31: "Cults & Extreme Belief - NXIVM"

Shear Crime Podcast

This week, Kenzie and Ame discuss the episode in the A&E series Cults and Extreme Belief: NXIVM. We hear from a former cult member, Sarah Edmondson on what her 12+ years inside the organization was like. She'd come to learn about a group of people focused on self improvement and living up to their highest potential and was instantly hooked. Surrounded by positive, smiling and successful people, she quickly decided she wanted to be involved at a higher level. With her estimated number of recruits being close to 2,000 people, she never imagined the cult's founder and leader, Keith Raniere, had ulterior motives in mind. Soon Sarah found herself being initiated into sub-groups within NXIVM, where she was expected to engage in a slave/master relationship (all heavily promoted by Smallville actress Allison Mack). What she didn't realize was that not only was she expected to give several intimate pieces of her life in exchange for her loyalty and silence, she was also to give some of her flesh in the form of a branding. This is the story of how she managed to escape the universal sex-ring cult known as NXIVM.