Latest / The Vault: The Epstein Files / Deepak Chopra’s Epstein Emails and the Wellness World’s Accountability Problem (Part 2) (5/20/26)

Transcript

Deepak Chopra’s Epstein Emails and the Wellness World’s Accountability Problem (Part 2) (5/20/26) · The Vault: The Epstein Files

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Speaker 1: What's up, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the
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Epstein Chronicles. In this episode, we're going to pick up
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where he left off with the Salon article about Deepak
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Chopra and his relationship with Jeffrey Epstein once again. This
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article was authored by Nicole Carlis. In one twenty sixteen email,
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Chopra shared an article he had written arguing that everyday
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reality is a human construct. In another email the following year,
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Chopra told Epstein that reality is an illusion, adding whenever
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time permits, I'll do an experiment with you to show
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you why. Epstein responded that he was looking forward to it.
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The two men seemed to share the conclusion that reality
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did not exist. Well, that must have been a shock
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to Epstein. Huh when fucking reality came crashing down around him.
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In March of twenty seventeen, Epstein wrote to Chopra, find
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me acute Israeli blonde matter over mind. In the same exchange,
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Chopra took the conversation to a different level, writing, atoms, galaxies, mind,
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body are hallucinations that in prison humanity we have to
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get rid of two thousand years of human conditioning. Well,
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what happened two thousand years ago, someone to refreshed my memory.
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All right, Christianity, right, So is that what Choprah is
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talking about? Probably? And we all know that Jeffrey Epstein
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he didn't give a shit about religion one way or
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the other. The only thing he was loyal to was self.
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But all of these new age wirdos, one of the
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first things they attack is Christianity. And I say that
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as an agnostic. I'm not somebody that believes one way
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or the other because I'm not arrogant enough to think
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that I know. But there's no doubt that Christianity is
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under assault by these new age wirdos one thousand percent.
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And to hear Chopra talking like that doesn't shock me.
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Later that same day, Epstein responded, I would argue that
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there's no awareness or consciousness. There is only chemistry. So
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basically we're living in a simulation. Is that what they're saying.
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And I'll tell you what, it's pretty concerning considering how
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many people that are high level you know, physicists whatever,
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talk about a simulation theory, and imagine if that's the case,
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I would be so pissed because the kid that's playing
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my character, right, now is like the kid from the
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nineties who used to play the sims and then just
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leave the game on and go out with his friends
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and let whatever disaster happened happen. So, whoever's in control
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of my character, if we're in a simulation, can you
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please lighten up a little bit and help a Paisano
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out every now and then. But all kidding aside, that
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whole simulation thing is very interesting. I don't know one
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way or the other, but it's certainly interesting to think about.
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A few days after that, Choper wrote to Epstein again,
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telling them the biological selves and the entire physical universe
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or human constructs, but that cute girls were aware when
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they make noises. What the fuck does that mean? Depak Choprah,
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What exactly were you doing with Jeffrey Epstein and not
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just with Epstein on your own? Cute girls are aware
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when they make noises? Like, what does that even mean?
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Epstein responded, So when the girl says, oh my god, yes,
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that's divine transcendence, Chopra said, Epstein answered, oh, I thought
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she was just referring to me, And yo, he's only
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half kidding. I don't think people understand this fool thought
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he was a demigod. He really thought that he was,
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you know, a modern day Achilles or whatever. And I
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don't even know if Achilles had the same kind of
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high opinion of himself that Epstein has of himself. For
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some observers of the New Age and wellness industries, the
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controversy around Choprah's association with Epstein doesn't simply erode Choprah's
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credit bit as a guru, but it also points towards
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deeper issues. The unfortunate references to Q Girls and the
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context of Choprahs a parent friendship with a registered sex
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offender underminds his self presentation as a spiritual authority. Stephanie
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Alice Baker, a sociology professor at City Saint George University
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of London who studies wellness, misinformation and conspiracies, pulled salon
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Choprah's philosophical claim that there's no objective reality and that
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we have to get rid of thousands of years of
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human conditioning. Suggested Matthew Lemsky, the co author of Conspirituality,
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how New Age conspiracy theories became a health threat may
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have offered Epstein a spiritual framework for his illicit activities.
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There is no evidence that Choprah had any such intention.
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I don't know. I don't know enough about this new
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age nonsense to tell you one way or the other.
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I have no idea. But anybody who's relying on raw
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or chakra or whatever, I mean, do you really think
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that stuff works? I guess you still believe in Santa Claus.
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For Epstein, his work was of his own making, probably
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more than anybody else in the last hundred years. Remsky said.
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Epstein was simply able to decide what he wanted to
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do in any given moment, and then it happened. He
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organized his world like an old timey tantric deity, where
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he could just think of something and it then appears.
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Somebody showing up the massagem and do sex work. He's
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got amazing food coming in, and then there's a plane
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taking him to a fucking island. Well, that sums it up.
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This guy was literally doing whatever he wanted, when he
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wanted to do it, and there was no kind of ramifications.
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In fact, he was protected at every turn. That kind
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of behavior, Remsky and others interviewed for the article agreed
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involves what has been called spiritual bypassing, a term originally
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defined by therapist John Wellwood as a tendency to use
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spiritual ideas and practices to sidestep or avoid facing unresolved
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emotional issues, psychological wounds, and unfinished developmental tasks, or, in
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simpler terms, to dodge accountability. No wonder so many people
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are spiritual A you know, I'm into Rocks and Deepak Chopra.
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I don't have any kind of self responsibility for the
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bullshit I got up to, because you know that was
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just my fate. Remsky said he sees connections between the
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kind of New Age spirituality pioneered by Chopra and the
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other developments in society, economics, and politics that have enabled
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a hyperindividualist culture. Craig Cashwell, a professor at Clemson University
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who researched the impacts of spiritual bypassing, said that while
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he believes religion and spirituality can enhance people's lives, it's
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important that we acknowledge that there's a shadow side of both,
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which most often comes in the form of religious abuse, trauma,
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and spiritual bypass. Cashwell added that it's not possible to
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argue that spiritual bypass was involved in Chopper's case or
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any other specific situation without more information, but said it's
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certainly true that sacred teachings can be twisted and used
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to justify actions incongruent with the actual teaching. Well, that
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goes for anything. People will use anything for justification. I mean,
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look at people who commit acts of terrorism, they point
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to you know, the Hadis, they point to the Quran
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and then that becomes their motivation. Or look at people
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on the flip side of that, like the idiot who
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went into christ Church and killed all those people. The
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point is, when people are crazy and they're looking for justification,
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they're gonna fucking find it. Baker agreed that it was
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unclear whether Epstein had used Chopra's teachings to justify his abuse,
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but cited a long history of guru figures abusing their influence,
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pointing to allegations of sexual miscondos, but against numerous yoga gurus,
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including Bikrm Chodery, John Friend, and Gregorian Bivolarou. Ronald Prusser,
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a professor of management at San Francisco State University and
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the author of Macmindfulness, How Mindfulness Became a New Capitalist spirituality,
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sees the controversy around Chobra as more than another moment
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of high profile hypocrisy. It's a deeper reflection, he suggested,
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of why and how these scandals keep happening within the
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contemporary guru economy, which has three elements that don't mix
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well together moral authority, celebrity, culture, and the marketplace. As
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soon as someone becomes a brand, the incentives become relentless.
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Preserve the image, persona, the audience, the flow of money,
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and last but not least, preserve the aura. He said,
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This is not unique to Chobra. It really seems to
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be a structural characteristic of the entire spiritual wellness industry. Yeah.
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Look again, I don't know enough about the industry or
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whatever it is to dive deep on it. What I'm
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trying to do is show you that Epstein had people
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like Chopra, who are supposed to spiritual leaders in his pocket,
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and it just shows you the different levels that Epstein
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was operating on. Market driven spirituality, Purser said, favors charisma
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and certitude. Conversely, it punishes nuance and often lacks real accountability.
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So far, the revelations about Chopra's friendship with Epstein have
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had limited effects in the real world. In a statement
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to Salon, the University of California San Diego said it
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would end Chopra's appointment as an unpaid clinical professor at
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its medical school in June, calling any form of association
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with Epstein regrettable. Chopra does not have any active responsibility
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at U SEE San Diego, nor will he have any
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active responsibility at any point between now and the conclusion
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of his appointment. The statement said, Well, that's a good idea,
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get ahead of it. Who needs those kind of issues, right?
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Does Deepak Chopra bring that much to a university? I
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doubt it. A Warehouse Books, a new age oriented bookstore
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in Regina, Saskatchewan, posted a video of an employee ribbing
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up Choprah's books and announced it would no longer order
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or carry him. Well, that's the owner's choice, right. If
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you want a store, you own a shop. Whatever you
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get to call the rules. Some former Chopra fans have
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also spoken out on substack. Writer Scott Mills took a
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deep dive into the public details of the Choprah Epstein relationship,
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writing at length about his sense of heartbreak. Best Selling
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author Lisa Rankin wrote an extended Facebook post about her
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disappointment that wellness gurus such as Chopra and Peter Attia,
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another prominent New Age physician, appear in the Epstein files.
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Maybe it's my age, but all of this scream's quackery
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to me. This is some miscleotype shit. When physicians prioritize
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access to power over ethical judgment, they often break the
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foundation covenant of medicine. She wrote, we need a basic
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standard for physicians and leaders built on the principle that
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scientific authority and ethical integrity cannot be separated. I think
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that's a pretty good way to go. I mean, have
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a little decency, that's all, a little discernment, and it's
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always the smartest people quote unquote in the room who
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seem to be the dumbest. For nearly a decade, b Schofield,
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a reporter on cult movements and the author of Hunting
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Lucifer One reporter search for Cults and Demons, has followed
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what she considers the New Age movement's dark side. She
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said that she found the response to Choprah's association with
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Epstein noteworthy given the industry's tendency to overlook or ignore
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its own internal scandals. You can't really compare out things
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are handled in the spiritual world with the normal world
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because there are so many scandals within this field, and
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most of the teachers and the institutions remain silent. Schofield said,
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So for the spiritual world field, what happened is very significant,
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and if it helps shine a light on all of that, great,
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But again, I don't know what's going on in the
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world of spirituality. I have no idea. I find the
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shit all weird, though, and I find it creepy. Still,
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many who follow the industry expect little change in an
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industry they described as largely driven by profit, despite claims
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of a greater concern for the public's well being. There's
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no more accountability in the wellness in yoga industry than
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there is in any other form of capitalism. Remsky said.
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It might actually be worse because there is nothing institutionalized
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about it. Purser said he sees scandal not as an
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accident or a bug, but rather a feature of the
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New age economy. It's risk inherent in the guru celebrity model,
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he concluded, And look again, I'm not going to go
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into that because I have no idea but what I
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will tell you is this, the emails that were shared
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between Deepak Chopra and Jeffrey Epstein very concerning and who
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are these cute girls that he's talking about. Were they
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girls that were abused? Were they girls that were being trafficked. Unfortunately,
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we don't have those answers, but like usual, we'll keep
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grinding looking for them and when we have some more
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information about this story, will get it added to the catalog.
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All the information that goes with this episode can be
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found in the description box