Pseudo-scientific mystification. The instigators of pernicious cults seek to overwhelm their adherents emotionally and intellectually by pretending that progressive initiation into their own superior or superhuman knowledge (coupled with total belief in its authenticity and unconditional deference to the authority of its higher initiates) will defeat a negative or adversarial force of impurity and absolute evil, and lead to future, exclusive redemption in some form of secure Utopian existence. By making total belief a prerequisite of redemption,adherents are drawn into a closed-logic trap (i.e. failure to achieve redemption is solely the fault of the individual who didn’t believe totally). Cultic pseudo-science is always essentially the same hypnotic hocus-pocus, but it can be peddled in an infinite variety of forms and combinations (‘spiritual’, ‘medical’, ‘philosophical’, ‘cosmological,’‘extraterrestrial’, ‘political’, ‘racial’, ‘mathematical’, ‘economic’, ‘New-Age’, 'magical', etc.), often with impressive, made-up, technical-sounding names. It is tailored to fit the spirit of the times and to attract a broad range of persons, but especially those open to an exclusive offer of salvation (i.e. the: sick, dissatisfied, bereaved, vanquished, disillusioned, oppressed, lonely, insecure, aimless, etc.). However, at a moment of vulnerability, anyone (no matter what their: age, sex, nationality, state of mental/ physical health, level of education, etc.) can need to believe in a non-rational, cultic pseudo-science. Typically, obedient adherents are granted ego-inflating names, and/or ranks, and/or titles, whilst non-initiates are referred to using derogatory, dehumanizing terms. Although initiation can at first appear to be reasonable and benefits achievable, cultic pseudo-science gradually becomes evermore costly and mystifying. Ultimately, it is completely incomprehensible and its claimed benefits are never quantifiable. The self-righteous euphoria and relentless enthusiasm of cult proselytizers can be highly infectious and deeply misleading. They are invariably convinced that their own salvation also depends on saving others.
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For the benefit of the many new readers coming to this Blog, four months ago, I opened it by stating that:
In 1945, whilst most, contemporary mainstream commentators were unable to look beyond the ends of their noses, with a perfect sense of irony, George Orwell presented fact as fiction in an insightful 'fairy story' entitled, 'Animal Farm.' He revealed that totalitarianism is merely the oppressors' fiction mistaken for fact by the oppressed. In the same universal allegory, Orwell described how, at a time of vulnerability, almost any people's dream of a future, secure, Utopian existence can be hung over the entrance to a totalitarian deception. Indeed, the words that are always banished by totalitarian deceivers are, 'totalitarian' and 'deception.' Sadly, when it comes to examining the same enduring phenomenon, albeit with an ephemeral 'American/Capitalist' label, most contemporary, mainstream commentators have again been unable to look further than the ends of their noses. However, if they followed Orwell's example, and did some serious thinking, this is the reality-inverting nightmare they would find.
For a long time, I have been openly-saying that all so-called 'MLM income opportunities' have been variations of essentially the same, self-perpetuating, pseudo-scientific lie which (exactly like 'Soviet'-style 'socialism') has been allowed to grow to such a vast scale, that the truth has become almost unthinkable to all but the most-intellectually-rigorous of observers.
As if to prove the validity of my statement, in a recent conversation with a far-from- intellectually-rigorous, American financial journalist, I was asked the following question:
'Are you seriously suggesting that the entire direct selling industry is a fraud?'
Even in the light of the recent dramatic fall in the inflated market-price of effectively-valueless 'Herbalife' shares (due to the incapacity of the company's senior officers to answer one intellectually-rigorous investor's question concerning external sales), this financial journalist still found it impossible to accept that, for decades, a growing number of gangs of sanctimonious racketeers behind so-called 'MLM direct selling companies' like 'Amway', 'NuSkin' , 'Xango,' etc., have successfully dissimulated vast, blame-the victim, closed-market swindles simply by supplying endless-chains of constantly-churning, ill-informed recruits with banal, but grossly-over-priced and, therefore, effectively-unsaleable, products, and/or services, enabling these racketeers to launder billions dollars of losing investment-payments as 'lawful sales.'
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| The 'Xango' racketeers |
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| The 'NuSkin' racketeers |
It beggars belief that (to date) no one from the mainstream media has had the courage, or gumption, to go the grinning bosses of any 'MLM income opportunity' racket, look them directly in the eye and calmly ask them the following, blindingly-obvious question:
What quantifiable evidence can you produce, proving that your alleged 'direct selling company's' so-called 'Multi-Level Marketing income opportunity' has actually generated any significant revenue other than that deriving unlawfully from its own constantly-churning, losing-participants?'
David Brear (copyright 2012)
David,
ReplyDeleteGreat question indeed! Why does the media in general--by silence--allow racketeers to continue to masquerade their money extracting schemes as legitimate business? You are correct in saying "The American Dream Made Nightmare!"
It is a shame that the true "American Way" has been incorporated as a front for a pernicious cult and made the blue print for the Amway imitators like Herbalife, Usana, Xango, Monaie and NuSkin.
I think that a lot of very well-educated, but short-sighted, key persons within the financial media, exactly like their equivalents within government and regulatory authorities, have refused to tackle fraud disguised as 'business,' falsely believing that confidence has to be maintained in the free-market system at all costs. When offered the choice between dishonour and economic collapse these spineless people have chosen dishonour, but they will have economic collapse.
ReplyDeleteDavid Brear (copyright 2012)