Station One: A fake-news YouTube channel from fraud Chase Hughes

[Chase Hughes clip about his news station]

Zach Elwood: If you chose to watch this video, you might be curious about this new news platform that calls itself Station One. 

Station One’s first video on youtube https://www.youtube.com/shorts/s30HLczFi9s asked “Why is it so easy for people to be manipulated?” That’s a very good question from them, because as that channel shows and will continue to show, it is extremely easy to manipulate people, to make them think you have knowledge and wisdom. 

I’m here to warn you that Station One is not a news platform; it’s a distribution channel for lies and paranoia created by a pathological liar and con artist named Chase Hughes. 

I’m here to tell you that watching Station One will make you dumber, and make you more paranoid. You should be very skeptical out there; the same skepticism you apply to news sources you distrust, you should apply to all these youtube and social media channels that claim to bring you secret knowledge and the quote “real” news; apply the skepticism evenly, to everyone, is what I think you should try to do. 

Chase Hughes is someone who has been lying through his teeth about his experiences and credentials going back roughly twenty years, probably more. If you want an overview of his lies, go to whoischasehughes.com, where there are links to details about his many, many lies, and also information about how he is exploiting and harming financially and psychologically vulnerable people. 

I can’t stress this enough: Chase Hughes is a massive liar. Back in 2007 he published his pick-up artist book The Passport, in which he claimed he could teach people to seduce women and where he falsely claimed he was well known in the pick-up artist community. He’s someone who was making childish fighting videos on YouTube in 2008, claiming he could teach you advanced fighting techniques but coming across like an immature child. He’s someone in 2008 who was falsely claiming his vitamin supplements were technologically advanced and could do amazing things and that they were hugely popular and used across the world. He’s someone who then pivoted to being a behavior and psychology expert, falsely claiming his behavioral analysis was well known across the world and had changed many industries. He falsely claimed and heavily implied that his Navy experience had something to do with his psychological and behavioral knowledge, and his alleged knowledge about top secret mind control and brainwashing and psy-ops operations, but this is all just untrue; Chase was a QuarterMaster; someone who works on ship navigation and equipment; I have a video examining the details of his military career if you’re curious about that. Chase’s lies and exaggerations about how his military service relates to his psychology and intel-related claims is Stolen Valor, even if he might avoid being charged for it, and the fact that he uses these false claims as a way to charge gullible people a lot of money, is just plain disgusting. 

Along the way, Chase has spread false and just plain absurd claims about what’s possible in the realms of reading behavior and mind control. For anyone who knows even a little bit about psychology and behavior, the claims Chase makes are so absurd as to be immediately laughable. I first thought Chase was a con artist within two minutes of hearing him speak on the Jordan Harbinger podcast; the stuff just doesn’t add up to anyone with real knowledge of those domains.

One of the more comical things Chase has posted publicly was his Evergreen Project, where he talked about turning attractive young women into quote “psychological weapons.” He had the sense to take that down from his website, later, when he started getting more attention, as I think even he realized how silly and strange it made him sound. I think there’s an obvious throughline from Chase’s early pick-up artist and seduction work, to his later focus on personally mentoring attractive women under the false guise of being a top secret spycraft expert, to his posters of scantily clad women in the background of his videos, to his seeking young and attractive women to be the talent for his fake-news platform. I’ll let you do the deductive work about what all those things might mean. 

In 2020 Chase succeeded in getting a few gullible and irresponsible self-proclaimed behavior “experts” to partner with them on their show; this was the show known as The Behavior Panel. This show helped him gain a big audience. Then Chase started getting gullible podcast hosts to invite him on; people who didn’t care that he was a serial liar with nothing impressive to show in his background, and mainly cared about clicks. This includes some popular podcast hosts, like Joe Rogan, and Diary of a CEO, and Jordan Harbinger, and Patrick Bet David, and quite a few others. Amazingly, these people have not seemed to care at all that he is an egregiously obvious liar, and have helped promote him and helped him fool millions of people into thinking he has some sort of impressive track record. But Chase knows it’s easy to fool people; he knows it’s the easiest thing in the world, if you establish authority, and if you can borrow authority from people and platforms that many perceive as trustworthy and reputable. 

And Chase is quite pathological, and that is not something I say lightly at all. In his extreme narcissism and insecurity, Chase has pivoted to becoming an all-knowing guru, someone who claims that many things around us are psy-ops, psychological operations, that are created by shadowy forces to deceive the ignorant masses, while claiming he can see through all these false fronts. He claims to possess advanced psychological healing powers, and he has charged people $50,000 for what he calls his Avery Program, where he says he’ll use top secret mind control tactics to install a different personality in you and fix your psychological problems. He’s now claiming to have been reading ancient religious texts since he was 10 years old, to be someone who knows what all the religious texts are secretly saying, the list of spiritual knowledge and wisdom goes on and on. He’s also done DMT and says he can literally see the false simulation, the Matrix, around us. Long story short, Chase has been spreading paranoia, and increasing fear, and this is part of how he’s established a cult-like dynamic around him, with vulnerable people seeking him out and paying him lots of money and being psychologically manipulated by him. 

Now Chase is continuing his false claims of delivering amazing intel and top secret news briefings with his latest scam, Station One. 

[clip from Station One youtube episode]

Zach Elwood: Here’s what their youtube description says: 

Station One is a media network built on a single idea: the public deserves the same kind of briefing the people in power get every morning. Every show on the network is designed to do one thing — make you harder to manipulate, and more dangerous to govern by narrative. If you’ve ever wondered what a presidential intelligence briefing actually feels like, this is the closest you can get without a clearance.
End quote. 

The scam is the same; trying to make you think he’s in possession of secret knowledge, and he knows that many people are paranoid these days and willing to embrace outlandish and paranoid ideas. The demand is there; and he’s got the supply. The scam and delusions are the same; he’s just pivoting to try to make more money and get more influence under the banner of a quote “news” site, where it will seem even more reputable to some people than a single person. And ironically, as I cover in a recent video about his spreading of paranoia, he manipulates people by claiming he’s making you harder to manipulate. He will fill your head with lies while claiming he’s the one who is helping you see through the lies. If you dislike liars and even somewhat value the truth, this stuff should make you angry. 

One reason people get fooled by fake news creators like Chase Hughes is that they see them repeat some okay and correct information. They think “they’re correct on that thing I know about, they maybe are okay and can be trusted.” But that’s a bad conclusion, and exactly the kind of thinking that helps con artists and liars get away with this stuff; the fact is that repeating some correct information is par for the course for con artists and frauds; anyone can repeat some correct and okay ideas and facts. Anyone can read wikipedia to pick up some facts; anyone can read real news to get a few basic facts about what’s going on in the world. What liars like Chase do is add in a bunch of nonsense and lies on top of the base layer of truth. And if you make the mistake of trusting people like Chase, you will be in a horrible position to separate the lies from the truth, the senseless paranoia from the truth. Why would you make the decision to watch and listen to someone who has been proven to be a massive liar. It’s a strange decision to me, but I do hear from many people who say something like “yeah, Chase has lied a lot, but I like some of the things he says.” Think about what a bad decision it is to listen to a pathological liar. You will just be absorbing the things you like and want to hear, and some of those things will be nonsense; you’ll be filling your head with nonsense. 

Another thing Chase does is use high production values. He knows that people will be more likely to believe these things and see him as wise and give him money if the information is packaged in a pretty package. You should examine if this might play a role in your trust of Chase and other people. Again, you should bring the skepticism you apply to people and news sources you dislike, and apply that skepticism equally. Your brain will thank you for it later.  

I have covered various aspects of the Chase Hughes phenomenon in some episodes I’ve done for my podcast, People Who Read People. Many people ask me why I have focused so much on covering Chase Hughes’ lies. The fact is that I don’t want to cover this stuff, I have many things I’d rather be doing, but the state of our media ecosystem, the fact that there are so many con artists and liars around us, and the fact that there isn’t much actual investigative journalism being done these days, means that nobody else is covering this story. So I feel responsible to cover it, until someone with a larger audience than I do covers it. I’ve been told by journalists that it will only rise to the level of interest when more people start reporting harm and exploitation. That’s already been going on; my video about Chase Hughes’s guru-like aspirations and the cult-like dynamics developing around him, has quotes from people about the harm he’s doing to financially and psychologically vulnerable people. But I think perhaps there needs to be more of that in public spaces before this rises to the level where mainstream news covers it. But I will say that if you’re a content creator and independent journalist, you will get clicks and attention for covering Chase Hughes and Station One and educating people about them; and you’ll be doing the world a major service, because right now Chase Hughes is winning the SEO war; he’s flooding youtube and other channels with content, and the large podcasts that promote him also flood the space, so any critical stuff is a drop in the bucket. 

Partnered with Chase on his venture are some people who should really run for the hills if they want to help themselves long-term and avoid tarnishing their reputations. This includes Chase’s onscreen talent, one of whom goes by Ellie Scarlett. https://www.instagram.com/ellie.scarlett_ . Another goes by Molly Reid https://www.instagram.com/mollyreidanchor . I say ‘goes by’ as it seems there’s a good chance these are only their acting names. And if you work with Chase, avoiding using your real name would be a very good practice. If you personally know these people, warn them about the risks of interacting with and being associated with an unethical serial liar like Chase Hughes. Do them a favor. And spread the word to others about Station One. 

Unlike Chase, I don’t have much to sell you, but if you would like non-paranoid and more logical and psychologically accurate views of the world, follow my substack Defusing American Anger, and check out the books I’ve written on the topic www.american-anger.com . If you want free ebook files of my book, just email me via my podcast site behavior-podcast.com and I’ll send them to you.