Keith Raniere

Law Professor Robin Boyle-Laisure Discusses Using Trafficking to Prosecute Cult Leaders Like Raniere of NXIVM

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I recently watched the first four episodes of  The Vow, a new HBO series about the cult of Keith Raniere. It tells the story through the experience of former leaders of the cult Mark Vicente and his wife Bonnie Piesse and Sarah Edmondson and her husband, Anthony Ames and then expands to Catherine and her daughter India Oxenberg and Allison Mack. I think the first few episodes give a window for the public to see how  intelligent, educated well meaning people including actors, filmmakers, businesspeople and billionaires get deceptively recruited into a destructive cult. It is well known in the media as NXIVM but had other recruiting front groups like Executive Success programs or ESP. It was the secret DOS group which branded women by their genitals as a sign of their life commitment to be a slave to their master, ultimately Raniere. Keith Raniere, known to members as Vanguard, is a malignant narcissist and claimed to the world’s most intelligent person. Of course, it was only one of the many lies he told. What is true is that he had previously been busted for running a multi-level marketing group  (MLM) called Consumer’s Buyline which was shut down by twenty Attorneys General as an illegal pyramid scheme. Part of the settlement was Raniere was told to never to operate a multi-level marketing group again. However, the cult he created essentially was just this, as it sold coaching and seminars instead of products. Former NXIVM member Sarah Edmondson talked to me about being recruited into and escaping Raniere’s cult and bringing charges that led to him being convicted of 7 felony counts in the criminal case of United States vs. Raniere, which was conducted in the federal court in the Eastern District of New York (Brooklyn courthouse). He is awaiting sentencing while in jail. I did a long post on mind control methods used by NXIVM including a BITE model analysis.

Law Professor Robin Boyle-Laisure Discusses Using Trafficking to Prosecute Cult Leaders Like Raniere of NXIVM Read More

NXIVM & Hassan BITE Model and Undue Influence

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These three factors are known in psychological terms as “influence processes” and demonstrate that situations often determine human behaviors, often more than the values and beliefs of the individual. One of the most remarkable discoveries of social psychology is that people are hardwired to unconsciously respond to social cues. For example, a class of psychology students once conspired to use behavior modification techniques on their teacher. As the professor lectured, the students would smile and seem attentive when he moved toward the left of the room. When he moved to the right, the students acted bored and listless. Before long, the professor began to drift to the left, and after a few classes he spent each lecture leaning against the left wall. But when the students let the professor in on the experiment, he insisted that nothing of the sort had happened. He saw nothing odd about leaning against the wall, and angrily insisted that it was merely his personal lecturing style— something he had chosen to do of his own free will. This psychology professor was completely unconscious of how he had been influenced. Of course, under ordinary circumstances, the people around us are not all secretly conspiring to make us do anything. They simply act more or less as they have been culturally conditioned to act, which in turn conditions us. This is the way in which a culture perpetuates itself.

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What to Do About QAnon and Those Ensnared in It? Interview with Travis View

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Q is a high-security level clearance given to Intelligence operatives. Supposedly, QAnon was started by such a person. However, Gregg Housh (whom I met in the context of his organizing protests against Scientology all over the world), one of the original Anonymous founders, told me he knows the people who started QAnon! It was intended as a total joke. A goof on Trumpers. It was only when they realized they could sell merchandise and make money that they really expanded it. Then, the Russians got involved.

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Former NXIVM Member Sarah Edmondson Talks About Being Recruited Into and Escaping Keith Raniere’s Cult

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I am pleased to share a long-awaited interview with Sarah Edmondson–a former high-ranking member of NXIVM, founded by Keith Raniere. Sarah Edmondson is a Canadian actress who has starred in the CBS series Salvation and more than 12 films for the Hallmark Channel and Lifetime. She is featured in the CBC podcast Uncover: Escaping NXIVM and The Vow, the upcoming HBO documentary series on NXIVM.

She is the author of the book, Scarred: The True Story of How I Escaped NXIVM, the Cult that Bound My Life. Scarred is a memoir of Sarah’s recruitment into the NXIVM cult, founded by the now-convicted trafficker, Keith Raniere. It narrates in detail the 12 years she spent within the organization, during which she enrolled over 2,000 members, directly and indirectly, chronicling her breaking point and her harrowing fight to get out, help others, and heal.

Former NXIVM Member Sarah Edmondson Talks About Being Recruited Into and Escaping Keith Raniere’s Cult Read More