Making It Awkward

What's going on with health and food policy right now? Each week dietitian and author Jessica Wilson shares her conversations with experts in their field or on their farm and figures out how we got here and why. Jessica has followed the ultra-processed food hysteria to trad wife pipeline and the direct path from COVID conspiracies to RFK Jr to the current administration.From her conversation with the Make America Healthy Again spokesperson to the Oregon beef farmer this podcast connects it all. Listen each week as she brings something new to the conversation and at times makes it awkward.

Making It Awkward is a society podcast hosted by Jessica Wilson, MS RD, with 142 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80.

Jessica Wilson, MS RD hosts Making It Awkward, a society show with 142 episodes published.

Our AI reads these to draft pitches. Use them as grounding for a pitch that cites a real guest and a specific topic.

• 

  Episode #29

  Democratic Dark Money, the Influencer Economy and Sam Rosenholtz with Lindsay Lee Wallace

  Sep 24, 202656 minS4

  As news outlets are being banned from the White House let's talk about the Democratic dark money funding influencers positioning themselves as journalists. Actual Journalist Lindsay Lee Wallace returns to the show to unpack dark money in social media influencing, and the social media economy. Lindsay talks about the there isn't a code of ethics for influencers, people aren't required to be experts in their field and what this means for journalism. We talk about how Jessica became the subject of a social media video from Sam Rosenholtz , an influencer who is funded by the Democratic dark money non profit Chorus and has been paid for engaging in Denver politics. Rosenholtz is a white guy with 1.4M Instagram followers, and used a video of Jessica dressed as her conservative alter-ego as his hook to get people to pay attention to him talking about cyclospora. Today Lindsay and Jessica connect Rosenholtz and his video to the state of our news and journalism landscape and we also discuss that being the subject of Rosenholtz's video made Jessica care more about Democratic political spending, something that was way overdue. Sam Rosenholtz is part of the Chorus Creator Collection and you can buy his favorite saying Sam involved in Denver bond measure Comer Launches Investigation into Sixteen Thirty Fund's Reported Secretive Chorus Program, Effort to Evade Campaign Finance Laws We're living through an explainer epidemic | Dazed 'The Least Transparent Midterm': How Dark Money Is Washing Over the 2026 Election - The New York Times Influencers Have a Lot to Say About Politics. Many Are Quietly Paid for It. - The New York Times Influencers trying to self-regulate their political involvement Like this episode? You can rate, review, subscribe, follow, share and comment! Questions about the show? Guest pitches? Email makingitawkwardpod@gmail.com You can buy awkward merch ! You can become a Patreon member! You can watch this episode at https://www.youtube.com/@MakingItAwkwardPod Follow Jessica Wilson on Instagram @jessicawilson.msrd Jessica Wilson's book: It's Always Been Ours; Rewriting the Story of Black Women's Bodies

  ListenShow Notes
• 

  Episode #28

  The SPAMisode! with Daphne K. Jenkins

  Sep 10, 202644 minS4

  SPAM! Cultural traditions, recipes, the Hormel Girls and the history of SPAM. Daphne K. Jenkins returns to the show to talk about the history, cultural relevance and celebration of SPAM . Daphne shares the different ways in which she ate SPAM growing up n Hawaii and her recent elevation of the iconic food to butter mochi magic . The two discuss the need for shelf stable foods, especially when Hawaii has been under multiple hurricane warnings this year. And where does the term spam email come from? Bougie SPAM 'ONO MAU GOODS Daphne in Serious Eats Daphne in Willamette Week FOOD ASSISTANCE AVAILABLE ACROSS KAUA'I A quick history of SPAM Like this episode? You can rate, review, subscribe, follow, share and comment! Questions about the show? Guest pitches? Email makingitawkwardpod@gmail.com You can buy awkward merch ! You can become a Patreon member! You can watch this episode at https://www.youtube.com/@MakingItAwkwardPod Follow Jessica Wilson on Instagram @jessicawilson.msrd Jessica Wilson's book: It's Always Been Ours; Rewriting the Story of Black Women's Bodies

  ListenShow Notes
• 

  Episode #26

  "Poor People Food", Sponsorship, and Semantics; Is Health Science Up for Debate? Part 2 With Dr. Bethany Johnson

  Aug 13, 202649 minS4

  Cigarettes, bacon, raw milk, raccoon, pork, chicken and The Conscious Lee! Today's guest, medical historian Dr. Bethany Johnson , returns to the show for the first follow up episode following the episode with The Conscious Lee's . In addition to her analysis of what went down in that episode, Bethany covers a lot of ground! Our conversation includes raw milk with formaldehyde, the idea of "poor people food" shifting over time and always connected to race, the history of eating other game meats like raccoon, and the history and stereotypes about the consumption of both pork and chicken among Black communities. If you have feedback on the episode or ideas for Bethany's handle you can email them to makingitawkwardpod@gmail.com Show notes from the original episode with The Conscious Lee: The Conscious Lee joins the show to debate the merits of his recent video about cured meats causing cancer and Jessica's video reply questioning the honesty of his presentation of the evidence. Both of them reference the World Health Organization's 2015 report about carcinogens, and Jessica attempts to provide nuance to the carcinogen designation by discussing how substances are labeled as carcinogens and how it's the strength of the research, not the level of risk that makes something a carcinogen. The Conscious Lee's video is part of a partnership with Farm Forward and references the Save Our Bacon Act. Like this episode? You can rate, review, subscribe, follow, share and comment! Questions about the show? Guest pitches? Email makingitawkwardpod@gmail.com You can buy awkward merch ! You can become a Patreon member! You can watch this episode at https://www.youtube.com/@MakingItAwkwardPod Follow Jessica Wilson on Instagram @jessicawilson.msrd Jessica Wilson's book: It's Always Been Ours; Rewriting the Story of Black Women's Bodies

  ListenShow Notes
• 

  Episode #25

  Is Health Science Up for Debate? Part 1 with The Conscious Lee

  Jul 30, 202658 minS4

  The Conscious Lee joins the show to debate the merits of his recent video about cured meats causing cancer and Jessica's video reply questioning the honesty of his presentation of the evidence. Both of them reference the World Health Organization's 2015 report about carcinogens, and Jessica attempts to provide nuance to the carcinogen designation by discussing how substances are labeled as carcinogens and how it's the strength of the research, not the level of risk that makes something a carcinogen. The Conscious Lee's video is part of a partnership with Farm Forward and references the Save Our Bacon Act. This is a multi-part episode and Jessica will be back with guests in a couple weeks to follow up on this conversation. If you have thoughts or feedback that you want to share you can email the pod and send voice memos to makingitawkwardpod@gmail.com . The Conscious Lee's services The Conscious Lee on Instagram The Conscious Lee on YouTube The Conscious Lee on Tiktok Like this episode? You can rate, review, subscribe, follow, share and comment! Questions about the show? Guest pitches? Email makingitawkwardpod@gmail.com You can buy awkward merch ! You can become a Patreon member! You can watch this episode at https://www.youtube.com/@MakingItAwkwardPod Follow Jessica Wilson on Instagram @jessicawilson.msrd Jessica Wilson's book: It's Always Been Ours; Rewriting the Story of Black Women's Bodies

  ListenShow Notes
• 

  Episode #24

  Gay the Pray Away; Film Review: "Leviticus" with Blake Flaugher, MPH and Caleb Haven Draper

  Jul 23, 20261h 7mS4

  Blake Flaugher, MPH and Caleb Haven Draper return to the show to review the horror film Leviticus from first time writer and director Adrian Chiarella. The film follows two queer teenage boys who live in an Australian town and are part of a small conservative church. In this review the three discuss the role that both fear and shame play in our lives and in society. The three of them break down the plot of the movie in detail so there are spoilers. There isn't a big reveal at the end of the film, though, so they won't give away a plot twist. During this episode we learn that Caleb's family is a founding family of a Christian mega church and more about Blake's Christian Evangelical fundamentalist upbringing. The two discuss the impacts of religion on their identity development. Caleb and Blake's episode on queer men, body image, peptides and peacocking Like this episode? You can rate, review, subscribe, follow, share and comment! Questions about the show? Guest pitches? Email makingitawkwardpod@gmail.com You can buy awkward merch ! You can become a Patreon member! You can watch this episode at https://www.youtube.com/@ MakingItAwkwardPod Follow Jessica Wilson on Instagram @jessicawilson.msrd Jessica Wilson's book: It's Always Been Ours; Rewriting the Story of Black Women's Bodies

  ListenShow Notes

Recent guests on Making It Awkward. Study who booked and why before you pitch.

Based on semantic analysis of episode topics and host coverage, this show is a strong guest fit for executives in:

Industry fit is computed by PitchCentric using vector embeddings of the show's episode catalog.