PREVIEW: NewLife Expo NYC 2025
A Look at the Latest in Medical Quackery
Fetching some tallboys from my corner bodega at 3AM, I stumbled across a periodical advertising a new convention in town! As long-time readers of the PAI know, I have a fascination with quack cranks and exploitative conventions that are scamming the public, such as Stanford’s “Pandemic Policy” playdate for anti-vaccine cranks. So let us dig into the quackery of “New Life: Magazine & Expo is Back: For Those Who Want to Make a Change” - featuring a “Sound Healing” expert, and an “Energy Healing” expert on the cover. They also promise “biohacking,” which I assumed was about shoving computer chips under your skin. If you sign up early, you can receive a free “sound bath healing” session.
The next page features an ad for “the evolution of energy healing,” abusing a Star Trek font and an AI-generated graphic of a naked lady walking through a portal: “Remember your soul’s mission here...reclaim your stellar birthright.” This feels like it’s exploiting gullible people’s insecurities. Human beings for far too long have fantasized about having some sort of mystical, all-powerful energy within them to call upon. “Chi,” or “The Force,” or whatever nonsense lets you palm fireballs at an underpaid barista that gets your order wrong.
Finally, we can skim the introduction, and these typos, of which this rag are absolutely riffled with, are not mine:
“The NewLife Expo in New York has been a staple...where thousand of people looking to expand their life can meet each other. Are you someone who prefers to follow the crowd or do you embark on a journey of self-discovery and embrace the path of exploration? NewLife consciousness is for those who embody the spirit of trendsetters and adventurers, always open open to diverse possibilities and eager to unlock their maximum potential.”
This is an odd contradiction, as a convention is technically a form of “crowd.”
The next page is an advertisement for wheatgrass shots. My senior advisory staff of elite doctors & scientists has informed me that this is “quackery but probably harmless.” Thankfully, I’m neither a cow nor a goat, so I think I’ll be passing.
Following that features a woman who promises “No More Suffering,” that publishes the same headshot of herself twice, reflected back and forth, but right next to each other. She is offering a talk where she spills out her entire life story to help sell “personalized coaching” as well as “holistic protocols, fermented enzymes, peptide bioregulators, and DNA-repairing solutions” that hints at a conspiracy theory that vaccines “damage” your DNA. Concerning.
Intergalactic Exhibitors
Next, we have the “Exhibitors & Booth Numbers Partial Listing!” Just what might they feature, you ask? Oh, what wonders await! We’ve got promises of an “authentic Tachyon Healing Chamber,” “Functional Neurology,” “LifeWave light technology,”
“Biofield Tuning,” “Scents 4 My Soul,” and even “Shielding Devices.” There’s also an ad offering a lecture on how to “Discover the Healing Power of Sacred Sites,” which will unlock your innate ability to “receive and transmit light codes for personal healing and planetary service.”
Opposite this is an entirely separate promise for “A New Paradigm in Healing,” which hints at “advanced beings” known as “Lightworkers, trapped in the density of 3D reality, couldn’t sustain the vibration necessary for ascension,” but through “recalibration,” you can navigate a “stairway across dimensions” to “rewrite timelines” and “collapse limiting realities.” You see, “Earth has already undergone a quantum split into 3D, 5D, and 7D frequencies.” I feel like the lore of the Warhammer 40,000 universe is more coherent.
Next, we have a list of speakers and panels. One woman claims that “Humanity is breaking free from old control systems tied to Anunnaki overlaws...truths about secret treaties, cloning, and off-planet agendas are surfacing.” Another speaker claims to speak “many galactic languages and works with star beings as a Galactic Ambassador,” not to be confused with someone else who offers lessons on “how to protect yourself from any ‘off-planet nasties.’” If you want something a little more down to Earth, you can receive “psychic surgery healing” from a “six-generation Reiki Master.” This claim of “therapeutic touch” was debunked countless times:
If you’ve been yearning for a round of make-believe roleplay, there’s a panel promising that “using their psychic abilities, their contacts with alien beings and remote viewing” they will contact extraterrestrial life, not from a space station or advanced satellite, but from a drab convention center hall. Y’know, one has to worry, are there people truly this gullible? Wait, there are people like this, and... they’re in the federal government in senior positions. Darn.
Another UFO-themed speaker claims he will share “the latest information about UFO disclosure going on in the government,” as if this wouldn’t be the leading story on every primetime news show. He also claims he “injected the ET issue into the 2016 presidential campaign,” as if someone would ever dare to reboot such a beloved a Steven Spielberg movie just to get Hillary in the White House.
“Biohacking” COVID-19 Away?
You probably don’t have to ponder too hard to guess that these far-out fanatics aren’t the biggest fan of vaccines. However, have no fear! A panel dedicated to “Biohacking” will teach you “what food and supplements to take to prevent COVID and to help negate the effects of the vaccine,” Sadly, I don’t think an N95 is a vegetable and there’s no fruits that treat a sore arm.
One truly offensive speaker, a “Medical Medium,” claims that she “dissolves tumors in 5 min, inflating collapsed lungs, and obviating the need for many transplant surgeries.” Isn’t there some sort of law against these sorts of claims? Do we just wait around until they get someone killed?
Promising “The Final Answer to Herpes, Lyme and COVID,” one speaker is shilling “Medical Ozone Therapy” which “destroys every virus including Herpes...every fungus yeast and mold...and all bacteria... with no adverse reactions!” and has somehow performed “185,000 cutting edge therapies safely.” Well before the Food & Drug Administration was infested with anti-vaccine cranks, the FDA banned “ozone therapy” on the grounds of ozone being “a toxic gas,” and has prosecuted numerous “Ozone Therapy” scam artists preying upon AIDS patients since…1991.
For an expo called “New Life,” much of this is tired old quackery. While wheatgrass shots and elaborate daydreams about intergalactic visitors are relatively harmless, certain participants are clearly exploiting vulnerable people with serious health challenges for personal profit. This is disgraceful misconduct and something we should all be able to condemn.
The Politics of “Free-Market” Quackery
Yet, being a conspiracy theorist scam artist crank is now a requirement for serving in the federal government. While Soviet-era “Lysenkoism” isn’t an entirely inaccurate label for what we have festering in the government now, it obfuscates the fact that the bi-partisan consensus in America was turning a blind eye to these blatant scam artists abusing a hands-off, “Laissez-Faire” approach to common low-lifes taking advantage of people with serious health problems.
Decades later, letting these illegitimate actors claim the legitimacy of the marketplace is clearly not going well for us.
A kid shouldn’t die of a vaccine-preventable cause because their gullible ignoramus of a parent fell for an anti-vaccine scam artist spewing inflammatory garbage on social media. Garbage that has led to abuse, threats, and violence against actual scientists and healthcare workers. It’s always wildly, fantastically incorrect about basic facts and provides zero informative or intellectual value, while causing very real harm.
Permitting the prosperity of such scam artistry also weakens our economy. Consumers should feel confident that their dollars aren’t being wasted. Potential scam artists should fear severe consequences for deceiving and exploiting the public for personal gain and instead direct their time and resources to genuinely productive economic activity. Instead, America’s government has allowed these snake oil salesmen to flourish over the past two decades, with elected officials publicly endorsing quack cures for COVID-19.
A Bold Proposal
The new political priority must be stomping out the medical disinformation industry in all its forms. Americans being robbed of their health, finances, and even lives cannot be considered “free speech” nor “free market” activity. It provides no value and only makes our nation weaker. Many Americans, including numerous elected officials, have been robbed of their critical thinking skills and completely lost touch with reality, in no small part due to anti-science propaganda which has been allowed to flourish on social media (and sometimes legitimized in mainstream news outlets such as The New York Times, The Atlantic, Slate, etc.), while the private owners of these companies profit from the advertising revenue which appears alongside this garbage.
There is zero excuse why this sort of nonsense should not be cracked down upon by legislation, regulation, and enforcement. Yes, conservatives will whine and squeal, and liberal pundits will grant legitimacy to their bad faith arguments, but this is no longer a burden America can afford to bare. The state of public health in America after Trump is finally forced from office will be in a catastrophic state, with infectious diseases running rampant and a global death toll in the millions.
Civic democracy, as well as the medical and scientific communities, are going to have a very serious mess to clean up.
