On this thought-provoking Blog, Englishman, David Brear, guides us to the dark heart of a modern-day, totalitarian labyrinth and shines a piercing light on its manipulative rulers and manipulated inhabitants. First, he provides a spool of unbreakable thread so that we can all find our way safely home. Blog readers may contact David Brear via: axiombooks@wanadoo.fr
The recent report by staff of the FTC Consumer Protection Bureau related to a proposed rule on MLM “Earnings Claims” confirms the economic analysis of Dr. Lasdwun N. Luzes that such a rule would be useless and unworkable. Dr. Luzes is the author of the ground-breaking booklet, In Defense of the Pyramid Scheme.
Dr. Luzes argues that multi-level marketing (MLM) is an obvious pyramid scheme, and that pyramid schemes are now conventional businesses and should be legalized. He points to other areas of the economy also based on “robbing Peter to Pay Paul”, including crypto, real estate flipping, the banking system, the stock market, consumer credit, and the federal budget.
In the case of MLM, which he views as the most obvious pyramid scheme directly affecting the most people, the extreme loss rates, he has shown, are consistent with trends in the general economy today for the rate of “losers.” In his view, “deception” in a MLM pyramid scheme is not different or worse than blatant lies told every day in general advertising and in political campaigns. Most importantly, he notes that pyramid schemes are extremely lucrative for founders and top recruiters, and so pyramid schemes are very good businesses.
Dr. Luzes points out that more than 40 years ago, the FTC legalized the MLM “business model”, which is definitively a pyramid scheme, and the FTC has consistently endorsed the MLM pyramid as it grew to global proportions. In all that time, the FTC never monitored loss rates or deceptive “earnings” claims. Yet, the FTC also, on rare occasion, prosecutes an MLM as a “pyramid scheme”. Dr. Luzes believes the FTC should drop the pretense and just openly support pyramid schemes as businesses, which it is doing anyway in practice.
The FTC report confirms that a workable, enforceable “rule” on MLM “earnings claims” is impossible, as Dr. Luzes has explained. After studying “data” from 70 MLMs – which they characterized as incomplete, sometimes incomprehensible and inaccurate – the FTC staff was led, as Dr. Luzes predicted, to an erroneous and misleading “conclusion,” portending a useless, misleading “rule.”
The “take-away” of the report is that the vast majority of MLM participants earn “less than a thousand dollars in a year.” This is like saying “not many” people win lotteries, or “most people live less than 200 years.” It misrepresents reality. The FTC “conclusion” erroneously implies most recruits gain, or could gain, some “earnings”, up to $1,000, per year. In fact, almost no one gains even one-cent in net profit. It also implies most MLM recruits continue for a year or more. Most new recruits quit and are replaced within a year, every year, making “annual” data invalid.
In plain language, as Dr. Luzes explains in his provocative book, there are no “earnings” in MLM. There are financial gains for those at the extreme top, owners, founders, and early recruiters, based on the losses of all others, That is the nature of the pyramid scheme “business.” The losses for new recruits are “by design,” and can never change. So, there is nothing to “regulate.” A “rule” on “earnings claims” is a pretense that there are “earnings.”
MLM’s unique “business model” – consistently endorsed by the FTC since 1979 – is based on the “endless chain”. This model, as Dr. Luzes eloquently explains in his book, permits MLMs – only MLMs – to make the electrifying promise of “unlimited income potential” for all recruits, regardless when they are enrolled or how many others are already enrolled. This FTC-approved “plan” authorizes MLMs to claim to be “the greatest income opportunity in the world,” even if data show more than a 99% loss rate, every year. Because MLM is based on the metaphysical concept of “infinite expansion,” it can claim it is not bound by markets or math. Recruits are told they succeed with “belief” (as long as they also pay and recruit).
In his book, Dr. Luzes shows that what MLMs actually promote is not “earnings,” but the “opportunity” to be part of an “endless” money-chain that “transfers” money, the opposite of “earnings.” Promises and claims of an “unlimited opportunity” could never be regulated.
Dr. Luzes further backed his recommendations by citing the FTC’s official view that “earnings claims” by MLMs don’t have to be true. He quotes what the FTC wrote about MLM earnings claims in 1979 when it legalized the MLM “endless recruiting chain” model:
“References to the achievement of one’s dreams, having everything one always wanted, etc. are primarily inspirational and motivational; to the extent that they dangle the likelihood of financial security and material success before the potential distributor, they constitute vague ‘puffs’ which few people, if any, would take literally.”
Dr. Luzes also notes, since an “earnings claims rule” would imply systemicdeception, it insults and discredits all the FTC officials who now work or may in the future work for MLMs or MLM law firms or for the Direct Selling Association.
The document (linked above) tells us nothing that we don't already know.
One thing is certain, the regulators and academic advisors who compiled this report, have not examined, or even tried to find, independent quantifiable evidence (in the form of income-tax payment receipts) proving that any 'MLM' contractor has generated an overall net-income lawfully (i.e. after the deduction of all start-up and operating costs) from regularly retailing goods/services for a profit to members of the general public (i.e. persons who were not fellow'MLM' contractors) based entirely on value and demand.
The FTC's report is morally and intellectually feeble, because a collection of copy-cat so-called 'income opportunities' which, over decades, have produced effectively 100% overall net-loss/churn rates for countless millions of ill-informed participants around the globe, cannot, by any stretch of the imagination, be described as, 'income opportunities,' in the traditional sense of these words. On the contrary, they have quite obviously been pernicious fakes based on the same, self-perpetuating design, and which have been maliciously instigated by criminals to deceive, rob and enslave vulnerable persons.
The FTC's report also confirms that the criminals peddling these copy-cat fakes have all been maliciously hiding/mystifying the truth, whilst pumping out their Big 'MLM income opportunity' Lie.
Furthermore, the chronic failure of law enforcement to recognize this vast, ongoing criminogenic phenomenon, has made it appear to both victims and casual observers, that so-called'MLM income opportunities' have been part of a lawful industry.
This clip was recently posted on Youtube, but it comes from an episode of 'My Family' - a top-rated BBC situation comedy show that was first broadcast around 15-20 years ago.
Although, to many people, what is depicted in this clip, can seem far too ridiculous to have any basis in reality, whoever wrote this episode of 'My Family', must have had a direct experience of an'MLM' cult, probably 'Amway.'
Amazingly, as far as I'm aware, no British television channel has ever made, let alone broadcast, a serious investigation of the 'MLM'cult phenomenon. Yet clearly there have been persons working in television in the UK who know that so-called'MLM'companies have been the fronts for pyramid frauds, and that chronic 'MLM' adherents really have undergone sudden, radical personality transformations. However, the'MLM' cult phenomenon first entered the UK, in the form of 'Amway,' as long ago as 1973.
According to the so-called'UK Direct Selling Association,' currentlythere are half a million UK citizens (95% of whom are women) under contract to its member companies. However, this propaganda doesn't explain that almost all of these corporate structures are'Amway'copy-cats which have been peddling so-called 'MLM income opportunities,'or that their bosses have been fraudulently withholding key-information revealing their (built in) effectively 100% overall net loss/churn rates.
Any claim, or implication, that one penny of extra (net) income, let alone life-changing sums of money, can be generated lawfully by the operation of an'MLM business,'is dangerous comic-book nonsense designed to deceive.
Decades of evidence, in the form of countless millions of ill-informed persons around the world who have been churned through so-called 'MLM income opportunities,' proves beyond all reasonable doubt that, what has become habitually-referred to as, the 'MLM industry,' has actually been nothing more than a classic example of the notorious, reality-controlling, totalitarian propaganda tactic known as the 'Big Lie.' That is to say, the spreading of a falsehood which is so colossal and outrageous that the average person cannot even begin to conceive that anyone would have the audacity to invent it.
Regular readers will recall that, back in April, I posted an article entitled: The Express publishes the pernicious'Multi-Level Marketing'fiction as 'fact,' but doesn't mention 'MLM.'
I explained that an article, signed by a journalist, Temie Laleye, had appeared in the Personal Finance section of the Express online, January 13th 2024, but it had only recently been brought to my attention.
The Express article was a classic example of the Big 'Multi-Level Marketing' Lie being reported as the truth. Some of the vague, unsubstantiated quoted-claims that were prominently featured in the article were so outrageous, and obviously-false, that it beggars belief that any journalist working in the area of finance could swallow them, but apparently, Temie Laleye did.
Temie Laleye
I also explained why the Express article could never have been researched, and that it was not clear what was the actual motivation of Temie Laleye. However, at the time, I did not explain how I had attempted to contact Temie Laleye as well as the editor of the Personal Finance section of the Express, with my concerns. However, neither of them replied to e-mails.
As a consequence, I contacted the Independent Press Standards Organisation Home (ipso.co.uk), but without any serious expectation that this would result in the Express article being withdrawn or rectified.
Thus, it was clearly explained in my initial e-mail to IPSO how the Express article was specifically constructed to pretend affinity with women and, thus, facilitate an insidious criminal fraud that has been designed to spread like a virus, and which has lately been mainly preying on hundreds of thousands of vulnerable, and ill-informed, women in the UK. However, the staff at IPSO (of whom there are only 20) were apparently so snowed-under with work, that they initially reacted to my accurate information and analysis by requesting that I reduce the size of my complaint, and merely set out why I considered the Express article to be in breach of IPSO's own Editors' Code of Practice.
This week I finally received a lengthy e-mail from IPSO signed by 'Assessment Officer,' Natalie Johnson. In this, behind a barrage of convoluted verbal gymnastics, Natalie Jonhson informed me that IPSO had decided to reject my complaint. As far as I could ascertain, this was essentially on the grounds that the Express article was not in breach of IPSO's Editors' Code of Practice, because, although the claims made in it might very well have been inaccurate, nevertheless, they were an accurate report of what the journalist had been told, and as such, this type of lazy reporting is permitted.
Quite obviously, this intellectually-feeble and morally-relativist interpretation of IPSO's Editors' Code of Practice, makes a mockery of it, because if the bar for press standards has been set so low, then what the Hell is the point of having them? In simple terms, IPSO's position is that it can be acceptable for the UK media to publish, or broadcast, falsehoods without any attempt to discover the truth, provided the falsehoods come from third parties and are accurately quoted word for word.
Thus, after a further formulaic e-mail from Natalie Johnson which concluded with the classic Orwellian phrase:
'We are unable at this stage to enter into correspondence offering reasoning beyond that included in the original decision.'
Contrary to what you write, based on the accurate information and analysis that I sent you, the choice you people had before you here, was extremely simple.
Either you stand against fraud and for the rule of law, or you don't.
Tellingly, you are still clinging to your Editors' Code and making absolutely no reference to the guts of the insidious criminal activity I flagged to your organization, or to the very real danger that misleading articles, like the one in the Express, pose to our fellow citizens. The article in the Express was quite obviously designed to facilitate a fraud that has been mainly preying on women in the UK. This was why the article was very specifically constructed to pretend affinity with women. It was signed by a woman and contained quotes from two other women, one of whom was pictured with her infant daughter.
Sadly, I can only conclude from your guarded-replies that any expectation on my part that anyone in a position of authority in your organization might do the right thing, is pointless.
That said, I would still like to know what would be your personal reaction if someone you cared about (e.g. a sister or daughter) came to you and declared that she had signed up with a so-called 'MLM/direct selling' company?
Misleading articles like the one in the Express are not only designed to lure vulnerable, and ill-informed, women into de facto servitude, they have also been designed to persuade victims that companies like 'Juice Plus' cannot possibly be the fronts for frauds. This is part of the reason why 'MLM' victims rarely come forward.
I managed to live more than three decades without ever hearing the words, 'Multi-Level Marketing (MLM),' or the phrases, 'MLM industry' and 'MLM is legal.' Today, I wish this dangerous nonsense had never entered my life, but unfortunately, I had no choice in the matter.
Anyone reading the published account of my own nightmare encounter with the original 'MLM/commercial' cult known as 'Amway' (corruption of 'American Way'), should bear in mind that, at the time these events started to unfold, I had no idea of the danger I was in, or of the true nature, extent and power of the phenomenon I was confronted with. As yet, there was no full and accurate explanation of 'MLM' cultism publicly-available, and certainly not in the media. That's why I began the thankless task of compiling one, as long ago the 1990s. However, at that time, I was still trying to find the right words to identify it accurately. Even when eventually I did find the right words, I discovered that the ugly, but ultimately absurd, truth about the 'MLM' cult phenomenon was still unthinkable to most people.
The truth being that what has become habitually-referred to as, the 'MLM industry,' has actually been nothing more than a classic example of the notorious, reality-controlling, totalitarian propaganda tactic known as the 'Big Lie.' That is to say, the spreading of a falsehood which is so colossal and outrageous that the average person cannot even begin to conceive that anyone would have the audacity to invent it. Indeed, when I first began to challenge the Big 'MLM' Lie, I was faced with the daunting situation where it had been repeated so often, and for so many years, that many apparently-rational people (including, journalists, editors, regulators, law enforcement agents, academics, legislators, celebrities, and even certain world leaders) had come to accept it as the truth.
Today, the situation is still daunting, but it has begun to change in that (largely due to the Internet) an increasing number of courageous 'MLM' cult survivors have found mutual support, enabling them to come forward and tell the truth about their essentially-identical nightmare experiences. Also, whereas in the past most 'MLM' recruits were men (who naturally found it difficult to admit to the world that they'd been duped), lately the overwhelming majority of persons being lured into 'MLM' cults have been women.
Furthermore, in the Spring of 2019, my associate, Robert FitzPatrick, published 'Ponzinomics.' In this, Robert not only goes a long way towards identifying the true nature, extent and power of the 'MLM' cult phenomenon, but he also traces the history, and origins, of the Big 'MLM' Lie, and explains how a pair of its earliest creators managed to obtain the highest-level of political protection in the USA. As a result, politically-appointed senior Federal Trade Commission officials raised the white flag of surrender when, in the 1970s, despite mounting-complaints, they ignored an established legal precedent which automatically banned endless-chain recruitment frauds (previously labelled as, 'pyramid selling schemes'), and chose not to shut-down the corporate-front for the original 'MLM' cult. This was evidently because the bosses of 'Amway,' Messrs. DeVos and Van Andel, with a Bible in one hand and the Stars and Stripes in the other, had purchased association their local congressman (fifth Michigan district) with significant quantities of stolen money.
Gerald Ford (centre) Jay Van Andel (left) Richard DeVos (right) at the 'Amway' Grand Plaza Hotel in 1986. DeVos and Van Andel were Charter Members of the Board of Trustees at the Gerald R. Ford Presidential Foundation.
The beneficiary of these ill-gotten gains was none other than Gerald Rudolph Ford Jnr. - a politician not exactly noted for his intellectual capacity, but nonetheless someone of great influence.
For those readers who are perhaps too young to remember him, Gerald Ford was leader of the republican party in the House of Representatives 1965-1973, US vice-president under Richard Nixon 1973-1974, eventually becoming US president 1974-1976 after Nixon was forced to resign. He is also the president who granted a pardon to Nixon, for the crimes he'd committed whilst in office.
There can be absolutely no doubt that in 1979, the chiefs of an important civil regulatory agency of the US federal government played politics and completely failed in their appointed task of protecting the American public. As a consequence, the FTC actually enabled the birth of the meaningless phrase, 'Multi-Level Marketing is legal.' Thus, an insidious, and highly-profitable, endless-chain recruitment fraud was effectively-authorized in the USA. Furthermore, this major American regulatory-lapse allowed the profitable racket of 'MLM' cultism to be extensively duplicated and exported all around the world; now hidden behind the outrageous false-claim that the 'Amway/MLM had been examined and approved by the US government.' Not surprisingly, subsequent generations of politically-appointed senior FTC officials have all continued to play the same amoral game - flatly-refusing to admit publicly to their predecessors' catastrophic failure - for which, one day, the American government might possibly find itself liable. Meanwhile, this eyes-wide-shut federal policy enabled the Big 'MLM' Lie to transform, and expand, into a well-oiled machine for laundering money on a global scale - each year bringing billions of stolen dollars into the USA, and all right under the noses of regulators who have been allowing this plunder to be falsely-declared (with the compliance of some of the world's largest accountacy firms) as 'retail sales revenue.'
However, plenty of senior FTC officials, as well as high-ranking US politicians (including a certain Donald John Trump), have had their snouts planted in this almost bottomless trough of foreign and domestic loot, which has been set before them by the bosses of various copy-cat 'MLM' rackets whose camouflaged criminal activities they have conveniently failed to identify. Indeed, the number of senior FTC officials who have accepted, and continue to accept, tempting offers of well-paid employment from 'MLM' front-companies, and/or law firms contracted to recite the Big 'MLM' Lie, is truly astonishing.
All this begs the question: other than enabling a bunch of devious American criminals to rob from the entire planet for the best part of half a century, what exactly has been the point of having such a spineless, easily-corrupted and, therefore, useless government agency, as the FTC?, when in 'Ponzinomics,' one independent American does far-more to protect his fellow citizens from the Big 'MLM' Lie, than the entire 1500 + FTC staff (including more than 500 attorneys and 70 economists, with an annual budget of more than half a billion dollars) have ever done. In fact, Robert explains in great detail why, completely-contrary to the ambiguous and misleading message broadcast by the FTC for more than 40 years, it's not just been a few bad apples, but all 'Amway' copy-cat so-called 'MLM Income Opportunies' that have been centrally-controlled rigged-market swindles, hiding their inevitable effectively-100% overall net-loss/churn rates of endless-chains of ill-informed participants.
In reality, the crack-pot pseudo-economic theory which has been falsely-labelled the 'MLM business model,' was maliciously designed to be flawed-commercially, to the point where it would be impossible for any so-called 'MLM' company to derive a majority of its revenue lawfully from persons who are not its own contractors. In even more simple terms, 'MLM' cults have comprised groups of ill-informed persons who have been conditioned to believe that:
Endless-chain recruitment + endless purchases by the recruits = endless profits for the recruits.
For this reason, Robert FitzPatrick coined the word, 'Ponzinomics,' in an attempt to place an accurate label on the economically-suicidal anti-commercial activity that, to its enternal shame, the FTC has allowed to be peddled all around the world as a 'viable and legal part of the direct selling industry.'
What the FTC has consistently refused to acknowledge, is the undeniable fact that any claim, or implication, that one penny of extra (net) income, let alone life-changing sums of money, can be generated lawfully by the operation of a so-called 'MLM business,' is dangerous comic-book nonsense designed to deceive. Indeed, it is blatantly obvious that the Big 'MLM' Lie is far-too-good-to-be true, whilst it's no secret that what used to be the traditional direct selling business (a.k.a. door-to-door peddling), has long-since died out. Its demise being due to many evolving social and economic factors - not least the arrival of supermarkets, hard-discount stores and online shopping. Furthermore, 'MLM' products/services have been offered at fixed (often exorbitant) prices, rendering them effectively-unsaleable on the open-market to persons with fully-functioning critical and evaluative faculties; whilst no so-called 'MLM' company has ever set common-sense limits on the number of contractors being recruited, or on the areas of population where these so-called 'distributors/direct sellers' are supposed to find customers.
Just imagine for a moment if McDonalds:
fixed the price of its hamburgers and other products at more than twice that of its competitors?
offered its franchise owners a commission payment on each overpriced-product they bought themselves?
offered its franchise owners a commission payment on each overpriced product bought by any further franchise owners whom they recruited, and on the recruits of their recruits, etc. ad infinitum?
set absolutely no common-sense limits on the number of restaurant franchises being sold?
placed absolutely no restrictions on the locations where all these millions of insolvent over-priced, self-consuming restaurants were supposed to be operating?
Once the total absurdity of the so-called 'MLM business model,' is fully-understood, anyone with a modicum of common-sense, and/or the most-rudimentary hands-on experience of commerce, should be immediately able to deduce that no so-called 'MLM' company can ever have been, or will ever be, found by the FTC voluntarily disclosing the true results of its activities and operating lawfully. Indeed, this ongoing situation is beyond farcical, because when asked the most-obvious of questions, American regulators, and their academic advisers, have never been able to suggest even one solitary example of a so-called 'MLM' company that would be able pass inspection. Yet despite decades of evidence proving that there can be no such creature as a 'viable and legal MLM income opportunity,' FTC officials, guided by a cabal of academic advisers, came up with an utterly pointless test for legality. This boils down to trying to determine on a case-by-case basis that a so-called 'MLM' company (suspected of being a pyramid scheme) has not been deriving the overwhelming majority of its income lawfully from authentic retail sales (based on value and demand) to members of the general public (i.e. persons who have not been contractors of the so-called 'MLM' company).
Laughably, the FTC has listed some of the other 'pyramid scheme red flags' to look out for, and has even publishing warnings that 'MLM companies have caused, and are still causing, extensive damage to consumers, because some 'MLM' companies are actually pyramid schemes in disguise.' At the same time, American regulators have continued to repeat the Big 'MLM' Lie by insisting that 'MLM is a viable and legal branch of the direct selling industry.' Yet no one at the FTC has ever seen a shred of quantifiable evidence proving that this pernicious fairy story can be true. In fact, when asked in the most-specific of terms, if they have ever seen such evidence, it as been impossible to get a truthful answer to this simple question. Another highly-revealing question that FTC types have obviously shied away from answering truthfully is: What would be your own reaction if an ill-informed vulnerable individual you care about suddenly underwent a radical personality transformation, and declared that he/she had signed up for a so-called 'MLM Income Opportunity?'
In respect of their Orwellian closed-logic refusal to tell the truth publicly, and identify the Big 'MLM' Lie, Robert FitzPatrick has compared the obstructive behaviour of FTC officials, and their equally-inflexible academic advisers, to a group of scientists who have been earning their living by investigating a claim that 'pigs might fly,' but after decades of examining hundreds of grounded pigs with no wings, they still insist on continuing their pointless, but profitable, quest, whilst systematically refusing to accept the obvious conclusion that there is no such creature as a 'flying pig.'
At this point, I should perhaps again point out that, although I am an 'MLM' cult survivor, I was never an adherent of an 'MLM' cult. Unfortunately, I found myself shackled (financially) to a person (my only brother) who, at a time of vulnerability, had fallen completely under the spell of the Big 'MLM' Lie. Again, at the time these nightmarish events started to unfold, I still had no idea that my brother was an ideal subject to be lured, defrauded and used to lure and defraud other vulnerable persons; all for the benefit of a little gang of santimonious American billionaire-crooks posing as 'Compassionate Christian Capitalists,' and whom he had never met. I only later came to understand that my brother was an ideal subject to be deceived and enslaved, for the simple reason that he was completely convinced that he could never be deceived and enslaved.
Initially, I failed to grasp just how dangerously-deluded, and devious, chronic 'MLM' cult adherents (like my brother) can be. That said, like the majority of people whom they approach, I immediately realised that they are living in a parallel reality - completely obsessed with trying to recruit you into what is quite clearly a pyramid scheme, but which they insist is 'part of the legal MLM Direct Selling industry and definitely not a pyramid scheme.' What took me much longer to fathom, is that core-'MLM' cult adherents are also living in a parallel system of morality. They are acting under the self-righteous guided-delusion that, by recruiting you, they are helping both themselves and you to achieve future redemption in a secure Utopian existence - a form of Capitalist Paradise Earth - where no one has a job, but everyone is a happy, healthy, wealthy and free 'MLM business owner.'
Thus, it should always be remembered that chronic 'MLM' adherents' belief can be quite genuine, but what they believe in (and have bought into body and soul) is a colossal and bedazzling fake.The irony of all this being, that the Big 'MLM' Lie continues to be perpetuated, because its deluded adherents have been tricked into wasting their own time and money spreading it and hiding the truth about it, combined with law enforcement agents' and legislators' chronic, and catastrophic, failure to identify it accurately.
Although they have no idea what they are really involved in, active 'MLM' adherents are, in fact, proselytising-evangelists for a camouflaged ritual belief system (call it a 'perverted religion' if you like) which has been maliciously designed not only to spread like a virus - attracting, deceiving, robbing and exploiting susceptible individuals - but also to load its victims with shame and guilt for their inevitable failure to succeed, and thus, prevent them from facing reality and complaining. Consequently, whilst they remain under the control of the BIg 'MLM' Lie, its most-dangerous adherents should be seen for what they really are - the deluded deployable agents of a syndicate comprising the bosses of some the most widespread, socially, psychologically and financially damaging organized cultic crime groups to have emerged in recent history.
Anyone with real hands-on experience of any form of trading, and a modicum of common-sense, should immediatey be able to deduce that 'IM Academy' must be a fraud. So what makes me say that with such certainty? Because, successful persons with the knowledge to make money from any legitimate form of trading, obviously have no reason to flaunt their wealth and peddle their valuable expertise to others.
Thus, there is no doubt that 'IM Academy' has been yet another corporate-front for a classic 'Amway' copy-cat blame-the-victim 'Multi-Level Marketing' cultic racket.
The instigator and boss of 'IM Academy,' Christopher Terry, is a psychologically-dominant performer, but completely-unoriginal conman reciting the familiar 'MLM' script. He apparently learnt how to instigate his very own 'MLM' cultic racket whilst he was previously involved with 'Amway.' Thus,Terry has been pretending to have access to a secret knowledge that enabled him to transform from an ordinary poor little human into a fabulously wealthy, happy and free superhuman - all from from successfully-trading in various markets (Forex, Crypto-Currency, etc.). He has been further pretending to be prepared to share this secret, life-transforming, knowledge with anyone - for a price (part of the price being the surrender of your critical and evaluative faculties). If all this BS sounds vaguely-familiar, then just consider what Bernie Madoff got away with pretending, and right under the noses of: regulators, law enforcement agents, economists, financial journalists, etc..
Alice Kantor
A young (evidently well-intentioned) Bloomberg journalist, Alice Kantor, has recently been interviewing survivor/victims of Terry's adaptation of the Big 'Multi-Level Marketing is legal' Lie. They included Ivy League university students, whom many people would automatically-assume to be far too intelligent to fall for a conman peddling a comic-book narrative that is far too good to be true. In reality, well-educated persons who are completely convinced that they could never be conned, are often the easiest persons to con and to keep conned. Unfortunately, Alice Kantor specialises in personal finance stories and, evidently, she has no hands-on experience of actual trading, or of investigating organized crime or long cons run by the bosses of pernicious cults. Hopefully, she has a modicum of common-sense and the capacity to admit to making a mistake? However, even though Alice Kantor also approached various widely-recognized independent authorities on the 'MLM' cult phenomenon (including Robert FitzPatrick), her Bloomberg article/video (whilst seeming to be a well-informed warning that 'IM Academy' is a front for a pyramid scheme targeting students), casually repeats the Federal Trade Commission's nonsensical version of the Big 'MLM is Legal' Lie.
Indeed, in her article/video, Alice Kantor actually made unqualified reference to both 'Amway' and 'Herbalife,' as examples of 'legal MLMs.'Thus, I am forced to conclude that she must have also approached the FTC, and/or its employee, the self-appointed 'MLM expert,' Bill Keep.
Like many others before her, what Alice Kantor has understandably failed to realize, is that the Big 'MLM is legal' Lie is potentially one of greatest scandals in recent history, in that, starting with the Republican administration of Gerald Ford, successive US governments (via the FTC) have been broadcasting the Big 'MLM is legal' Lie, as though it is the truth. Thus, successive US governments have enabled a vast and destructive blame-the-victim fraud not only to be extensively-duplicated and inflicted on many millions of vulnerable American citizens, but also to be exported all around the world. Indeed, I am a British collateral victim of this ongoing chronic, and catastrophic, failure of American law enforcement. This is the dark truth that Bill Keep and his federal government paymasters do not want to escape into the light of day, and possibly transform into a major international scandal.
Alice Kantor has so far been yet another casual observer of part of the criminogenic 'MLM' phenomenon, but who has never seen, or even thought to look for, quantifiable evidence proving that any contractor of any so-called 'MLM'company has ever generated an overall net-income lawfully (after the deduction of all allied start up, and operational, expenses) by regularly retailing products/services to members of the general public (i.e. persons who are not fellow'MLM' contractors) based on value and demand. In other words, Alice Kantor is yet another in an ever-lengthening line of journalists who have all reported the pernicious comic-book 'MLM' fiction as though it is fact. Yet the sinsister reality behind the bedazzling 'MLM' façade was clearly explained to Alice Kantor.
i.e. That due to all the built-in anti-commercial factors, the hidden overall net-loss/churn rate for 'MLM' participation has always been effectively 100%, by design. In reality, 'MLM'has been the made-up technical-sounding label for a fake business - a self-perpetuating cultic racket based on luring vulnerable persons into believing in a crack-pot economic/commercial pseudo-science. The so called 'MLM business model' has been maliciously-designed to produce universal financial losses for its never-ending chains of ill-informed de facto-slave proselytizers. Indeed, the longer anyone persists in trying to succeed in an 'MLM' cultic racket: the more time and money he/she will waste. Thus, anyone claiming or implying that it is possible to make money from the operation of a so-called 'legal MLM business,' let alone gain life-transforming wealth, cannot be telling the truth and will not produce any quantifiable evidence to verify their vague anecdotal statements.
In truth, any journalist reporting on the activies of an 'MLM' front-company, but who doesn't clearly understand the above, is merely demonstrating his/her pitifully low-level of understanding the wider'MLM' cult phenomenon,
What does it tell us about the Big 'MLM is legal' Lie?'
For years, there have been inflexible 'Multi-Level Marketing' propagandists active on the Net - some of them posing as independent fair-minded observers. These people have all recited the Big 'MLM is legal' Lie. Tellingly, none of them has ever tried to refute my published analysis - that decades of evidence proves, beyond all reasonable doubt, that what has been falsely-described as the 'MLM Direct Selling Industry,' is an (as yet) officially-unrecognised criminogenic phenomenon of historic significance. Conversely, no quantifiable evidence exists (in the form of income-tax payment receipts) proving that any contractor of any so-called 'MLM'company has ever generated an overall net-income lawfully (after the deduction of all allied start up, and operational, expenses) by regularly retailing products/services to members of the general public (i.e. persons who are not fellow'MLM' contractors) based on value and demand. Due to all the bulit-in anti-commercial factors, the hidden overall net-loss/churn rate for 'MLM' participation has always been effectively 100% by design. To put it bluntly, this is a fake business based on a crack-pot economic pseudo-science which is guaranteed to produce universal failure. Indeed, the longer anyone persists in trying to succeed, the more time and money they will waste. Thus, anyone claiming or implying that it is possible to make money from the operation of a so-called 'MLM business,' let alone gain life-changing amounts of money, cannot be telling the truth and will not produce any quantifiable evidence to verify their vague anecdotal statements. On odd occasions, 'MLM' propagandists have attempted to trivialize and misrepresent my work, but all of them run a mile when asked the most-basic questions. Meanwhile, it's painfully obvious what has really been happening.
More and more courageous survivors of the Big 'MLM is legal' Lie have been coming forward to tell the truth that they were lured into a trap at times of vulnerability, and not only robbed, but also tricked into wasting their time and money as de facto slaves, acting the role of bait to lure others into the same trap. These survivors are further explaining how they were subjected (without their fully-informed consent) to coordinated devious techniques of persuasion and, thus, made to feel that they were entirely responsible for their 'MLM'-related losses. The increase in the number of witnesses who have the correct words to describe what was inflicted on them, is because the full history, and accurate explanation, of 'Amway'copy-cat 'MLM' cultic racketeering has become widely-available in recent years. Thus, the current generation of reality-denying US Federal Trade Commission officials, and their flock of blinkered academic advisers, cannot completely ignore what has become known as the 'anti-MLM' movement, or the accelerating melt-down of the 'MLM' racketeers' monopoly of information. However, they still cannot openly-accept the embarrassing truth and take the matter to the FBI. This is because politically-appointed senior FTC officials made a serious mistake when, back in the 1970s, they broke with established legal precedent, and chose not to nail the bosses of 'Amway'for running what was obviously an endless-chain pyramid scheme, albeit disguised behind effectively-unsaleable products.
In reality, far from finding that 'MLM is legal,'under the adminstration of president Gerald Ford (a Republican politican whose main financial backers just happened to be the bosses of 'Amway'), the amoral chiefs of an important agency of the US government simply buried their heads in the sand and, thus, effectively-authorized fraud. The resulting, politically-motivated, eyes-wide-shut American regulatory policy, allowed'MLM' racketeering to be extensively-cloned and exported all around the world. We have long-since reached the point where truth has become almost unthinkable.
Subsequent generations of politically-appointed senior FTC officials have consistently refused to admit to their their predecessors' catastrophic failure. This is partly because a significant number of senior FTC officials have been in receipt of piles of stolen money offered to them by the 'MLM' racketeers whose profitable criminal enterprise they refused to identify. Certain FTC officials' corrupt role in these matters should also be identified as criminal, because, even though they pretend ignorance, they must know damn-well what they have done. They also know of the extensive damage that their mistake has caused, and still causes, but they continue to obstruct a full criminal investigation, to protect their own interests. The damage caused by the Big'MLM' Lie obviously hasn't only been confined to those lured into believing it, because it has also destroyed the lives and happiness of friends and relatives of its chronic victims. Indeed, I'm a firsthand witness to this, being a collateral victim of an 'MLM' cultic racket.
In reality, the FTC has itself been broadcasting the Big 'MLM is legal' Lie, for decades. We had a word-perfect performance of this dangerous nonsense during the recent 'MLM' conference stage-managed by FTC employee, Bill Keep.
This shameful, ongoing American cover-up has remarkable parallels with what has happened in Britain with the Post Office scandal, albeit on a much smaller scale. More than 900 innocent Post Office contractors are known to have been wrongfully sacked, prosecuted, extorted, bankrupted and their lives and happiness destroyed, due to a faulty computer system which they were assured was 'robust,' and which they were obliged to use. More than 230 innocent people were sent to prison. Furthermore, 3500 other innocent sub-postmasters were coerced, by the threat of sacking (which also meant the loss of their initial investment) and criminal prosecution, into paying the Post Office significant sums of money (in some cases over £100 000) which they were falsely-accused of stealing. The effectively-valueless software - known as 'Horizon' and which cost UK tax-payers one billion £ - made it appear that all these thousands of honest people were liars and thieves. The true scale of the damage caused by the Big 'Horizon is robust' Lie, is incalculable, because, obviously, it wasn't just the innocent sub-postmasters whose lives and happiness were destroyed by it. Yet, no independent quantifiable evidence existed to prove that any money had been stolen.
The politically-appointed senior management of the UK Post Office, and of the government-backed Japanese commercial company, Fujitsu, that supplied the faulty software, knew the truth, but maliciously hid it to protect their own reputations and financial interests - causing a massive miscarriage of justice to occur and, in some cases, lives to be lost. Perhaps the most- damning evidence proving that the abuse was centrally-directed by the Post Office senior management, lies in the fact that the victims were all fed exactly the same scripted-lies - initially when they contacted the Post Office's 'help-line,' and subsequently, when they faced the Post Office's bullying investigators.They were told individually that the Horizon system was proven to be without fault, in that they alone were the only sub-postmaster in the UK with large sums of money missing. Just like in a totalitarian state, the all-powerful Post Office managers maintained an absolute monopoly of information over their powerless workers, whilst the ruling-regime's closed-logic controlling-narrative, could never be wrong. Thus, any sub-postmaster challenging the Big 'Horizon is robust' Lie, was sytematically branded as 'a liar and a thief.' According to their contracts, sub-postmasters were personally responsible for any losses and the Post Office had the right to prosecute them to recover losses. However, it was later ruled by the UK High Court, that since the Post Office had withheld key-information from, and lied to, the Sub-postmasters, their contracts were unenforceable and, therefore, none of them should have been prosecuted in the first place.
Perhaps the most damning-evidence proving that the abuse was also centrally-directed by the senior management of Fujitsu, lies in the fact that the company is now known to have employed a team of 12 specialists to gain constant remote access to thousands of the sub-postmasters' 'Horizon' accounts. This was a secret attempt to maintain Fujitsu's management's monopoly of information by identifying and correcting the many accounting mistakes, and thus, remove the evidence that the system was fatally-flawed. At the same time, Fujitsu propaganda kept telling the sub-postmasters that remote access to their Horizon accounts was completely impossible.
Adam Crozier
Paula Vennels
As it gradually became clear that something must be radically-wrong with 'Horizon,' because hundreds of sub-postmasters were being accused of theft, an all-party group of Members of Parliament was formed to investigate. The Post Office CEO, Adam Crozier, was replaced.
In 2012, a sinister game then began to be played when the new CEO of the Post Office, Paula Vennels (an ordained Minister in the Church of England), began pretending that she too was in search of the truth about Horizon. However, the ensuing independent investigation she organized, but which she and her colleagues tried to limit and stage manage, reveals that just like her predecessors, Paula Vennels was probably only interested in hiding the full-truth, and/or playing for time.
Eventually, when it looked like the Post Office's monopoly of information could no longer be maintained, Paula Vennels instigated an internal system of dispute resolution, supposedly to compensate the innocent sub-postmasters, but this turned out to be just another cruel charade.
Most of those criminally-responsible for creating, and maintaining, the Big 'Horizon is robust' Lie have finally been hauled before a public enquiry and grilled by lawyers acting for the surviving victims. Some of the most-arrogant guilty parties had to be forced to appear. All of a sudden, their memories of their own abusive criminal roles in these matters have become lost. They have kept reciting the classic phrase, 'I don't recall.' Various current, and previous, UK government Ministers are also implicated for failing to take appropriate action, until public opinion suddenly-shifted and they began to fear for their future electoral chances.
After several years with, little or no, well-informed media interest, Fujitsu and the Post Office's monopoly of information began its slow public melt-down. This was the result of an article by Rebecca Thompson published in 2009 by a specialist magazine, 'Computer Weekly.' That was followed a few years later, by an investigation conducted by journalists from the popular satirical magazine, 'Private Eye.'
In 2015, the BBC took an interest and from then on news reports of developments in the Post Office scandal continued to appear.
However, the award-winning television dramatization, 'Mr. Bates vs the Post Office' (broadcast as recently as January 2024), was the major factor that finally changed everything. This four part ITV series shone a light on the truth, revealing the courage and determination of ordinary decent British people, who refused to surrender in the face of an immoral, reality-inverting corporate regime that was Hell bent on destroying them. The quality of this programme and the strength of the public outcry it triggered, forced the sitting Conservative government to take swift appropriate action.
Alan Bates is a financially-savvy, dignified and tenacious former sub-postmaster who, when in 2000, he spotted substantial short-falls in his weekly 'Horizon'-generated accounts, went through all his Post Office transactions with a fine tooth-comb. Alan Bates immediately realized exactly what was going on. 'Horizon' was glitching and duplicating certain transactions making it appear that money had gone missing. He contacted the Post Office with his urgent concerns and, realizing the serious implications, refused to sign any Post Office document which would make him look responsible for 'Horizon's' obvious mistakes. At the same time, he did his best to confront the Post Office bosses with the reality that they had bought a fragile system which could not be trusted, but he met with an inpenetrable wall of organized lying and obstruction. Eventually, Alan Bates was arbitrarily sacked simply for continuing to report the truth, and refusing to be framed. The Post Office counter was removed from his shop, and his initial investment of £60 000 was lost. That didn't stop Alan Bates, because he gradually managed to gather together an alliance of other, equally-determined, and well-informed, innocent victims.
The 'Justice for Sub-postmasters Alliance' eventually managed to take the Post Office to court and ultimately win against all the odds. The Post Office spent £100 millions on defence attorneys, and attempted to prolong the proceedings knowing that the sub-postmasters funds were limited. Essentially, the Post Office’s echelon of intellectual prostitutes were paid to deny reality and keep reciting the Big 'Horizon is robust' Lie. Although 550 sub-postmasters were vindicated and awarded £58 millions, £47 millions of this went on their own legal fees, leaving just £20 000 each. The initial triumph of the truth in the High Court, opened the flood gates, because the justice system itself then had to confront the shameful catalogue of cruel abuse it had presided over.
Prior to the broadcast of 'Mr. Bates vs The Post Office,' although they were fully-aware that a massive miscarriage of justice had happened, the government Ministers with responsibilty for these matters had claimedto be concerned, but they had done as little as possible to compensate fully the surviving victims and their families. Folowing the widespread public outrage sparked by the broadcast, the government suddenly changed its tune.
As the public enquiry advances, it looks increasingly likely that a number of current, and former, Post Office and Fujitsu employees are soon going to be charged (at the very least) with the crime of 'conspiracy to pervert the course of justice,' and they will probably be jailed themselves. That said, there seems to be a very strong case that, by the malicious withholding of key information and lying, senior Post Office managers, investigators and prosecutors engaged in a blatant conspiracy to commit extortion and fraud. In this way, they knowingly-destroyed the lives and happiness of thousands of innocent sub-postmasters and their families, as well as causing the deaths of several of the victims of their criminal conspiracy, whom they deliberately framed. Alan Bates says he is quite prepared to raise the cash via public appeal in order to launch private criminal prosecutions; that is, if the authorities fail to hold the guilty parties fully to account. The succession of impotent politicians who presided over this tragedy for more than 20 years, of course, will never be held fully to account.
In the meantime, UK tax payers will have to foot the bill for the Big 'Horizon is robust' Lie, although Fujitsu is ultimately responsible financially. The innocent survivors' criminal convictions are still in the process of being quashed. They are all still waiting for full compensation. Sadly, more than 30 victims have already died.
Sub-postmasters, are contractors who have bought a form of frachise from the UK Post Office to operate a local post office business. However, contrary to the vocabulary employed, these take-it-or-leave-it contracts have placed sub-postmasters in the position of dependent employees, rather than independent business owners. Indeed, the Post Office has retained the one-sided right to terminate these contracts, if it is ruled that any of the many terms set out in them, is not being respected by a sub-postmaster.
'Horizon' is the name of a computer software system which the UK Post Office originally purchased at a cost of one billion pounds sterling from the Japanese information technology company, 'Fujitsu.' At the time of 'Horizon's purchase, the government of Prime Minister, Tony Blair, held power in the UK and it was ultimately a government decision.
'Horizon' was supposed to have been acquired for the benefit of sub-postmasters, in order for them to accomplish electronically the laborious day-to-day tasks of running a sub-Post Office (accounting, stock-taking, etc.). These activities previously required hours of paperwork and calculations.
'Horizon' was installed by the Post Office in 1999. Serious problems immediately began to be reported to the Post Office's own 'helpline.' Postmasters were assured that their concerns were being addressed. However, Post Office management not only disregarded these concerns, they also began reciting the Big Lie that'Horizon is robust,' and they began blaming, and isolating, the sub-postmasters for the accounting mistakes that the faulty system kept producing.
In this way, the faulty Horizon system made it appear thatmoney was being stolen by hundreds of previously honest sub-postmasters, when in reality, this obviously could not be the case. It is interesting to note that 'Horizon' never seems to have made it appear that money was appearing: only that money was disappearing, a fact which seems suspicious to me. That said, the faults in Horizon are evidently only assumed to have been the result of genuine mistakes in the system's development, rather than any criminal activity.
