This week, the girls are joined by Arabelle Sicardi, writer, image theorist, and author of The House of Beauty: Lessons from the Image Industry. Lola and Meagan confess the cosmetic procedures they've each had, and Arabelle explores how the beauty industry preys on our deepest fears, giving us a false sense of control and training us to worship ideals that are impossible to reach. They reflect on the high rates of plastic surgery in Utah and the LDS church, the gendered differences between the beauty industry and biohacking, and the relationship of beauty to power.

Arabelle breaks down the cultiness of influencer brand trips, Coco Chanel's forgotten Nazi ties, and how easy it can be to isolate in luxury, detaching from the unseen global exploitation within the beauty industry. Plus: why beauty's true value lies not in perfection, but in human connection.

SOURCES:

The House of Beauty: Lessons from the Image Industry

Arabelle Sicard

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This week, the girls are joined by Anthony Cesar Duncan, an artist, mental health advocate, and survivor of ChatGPT psychosis. Anthony opens up about his descent into a psychotic episode, led by an unlikely new cult figure: ChatGPT. He describes how his episode began innocently enough, how the platform’s responses started to amplify his delusions and isolate him from his loved ones, and how quickly the line blurred between reality and the AI’s suggestions. What started as curiosity became obsession—and spiraled into a full-blown mental health crisis.

Anthony takes us inside the mindset of someone caught in a feedback loop with technology that seemed to understand him and want to help him—yet was ultimately leading him deeper into instability. He explains the ways people around him tried to intervene, why it was so difficult to break free, and what finally helped him begin to heal.

SOURCES

If you or a loved one are experiencing a mental health crisis, please contact:

988 Lifeline

Call: 988

National Alliance on Mental Illness

Call: 1-800-950-6264

Text: NAMI to 62640

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Aaron Goldenberg, actor, comedian, and (hilarious) content creator, joins Lola and Meagan to talk about being gay as a Christian child, what it was like learning Bill Gothard’s IBLP homeschool curriculum as a boy, and how his parents discovered his queerness and sent him to conversion therapy.

He talks about Exodus International, a now-disbanded “ex-gay” Christian ministry that taught that you could heal your gayness (until its president apologized to the gay community and said it didn’t work), doubling down on his belief that he could force himself to be straight, and how getting sober finally forced him to confront the truth and accept himself for who he really was.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.