Another article about this phenomenon
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In the terrifying early days of the pandemic, a concerning development emerged in the wellness space. Chiropractors, health coaches, ayurvedic healers and other mind-body professionals
took to the internet in earnest to circulate
QAnon content, stories about Hillary Clinton guzzling blood, and screeds against social distancing.
It was a puzzling shift for a motley group better known for sharing recipes and stretching tips. Over far-reaching newsletters and palette-perfected Instagram posts, wellness gurus were now
peddling plotlines of hidden agendas, secret cabals and the Great Awakening……
She observed that people working in the field of bodily care seemed particularly drawn to anti-vax, anti-mask, “
plandemic” beliefs. The Center for Countering Digital Hate’s
report on the Disinformation Dozen – a list of 12 people responsible for circulating the bulk of anti-vax content online – was populated by a chiropractor, three osteopaths, and essential oil sellers, as well
Christine Northrup, the former OB-GYN turned Oprah-endorsed celebrity doctor who claimed the virus was part of a deep state depopulation plot, and
Kelly Brogan, the “holistic psychiatrist” and new age panic preacher.
Klein allows that some of this crossover made economic sense: for people working with bodies, social distancing often meant the loss of their livelihoods, and these “grievances set the stage for many wellness workers to see sinister plots in everything having to do with the virus”.
But the spread of misinformation across wellness culture was likely attributable to more complex factors, including the limits of conventional medicine and the areas of health that are understudied or dismissed.
I spoke with Klein over Zoom about the allure of the mirror world, why wellness culture came to mingle with the far-right, and how we might tunnel back out of the rabbit hole. Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.……
We are in this moment where some of these distorted projections are also showing up in wellness culture. You’ve noted that there are a number of people who are in the business of bodies who appear to have been especially seduced by the mirror world. Chiropractors, juice enthusiasts, yogis – they’ve portaged their interests in health towards rabid, far-right belief systems.
First of all, we have to be clear that it’s not everyone – but fitness really was kind of on the front line. I was in New Jersey for the first few months of the pandemic and the two groups that were organizing most in those early days were the very religious, and the very fit.
Some of the first protests against lockdowns were outside of gyms. And I was trying to understand what was going on with that. Why were these
super buff folks having these protests, doing push-ups outside of their gyms?
And I came to the conclusion that there was something similar to the way in which some ultra-religious people were reacting, where they were insisting no matter what this was, they had to go pray. They had to be in these collective spaces, because that was their force field. Prayer was their protection against death or what happens after death.
I vividly remember watching the news one night, and there was a story about a megachurch that had broken lockdown. Journalists were interviewing people as they were streaming out of the megachurch. And they said: “Aren’t you afraid of Covid? You’ve just been in a room with thousands of unmasked people singing.” And the answer from one worshipper was: “No way! I’m bathed in the blood of the Lord.”
I saw these gym protests as a similar idea: my body is my temple. What I’m doing here is my protection; I’m keeping myself strong. I’m building up my immune system, my body is my force field against whatever is coming.……
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2...ness-culture-far-right?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other