A few months ago, I was reading about the NXIVM cult, if you’re not familiar with it, it was the cult where the actress: Allison Mack from the TV show: Smallville, sex trafficked and used a soldering iron to brand over a dozen women with the initials of her and her cult leader’s name.
I got really sucked into learning about this cult, because some of the victims from some of America’s richest families. Now, this is just a theory, but I think the powers at be are hiding the fact that there are many more branded women, because these brands are different and incriminating. My theory is that they were of the names of other cult members that were from elite families and the elites covered this up in order to keep their family members out of prison.
Anyways, while I was in depths of this NXIVM deep dive, in the comment section I saw post about another cult titled: The Most Destructive Cult in America: “The Group!”
Out of curiosity, I created a throwaway InstaFace account to send the author a message and she took one look at my fake account and immediately responded by playing dumb: “The Group!? What’s that!? Who are you!?”
So after some convincing, that I wasn’t out to kill her, she finally admitted who she was and began to open up, but the thing is, I knew exactly how she felt.
Many of you may know that in 2016, I came to what we now call Hive and met Sarah and we got married... But what you don’t know was that before Hive, I too had spent many years inside a cult and many more years in hiding to avoid other cult members and to try to cope with the trauma of my involvement in The Group.
So, the moment that I picked up the microphone to talk to Sarah on Discord, was the same moment that I finally dropped my guard and re-entered society.
And the only reason that this happened was because of the Steemit Talk Podcast. Even though I protested, @giftedgaia fundraised to buy a microphone for me in order to make me the official mascot of the Steemit Talk Podcast.
So when the microphone finally arrived, like any typical paranoid, agoraphobe, who spent way too much time alone, I began to panic over the idea of people hearing my voice again. Now I'm not exactly sure how she did this, but somehow Sarah managed to talk me into testing the microphone with her.
I had no idea that that one single event would completely change my life and I honestly don't think I would be around today if things worked out differently.
Over the years, I have tried to write about my experiences within the Group countless times, but I always just stopped, I guess I wasn’t ready to deal with all the emotions, because each time I would begin to feel really depressed. Also, I felt like what I was writing, just wasn’t good enough and that the kids, who lost their lives in there, really deserved a better writer.
At this point I have given up on the idea of making this into a proper story with a beginning, middle and end, because for me, it never really ends.
Also, it’s extremely difficult to explain what it’s actually like in there, partly because no two people have the same experience.
So instead of a linear story, I will try to show different perspectives in order to offer a more complete picture, but out of respect for all the other victims and their families, I will have to change the names and some identifying details of those involved.
I have been working on this for about a month now and I have a lot written, but before I get into the more personal stories, I'm just testing the waters with this introduction post to see if there is any interest in this topic on Hive.
And if any of you have had any experiences with a cult, let me know, I would love to read about it.
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