#627: Joseph "Joe" Dispenza

Joseph Dispenza is an author of several fluffy New-Age snowflake bullshit self-help books, and is particularly notable for his appearance in the deranged piece of pseudo-science delusion “What the Bleep do we know”. Dispenza, who presents himself as "Dr. Dispenza", is the proud possessor of a “Doctor of Chiropractic degree” from Life University, and currently seems to be in the “miraculous healing” business. He is also a follower of Ramtha’s School of Enlightenment, and has produced several Youtube videos in which he talks about quantum physics the way he sees it, which has nothing to do with quantum physics (Dispenza really doesn’t even have the faintest idea what quantum physics is), but a lot to do with gibberish centered around various ridiculous forms of woo and crackpot spirituality crap.

If you enjoy torturing yourself with fluffy fogbanks of pink-tinged drivel, you may check out his DVD series “Your Immortal Brain,” which allegedly “looks at the ways in which the human brain can be used to create reality through the mastery of thought” – which does not mean anything (alludes to the Secret), but that doesn’t seem to matter much to Dispenza; like quantum physics linguistic meaning appears to be just whatever Dispenza fancies it to be at any given moment.

Diagnosis: Pretentious, delusional puddinghead who is apparently convinced that what he thinks becomes reality in virtue of him thinking it. Otherwise Dispenza doesn’t care too much about reality.

#598: Paul Crouch

The Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN) used to be the third most significant network in the Christian Broadcasting world (after Jim Bakker’s PTL and Pat Robertson’s CBN), though it advanced a couple of places when Bakker’s PTL took some familiar damage back in the days. TBN’s programs are mostly concerned with name-it-and-claim-it preachers and faith healing, and Paul Crouch is its monstrously insane pentecostal televangelist founder.

The TBN's most important program is probably “Praise the Lord”, which features several expensively-dressed evangelical preachers discussing obscure religious doctrine, how Jesus made them rich, and claims to the effect that Jesus was indeed wealthy himself and his disciples wore designer robes – one senses a certain dim awareness of the conflict between the prosperity gospel and religious doctrine, and the theology is pretty tortured. The viewers of “Praise the Lord” then send the preachers shitloads of money so that they (the viewers!) can get rich as well, though the rest of us tend to see the discrepancy between the goal and this particular strategy for achieving it. At TBN’s Praise-a-Thon telethon events, however, the agenda is more direct; in this case viewers are told that they will get their reward in heaven rather than in earthly lives.

TBN also owns and runs The Holy Land Experience, a particularly bizarre theme park (or, really, a chain of gift shops) devoted to showing you the Middle East from a fundie perspective; it was founded by the particularly insane and controversial Messianic Jew Marvin ‘Marv’ Rosenthal, but was taken over by TBN after Rosenthal experienced some financial troubles. The theme park was an important stop during Herman Cain’s 2012 campaign tour.

In 2012 TBN was the subject of some lawsuits e.g. from Paul Crouch’s own granddaughter. Paul and his son Matt reacted in interesting ways – “God help” anyone who gets in the way of TBN – and Paul claimed to have attended the funerals of two people who had tried. One wonders how many kneecaps Jesus and his “disciples” were breaking to pay for those designer robes, but I suppose it would be easy for Jesus and co. to extort protection money out of bronze age shepherds given how his Family had previously treated recalcitrant Pharaohs and pretty much anyone else standing in their way in the Old Testament.

As for other projects, Crouch himself has the production company Resurrection Pictures, which is supposedly behind the (still) forthcoming(?) movie “Creation” concerning the life of Kent Hovind, and Crouch himself wrote the “popular” End Times novel and subsequent movie The Omega Code.

Crouch rather suddenly resigned from Trinity in October 2011, but it was all left to his son who is also called Paul Crouch, which is very convenient since it means that we don’t have to create two separate entries.

Diagnosis: Some may argue that Crouch is a fraud, but if he isn’t he is certainly a loon. The two are not mutually exclusive.

[Note to readers in response to requests: we’ll keep an eye on Ted Cruz – a wingnut’s wingnut, to be sure, but thus far he has primarily exhibited dishonesty, bigotry and extremism, and for instance avoided clear commitments to denialism or critical thinking failures (that he thinks that “George Soros is in a conspiracy to prohibit golf courses” relies, strictly speaking, on an uncharitable interpretation).]

#545: Keith Butler

Keith Butler is the founding pastor of the megachurch Word of Faith International Christian Center Church, Detroit, former city councilman, author, board member of Christians United for Israel (Hagee’s organization), and GOP activist who in 2006 he lost the nomination for U.S. Senate (he said that God handpicked him to clear out Democrats, since the latter are “on the wrong side of Judeo-Christian issues.”) More on his background here.

The core of Word of Faith theology is the notion that faith is actually a power that believers can wield to accomplish things by declaring that power verbally. In other words, it is the Christian fundamentalist version of The Secret and the Law of Attraction, and – you guessed it – the very foundation for the prosperity gospel. Butler is, accordingly,an extremely rich fanatic, and according to one Word of Faith preacher: “He is trying to get you out of this malaise of thinking that Jesus and his disciples were poor ... the Bible says that he has left us an example that we should follow. His steps. That's the reason why I drive a Rolls Royce. I'm following Jesus's steps.” Butler’s particular version of the name it and claim it game is discussed here.

He is also virulently anti-gay: “the gay lifestyle is based on a behavior choice that endangers family, children, and the core of society … The attempt to push this decadent lifestyle into mainstream society … is simply wrong,” though I am not sure Butler is really entitled to accuse other groups of a “decadent lifestyle.”

Diagnosis: Insofar as he is not just a corrupt fraud, Butler and his followers are just as crazy as anyone who thinks The Secret has anything going for it. Augmenting new age drivel with the Bible does hardly make it any more respectable.

#525: Dannion Brinkley

Dannion Brinkley is an author best known for describing two near death experiences in his 1994 book Saved by the Light (later adapted as a movie), and for subsequently becoming a prominent figure in the New Age and New Thought Movement. He has, for instance, worked closely with the famous near death ”researcher” Raymond Moody (to be covered later).

In his near-death recounts Brinkley claimed that he met 13 Beings of Light who told him that “those who go to Earth are the real heroes and heroines [in othre words, Brinkley is really an angelic being on a mission from God], because you are doing something that no other spiritual beings have the courage to do. You have gone to earth to co-create with God,” and, apparently, to receive visions of future events. Brinkley foresaw that there would be a breakdown of the Soviet Union in 1990 and subsequent food riots (according to Moody the forecast struck him as ”silly and absurd” at the time but later proved accurate – funny enough Moody only mentioned this after the fall of the Soviet Union). Brinkley's visions also reportedly included the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster and the 1990–1991 Persian Gulf War, but unfortunately Brinkley never mentioned these visions to anyone before his 1994 book. A pity, isn’t it? And extremely surprisingly, the forecasts he did make in 1994 –  a 1995 nuclear accident in Norway and a pre-2000 economic collapse in the United States – never occured. Brinkley also claims the events surrounding his first near death experience left him with ”special powers”, i.e. psychic and paranormal abilities, but these don’t seem to be testable (presumably, they magically refuse to work in controlled situations).

His most recent book (with Kathryn Peters-Brinkley, presumably his wife) is The Secrets of the Light: Spiritual strategies to empower your life ... here and in the hereafter, which contains a garbled mess of quantum woo and claims to the effect that ”chaos is not something to be avoided, but is, if used with intent, an unfailing source of spiritual growth, so we should welcome it” (according to his fan Don Croft). Brinkley is currently apparently writing a new one: ”is this like The Secret? Well, yes, sort of, but it’s soooo much more.” Indeed.

Among Brinkley’s other claims are recounts of his alleged actions as a CIA sniper in Laos during the Vietnam War, even though military records show that he was stationed in Georgia as a truck driver throughout the events.

To be fair, Brinkley does seem to have done some pretty decent charity work in his life, but that doesn’t quite disqualify him from receiving an entry.

Diagnosis: He does seem to enjoy some popularity, but primarily among those with a tenuous grasp on reality to begin with. Probably rather harmless.

#515: Gregg Braden

There is out there, and there is out there, and Gregg Braden is definitely as far out there as you get. Braden is  an author and speaker promoted Hay House and endorsed by Deepak Chopra, Braden promotes himself as “a pioneer in bridging science and spirituality”, which predictably means that doesn’t have the faintest grasp of science. He claims to be able to heal cancer in three minutes through “the language of emotion”. His “discoveries [read imagination] have led to such paradigm-shattering books” as The Isaiah Effect, The God Code, The Divine Matrix, Fractal Time: The Secret of 2012 and a New World Age, and Deep Truth – and they do seem to enjoy some popularity. An clue to what he is all about can be grasped from the fact that “[f]or more than 25 years Gregg has searched high mountain villages, remote monasteries, and forgotten texts to uncover their timeless secrets.” That’s how science is done, baby. And Braden really did promote the 2012 “end of the world since that’s when the Mayan Calendar stops” bullshit, though believed that it would usher in a New Age. Though I haven’t seen any official response I think it is probably safe to assume that met the failure of his prophecies with the same humble attitude with which Pat Robertson met the failure of his.

Braden is a ”sacred activist” (which seems to mean that he combines quantum woo, New Age bullshit and fundamentalist religion), and “Evolutionary Leader”, a title which reveals preciously patchy understanding of evolution, and he was involved in a concerted effort among prominent crackpots to pray away the BP oil spill in 2010.

Here’s Braden (with Bruce Lipton) on Quantum Holograms (for more on quantum holograms, see here), claiming that “[s]tatistics have shown that a specific number of people, joined in a focused, unified consciousness of non-denominational mass prayer, produce effects that extend well beyond the room or building where the prayer has occurred,” which is not even wrong (Braden doesn’t specify which “statistics” he is thinking about, but one suspects the Maharishi effect) According to the advertisment he “also sheds new light on ancient textual references to this field, and how our emotions and state of mind influence our DNA.” I am not sure “light” is the correct choice of words. Tom here seems to be a fan.

But this is just a sample. If there is a crazy belief to be had you can be sure Gregg Braden has it. His imagination is rich, his grasp on reality absent, and he has found ways to make money off of most elements of this combo.

Diagnosis: Demented fuckwit.