Why we do it

"It's not what you don't know that sinks you. It's what you DON'T KNOW you don't know."

John Counsel
Author, "What You Should Know About MLM BEFORE You Join!"

With every release of one of our Special Reports we receive lots of hostile e-mails from affronted people wanting to know...

• why we targeted their MLM opportunity
  
  
• what we hope to gain from such "seek and destroy" activity
  
  
• why we don't just openly admit that we're really anti-MLM
  
  
• why we can't be "caring and sharing" in the best spirit of MLM.

It's hard to reason with people who are so emotionally caught up by, and bonded to, their personal choice of MLM company. The more rational we are in our arguments, the more irrational and vehement their defence of their emotional investment becomes. It's a no-win.

(Interestingly, these same people who accuse us of being biased and unfair in analysing THEIR opportunity are often those who praise us for our objectivity and fairness in analysing OTHER opportunities. Hmmm... interesting. Happens every issue, too.)

So why do we bother?

To understand why we do it – our motives – we need to understand the nature of the problem confronting network marketing. Especially for people outside of North America who, in the past, have been largely protected from the rip-off merchants and parasites who thrive in the USA, due to vigilance by local regulatory watchdogs and media crusaders, and the sheer size of the US market.

The Internet has changed all that.

The ease and speed of communication and commerce created by the Net have meant that these scam artists can now hit and run almost anywhere, while the law trundles along at snail's pace in their wake. They bounce back, time after time, with seeming impunity.

The whole problem is about choices and consequences – or the apparent lack of consequences – on everyone's part, both predators and prey alike. (See later in this message for details.)

And it's all due, ultimately, to ignorance on the part of their victims. They don't know what they need to know to prevent it.

Worse still, they DON'T KNOW that they don't know! Instead, they think they're in control of their situation and choices... so they blunder blithely along from one dud to the next until, finally, they declare than MLM is nothing but a complete rip-off.

The following graph shows the real situation – and solution – in stark simplicity.
 
 
THE FOUR STAGE CONTROL PROCESS

Note – Click the numbers on the graph for explanations. Click the "Graph" links in the text to return here to the graph.

This graph shows the process we all go through in achieving control over any aspect of life. It's a 4-stage process that begins BEFORE we're ever ON the graph itself, at Stage 1.


Stage 1: UNCONSCIOUS INCOMPETENCE

We don't realise our own ignorance and incompetence. We're not even aware that we don't know what we need to know!

We THINK we're in position 1B – in control.

It's an illusion.

So when we eventually step off the edge and plummet to the ground (or we're helped by a gentle push, or removal of the blinders), the only reason the fall doesn't hurt us is because it was a DELUSION in the first place... we were really in position 1A all along. We just THOUGHT we were in control.

"Ignorance is bliss."

 
Stage 2: CONSCIOUS INCOMPETENCE

Any time we realise we're not in control of our situation, that awareness triggers fear... shock... PANIC.

And fear, as often as not, triggers the "fight or flight" reaction in most people. They'll lash out – and shoot the messenger! (We get this all the time at MLMTruth.)

For some, the shock is terminal. They can't handle it. They flee. Then they have to justify/rationalise their own incompetence by blaming eveyone and everything else for the rest of their lives. They can never face reality – that they didn't know what they were doing. That their choice was based on emotional appeal, what they WANTED, instead of rational, objective evaluation based on FACTS and FIGURES – what they NEEDED.

 
Stage 3: CONSCIOUS COMPETENCE

The intelligent ones recognise reality and set about getting the know-how they need to gain control.

It's a slow, three-steps-forward-and-two-steps-back process at times. But as we stick at it and increase our knowledge and skills, the learning curve begins to swing upward. As Ralph Waldo Emerson so eloquently said...

"That which we persist in doing becomes easier for us to do; not that the nature of the thing itself is changed, but that our power to do it is increased."

In other words, "practice makes perfect."

So we begin with the mental checklists, like learning to drive a car. Then, one day, we suddenly realise that we just drove clear across town to a meeting, so focused on what lay ahead and what we'd say and do, that we can't remember the trip!

How many red lights did I run? How did I find my way here?

We've finally achieved true control...

 
Stage 4: UNCONSCIOUS COMPETENCE

Our mission at the MLMTruth Coalition is to trigger Stage 2, in order to facilitate Stage 3 so that YOU can achieve Stage 4.

Our mission is NOT to "convert" you to any particular MLM opportunity. It's to put YOU in control of YOUR OWN choices, so that you're no longer swayed by subtle (and not-so-subtle) emotional manipulation... by appeals to greed and laziness ("make millions with no effort – we'll do it all for you!") or more noble sentiments ("help save the children").

Our position on network marketing – MLM – is simple:

"Network marketing is the most enlightened, effective, ethical, equitable and intelligent business system ever to evolve... but ONLY when it's operated by people who are equally enlightened, effective, ethical, equitable and intelligent!"

Education is the only answer to the rip-offs and scams that plague network marketing. People have to be empowered to make reliable, business-like decisions – the right things for the right reasons... the Secret of Success.

 
THE PROBLEM WITH CONSEQUENCES

Consequences are inevitable. They're just cause and effect at work. The REAL problem with consequences is that they're usually DELAYED. There's no IMMEDIATE retribution.

• Nobody dies of cancer after their first cigarette.
  
  
• Nobody dies in poverty and obscurity from alcoholism after their first drink.
  
  
• Nobody becomes addicted to heroin after their first score.

So we think, because there APPEAR to be NO consequences, that there ARE none.

WRONG!

The chickens ALWAYS come home to roost. It just takes them time to get there.

When there are no consequences, the wrong lessons are learned.

As parents, when we remove the consequences of our children's choices, those kids learn that they can get away with it.

They don't, of course. They just keep on going, making the inevitable reckoning many times worse. Meanwhile, WE have to put with consequences of our own from OUR wrong choice in allowing it to happen. (Their appalling selfishness, for a start.)

It's the foundation of criminality, if you think about.

Criminals believe that they can get away with flouting the law. And, because there are too many people ready to remove the consequences of their choices by finding excuses for their behaviour, or finding loopholes in the law, etc, they learn the wrong lessons – and the final arrival of all these delayed consequences can be horrific. For everyone.

It's the same in network marketing.

When authorities turn a blind eye to repeated flouting of the law, even contempt of court orders, the rip-off merchants keep on doing what they've always done because they learn the wrong lesson. And we ALL pay a high price.

The only way to STOP these characters is twofold:
 
 
1. EXPOSE THEM

Fines don't deter these criminals. It's usually a drop in the ocean compared to what they've scammed from their victims.

Not even jail terms do it, because they're usually out in no time and back to their old tricks again.

But public awareness and public odium are powerful weapons in deterring them. And it's always the CERTAINTY of punishment that's the real deterrent, not the severity.

When we shine a blazing spotlight on what these characters are doing behind people's backs, out of sight, we create an effective consequence. One that, hopefully, they'll learn the RIGHT lessons from. When they do, they rarely come back for more.

Oh, sure... many will turn and fight rather than flee, using placatory assurances that all's well and there's nothing to worry about, God is on our side and next week/month/year all will be revealed, that it's all the fault of...

• crusading bureaucrats who don't understand/hate MLM
  
  
• lies and sabotage by vengeful ex-employees
  
  
• an unfortunate misunderstanding
  
  
• a conspiracy of some kind.

Familiar stuff, isn't it?
 
 
2. EDUCATE THEIR INTENDED PREY

It's hard to fool someone who knows what you're up to.

The problem is, of course, that most people can't or won't see what's really happening to them. They WANT it to be true so desperately that they'll refuse to face reality...

"There are none so blind as those who will not see."
      – Anon.

The scam artists bait their hidden hooks with irresistible emotional appeals to the desperate, the ignorant, the lazy, the greedy and gullible – and even the honourable! Here's a sampling...

• "Get rich with no work... we build your downline for you!"
  
  
• "Build your wealth with spillover..."
  
  
• "Save the children!"

To anyone with education or experience in clear thinking and rhetoric, these claims – and the arguments that support them – lack any rational foundation. They can never work.

They're usually a murky mish-mash of emotional manipulation, sophistry, insinuation, hype, misinformation or outright lies, wrapped in glossy, slick packaging with fancy, deceptive names.

None of this changes the underlying reality.

"You can dress yourself up as a legitimate business and call yourself something you're not, but a pyramid is still a pyramid, and pyramids are illegal,"

Jodie Bernstein,
Director of the Federal Trade Commission's Bureau of Consumer Protection.
http://www.ftc.gov/opa/1999/9912/2xtreme.htm

What they rely on is time. Delayed consequences. And the blind emotional commitment of their victims to the false vision they've created for them.

Hit and run, then bounce back under another name to bleed a fresh batch of victims dry.

Well... maybe. And maybe not.

Not with the MLM Truth Coalition determined to stop them by exposing their history along with their latest ploys, and educating their intended prey.

Darnkess cannot abide light.
 
 
IN CONCLUSION...

So... are we really anti-MLM?

Not at all. We don't hate MLM. Quite the opposite.

What we DO detest, however, are those who prey on the innocent, the ignorant, the weak, the lost, the needy, the hopeful... the ordinary people of this world who want to better themselves, not be sucked in by parasites and predators who care nothing about them or the damage they inflict, in every sense.

And yes, we see ourselves as caring and sharing in the very best tradition of network marketing. By helping to prevent the ongoing damage that these sharks and shonky operators do to

• PEOPLE.
  
  
• public perceptions of MLM

we consider ourselves to be upholding the true nature of this brilliant, but exceedingly vulnerable, system of business.

Never forget... the price of freedom is eternal vigilance.

And the threat that's most lethal usually comes from within.

The REAL question, my friends, is not about us and our motives. They've always been clearly stated and pursued, unswervingly, for more than two years.

No... the REAL question is about YOU.

Now that you KNOW, what are you willing to DO?

Your choices are simple enough:

1. Do nothing.

2. Fight us.

3. Join us.

Whatever your choice happens to be, please understand one very important fact, now that you've read this page...

Your choice will say a lot more about YOU than it says about us.