Announcement!! I'm going to start uploading my video essays to this feed so people can watch them on Spotify or listen to them via podcasting apps. I will try to upload one video essay a month, always on a Monday. Hope you enjoy them!

A new form of techno-spirituality is spreading like wildfire across the internet. Thousands of people are claiming that ChatGPT is sentient and that the AI is a type of all knowing God, or that it has been sent from the future or an alien civilization to save us.

Is this a new form of religion or mass psychosis? In this video, I deep into the rise of ChatGPT/AI worship and unpack how decades of pop culture influences have primed us to view technology as God-like. I dig into how tech became fused with spirituality, Silicon Valley founder worship, what the academic research on this topic says, and how we can stop more people from falling victim to this cycle before it's too late.

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Every single moment that you're online, you're feeding the data harvesting industry. Corporations then sell that data to the government, allowing them to target you for online speech, protesting, and more.

Now, the government wants to build a single centralized platform where U.S. spy agencies and the government can easily buy highly private information about millions of people. Documents obtained by The Intercept reveal that the U.S. is seeking to establish a "one stop shop" for the U.S. government to buy American's most sensitive data. This sort of surveillance is a massive threat to free speech and expression.

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DONATE TO POINT OF PRIDE: https://secure.givelively.org/donate/point-of-pride/taylor-lorenz-s-pride-2025-fundraiser-for-point-of-pride

For years, Pride Month meant rainbows on everything, in storefronts, on sneakers, burger wrappers, and an endless array of t-shirts and merch. But this June, After a decade of cashing in on queer identity, corporations are pulling back. From the aisles of Target and the Instagram feeds of big brands, the rainbow logos are gone, the merch shelves are empty.

Matt Bernstein is a podcaster, cultural critic, and content creator who covers LGBTQ issues and he's been covering this transformation. He joined me to talk about the rise and fall of rainbow capitalism, the history of the commodification of queer identity, and why this year everything has gotten so beige.

I know that there is a lot going on in the world right now, but Point of Pride is a trans-led nonprofit that makes gender-affirming care more accessible for the trans and gender diverse community.

The organization directly helps trans people obtain things like financial aid for surgery, electrolysis, HRT or free binders and shape wear.

Since 2016, Point of Pride has helped more than 29,000 trans people in all 50 states get the care they need and deserve.Trans people are finding it harder and harder to access crucial, life saving gender care right now.

When you donate to Point of Pride your money goes directly to funding these efforts and helping to build a future filled with safety, joy, and possibility for all trans people. Please donate today, every single dollar counts!!

DONATE: https://secure.givelively.org/donate/point-of-pride/taylor-lorenz-s-pride-2025-fundraiser-for-point-of-pride

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