellectual toolkit for your own interior monologue debates, followed by some love for Heated Rivalry to balm your restless soul.

Scott Galloway vs. Diabolical Lies, a Debate in Three Parts

1.) On educational biases against men

The argument made by Scott Galloway: The crisis of modern masculinity begins in the schoolroom, with young boys falling rapidly behind in the educational system by the time they reach kindergarten. This is largely due to developmental differences and educational biases which put young girls at an advantage, one that carries on through to college and higher ed, where they now have majority representation.

TL;DR: Little girls have way better brains and the school system is totally set up for them to win, which is why they’re fully creaming little boys all around the world, and that is bad.

The rebuttal, from Diabolical Lies: It’s true that certain studies have shown broad neurological differences between the sexes during adolescence, but these differences do not constitute a monolith. Plenty of other studies have flat-out disputed the premise of neurological differences altogether, alternatively suggesting that the difference in behavior between young boys and girls in classrooms is culturally driven. And anyways, given how men have been known to cut out the frontal cortex of ladies who yap too much, I think we’re licensed to say: Stay the fuck away from our brains regardless, you weirdos!

It also seems like an example of profound biological cherry-picking to claim that women have an indisputable biological advantage to young boys during the educational period, when the onset of menstruation during this exact same time period puts women at a proven massive deficit on a global level.

An estimated one in five girls globally and one in four in the US end up missing class or dropping out of school altogether because they cannot afford menstrual products.

Is that a crisis?

How about the fact that unexpected pregnancy is the number one reason young women drop out of school altogether, a stat that translates to millions of educational dropouts globally each year?

How about that? Is that a crisis?

Additionally, while it’s true that young girls do score higher in class on average, and that they do attend higher education in greater numbers, there’s no evidence that this is due to an educational bias. On the contrary, there is strong evidence to suggest that girls score higher grades in class and go on to college and graduate school in high numbers because they have to.

Evidence shows that women need to have at least one more degree than men to achieve pay parity across a number of fields; even then, the pay gap is still stark. And beyond that, it’s worth asking a few questions: are young men no longer going to college because the system discriminates against them, or are they no longer going to college because college is now coded as feminine, and therefore perceived as undesirable? And if we’re going to worry about educational biases, is gender truly the lens we should be examining the problem through, or are race and class far more useful for exploring discrimination in educational outcomes?

TL;DR: idk, read a book or something

mental health break

I HOPE UR FUCKIN PRAYING SCOTT

2.) On men being specifically and exclusively screwed in this current economy

The argument made by Scott Galloway: The current economy increasingly punishes the many in favor of elevating the few. In recent decades, the cost of housing, education, and healthcare have skyrocketed, and wages haven’t even remotely kept up with inflation. For the first time in American history, younger generations no longer feel confident they will achieve a higher standard of living than their parents… and this dire economic situation is one that disproportionately impacts men.

TL;DR: Men care more than women about manly things like living in homes because rahm emanuel said so

The rebuttal from Diabolical Lies: Contrary to popular belief, women are also people, and therefore impacted by broad socioeconomic issues, not the least of which include the affordability and housing crisis in America. This is to say nothing of the childcare crisis. In fact, according to a recent University of Kansas analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics data, more than 400,000 women left the workforce in the first half of 2025, marking the steepest decline in over 40 years for mothers of young children. The main reason why these women left the workforce? They wanted to be good Christian wives and mothers, of course! Neat little fun fact for you: When something has to give, societally speaking, it is always the woman who gives it.

TL;DR: Women also need homes and groceries and money for childcare. Radical concept, I know!

mental health break

3.) On men needing women to serve as the “guardrails” of culture

The argument made by Scott Galloway: In order to be functioning, contributing members of society, men need a sense of purpose in their lives. They need to feel victorious. And since world war is no longer a reliable failsafe for men feeling purpose, the goal of securing a wife and mother for your children is the best motivator for men to do the stuff they need to do, like stay in school and get a good job. Women like educated men with good jobs! That’s why people got married more in the 1950s: because women found men in uniforms attractive, and because those men in uniforms knew how to behave like gracious, respectful suitors worthy of female affection. That’s what we need to get back to: a 1950s-style of engagement.

TL;DR: Women are, as we have discussed in a recent episode, the morality police for society. Their job is to alternately be the carrot and/or the stick to lure or prod men forward as good citizens of society, and that is…a really healthy perspective to have on how men and women should operate! For sure! No downsides detected here!

The rebuttal from Diabolical Lies: Ha ha, okay, so just to be clear here :) women did not enter into marriage and motherhood in the 1950s because the men were hotter and nicer back then :) they entered into marriage because they had very few legal rights of their own :) they were property, Scott :) do you know what property is? :) the first no-fault divorce law was passed in 1969 in California :) women were not allowed to access credit or bank loans free of male cosigners until 1974 :) there was no such thing as paid maternity leave until 1993 :) are you picking up what I’m putting down here :) did I stutter :) we had no rights :) and then we got some rights :) and now you’re very politely trying to take our rights :) get the fuck away from our rights, Scott :)

TL;DR: Scott Galloway I will drive to your house and lobotomize you myself and you can let me know how much you like a 1950s-style approach to dealing with our problems

In conclusion: We win the debate and are just flatly correct but Galloway will still continue to out-earn, out-panel, and out-scream us for the rest of his days, a truly delicious irony for a man who has made a career whining about men falling behind

More Galloway-related stats to peruse at your leisure

It might be true that there are differences in brain development between the sexes…

…but it also might not be!

It’s also been a proven fact for decade that race and class discrimination are far more impactful variables in the educational bias conversation than gender. Consider this NYT summary of a 2025 study on which kids are admitted to the best colleges, and why: “For applicants with the same SAT or ACT score, children from families in the top 1 percent were 34 percent more likely to be admitted than the average applicant, and those from the top 0.1 percent were more than twice as likely to get in.”

Moving past education to the workforce: boy, there also sure is a lot of evidence that (in spite of the assuredly profound systemic biases put in place against them) white men still manage to make way more money, serve in more executive positions, occupy the majority of seats in Congress, have larger net worths at the end of their careers, and found more companies!

oh also the gender wage gap has been at a virtual standstill for about two decades now, with women earning 85 cents on the dollar to men <3

Fear not tho, Richard Reeves wants you to consider how nuanced the gender gap really is in both directions, because again, if you are not listening, the boys are struggling in school and ladies live a bit longer and that is the most important thing

As an aside you should listen to this IBCK podcast episode on Reeves’ book, Of Boys & Men, where Peter and Michael spend time deconstructing this whole idea of little boys and girls and their brains and their kindergarten teachers, etc.

It’s worth noting that affordability crises often lead to the worsening of gender and racial wage gaps. Just one of the many takeaways from this study that we wish Galloway would read: “Both women’s and men’s typical earnings increased in 2023, but women’s increased less than men’s. Adjusted for inflation, the earnings of a typical full-time year-round working woman increased by 1.5 percent in 2023, compared to a 3.0 percent annual increase for a typical man.”

As for deaths of despair: It’s true that men make up the majority of these deaths. In fact, the highest suicide rate among any demographic group in America is men 75 years or older—but even this stat contains more nuance than Galloway is willing to consider. First: Young women actually attempt suicide more often than young men. Second: One of the primary theories for why older women commit suicide less than men is because they are the primary caretakers for children and the elderly.

Oh, also, this is the date psychology site and YouTube channel I was talking about from which Galloway cribbed the “statistic” he repeats on every daytime television news program. Very legit, very cool!

….now some Heated Rivalry content to soothe your frayed nervous system after learning about the three Ps

“Popularity of Heated Rivalry has Surprised Even Television Executives,” by John Koblin for The New York Times

“The Delicious Anticipation — and Yes, Release — of Heated Rivalry,” by Naomi Fry for The New Yorker

“Heated Rivalry Is Gay Culture’s Next Frontier,” by Jim Downs for The New York Times

This YouTube Q&A with Connor Storrie, Hudson Williams, and Jacob Tierney

The Empty Netters Podcast and the What Chaos Podcast

Thanks for coming, folks, good luck sleeping at night after so much talk about men

The disgusting brothers circle jerk of love

The TikTok video primal scream for straight women everywhere

“Why Heated Rivalry’s Relationship of Equals Is Revolutionary,” by psychotherapist Leor Ram for Out Magazine

This gotcha journalism attack piece by Jessica Winter for The New Yorker: “What Did Men Do to Deserve This?”

Earlier this month, the Office of the Texas Governor Greg Abbott quietly released a statement that “emphasized the importance of TPUSA Club America chapter enrollment and involvement on high school campuses across the state,” in effect signaling their intent to support after-school programs for right-wing extremism in Texas public schools.

This would appear to be your average, garden-variety depressing update relevant only to those living where the Stars At Night Are Big And Bright, except for the fact that Texas has long been a laboratory for approximately half a dozen Christian Nationalists, high from huffing the fumes wafting off their barrels of oil money, to speed-run insane shit that ends up in documents like Project 2025.

So what can we learn from studying their playbook and understanding the mechanics of their holy war as ground zero for Christian Nationalism? Diabolical Lies investigates.

Surprise! Caro & Katie react in real time to the programming we all should’ve seen coming: “CBS News Presents: A Town Hall with Erika Kirk.”

If, for whatever reason, you do need to go to Starbucks right now, fine. This is not a game of purity tests! It’s a game of numbers. As such, consider cutting your usual order or frequency of visits in half. Get your kid the cake pop, but cut out your regular cappuccino, or take the venti to a tall, etc. Every dollar you withhold from this corporation during a sustained labor strike is going to hit them that much harder, and the potential ripple effect of a combined consumer and labor boycott on one of the largest food & beverage corporations in America is hard to overstate.

Other references & citations

* As of Monday, 3,800 baristas across 130 cities are holding the line

* Workers in 10 other countries (!) began protesting in support

* If you’re a Starbucks barista thinking about organizing your store, you can reach out here

* Starbucks Workers United national strike fund

Get it now before it’s gone. We’re so proud of this limited edition drop of deeply diabolical merchandise. Items will ship in mid-January, and 33% of all net profits will go to Feeding America, a non-profit nationwide network of more than 200 food banks that feed more than 46 million people through food pantries, soup kitchens, shelters, and other community-based agencies.

If you’re a paid subscriber, you can access two exclusive pieces of DL swag by using your special password, which can be found in our merchandise announcement, or in the episode preceding this one in your audio feed.

I, Caro, usually to try to be witty for show notes but frankly there are too many resources to share for this episode so I’m going to organize them by the three major topics covered in this conversation and then leave it there, ya girl has been poring through met gala archives for days and she’s TIRED.

on the body positivity movement, aka that time period where we were all briefly “liberated” by the charitable and fierce activist work of, uh, corporate capture

First, you should read anything that Virginia Sole-Smith or Aubrey Gordon write on the topic (and here’s the column we quote from Gordon about being “body positive but”)

Now, onto the links.

The Guardian op-ed on the “end of body positivity” by fat columnist and writer Rose Stokes

Some useful historical information on the history of fat activism (generally speaking, the national association to advance fat acceptance (naafa) is a great org)

Vogue’s 2025 inclusivity report which lamented our drop in body positivity from, checks notes, 2% percent of models to 1.8% of models

Some helpful context for the real-world weight loss of glp-1 vs clinical trials

some evidence for just how often we undergo a culture-wide chicken little moment of running around screaming that “ultra thin body types” are “suddenly back in vogue” and “it’s a dangerous new trend”

* we were worrying about it in 2023

* …and also in 2022

* …and also in 2019

* oh and by the way, when we *did* have fat characters on the screen, we basically mocked the characters mercilessly for being fat, yay for body positivity!

* anyways yeah we were also talking about this in 2016

* and 2012

* and 2007

You get the point.

Oh also here’s an op-ed about michelle obama’s crusade against obesity that might complicate the narrative around conservatism equaling skinny culture

on the moral panic around eating disorders, featuring a series of fun facts caro learned on her intellectual rumspringa which thoroughly blew her mind

some recent studies on the potential inheritability of eating disorders

some background information on how men and fat people have been historically excluded from eating disorder research and recovery avenues

a historical explainer of anorexia (and here’s where I found the William Gull excerpt)

info on the high comorbidity between anorexia and obsessive-compulsive disorder

a deep dive on the “biopsychosocial” of it all in relation to eating disorders

and then a quick side door into the tressie-katie convo that truly rocked our worlds

as well as this incredible comment we received on our liv schmidt/skinnytok ep, in its entirety:

casual!

on the magical third door/leg stool: Rayne Fisher-Quann’s theory of being “womaned”

Here’s the full piece Fisher-Quann wrote for i-D Magazine

And the book I reference, Damned Whores & God’s Police, by Anne Summers

Here’s the JLaw NYT interview, as well as the Kristen Stewart NYT interview

That’s it, thanks for coming to the show, there will be no encore, etc etc etc-

Feminist hysteria has replaced logic and reason in the American public discourse, or so says one Helen Andrews. Today, we dive into the logical underpinnings for this argument and conduct a close read of the source material, which does a genuinely impressive job of evading all manner of pesky contradictory data (women’s workforce participation declining since the year 2000, women making up less than 50% of corporate America even at the entry level, etc.) in order to mount an incredible argument: Wokeness is *sharply inhales through teeth* just chick stuff.

Consider this a corollary to our The Men Are Not All Right episode, in that the “Great Feminization” panic is yet another outgrowth of the thesis that governs all of American gender politics: Society is failing men, but women are failing society.

All references and citations in this episode can be found on the episode page at www.diabolicalliespod.com.

As a reminder, this is a bonus episode, which means (say it with us now) we didn’t try that hard <3

Thanks for everyone who showed up to our live AMA this week. We laughed, we cried, we read RFK’s “swallow” poem to Olivia Nuzzi and will never be the same.

A sampling of questions asked, and answered, in this conversation:

This is a massive decision, to say the least, with major financial and spiritual implications — and if I, Caro, may be so bold, it feels very Diabolical Lies-coded. When Katie made the announcement public, it served as an excuse for me to corner Katie into a conversation I’ve been wanting to have with her for a very long time.

So today we’re doing it. We’re diving into the full story of Money with Katie, featuring but not limited to:

* how Katie became involved with personal finance

* what it was like to build MWK from a side hustle to a seven-figure brand

* where her political deconstruction from a capitalist to a radical commie fits into this equation

* what it was like to kickstart another podcast while working sixty hour weeks

* how much fun it was to meet me, Caro, hee hee ho ho

* why she’s deciding to pivot at the exact moment when most people would double down on what’s “already working”

Next spring, we will do a similar episode about me related to my novelist career. As a reminder, we’re doing an live AMA/bonus ep/gigglefest on Substack on Monday, November 24, at 6 PM EST. Email questions to ask@diabolicalliespod.com.

“Is There REALLY No Ethical Consumption Under Capitalism?” from Clotheshorse with Amanda Lee McCarty (2024)

“This feminist t-shirt isn’t actually made in a sweatshop” by Zing Tsjeng from Dazed (2014)

Karl Marx in America by Andrew Hartman (2025)

“Marxism Unmasked: From Delusion to Destruction,” a lecture series from 1952 by all-time neoliberal juggernaut Ludwig von Mises

“The Litter Myth” from “Throughline” by NPR (2019)

“A Beautiful If Evil Strategy” by Chris Rose from Plastic Pollution Coalition (2017)

“Leaked Audio Reveals How Coca-Cola Undermines Plastic Recycling Efforts” by Sharon Lerner from The Intercept (2019)

“What is Amazon Web Services?” by Melissa Eddy from The New York Times (2025)

“People Think Amazon Is an E-Commerce Company, but 74% of Its Profit Comes from This Instead” by Anthony Di Pizio for The Motley Fool (2024)

This video from Grace Blakeley, author of Vulture Capitalism, about whether one’s identity as a consumer can ever be weaponized as an anti-capitalist tool

“Ethical Consumerism Isn’t Dead, It Just Needs Better Marketing” by Julie Irwin for Harvard Business Review (2015)

“The Case Against Corporate Social Responsibility” by Aneel Karmani for Wall Street Journal (2010)

“Nirvana: Inside the Heart and Mind of Kurt Cobain” by Michael Azerrad for Rolling Stone (1992)

“Lived Through This,” an interview with Chuck Klosterman, by David Wallace-Wells for Vulture

“The Rise and Decline of the ‘Sellout’” by Franz Nicolay for Slate (2017)

Shakespeare’s Sonnet 110, in which he bemoans the need to do spon con so he can make a living as a writer

“In the 90s, We Worried About Nirvana ‘Selling Out.’ I Wish That Concept Still Made Sense,” by Dan Brooks for The Guardian (2023)

“How We Stopped Caring About Selling Out” and “Comedy’s Favorite Truth-Tellers are Playing Jester for the Saudi Prince” by Emily Topping for Current Affairs (2025)

“The Age of the Double Sell-Out” by W. David Marx (2025)

“I didn’t listen to a single Taylor Swift song on Spotify last year. She still made money off me.” by Chris A. Williams for The Philadelphia Inquirer (2024)

“It’s Not the Crime, It’s the Coverup” by Freddie deBoer (2025)

“Ha ha! Ha ha!” an infamous review of Trick Mirror by Lauren Oyler for London Review of Books (2020)

“The Journalist as Influencer: How We Sell Ourselves on Social Media” by Allegra Hobbs for The Guardian (2019)

As with all bonus conversations, this episode breaks from the regular format of this show and operates instead like an homage to how it started—sending impassioned voice memos back and forth. Enjoy.

*snaps into character to method-act as Tyra Banks* We were all rooting for you.

As promised, here’s a brief follow-up conversation on the Kirk of it all: one half news updates, and one half cultural analysis on the ongoing political fallout from Kirk’s murder.

Charlie Kirk “practiced politics the right way.”

He was “a controversial and polarizing figure, but that doesn’t matter.”

His “sort of dialogue is what universities are supposed to foster.”

In the wake of Kirk’s murder, these are the sentiments that have been echoed repeatedly in op-eds written for our nation’s most esteemed publications. For any writers, comedians, or civilians who have dared to suggest otherwise, the retribution has been swift.

We’re unpacking it all today in this two-part conversation: what actually happened in the last week, and what it means moving forward.

Oh, and if you’re reading this and would like to get Katie fired, please let me know. I, Caro, am Katie’s boss, and have been looking for a reason to fire her anyways. Please relay your complaints about her behavior to our designated reporting hotline, 1-800-PSY BTCH. (Please press 666 followed by the pound sign to reach my office extension line located in the inner hallways of the darkest area of the ninth circle of Hell).

Let’s get into it.

In the wake of running (and losing) a centrist presidential campaign side-by-side with the Cheneys, followed by a wave of interest in democratic socialists at the local level, liberal centrists are scrambling to prove that their ideology is still relevant and popular with voters. They suggest that candidates like Zohran Mamdani are “dangerous.” But…dangerous for whom?

Do Democrats have a messaging problem, or a message problem? Do Americans need more convincing, or might Democrats need better principles? If only there were an overwhelmingly popular Democratic candidate whose positions we could study!

Rather than step-ball-changing with the times, establishment Democrats are digging in their heels. Calls to rally behind Gavin Newsom are already rampant because, the thinking goes, “We need to unify the Left.” Instead of pushing for change, it’s time to fall in line and support yet another candidate who’s functionally indistinguishable from the last three unpopular candidates so we can “save democracy” and “beat Trump” and “no, seriously, stop asking why we keep sending billions to Israel, your ~purity politics~ of drawing the line at genocide are annoying.”

Today, we investigate the end of the so-called “liberal order.”

Taylor Swift recently confirmed the imminent arrival of her 12th studio album, Life of a Showgirl. Over the course of a single fateful podcast interview, a new musical era wasn’t ushered through our cultural door so much as it kicked down the door entirely, machine guns blazing, screaming at us to drop to our knees and choke glitter.

The marketing rollout for the Latest Taylor Swift Album to Save the Music Industry is now in full force, and likely will continue at pace through the album’s release date in October. For example, If you type Swift’s name into the Google search engine, your screen will rain orange confetti. Or if you enjoy following CPG brands on social media1, then you might have noticed the corporate leach effect of what amounts to one long algorithmic skid mark of unofficial brand collabs: United, Post It, Mentos, Oli Pop, Hallmark, Victoria’s Secret, Sharpie, and the Virginia Department of Transportation, to name a few. Who says social media innovation is dead!

In this (bonus) conversation…

Ever wondered why Bari Weiss is constantly creeping around the perimeters of the conversations we have on this podcast? Well, folks, today’s the day to understand.

Who could’ve foreseen when we started this podcast nearly one year ago to discuss the Times of London Ballerina Farm profile that today we’d be publishing a two-hour episode about the most stereotypically “controversial” geopolitical “dispute” in modern history?

There’s one thing you’ll hear repeatedly in conversations about what’s happening in Gaza: It’s complicated.

Or, you might hear that “Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East,” or that it’s the only country in the region that “shares our values.” (No objection there; Israel certainly shares American values, though probably not the values you think.)

Unfortunately, the story of Israel and Palestine is a deeply American story—and it’s only through confronting it that we’ll be able to understand not just the past of American right-wing extremism, but its present and future.

Even though we want this episode to be free for all to access, we want to extend a heartfelt “thank you” to the paid subscribers who make conversations like this one possible. $35,000 of the $66,000 in subscription payments we’ve donated so far this year have gone to food aid in Gaza. As Caro said, this episode is for—and exists because of—you, Dirty Little Liars: Thank you, and let’s fucking go.

To become a paid supporter or access a full list of references and citations for this episode, head to diabolicalliespod.com.

It’s the grassroots sensation sweeping the internet and, by extension, the culture—proof that conservative values are mainstream, conservative women are hot, and their rapidly proliferating attendant movement is finally overpowering the excesses of liberalism. “We aren’t running from culture anymore,” as Alex Clark put it, “We’re running it.” They’re courageous enough to stand up for countercultural ideas like, “Women should be wives and mothers,” or, “White people are superior,” and there’s one thing they want to make absolutely sure you know: They’re taking over.

…or are they?

What do “conservative values” mean in this context? What does it mean to be a conservative, when the tent has metastasized beyond the point of recognizable cohesion? And most importantly, is there any proof that this “movement” is growing more popular with young women? Diabolical Lies investigates.

When Sabrina Carpenter shared the album cover for her highly anticipated seventh studio album, Man’s Best Friend, the internet suffered an algorithmic nosebleed. An extremely high-stakes cultural debate unfolded: Was the photo (and correspondingly, her entire vibe) supposed to be funny? A form of edgy political satire? Or was Carpenter cashing in on our cultural history of fetishizing domestic violence/pedophilia/women’s suffrage/[insert infuriating clickbait term here]?

In response to the foaming masses, Carpenter released a second alternative album cover — this one “approved by God.” But the question remains: did she do something wrong to begin with?

What do pop stars owe the public, anyways — and what does our seemingly eternal frustration with them say about us?

It’s not technically true that Sabrina Carpenter “became a pop star” in 2024. She’s been rising and grinding for over a decade now, moving through the Disney Industrial Complex with seemingly tireless pluck: First she starred in Girl Meets World, then she released five studio albums (casual), then she featured as “that blonde girl” in the Olivia Rodrigo diss track heard round the world, and then, finally, she got her big break. Well, technically two big breaks: she opened at the Eras Tour, and then she rebranded herself as a sixties, Bardot-esque character alongside the release of her sixth studio album, Short n’ Sweet.

Boom. A star is born, etc.

…but of course, the rules of stardom are clear: you cannot become a deeply famous, deeply marketable, deeply accessible Female Pop Entity without also becoming vaguely despised by feminists and evangelicals alike. Neat!

Carpenter’s first major foray into controversy happened thanks to this W Magazine photoshoot, which featured Carpenter emulating the visuals of…

In this (bonus) conversation…

Reporting live from the basement where Annie Lowrey is chained to a radiator while a six-foot-tall sentient copy of Abundance holds a gun to her head, Caro & Katie review four pieces in major newspapers and magazines that were published in the days leading up to the New York City mayoral race when it became clear that the progressive Democrat who somehow managed to lead the polls without throwing trans people or immigrants under the bus might actually win.

SkinnyTok is full of contradictions: You’ll hear you need to work hard to lose weight so you can be effortlessly chic; you’ll discover a world of corporeal obsession in which attaining a “hot body” is the ultimate form of pleasure. So why does it all feel so sterile?

In this conversation…

In 2015, Caro took a politics course at the University of Virginia called “Sex Differences.” This is her story.

*law and order theme music*

Six years and five Trump press secretaries ago, The Guardian reported that, thanks to Trump’s ceaseless tweeting, the press secretary position had become “redundant,” an anachronism from a quainter era of politics when presidents didn’t preside like mad kings over their own social media platforms. So what should we make of Karoline Leavitt and the role she’s performing in this political theater?

What is Diabolical Lies?

Diabolical Lies is 100% listener-supported culture and politics podcast designed to make you smarter, saner, and infinitely more unbearable at your next family gathering. 33% of our revenue is redistributed to organizations actively working to build a better world for everyone—one in which people like Karoline Leavitt are relegated to their rightful position in society making conspiracy theory YouTube videos about the Denver airport.

In this conversation…

Over the last several months, the policy agenda of the pro-natalist right has become startlingly clear. What’s much less clear, though, is how the left plans to counter such red-pilled pro-baby and pro-family rhetoric—or if the left even wants to counter this rhetoric.

In this conversation…

Katie & Caro answer questions from our paid subscriber chat of Dirty Little Liars, like:

* Who would be your dream guest on Diabolical Lies (if you ever get over your narcissistic obsession with being the only two people yapping)?

* Are you actually joining DSA (Democratic Socialists of America)?

* What are the logistical challenges around setting up the charitable aspect of the business?

* What’s an issue you’ve recently changed your opinion on?

…plus, some Careless People and Space Girlboss reflection.

It’s the best system we’ve tried so far! It’s just human nature! It’s the force that drives innovation! …or is it? What if capitalism isn’t pushing us forward anymore, but holding us back from the future that we could have? Diabolical Lies investigates.

In this conversation…

You asked, we answered. Today we’re talking about the latest, greatest moral panic of our time: Are trans athletes ruining women’…

The “MAHA Moms” insist their healthy living movement is all about “the children,” who you’ll quickly learn are being “poisoned” by all the “toxic” ingredients in our food supply or corrupted by the crooked doctors in our medical system. But which kids is this really for?

This episode is a Tour de Grift that explores some of the most notable figureheads, their claims, and how this information metastasizes—so that even @CrunchyMom6969 ends up sharing vaccine misinformation between enema cleanse updates.

In this conversation…

What does it mean to “run the government like a business” in America today? In today’s episode, we scrutinize the fetishization of “efficiency” and the American businessman, the role this valorization played in the ascendancy of our current “leaders,” and what everyone’s getting wrong about how business is done in America today—through the lens of a recent bombshell report that “breastaurant” Hooters is filing for bankruptcy.

Got questions? ask@diabolicalliespod.com.

References in the Episode

“Is Hooters Really Rebranding Because Millennials ‘Aren’t That Into Boobs’ Anymore? Here’s What We Know So Far,” the important, hard-hitting journalism you’ve come to expect from Peter Thiel’s favorite beach read, Evie Magazine

“The decline and fall of Hooters,” by Kara Kennedy in The New Statesman

“Hooters in Talks for Potential Bankruptcy in Coming Months,” by Eliza Ronalds-Hannon and Reshmi Basu for Bloomberg UK

“Chanticleer Holdings and Hooters Ring NASDAQ Closing Bell,” a 2012 Hooters press release

“Prison food is the latest target in a campaign to divest holdings,” by Fola Akinnibi for The Los Angeles Times, because nothing says American dream quite like the ROI on mass incarceration

“PE Firms Rebrand Prison Healthcare Companies, But Care Issues Continue,” by Syed Hamza Sohail for HIT Consultant

The Private Equity Stakeholder Project’s report on HIG Capital and Wellpath, and the 1,395 times the “Correct Care Solutions” subsidiary was sued in federal court

“PE-Backed Prison Health-Care Firm Wellpath Declares Bankruptcy” by Dorothy Ma for Bloomberg

“H.I.G. Capital’s Companies Mired in Regulatory and Headline Risk,” by Eileen O’Grady for the Private Equity Stakeholder Project

“H.I.G. Capital puts Hooters up for sale,” by Luisa Beltran for PE Hub in 2015

“H.I.G. calls off ‘Hooters of America’ auction,” by Luisa Beltran for PE Hub approximately 10 minutes later lol

“H.I.G.-backed Hooters of America seeks a buyer: sources,” by Luisa Beltran for PE Hub in 2018

“New Owners of Hooters Plan to Expand Less Offensive Spinoff, Hoots” by Greg Morabito for Eater

“Hooters of America sold to 2 private equity firms,” by Julie Littman for Restaurant Dive

“Hooters of America Announces Closing of $70 Million Term Loan Facility,” from Stephen Brown on Business Wire

“How the Financialization of America Hurt Workers and the Economy,” by Michael Collins for IndustryWeek

“The Apprentice, Intro Season 1, Donald Trump,” which is nothing short of an absolute fucking trip to the reality television universe where this man truly shined and should’ve stayed

Marjorie Taylor Greene being generally confused about how the government is supposed to work pt. 359235

“Trump seeks to run government like a business, for better or worse,” by Brett Samuels for The Hill, which contains some of the bleakest quotes known to science

“DOGE is causing the very problem it claims to be solving,” by Shannon Arvizu for The Hill

“Trump Quietly Plans to Liquidate Public Lands to Finance His Sovereign Wealth Fund,” by Mark Haggerty and Jenny Rowland-Shea for the Center for American Progress

Ronald Reagan contradicting himself for 41 seconds

“How Ronald Reagan Tried to Shrink Government Spending” by Christopher Klein for History

usaspending.gov, a literal line by line accounting of where we spend money

“Americans voted for Trump, but don’t support his agenda,” by G. Elliott Morris for ABC News

“What DOGE is Doing Across the Federal Government,” by Nik Popli for Time

fiscaldata.treasury.gov, where you can learn about the national debt

“How Much Is the National Debt? What Are the Different Measures Used?” from the Peter G. Peterson Foundation

Let’s get spicy, y’all! Today, we’re talking about the politics of consensual sex work, through the lens of a recent, extremely viral documentary that covered sex worker and OnlyFans influencer Lily Phillips’s 100-men-in-a-day sex stunt. If you haven’t watched the documentary yet, we’ve embedded it in this post for your easy viewing pleasure. And yes, this documentary is safe for work; the curse words are censored and there’s no actual nudity. The same cannot be said for the podcast episode. You’ve been warned!

A note: this conversation was recorded prior to the are-they-or-aren’t-they viral drama of Phillips and fellow influencer-sex-worker Bonnie Blue both claiming they are pregnant within hours of one another, but for apparently different reasons (?), so we didn’t cover that. But please sound off in the comments if you’d like to discuss!

References in This Episode

The video of Ben Shapiro insisting quite seriously that women who fuck around will always eventually find out

“Lily Phillips, OnlyFans and the big lie that sex work is good for you,” a rollicking ride of a think piece by Tanya Gold which dares to ask the question on everyone’s mind these days: What if women are not, in fact, sentient?

“Shame on the men exploiting Lily Phillips,” a left-wing take by feminist Julie Bindel that will show you just how bipartisan the hatred for sex work truly is <3

“Men in the Lily Phillips’ Experiment Are the Real Victims,” an essay by Liz Plank that is honestly the most normal review we covered lol

“The Dirty Secrets of Pompeii,” a kind of touristy verbal romp through the fuckfests of Pompeii

“Sex Work Through the Ages,” a very accessible deep dive on sex work that features our gurl Valeria Messalina sucking and fucking her way through life

“The 7 Most Common Fantasies — and How Many People Have Ever Had Them,” a survey/data study on sexual fantasies by social psychologist Jeff Lehmiller of the Kinsey Institute, which—plot twist—actually took women’s fantasies into consideration

“What Kinds of Porn do Men and Women Watch Most Often?,” another survey by Lehmiller on the relative kinkiness across genders

“A Heated Debate: Theoretical Perspectives of Sexual Exploitation and Sex Work,” a nice li’l academic paper on this topic that can serve as a puritanical palate cleanser amid all this raunchiness

“Sex Worker-Led Provision of Services in New Zealand: Optimising Health and Safety in a Decriminalised Context,” which explains what they are doing right in the LAND DOWN UNDAH

“The Real Impact of the Swedish Model on Sex Workers,” a report by Global Network of Sex Work Projects, a nonprofit that advocates for the health and human rights of sex workers, that is just generally helpful

“The Audacity of Tolerance: A Critical Analysis of Legalized Prostitution in Amsterdam’s Red Light District,” a report by Humanity in Action, an international nonprofit organization that educates and connects young leaders on issues related to human and minority rights, about why sex workers hate *special rules*

“Dominance Feminism: Placing Sexualized Power at the Center,” a kind of dry academic paper about dominance feminism (honestly just read the abstract and you’ll get the gist lol)

“The Kingdom in the Closet,” a great overview of the profound contradictions taking place within OuR tReAsUREd eCoNomIC pArTnER, Saudi Arabia!, written by Nadya Labi for The Atlantic

And of course, a link to the GREATEST PODCAST (BESIDES THIS ONE) OF ALL TIME. Highly recommend the gang bang episode, the Saudi Arabia episode, the sex workers in New South Wales episode, though honestly, all of them are—wait for it—bangers

Bonus Reading

“4 Sex Workers Answer On How Much They Actually Earn,” an amazing Financial Diet rundown that shows just how much a sex worker’s life/finances/schedule/offerings can vary

“[What the Lily Phillips] Doc Gets Right About Sex Work,” by Jessie Sage for Rolling Stone—this is notably the only mainstream take on Lily Phillips that dared to center the perspective of actual sex workers

In this conversation…

A woman’s appearance has always been inseparable from her message in politics. So what does this latest, conspicuous shift signal? In this episode, we’re taking a question the New Right is obsessed with—what is a woman?—and answering it by analyzing the aesthetic transformations of the women they tolerate becoming prominent and visible within their coalition.

In the time since we recorded, a few major news stories have broken:

* TikTok users are reporting that TikTok is now removing comments including #freepalestine and labeling them as “hate speech”

* Meta is under fire for allegedly requiring people to follow the POTUS and VP Instagram accounts, as well as blurring images that relate to abortion care resources

* A new trend on TikTok called “cute winter boots” is being utilized to share information on how to resist the Trump administration (the admin’s anti-immigration efforts in particular)

* A Chinese start-up, DeepSeek, released an insanely advanced open source AI model that 1) absolutely trounces American AI efforts across all benchmarks, 2) was funded on a fraction of the resources that American companies claim to require, and 3) flies directly in the face of extensive US efforts to limit Chinese competition in the space via chip export restrictions

Fortunately for our new audio engineer (and unfortunately for just, like, the general state of America right now), these new developments did not require any last-minute edits—if anything, they reinforce the arguments underpinning this conversation.

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit diabolicallies.substack.com.

Since the passage of the US PATRIOT Act in 2001, the culture of anti-terrorism in the United States has proven fertile ground for at once legitimizing a threat as extreme and delegitimizing the context which produced it. So what does it mean when it’s a label deployed more often for college protestors and disgruntled Florida moms than murderous white supremacists?

For notes, citations, and bonus reading, check out diabolicallies.substack.com and select this episode.

In this conversation...

Evie Magazine bills itself as a “Cosmopolitan for conservatives,” but is that the best description for this editorial mission? Spoiler alert: No! Today’s sprawling conversation explores every nook and cranny of this dumpster fire of a “media company,” as well as the… uncanny, let’s say, timing of Hannah Neeleman becoming an Evie cover girl and the beneficiary of a glowing NYT puff piece, all in a matter of days.

Caro & Katie dive headfirst into the “male loneliness epidemic,” “the boys are not all right,” “feminism hurts men” discourse to understand which right-wing think tank’s research suddenly indicates The Men™️ are struggling, its curious timing, and the frustrating tendency of all the coverage to completely gloss over the core problem.

References in this Episode

Of Boys and Men, by Richard Reeves, the man who has penned most of the mainstream coverage on this issue, like this one in the Wall Street Journal

The CNN segment featuring Scott Galloway, “Young Men Feel Abandoned by the Democratic Party”

“How I Escaped the Alt-Right Pipeline,” the video we watched clips of in the second half of this episode that identifies Jordan Peterson as a common entry point

“Alok Vaid-Menon: The Urgent Need for Compassion,” an interview for the Man Enough podcast

“omg enough about male loneliness,” by Clara for Hmm That's Interesting

“On the Ballot: American Manhood,” by Richard Reeves for The Wall Street Journal

“America’s Young Men Are Falling Further Behind,” by Rachel Wolfe for The Wall Street Journal

“How I Escaped the Alt-Right Pipeline,” by YouTuber JimmytheGiant

Bonus Reading & Resources

“Patriarchy is Bad for Men and Boys” from Matriarchy Report

“Why aren’t we talking about the real reason male college enrollment is dropping?” from Celeste Davis of Matriarchal Blessing, about the “feminization” of higher education

“Race, Class, and Gender in the United States: Fear, Shame, and Silence in the Construction of Gender Identity” by Michael Kimmel, which is a fancy academic PDF by a sociologist about all the ways “masculinity” is invented and redefined over time

“How an Empty Internet Gave Us Tradwives and Trump” by all-star heavy-hitter Diabolical Lies favorite, Tressie McMillan Cottom, which explains the cultural aesthetic of the “podcast bro”

“Patriarchy Is Bad for Men and Boys, Too,” a banger by Lane Anderson for Lane Anderson

Time Stamps

0:00 - BUT WHAT ABOUT THE MEN? let’s discuss.

3:00 - Hulk Hogan enters the chat because of course

5:00 - *whispers* this is a conversation about identity politics actually!!!

6:00 - understanding Richard Reeves, the architect of the “what about the boys” movement

11:55 - CNN clip #1, in which two bald white men in suits convey their grave concern about the fact that “men have fallen”

14:11 - CNN clip #2, in which those bald white men seem not to realize that “latinos,” “rural Americans,” “ethnic Americans,” “seniors,” and other demographic groups…include…men????

19:10 — final piece of mainstream coverage, in which a featured image on an article says the quiet part out loud

23:35 — what is patriarchy, actually?

28:24 — are the men actually more lonely than other demographics?

32:10 — in case anyone wants to learn more about how the American Enterprise Institute lifts up men <3

34:22 — yes, dear reader, there are in fact women who uphold the notion that men need more time, attention, and resources from this country

50:00 — little tip for the women who want to give up feminist beliefs in order to “fix their marriage”

53:00 — Caro beats the “look at the data” drum

55:50 — Katie makes a huge point

58:30 — we listen to a personal account from YouTuber JimmytheGiant on how he escaped the alt-right pipeline

1:04:00 — Jordan Peterson enters the chat. Is anyone surprised?

1:13:25 — JimmytheGiant offers a v compelling argument for class consciousness as a solution to alt-right ideology drift

1:20:00 — no guys sincerely: it’s hard to overstate how unique America’s brand of “capitalism” is, compared to other wealthy capitalist nations

1:24:00 — Richard Reeves makes his big grand argument

1:29:00 — Katie makes another huge point

1:38:00 — let’s be clear on where the two-party system fits into this conversation

In this conversation…

Caro & Katie engage in a close read of the viral Free Press debate TikTok that stars a young woman angry she can’t live on a homestead, and accidentally discover it’s uniquely emblematic of the sort of right-wing radicalization we’re witnessing en masse in the United States.

Caro & Katie talk about abortion in America, starting with leaders in the evangelical church recognizing it as a political tool in the 1970s with which to gain power in the face of unwanted desegregation, to the profound discomfort that modern politicians across the spectrum express about the subject—that is, until maybe, right now. It turns out that American women have never actually been guaranteed the freedom to get an abortion, and to begin changing that, we need a new moral framework.

References, Bonus Reading & Timestamps, Oh My

References

“An Irish Problem,” a knock-your-socks-off essay by Sally Rooney about something that is also, incidentally, An American Problem

“Hillary Clinton’s Moral Conflicts on Abortion,” a 2016 profile in The Atlantic that feels, in retrospect, like such an ambulance siren warning for the years to come that it might just inspire you to quit your job, spend a decade or two building a time machine, and go back in time just to try that much harder to get Bernie across the finish line at the DNC

“Obama Says Abortion Rights Are Not a Priority,” a 2009 Reuters article that will make you realize the time machine needs to take you back earlier

“Jimmy Carter Says Jesus Would Not Support Abortion, Revealing ‘Only Conflict’ Between His Politics and Christian Faith,” an article that will make you say fuck it, the time machine effort is pointless, and inspire you to smash the time machine in a field, Office Space-style, because when it comes to Democrats dropping the ball on abortion, the limit does not apparently exist

“Doctors Agreed Her Baby Would Die 3 Months Before She Was Forced to Give Birth,” a Rolling Stone story of a Florida woman who was psychologically, physically, and financially tortured by Ron DeSantis’s abortion laws

The Turnaway Study (2008), a 10-year longitudinal study of nearly 1,000 women who sought abortions—some of whom accessed care and others who were denied it—that found not only do women who get abortions not regret it (95% reported it was the right choice in the years that followed), but those who don’t receive care accurately predict the hardships they will encounter after being denied care

“The Obstacle Course Facing Those Seeking Abortions,” a 2021 interview with reproductive rights expert Carole Joffe that offers insight into just how shitty our “golden age” of reproductive rights under Roe really was

“The Religious Right and the Abortion Myth,” a 2022 piece in Politico in which old quotes from Christianity Today prove how little church leaders cared about abortion, and how in 1971, the delegates to the Southern Baptist Convention passed a resolution calling for the legalization of abortion, a position they reaffirmed in 1974 and again in 1976 (one year and three years after Roe v. Wade, respectively)

Bonus Reading/Listening

“The New York Times’ War on Trans Kids,” a truly stellar episode of If Books Could Kill that highlights the Republican strategy of taking a microscopic statistic/nonexistent “problem” and using it to delegitimize an entire civil rights issue

“Abortion Is Ancient History and That Matters Today,” a lovely CNN debunking of the “abortion = modernity” fallacy we see everywhere

“The Brilliance of Safe, Legal, and Rare,” an Atlantic article highlighting the most annoying “pro-choice” rhetorical argument of all time

Timestamps

0:00 - this episode brought to you by…

1:15 - Diabolical Lies makes its first-ever presidential endorsement!!!

2:30 - lil explainer on how today’s conversation will unfold, featuring a deranged metaphor/Dane Cook deep cut about three monkeys fucking a coconut

4:42 - meet the first monkey that fucked the coconut: the Republican christo-fascist base <3 <3 <3

12:44 - discussing the OG political pick-me, Phyllis Schlafly

17:01 - meet the second monkey that fucked the coconut: the Supreme Court <3 <3 <3

35:00 - addressing the post-Dobbs, T.S. Elliott-Wasteland-esque landscape we find ourselves in today

40:00 - meet the third monkey fucking the coconut, caro’s personal fave: the feckless pearl-grabbing behavior of Democratic leaders over the years <3 <3 <3

51:00 - debunking the absolute horseshit fake-ass drunk history claims of “late-term abortion concerns”

59:30 - welcome to part two of the conversation, where we wave bye bye to the monkeys that fucked us (yes, dear reader, WE were the coconut all along! i love a good mid-novel plot twist!) and say hello to a new framework called reproductive justice

1:01:45 - enter, stage right: famed Irish author and marxist thinker, Sally Rooney

1:08:00 - caro finally follows up on her promise for an optimistic hot take on our current moment lol

1:15:40 - yay we made it to part three where we quit whining and start talking about how to actually solve things (gulp)

Our first bonus episode! The first 40 minutes of this conversation are available to everyone, but if you'd like to become a subscriber, join us on Substack or Apple Podcasts.

In this conversation…

A critique of work that best illustrates different elements of the, “I used to be a liberal, but…” media personality that purports to have invented a bold new form of centrist, independent thinking—but upon further inspection, it’s…just conservatism, often cloaked in the language of the left.

Two pre-menopausal females break down the replacement theory panic disguised as Reasonable! Political! Concern! and why it’s completely unnecessary and counterproductive to entertain the pronatalist conversation on their terms: that is, litigating the validity of having (or not having) children. It is not, and has never been, about the kids.

Bonus Reading

The Dawn of Everything by David Graeber and David Wengrow, which really puts the whole “the traditional, natural order is the nuclear family with the man at the helm” into historical context

Sisters in Hate by Seyward Darby, an absolute banger about the girlbosses of white nationalism

“White Noise,” a documentary about Richard Spencer, Lauren Southern, and Mike Cernovich’s rise to viral fame ha ha ha everything’s fine!

“The Housewives of White Supremacy” by Annie Kelly, a piece that traces the current anti-feminist resurgence to economic precarity and a mythic past in which everyone had sugar daddies and three-bedroom starter homes

“The Cultural Politics Behind JD Vance’s Obsession with ‘Cat Ladies’” by Jacob Rosenberg for Mother Jones, an interview with Dr. Melinda Cooper about how “the legalization of same-sex marriage has shifted the line of deviance from sexuality to reproductivity”

“Pro-Natalism” on In Bed with the Right, featuring some of the commentary we discussed from feminist writer Moira Donegan

“Warren Hern, America’s Abortion Doctor,” a New Yorker interview conducted by Jia Tolentino with the only octogenarian doctor on the planet that we will personally beg not to retire

“Roe Was Never Enough Anyway,” a critique of the landmark abortion case in Boston Review by Rachel Rebouché, in which she casually points out that Roe NEVER ACTUALLY GUARANTEED ABORTION ACCESS TO BEGIN WITH HAHA K COOL

“What the ‘Mississippi Appendectomy’ Says About the Regard of the State Towards the Agency of Black Women’s Bodies,” a historical analysis that, fair warning, will radically change your relationship to our nation’s history, and to the practice of colonialism writ large, if you aren’t familiar with this topic

“Israel Gave Birth Control to Ethiopian Jews Without Their Consent,” ha ha ha ha ha here we go again same story different colonial project cool cool cool no biggie

…and a funny little tiktok to reward you for reading so much depressing shit<3

Time Stamps

1:00 Katie sets the scene for the conversation, and makes a startling admission in the meantime

5:00 enter, stage left: the interview where JD Vance acknowledged his wife’s skin color in the most American Psycho way possible

8:00 Caro takes a moment to shit all over Megyn Kelly

10:00 let’s talk about how *~meaningful*~ it is to have kids, no wait we mean economically important, no wait we mean personally meaningful, NO WAIT —

16:00 if you’re wondering whether republicans give a single shit about babies/families/women, take a gander at how they engage with labor unions

21:00 the sneaky little fact that no one discusses in the birth rate conversation

25:00 let’s talk about how tenuous the connections are between marriage, child welfare, and child stability

32:00 who decides what is “natural” and “human” and what is not?

35:30 the first cracks in the pronatalism argument become evident

37:00 let’s discuss the Quiverfull movement!!!

48:00 exploring the cultural roots and propaganda campaigns that motivate women to lean into the pronatalist movement

59:30 how the republican party harnesses the fuck out of nostalgia to make us perceive their DEEPLY IMPRACTICAL goals as highly practical and maybe even inevitable

1:05:00 the part where we realize this episode is literally the sequel to agriculture wars

1:08:00 let’s address the elephant in the room, the elephant in question being *checks notes* the virtual elimination of teen pregnancies being somehow bad

1:10:00 insert obligatory conservative trans/gender panic here

1:17:00 is the birth rate panic actually a marxist panic in disguise????

1:21:00 Caro offers a rare optimistic call to arms (cherish it when it happens folks)

1:26:00 is anyone else just extremely bored by the ongoing effort to solve the effects of capitalism with more capitalism?

1:30:00 Katie drops the thought banger of the fucking century

The picture heard ‘round the Reddit Popular page has reignited the internet’s favorite form of is-that-misogyny? debate: Ladies, are we allowed to talk about what may or may not be happening on Taylor Swift’s face?

Plastic surgery speculation is an online sport in its own right, but the real story is what it tells us about our culture’s attitude toward cosmetic procedures (and the “feminist” way to participate) that the mere suggestion ignites such a fervent defense of Swift’s honor. The grand, widely celebrated deception of dermal filler is the foundation on which this melodrama is built.

Bonus Reading

“How long do dermal fillers really last? MRI scans provide evidence,” from Victorian Cosmetic Institute, a 5-year-old YouTube video clearly outlining the little-discussed long-term effects, plus this sort of clickbait-y follow-up about the risk of dissolver “destroying [your] face” by the same doctor, that explains how the dissolver—a substance called hyaluronidase—works

“Hyaluronic Acid Filler Longevity in the Mid-face: A Review of 33 Magnetic Resonance Imaging Studies” in the Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery-Global Open journal, July 2024

“On cosmetic procedures and the limits of ‘destigmatization,’” by Haley Nahman, November 2022

“In the Name of Beauty,” Tressie McMillan Cottom, 2019 (highly recommend this entire essay collection, Thick)

“Allie Rowbottom is no botox moralist,” by Brock Colyar for New York Magazine (also recommend Rowbottom’s novel, Aesthetica)

“We’re Having Fun, Right?” (Katie’s essay mentioned in the episode, about the unique psychological torment of entering a Sephora)

Down, Girl: The Logic of Misogyny by Kate Manne, which offers a definition of misogyny that focuses not on feelings of hatred toward women, but the social systems that enforce a patriarchal set of standards in women’s behavior

to see what terrifying ground we’ll traverse next, subscribe for more 🤠

Time Stamps

0:15:00 - let’s talk about that viral picture of TS looking “crispy”

3:30 - Caro self-therapizes about why she has so many blind spots as a Swiftie haha lol

8:37 - Katie gives a crash course in filler (how it works, how we understand and misunderstand it)

18:00 - some thoughts on the effort to dEsTiGmaTiz3 Be@uTy, LadiEZ!

23:00 - the more injectables are democratized, the more that famous people will distance themselves from the endeavor

25:05 - caro claims botox as her latest roman empire, katie immediately chops her off at the knees

31:20 - do we no longer believe that beauty standards are dangerous?

32:23 — theory #1 regarding why people are so effing defensive about TS getting work done (keywords: feminism, honesty, amnesty, Alix Earle)

36:50 - theory #2 regarding why people are so effing defensive about TS getting work done (keywords: code switching, the aryan movement, branding)

38:40 - how race theory plays a foundational role in the plastic surgery/injectables conversation

44:20 - Katie’s Grand Unifying Theory of Filler™

51:35 - is it maybe a good thing that we’re culturally freaked out by injectables?

53:50 - theory #3 regarding why people are so effing defensive about TS getting work done (keywords)

55:50 - theory #4 regarding why people are so effing defensive about TS getting work done

57:00 - theory #5! how! high! will! they! go! (keywords: thinkers, objects, commodifiers)

1:01:50 - why the “my body my choice” argument is bullshit in the context of cosmetic surgery/injectables

1:05:00 - on the importance of being ruthless with systems and kind to people

1:09:50 - why beauty is the only form of capital that women are encouraged to pursue 🫠

1:12:45 - the irony of happiness myth surrounding the beauty standard (“I do this because it makes me happy/feel good!”)

1:19:50 - ever notice how women are allowed to age if they’re in artistic fields where their faces are hidden/obscured by their art, whereas singers and actresses basically face forced retirement before they can even develop their craft?????

1:26:00 - Katie and Caro make a lifelong blood oath

“The Right-Wing Campaign to Purge Women from Women’s Sports” — The Intercept

“Boxer in Controversy Over Eligibility Lets Her Gloves Do the Talking” — New York Times

“Imane Khelif and Western Delusions of White Innocence” — Al Jazeera

“Imane Khelif Fights The World's Greatest Boxers—and Bigots” — Qasim Rashid Substack

some helpful 101s on debunking gender panic/trans hysteria

The New York Times's War On Trans Kids — If Books Could Kill podcast

Alok Vaid-Menon interview — Man Enough podcast

“No link between trans-inclusive policies and bathroom safety, study finds” — NBC News

“Arguments that trans athletes have an unfair advantage lack evidence to support” — NPR

the zeitgeist giveth an inch, and caro & katie taketh a mile. if you liked this, subscribe for more!

* What even is free will?

* What the follow-up article means about the response

* The Venn diagram between fundamentalist Christianity and white supremacy is a circle

* Where we go from here

We’ll be releasing these types of conversations as the zeitgeist allows. Subscribe for more!

Resources

Primary cited sources 

Meet the Queen of the ‘trad wives’ (and her eight children)

My day with the trad wife queen and what it taught me (second article, audio embedded)

Vimeo video 

Ballerina Farm explainers

Tradwife Life as Self-Annihilation, Culture Study

The Myth of Making It, Culture Study 

The Unbearable Daniel of it All , Influenced (Sara Petersen)

How Mormons Churn Out the Most Influential Tradwives (Caro)

Deconstruction Recommendations

Celeste Davis Substack

Mikki Kendall TikTok

Daniella M Young Cult Deconstruction 

Reddit thread for ex-mormons