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The Jordan Harbinger Show

1344: Avocados | Skeptical Sunday

The Jordan Harbinger Show

Jordan Harbinger

Science, Education, Business

4.8 • 12.4K Ratings

🗓️ 14 June 2026

⏱️ 59 minutes

🔗️ Recording | Apple Podcasts | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Does your guac come with a body count? Jessica Wynn peels back blood avocados, cartel taxes, and deforestation on this week's Skeptical Sunday.

Welcome to Skeptical Sunday, a special edition of The Jordan Harbinger Show where Jordan and a guest break down a topic that you may have never thought about, open things up, and debunk common misconceptions. This time around, we’re joined by writer and researcher Jessica Wynn!

Full show notes and resources can be found here: jordanharbinger.com/1344

On This Week's Skeptical Sunday:

  • How a Los Angeles mailman's single grafted tree became the Hass — now 95% of the world's avocados — and how decades of slick marketing rebranded a suspiciously oily fruit into the "healthy fats" superfood clogging your Instagram feed.
  • Why drug cartels muscled into guacamole after NAFTA opened the border in 1997 — discovering that "green gold" was safer than cocaine and nearly as profitable, then taxing every crate, shaking down farmers, and pioneering what economists call "narco-agriculture."
  • How "blood avocados" hide their real cost — Michoacán's homicide rate more than doubling alongside soaring exports, journalists murdered for covering the trade, and indigenous families displaced while the violence stays invisible to anyone ordering a side of guac.
  • What the environmental toll actually looks like: 700,000 acres of Michoacán forest cleared, arson weaponized as a legal loophole, monarch habitat collapsing, and roughly 300 liters of water drained for just two or three avocados — and the same pattern in Chile and Peru.
  • Why the smartest move isn't a guilt-ridden boycott but better leverage — backing fair-trade and Pro-Forest certified growers, pushing retailers for real transparency, and remembering avocados swap easily for lentils, broccoli, and olive oil when you want a break.
  • Connect with Jordan on Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube. If you have something you'd like us to tackle here on Skeptical Sunday, drop Jordan a line at jordan@jordanharbinger.com and let him know!
  • Connect with Jessica Wynn at Instagram (and Instagram!), and subscribe to her newsletters: Between the Lines and Where the Shadows Linger!

And if you're still game to support us, please leave a review here — even one sentence helps!

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Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I'm here with Skeptical Sunday

0:08.0

co-host writer and researcher Jessica Wynn. On the Jordan Harbinger show, we decode the stories,

0:12.7

secrets and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical

0:17.1

advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you. Our mission is to help you become a better informed, more critical thinker, and during the

0:24.3

week, we have long-form conversations with a variety of amazing folks, from spies to CEOs,

0:29.4

athletes, authors, thinkers, performers. On Sundays, though, it's skeptical Sunday.

0:33.7

A rotating guest co-host and I are going to break down a topic you may have never

0:37.0

thought about and debunk common misconceptions about that topic, such as the lottery, diet supplements, recycling, chem trails, crystal healing, and more. If you're new to the show, or you want to tell your friend about the show, I suggest our episode starter packs. These are collections of our favorite episodes on topics like persuasion, negotiation, psychology,

0:55.2

disinformation, junk science, crime and cults, and more that'll help new listeners get a taste

0:59.2

of everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com slash start or search for us

1:05.2

in your Spotify app to get started. Today on the show, we're talking about avocados. That's right,

1:10.3

the fruit that ruins, brunch prices,

1:12.1

clogs, Instagram feeds, and somehow convinces us that it's normal to pay $15 for toast. It's just

1:18.7

that good. But behind the memes and the guacamole bowls, there's a darker story. When you order

1:23.6

that sign of avocado, it's less likely farm to table and more likely cartel to

1:28.3

cafe. To help find out what that additional $2.2 avocado option is really paying for is writer and

1:33.9

researcher Jessica Wynn. Hey, Jess, so I love avocados. Are you going to tell me I shouldn't be

1:39.6

eating them? Because we've already, you know, we've ruined like coffee and quite a few other

1:44.1

crowd favorites. I know. Well, nutrition know, we've ruined like coffee and quite a few other crowd favorites.

1:45.3

I know. Well, nutritionally, avocados are terrific, but this isn't about health benefits.

1:52.4

A lot happens before that avocado ends up on your toast.

1:56.8

Before you ruin everyone's guacamole, give me the basics.

...

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