Madeline Peltz is a writer, journalist, and researcher born in Chicago. Over the last decade, her reporting has appeared in Media Matters for America, MSNOW, Newsweek, More Perfect Union, and more. She has been quoted as an expert on right-wing media and the conservative movement in The New York Times, CNN, Democracy Now!, The Washington Post, BBC, The Guardian, and elsewhere.
The fight for young minds is happening daily on podcasts, YouTube, and social media—platforms saturated with conservative messaging. The right has spent decades investing in this year-round digital propaganda apparatus, targeting Gen Z’s economic insecurity and distrust of mainstream institutions to push answers rooted in hyper-individualism, misogyny, and bigotry.
In Good Girls and Alpha Males, journalist Madeline Peltz takes readers inside the online conservative sphere shaping the future of politics. From “tradwife” influencers to “manosphere” mouthpieces, she exposes the voices driving Gen Z’s shift to the right along gendered lines. With equal ferocity, Peltz interrogates the Democratic Party’s culpability, condemning the hostility to its younger, more progressive flank.
Join Rep. Jared Huffman, co-founder of the Freethought Caucus, and Secular AZ Executive Director Jeanne Casteen for a discussion and signing of his book, No Prophets, a behind-the-scenes look at the shocking extent of Christian nationalism’s reach in our government—and the fight to defend church-state separation. They’ll be at Changing Hands Books in Tempe on September 8 at 7p!
RSVP here
Sinclair Lewis is said to have warned: “When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross.” On January 6, 2021, Rep. Jared Huffman saw something chillingly close to that vision. Thousands of Christians following self-declared prophets stormed the Capitol. The insurrection should have been a national wake-up call about Christian nationalism. Instead, most Americans and politicians looked away.
No Prophets argues that Christian nationalism is now America’s most dangerous political movement. Huffman pulls back the curtain on religious extremists behind the insurrection who have only grown more powerful with Trump’s return. Openly vowing to destroy church-state separation and democracy as we know it, they now work inside the highest levels of government to drive domestic and foreign policy, reshape federal agencies, undermine science and education, and tilt elections. The endgame: an authoritarian theocracy that imposes their religious beliefs by force of law.
Drawing on his experiences as a formerly devout Christian and the only Humanist ever to serve in Congress, Huffman maps the movement’s largely hidden landscape—taking readers behind the scenes of the Capitol, exposing the tactics and myths Christian nationalists use to advance their agenda, and showing how America is imperiled by our reluctance to confront threats cloaked in Christianity.
But, he argues, it’s not too late. If we muster a broad interfaith coalition grounded in shared commitment to democracy, we can reclaim the public square for everyone—religious and secular—to share on equal terms.
No Prophets is a clear-eyed, urgent appeal to defend the secular foundations of democracy.
Join us on August 21 at noon/PT as we welcome director Liz Smith and producer Noelle Cook to discuss their new documentary film, The Conspiracists, in which a January 6th insurrectionist takes a British filmmaker and an American researcher on a road trip and attempts to convert them to her world of conspiracy theories. We recommend watching the film before the presentation on 8/21; you can rent it here for $4.99, check your local library catalog, or watch for free (with ads) on Roku.
Three women set off on a road trip across America. One of them is a MAGA supporter and conspiracy theorist. She has just been sentenced to 30 months in prison for her role in the storming of The US Capitol. They meet other “patriots” along the way and as the journey unfolds she leads her travel companions deeper into her labyrinth of conspiracy, determined to open their eyes to what she sees as the real truth. By the trip’s end will she have converted them to her “5D world”?
Noelle Cook is an ethnographer and researcher examining how identity, belief, and belonging shape women’s participation in conspiratorial and right-wing movements. She is the author of The Conspiracists: Women, Extremism, and the Lure of Belonging and is featured in the documentary The Conspiracists.
Liz Smith is an award-winning British documentary filmmaker. Her work is centred around human rights. The films she makes at Page 75 Productions are the outcome of years of study on the issues driving the rise of populism and the erosion of our democratic rights. However, researching the issues can only go so far. Her approach of spending time with affected communities on the frontline delivers a much deeper understanding of the forces driving these trends.
Her recent feature documentaries include I Am Gen Z, The Line We Crossed and The Conspiracists. I Am Gen Z investigates the impact of digital technology on the first generation to grow up with mobiles in their pockets. It premiered at CPH:DOX in 2021 and won Best Feature Film at the Lower East Side Film Festival.
The Conspiracists explores the profound and unsettling impact of conspiracy theories on individuals and society and won the award for Best Documentary Feature at The Miami Women Festival 2025. The Line We Crossed exposes the alarming erosion of the right to protest in the UK and had a successful theatrical release in the UK in 2025 as well as winning the award for Best Feature Film at the Environmental Film & Screenplay Festival.
She is currently completing the feature documentary, The Humanitarians, about the right to asylum and the rise of anti-immigration sentiment across Europe. She is also in the early stages of production of an investigative documentary about the growing anti-rights movement in the UK and writes about human rights issues in her Substack.
Learn more and follow on social media:
@p75investigates and noellecookdotcom on Instagram.
Despite fifty years of idealistic, diverse new lawmakers arriving in Washington, Congress remains paralyzed and inhospitable to change. In Stuck, Maya Kornberg explains that well-intentioned reforms have been thwarted by systemic forces: political violence, skyrocketing campaign costs, constant fundraising, diminished staff, and centralized party leadership. Furthermore, social media has fueled a performative culture that prioritizes spectacle over substance. This gridlock reveals how internal dynamics cripple America’s central democratic institution, causing citizens to lose faith. Ultimately, Kornberg argues that saving American democracy requires targeted structural reforms that empower new members and restore Congress’s capacity to function.
Maya L. Kornberg is a senior research fellow at NYU Law’s Brennan Center for Justice and the author of Inside Congressional Committees: Function and Dysfunction in Lawmaking.
Join us on July 31 at noon/PT as we welcome special guest Wendy Via, Co-Founder, CEO and President of the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, to learn about Christian nationalism at the DOJ and DHS.
Launched in 2020, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) was founded by Heidi Beirich and Wendy Via to address the gap in efforts to stop transnational hate and far-right extremism movements, particularly U.S.-based activity that is exported to other countries and across borders.
GPAHE tackles the issue of hate and extremism by working to reduce the associated violence that terrorizes communities and our society and tackling systemic problems rooted in hate in our governments and societies. As we’ve seen in recent years in the U.S., as well as in countries around the world, we can no longer separate hate and extremism from our leaders and politics.
Wendy Via is an expert in the intersection of technology and far-right extremism and the effect on democracy as well as in achieving change and influencing narratives and actions around some of the most pressing civil and human rights issues of our time, including far-right extremism, systemic racism, economic inequality, immigration, criminal justice reform, and LGBTQ+ rights. For the last two decades, she has successfully directed high-impact philanthropy initiatives, exposed hate and extremism in institutional systems, designed influential policy and advocacy campaigns, leveraged research, and highlighted storytelling to educate the public and create lasting change.
In 2020, Via cofounded the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism to address the transnational nature of hate and far-right extremism and how these movements harm flourishing and diverse democracies. She serves on the core committee of the Christchurch Call Advisory Network, founded by the governments of France and New Zealand, which seeks to stop the proliferation of online violent extremism and terrorism, and is the author of numerous reports on transnational extremism. She regularly provides expert advice to members of Congress, including testimony to the January 6 select committee and the Canadian Parliament, and other intragovernmental bodies, is regularly interviewed by leading media outlets, and serves as advisor to various tech companies.
Prior to co-founding GPAHE, Wendy was the Chief Communications and Development Officer at the Southern Poverty Law Center, where she led numerous teams. She also helped launch Justice for Migrant Women, dedicated to ensuring that migrant women can live and work with dignity and free from violence, and worked with Jeremiah Program, dedicated to disrupting generational poverty for single moms and their children. She holds a BA in Humanities from Auburn University, Montgomery.
Hey there Secular FAM! Happy Pride, Heathens!
And what a Pride month I’ve had so far! I started off in Mohave County for their annual Pride event, and took a much needed road trip in solitude. My friend created an incredible playlist for me, and I wondered at the majesty of the Redwood Forest and the Oregon Coast.
Continue reading →
Last week, I shared an update about the goings-on of Peoria Unified School District (PUSD). A special meeting was requested by members of the governing board asking for the board to consider voting for new leadership. Continue reading →
Madeline Peltz is a writer, journalist, and researcher born in Chicago. Over the last decade, her reporting has appeared in Media Matters for America, MSNOW, Newsweek, More Perfect Union, and more. She has been quoted as an expert on right-wing media and the conservative movement in The New York Times, CNN, Democracy Now!, The Washington Post, BBC, The Guardian, and elsewhere.
Noelle Cook is an ethnographer and researcher examining how identity, belief, and belonging shape women’s participation in conspiratorial and right-wing movements. She is the author of The Conspiracists: Women, Extremism, and the Lure of Belonging and is featured in the documentary The Conspiracists.
Join us on August 7 at noon/PT as we welcome special guest Maya Kornberg, PhD, to discuss her new book 
