Monday 27 July 2020

Warning - 'Crowd1' and 'Impact Crowd Technology' front a blame the victim 'MLM' cultic racket.




'Multi-Level Marketing' Warning.

The following deconstructed analysis has been formulated to sharpen the critical and evaluative faculties of all unwary persons approaching so-called 'Multi-Level Marketing' from the dangerous (subjective) point of view that it must be a business/industry, rather than from the safe (purely-objective) point of view that they don't really know what it is.




_________________________________________________________________________


More than half a century of quantifiable evidence proves beyond all reasonable doubt that:


  • the widely-misunderstood phenomenon that has become popularly-known as 'Multi-Level Marketing' (a.k.a. 'Network Marketing') is nothing more than an absurd, non-rational,  cultic, economic pseudo-science maliciously-designed to lure unwary persons into de facto servitude, dissociate them from external reality and not only steal their money, but also deceive them into unconsciously acting the role of bait to lure other unwary persons (particularly their friends and family members) into the same trap. 
  • the impressive-sounding made-up jargon term, 'MLM,' is therefore, the misleading title for an enticing structured-scenario of control which has been developed, and constantly acted out as  reality, by the instigators, and associates, of various copy-cat, major and minor, ongoing organised crime groups (hiding behind labyrinths of legally-registered corporate structures) to shut-down the critical, and evaluative, faculties of victims, and of casual observers, in order to perpetrate, and dissimulate, a series of blame-the-victim 'Long Cons*'  - comprising self-perpetuating rigged-market swindles**, a.k.a. pyramid scams (dressed up as 'legitimate direct selling income opportunites') and related advance-fee frauds (dressed up as 'legitimate: training and motivation, self-betterment, programs, recruitment leads, lead generation systems,' etc.).
  • Apart from an insignificant minority of shills (whose leading-role in the 'Long Con' has been to pretend that anyone can achieve financial freedom simply by following their unquestioning example and exactly-duplicating a step-by-step-plan of recruitment and self-consumption)the hidden overall net-loss/churn rate for participation in so-called 'MLM income opportunities,' has always been effectively 100%.
________________________________________________________________________

*A 'Long Con' is a form of fraud maliciously designed to exploit victims' existing beliefs and instinctual desires and make them falsely-believe that they are exercising a completely free-choice. 'Long Cons' comprise an enticing structured-scenario of control acted out as reality over an extended period. Like theatrical plays, 'Long Cons' are written, directed and produced. They involve leading players and supporting players as well as props, sets, extras, costumes, script, etc. The hidden objective of 'Long Cons' is to convince unwary persons that fiction is fact and fact is fiction, progressively cutting them off from external reality. In this way, victims begin unconsciously to play along with the controlling-scenario and (in the false-expectation of future reward) large sums of money or valuables can be stolen from them. Classically, the victims of 'Long Cons' can become deluded to such an extent that they will abandon their education, jobs, careers, etc., empty their bank accounts, and/or beg, steal, borrow from friends, family members, etc.

_________________________________________________________________________

** The enticing structured-scenario of control fundamental to all 'rigged-market swindles' is that people can earn income by first contributing their own money to participate in a profitable commercial opportunity, but which is secretly an economically-unviable fake due to the fact that the (alleged) opportunity has been rigged so that it generates no significant, or sustainable, revenue other than that deriving from its own ill-informed participants. For more than 50 years, 'Multi-Level Marketing' racketeers have been allowed to dissimulate rigged-market swindles by offering endless-chains of victims various banal, but over-priced, products, and/or services, in exchange for unlawful losing-investment payments, on the pretext that 'MLM' products/services can then be regularly re-sold for a profit in significant quantities via expanding networks of distributors. However, since 'MLM' products/services cannot be regularly re-sold to the general public for a profit in significant quantities (based on value and demand), 'MLM' participants have, in fact, been peddled infinite shares of their own finite money (in the false expectation of future reward). 

Thus, in 'MLM' rackets, the innocent looking products/sevices' function has been to hide what is really occurring - i.e The operation of an unlawful, intrinsically fraudulent, rigged-market where effectively no non-salaried (transient) participant can generate an overall net-profit, because, unknown to the non-salaried (transient) participants, the market is in a permanent state of collapse and requires its non-salaried (transient) participants to keep finding further (temporary) de facto slaves to sustain the enticing illusion of stability and viability.

Meanwhile an insignificant (permanent) minority direct the 'Long Con' - raking in vast profits by selling into the rigged-market and by controlling/withholding all key-information concerning the rigged-market's actual catastrophic, ever-shifting results from its never-ending chain of (temporary) de facto slaves.

Although cure-all pills potions and vitamin/dietary supplements, household and beauty, products have been most-prevalent, it is possible to use any product, and/or service, to dissimulate a rigged-market swindle. There are even some 'MLM' rackets that have been hidden behind well-known traditional brands (albeit offered at fixed high prices). Some 'MLM' rackets have included 'cash-back/discount shopping cards, travel products, insurance, energy/communications services' and 'crypto-currencies' in their controlling scenarios.

No matter what bedazzling product/service has been dangled as bait, in 'MLM' rackets, there has been no significant or sustainable source of revenue other than never-ending chains of contractees of the 'MLM' front companies. These front-companies always pretend that their products/services are high quality and reasonably-priced and that for anyone prepared to put in some effort, the products/services can be sold on for a profit via expanding networks of distributors based on value and demand. In reality, the underlying reason why it has mainly only been (transient) 'MLM' contractees who have bought the various products /services (and not the general public) is because they have been tricked into unconsciously playing along with the controlling scenario which constantly says that via regular self-consumption and the recruitment of others to do the same, etc. ad infinitum, anyone can receive a future (unlimited) reward.

I've been examining the 'MLM' phenomenon for around 20 years. During this time, I've yet to find one so-called 'MLM' company that has voluntarily made key-information available to the public concerning the quantifiable results of its so-called 'income opportunity'.

Part of the key-information that all 'MLM' bosses seek to hide concerns the overall number of persons who have signed contracts since the front companies were instigated and the retention rates of these contractees. 

When rigorously investigated, the overall hidden net-loss churn rates for so-called 'MLM income opportunites' has turned out to have been effectively 100%. Thus, anyone claiming (or implying) that it is possible for anyone to make a penny of net-profit, let alone a living, in an 'MLM,' cannot be telling the truth and will not provide quantifiable evidence to back up his/her anecdotal claims.


Although a significant number of 'MLM' front-companies (like 'Vemma', 'Fortune Hi-Tech Marketing', 'Wake Up Now') have been shut-down by commercial regulators, some of the biggest 'MLM' rackets (like 'Amway' ,'Herbalife', Forever Living Products' ) have continued to hide in plain sight whilst secretly churning tens of millions of losing participants over decades.




The quantifiable results of the self-perpetuating global 'Long Con' known as 'Multi Level Marketing,' have been fiendishly hidden by convincing victims that they are 'Independent Business Owners' and that any losses they incurred, must have been entirely their own fault for not working hard enough. 








Blog readers should observe how (in the above linked-videos) chronic victims of 'MLM' cults are incapable of describing what they were subjected to in accurate terms. Even though they are no longer physically playing along with the 'Long Con's' controlling-scenario, they unconsciously continue to think, and speak, using the jargon-laced 'MLM' script - illogically describing themselves as 'Distributors.' 

Chronic victims of blame-the-victim cultic rackets who have managed to escape and confront the ego-destroying reality that they’ve been systematically deceived and exploited, are invariably destitute and dissociated from all their previous social contacts. For years afterwards, recovering cult victims can suffer from psychological problems (which are also generally indicative of the victims of abuse):

depression; overwhelming feelings (guilt, grief, shame, fear, anger, embarrassment, etc.); dependency/ inability to make decisions; retarded psychological/ intellectual development; suicidal thoughts; panic/ anxiety attacks; extreme identity confusion; Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder; insomnia/ nightmares; eating disorders; psychosomatic illness, fear of forming intimate relationships; inability to trust; etc



David Brear (copyright 2020)

_____________________________________________________________________



https://www.biznews.com/rugby/2020/06/25/crowd1-ponzi-alert
https://business.inquirer.net/296010/sec-flags-more-illegal-investment-schemes
https://www.businessforhome.org/2020/06/crowd1-listing-terminated/
https://news.trijo.co/en/news/major-network-marketing-company-crowd1-accused-of-being-a-pyramid-scheme/
https://badisaboikanyo.co.za/who-is-crowd1s-founder/


 1. New Zealand:
“We recommend exercising caution before dealing with Crowd1 and Impact Crowd Technology S.L. as they are not registered companies or financial service providers in New Zealand”.
2. Norway:
“The Lottery Authority records that Crowd1 is being traded in a pyramid system”.
3. Philippines:
“The Commission has received information that an individual or group of persons representing an entity named CROWD1 ASIA PACIFIC INC. (CROWD1) are enticing the public to invest their money in the said entity with the promise of high monetary rewards or profits.
Those who act as salesmen, brokers, dealers or agents of the said entity in selling or convincing people to invest in the investment scheme it is being offered including soliciting investments or recruiting investors through the internet may be held criminally liable under Section 28 of the SRC and penalized with a maximum fine of Five Million Pesos (Php5,000,000.00) or imprisonment of Twenty One (21) years or both pursuant to Section 73 of the SRC (SEC vs. Oudine Santos, G.R. No. 195542, 19 March 2014).”
4. Namibia:
The core business activity of Crowd1 is to introduce new members of the public to its business practice. Participants who join as members are encouraged to recruit new members through promises of bonuses and additional owner rights. The primary source of income for Crowd1 is generated through the recruitment of new members.
5. Paraguay:
The CNV identifies Crowd1 as a securities offering. The regulator notes Crowd1 is not registered with the CNV and therefore operates illegally. It is also illegal to promote unregistered securities. Promoters of Crowd1 in Paraguay face up to three years imprisonment or a fine.
6. Mauritius:
The FSC hereby informs the public that Crowd1 and/or any individuals/ representatives or promoter groups operating under this name are not and have not, at any point in time, been licensed and regulated by the FSC
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
WARNING

'Crowd1' and 'Impact Crowd Technology' are the impressive-sounding made up names for yet another 'Amway' copy-cat, blame-the-victim 'Multi-Level Marketing/Prosperity Gospel' cultic racket. All around the world, loud alarm bells are starting to sound, but investigative journalists, and indeed regulators and law enforcement agents, never seem to know what common-sense questions to ask.






Crowd1 Terminated



The pair of unoriginal Narcisistic charlatans fronting the 'Crowd1' racket are Johan Staël von Holstein (a long-time would-be 'MLM' racketeer) and Jonas E Werner (a long-time would-be 'MLM' racketeer). They lately-pretend that their 'Crowd1 MLM' scheme is different to all other MLM schemes, that it is perfectly viable and legal and operates in 180+ countries with more than 7.5 millions participants.





The pair can be seen in this propaganda video reciting the bedazzling 'MLM' fairy story in response to scripted-questions being fed to them by a bedazzling female associate (employee).

Scandinavia has produced some particularly vile 'MLM' racketeers in recent years. Their criminal activities are neither original nor unique and, consequently, they cannot be fully-understood in isolation. Indeed, both Jonas E. Werner and Johan Staël von Holstein turn out to have been involved with some of Scandinavia's most-notorious 'MLM' racketeers.

Well who would have guessed that?






The Scandinavian-based  'MLM Income Opportunity/ Prosperity Gospel' cultic racket known as 'Zinzino,' was ostensibly instigated by an otherwise-mediocre, baby-faced, Norwegian narcissist, Finn Ørjan Sæle.







Former jailbird and failed-businessman: turned 'MLM Multi-Millionaire,' Randy Gage

Ørjan Saele seems to have learnt his self-deluded act, almost word for word, from a notorious American 'MLM' shill, Randy Gage, whom he encountered in his youth. Randy Gage is yet another absurd loud-mouth who is fluent in 'MLM' jargon. Following the classic ordinary poor little man turned mighty 'MLM' superman fairy story, Mr. Gage has variously boasted of being a once-penniless high-school drop out substance abuser who was briefly jailed for armed robbery, and who (aged 30) went bankrupt (for a second time) trying to open a restaurant, but who finally transformed into an 'Amway Diamond and multi-millionaire MLM motivational author and speaker.'



'MLM' racketeer, Terje Duesund
'

Zinzino' has not been Ã˜rjan Saele's only corporate front for racketeering. Indeed,  Ã˜rjan Saele and his criminal associate, Terje Duesund, have been leading members of a veritable Scandinavian 'MLM' Mafia. 





Terje Duesund has been the boss of 'Lyoness Norway.'

A  ‘Crowd1 Top earner’  Renze Deelstra (aka. Renz Eduardo) is linked to other cultic rackets. He was the ‘managing director of Flexkom Netherlands’ - also with ties to the Austrian-based  ‘Lyoness’ racket, because ‘Flexkom’ was founded by a managing director of ‘Lyoness Turkey’. 


Claiming 600 000 adherents (i.e. more than 10% of the Norwegian population), 'Nature's Own' was openly described in the Norwegian media as a pyramid scam. At first, Norwegian Government agencies (including the Justice Dept.) seemed to be taking a tough line against the counterfeit  'direct selling company', but strings were evidently pulled and what seemed to be just a case of mass-consumer fraud began to show all the classic signs of major ongoing racketeering activity.


Former, Right-Wing Norwegian Member of Parliament, Anita Apelthun Saele (Christian Democrats - KrF) who just happens to be Ã˜rjan Sæle's mother, was publicly accused of trying to influence Norwegian public prosecutors. Anita Apelthun Saele was even reported to have been directly involved in promoting 'Nature's Own,' but later she claimed only to have used the products


Finn Jarle Sæle

Ørjan's Sæle father, Finn Jarle Sæle - is an influential newspaper editor in Norway. 


At the time 'Nature's Own' came under investigation in Norway as a suspected pyramid scam, Norwegian Minister of Finance, Gudmund Restad, was reported to have had his three daughters involved in 'Nature's Own.'




Evidently not wanting to open this embarrassing can of Norwegian worms, an extensive investigation allegedly conducted by the Norwegian Ministry of Justice and Public Security, was apparently shelved by prosecutors with jurisdiction in the case. However, all the bad publicity surrounding the front company obliged its bosses to change their corporate camouflage to 'Natures of Scandinavia.' The restyled front company was used to expand its bosses' criminal activities into the mobile phone market, offering adherents Internet subscriptions (in the false expectation of future reward) under the name 'PGOne' - a corporate structure which was later integrated into 'Ventelo'.





Now believing themselves to be above the law, Sæle and his criminal associates began to instigate a labyrinth of copy-cat rackets in Scandinavia and elsewhere, including 'Zinzino' which has lately been used to infiltrate financial markets in Sweden. However, 'Zinzino' has attracted more, unwelcome attention in Sweden, Finland and Estonia.





Other rackets which Sæle, and/or Duesund, and/or 
Johan Staël von Holstein, have been involved with have included: 

'Spinglo/Synkronice'





'SaferWaver' (targetting people who fear radiation), 
'Bewell' 
'DailyPoker' 

Many of the blame-the-victim rackets which have lately been the constituent parts of a cultic epidemic in Scandinavia, turn out to have been instigated and dissimulated by Sæle, and/or Duesund, or persons who have been closely linked to them (like Peter Jakobsson in Sweden and Jimmy Larsen from Denmark). 


David Brear (copyright 2020)

Thursday 9 July 2020

Does Mary Trump know how 'MLM' cults helped her comic-book 'superman' uncle to become US president?




Un juge lève l'interdiction d'un livre écrit par la nièce de Donald Trump [DR]

  • It is a matter of public record that the current (elderly) US president, Donald Trump would have the world believe a comic-book scenario that in recent years, the USA has been governed by moral, intellectual, physical and psychological weaklings - 'losers' who have been easily-defeated by other world leaders, but that he is a genetically-superior all-American superman  - a self-made billionaire 'winner' and 'very stable genius' who acts only out of a selfless-love for his country and his fellow citizens... 
  • Dr. Mary Trump (b. 1965) is the daughter of Donald Trump's late brother, Frederick ('Freddy') Christ Trump Jnr. (1938-1981).
  • Dr. Trump has written a book, 'Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man.' 
  • Based on her life-long personal observations (from inside the demonstrably- dysfunctional Trump family), Dr. Trump describes Donald Trump as a fraud and a bully who was himself bullied, and psychologically-damaged, by his sociopath father, Frederick ('Fred') Christ Trump Snr. (1905-1999).
  • Predictably, without even reading it, the White House (i.e. Donald Trump) has immediately dismissed all claims made in the current president's niece's book as 'fiction,' but with an irony close to exquisite, this systematic denial of reality only serves to confirm the accuracy of Dr. Trump's self-evident observations and qualified analysis.
Dr. Trump (who holds a doctoral degree in clinical psychology), observes that  'nothing is ever enough' for her uncle, and she confirms (what is already public knowledge) that the current president has exhibited, and continues to exhibit, all 9 diagnostic criteria of a severe and inflexible narcissist*.


_________________________________________________________________________

* ‘Narcissistic Personality Disorder,’ is a psychological term first used in 1971 by Dr. Heinz Kohut (1913-1981). It was recognised as the name for a form of pathological narcissism in ‘The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders 1980.’ Narcissistic traits (where a person talks highly of himself/herself to eliminate feelings of worthlessness) are common in, and considered ‘normal’ to, human psychological development. When these traits become accentuated by a failure of the social environment and persist into adulthood, they can intensify to the level of a severe mental disorder. Severe and inflexible NPD is thought to effect less than 1% of the general adult population. It occurs more frequently in men than women. In simple terms, NPD is reality-denying, total self-worship born of its sufferers’ unconscious belief that they are flawed in a way that makes them fundamentally unacceptable to others. In order to shield themselves from the intolerable rejection and isolation which they unconsciously believe would follow if others recognised their defective nature, NPD sufferers go to almost any lengths to control others’ view of, and behaviour towards, them. NPD sufferers often choose partners, and raise children, who exhibit ‘co-narcissism’ (a co-dependent personality disorder like co-alcoholism). Co-narcissists organise themselves around the needs of others (to whom they feel responsible), they accept blame easily, are eager to please, defer to others’ opinions and fear being seen as selfish if they act assertively. NPD was observed, and apparently well-understood, in ancient times. Self-evidently, the term, ‘narcissism,’ comes from the allegorical myth of Narcissus, the beautiful Greek youth who falls in love with his own reflection.

Currently, NPD has nine recognised diagnostic criteria (five of which are required for a diagnosis):
    1. has a grandiose sense of self-importance.
    2. is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, ideal  love, etc.
    3. believes that he/she is special and unique and can only be understood by other special people.
    4. requires excessive admiration.
    5. strong sense of self-entitlement.
    6. takes advantage of others to achieve his/her own ends.
    7. lacks empathy.
    8. is often envious or believes that others are envious of him/her.
    9. arrogant disposition.
    _______________________________________________________________________________________
    However, Dr. Trump rightly refuses publicly to offer a professional opinion as to the exact nature of her uncle's psychological troubles and points out that - 'his pathologies are so complex and his behaviours so often inexplicable that coming up with an accurate and comprehensive diagnosis would require a full battery of psychological and neurophysical tests that he will never sit for.'
    Personally, I am of the opinion that Donald Trump would readily accept (or at least say that he would readily accept) any test, if it was pitched to him in the right way; for once you undertstand his self-deluded ('I'm a very stable genius and by far the healthiest man ever to occupy the Oval Office' model of reality, the current president's behaviour can be predicted with almost 100% accuracy. Thus, Donald Trump can be easily manipulated. Furthermore, the same obvious conclusion must long-since have been drawn by the psychological profilers of various intelligence agencies around the world - including those of Russia, China, North Korea, Iran and Israel (not to mention the USA).

    Dr. Trump writes:

    'This is far beyond garden-variety narcissism..... Donald is not simply weak, his ego is a fragile thing that must be bolstered every moment because he knows deep down that he is nothing of what he claims to be.'
    Dr. Trump explains how Donald Trump's personality was first adversely-effected as a youngster due to his witnessing his father dominate and bully his older brother, Freddy - who subsequently died from an alcohol-related heart attack at the age of 42. Dr. Trump, who was 16 at the time of her father's death, confirms that Fred Trump was a hard and abusive man who humiliated and terrorised her father whenever he showed his feelings or admitted to being in error. Trump Snr. evidently tried to harden his eldest son and turn him into a ruthless carbon-copy of himself in a failed attempt to groom him to take over the helm of his real estate empire. When Freddy cracked under the pressure and wanted out, his father was then obliged reluctantly to turn to his second son, Donald. 

    The classic punishment and reward tactics that failed to transform, and ultimately killed, Freddy, evidently succeeded with young Donald who began to see the world through the same distorted (never defend always attack, win-at-all-costs and fuck the losers) lens as his master - to the extent that he lost all respect for his older brother. However, by the late 1980s, Trump Snr. found himself propping up his old business due to Donald's increasingly-grandiose view of himself combined with his commercial ineptitude. Trump Snr. became increasingly bitter and was privately abusive towards his second son whom he now saw as a posturing clown. Indeed, despite the glamorous self-made young business genius narrative Donald fed to the tabloid press, he secretly remained under his father's thumb until fatigue, old-age and illness began to set in and Donald acquired unfettered control of his father's remaining fortune.

    https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/05/07/us/politics/donald-trump-taxes.html

    In her book, Dr. Trump reveals how she gave tax documents to the New York Times. These contributed to an investigation, and major article, concerning Donald Trump's elaborate fraudulent schemes to avoid paying tax on his inheritance.

    Dr. Trump also describes (in great detail) how Donald Trump cheated on his Scholastic Assessment Test in order to get into college, by paying a much smarter aquaintence to take his place. 

    I'm certainly not the first, or the last, person to observe that Dr. Trump's frank eye-witness account of her uncle doesn't really tell us much that we didn't already know. However, her book does fit perfectly into my previously-stated analysis that, at times of mass-alienation (following: wars, natural disasters, economic crises, etc.), history proves that would-be demagogues steadfastly pretending moral and intellectual authority whilst pursuing hidden criminal objectives, who at other times would have been almost universally-recognised as absurd charlatans, have found it much easier to become widely-accepted as authentic Messiahs. 

    When you consider the power, and influence, that Donald Trump currently wields (particularly his command of the world's most-powerful nuclear, and non-nuclear, weapons systems) it is entirely reasonable that Dr. Trump currently describes her uncle as: 'the world's most dangerous man.'







    Image ca

    ________________________________________________________________________

    All this makes me very curious to discover what Dr. Mary Trump knows about the pernicious cult phenomenon in general, and about the destructive blame-the-victim psychology of  'Multi-Level Marketing' cults in particular. Sadly, as far as I'm aware, she has made no reference to Donald Trump's extensive 'MLM' cultic activities in her new book.


      


    During the best part of a decade, in return for promoting a fraudulent 'direct selling income opportunity,' Donald Trump is known to have openly-received millions of stolen dollars from at least one gang of blame-the-victim 'MLM' cultic racketeers.


    Image result for donald trump network marketing bookImage result for donald trump network marketing book

    Image result for donald trump network marketing CD


    Via the peddling of effectively-valueless materials bearing his celebrity name, Donald Trump has also been lining his pockets at the expense of countless victims (internationally) of many other variations of the American-spawned Utopian lie entitled, 'MLM.' As far as I'm aware, neither Donald Trump nor anyone in his entourage, has made any statement to explain the current president's conflict of interest regarding this toxic channel of income. Furthermore, to date, no journalist has bothered to ask Donald Trump about his ongoing revenues from comic-book sales to vulnerable 'MLM' adherents. Personally, I'd like to know if Trump is still getting this windfall, exactly how much is he getting and how much has he already had?



    In the past, when Donald Trump's titanic casino business was sinking in Atlantic City, he managed to abandon ship (his pockets stuffed with other people's cash) leaving everyone else to drown. Although Carl Icahn's name features prominently in media reports as one of Trump's major casino business investors, I suspect that his actual role in this earlier chapter of the ongoing Trump tragicomedy, will never be fully-explained.


     Image result for carl icahn herbalife

    For a while following the 2016 election, it was rumoured that Carl Icahn would be appointed to president Trump's Cabinet, but in the end, it was announced that the (then) 81 year old tycoon would be 'the President's unofficial advisor on regulatory reform.' Yet, in this democratically-unaccountable made-up role, Icahn's conflict of interests almost beggared belief, because at that time, his (potentially-catastrophic) investment in the effectively-valueless 'MLM' cultic racket known as 'Herbalife,' topped more than one billion dollars. 

    Since Donald Trump could appoint new senior federal regulators whom he knew would turn a blind eye to 'MLM' rackets, you would have to be pretty stupid, and/or deluded, not to foresee that the President would have heeded the 'advice' of his greedy buddy, Carl Icahn, and continue to betray his fellow citizens (and those of America's allies) by doing everything in his power to protect his fellow peddlers of the pernicious, 'MLM' fairy story. 

    Currently, and not just in respect of the 'MLM' phenomenon, government of the people, by the people, for the people has perished from the USA, to be replaced by government of racketeers, by racketeers, for racketeers.


    Months ago, I re-published a 'Slate Magazine' article, 'Trump's Great Pyramid,'  by Michelle Celarier. Yet even this encouraging piece didn't tell us anything which we didn't already know. It quoted my associate, Robert FitzPatrick, extensively and acknowledged that, for the overwhelming majority of transient core-adherents, 'MLM' participation has been a confusing and costly nightmare of temporary de facto servitude. However, although this article also acknowledged that all 'MLMs' prey on the vulnerable and hide behind the same thought-stopping 'Direct Selling' jargon and Amercian Dream imagery (copied from the 'Amway' original), Michelle Celarier still was not at liberty to publish the full-truth and she even inadvertently repeated some familiar 'MLMbullshit. 





    Michelle Celarier pointed her readers in the direction of mainstream commentators who have been allowed to get closer to the full-truth about 'MLM'. The 'Slate Magazine' article contained a link the episode of John Oliver's satirical show which tore the 'Herbalife/MLM' lie to shreds and, at one point, compared 'MLM' rackets to the 'Scientology' racket. 




    Although serious in tone, Michelle Celarier's article was in line with the many satirists who have long-since realised that the outrageous, 'America is broke and only I can fix it,' quackery which Donald Trump peddled to get himself elected, is neither original nor unique and, consequently, it cannot be fully-understood in isolation.

    So, apart from all the stolen cash that 'MLM' racketeers have invested buying influence in Washington, how did 'MLM' cults help Donald Trump's comic-book superman character to become US President?

    First of all, it should be clearly understood that 'MLM' cults are also 'Prosperity Gospel' cults and that the bosses of these organisations have been employing co-ordinated devious techniques of social, psychological and physical persuasion in order to shut down their victims' critical and evaluative faculties and prevent them from facing reality and complaining. In this way, for decades, 'MLM' cult bosses have been hiding the evidence of their crimes in order to continue to perpetrate them


    Donald Trump's connections with the so-called 'Prosperity Gospel' go all the way back to his youth. 

    Family ties: Donald Trump, left, with his brother,
    Donald Trump (left) with brothers and sisters.
    Image result for marble collegiate church


    At one time, it was reported that, as youngsters, Donald Trump, and his siblings had been taken by their parents to Pastor Norman Vincent Peale's 'Reformed Dutch Protestant Marble Collegiate Church' in Manhattan. Today, Donald Trump's Wikipedia page states that Fred Trump and his wife did not officially become members of Peale's congregation until the 1970s, and that Peale had ministered to the Trump family until his death in 1993. 

    Donald Trump and Ivana Trump posing with guests on their wedding day.

    In 1977, Donald Trump's marriage to his first wife, Ivana, took place in the 'Marble Collegiate Church' with Pastor Peale officiating.

    In 2015, Donald Trump still claimed to attend the Marble Collegiate Church regularly, until the church issued a statement revealing that this was not true. However, Donald Trump has never hidden his long-time adherence to Pastor Peale's philosophy. In her recent book, Mary Trump acknowledges how attracted Fred Trump was to Pastor Peale's 'positive thinking' preachments, even before he and his family began to attend Peale's 'Church.'




    There has been a lot written about Pastor Peale (1898-1993), but essentially all he did was syphon an existing deep well of credulity to make himself rich. It has to be said that Peale was a highly convincing, word-perfect, performer. He re-wrote, updated and peddled (as his own philosophy) long-established religious concepts (blind faith, power of prayer, paradise, etc.) in a non-religious format ('positive thinking, visualisation, success,' etc.). Cleverly, Peale used the exemplary wealth and success of a few of his followers (like Donald Trump's father) as the proof that his philosophy worked, but he also employed co-ordinated devious techniques of social, psychological and physical persuasion in order to convert other followers to the guilt-inducing belief that a person can only achieve wealth and success by excluding all doubt and totally believing that he/she will achieve wealth and success. In other words, when any of Peale's unquestioning adherents failed to achieve wealth and success, it was child's play to convince them that their failure must have been entirely their own fault for not believing totally.

    This, in a nutshell, is the destructive, closed-logic, controlling scenario which has been lying at the heart of all 'MLM' rackets since they first appeared in the late 1940s. Countless millions of victims of dissimulated closed-market swindles (a.k.a. pyramid schemes) have been silenced simply by convincing them that they made a free choice to participate and that they could have made money, if only they had duplicated their leaders' perfect example and not quit. It's little wonder that Peale's  books and recordings have been, and still are, widely-peddled by 'MLM' racketeers to their victims.



    Pastor Peale was only one of several copy-cat 'Positive Thinking/ Prosperity Gospel' quacks who all found hordes of desperate takers for their rebranded cocktail of psychological + religious + economic snake oil, during the Great Depression. Many politicians (including Presidents) were also bedazzled by their optimistic message and they didn't want to recognise its inherent danger. Again, for obvious reasons, the works of persons like Napoleon Hill have also been, and still are, widely-peddled by 'MLM' racketeers to their victims.


     


    There have been countless, unoriginal, parasitic 'Positive Thinking/mindset/ Prosperity Gospel' quacks who have attached themselves to 'MLM' rackets down the decades.  All of them have employed co-ordinated devious techniques of social, psychological and physical persuasion. 




    Donald Trump cut his political teeth performing live to deluded 'MLM' cult adherents. Trump witnessed first hand how (just like Norman Vincent Peale) 'MLM' shills recite a ritual script - pretending affinity with vulnerable people by acting the roles of ordinary men and woman turned super men and women via their access to a secret step-by-step 'positive' plan which can enable anyone to achieve the American Dream of freedom, wealth and success. In 'MLM,' cultic rackets the shills are always prepared to share their knowledge with anyone (for a price - part of the price being the surrender of the adherents' critical and evaluative faculties).  



    David Brear (copyright 2020)

    __________________________________________________________________________


    'Multi-Level Marketing' Warning.

    The following deconstructed analysis has been formulated to sharpen the critical and evaluative faculties of all unwary persons approaching so-called 'Multi-Level Marketing' from the dangerous (subjective) point of view that it must be a business/industry, rather than from the safe (purely-objective) point of view that they don't really know what it is.




    _________________________________________________________________________


    More than half a century of quantifiable evidence proves beyond all reasonable doubt that:


    • the widely-misunderstood phenomenon that has become popularly-known as 'Multi-Level Marketing' (a.k.a. 'Network Marketing') is nothing more than an absurd, non-rational,  cultic, economic pseudo-science maliciously-designed to lure unwary persons into de facto servitude, dissociate them from external reality and not only steal their money, but also deceive them into unconsciously acting the role of bait to lure other unwary persons (particularly their friends and family members) into the same trap. 
    • the impressive-sounding made-up jargon term, 'MLM,' is therefore, the misleading title for an enticing structured-scenario of control which has been developed, and constantly acted out as  reality, by the instigators, and associates, of various copy-cat, major and minor, ongoing organised crime groups (hiding behind labyrinths of legally-registered corporate structures) to shut-down the critical, and evaluative, faculties of victims, and of casual observers, in order to perpetrate, and dissimulate, a series of blame-the-victim 'Long Cons*'  - comprising self-perpetuating rigged-market swindles**, a.k.a. pyramid scams (dressed up as 'legitimate direct selling income opportunites') and related advance-fee frauds (dressed up as 'legitimate: training and motivation, self-betterment, programs, recruitment leads, lead generation systems,' etc.).
    • Apart from an insignificant minority of shills (whose leading-role in the 'Long Con' has been to pretend that anyone can achieve financial freedom simply by following their unquestioning example and exactly-duplicating a step-by-step-plan of recruitment and self-consumption)the hidden overall net-loss/churn rate for participation in so-called 'MLM income opportunities,' has always been effectively 100%.
    ________________________________________________________________________

    *A 'Long Con' is a form of fraud maliciously designed to exploit victims' existing beliefs and instinctual desires and make them falsely-believe that they are exercising a completely free-choice. 'Long Cons' comprise an enticing structured-scenario of control acted out as reality over an extended period. Like theatrical plays, 'Long Cons' are written, directed and produced. They involve leading players and supporting players as well as props, sets, extras, costumes, script, etc. The hidden objective of 'Long Cons' is to convince unwary persons that fiction is fact and fact is fiction, progressively cutting them off from external reality. In this way, victims begin unconsciously to play along with the controlling-scenario and (in the false-expectation of future reward) large sums of money or valuables can be stolen from them. Classically, the victims of 'Long Cons' can become deluded to such an extent that they will abandon their education, jobs, careers, etc., empty their bank accounts, and/or beg, steal, borrow from friends, family members, etc.

    _________________________________________________________________________

    ** The enticing structured-scenario of control fundamental to all 'rigged-market swindles' is that people can earn income by first contributing their own money to participate in a profitable commercial opportunity, but which is secretly an economically-unviable fake due to the fact that the (alleged) opportunity has been rigged so that it generates no significant, or sustainable, revenue other than that deriving from its own ill-informed participants. For more than 50 years, 'Multi-Level Marketing' racketeers have been allowed to dissimulate rigged-market swindles by offering endless-chains of victims various banal, but over-priced, products, and/or services, in exchange for unlawful losing-investment payments, on the pretext that 'MLM' products/services can then be regularly re-sold for a profit in significant quantities via expanding networks of distributors. However, since 'MLM' products/services cannot be regularly re-sold to the general public for a profit in significant quantities (based on value and demand), 'MLM' participants have, in fact, been peddled infinite shares of their own finite money (in the false expectation of future reward). 

    Thus, in 'MLM' rackets, the innocent looking products/sevices' function has been to hide what is really occurring - i.e The operation of an unlawful, intrinsically fraudulent, rigged-market where effectively no non-salaried (transient) participant can generate an overall net-profit, because, unknown to the non-salaried (transient) participants, the market is in a permanent state of collapse and requires its non-salaried (transient) participants to keep finding further (temporary) de facto slaves to sustain the enticing illusion of stability and viability.

    Meanwhile an insignificant (permanent) minority direct the 'Long Con' - raking in vast profits by selling into the rigged-market and by controlling/withholding all key-information concerning the rigged-market's actual catastrophic, ever-shifting results from its never-ending chain of (temporary) de facto slaves.

    Although cure-all pills potions and vitamin/dietary supplements, household and beauty, products have been most-prevalent, it is possible to use any product, and/or service, to dissimulate a rigged-market swindle. There are even some 'MLM' rackets that have been hidden behind well-known traditional brands (albeit offered at fixed high prices). Some 'MLM' rackets have included 'cash-back/discount shopping cards, travel products, insurance, energy/communications services' and 'crypto-currencies' in their controlling scenarios.

    No matter what bedazzling product/service has been dangled as bait, in 'MLM' rackets, there has been no significant or sustainable source of revenue other than never-ending chains of contractees of the 'MLM' front companies. These front-companies always pretend that their products/services are high quality and reasonably-priced and that for anyone prepared to put in some effort, the products/services can be sold on for a profit via expanding networks of distributors based on value and demand. In reality, the underlying reason why it has mainly only been (transient) 'MLM' contractees who have bought the various products /services (and not the general public) is because they have been tricked into unconsciously playing along with the controlling scenario which constantly says that via regular self-consumption and the recruitment of others to do the same, etc. ad infinitum, anyone can receive a future (unlimited) reward.

    I've been examining the 'MLM' phenomenon for around 20 years. During this time, I've yet to find one so-called 'MLM' company that has voluntarily made key-information available to the public concerning the quantifiable results of its so-called 'income opportunity'.

    Part of the key-information that all 'MLM' bosses seek to hide concerns the overall number of persons who have signed contracts since the front companies were instigated and the retention rates of these contractees. 

    When rigorously investigated, the overall hidden net-loss churn rates for so-called 'MLM income opportunites' has turned out to have been effectively 100%. Thus, anyone claiming (or implying) that it is possible for anyone to make a penny of net-profit, let alone a living, in an 'MLM,' cannot be telling the truth and will not provide quantifiable evidence to back up his/her anecdotal claims.


    Although a significant number of 'MLM' front-companies (like 'Vemma', 'Fortune Hi-Tech Marketing', 'Wake Up Now') have been shut-down by commercial regulators, some of the biggest 'MLM' rackets (like 'Amway' ,'Herbalife', Forever Living Products' ) have continued to hide in plain sight whilst secretly churning tens of millions of losing participants over decades.




    The quantifiable results of the self-perpetuating global 'Long Con' known as 'Multi Level Marketing,' have been fiendishly hidden by convincing victims that they are 'Independent Business Owners' and that any losses they incurred, must have been entirely their own fault for not working hard enough. 








    Blog readers should observe how (in the above linked-videos) chronic victims of 'MLM' cults are incapable of describing what they were subjected to in accurate terms. Even though they are no longer physically playing along with the 'Long Con's' controlling-scenario, they unconsciously continue to think, and speak, using the jargon-laced 'MLM' script - illogically describing themselves as 'Distributors.' 

    Chronic victims of blame-the-victim cultic rackets who have managed to escape and confront the ego-destroying reality that they’ve been systematically deceived and exploited, are invariably destitute and dissociated from all their previous social contacts. For years afterwards, recovering cult victims can suffer from psychological problems (which are also generally indicative of the victims of abuse):

    depression; overwhelming feelings (guilt, grief, shame, fear, anger, embarrassment, etc.); dependency/ inability to make decisions; retarded psychological/ intellectual development; suicidal thoughts; panic/ anxiety attacks; extreme identity confusion; Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder; insomnia/ nightmares; eating disorders; psychosomatic illness, fear of forming intimate relationships; inability to trust; etc



    David Brear (copyright 2020)