One of the more... insidious aspects of MLM is how its members will often NOT listen to "reason", even if it's coming from people they used to trust, like family members and best friends. They are often screaming for some understanding, that they really are trying to improve their situation, and why are people around them so... defeatist, and so on. They will appear to be completely brainwashed.
(Sidebar: China claims to have found a new type of paranoid disorder they temporarily named pyramid cult sales disorder. )
But what motivates such... hate? It's a combination of factors, but generally, it has to do with how you perceive people on the other side, and its origin was longstanding.
In a research by Liane Young at Boston College, it was revealed that both Democrats and Republicans (political parties in the US) claim that they were motivated by positive emotions such as love and loyalty to their party members, and their opponents were motivated primarily by hate and animosity.
In other words: "I think you hate me, therefore I hate you." It's basically preemptive hate.
Preemptive hate happens quite often in discussion of MLM. While the MLM critics sticks to the facts, often the first disagreement states "you obviously hate us/mlm". They then go on to imagine various reason WHY we would hate MLM, such as sour grapes, bitter aftertaste, conspiracy of competition, and conspiracy of the rich, frequently without addressing the evidence brought forth.
(Conspiracy theory plays such a large role in MLM thinking that I dedicated a different blog post to talk about conspiracy theories in MLM. )
However, that's not the primary danger when MLM went overboard. The main danger is when MLM turns cult-like, indoctrinating its members to hate their family and friends (for holding them back, for being so negative) and to ignore any all and all facts deemed detrimental to the business ("negativity" to be avoided) and live only within the echo chamber of fellow MLM members and be isolated from reality.
A MLM, either as a part of its corporate culture, or as a local cult of personality, would indoctrinate its members. While some amount of company indoctrination is expected about the corporate culture, there is little if any checks and balances in MLM, when compared to regular corporate structure, to make sure the leaders are doing the job properly and ethically. In traditional companies, supervisors and human resources department is supposed to supervise those below and stop abuses and unethical behavior. No such safeguards exist in MLM. And often, leaders take unethical shortcuts because nobody is there to tell them that's wrong. The ONLY validation they have is the sales numbers (and awards, which is based on sales numbers).
Often such rhetoric were bandied about:
They didn't tell you about how this alienates you from you and your family and friends, esp. if the "camaraderie" goes overboard. It's not uncommon a member, who has a life partner that did not join, to receive advice from other members that "if your partner refuse to join, s/he is obviously a loser and you should leave him/her". And if you are thoroughly indoctrinated...
Are you being taught to hate by default?
(Sidebar: China claims to have found a new type of paranoid disorder they temporarily named pyramid cult sales disorder. )
But what motivates such... hate? It's a combination of factors, but generally, it has to do with how you perceive people on the other side, and its origin was longstanding.
In a research by Liane Young at Boston College, it was revealed that both Democrats and Republicans (political parties in the US) claim that they were motivated by positive emotions such as love and loyalty to their party members, and their opponents were motivated primarily by hate and animosity.
In other words: "I think you hate me, therefore I hate you." It's basically preemptive hate.
Preemptive hate happens quite often in discussion of MLM. While the MLM critics sticks to the facts, often the first disagreement states "you obviously hate us/mlm". They then go on to imagine various reason WHY we would hate MLM, such as sour grapes, bitter aftertaste, conspiracy of competition, and conspiracy of the rich, frequently without addressing the evidence brought forth.
(Conspiracy theory plays such a large role in MLM thinking that I dedicated a different blog post to talk about conspiracy theories in MLM. )
However, that's not the primary danger when MLM went overboard. The main danger is when MLM turns cult-like, indoctrinating its members to hate their family and friends (for holding them back, for being so negative) and to ignore any all and all facts deemed detrimental to the business ("negativity" to be avoided) and live only within the echo chamber of fellow MLM members and be isolated from reality.
A MLM, either as a part of its corporate culture, or as a local cult of personality, would indoctrinate its members. While some amount of company indoctrination is expected about the corporate culture, there is little if any checks and balances in MLM, when compared to regular corporate structure, to make sure the leaders are doing the job properly and ethically. In traditional companies, supervisors and human resources department is supposed to supervise those below and stop abuses and unethical behavior. No such safeguards exist in MLM. And often, leaders take unethical shortcuts because nobody is there to tell them that's wrong. The ONLY validation they have is the sales numbers (and awards, which is based on sales numbers).
Often such rhetoric were bandied about:
- Only your fellow brothers and sisters in the MLM would understand your struggle
- Nobody else, not even your family and friends, would understand.
- Anybody who criticize us are out to wish us ill, and you must ignore them
- Only we have the truth. Everybody else by default are wrong.
- and so on
They didn't tell you about how this alienates you from you and your family and friends, esp. if the "camaraderie" goes overboard. It's not uncommon a member, who has a life partner that did not join, to receive advice from other members that "if your partner refuse to join, s/he is obviously a loser and you should leave him/her". And if you are thoroughly indoctrinated...
Are you being taught to hate by default?
