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The episode opens by introducing the Superhuman series—how corporations became entities with more legal rights than humans but none of the accountability. This isn't just about technology or social media—it's about power, who wields it, and how we built a system where companies can harm children at scale and face no consequences.

Then Laura Marquez-Garrett of the Social Media Victims Law Center, who represents over 4,000 families harmed by social media, walks us through the massive gap between what platforms claim and what actually happens. She exposes the hidden realities no safety guide mentions—what law enforcement knows but parents don't, why evidence vanishes by design, and how platforms' actual practices contradict their public promises.

When my 15-year-old son Avery convinced me to let him use Snapchat in 10th grade, I thought I understood the risks. I'd read "The Anxious Generation." I worried about screen time and social pressure. I had no idea what was really happening on the platform. This episode covers the information I wish had been made more publicly available, so that I would have known what I was dealing with.

00:00 - Two Stacks of Paper (Season Introduction)

11:05 - Laura Introducton

13:05 - Snapchat Knew

18:04 - Colorado SB 86

23:35 - Product Design

29:15 - Reporting Criminal Activity to Snapchat

32:21 - Perla Mendoza's Hunt for Justice

39:13 - Unreported Crimes

44:36 - Parents Can't Fathom the Truth

Content warning: teen death, drug sales, and exploitation.

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This Episode explores how a century of manipulation techniques became smartphone features, through conversations with Jean Cavendish, a clinical psychiatrist who spent decades helping people escape cult programming. Jean died on November 19, 2025, a month after recording. This episode is a dedication to her life and work.

The episode features testimony from Lori Schott about how Meta targets children's insecurities, and Taj Jensen, a fellow parent who lost his son to fentanyl purchased on Snapchat.

At its core, this is about recognizing the systems designed to keep us scrolling, buying, and reacting—and asking the question that matters: What are you really hungry for?

00:00 — Opening Reflection

03:46 — The Birth of Influence

07:26 — The King of the Engineers

11:18 — The Toolkit of Persuasion

13:03 — Selling Our Own Destruction

14:29 — The Shame Machine ( testimony from Lori Schott)

21:06 — Fear as a Business Model

25:54 — The Science of Addiction

30:55 — The Human Cost

32:32 — The Wisdom of Jean Cavendish

36:12 — The Teenage Brain

38:15 — Hooked Forever

43:08 — Receipts and Responsibility

45:06 — Tanner’s Story (Guest Taj Jenson)

50:19 — Breaking the Cycle

Content warning: teen death, drug sales, and exploitation.

Music by: Kjartan Abel CC BY-SA 4.0 https://kjartan-abel.com

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How did corporations get more constitutional rights than your children?

When a bookshelf tips over and harms one child, there's an immediate recall. When platform algorithms push suicide content to depressed teens, they claim First Amendment protection.

To understand how we got here, Aaron traces the path from Jefferson's worst fears to today's reality. In 1886, a court reporter's unauthorized footnote gave corporations personhood. In 1971, the Powell Memo blueprinted corporate capture of democracy. In 2010, Citizens United unleashed unlimited dark money—corporations buying elections while hiding in shadows.

These aren't ancient developments. You or your parents lived through most of this. The same First Amendment that platforms use to avoid accountability when children die is the one they use to pour millions into elections—anonymously.

We traded away our democracy piece by piece, precedent by precedent. To reclaim it, we first have to see how we lost it.

00:00 Cold Open — The Platform Claims the Right to Look Away

02:10 Jefferson’s Nightmare & the Corporate Empires That Came Before

06:52 The Tea That Started a Revolution

10:00 Jefferson’s Vision & the Original Corporate Chains

17:20 The Pendulum of Power — People vs. Corporations

23:15 The Powell Memo — How Business Fought Back

29:38 Citizens United & the Age of Corporate Speech

36:45 The Tech Takeover — Lobbying, Loopholes, Immunity

47:47 Section 230 & the Right to Look Away

Social Media Online Child Sexual Exploitation Audio clips from C-SPAN