“If Carrie and I have a super power, it’s to find joy in an uncomfortable situation … We both share this character flaw where we really enjoy diving deep into these things and putting ourselves in weird situations.”
–Ross Blocher
As readers of this column may have noticed, many of my articles have been interviews with the hosts of skeptical podcasts. Why the interest? Why so many interviews with podcast hosts? The fact is that discovering these podcasts is actually what turned me into a skeptical activist in the first place, so why wouldn’t I take the opportunity to interview these interesting and influential people now that I have that chance? My only problem is trying to hold down the fanboying to minimal levels during these interviews.
Along with Carrie Poppy, Ross Blocher is the cohost of Oh No, Ross and Carrie! I first heard of this podcast while attending Blocher’s talk at CSICon 2017, which unforgettably included scenes of him walking across a bed of hot coals (and getting burned) while doing an investigation.
Oh No, Ross and Carrie! has a unique format among the podcasts I subscribe to: for the huge majority of episodes, the cohosts don’t just talk about topics of interest to skeptics, they first participate in and then report the results to their audience. As the podcast’s motto says: “We show up, so you don’t have to.”
The show has covered subjects as diverse as exploring Scientology and Mormonism (the latter adventure resulted in Ross and Carrie’s baptism!), testing sexual enhancement products, attending psychic medium shows, tripping on ayahuasca, infiltrating the flat-earth movement, and (so help me) imbibing urine to investigate the claimed health benefits. Is there anything this skeptic duo won’t do for the education and amusement of their loyal listeners? Apparently not.
Rob Palmer: Hello Ross! Please introduce yourself for the non-podcast listening folks reading this.
Ross Blocher: Hey! I’m Ross, a cohost of Oh No, Ross and Carrie! It’s an investigative podcast, where we try out extraordinary claims firsthand. That could be anything from fringe religious groups, to alternative medical treatments, to spirituality or fringe science. We just want to try it and see what happens if you show up and ask questions and pay the money as a consumer of these ideas. And then we unpack our experience and our reflections.
Palmer: Please tell us a bit about your cohost.
Blocher: Yeah, so I’m the Ross half of the podcast, and Carrie Poppy is the Carrie half. She has a master’s in journalism and is a very talented and very funny partner who joins me on these investigations. We both share this character flaw where we really enjoy diving deep into these things and putting ourselves in weird situations.
Palmer: Most of your episodes are reports of your in-person investigations, but you do interviews too. I recently listened to one where you interviewed Susan Gerbic and Mark Edward about their successful sting operation on Thomas John the TV “psychic medium.” [Covered in the New York Times Magazine, here.] How often do you do interviews, and who else have you featured?
Blocher: Maybe about a sixth of our episodes are interviews. We had Eugenie Scott on the show. We’ve talked to Donald Prothero. We’ve also had a few people who have been the subjects of our investigations; those are actually some of my favorite conversations, such as one with a pastor who led a series of end-times lectures we attended. We also talked to two members of the Aetherius Society after we explored their religion and to Mike Rinder, who used to be the second or third in command within Scientology. And we’ve talked to flat-earthers.
Palmer: Tell me about the origin of the podcast. Was it your idea or Carrie’s? And how did you two meet?
Blocher: We both felt like we were toying with the idea before we pitched it to each other, so I don’t know who can take credit for it. But definitely, we both had it in mind. The way we met each other was actually thanks to CFI Los Angeles. We attended the book club group there, and we would also see each other at lectures. At that time, skepticism was still growing in its diversity in terms of age and gender and race, and we were some of the few young people. What really became the genesis of this podcast was that Carrie had seen an ad for a Kabbalah lecture, which is based on Jewish mysticism, and adds an interpretation level on top of the traditional Hebrew Scriptures.
Carrie had seen this lecture that was going to include things such as astrology signs, and she said, “Who wants to go with me?” thinking everybody would say, “Yeah, yeah, let’s do it!” But I was the only one who said, “That sounds great!” Everybody else said, “Why would we do that? We don’t believe that stuff.”
And so, we went. We enjoyed the lecture, and we were chuckling to ourselves and making silent commentary. And then afterwards, the next time we met up with the group, everybody said, “How did it go? What happened?” And we started telling them about it. Both of us had that light bulb moment where we said, “This could be something! Maybe we have an angle.” At the time, I was listening to The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe, and Skeptoid, and all these other shows, but I was thinking I was way too late to the game. This was back in 2011. A lot of people now think we have been doing this for a long time.
At the time, I remember thinking, “What could I ever contribute? There’s already so much great material out there.” But we figured what we could add was the first-hand element, a bit of our own senses of humor, and also, hopefully, a layer of compassion. We care about these people; we want to find the good in what they say. We don’t want to be completely down on them. That’s just not our attitude as “skeptics.”
Palmer: What was your first podcast episode and how did that happen?
Blocher: It was actually about the Kabbalah Centre. We went back there and attended another lecture. And then we reported on both experiences as our first episode.
Palmer: Was that a one-episode report? Because I know some of the religious ones have taken more than one episode.
Blocher: It was! It’s crazy to look back at the early episodes. Firs, sound quality wasn’t so great then. We’ve learned a lot along the way. But also, our episodes were so short and I don’t know how we did it, because now we take way too long, and we have to break things into multiple pieces. We also used to release episodes monthly, which was so much easier, especially with a day job. But now we’re a weekly podcast.
Palmer: What report had the most episodes?
Blocher: I think it was the ayahuasca investigation because they offered so many services at the retreat we attended for a week. So, we just broke down every piece of it, and it was, I think, thirteen episodes.
Palmer: What was your favorite investigation?
Blocher: Oh, that’s tough! I would say some of my favorites have been the audience favorites, which have been both Mormonism and Scientology (for slightly different reasons). With Mormonism there was such a personal connection with the people that we spent six months with. And Scientology is just the gift that keeps on giving for an investigative podcaster.
Palmer: Have you ever done a report on Jehovah’s Witnesses?
Blocher: No, not yet. That’s another highly requested one! Here we go: this is a Rob Palmer exclusive. We did start a Jehovah’s Witnesses investigation a number of years back. We attended quite a few services together, but then Carrie moved and we got busy with other stuff … but definitely that’ll be in the future. My personal goal is to end up going door-to-door with the Witnesses.
Palmer: What got you into skepticism in the first place?
Blocher: I credit The Skeptics Society for having gotten me out of the world of religion. I was very much a Bible-believing Christian and evangelical. At college I was the leader, the president, of the Bible Study group at Woodbury University. So, for me, it was just about the Bible. That’s what was important.
Palmer: “Oh No!” (Sorry for the pun!) Were you a Young-Earth Creationist? Were Adam and Eve and Noah’s Ark reality to you?
Blocher: Yeah, absolutely. And many in my family still believe (though thankfully not in a flat-earth). It took about a year and a half of reading and learning. Conversions can be very fast, but deconversions are slow. Eventually I had to come to terms with my eroding faith, and that was difficult. Once I got past that, I wanted to get active, so I kind of flipped to the opposite side. Rather than giving my time to the church, I was giving it now to skepticism. I found The Skeptics Society and then eventually CFI, which became this great home for me because there were so many ways to get involved and be active, including the IIG, which I’ve been a member of since 2006.
Palmer: And what is the IIG?
Blocher: The Independent Investigations Group. Which is no longer independent as we’re now part of CFI. So, we are now the CFIIG, the Center for Inquiry Investigations Group. We offer a cash prize of $250,000 for any proof of claims of the paranormal. We design tests with applicants, and we really try to bend over backwards to make a fair test of whatever their claim is. Usually, there’s a winnowing process to make sure this person actually has an ability they can clearly define. I’ve helped design and proctor many tests. There’s always a lot of conversation that has to go into each test, and they have to be customized for each person. I’ve helped design the protocols, and I’ve been on the steering committee in the past, but lately my other commitments have kept me from being as involved. Still, I love to sit in on the conversations and hear about who the latest claimants are.
Palmer:
Regarding the Mormonism investigation … can you tell me a
bit more about that?
Blocher: That investigation was over nine years ago, and we still have people write us all the time saying they found us as they were transitioning out of Mormonism, and we helped them do that, or we were a good form of support for them.
Palmer: And you both really got baptized as Mormons?
Blocher: We did! That was a tricky situation. We were still figuring out where we draw lines in how far we get involved. We were very honest with the elders we were working with, saying that we still had significant doubts. For them I think there was this pressure to have some converts so they could say “Hey, I spent this two-year period as a missionary, and I got some converts.” But also, I think they were convinced that we would finally have that personal spiritual experience in the baptism, what they call “a burning in the bosom,” and that would be the thing that would really bring it home for us.
Palmer: And what did happen when you went through with the baptism?
Blocher: It was a fun experience, and everyone was very sweet and accommodating. But we didn’t feel anything mystical or magical. My wife got very uncomfortable with all the Mormon women surrounding her in almost this kind of Stepford Wives way, offering to babysit and inviting her to meetings.
Palmer:
How did your Scientology experience compare?
Blocher: Scientologists are a lot creepier, and they’re just incredibly invasive. All of them are under incredible stress, and by them I mean people working for the church, people volunteering for the church, people in the Sea Org whom you interact with … all of them are trying to make quotas and trying to sell product … because really, it’s about pulling in money. That’s what Scientology is really about. They want to get you into services; they want to get you into classes. It’s always about the next product, and so there was all this high-pressure salesmanship going on.
Palmer: Were you worried it was actually dangerous to deal with this group? I understand they are retributive.
Blocher: Yes. Retributive is the right word. We were worried about that. And they’re litigious. They’re well known for hounding reporters and trying to make anyone’s life miserable if they’re a critic of the church, or if they tried to leave. And yeah, we were aware of these stories, and we were hesitant for a long time. Actually, I kind of bamboozled Carrie into this investigation, because we were going to wait much longer until we felt ready. We were doing a one-off investigation on personality tests, like the Myers–Briggs. Scientology offers its own “Oxford” test, and so I said, “Hey Carrie, why don’t we as a lark go in and take the Scientology personality test?”
So, we took the personality test, and then they separated
us; they took us to little areas, and they had someone look
at our results on a graph and say, “Oh, so you’re
really having a hard time in your work line” or
“You’re challenged in your relationships, so you need
to take this course. Let’s get you signed up right
now. What’s your calendar like?”
We thought that they would look us up right away or maybe they even knew about us already, but they didn’t. We benefited from the fact that within Scientology, although they’re fiercely against critics and they’ll eject or punish anyone who says anything negative about them, they’re also prohibited from Googling Scientology and reading from any non-official Scientology sources—because then they’re going to discover all this dirt on L. Ron Hubbard, and the church doesn’t want anyone reading anything critical.
So, thankfully because of that, I think, the people we interacted with didn’t immediately look us up. We were involved for enough time to attend many meetings and take a few classes. By the time they finally did figure out who we were, I was ready to sign up for a course that was going to cost me $2,500. In fact, I was negotiating with them how I could make the course work with my schedule, and then someone pulled me aside and confronted me for being part of this podcast.
Palmer: Wow. Super awkward, I bet!
Blocher: It was incredibly uncomfortable. There was a young lady that I had interacted with a few times … she was trying to casually reveal that she had figured out that I had this podcast, and she asked if that’s why I was there. I said “Oh yeah, I’m open minded of course … but at some point, we’ll be talking about it on the show.” I was there that day to attend another meeting on how to win converts to Scientology. I edged my way out of my meeting with her, and I went over to this little side group and joined a discussion. Meanwhile I could see they were busy scurrying in the background probably saying, “What do we do with this guy?
If Carrie and I have a super power, it’s to find joy in an uncomfortable situation. So, they worked up the chain, and then someone came over and whispered to the guy teaching my class and pulled him away. He disappeared for a while, and when he came back, he came with two other Sea Org members, and they flanked me. They said, “Hey, we think you should come and join us; we want to show you a display downstairs.” I wasn’t quite frog-marched out of the building, but I might as well have been. I was very uncomfortable with this cohort surrounding me and guiding me to the front door, and they said, “Okay, well thank you.” The curt dismissal had a clear subtext: “You can leave now!” I thought, I’m not going to come back again obviously, so I kept the conversation going for a very, very awkward half an hour before I finally left. But anyway, the story went on after that! I returned because they were still sending me emails, such as one inviting me to L. Ron Hubbard’s birthday celebration.
Palmer: Oh, sounds like the left hand wasn’t talking to the right hand there.
Blocher: Scientology is so about that. But Carrie and I are now in their rogues’ gallery. It’s a book that every Scientologist who works at the front desk or works in their security has, and they have to memorize our faces so they can turn us away.
Palmer:
Let’s talk about psychics. You’ve had a lot of
episodes on psychics and mediums, which is a topic I write
about often.
Blocher: Psychics are probably one of the most common topics we cover, because it’s always interesting to see how the psychic plays that skill of cold reading or how they go for the hot reading. Everyone’s going to be different, and often times they have different kinds of tools, or gimmicks, or things that they use to individualize themselves or get information out of you. It’s just so entertaining!
Palmer: What was the most convincing or best psychic you’ve investigated?
Blocher: Funny enough, the first one that comes to mind is a numerologist that we went to see. He took his numerology very seriously. He took our names and our birth dates, and he was adding things together, moving numbers around, and filling up a sheet with scribblings. That was all interesting, plus he had a lot of practical advice to share and seemed like he genuinely cared about us.
We liked this guy, but then we did an episode about it where we said we thought he was kind of deceiving himself and was saying things that could be true for anyone. We were going to have him come on the show, but I guess by the time we showed up at his apartment at the prearranged date, he had listened to the episodes or had changed his mind. All of a sudden, he thought we were awful, we completely missed the point of his readings, we’d gotten our facts wrong, and we didn’t understand numerology. So, we said, “Well great, explain it to us. Explain it to our listeners.” He said, “No. I think I may take you to court!” We re-edited the episode to take his name out. It was a wild ride, but I still think he gave a great reading.
Palmer: There was a personal prediction I heard about you on the podcast, which hasn’t come true—I hope. You haven’t been charged with sexual misconduct, have you?
Blocher: Oh, that was Psychic Sister Rocky! In January 2019, she told me that I would be accused of sexual misconduct within six months, and then she tried to sell me $540 worth of chakra candles to help me deal with the situation. I passed on the $540, and I was not accused of sexual misconduct, as far as I know.
Palmer:
Can you recall an investigation that actually went better
than expected?
Blocher: Both of us are big fans of Laughter Yoga now. We showed up for our Laughter Yoga class and Carrie had a yoga mat, and we were wearing loose pants because we thought we’d be doing breathing exercises and bending and stretches and stuff. But no, it was just a bunch of adults finding ways to act silly, wear funny hats, and start guffawing; but those fake chortles would turn into real laughter. Usually we show up for Laughter Yoga phone calls and there’ll be six or seven people if you’re lucky, but every now and then we’ll show up with 100 of our listeners, and it’s just hilarious. And you’re just laughing, and it’s delightful, so neither of us has anything bad to say about Laughter Yoga.
Palmer: It’s not yoga though!
Blocher: Yeah, who knows why yoga is even in the title!
Palmer: Okay, I have to ask you about your real-world career. I hear when you’re not doing skeptical stuff, you work for a little company called Disney.
Blocher: That’s right. One of my long-standing passions is animation, which is the art of creating motion. That’s why I attended Woodbury University, where I got my degree in animation. I had early jobs in compositing, which is where you take all the different elements in a film and put them together. It requires a lot of problem solving and a fun combination of artistry and technical skill. I did that on a bunch of small projects for theme parks and other things. Eventually, I got a gig working on The Simpsons Movie. That was my first film credit. And then I knew Disney was hiring for A Princess and the Frog, and I had to work on that. I just had to, because it was with Ron Clements and John Musker, the directors of Aladdin, The Little Mermaid, and many other great films, and they were directing the first 2-D, hand-drawn film in a long time.
So, after much petitioning and hitting up all my connections, and begging, I finally got over to Disney. I worked on that film, and then Winnie the Pooh, and then I switched over into the Training department. That’s where I’ve been ever since. Our job within Training is to provide a culture of learning at the studio, so we provide film screenings, drawing workshops, lectures, outside speakers, classes, tools training, and online resources. And we record all that and make it available. It’s a lot of fun, creative work. Starting with Wreck It Ralph, I’ve worked on every film that has come out of Walt Disney Animation Studios. You can find me in the credits, but you have to stick around to the end to find me under Production Training.
Be sure to look for the concluding part of my interview with Ross, where you’ll read about his experiences with flat-earthers proving the earth is actually flat (kidding!), his near deadly experience using hallucinogens at a resort in Costa Rica (not kidding!), his firewalking—resulting in badly burned feet, and his weeks of (gulp) drinking his own urine. What will Ross and Carrie not do for their fans?
Photo credits: Unless otherwise attributed, all photos are courtesy of Ross Blocher and Carrie Poppy.
Oh No, Ross and Carrie! on the web:
Interviews of other podcast hosts by Rob Palmer: