On Friday 25 May 2007, Dawn _ wrote:
> I've waited to respond on this because I did not want people thinking
> I was a bulldog with a vendetta, but there is a point to consider
> here. Lori describes many of the problems in her grandmother' s
> behavior. It doesn't take a scholar making a careful perusal of that
> list to see that the traits she talks about are all associated with
> MLMs. I won't go into listing them (but I can if I need to support
> what I say for anyone who can't re-read her original e-mail), but
> pretty much all of her issues with her grandmother are the same as
> any of us close to MLM members have had: they won't listen to logic,
> they refuse to hear anything contrary to what they've been taught,
> and large parts of their conversation consist of canned statements
> and replies taught to them by their MLM.
>
> <<I agree completely, Hal. My point was that my OWN MOTHER
> exhibits those exact traits, and has never been part of an MLM!
> Actually she HATES MLM's! (And, yes, "hate" is a strong word, but,
> honestly, that's how she feels). Now, the fact that Lori's
> grandmother has been a big MLM supporter all her life does indicate
> that much of her way of thinking is in all likelihood a direct
> reflection of the way of thought that is taught in MLM's. I never
> denied that. But, I wanted to keep the door open to the "possibility"
> that some of those personalicty traits could just be "because that's
> the way she is". I am speaking from personal experience of having a
> parent who has those same types of behaviors, but has never had any
> involvement whatsoever with an MLM. Okay, I take that back. She had a
> tupperware party once, when I was a young child, because she wanted
> some particular bowl for free. But she was a hostess, not a
> distributor.
I love being open to other possibilities, but when those possibilities
are less than .00001%, then they're insignificant and irrelevent.
> Many cult experts recognize many MLMs as cults. I found this site
> after finding a lot of sites like Rick Ross' cult site and was
> surprised to learn this is true, but many MLMs show the same
> characteristics as cults and, in Lori's case, what she describes are
> symptoms of cultish MLMs.
>
> <<The traits that Lori describes can also fall under narcisistic
> personality disorder, which has absolutely nothing to do with
> MLM's.>>
True, but she related them in context. That makes a difference.
> True, all those issues could have come from other sources, but at
> that point, to say the issues do not come from MLMs is basically
> saying that she's in MLMs, shows all the negative behaviors of MLMs,
> but that those traits don't come from MLMs. It's like seeing someone
> walk out of a working gold mine with sacks of ore and saying, "They
> probably didn't get that gold from the mine."
>
> <<I never said "those traits don't come from MLMs". I was simply
> holding the door open to the possibility that maybe...just
> maybe...there could be hope that she might be able to have SOME kind
> of relationship with her grandmother, and that maybe there is a
> slight possibility that SOME of those personality traits weren't
> brought about SOLELY because of MLM involvement. She sounded like she
> was very pained by her lack of relationship with her grandmother. I
> can relate. I was offering my own advice, just like you do. Again I
> will say: "Just because it's different than what someone else thinks,
> doesn't make it wrong. It just makes it different.">
There's no need to defend MLMs.
No.
On the other hand, please, keep defending them. I don't think you see
in yourself what you are showing to the group and, honestly, the more
you defend MLMs and the more you point out other possibilities, the
more the limits on your thinking and on your restricted point of view
show. It's good people interested in MLMs see those limits. I'm not
saying this to be mean or cruel, but because the more I read your
posts, the more I see a limited viewpoint with blinders that you are
probably not aware of.
...
> I'm asking this not to attack, but because you are showing a tendency
> to not look facts in the face and accept their meaning. Is it
> possible you are avoiding truths about your group that you do not
> want to face?
>
> <<These "facts" that you talk about, I am assuming are "facts"
Never assume anything. Didn't anyone teach you what you make of "u" and
me if you assume.
Yes, I've been burned, but I've also studied and listened to many
others.
> based on your own personal involvement with MLM's, and we all posses
> our own set of facts, based on our own personal involvement. And I
> don't take it as an attack. I look at it as coming from someone who,
> like myself, has been badly burned somehow by MLM involvement. I can
> completely understand your defense of your position, and your
> cynicism. Been there, done that.
>
> Please don't forget: I have also been badly burned by MLM's!! And
> I still stand by my opinion that most MLM's are not set up in such a
> way that the "average" distributor (if they are truly "distributors"
> at all. i.e. exchanging a tangible product for money) can make any
> money whatsoever. Of the 4 MLM's I have been a part of, only one has
> not gotten me into severe debt. Only one has allowed me to actually
> bring home money! So, I understand your cynicism. And I can speak
> from experience (negative ones) about 3 certain companies in
> particular, and would steer anyone else from taking part in them.
And yet, after getting burned each time, you kept going back to find
another...
> I will tell you that through this group, I have come to terms with
> one thing about my current business that I am not happy with. But, it
> lies in MY way that I run my business, and NOT in the way that the
> business "corporation" tells me I should run things. I have found,
> upon closer examination of my tax paperwork (thanks to a chat with
> PW) that I am not making as much money as I originally thought I was.
That's interesting. What I don't see, and I'm sure others who have run
their own business will back me up, is how someone can run a business
and, for any length of time, think they're making ore than they are.
Yes, there's a lot of different facets ot accounting, but you take the
income and subtract the expenses. What's left is what you're making.
It would be interesting to see what kind of income you'd have if you do
it their way. Would more money go to them or to you?
> I DO make money. And I DO show a profit on my tax paperwork. But, I
> have found that there are some areas where I could be lessening my
> outgoing expenses. However, it's not due to anything that the company
> forces me to do. Instead, it is due to my own oversight with regard
> to spending money doing things that I thought were good ideas, that
> turned out to be costing more money than I originally realized.
I made money from the start of my business. Unfortunately, for the
first six months, I made about $200 a month. But, hey, I was making
money. I guess that qualifies. Making money is a vague and slippery
term.
...
> I would like to know, though (not being sarcastic; just really
> trying to understand), how you think I would hurt my downline.
People often do things they think will have one effect when, in reality,
it has another effect. If you make a profit on your downline's sales,
it's possible that profit that goes to you and your upline and those
between you and the downline person could eat away enough that they're
not even paying expenses. That's one example.
Hal
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