My Unfiltered Rant On The LuLaRoe Documentary 

Chelsea woke up and chose violence and I'm here for it.

I think the takeaway from the number of women involved in MLMs is evidence for how difficult it is for mothers and other populations the labor force craps on to get meaningful work to support themselves and their families. Namely the lack of jobs that work for people with kids in school that ends at 3pm, part-time jobs with real wages and set schedules. Not the ones that demand you be available for shifts 24-7. The one woman I know in an MLM only joined after she left her professional job of 17 years to be home more for her special-needs twins. But her family still needed her to make some money, and she still needed to be with adults and have purpose. There are millions of women at all levels of education underemployed or unemployed because employers lack the creativity or long-term thinking to find a way to use their talents and skills.

Chelsea has a unique gift in intermingling a serious commentary with the appropriately timed F bomb.

Also ironic when Amazon makes a documentary about an exploitative business model 🧐

Chelsea's personal beef with the UGLINESS of those leggings never ceases to make me giggle

"No snowflake in an avalanche feels responsible" ~Voltaire

My takeaway from the documentary was how much these MLMs target mom's. Specifically, stay at home moms. I wonder if our society was more supportive of stay at home moms, if these schemes would reduce?

"Negatively. Badly. We don't stan." - a moment in time for us all

Please don't forget Roberta (I can't remember her last name but she is the blond lady). She has worked tirelessly to get women out and has not shut up about Lularoe and MLMs as a whole. She's made it her job and did a deposition for the washington state thing. I know this is an unfiltered rant but she has been instrumental in getting the word out and it should have been noted like the freaky family marriage thing. Oh and I loved that dude at the end telling us about Kelly Clarkson. Omg you could feel how betrayed he felt. I hope he gets his wish and they lose everything and get escorted out in handcuffs.

"Go girl, give us nothing." HAHAHA this is why I love Chelsea so much.

I was a military spouse 2014-2019 and every single Milso that was involved with MLM was extremely predatory. You couldn’t walk on base without someone trying to sell you luluRoe and start a “business”. Worst is the amount of them that would pretend to be your friend then get mad if you wouldn’t buy their stuff, go to their parties, etc.

AntiMLM creator here chipping in. I think it's great to hear your take on the doc, especially being a larger channel. I do think it's a bit harsh though to not allow former consultants any redemption or forgiveness. Just like cult members, there is a lot of brainwashing involved and many, even those at the top, genuinely don't see the harm that they are doing. One former consultant in particular now does a lot of work against MLM's and awareness raising. Another former top consultant has a great RU-vid channel where she brings awareness to the evils of MLMs. So to brand them all as just all bad people is actually unproductive and unfair. The online antiMLM community welcomes all former consultants, no matter their sins because if we don't give them a second chance, how else are they going to find work and a life outside of the cult?

“What the fuck are these leggings” is my new favorite phrase.

If you listen close, the one girl Roberta Blevins wound up helping a ton of people get out of LLR and she’s become an anti-MLM advocate. I’ve listened to her podcast and I think she’s a success story of how a bad situation can be turned into good for these women.

Chelsea - I think you overestimate the general cultural level of understanding about what MLMs are, what defines an MLM, and how to identify one by looking at it. I think you and I have a similar exposure to all of the information and dangers about MLMs, but I have friends who still have absolutely NO idea, have invited me to "parties", and are shocked when I send them information. If you're in a certain kind of financial/emotional position and you're shown a potential opportunity by someone you trust, and when they have pre-prepared answers ready for "but are you a MLM/pyramid scheme?", and everyone is friendly and warm and welcoming and excited for you to come on board, it may not occur to you to dig deeper. And I think that even within those kinds of MLMs they are given very cultivated information diets and led to believe that anyone CAN be successful in that company. And as you mentioned early on, a lot of these places function effectively like cults, making it SUPER difficult to leave once you're already in. I'm not saying we shouldn't hold people accountable for their actions, especially when those actions are super harmful. But as someone else in the comments said - people are complex. It's not a matter of the heroes versus the villains - people can be capable of causing great harm AND also be worthy of compassion, and we should hold them accountable while ALSO extending them some understanding when it is warranted.

I think there is a problem with trying to separate people out into 2 camps: victim or perpetrator. Human beings are complex, so people have the capacity to be a victim and a villain at the same time. I don't trying to sort them as one or the other, or put them on a sliding scale, is actually all that helpful. I think it actually discourages these women from leaving these toxic MLM communities by alienating them further. Besides I don't think it's even true. Being a victim doesn't make you incapable of committing that offence on someone else. We should think about what our goal is (having less people in MLMs), and what the best way to achieve that goal is. Even if it brings less personal satisfaction.

I have a friend who not only got roped into LulaRoe and tried to force it on me, she is now roped into an additional two MLMs. Clothing again and jewelry. It really wears on our friendship.

I am torn because Shae is obviously one of the people this applies to, but her line about not wanting to go on a cruise with a bunch of white people is my favorite thing in the whole doc.

I always mix up Lularoe with Lulu Lemon and try to point at the stores and say: "Look a pyramid scheme," and then my female friends yell at me for saying the same joke every damn time.

While I agree that morally participants in MLM bear some responsibility, I'm not sure how useful shaming them is in terms of getting people to leave MLMs. There's already a "bully" narrative that MLMs use to keep people from listening to anti-MLM content, and I think just berating people for ever having participated isn't going to be super useful in getting people to leave/listen.

Just like cults, it can be really, really hard to realize, acknowledge and process that you have been part of something bad. The process can take years for some people. I type this as a woman raised in the Mormon church (no longer practicing), and it's so important to understand how much socialization goes into a wider culture and attitude to disregarding "negative" people and naysayers. A lot of the women roped into Lularoe or any other MLM won't ever have HEARD the term "MLM" before, they will be surrounded by people they trust, and those people and even authority figures will classify any criticism or dismissal as hate/persecution. Which of course, reinforces the faith in the community/brand/product. And the kicker is that the good faith types go much further up the pyramid than most people would think. The ability for the human brain to continuously convince itself that something that is self-evidently bad is Good Actually (tm), especially if you include the sunk cost fallacy, is incredible. Mormon culture, american culture at large and MLM pressure culture all lean heavily on the idea that any failure is YOUR fault and if you just work hard enough (and have enough faith, if you will) then you will be successful. I'm not trying to defend predatory behavior at all! But having lived in, left, and regularly examine and comment on that culture, it's possible for people to refuse/fail to recognize their own role in a toxic organization for a long time. Because once you do...you have to confront a lot of things about yourself and behavior that are difficult for any human being to process. I guess I see a lot more victims than perpetrators in this combination of patriarchy, religion, and capitalism.

My boyfriend is WFH and he watched the whole thing in one sitting, live-texting me his reactions. I love him so much.

Just like the lovable chimney sweeping John Oliver, you’re so much better when you’re actually infuriated about a topic :)

I watched the documentary last night and have a different take for the following reasons: 1. One of the women did express profound guilt and regret at hurting others when she realized what she was doing. 2. There is cultic mentality. Most of the people in mlms genuinely think they are helping others, it often takes years to deprogram and a lot of trauma and guilt involved. This was mentioned but there wasn’t room in the already 4 part series to explore it more. 3. I believe the burden is with the government to make these things absolutely illegal and actually enforce their very weak policies (or better yet change them) at a federal level. Many of the huns stated “but this is legal”… if they were made aware of the illegality of the companies’ actions many would back away quickly. This is a nuanced topic because this system (nxium was an mlm as well) uses cultic manipulation and does turn the victims into the victimizes to perpetuate systemic abuse. Anyways, my two cents. I get the fury though. It is super frustrating.

Determining how culpable people in the middle to lower tiers of MLMs is tricky. We have a great deal of our populace who have terrible critical thinking skills when it comes to their daily functions with money. They make perfect marks for MLM schemes.

This video was a miss for me. If former participants in an exploitative system have to pass an ideological purity test before they can call out the abuses of said system, then we're going to be waiting a long time for justice. The critique also ignored the systemic factors that push women, often the primary caregivers for children, disabled family members, and elderly parents, into affiliations with MLM schemes and other work-from-home opportunities with, shall we say, questionable business ethics. Mike Rinder was high up in Scientology and is on camera doing and saying some ethically questionable things before he left and joined Leah Remini in exposing this cult's abusive practices. Should I ignore everything Rinder says because he was a one-time, high-level participant in Scientology?

The fact that you compared this to “the ring” is so perfect. Humans will throw each other under the bus if it saves their own skin. Man.

The Venn diagram of MLMs and cults definitely has a *LOT* of overlap in terms of emotional and behavioral manipulation, i.e. on the BITE model, and actually we need to talk about this connection more. The reason why we don't see people calling out scammers on their socials is not that it's not happening, but (a) because of the manipulation strategies those people employ + (b) they actively police their comments. I've seen so many influencers/scammers either delete any comments they don't like and block the posters, or they prime their audience to see any form of legitimate criticism as "hate", and just to "ignore the haters". It's not that the discourse around scams and MLMs isn't mature enough, the problem is that it is almost entirely a futile exercise to deal with these people, just like arguing with political trolls online. You have to completely expose the scam for what it is and destroy their income by making sure people steer clear before it's too late, because a lot of these snake oil vendors refuse to accept any responsibility for what they are doing - they just prime their victims to believe it's their fault if they lose money.

The glaring issue here is that she underestimates the brainwashing. She thinks that those who join know as soon as they do and before they bring someone in know that it's bad. This is not the case most of the time.

1:58 "He looks like Glenn Beck if he went the machine in the fly with a beet." These comparisons feel like something John Oliver would say and I am loving it. lol

Right on, Chelsea! Being a victim of anything does not give me the right to turn around and do the same thing to others.

👏🏽👏🏽👏🏽 THANK YOU!! Favorite part of this brilliant analysis: calling the middle level MLM "victims" out on their predatory behavior to others and justifying it. 🌹

Interesting how no one who was doing well in company "saw the light." It was only when they were struggling that they decided to get out.

I love MLM shaming.

Chelsea, with all due respect you need to stay in your lane. There are so many layers as to why people enter MLMs and stay. As any mental health provider will tell you, shame (victim blaming) is not a motivator for sustained behavior change. Shame is a collapsing emotion and keeps us stuck. It’s plays a role in why people have difficulty exiting these types of complex situations where they function in dual roles as both victims and proxy victimizers. We need to be hard on systems and easy on people. Making these types of things about individual moral failings is not an adequate solution to address why MLMs are so popular. We all know that stealing and murder is bad and yet these acts occur every single day. Blaming women “well the information is out there stupid” or “you’re just as bad because you recruited people into this scam” might feel like an instinctual cathartic response, but it’s a pretty basic take and one that should have been left on the ideas board.

Thank youuuu!!! I got in a heated argument with my husband about the fact that selling weight loss harmful shit to our community and preying on women during holidays to make them victims to her makes that woman bad, and not a victim by any mean. I know someone with an MBA who tried to sell these MLM products to our community then when some people got sick of her spamming and tried to block her, she accused the group of being racist🤦🏻‍♀️

I haven’t watched this documentary series but I know a lot about MLM’s. They’re so unethical, exploitative and overall gross. So glad I’ve never fallen victim to their crap. Edit: ew Kelly Clarkson wtf is wrong with you?

I think it’s really gross to sit here and say that women who were roped into a predatory MLM are NOT victims just because they went on to victimize as well. Are survivors of sexual abuse who go on to sexually abuse not still victims? (Apparently you think so based on what you said about the victims of NXIVM but psychologists would disagree with you.) We can hold them to task for what they have done while also understanding that their own victim hood is why they perpetuate the cycle. If you listen to any anti-MLM content featuring former reps, trust me you will hear lots of regret, lots of apologizing, lots of trying to make it right by helping people get out of these “businesses” and preventing anyone else from falling victim to them. I’ve personally never been in an MLM (thanks in large part to documentaries like lularich and anti-MLM content) so I have no skin in the game here, but you are displaying a severe lack of understanding of group think, undue influence, denial, and desperation, not to mention empathy. Yes, they did bad things. Most of them who are out openly admit it, whether or not the doc chose to hit that hard enough for your personal taste. Listen to Roberta Blevins podcast, see if these former Lularoe consultants don’t feel guilty. Criticize the documentary all you want, but to say the reps, even the rich ones, weren’t victimized is irresponsible.

If we're cancelling Kelly Clarkson, we need to also cancel Katy Perry too.

We really need real legislation around these predatory companies.

I'm on the fence about taking the participants/clients in an MLM to task. I think a lot of them get taken to task, ultimately, by the MLM. And kinda like war on drugs, if we focus on punishing the participants, the dealers at the top will just rework their scheme into something else. You gotta go after the top first and with more than insignificant fines.

I like how you snuck in the “Kelly Clarkson is cancelled” because now I feel like I need to watch the documentary.

Preaching online hate mobs go swarm insta-lives is messy. I know mlms are seriously evil, but get a grip on that call to action Chelsea. This is an ugly thing to suggest to your audience.

i worked at the warehouse in Corona, i was one of the ones laid off, i actually got asked to work in Fontana, but was like naw, i had enough, man i could tell you some horror stories from that place i started in curating and ended up in QC and inventory, man it sucked i'm still getting hit up by attorneys from that job because so many people are suing them

My favorite fun fact is I’ve never owned or worn these ugly ass leggings

I read a very insightful newsletter this week going indepth on why MLM's are so huge among Mormons - tying it directly to Mormon teachings about saving people by roping them into the religion. These teachings use exactly the same terms for winning people for Jesus, as winning people for MLMs. Not just that, but MLMs are basically a direct physical manifestation of the prosperity gospel that is very deeply ingrained in Mormonism. It was crazy enlightening.

Lol, The Ring-ing! Yes it’s the worst part of MLMs. Had a friend in the 90s try to sale my mom into Primerica. It seemed fishy af to me and my mom. The woman was so smart, we didn’t understand how she got into it. The fact that people still fall for it is because its their friends and family members that rope them in. They trust these people. I recently unfollowed a old friend bc all her IG post were about her obvious MLM, don’t recall what it was but it “changed her life”🙄 Seriously even if you love your job and business you don’t turn every post about your life into ads with discount codes and links to signup with your referral code in the bio. It was so bazaar. I hope she’s okay.

Thank you!!! Everytime I watch these "I got rich/suckered into an MLM" videos or articles im always left wondering if these women who took advantage of other women regret their part in all of this. Sometimes it's implied, like the woman who divorced her husband during her LLR follow-out. Or the couple who roped in their nearest and dearest family and friends in their downline. I'd like to hear more about that regret or any regret they have for scaming people they weren't emotionally close to.

I scream/laughed so loud at "people the ringing each other" it scared the contractors doing the earthquake retrofit outside my apartment lol

I like how one woman in the documentary took accountability by helping her whole team get out and said she’s been helping thousands of women get out as well. Another woman was asked which checks were bigger, the bonus checks or her own personal sales and she declined to answer… (ahem bonus checks!). That was the moment I saw the hypocrisy in the middle man retailers. Thank you so much for exposing the hidden monster in the room.

Chelsea, have you read the book "Cultish?" It's a newer nonfiction book about modern cults. It has multiple chapters comparing MLMs to cults.

I disagree with your stance on many subjects, but I’ll never not appreciate your vigor and passion. It’s infectious, in the best way possible.

Uh did I hear that two of their kids are married?

I love the woman John Oliver has in his video on MLM, where she realized the scheme had ruined her, but vowed that she would never rope in someone else to be harmed like she was.

I remember watching something about LuLaRoe and being surprised that the buy in was so little, compared to what I was expecting. From a business standpoint, these people probably get roped in because they see it as a manageable upfront cost, compared to renting out a store and buying clothes through a distributor (huge upfront costs). If any of these folks had wanted to start their own boutique store, they probably wouldn't have thought twice about the upfront cost, given how much *more* expensive a store is to open.

Lovable chimney sweep, John Oliver… so accurate.

Not the Good Girl is a good YouYuber to watch about MLMs. She talks a lot about the shame she felt as a high earner when she left and saw it from the outside. There's an insane amount of denial that goes on inside these groups because they've all been persuaded that the only reason someone could fail is because they're lazy & don't want to succeed. They don't see how predatory it is until the toxic positivity fog lifts.

Some of the women in the documentary actually say that they realize the were exploitative towards others and that they feel bad or ashamed for it. I mean it doesn’t make it any better but it is at least mentioned in the series.. btw love your video!

One of the worst things someone said to me about the predatory nature of MLMs, including Lularoe, was "if I like the product, I'm going to keep buying it and I don't really care." Another person I know who is all about her MLM, to the detriment of her relationships, has the same people liking and commenting on her posts. They comment "I'm ready" or "I'm in" or "is there a spot for me?" On her recruitment posts, except in earlier posts they say "best decision I ever made," or "I'm so happy to have my business." Noticing this really drove home how much of a show this all is. There's no interest in this garbage, but they're propping each other up like there is, in the hopes that just one person won't see the pattern of these comments and will think there's genuine interest. But who is worse, the one trying desperately to get some money, or the one who is willing to host a party to get "free" stuff, knowing that the "rep" is deeply in debt but could care less because she wants those ugly leggings and doesn't want to pay for them?

😂. “Wtf are these leggings”

I wish that I could give this a million thumbs up! Thank you for drawing attention to the second-tier predators too. Those who know right from wrong can’t justify knowing that something is wrong and doing it anyway.

"loveable chimney sweep John Oliver" someone please tweet this to him or something that's amazing. Also I LOVE her delivery on all of this. Yes, please hold *all* responsible, including those not at the very top.

Thinking it’s a good ideas to try to sell those leggings should be the first alarm bell that something sketchy is up with the business 🚨😬

'Necessity is not a defence for murder' is a statement that should apply to the women or people who rope others into these schemes.

I feel you need to be on a major network. Your work through TFD is amazing. Speaking truth to power needs to be heard everywhere and as often as possible.

One woman in Lularich, Roberta, does talk about how she was a victim and a perpetrator. She now works as an advocate to educate people about MLMs.

When I watched that documentary awhile ago, I felt the same way.... They were the cause of why a lot of women lost lots of money, too. Were they really a victim? Yes, but they were also the perpetrator.

Sooo many thoughts! 1. Immediately paused video and googled the kids marrying each other. They are not blood related, and we’re both living on their own when the parents got married, but it’s still just icky to me. 2. I watched this commentary before I watched the documentary. And full disclosure, I was a lula customer and bought several items of clothing at their peak. This video was so entertaining and really summed up the documentary well. 3. Seriously, how was the weed Ponzi scheme (And the ridiculous text messages related to it) just a footnote in this story! 4. After so many MLM’s being called pyramid schemes, I felt like this documentary finally explained thoroughly that it’s not just because of down lines, but because the money makers are making the majority of money by recruiting not actual sales. There is of course limited space at the top, and you can’t just “hustle” your way there because there are not enough people on earth, let alone enough people that would be interested in the “opportunity.” 5. Soooooo much toxicity from this couple/family/company. The marriage “advice”🤢, gender roles😬 in the family are unthinkable enough, then they get to the groupthink issues. 6. While I agree that current reps should absolutely be seen and treated as the accomplices they are, I truly believe that some of these people were desperate for belonging and community and the promise of financial gain. Groupthink is real, and after investing large amounts of time, effort, money into a venture it’s hard enough to walk away. It’s the same as how some gamblers can’t quit, even when they are clearly loosing money. Add to that, the “friends” that are pressuring you to stay, so they maintain their down lines, and the abusive meetings/speeches/conventions that convince you to stay and we end up here. When the recruiting started, these women were promised the world. What would you say if you were invited to invest in a property or up and coming stock… then the money starts coming in, you would want all your friends and family to be reaping those benefits too right? Obviously this is problematic knowing what we know or mlms, but there wasn’t as much buzz about them and the failure rates back when lula started. The reps that saw the light are sharing now to get the information out and warn others about LLR and MLMs, I think that their speaking out coupled with their pain, embarrassment, and financial loss is a pretty good start to their retribution.

My sister's boyfriend's mom (sorry for the cluster that is) sells for Avon. The same sister tried selling that stuff and failed, yet told me to get my Avon from her! I told her no, they're an MLM, and the only reason she is successful is that she is scamming the women in her downline and has no morals to get out.

I've never understood why people continue to think MLMs are a good idea in this century. The business model used to be good at one time, but it has now been obsolete for around 70-100 years, at least. Think about it. Up until the early 1920's people didn't have a ton of options for buying or learning about new products. There wasn't any TV, radio, or internet, or big box stores on every corner. They only way you could buy things was through a catalogue, stores that you had to travel pretty far to get to, or small town general stores that didn't carry much, or door to door sales people. The only way you could really learn about new products was from magazine and newspaper ads. It made sense in that kind of environment, for a company to get a network of independent distributors to sell their products and get paid to recruit other distributors as well. They needed the distributors to endorse and recommend the products to their friends and teach people how to use the products. But as soon as radio and TV came in, this started to become obsolete. And now with the internet, there's absolutely no reason why it should exist. I mean, think about every better, cheaper option for selling, marketing, and distributing a new product, that exist in today's world. TV commercials and celebrity endorsements? RU-vid commercials and influencer endorsements? TV infomercials? - And all the better, more efficient ways to buy products without having to wait for your friend the distributor to get some more items in stock. Like, I don't know - from stores that exist now on the side of every road that you can drive to in your car? Or the vast network of warehouses and the vast network of cargo planes and ships that exist so we can buy almost any product you can think of from anywhere in the world, off the internet? A good analogy of an MLM would be like if there was some shady 150 year old horse and buggy company desperately trying to stay in business by trying to sell everyone horse hitches by falsely claiming that you need them for your car.

Everyone who is glossing over, step- siblings or adopted siblings having a relationship....needs to reevaluate their morals....

You are completely right in saying that its hard to draw the line, but I think the reason why its hard for me to judge someone who gets roped into this situation is because I believe most people do it out of desperation. I think about situations where for example financially vulnerable young women get roped into unregulated and unsafe sex work by other women with the promise of income, and bringing in new women often can result in the woman who recruited them getting money from a pimp. We have ample understanding of how unregulated sex work like this is often extremely harmful, however I would not want to see the women who recruited them as anything less than victims themselves. While this is a more extreme example I think at the end of the day going directly to these women who recruit others to try and stop them from roping more people in is futile. What makes more sense to me is to go further up the chain, not down. So yes we should villainize the people who started the scheme, but also we should hold the lawmakers, politicians, and other figures that allow this exploitation to happen accountable. Why are these companies allowed to operate in the first place given how indistinguishable they are from business practices that are in fact illegal? Given how widespread this issue is I am shocked that I have never heard an aspiring politician running with the promise of holding these companies accountable as part of their platform.

I’m personally in favor of shaming and castigating those who relentlessly post MLM nonsense on social media, publicly.

Most of the friends I've lost in my life are because of MLM's. And not because I'm through with them after 1 or 2 "invitations", but because they're told to disassociate with anyone not onboard. As far as I've seen, they're all back to square 1 within a year and they ve lost all their friends who they either disowned during or who are still somehow holding on in the MLM

This question of holding people responsible has really got my brain working, because I think it's more complicated than just "perpetrator" or "victim" because for so many people in MLMs, they are BOTH. I really think there's something to be said about MLMs as "commercial cults", as Steven Hassan (and others) has called them. How much do you hold someone responsible for their own manipulation (brainwashing, exploitation, etc.), even if they were also responsible for manipulating (etc.) others? I'm not saying we absolutely don't...but I'm also not sure how much we do, either. It's definitely something I've been thinking about for some time now.

Watching this documentary after listening to a podcast about the formation of Mormonism was just 😬😬😬

“Glenn Beck and a beet” girl I had to hit pause and catch my breath from my reflexive scream-laugh at that one! 😂🤣😂🤣

‘Who got filthy rich by trapping vulnerable woman. And aspiring actors, the most exploitable people’ I ACTUALLY CHOKED ON MY TEA HAHA

An unfiltered rant on the Lularoe documentary I am READY for this!

What hurts me about this is the sheer tons of trash that is being created just from this MLM. We all know the reps aren't able to sell all their inventory and who in their right mind would buy those fugly looking leggings second hand? Not that many that's who, so inevitably it all goes into the trash.

Please do World Financial Group next, I feel it’s really blowing up.

For anyone wondering. I was duped. I was in first 3,000. (Never once did anyone mention recruiting while I signed up, I was told “buy at wholesale sell at retail) I refused to recruit anyone! I made a bit of money but it was definitely not what they promised with “part time work”. So anyway, my friends and I quit the day they announced the buy back. I got 100% refund of left over shit. I just last week received my settlement check because of the Washington lawsuit. 👏🏼 FYI if you enjoy gossip check out the drama between Deanne and Dianne.

I have a sister who is so smart and responsible with her money, and she got roped into Stella and Dot! Thankfully, she got out of it quickly, and she at least got some cute jewelry pieces out of, but it really did show me that anyone can get sucked into these.

I literally sat there the entire documentary saying "these are so ugly!" Any time they'd say anything about them I'd just yell it at the screen lol

I don’t disagree with your take but I think people on the outside might take the gentle approach with victims/perps so as to not chase them back into the arms of the cult leader and further indoctrinate them. It’s then so easy for the up line to say, see I told you they’d never respect your hussle. I always thought with abuse situations, the most important thing is to ensure the victim always has a safe place to escape to.

Roberta is the only one I really respect. She was the only one who admitted that she was at fault for preying on other vulnerable women. The rest are only sorry for themselves and it makes me sick

Yes! Thank you for highlighting this. HOW we make money really really matters, no matter how desperate our own financial situation is.

I joined a MLM years ago, the jewelry kit cost me $99...with supplies and $1,000 retail value of jewelry... I would have never, yes, never had paid $5k to $10k, hell no. Especially for ugly clothes. My experience with the jewelry co that many women I knew made insane $$$...unfortunately they financed expensive vehicles and insanely extravagant homes. It was for show, to make them seem very successful. They did not pay off anything... I always wondered. Everything I earned went to pay off and upgrade my home...thank goodness, because the company closed with one month notice.

I did not get the impression that many of the women knew they were doing anything wrong signing up new consultants until later.

The thing that makes it harder to see the MLM participants as more victim than villain as well is how many of them fall for multiple MLM schemes. They'll get into one, finally get out and then six months down the line they're in another, all excited that THIS one will be where they hit the jackpot. It's a mindset, all tied up into things like hustle culture and the prosperity gospel and the law of attraction and basically everything that claims there's some formula or key that will "unlock" success for those who are true believers, follow the instructions and stay loyal to the cause. And people just keep on buying into it like they can't recognise it's all the same BS.

I had the same NXIUM comparison thought when I was watching this. It was heartbreaking in both cases and it was so sad to see how many victims became perpetrators as well and ended up losing everything including spouses, family, friends, and home. MLM's are evil and have so many similarities with cults. So many family members and friends have been suckered in and hurt.

I’m laughing so hard at how she ate them up like this! The sass, jabs, and shade. Love it 😭😭😭😭

I'd love to see a deep dive into how MLMs are intersecting with the anti-vax movement. Sooo many anti-vaxxers I've seen are also selling supplements, vitamins, health shakes, etc. One of the wealthiest backers of anti-vax efforts made his millions selling supplements. There is definitely financial incentive to convince people that COVID can be conquered with health shakes and the like.

The “prey to predator” pipeline is really an issue a lot of anti-MLM content seems to skirt around. You don’t want to blame people who were in a tough spot for becoming victims, but at the same time, you have to hold them accountable for perpetuating the victimization of others.

There's a podcast called The Dream that goes into the genesis of MLMs in season 1. After you listen to that you'll be ever more pissed off.

I really walked into this thinking MLM was Men Loving Men and I have been completely blindsided

You are doing God's work with this channel. I hope you get everything that's coming your way. You, and this channel are what I imagine when I hear the words "women empowerment". God bless

YES YES! The ring! Thats what i couldnt put into words... You were in until it went bad!!! Thank you

I am totally watching this now for sure! Love your review. And yes, those leggings are hideous, to say the least. One of my gripes with MLM has always been the requirement of buying ridiculously expensive auto-ship products that I wouldn't use myself or try to promote to anyone else.

I saw many anti-mlm content and the level of manipulation and gaslighting is unreal. They prey on vulnerable women (mostly) by selling them the dream. The BITE model applies to the MLMs and yes, the vast majority of MLM participants are victims. They are coaxed by their upline into recruiting, being 24/7 on the phone. Even to this day, people are still roped in MLMs. Many of the anti-MLM content creators were in a MLM and they share their insights on these shady companies and, without them, many would be roped in.