NOT going to lie, this episode was a wee bit nerve racking to record!!! Despite the, ahem, LARGE number of requests we received for this topic (which would make you think it was ubiquitously reviled), the acolytes in this group ride HARD for their leader! Money and religion are the twin engines that make the world go ‘round, dear culties, and as such, they are the perfect mediums for sinister influence. This week’s subject has been ~blessing~ the airwaves and teaching your parents how to be debt free AND godly since the 1990s…the OG finance bro…the one and only… Dave Ramsey. This week, Amanda and Reese take a trepidatious foray into the chaotic, testosterone-filled, rapidly aging world of Ramsey Solutions with the help of seasoned Dave Ramsey experts (though, tbh, *survivors* is probably a more apt word) Jen Smith and Jill Sirianni from the Frugal Friends Podcast.

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell @chelseaxcharles @reesaronii

Watch the new season of Sounds Like A Cult on YouTube!

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here. To subscribe to Amanda's new Magical Overthinkers podcast, click here :)

Thank you to our sponsors! 

• Head to Squarespace.com for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, go to https://www.squarespace.com/CULT to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.
• Earn points by paying rent right now when you go to joinbilt.com/CULT.
• Shop the SKIMS bras at SKIMS.com. After you place your order, select "Sounds Like A Cult" in the survey and select our show in the dropdown menu that follows.

Who’s your #mommy culties: Taylor or Whitney? That’s right, fresh(ish?) off the release of Hulu’s Secret Lives of Mormon Wives reality series (for which Amanda and Reese attended a blissfully tinsel-adorned premiere party #notsponsored lol), this week we are covering the cult of Mormon MomTok. This coalition of young Mormon mothers turned TikTok stars raises a truly baffling number of questions: Are these girls really Mormon? Does that matter? Where are their garments? Are they even friends? And most importantly, will MomTok survive the "swinging scandal" that overtook headlines a few years back, earning these gals their own TV show?!?!?!??!?! Grab your heaviest Stanley, fill it with Fruity Pebbles ;) and settle in to have all of your most sacred prayers answered. Potentially cultier than the sum of its cults (and trust us there are plenty), Reese and Amanda are determined to get to the bottom of the drama-filled, diet Dr. Pepper flavored mom-strosisty that is #MomTok.

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell @chelseaxcharles 

Watch the new season of Sounds Like A Cult on YouTube!

Thank you to our sponsors! 

• Head to Squarespace.com for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, go to https://www.squarespace.com/CULT to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.
• Visit BetterHelp.com/CULT today to get 10% off your first month.
• Dipsea is offering an extended 30-day free trial when you go to DipseaStories.com/cult. 
• Go to stopscooping.com/SLAC and enter promocode SLAC to save an EXTRA $50 on any Litter-Robot bundle.  

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here. To subscribe to Amanda's new Magical Overthinkers podcast, click here :)

Settle in with a Kirkland brand sparkling water and a rotisserie chicken because this week, Amanda and Chelsea are going IN on the us/them dynamics, strange rituals, manipulation tactics, over-the-top passion, and lore of your favorite membership-only cathedral of affordable excess, Costco. Based on this episode’s fervent listener call-ins alone, it’s clear Costco is more than just a place to buy 500-packs of plastic cups, gold bars, and even your future casket (???) ⚰️ Costco is some people’s entire personality. But has it crossed over into full-blown cult? Tune into our lol-filled analysis to find out.  

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell @chelseaxcharles @reesaronii

Watch the new season of Sounds Like A Cult on YouTube!

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here. To subscribe to Amanda's new Magical Overthinkers podcast, click here :)

Thank you to our sponsors! 

• Head to Squarespace.com for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, go to https://www.squarespace.com/CULT to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.
• Go to the App Store or Google Play store and download the FREE Ibotta app to start earning cash back and use code CULT. 
• Shop the SKIMS bras at SKIMS.com. After you place your order, select "Sounds Like A Cult" in the survey and select our show in the dropdown menu that follows.
• Get 20% off your first order of Liquid I.V. when you go to LiquidIV.com and use code CULT at checkout

We’re baaaAAAAAaaaaack!!! Join us for a 🪐transcendent🪐 new season of Sounds Like A Cult, whose opening episode features Chelsea Charles, one of our sparklingly hilarious new co-hosts. An unscripted TV producer by day, Chelsea joins returning host Amanda to unpack this week’s nightmarish topic: Dance Moms. Indeed, we’re exploring every culty corner of the fanatically followed Lifetime reality show, which centers on a group of competitive child dancers, their high-drama mothers, and their veritable cult leader of a teacher, Abby Lee Miller *shudders*. It mightttt sound dramatic to call this goofy little TV program a cult, but the sky-high exit costs, rampant verbal abuse, lifelong trauma, obsessed fan behaviors, and scandalizing financial crimes say otherwise!!! Tune in as Amanda and Chelsea dissect the show’s cultiest characteristics, and their broader implications, with the help of The Pyramid Podcast. 

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell @chelseaxcharles @reesaronii

Watch the new season of Sounds Like A Cult on YouTube!

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here. To subscribe to Amanda's new Magical Overthinkers podcast, click here :)

Thank you to our sponsors! 

• Shop the SKIMS bras at SKIMS.com. After you place your order, select "Sounds Like A Cult" in the survey and select our show in the dropdown menu that follows.
• Dipsea is offering an extended 30-day free trial when you go to DipseaStories.com/cult. 
• Head to Squarespace.com for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, go to https://www.squarespace.com/CULT to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.
• Get 20% off your first order of Liquid I.V. when you go to LiquidIV.com and use code CULT at checkout

This is Sounds Like A Cult, a show with two sparkling new cult leaders, ahem, co-hosts!!!!!!  We’ve been keeping this secret for months, and it feels downright ~transcendent~ to let you culties know: Joining host Amanda for the next season of Sounds Like A Cult are two brilliant, kind, warm, and hilarious recurring voices—unscripted TV producer Chelsea Charles and theatre/rhetoric student Reese Oliver (whom you may already recognize as SLAC’s beloved coordinator). Tune into today’s surprise bonus minisode for some angelic wee introductions, teasers, and deats about what to expect from SLAC 2.0. The next season premieres Tuesday, September 17!

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell @chelseaxcharles @reesaronii

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here. To subscribe to Amanda's new Magical Overthinkers podcast and/or watch full episodes on YouTube, click here :)

Thank you to our sponsor! 

• Visit BetterHelp.com/CULT today to get 10% off your first month.

New Age love & wellness influencers turned baby NXIVM: That's kinda the best way we can succinctly describe this week’s cult, Twin Flames Universe, one of the most chilling groups we’ve discussed on the pod thus far. Several months ago, Twin Flames survivor Jessi Hersey, whom you might recognize from the “Escaping Twin Flames” doc on Netflix, slid into our DMs and made a very generous and compelling argument as to why Twin Flames needed airtime on Sounds Like A Cult. After all, it’s important to represent the whole LYL, WYB, GTFO cult spectrum! This week, we're asking the fundamental questions: How did this niche online self-help “community” turn so destructive so fast, and how are its tenets low-key a threat to us all? Tune in to find out, and make sure to listen to the very end of the episode. We’re making a highly exciting announcement about the next season of SLAC… let’s just say there might be a couple new “cult leaders” (ahem, co-hosts) in your future!

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell @reesaronii

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here. To subscribe to Amanda's new Magical Overthinkers podcast and/or watch full episodes on YouTube, click here :)

Thank you to our sponsors!! 

• Visit BetterHelp.com/CULT today to get 10% off your first month.
• Dipsea is offering an extended 30-day free trial when you go to DipseaStories.com/cult. 
• Head to Squarespace.com for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, go to https://www.squarespace.com/CULT to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.
• Get 20% off your first order of Liquid I.V. when you go to LiquidIV.com and use code CULT at checkout

Further reading:

How ‘Twin Flames Universe’ YouTubers Monetized Heartbreak and Trauma

“Everywhere I Went, They Went With Me, Because They Were on My Phone”: Inside the Always Online, All-Consuming World of Twin Flames Universe

Why We Can't Get Enough of Cult Documentaries

Twin Flames, Explained

Pack your hammer and your lack of cultural awareness, because this week on Sounds Like A Cult, we're interviewing Tia Levings, a former Christian fundamentalist, mission trip devotee, and survivor of church-sanctioned domestic violence. Tia is also the author of the brand new memoir A Well-Trained Wife. She joins to discuss the ever-so-common culty practice of recruiting church kids to go on white savior vacations all under the guise of bringing Sky Daddy and ultimate nepo kid Jesus into the lives of people who most certainly never asked for that. Aka, mission trips! Many thanks to all the listeners who submitted call-ins for this episode! Be sure to listen to the end, because we’ve got a verrrrrrrry exciting announcement about next season coming :)

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here. To subscribe to Amanda's new Magical Overthinkers podcast and/or watch full episodes on YouTube, click here :)

• Head to Squarespace.com for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, go to https://www.squarespace.com/CULT to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.
• Earn points by paying rent right now when you go to joinbilt.com/cult.
• Shop the SKIMS Soft Lounge Collection at SKIMS.com. After you place your order, select "Sounds Like A Cult" in the survey and select our show in the dropdown menu that follows.
• Go to the App Store or Google Play store and download the FREE Ibotta app to start earning cash back and use code CULT.

Further reading:

• Mission trips are an evangelical rite of passage for US teens – but why?
• YouTube channel: ExMoLex
• Stop going on Mission Trips
• Why I'll Never Go on a Mission Trip Again

• Get Tickets to Isa Medina's Live Comedy Show in NYC August 24th! Click Here! 
• Follow Isa on Instagram to keep up with her upcoming comedy shows! 
• Subscribe to Isa's new podcast I'm Right You're Wrong on Spotify or Apple! 
• If you want to support Isa's new podcast subscribe above, listen or watch the full episodes at the I'm Right You're Wrong Podcast Page! <3 

Ep 6: Friendship Breakups: Right or Wrong? Have you ever had a Friendship Breakup? Absolutely no worries if not! Sounds like you're perfect and that's awesome <3 This week your gorgeous hosts, ⁠Lydia Keating⁠ and ⁠Isa Medina⁠, get into whether Friendship Breakups are right OR wrong. They debate both extremes, tell personal stories and chat about how post-college life affects friendship. They talk about bisexual friendships....aka love affairs and of course, they talk about boundaries. xx love you so much! 

• Subscribe to Isa's new podcast I'm Right You're Wrong on Spotify or Apple! 
• Follow the podcast on Instagram: ⁠⁠⁠⁠@ethicalgirlies⁠⁠ 

Oops a politically flavored episode of Sounds Like A Cult!!!!! Would you believe it if we told you we recorded this nearly SIX MONTHS AGO and just crossed our fingers it would resonate whenever it ended up going live??? This week, host Amanda is joined by Puck reporter and former MAGA youth recruit, Tina Nguyen, author of the 2024 memoir The MAGA Diaries, who’s here to shed light on the culty modern movement that is conservative youth activism: why it exists, how it works, and why there’s no left-wing analog. Culty times people!!! Intrigued how this episode will land with you culties 👀😵‍💫✌️

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here. To subscribe to Amanda's new Magical Overthinkers podcast and/or watch full episodes on YouTube, click here :)

Watch Amanda's Offline with Jon Favreau interview

Thank you to our sponsors, who make this show possible!

• Get 20% off your first order of Liquid I.V. when you go to LiquidIV.com and use code CULT at checkout
• Head to Squarespace.com for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, go to https://www.squarespace.com/CULT to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.
• Go to stopscooping.com/SLAC and enter promocode SLAC to save an EXTRA $50 on any Litter-Robot bundle.  

Learn more about host Amanda's Italian writing "cult" ;) It's a Live Your Life!!! 

https://trovatrip.com/trip/europe/italy/italy-with-amanda-montell-oct-2024 

If you’ve ever seen a suburban lady wearing a tee shirt that reads, “I wine because he whines” or “I’m not a normal mom, I’m a wine mom,” then you have likely born witness to a follower of this week’s “cult.” Wine moms may have nailed the merch aspect of modern-day fanaticism with their culture of “rosé all day,” and there’s certainly valid solidarity in venting about the hardships of American motherhood over a glass of Prosecco or two. But… ten? At the kids’ soccer practice? Is any group that aims to cutesify alcoholism en masse ever not at least a “Watch Your Back”-level cult??? To help figure it out, please welcome this week’s special guest, survivor of both the wine mom cult AND the cult of MLMs (no small feat!!), author and sobriety coach Emily Lynn Paulson. 

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here. To subscribe to Amanda's new Magical Overthinkers podcast and/or watch full episodes on YouTube, click here :)

Thank you to our sponsors, who make this show possible:

• Get 20% off your first order of Liquid I.V. when you go to LiquidIV.com and use code CULT at checkout
• Dipsea is offering an extended 30-day free trial when you go to DipseaStories.com/cult. 
• Head to Squarespace.com for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, go to https://www.squarespace.com/CULT to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.

From TV executives abusing kids on sets to Scientology's "Celebrity Center," the cult of the entertainment business can getcha from about 6,000 different angles. After all, what other mainstream American industry is glamorized and lusted-after to this extreme degree, only to betray its most successful acolytes with financial and physical exploitation, social isolation, dehumanization, and a destroyed sense of self-worth to the point that entertainers dying early tragic deaths of despair is not only accepted, it's practically a meme??? This week, host Amanda offers a lil history lesson on the cult of Hollywood before getting into some juicy personal stories and an analytical discush with the one and only Maria Bamford, iconic comedian and author of Sure, I'll Join Your Cult: A Memoir of Mental Illness and the Quest to Belong Anywhere. Who are Hollywood's true "cult leaders," and do their worst behaviors earn it the title of a GTFO-level cult? Tune in to find out!!!

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here. To subscribe to Amanda's new Magical Overthinkers podcast and/or watch full episodes on YouTube, click here :)

Thank you to our sponsors, who make this show possible:

• Go to stopscooping.com/SLAC and enter promocode SLAC to save an EXTRA $50 on any Litter-Robot bundle.  
• Head to Squarespace.com for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, go to https://www.squarespace.com/CULT to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.
• Earn points by paying rent right now when you go to joinbilt.com/cult.