Part One: The Child Molester Whose Sex Cult Taught Women Friendship

Have you ever heard of a guy named Keith Raniere? You may have heard of his cult, 'NXIVM' which has been in the news a lot lately. In Episode 8, Robert is joined by writer/comedian  Anna Salinas (badcomixbyanna, John Baxte) and they discuss Keith Raniere who describes himself as the 'conceptual founder of NXIVM, a group that focuses on the overarching philosophy of companies focusing on increasing joy and ethics in the world.' BUT we now know that is complete crap and   NXIVM is actually a creepy sex cult that forced women to brand each other.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Mmm, hello friends, I'm Robert Evans, and this is once
again Behind the Bastards, the show where we tell you
everything you don't know about the very worst people in
all of history. Our guest today is on a Sealinas cartoonist, comedian,
writer person sitting across from me at the table. That
is my greatest qualification. You have so many qualifications, um Anna,

(00:24):
thank you for joining us today. Thank you for having me.
I'm so excited. Well the show. Now, let me ask you.
Have you ever heard of a guy named keithrew Neary.
I will be honest with you. I had not until
about five minutes ago. Um and you did introduce him
very nominally. You're killing the movie magic Anna, Oh am,
I really no, No, it's fine. Uh well, now I

(00:47):
have to keep going. I feel like, uh you you
you introduced him as the founder of how do you
say it? Nexium? So not the heartburn medication. They say name, Yeah,
it's not so it's spelled in like all capital letters
in X, I V M. Because they're super pretentious, super pretentious.

(01:11):
I was. I was very embarrassed when I thought it
was the founder of Nexium, the heartburnt medication. No. Upon
hearing it. It's the same. It is the same, and
it's not your fault. It's their fault for naming their
weird cult after a heartburn medication. Yeah, exactly. I think
existed before Late Night. I've been taking it for years.

(01:34):
And how long is the sex cult? But going on, Well,
we're going to get into that today. So, uh, if
you've heard of Nexium as a sex cult, it's probably
because Alison Mac, former Small Vill actress, got arrested recently,
along with the founder of the cult, Keith Renary. They're
a bunch of New York Times articles about it. They
called it a sex cult, and so I think if

(01:55):
that's what most people know about Nexium. Did you read
the New York Times articles um about Alison Mac? Yeah?
I mean no, I read probably the lead Yeah, the
article you got that she's in some hot water. Yeah.
And I used to watch small also, it was a
really big shock. Well, I wanna, I wanna make sure
everybody listening knows even if you read those articles that

(02:18):
the New York Times posted, and remember every word of
the this is going to be new to you because
I started by reading those articles and then I started digging,
and it turns out there's like thirty some odd years
of stuff behind this colt and behind this guy, Keith
rew Eerie, and he is a fascinating piece of ship.

(02:38):
So we're gonna dig into him a little bit. Um. Yeah,
Keith ran Eerie and Nexium kind of first hit the
public mind most recently with the New York Times article
last October called Inside a secretive group where women are branded.
The article focused on the creation that's a little v
uous where women are branded, branded like literally brand yeah

(02:59):
with a hot eye. Oh my god, because when I
first heard it, I thought it meant like brand like
branded content where women are like they're the brand of
the content. Now you're Cheetos on No, no, no, that's
that's not that's not what happened. No. Uh. There would
be five minute branding sessions with a hot iron for
women who were like part of a special subcult within

(03:21):
this larger cult. Can I ask a problematic question? There's
no non problematic questions in this podcast. Did they like it? Well,
you're gonna get a different answer depending on who you
talked to. A number of the women claimed that it
was a positive experience. I think most of them were
horrified at what happened. A lot of people left immediately
after getting branded. They sort of like stayed there and

(03:43):
suffered through it because they were too scared to leave.
But yeah, I mean, that's that's part of why there's
charges against both Keith and Alison mac And she did
the branding also. She says she came up with the
idea for women within this group to be branded. It's
a wacky story. She was acting in Smallville, and she

(04:03):
took some of those storylines too seriously because some of
them got dark. I never watched Smallville. Well, Amy Adams
made her debut on that show, so you missed out. Okay,
Well you can let me know if any of these
parts of the story sync up with parts of small
Ville in a meaningful way. I will ex Yes, Okay,
that's that's really good then, because I know nothing about

(04:24):
that show. I mean I kind of fell out towards
the end once they brought in Lowest. But so Alison
Mack was not Lowest. Oh no, no, she was. She
was like a journalist. She was a truth teller. She
worked for the I guess it was the school paper.
Um gosh, people are going to probably call me on
my inaccuracies. Well, that's a fun segue then, because speaking

(04:46):
of journalism, how much do you keep up with Elon
Musk these days? Only who he's dating. Oh, then you're
probably a little bit bombed. Well oh no, oh no,
you like it? Yeah no, I hate it. Okay, Well
I was going, yeah, she's well, I don't know. I've
done a deep dive into their relationship and grimes. She's

(05:09):
so young. That is weird, right, that's the weirdest part.
She looks like she's twelve. I get that she's in
her twenties, but she looks really young. My favorite thing
to do with Elon Musk is look at pictures of
him back when they were first starting PayPal, and he's
like a chubby, shlovy guy who's gone bald. Knew it.
I knew it because he looks You can see it
a little in his face that he used to be slovey,

(05:32):
but like got so rich that it's almost like the
richness seeps onto his face and you're like, he's attractive?
Is I can't tell. There's a certain amount of money
where you can just pay people to make you make
sure that you look good. Anytime you say the hair
he probably has like personal trainers and personal chefs. Yeah,
what he doesn't have is personal people to vet the

(05:55):
news websites that he reads. Late last month, he got
into a bit of a if with the entire independent
news media and expressed his desire to create a service
to rate news sites for bias, which is not an
inherently problematic idea, although it's hard to imagine someone executing
it in in a way that wouldn't piss off at least
half the country anyway. At some point during this whole debate,
a guy named Jen's Eric Gould, who's the editor in

(06:17):
chief at a site called The Knife, tweeted out an
article his site had written in support of Elon Musk. Now,
the Knife Media purports to rate mainstream news coverage on
its level of bias and slant. They rated the total
integrity of several articles about Elon's proposed website, none of
which scored higher than fort Musk retweeted The Knife's analysis
and called it excellent. It didn't take long for users

(06:38):
to inform Elon that the article he praised was written
by a literal cult because the Knife Media happens to
be part of the Nexium family thing of the Jig's
yeah uh so. Musk's initial response was that their article
had better His exact quote was, sadly it had better
critical analysis than most non cult media, which if you're praising,

(07:01):
if you're attacking noncult media, you should back away from
the argument you're making. Yeah, Like, there's only so far
you can go with that. Also, the whole like, by now,
it's we know when we see a news source from
something we don't totally recognize, to be like, oh, this
is probably I shouldn't retweet this, and it's I'll say

(07:24):
this in fairness to must number one. He deleted those
tweets once he I think did a little bit of digging.
The knife doesn't look sketchy. It looks like it's got
and it clearly does have some money behind it. The
layouts find the site like, it doesn't look like he
made Tesla's. He's he's supposed to be so smart and
he couldn't be like, huh, the knife, I've never heard

(07:47):
of this, and I am an adult man in my
presumably forties at least, right, he's older than that man.
Grimes is creepy. That Grimes is the creepy one. No,
I mean well, no, I would never king shame her
for dating an old man, but I will shame him
for dating much younger. I feel like that's fair. Yeah.

(08:09):
Uh yeah, So one way or the other, you can
you can either attack Musk for not checking on it,
or you can say that this is like a message
that no matter how much money someone has, we shouldn't
treat them as particularly smart just because they've got lucky
with a company once. Yeah, and I I have been
up until now a Musk apologist because I was really

(08:30):
rooting for him just because, like you know, Tesla's and SpaceX,
that's all cool. Uh. And then I've heard little allegations,
not a little, but rumors that like he's manipulative and
he can be abusive. Yeah, and I don't I don't know.
I haven't done my research on that. And this, this
podcast isn't going to be about Musk, so I'm gonna

(08:51):
steer us a little bit away from that. I guess
the point I'm making is that if Musk got taken
in by any of us Keith Nieries umbrella of madness,
He's not the first relatively intelligent person for this to
happen to. That's kind of the story is Keith renieries
really really good at tricking smart people into thinking he's

(09:13):
got something to say. So NEXTI um starting to read
about the knife and then Keith renaries you know the
stuff with the branding of those women and the other
crazy ship like they would they would hook these women
in this group up to brainwave analyzers and force them
to watch videos of women being dismembered and stuff. Use
craziness like he had. Yeah, so was Ala Alison mac

(09:35):
like a partner in all this or a late entry?
She was a late entry. So so that's kind of
what we're getting into. So at its core as a business,
Nexium was a company that offered seminars helping business people
be better at doing business um. It ran a series
of intensive and expensive clinics, often consisting of five seventeen
hour days in a row for thousands of dollars. Everything

(09:57):
in the clinics was based on Mr. Nares teachings, which
amounted to a new science for how to succeed at life. UM. So,
let's pull back a bit, back before Alison mack gets involved,
back before Elon Musk gets tricked by an article and
talk about the life of the charismatic founder of Nexium,
Keith Reniery. I usually believe in going straight to the

(10:19):
source first for things like this, and his luck would
have it. His website, Keith dot com is still up.
His official biography opens with a picture of him, which
we'll be putting up on our site behind the Bastards
dot com so you can get a look at the guy. Okay,
this picture is not threatening. He's a normal looking guy.
He's wearing a fleece. Yeah, you wouldn't think he was
weird if you passed him on the street. He'd just

(10:39):
be a dude. Yeah, I think I would. I'm going
to say this, I think I would trust anyone in
a fleece. Really think about it. Well, if Donald Trump
over a starting a cult, anyone listening to the podcast,
you've got one guaranteed member if you buy a fleece. Well, look,
there's other tests, but that's the first one. The first test.

(11:00):
I myself phone a fleece from Patagonian. When I wear it,
I feel like a like a mom, you know, and
you trust and I trust moms. Okay, I don't know,
like a guy you would find at a Gelson's supermarket. Yeah, yeah,
he looks like a guy who's who buys really expensive

(11:21):
cheeses and only the like nine dollar a pound grapes exactly.
And it's like there's no difference between Gelson's and any
other supermarket except that it's more expensive. But there's fewer
people in the lines. And you know his fleece costs
like three Oh yeah, he got the special edition north
Face for the super rich people. I feel like he's

(11:43):
a padagon you guy. Really. I don't know why that
touched me. That was that. I thought that was delightful.
More people should have Patagonia fleeces. Yeah, quality fleeces. We're
not We're not attacking the man's choice and fleeces. Um.
I am going to start reading from his official biography now.
So this is Keith rneer on Keith Ranieri quote. Keith
Rawnary holds many titles to his name scientist, mathematician, philosopher, entrepreneur, educator, inventor,

(12:11):
and author, but perhaps the most poignant among them is
that of humanitarian. He has devoted his life to studying
the human psychodynamic and developing new tools for human empowerment, expression,
and ethics. His endeavors share a drive to enhance human existence.
As he works tirelessly and joyfully to help others elevate
their awareness, success, and ultimately experience of life. Wow, I've

(12:34):
never heard someone who is supposedly in the line of
self help call themselves a humanitarian. That's such a stretch.
My favorite thing about it is that this is the
first paragraph of his biography and I have no idea
from that what he does or has done. Well. From that,
I feel like he sounds like Elon Musk, right inventor,

(12:58):
but he's not. He doesn't say like if Elon Musk
was writing the paragraph intry, he would say like he's
the founder of Tesla, he helped to make PayPal, Like
there would be accomplishments that you could list. That is
the red flag vagueness. If you're trying to scamp people,
just makeup companies. Don't be so vague. Tell me what
book he wrote, if you're an author, tell me what
you invented, if you're an inventor, tell me what company like.

(13:20):
Don't just say you're all these things and give me nothing.
But also, but most of all, the humanitarian period end
of paragraph, Well, that's the most poignant of his title. Yeah,
which is the most poigned the title that brings people
to tears. Yeah, exactly, I feel like crying a little bit.
I'm yeah, this is a safe space on his His

(13:40):
patagony oft leice delighted me and now his humanitarian credential,
Uh makes me weep. Well, let's let's get into Keith's more.
Keith's biography. This is this is sort of him going
through his his background. Okay, okay, okay. By the age
of one, so we're already off to a great start here.
He could construct full sentences and questions. He was able

(14:02):
to read by the age of two. An auto diet act.
He directed his learning activities to learning itself, studying its
art and science in order to find optimized learning strategies
and methodologies. Applying his skill to athletics, Keith Rawnieri excelled
in judo and was an East Coast judo champion at
age eleven. He also excelled in numerous other sports, including volleyball, tennis,

(14:23):
table tennis, diving, softball, cycling, and skiing. By the age
of twelve, he taught himself to play piano at the
concert level. His passion and aptitude for music would inspire
him to master many other musical instruments. He taught himself
high school mathematics in nineteen hours at the age of twelve.
Only one year later, he was proficient in third year
college mathematics and was a professional computer programmer. I have

(14:47):
so many problems with this. First of all, this is
like when someone kind of beef up their college application
and they're like, oh, I I was captain of the
uh cycling club. Yet it's like, this is all totally irrelevant.
You know, if the vagueness of paragraph one didn't turn
you off immediately, this is crazy. I love I love

(15:11):
him bragging about being a judo champion at age eleven,
because that is that if I ever meet an adult
human being and one of the first things they tell
me is that they were a judo champion decades ago
as a small child, you would be like, Oh, this person,
I don't want to know you. Yeah, this is someone
with no friends who's deeply looking for a companionship. His

(15:34):
whole thing has like the feel of that kid in
elementary school who totally had an uncle that was a
Navy seal, only like he's he's clearly a mature adult. Yes,
in my case, that that was Lance and his dad
was a book author who wrote about war pilots Um.
I mean he was a nice thing to lie about. Well,

(15:54):
he didn't lie, he just talked about it along. And
it was like Lance was so boring. I almost said
his last name. That would have vouted him too much.
He's just the most boring guy. But because I'm sure
he's working at like an accounting firm right now, and
this would yeah, if this information got it would be
if I had to guess accounting. Yeah, yeah, that is

(16:15):
the I'm sorry. If there's accountants listening right now, please
keep this. Accounts are great. They saved my taxes. Yes, yes,
it's a good job. Yes, they're useful people. You know
who's not a useful person? Keith fucking Ranieri. Uh So,
I decided I wanted to fact check his bio a
little bit. Whoa you know, you can such a thing

(16:37):
be done? Can you really know if he was jiu
jitsu judo judo champion? Well, the East Coast Judo Championships
are a real thing, and they do have a judo
division for kids seven to fourteen years old. We know
Keith Ranieri was born in August nineteen sixty because that's
what he listed his birthday in a sworn affidavit that
he filed for a lawsuit in two thousand three. Um. So,

(16:58):
thanks to Google, I was able to find old issues
of black Belt magazine that gave winners of the East
Coast Judo champions and unfortunately none of them were from
nineteen seventy one. So there's no I really thought you
were going to blow the lid off of that. You
are just like Alison mac in Smallville. Oh you did
some investigative reporting. Well I did a little more because

(17:21):
on his website, Keith claims to have started at renissel
Er Polytechnic Institute at age sixteen. When I started looking
into this, I found a bunch of articles from a
crazy guys website called the Frank Report. It appears to
be the personal or the Frank Report. It appears to
be the personal project of a man named Frank Parlatto.
He's a developer in Niagara Falls who worked for Nexium
in two thousand and seven and eight and then started

(17:42):
a new site dedicated to attacking the company and Mr
Rainery that's still going on to this day. It's a
weird website. It has the look of like an unhinged
nuts article about how the Earth is flat or whatever,
but the actual information and the articles is often useful,
Like he he has he does a bunch of weird
photoshop jokes and stuff like about Keith Ranieri and his

(18:02):
clearly so bitter. Yeah, bitter and a little unhinged, but
like it's also not just nonsense. Like he provided links
to the affidavit, which is where I was able to
prove that Keith was lying on his bio about starting
college at age sixteen. Um because in the affidavit he
said he entered college just after his seventeenth birthday and
then expands to say he didn't really enter college, he

(18:24):
just started taking some college classes. So basically he was
taking ap courses in his senior year like a lot
of people. Yeah, he's just he's a liar. Yeah, So
thank you to the Frank Report for helping us bust
at least one of the myths. Conclusively. Kudos to Frank
for having the balls to call his report his own name.
He has been doggedly calling his news site by his

(18:47):
own name for years now. Yeah. You can imagine his
wife for friends or I don't know, husband, were like Frank,
come on, just come up with a different name. He's like,
no name of Frank Frank. People need to know, people
need to know who it came from, and they need
to be amused by my photoshop. Yeah. I don't know
if he's from the South, but I'm I think he

(19:07):
lives up in like Albany. Well, he moved from Tennessee,
So that's why it has an accent shots fired Tennessee.
Oh no, it's Frank. Frank's on her side, I think, yeah, no,
more or less. He may have stolen a million dollars,
but what yeah, get into So this whole story. I'm
trying to tell this from this point in like a

(19:29):
chronologic point of view, but this is a fucking twisty
turney mess. Like I need like a chalkboard. It would
help drying if there was a component of this podcast
that was like a wall covered in pictures and pieces
of string. Yes, um, But our producer Sophie informs me
that that is not possible with podcast technology. So wait

(19:51):
ten years, wait ten years, Yeah, and we'll have the holograms. Yeah,
the holograms and like holographic yarn connecting pictures like just
like in Minority here. Yeah, that's the dream. Um, so,
after bragging about Keith's education, his websites bio goes on
to print what might be the most punchable paragraph I
have ever read in my entire life, So buckle up. Quote.

(20:12):
Noted as one of the world's top three problem solvers,
Keith row Neery was honored in nineteen eighty nine by
the Guinness Book of World Records in the category of
Highest i Q. He has an estimated problem solving rarity
of one in four hundred and twenty five million with
respect to the general population. He has intellectual patents pending
in the areas of human potential and ethics, expression, voice

(20:33):
and musical training, athletic performance, commerce, education and learning, information processing,
and human modeling. He also holds several technological patents on
computer inventions and a sleep guidance system. That's so clearly fake.
That's so clearly fake. It is a bucket of nonsense. Um,

(20:54):
but you'll these are things that you will see as
patterns as we go along here. He loves being really
cific about how great he is in a totally nonsensical way,
because there's no problem solving rarity of one informed. That's that. Yeah,
that's that's just insanity. Um, it's very important to keep
that people understand just how smart he is. On the

(21:15):
website for his main business executive Success program, Keith writes
that he was accepted into the Mega Society in nineteen eight,
which is some nerds society that requires a demonstrated i
Q of a hundred and seventy six or higher, which
is an intellectual performance of one in a million level
of rarity. As proof, he cites an article from late
nineteen eight and nine titled Troy Man has a lot
on his mind. I Q test proves what many suspected.

(21:36):
He's one in ten million. So I searched for this
article and I didn't find it, but I found a
plain text website that has the article posted on. Yeah. Um,
so we're gonna get into Keith thrown eeris i Q
a little bit when we come back, But we do
have to break for some ads. So if you have
an intellectual problem solving capacity of one in four into

(21:57):
twenty five million, which all of our listeners do, these
ads will help you solve problems by things. And we're back.
We're talking about Keith Rinieri and his i Q. So
I was just telling you that he he cited an

(22:18):
article from nineteen eighty nine that that covered his joining
into the Mega Society. So I found a plain text
copy of this website. There's a lot of cringe wrothy
quotes in here, but here's another one of them. He's
not your stereotypical genius. Watchful blue eyes look out from
behind aviator glasses. His brown hair is parted stylishly in

(22:39):
the middle. He has the physique of an athlete, which
he is. He was East Coast judo champion at age twelve,
tied with the state record for the hundred yard dash.
Is an avid skier, swimmer, and windsurfer. He says he
plays seven musical instruments and also sings high tenor in
local musical productions. Well that is also fake. Like at

(23:00):
first what I found it hosted on a plain text website.
I was like, Keith Renier, he just lied and made
up an article. But the actual website that hosts it
is some dude who's obsessed with i Q tests, who
has cataloged every article about i Q tests for the
last like forty years, And I think he just typed
up news clippings he had and hosted them online. It's

(23:21):
an exercise and madness. But I don't think Keith faked it.
I do think he lied to this journalist and it
wasn't a good journalist who just like said, of course
he's telling the truth. Look at how smart this piece
even like tilts his hand a little and it's like
he says that, yeah, yeah, exactly, uh wow yeah. So um,
it's possible Keith actually is a member of the Mega

(23:42):
Society and has a very high i Q. However, Keith
also claims the nineteen eighty nine Guinness Book of World
Records honored him for having the highest i Q. That
is clear and provable nonsense, because Maryland Vassavant had the
highest recorded i Q on the and was in the
Guinness Record for that from nineteen eight six through eighty nine.
I don't even believe this man has had and i
Q test. Yeah, that's I could totally see that being

(24:03):
alive from the beginning. Yeah, because in the nineteen eighties
you could say anything you could. You think people couldn't
google it. Albany random newspaper isn't gonna check. No one
was looking. And I don't know the way this guy writes,
he doesn't sound very smart. He doesn't write, he sounds
like someone who's pretending to be smart. We're going to

(24:26):
listen to him later. I don't disagree with you. We're
gonna listen to him later. He clearly has a type
of intelligence, just like Donald Trump has a type of
intelligence as he wouldn't be able to do what he does.
It's very comparable. But he is not a genius in
the sense that, like he's able to usefully add to
the human experience from people. What an interesting thing to

(24:50):
get people. And I guess Trump does this too by
being like, I'm smarter than you. Yeah, and he does
it in such a almost more frustrating way. Yeah, Like
Keith doesn't like his focus on like I have this
i Q, I am this much rare. My brain is
so this rare, and the I'm one of the three

(25:11):
greatest problem solvers on the planet, which is even more
nonsense than he. Uh. He reminds me of what we
used to do in speech and debate in high school?
Did you did you ever know I was a speech
and debate kid for four years? What did you do?
Ld a lot of Lincoln Douglas debate? I did one

(25:32):
of those kids. And what you learned in extent was
you know, you gave a speech for seven minutes extemporaneously,
and what you learned is to just make up yeah
things yeah, and to say them with confidence. And no
one would ever know the difference because these were just parents.
Uh he sounds like how how we sounded making up

(25:54):
those But also like looking back, it's like, nah that
the adults knew it was fake. We we just I
don't know. I once gave a whole speech about is
Macedonia going back to civil war? Oh? Wow, were they
Macedonia do in these days? I made up everything from

(26:14):
the beginning to the end beautiful. Yeah, and I thought
I did great, But looking back, well it was it
was not unlike that bio. No, I mean the great
Like if you if you're a student of history, the
most important lesson of history is that if you get
up and you lie with confidence, most people will buy it. Yeah,
Like that's just human history from like ten thousand b c. Too. Now,

(26:36):
if you just get up and you're full of ship,
like LD. Debate was a lot of that, like it
really I always regarded debate as like the smart ones.
There's a lot of research involved, but in a pinch,
lying will do the trick sometimes, especially if you're like me,
like a tall white guy, because if you if you're
a tall white guy and you say things with confidence,
people just tend to trust you. It's amazing. It's like

(26:57):
when I saw Keith in the the Fleece, I was like,
I guess, I mean, look at this guy. He looks
like he's someone who talks avidly about hiking. Show me
a woman who looks exactly like me, and I'll be like,
I don't trust her. Oh boy, Okay, Well, moving right along.
Keith claims we have started his first business in nineteen
eight four. He called it the Concept School and then

(27:19):
later the Life Learning Institute. Again, Keith gives almost no
details as to what these businesses were. This is all
from the affidavit, which I'm using because he presumably lied
less in it because it would be perjury, right, Yeah,
So that that anyway, That's why I'm using the affidavit
so much. In order to start these businesses, he claims
he distilled a lifetime of careful thought and his genius
intellect into their creation, but he never actually says what

(27:41):
they did. These first ventures wound up closing due to
irreconcilable differences between Keith and his backers. Uh this is
which is code for he couldn't return on the money. Yeah,
he wasn't actually doing anything. Keith did get up to
something else in nineteen eight four though, molesting teenagers. Yeah,
he was all busy. He had a new hobby. He's

(28:03):
getting up to Okay. He was living in an apartment
building in Troy when he met Gina Melita. She was
fifteen and he was twenty four. They struck up a
friendship and went to the arcade together Rhneer. He was
obsessed with pac Man in a game called Vanguard. He
told her he was a genius and a judo champion,
which he always he loves bringing up that judo championship.
Why which again nothing against martial arts. Fine way to

(28:26):
stay fit, great pastime. If you brag about the martial
arts that you do, don't let that is the immediate.
Well that's also just the immediate, Like, okay, I'm going
to disregard you as a person if the first thing
you say to me is bragging about your martial arts
career and we're not like at a martial arts cup.
I immediately I immediately doubt it first of all, And

(28:49):
I wonder if he said it just because it was like, yeah,
I'm tough, don't mess with me. I could fight, but
I couldn't fight in a maybe it's like no one knows,
like no one knows judo, so they could never challenge him.
It was like safe, yeah, because I wouldn't know how
to be like, okay, well howdy good you would judo
or yeah, let's judo. Yeah, so he anyway, but so

(29:11):
he brings. He tells the fifteen year old girl that
he was great at judo at eleven uh, and then
he takes her virginity. They had what some sources call
a relationship and I think with the law call statutory rape.
Off and on for about four months. Keith Ranieri told
her not to tell her mother and also urged her
to lose weight because she was too fat for him.
Oh no, it's going to be a pattern to this

(29:32):
sounds a lot like Trump. They're not as different as
I think he would want to be seen as. Yeah,
the wait thing, although he's a big randy in uh
rand okay, Yeah. Keith met another girl in Nur also.
Her name is Gina Hutchinson. She was sixteen, they started

(29:54):
having sex. When Jina's sister heid He found out, she
confronted Keith Ranieri. Quote Heidi said, Ranieri told her that
she did not understand her sister's soul was much older
than her biological age. He explained to Gina was a
Buddhist goddess meant to be with him. Goddesses and Buddhism.
I mean, I don't know, there's a lot of different
little sects, but I'm going to guess this is just bullshit.

(30:14):
I mean, obviously bullshit, but I'm gonna guess he was
just lying about Buddhist goddesses existing anywhere. Man, what a
thing to tell someone. Yeah, you look, I know it
looks bad, but their souls really old. And I can
see their souls really old and Buddhist and Buddhist. So
that makes this fine. Yeah, as if just that alone

(30:36):
would make the sister be like, well, I did never
notice that he did say Buddha's name. Yeah, I guess
he's fine. That quote was from the Albany Times Union,
which has done a lot of good reporting on Keith Raniery. Uh. Yeah,
so if you're work for the Albany Times Union, congrats anyway,

(30:56):
None of the rapes are mentioned in Keith's official bios
obviously or the affidavit. He claims that during this time
he decided he was called on to teach people his
remarkable theories on learning. I'm quote from the affidavit here,
to test my theories and earn money. I became an
independent contractor for several marketing and sales organizations, with one
organization that had more than two thousand representatives nationally. I

(31:17):
was able to personally recruit and train, using my motivational methodology,
six of the ten top producers in a month. It
doesn't give the name of the company he was working for,
probably because it's a lie um definitely, which is a
big Keith threw eerie move. Yeah, just say the thing
without being the thing you did, like people who have
accomplished things do. Yeah. Like you can still be kind

(31:39):
of a scammer and have like but you just say
like I did this thing. Even Donald Trump people say
I built this building, I ran this company. I ran
this company, like keithrew an EARI there's never anything specific
it's mentioned, but it worked clear people Yeah listened. They
were usually younger, though, I assume yeah, or at least

(32:00):
in this in this sectual way. Yeah, so he wound
up quitting that unnamed organization because he says they didn't
gel with his ethical foundations, which never elaborates on, never
tells us what those ethical foundations are. But you know,
by the time the eighties are over, uh, he has
sort of started to settle on a new thing that

(32:21):
he wants to do. Using the quote from the affidavit,
in n held a meeting with four of my friends
in my living room to determine the principal structure of
a new business. We called this business Consumers Byline, which
like buyas and purchase, and officially started business on May Onet.
The business was based on my projective human model with ethics,
which does not tell you anything about what the business is.

(32:41):
It was a multi level marketing scam. It was a
pyramid scheme. People would pay two hundred plus dollars for
access to discount buying groups, which are supposed to give
them access to cheaper groceries and stuff, but if they
signed up other people then they get monthly commissions. The
grocery discount program was canceled, but the company kept charging
people for it, and they didn't actually pay people for
selling memberships. I there eventually they had something like a

(33:02):
quarter of a million members. But also we're paying out
millions in legal fees because they were defrauding tons of people,
very brazenly dera, very brazenly defrauding people, Like they're gonna
complain that they're not getting paid. Yeah, but if you
keep getting enough new members fast enough to pay the
legal fees, Keith Ranieri can live well. So in nineteen ninety,

(33:23):
the year that Keith and his friends came up with
Consumers Byline, Keith also allegedly sexually assaulted a twelve year
old Yeah, yeah, this is a This anonymous girl was
the child of a saleswoman who worked for the Consumers Byline.
According to The Times Union, her mother called Keith Ranieri
and Einstein quote. Rani would call staff meetings to deliver

(33:44):
sometimes tearful, emotional messages. He frequently showed a film without
a man who plants seeds in the desert to build
a forest. He suggested he was that type of noble
cultivator of people, which the deserts, the desert don't plant
seeds in it. It doesn't need trees, I mean, like
not that it doesn't have I wonder what that video was, Like,
did they stitch it together and make it seem like

(34:06):
the guy did it, like he planted a whole forest
in the desert. I don't know. It makes me like
if I was going to do that, it would be
like I'm gonna I'm gonna start an ocean in the
desert and I'm just gonna start dropping fish and water
and eventually we'll have us in oceans. Like, no, that's
not what it is. Yeah, that doesn't work. But like
if I were in his shoes, I think I would

(34:26):
just show people a real documentary, yeah, about an actual
inspiring person, Yeah, whom there are, and like jump on
that train. Yeah. Uh So he apparently, you know, saw
himself as a man who was planting seeds, and he
apparently decided to molest this twelve year old girl. So
Keith Nary told the girl's mom, who idolized him, that

(34:48):
he wanted to tutor her daughter. At the same time,
Keith's girlfriend apparently hired the young lady as a dog walker.
The girl alleges that Keith started by showering her with
attention and then quickly moved on to molesting her. Quote,
they told me, I was smart and took an interest
in me. They let me spend every afternoon at their house.
She said, it was exciting to be somewhere people wanted me.
I was perfect picking and secure at the time. To
have someone that mature and that well thought of be

(35:10):
interested in me, it was flattering. I was young and experienced,
overwhelmed and out of my league. Yeah. So, Keith continued
to have sex with her for quite some time in
his town house and empty offices and an elevator in
a broom closet at the plaza that hosted the consumers byline.
She claims the relationship went on for about a year,
with at least sixty individual sexual encounters. She reported it

(35:31):
to the police, but withheld her name. The report didn't
go anywhere. It's hard to say why, since police in
the Capitol region of New York purged all their files
in the late nineteen nineties, So it didn't nothing happened.
How can nothing happen off of that? I mean, that's
but that's the case with Cosby and with Weinstein. They
don't go anywhere for a long time. Yeah, that's true.
That's true. We're in such a radically differ a moment

(35:53):
right now. Yeah, this was still the dark ages for
that ship. Yeah. Wow, it's weird out, Like this idea
of telling a young girl she's smart and showering her
with attention. As shitty as that is, I feel like
that's still so common on college campuses and at high
schools with teachers kind of coming up towards that line.

(36:17):
I mean it works for everybody, because high schools, if
you're a thoughtful, smart person, usually not your favorite time. Yes,
it's rough for a lot of kids. And if an
adult who is well thought of says that like your
special and takes an interest in you, like that's that
can be a big deal. Yeah, because you feel the misunderstood, Uh,

(36:39):
you're doing Lincoln Douglas debate, which a lot of people
probably thought wasn't cool, certainly did not. You know, get
you dates. I'll tell you one thing, speach and debate.
At my high school, got you dates. We had no sports,
so it was like, I mean I thought it was
like the sports team. Yeah, I grew up in Texas,

(36:59):
so it was one of the was like, you know,
if you're on the football team, you can murder people,
but if you're anything else, if they didn't really care
all that much anyway. You remember that girl Gina from before, Yeah, okay,
so Keith convinced her to drop out of high school.
This is during the same time he's dating that twelve
year old. Um. He convinced a sixteen year old drop
out of high school, promising he would tutor her. The

(37:20):
two had kept seeing each other in Gina's family assumed
they would marry. She turned seventeen at some point during this,
which was the age of consent, so he was no
longer statutory raping er. He was just a creepy man
in his thirties dating a high schooler. That is a
line that exists. Yeah, it's fine, it's a crime anymore. Yeah,

(37:43):
it's hard to say exactly how long their sexual relationship continued.
She did eventually start going to college, and Keith reportedly
got angry when male teachers would praise her for being
smart because he's an abusive prick. Yeah, yeah, I feel
like we're getting that aspect of him. Yeah in college
for her for going to college. Not a story that

(38:03):
ends happily, but move on for right now. So when
you dig into the Keith's life, you get essentially two
stories there's the Keith story of what happened and the
everything else that you can actually back up with objective
evidence story of what happened. So in the everybody else
version of reality, Keith spends the early nineties building a
pyramid scheme and molesting end girls. His pyramid scheme falls
apart in which is also the year that he gets

(38:24):
reported of the cops from molesting another girl, which I
think we're four now three. That's when investigations in his
pyramid scheme collapses because investigations by twenty three states and
two federal agencies determined that the consumer's byline is in
fact a pyramid scheme. So Keith can't do that scheme anymore,
and he has to find another scheme. Now. In Keith's
version of reality, he just used his experience running a

(38:47):
totally legit and awesome business which was super successful and
then sadly had to shut down due to people's bigoted
ideas of the world. Uh. He used that experience though,
to learn about people. Um, he was studying human beings
the whole time he was working. He's a humanitarian in
his work and exploring and human psyche, and a scholar
and a judo champion. Don't you forget that I was

(39:10):
leading up to that. I was going in order of importance. Good.
When we get out of here today and someone asks
who are you talking about today, You'll say Keith r
An Eerie And they'll say, what's that guy? And you'll
say he was pretty fucking good at judo thirty or
forty years ago. Yeah, and they'll say it sounds sounds
legit sounds cool. Where can I give him my money? Yeah?
And I'll say, just ben, mom, if you get the fleece,

(39:33):
you can make that work. I own the fleece. You
gotta be wearing it. But I'm not. I don't look
like you. And Keith whoa, whoa. Okay, you know I
don't know if I can pull off a period scheme.
People are too suspicious of women. Well, yeah, that's probably fair, okay.

(39:56):
So Keith spent his time running a pyramid scheme and
moll and Girls, also learning about humanity, and he discovered
in his own claims that minds work the same way
as computers, only using words instead of numbers to program them.
So he built a new form of communication called rational inquiry,
and the R and the I are always capitalized, and
it's always followed by a trademark Signum. Oh no, this

(40:18):
is serious ship we're dealing with here. Don't don't you
dare dismiss rational inquiry? It sounds like a thing. Can
you hear the capitals? When I say it? The capital?
The first time I didn't, But then when you said
it again, I did? Rational inquiry? Now yes, Now it
sounds like a patented line of T M something see

(40:38):
M R M. I don't understand. I don't either. Um okay,
so you're probably wondering what is rational inquiry? I've got
a quote from Keith Reniery trying to explain it here. Quote.
It enabled a person to find a common understanding with
others antologically build a belief system that matched a person's
subjective world, highly individually at consistent. Using this model, people

(40:59):
seem to understand themselves and each other better. Do you
get what rational inquiry is? Now? Talking? That is of
what Keith Rawnery does is talk very quickly, uh and
throw out a bunch of big words. Um. So we're
going to get into the opus of Keith's life, the

(41:20):
main venture that would define most of his time on
this earth and would be his most successful project Nexium.
But before we get into Nexium, we need to go
talk about ads for products that are that are actual
things that you can buy, rather than nonsense words said
by a child molester. So please buy some products. We're

(41:47):
back and we're talking about Keith Ranieri, humanitarian, judo champion, businessman,
and molester of multiple children. He has a lot more
credentials than that. You're right, but we only have so
much time, that's true, And and I feel like I've
read multiple lists of his credentials in this cyclist Cyclist.

(42:08):
So at this point, Keith's first business may have been
a gigantic and possibly criminal disaster, but he sowed the
seeds of his next venture. Obviously, next um Keith medal
lady named Nancy Salzman, who he described as in the
fffidavit as an international authority on human potential? Which what
how can you be an international authority on potential? What

(42:31):
do you do for a living? Oh, you know, I
write for television. What do you do for a living, Oh,
I'm a I'm an accountant, I'm a I'm an expert
on human potential. It's like going up to everyone and
being like you can be anything you want or is
it the opposite going up to people and being like,
I think dentist. I feel like it's just reminding people

(42:52):
of what human beings can do. Like everybody's sitting around
talking about how to like build a road, and you're like,
you know, we landed a man on the moon at
one point, we could build a road, which is definitely
what it is. Bunch of executives are trying to figure
out a new flavor of Dorrito's and you're like, you know,
human beings made the Holocaust happen. Just you know, just

(43:12):
just reminding people because the human potential, Yeah, yeah, potential
can go either way. And it's important that the Dorrito's
people not fly too close to the sun. It is
because they've been flying real close lately. I know, cool
Ranch we were never meant to have it. No, we
can't handle it. I also hate Dorrito's. Cool Ranch is
a disgusting line of chips and a sea of terrible chips.

(43:34):
I just want to note to all the listeners that
it is not the official standpoint of this podcast that
cool Ranch Doritos aren't delicious. No, I understand many people
like them, but we're just trying to get the cool
ranch people to put some mad dollars our way. Oh yeah,
do they sponsor a lot of podcasts? I don't know,
but we could be the first. And I just want
people to know. If there is anyone from Dorito's listening,

(43:55):
please have a Derrito's tastic day. Yes, God, I love
a good Derito. Anyway, back to Keith Ranieri, Yes, a
good segue, speaking of speaking of chips, speaking of cheesy flavor.
So he met this lady, Nancy Salzman, International Authority and
human Potential. He touted her for six months on the

(44:16):
techniques of his new breakthrough learning science, and then the
two started Nexium. At this point you may be wondering
what the funk was Nexium. Well, next Sium was an
umbrella company and its main initial purpose was to host
professional development seminars focused around executive success programs all caps again, uh,
devised by Raneer, Rani and Salzman. You're probably still wondering
what the any of that means. This is by design

(44:38):
and the affidavit Ranieri had to file. He claims that
the basis for the training was a twelve point copyrighted
mission statement. The actual text of that mission statement is
a trade secret, and you aren't allowed to know what
it says unless you pay to take the class, at
which point you're required to sign a confidentiality agreement promising
not to tell anyone about it. So again, if you
are sitting at home wondering what the funk is he

(44:59):
actually doing, it's impossible to know. Well, it's not impossible
because we have some inside data, but we didn't dig
in on this ship. Did people break their n d
as in the course of this investigation? And how then
these aren't India's their confidentiality agreements, So we're not talking
about like a Weinstein level, where like somebody who has

(45:20):
very smart lawyers is drawing up actual iron clad legal documents.
We'll get into what these are a little bit. So
what happened in these executive success programs? Thankfully we have
reports from actual attendees. The following quotes are from a
woman who showed up at one of these seminars in
two thousands seven after being urged to do show so
by professionals. She admired. The whole process started with the
class received quote a document entitled Rules and Rituals which

(45:43):
informed us to never speak of any of our experiences
in esp Attendees were also told to quote, remove our shoes, bow,
and pay tribute to founder Keith Ranieri. There was a
lengthy explanation of how to perform a perfect handshake as
well as the ESP secret handshake, an explanation of how
different colored ash hierarchy works, which seems based entirely in
recruitment rather than a measurable skill set, and the request

(46:05):
that Keith Ranieri was to be referred to as Vanguard
and Nancy Salzman as Prefect. So, first off, the game
that Keith Rinieri played to impress the teenager he fucked
was Vanguard. I just think that's interesting. Oh. I don't
know if there's a connection there, but maybe weird. Right,
it's weird that people have to take off their shoes
and bow to him. That is weird. Huh, Like that's weird.

(46:29):
But then I started thinking, I've been an assistant for
various bosses and you start to do weird stuff that
you kind of normalize, where it's like, well, this is
this person is above me. I have to please them.
If I please them, things will go well. I guess
what I'm saying is I'm the kind of person that

(46:51):
would be an ac cult well, you might be able
to join this cult still, depending on how the court
cases go. Um. But there's a lot to dig into
in that pair graph and I do want to talk
about the handshake thing for a little bit, because back
in two thousand three, cult expert Rick Ross received several
internal Nexium training documents from a disgruntled attendee. He had
them analyzed by cult experts, including Dr Paul Martin, a

(47:13):
licensed clinical psychologist. This is where the affidavit comes from,
because Keith sued Rick Ross, saying that he was exposing
Nexium's trade secrets. He lost and so the stuff is
still up there. And now we have quotes from several
sections of the ESP training manuals and guidelines, including Keith R.
Neary's explanation of how to shake hands. Are you ready

(47:36):
to learn how to shake some fucking hands? Yeah? Okay, okay.
Quote handshaking is a sign of respect and affords us
an opportunity to make direct physical contact with others. We
believe that many of society's problems have developed because people
have come to view each other as objects rather than
human beings. So far, not entirely insane. Spoken from a

(47:57):
man who has sex with twelve year old spoken from
child molester. Yeah. Absolutely, But you know, society is fucked
up because people don't make direct physical contact enough. That's
an arguable point. Although creepy from the mouth of a
child molester it is, but I'm listening. Here. In the
sp we use a two handed handshake. This conveys warmth
into sense of community. Placement of the left hand denotes rank.

(48:19):
Individuals of higher rank place their left hand on the top.
Individuals of the same rank shake vertically. Lower rank places
the left hand on bottom. So simultaneously, society is fucked
up because we don't spend enough time connecting with each other.
But also, shaking someone's hand should be a sign of dominance. Wow,
you know what. It makes sense though, because he still

(48:40):
had to maintain this illusion that like he is always superior, exactly,
and you've got to reinforce that by changing the way people.
It's also crazy, is handshakes are that in real life
only with people who are lame? Okay, make that argument,
but I am not. I'm not much of a toucher.

(49:01):
I'm not much of a handshaker. I feel like it's
very awkward, even a hugger. Yeah, but it's fine. When
someone goes in to hold your hand, not to hold
but to shake it, and they have a steady, stern grip,
there's a little part of you that's like a steady grip,
but not like a crushing grip or anything like that.

(49:22):
Like I I spent some time, you know, working as
a war correspondent for a while in a couple of
different places, and I met a lot of really formidable
human beings, and none of them did the like crush
your hand. It was always just like a short like
like firm, but it was it was never like like
the people I've met who have always like really gone
into it and like gripped the hand like they're always lame.

(49:45):
They're always like sad little men who don't have any
other way to feel, to overcompensate. Yeah, I bet I
bet Keith had a very I bet Keith tried to
fucking rip your hand up here. Yeah. So there is
a detailed explanation for how to shake hands. And you
tell me if this gives you any good information on handshaking,

(50:06):
because I can't understand what the fun he's going for here.
Crux of the hand is the portion of the hand
between the thumb and forefinger, where they form a right angle.
Ristcock refers to the angle of the wrist, which can
be used to gain control of the handshake. It is
important to control the cock of the wrist slightly down
as you move into the handshake. Positioning of the feet
determines dominance. Stepping into the handshake with the right foot
creates a more dominant position, expressing strength for the handshaker.

(50:30):
Stepping into the handshake with the left foot will be
perceived by both people as a more passive expression. The
middle and ring fingers are used to gain control of
the handshake. Okay, I get it, now, I get Is
this still a rational inquiry? Oh yeah, I mean I
guess it's hard to it's hard to say where one
part and he's doing is taking ways that people interact

(50:52):
and explaining them as if you've never heard of it. Yeah,
like you're an alien, if you are an alien making
up because it never in my life. If I thought
about where my feet are in a handshake, or be
like that guy stepped forward with this left foot. He's
showing submission. Yes, no, And I feel like I should
acknowledge the fact that something can be said for like

(51:12):
the way we stand in the way we sit subconsciously,
like when you and this is something I've heard and
all that, like lean and talk for women, But when
you stand in a powerful stance and put your shoulders back,
that can affect your confident absolutely. But this the way
he's explaining it is not like feel more confident. It's

(51:34):
very Yeah, this is how to dominate the other person,
is how to take control of the handshake. Yeah, which
so sad. Yeah. These leaked documents are also how we
know the exact content of the confidentiality pledge that attendees
were forced to recite the methods and information I learned
in the ESP or from my use only, I will

(51:55):
not speak of them or in any way give others
knowledge of them outside ESP. Part of condition of being
accepted to ESP is to keep all its information confidential.
If I violate this, I am breaking a promise and
breaching my contract. But more importantly, I am compromising my
inner honesty and integrity. You know you're doing something embarrassing
when everyone's like, yeah, but let's not tell anyone, don't

(52:18):
tell anybody about this. Yeah, let's let's not know. There's
every great thing people are a part of includes a
confidentiality pledge. Yeah, anytime someone says that to me, I
immediately want to tell the whole world. So I'm like,
you don't get to tell me that. I feel like
that's why some of these documents like yeah, like whoa, whoa,
this is weird. I'm going to tell everyone. Going back

(52:39):
to the experiences of the lady we were quoting earlier,
who attended an sp course and wrote about it, she
also reported hearing an awful lot of nonsense about Keith
Renaris like que quote. At times it was two, at
other times it jumped to two hundred forty depending on
who was praising his amazing nous. Um attendees were forced
to watch a video of Nancy Salzman where she insisted
that Vanguard was one of only two or three people
in the world who could solve all of the planet's problems.

(53:02):
Um So. This attendee actually sat through the whole session
and says that she benefited from some of the exercises
in the course. Once the instructor got done praising Keith Rhneery.
It does sound like there's might be vaguely useful stuff
buried in the nonsense. But the session ended with a
two hour lecture on y E SP wasn't a cult,
which is the number one warning sign that something is
a cult. Yeah, come on, guys, this isn't a call.

(53:24):
This isn't a call. It's going to get a little weird,
but it's it's just how we do things. We're just
worshiping a man who makes us isolate ourselves from society
and our family. But it's not a cult. No. I
wonder if this guy had any experience with scientology. Oh boy,
he sure did. Oh yeah, no, scientology this so we'll
get into some of this a little bit. But his

(53:45):
everything that he's done is essentially a milange of iron
rand I'm rance philosophy and scientology, including using some of
the terms from scientology things to mash up. Yeah, it's
libertarian science pology. Yeah, so buckle up. So the session

(54:06):
in with the two our lecture on white ESP wasn't
a cult. The attendee who wrote that report noted that
a majority of the other attendees seem to be women
under twenty five who did not have a lot of
self confidence. Yeah. Now, her report doesn't go into an
awful lot of detail about the contents of the class,
but fortunately we do have direct quotes from Nexium's source material.
First off, here's an actual definition from the class of

(54:26):
rational inquiry. Rational inquiry is a science based on the
belief that the more consistent a person is in their thinking,
the more successful the individual will be. That's bullshit. Well,
that is in keeping with vagueness. That is the way,
the vaguest way to talk about human thinking. Yeah, just
be consistent. Which also that's bullshit because if you've ever

(54:50):
worked a creative job, you know one of the keys
to being effectively creative in a productive way is to
change your circumstances and situation, mind state, and whatnot so
that you can have you know, better ideas and even
mean in this context, Yeah, consistency is great if you're
making car engines. It's not great if you're a creative

(55:11):
person trying to make a creative product. Yeah. Anyway, Keith
Renery does go into more detail about what rational inquiry is,
so we'll see if by the end of this paragraph
you have any fucking idea what his breakthrough sciences. All
adults have disintegrations because when they were children learning to
be adults and learning about the world, our perspective was
based on the perception, intellect, and wisdom of a small child.

(55:33):
These lessons become the foundation of our whole adult reality.
Rational inquiry lets you re examine these childhood beliefs from
an adult perspective. So Keith Near, he claims he invented
growing up. Yeah what literally, all he's doing is taking
things people do anyway and naturally and giving them a

(55:55):
bad name. Yeah, giving them a bad name, claiming that like, like, yes,
of course we all learn things about the world that
aren't true as children. Yeah, yeah, which is childhood. But
I can see him. Maybe I'm giving him too much credit,
but I can see the way that this like grasps
at the edges of like psychoanalysis and question what you

(56:16):
know to be reality, but in the like most useless
of ways. Yeah, yeah, I can't see how anyone could
benefit in a major way from this stuff. But I
can see how because then this is something you'll see
when we play some of his audio later. He will
start with like, this is like citing an actual concept
in psychology or developmental psychology or whatever, And for a

(56:36):
minute or two he'll say something that's not nonsense, and
he'll use that actual fact to make the nonsense that
comes later sound like it's got some basis in science
as opposed to just Keith Ranierie being full of ship.
So uh, let's discuss the mission statement of Nexium Um.
If you remember from the affidavit, Keith stated that his
mission statement was so important that he had to see

(56:57):
a guy over it. Here's how Dr Martin, who's one
of the experts Rick Ross had review the materials, described
the mission statement. The first point is success is an
internal state of clear, honest knowledge of what I am,
my value in the world, and my responsibility for the
way I react to things. The second point is there
are no ultimate victims. Therefore I will not choose to
be a victim. There's a pledge to purge oneself of

(57:19):
all parasite and nvy based habits. There's a pledge to
control as much of the money of the world as
possible within each student's success plan quote, a world of
successful people will be a better world, and indeed a
world devoid of hunger, theft, dishonesty, envy, and insecurity. People
will no longer try to destroy each other and steal
from each other or rejoice at in other's demise. Success
ethics and integrity are coinspirational. I pledge to share and

(57:43):
enroll people in ESP and its mission for myself to
help make the world a better place to live. Man,
the parallels to Trump are so heavy, Like I can
see how offering people a way to empower themselves out
of perceived victimhood could be enticing, but then tacking on

(58:05):
and I'm going to make you super rich. Not just that,
but the best thing. You know, if you're an ethical person,
you look at it, all the fund up shi in
the world, and you're like, oh my god, what could
I do? He's saying the best thing you can do
for the world is to make a shipload of money. Yeah. Wow,
it's so broken. It's sad. It's the way I mean,
if not to compare Keith Ranieri to fucking Hitler because

(58:29):
they're not very similar people, but it's the same. It's
the same thing. Like if you can tell a group
of young people how special they are and make them
feel special, they'll do almost anything for you. But on
the other hand, I certainly have been in that position
numerous times, like in high school, having a mentor who

(58:51):
was a like a senior at the time, who was
who seems so politically smart and led all the protests
on campus and then looking back and like, I don't know. Yeah,
he was just kind of getting off on having a
lot of people look up to him. Yeah, And it's
easy then, because you're in a very small pond. You
don't need to know that much about the world. To

(59:11):
Keith didn't need to know that much. He just needed
to be better at talking than these people. Yeah. Yeah,
and of course make them pay thousands of dollars to
attend his classes, because there is a sunk cost fallacy
going on here. The five day intensive e SP course costs.
There was a three day intensive in a sixteen day
course which one assumes had to run at least seven

(59:32):
or eight thousand dollars. So you're paying this guy a
lot of money. You're going to be more inclined to
believe he's not full of ship, right, Yeah, you got
to protect yourself exactly. Say what you will about improv.
But it's cheaper than that, Yes, yes, do improv, improv
comedy cheaper than ESP classes. The healthiest quote you could
join is improv. Yeah, maybe cross fit is a notch

(59:55):
above it. Well, but people poop themselves a lot doing CrossFit.
That's a real effect. If you know someone who got
super at a crossbit, hey look excellent, they do look great. Yeah.
A cornerstone of the intensive classes was working to shed
parasitic behaviors, which you know we already quoted a little bit.
Examples of such behavior included complaining about pain, expressing hunger,

(01:00:19):
and statements like I know I promised, but I had
no idea how hard or painful this was going to be.
Oh god, oh yeah. Keith Renieri probably child molester, also
gave new definitions of the words good and bad. Quote
when we were little children, we learned bad when someone
yelled no, or that's bad stop. We learned good when
we were rewarded in some way. This sort of learning

(01:00:40):
is inconsistent limiting, because in order to have a full
understanding of each concept, we would have to examine every
example of good and every example of bad. This practice
session affords you the opportunity to reevaluate your definitions of
these vital concepts to form a solid foundation for the future,
which is, it sounds like someone who's going to do
something bad, sounds like someone good do something bad and
tell you it's good. Yeah, yeah, And if there's probably

(01:01:03):
no creepier thing than saying it's parasitic to tell someone
that you don't want to do something because it's painful. Yeah, yeah,
yeah yeah. We already talked about how there are along
lectures about how Nexium wasn't a cult. Keith does in
his training manuals define the word cult. Uh quote. This
is a label that conveys no meaning but to values
the group. It is designed to keep people away from

(01:01:25):
the group without saying what is wrong with it. Example,
that's a cult. Classic exam classic, example, that's a cult.
They also call anyone who doubts Nexium or anyone who
breaks faith and tells other people at the classes a suppressive,
which is straight out of scientology. Yeah. I could go

(01:01:45):
on about Executive Success program training all day, but we
have so much more ground to cover. I do want
to point out just how careful Keith was to stay
just on this side of not making legally fraudulent claims
about his services. So I'm going to play a selection
from a video Keith made called what Executive s S
Programs Does, where he claims his seminars have supernatural healing
powers in the weaselst way possible, and we will be

(01:02:07):
posting links to all these videos on the site if
you guys want to see Keith Renieri's creepy face, but
you'll get a lot out of hearing his creepy voice.
And I will say, within the thousands of people who
have gone through we've had some incredibly you might call
it strange or or wonderful happenings. And you can easily

(01:02:27):
hold that up and say, oh, you know, we change
this condition, or we there's one person in one of
our intensives for whatever reason, how who knows, grew like
three quarters of an inch and they're had some sort
of release I think in their spine or their posture.
Who knows what. Now that could have happened on the playground,

(01:02:49):
that doesn't necessarily happen from us. We've certainly that would
be at best a case study and inadvertent case study.
You certainly haven't done a double blind study, can we?
You know? But do you have something like that, and oh,
should we hold that up as a poster child and whatever? No,
because I'm sure there are many activities. You know, public

(01:03:10):
school has probably had more than we have of those
sort of things. So when people get really good results
from us, yes, we do take testimonials at times or whatever,
but we we look at those results ideally as an
effect of really the answer to the question do you
have more joy in your life? We would have been

(01:03:34):
very satisfied with our results with you if you kept
your full blown turets and all of that sort of thing,
but came out saying, you know something, life is better
for me. So that guy is claiming that Keith cured
his turets. Yeah, but no, but that's not what we're
saying the course does. We're just saying this guy took
the course and we're not saying it will make you taller.

(01:03:55):
But it did happen to this one guy. Yeah, that's
it's smart. Again, it's a trump check dick. But I
didn't get it when I just heard the written version
of him. But hearing that he does know how to speak.
He's very good at sea bringing it back like he
was literally spouting bullshit. You said it best like supernatural,

(01:04:19):
uh capacity of of course, like you know, you didn't
make someone grow. Yeah, that's nonsense. Um. But to bring
it back to like this question of did we bring
more joy into your life? That's laser focus, that manipulating people. Yeah,
and Keith Ranieri whatever else you can say about him,
is a genius at manipulating people. Yeah. Um, and this

(01:04:43):
brings us to the end of the part one of
our two part series and Keith Ranieri. This wound up
being like an eight thousand word thing that I wrote
for this, so we have a lot more to cover
when we come back on Thursday. We're going to talk
about the first news articles that started to uncover the
terrible story of Key through Eery back in the early
two thousand's. Uh. And yes, we will get to more

(01:05:03):
detail about the branding and all of that horrible ship.
And we will also have some really weird videos of
Keith Raney and Alex and Mac, So get ready for
that on Thursday. Until then, Anna, do you wanna plug
your plugables? Yeah? You can find me on Instagram. I
make a web comic. It's bad Comics with an X
by Anna with two ends. I make comics about depression, anxiety,

(01:05:28):
and cheese. So I'm lack post intolerant And you can
find me on Twitter at bad Comics by Anna. Her
comics are actually good. Thank you. We've gotta we've got
to throw that into legal reasons. Um. Yeah, we can't
be false advertising here h and by Doritos, by cool
Ranch is the coolest of the ranches. Yeah, I'm Robert Evans.

(01:05:50):
You can find me on Twitter at I Write Okay
two letters from my book on the Internet at A
Brief History of Vices. It's on Amazon um. And you
can find Behind the Bastards online at behind the Bastards
dot com or on Twitter at Bastards pod. Uh So
check us out. We'll have you know, some some video
clips and pictures of this creep on there, and come

(01:06:11):
back Thursday for the stirring conclusion to the story of
Keith Rniery, a real piece of ship m