 I hate looking stupid. I think we all hate looking stupid. And I just felt sad and I was embarrassed, et cetera. All these, all the words. I feel like she's trying to tell a story that just doesn't exist. Like the article that she was trying to write doesn't piece together. And that's why it's such a bad article because the story that she's trying to put together doesn't make any sense because it's not there. From our conversation, it was completely not what I was told how it's gonna go. Like be open and honest with your intention because anybody has any right to be critical of the movement and take a microscope to it. Native advertising is basically saying to corporations that wanna advertise, we will camouflage your ads to make them look like news stories. The ad is the kind you've probably seen. It's called sponsored content and it's formatted to look like an actual article on their website. The DSA tells everyone that what it is is a member-based organization. The truth is, it's a lobbying organization. An article about anti-malem that makes absolutely no sense. The creators quoted for that article speak out the Atlantic's dark past and corruption in the MLM world. In part two of this two-part series on the anti-malem article I read, things are about to get a lot deeper. First off, if you haven't seen part one of this two-part series, definitely check it out. I'll link it right above and also below in the description just because this might be a little bit confusing if you haven't seen part one. And let's jump right into it. So in the last episode, I mentioned how I came across an article on the Atlantic that had my face all over it. And one thing I vaguely mentioned in that video are the anti-malem creators who were quoted in the article. Heather Rainbow on TikTok, who makes awesome videos. If you DM people and ask them to join your team, you're in a pyramid scheme. Thank you, thank you, I'll be here all week. She's hilarious. And not the good girl or Josie Nyquay here on YouTube. There's a reason that people don't speak up when they leave an MLM, when they were in the top of the pyramid, when they were in the 1%. And it's because the shame and the guilt eats them up. Who makes incredible and informative content. Much of the quotes and perspective and outlook of these creators was not really shown in the article. And there were really only one or two quotes used from each individual. So I wanted to get insight on what each creator's experience was being interviewed for this article, what they talked about in the interview and whether they felt that the article really did them justice in their outlook on anti-MLM and what they communicated to the reporter. I was able to sit down with both creators and talk about their experience being quoted in this article. First, I talked to Heather Rainbow and discussed her experience with this reporter and this is what Heather had to say. Hey, I'd love to learn first off more about your anti-MLM work and your TikTok account and all of that and where people can follow you and stuff. Sure, I think we all kind of go through this but I'm still so embarrassed to talk about myself and like, oh, the TikToks I make, you know but I've just got to get over that. But yeah, I started making anti-MLM TikToks kind of after I started researching being anti-MLM as a whole and after I found the community I was really inspired by everyone that I saw and I come from a really small town. So we all know that small towns are infested with multiple marketing companies. They're everywhere. We all know this, unfortunately. I was never in one but they certainly surrounded me and what made you choose TikTok as like a platform and everything? I can totally talk about that because YouTube, I have a YouTube channel and I've made a couple of videos and it is so hard. So mad respect to all of you because it's so time consuming. It is so time consuming. And also no one was really doing it on TikTok that I saw making specific anti-MLM content. So I think there was really a potential there to reach people that were not familiar with the community. Talking about the TikTok leads us to the Atlantic because she first reached out to me after the TikTok fan. And how did she kind of approach you and like and talk to you about, you know your work in anti-MLM and all of that? So I can't quite remember if she DM'd me on Instagram or reached out to me initially over email but she was just interested in asking me some questions about TikTok banning multiple marketing companies. I had no knowledge of this person at the time and I was so excited that she would reach out to me and I was like, wow, someone wants to hear what I have to say about something that's so cool that's never happened to me before. So I had an email exchange with her which looking back, I preferred the email exchange whereas the second time around which we'll get to she asked for a phone call and looking back I wish I had kind of pushed to just say oh, let's actually just stick with email but I had no way of knowing what was gonna happen. So, you know, but in the future if any reporters reach out to you I felt like that article came out about the TikTok ban of multiple marketing companies was really good. I felt very well represented. I thought the quotes that she used in mine were really fair and they really represent what I said as a whole and kind of what my whole email exchange was about. So that article kind of led me to have some kind of trust in her and I'm sure this wasn't her intention but this is of course just how I'm reading the situation how I can perceive what she did which of course we don't necessarily know her thought process but then that article came out I was really excited about it. I promoted it even linked it in my bio all kinds of things. This reporter reached back out to me and said hey, I wanna make a article about the anti-mlem community more as a whole and about the anti-mlem movement as a whole. It was a great phone call. I got extremely passionate. I was excited. I was thrilled that someone wanted to hear about this and really the heart of what I said I unfortunately don't have the phone call recorded I kind of wish I had but I can tell you that the heart of what I said was listen, we have to stick to how unethical the business model is. We never wanna go after individuals. We wanna stick to the ethical argument. These companies do not belong anywhere in our functioning society. They should be outlawed. We never wanna attack people. This is kind of just what I was saying and she even asked me about... So this reporter even asked me about Kimber and I only said positive things which is so ironic because of how the article came out later. And you were never quoted. You were never quoted about that situation. And it was... No. Yeah. Interesting. So, you know, as I said, I don't have the phone call recorded. I don't wanna accidentally say anything wrong but to the best of my knowledge, I said, you know, we just see the ethical issue differently and it's unfortunate but I don't think she built a brand. I even defended her. I said, I don't think she built a brand off of being anti-malem. I think she has her own brand which she sells her own stuff which is awesome. And we just see this ethical issue differently and she's a business woman and she's business-minded and that's what it is. So I even like defended her integrity which is like the whole article is about the opposite of that which is just what made me so mad. It really is what made me so mad. But I'll get to all that and like my feelings about the article in a second but just for the sake of finishing the story. Then the article comes out. We hang up the phone. I, you know, was glowing. I was so excited that the reporter wanted to talk to me. The article comes out and I heard from another creator that she did us dirty. And I was like, no way. No way she did. And I looked at the article and the more I read the article the more I really did get upset because I felt like it really misrepresented us and shared a side of the story that was complete idiocy to be honest. Like the story that she was trying to tell doesn't even exist and that's why the article as a whole makes no sense. I did reach out to the reporter. I sent her an email and I think I explained really well how I felt about the article that I felt it kind of misrepresented us and it left a bit of a bad taste in my mouth especially in the sections that I was quoted. I thought it was a little bizarre because those quotes didn't represent really what I said. They were kind of picked out of a sentence that she had asked me about. So then she, you know, responded back and said, okay, I can discuss with you, blah, blah, blah, sorry. I sent her another email and she never responded. That's kind of the end of the story with the reporter. She said she'd be happy to discuss. I sent her a very detailed email with all of my thoughts and I was trying to be very kind and understanding because I know it's just her job and she wants story and that's life, that's business. I get it, I'm not an idiot. But to say you're happy to discuss and then never respond to my email is like, why would you say you're happy to discuss? Maybe just say you're not open to discuss. I mean, I don't know. It feels like also it's not really fair reporting. The whole point of the article was the perspective of the anti-MLM community and then they literally did not under, want to understand your perspective didn't take it into account and didn't respond to your emails when you were trying to clarify it in writing, this is what I said, this is what I meant by this. To me, that just doesn't really feel like fair reporting at all. I would have to agree. And let me just pull up the article really quick because I want to talk about how she quoted me. I feel like that was really what upset me. Let's get into what she said about me. Oh God, I can't. Well, that's a thing. It's like, you know. I don't even read this again because it made me really upset. It's your, it's not only, it's what you do. It's something that you've built yourself on social media. All of a sudden being taken out of context, being made into this thing, it's not like, obviously you're going to be upset about that. And I think you have a right to, you know? And that's like one thing I want to put out there. It's like, I know that she mentioned to me that she had a rushed deadline for this article and all that, but it's like, okay. But you still, you know, did this. You still made people feel this way. That's not okay. And people still have a right to talk about it, you know? Yeah. If you want to talk about ulterior motives or being unethical with your platform, let's talk about you because we feel so misrepresented by this article and you implied such strange things about us that make no sense. So you want to talk about, you know, you're, we're not using our platforms, right? Or we're unethical or something. Well, we can talk about you too. I mean, I get that that's kind of skirting around the point I get. So starting off, she calls me a, okay, hang on. Starting off, she says that I made my first anti-malem TikTok video, green screen myself in front of what I claim to be the 2018 MONAT income disclosure statement, which I thought was interesting because I, I claim that it's, uh, okay, sure. You know, you can have that one. Fine, that's fine. It's easily, what? I'm just gonna pass that. I didn't even catch that. It's fine. I know. Oh, trust me. I know. I know. I mean, that's easily researched to be the income disclosure. Oh, I know. Fine. And then, and then she says, she now considers herself something of a consumer advocate and misinformation combatant. Okay. Let me tell you how this, this line came into being because she said, so would you consider yourself as part of, again, I have the phone call recorded. This is what I remember her saying. Would you consider yourself fighting misinformation online? Do you consider part of your work to be fighting misinformation? And trying to expand on that and, you know, go along with her point. I was like, yeah, of course, being anti-MLM, we want to fight misinformation because someone has to share the other side of the story. You know, so, so often on social media, we only get the bright and shiny side of the MLMers and someone's got to combat their misinformation, advocate for consumers. So in that sense, I'm a consumer advocate. I want to fight misinformation, et cetera. So it was in the context of the question that she asked me, she asked, do you fight misinformation? I was like, sure, you know, duh. I mean, you almost wonder if she had that in mind before, like she had that sentence or quote, in mind before even interviewing you. And she had structured the questions because she knew you'd probably say, because I would do the same thing. That is exactly what I said in my first email. I said, it feels like you already had the story written when you were asking me the questions and that's really what left a bad taste for me else. So I totally relate to what you're saying there. For a second, I wanted to make a t-shirt that says consumer advocate. I thought that would be really funny. Something of a consumer advocate. Let's do it. That was genius. You know what, 100% like in this video, I'm definitely leaving that in. I 100% think you should do it. And I know people in the comments will probably back me up. I think it would be really funny. I'm not even kidding. Something of a consumer advocate. Which, oh, and we'll get into too, the funniest part of this, which is that you don't really make that much money on TikTok. Oh no, no, that's ridiculous. I mean, I've made so little money doing this. It's insane. I mean, I literally, I essentially do it for free. I mean, I do it for next to free. I have a real job. I'm a student. I don't need this money. Yeah, but I do need money, but not this money. I mean, I've seen the like, like the stats on TikTok of like income or whatever. And it's like, you do not, you do not make money. Like what? Like, yeah. You don't make enough money for it to be like, oh, like she's just building a brand. It's not a ludicrous business opportunity. Let me tell you. Maybe we should join an MLM. Okay, so then she also asked me about the subreddit. And in an effort to spread positivity, to show solidarity with my other anti MLM people, I was like, oh my God, love the Reddit. They're so funny. I scroll through there all the time. Love what they're doing. Their community is so big. And really the point that I wanted to make when I was saying that was that we are no more important than anyone else's anti MLM. And those individuals are the anti MLM community. We as content creators are not the anti MLM community. We just have a voice on social media that we use to talk about being anti MLM. But the anti MLM community is these individual people who are doing more important than work than we are because they're doing it, you know, in their daily lives with just the people they know. And that's really what I was trying to say. So I thought it, maybe that didn't come across. So after she goes and describes the Reddit and how, I mean, in my opinion, I feel like she kind of implies that they're mean and she doesn't describe them in a very nice way. To be honest, I felt like that was how she described the Reddit. So then right, of course, right after that, she puts my quote about the Reddit, which is the OG anti MLMers. And how I said they are the heart of the movement, which is true. I did say that. But I mean, I felt like that was so important. What I was trying to say was like, there's so much more important than we are, like we just, you know, have a voice, but you know what I mean? I feel like now I've shared, you know, the other side of those quotes that she used because I felt really just kind of shit about it, like just, wow, she kind of made me look stupid and I hate looking stupid. I think we all hate looking stupid. And I just felt sad and I was embarrassed, et cetera. All these, all the words, all the annoyed, depressed words. And after I, you know, was sad and I felt, wow, I really trusted this lady and, you know, looking back and after the emails and everything, I sort of get a lot more angry. And this is where I start to get fired up because I feel like she's trying to tell a story that just doesn't exist. Like the article that she was trying to write doesn't piece together. And that's why it's such a bad article because the story that she's trying to put together doesn't make any sense because it's not there. Like this is not what the anti-anti-anti is. We're just against an ethical business model. It's really not that complicated to understand. And it boggles my mind. Exactly. There's so many different ways to be anti-anti-anti. There's so many ways of being anti-anti-anti in your life on social media, whatever, what have you, you know, any number of things that represent us like this is just insane to me. And then to write this as if it's like a Kimber tells all piece is it's like, what, like she has specifically made it clear that she wants nothing to do with this community. She's not interested in being anti-anti-anti. So why are you still talking about us? Why do you feel any need to share your perspective on us? When you don't like, I mean, it just doesn't make any sense. It's like the Atlantic has become some kind of YouTube drama channel. What is this? Why is it like Kimber tells all sympathy piece? I mean, it literally makes no sense to me. It really did make me upset because I'm so not like that as a person where I would just trust someone and give them, you know, insights that are really important to me and talk about something that's really important to me in a way that I think they're gonna represent me well. And, you know, I feel like I did in that phone call representing the anti-MLN community really well. And I felt proud of how I communicated with her. And then after seeing the article, it really was disappointing because I felt like, you know, she had no obligation obviously to use any of my quotes, but just to use those quotes and then to paint in the community in this bizarre way when I was literally saying the exact opposite the whole time I was saying the opposite of what this article says. And that is exactly what she left out. Like my whole interview, what I actually said completely destroys her argument. It is the answer to the article. I mean, the article asked a question and my interview answered it, but she left it out. What is this? And so that's when I was like, is this reporting, is this journalism? Like, yeah. But that's what really grinded my ears because the article is proposing this scenario that doesn't exist and which is completely answered in what I told her about how we're against it and I think, well, this is model we're on against individuals. People don't build brands off of being anti-MLM. And if they do, that's their problem. Yeah. I'm supposed to do stop all these people from being anti-MLM online because they're doing it for money. Like how the heck would I do that? I mean, it doesn't make any sense. And then at the end of the article, this, let me just tell you, this is my favorite line. This is my favorite line in the article. A large group of mostly women is pushing back against an industry that has targeted them for years. Is it a movement or is it a collection of individuals expressing dissent? We'll get to that in a second. And sometimes leveraging that frustration into a personal brand. Is it a movement or is it a collection of individuals expressing dissent? Do you want to maybe define a movement for me? Do you want to maybe give me a quick wiki definition of move because I think it's a group of individuals expressing dissent. That's what I thought it was. Someone get this lady a thesaurus because I don't even know what you're saying about that. It's so disappointing and it's so frustrating to have something that you're so passionate about and truly deeply care about and want to advocate for, be twisted in such a bizarre way. She says she's a fan of the community and she likes anti-eminent content. That's what she said to me in email. So it was just so bizarre that she would paint it in this way. And I understand you need a story. I understand your story needs to have some kind of question or some kind of thought prompt or maybe upset some people. Like I said, my interview disproved what she says here. Before the question was even asked, you literally were already saying like, that's not it. I was prepared. I was like, you know, we fight this unethical method of business. We think it's not fair. It's broken, blah, blah, blah. And of course she ignored that, which is really disappointing. It's frustrating that the Atlantic of all publications is allowing this. I mean, it was bizarre. I feel that after describing my quotes to you, do you feel like they were taken out of context? 100%. I wanted to understand her perspective. I really did, especially after she sent me the initial email back saying, oh, I'm so sorry. The artist left a bentis in your mouth. Let's discuss. I was like, oh, maybe she genuinely doesn't know that we read it this way. Maybe she put it together and didn't take a step back. It's hard to take a step back of your own writing and see what it's really saying underneath or how it might read. So I was totally willing to give her the benefit and after she said that, I was gonna stop making any videos but I wasn't gonna even talk about it because I was like, maybe she just misunderstood or et cetera. But then after all these interactions and you know, finding that out, it starts to all fall apart once again. Thank you so much to Heather for talking and for being willing to share her experiences. I know it can be kind of intimidating talking about such a reputable publisher. So I wanna thank her so much for having the courage to speak out. Definitely give Heather some love. I'll have her TikTok bio linked in the description of this video. So that was Heather's disappointing and disheartening experience with this reporter. But what about Josie's? Did they have a similar experience or was hers completely different? Let's find out. When I saw it, I was like, okay. I was like, this one in a totally different way than I thought it would. It's super critical of the community, which is fine. Like, that's fine if you, we should be questioning people if they're doing this for the right reasons or not. But yeah, from our conversation, it was completely not what I was told how it was gonna go. Like, be open and honest with your intention because anybody has any right to be critical of the movement and take a microscope to it and be like, is this really what it appears to be? But tell us that. Don't act like, oh, I just wanna get your take on the MLM industry. So what is the work that you do on YouTube? On YouTube, I am not the good girl. And I created that channel name because I knew that speaking out, I would be labeled as a hater. I would be labeled as bitter and I would be looked at as a bad person. And I was like, okay, I'll accept all those things, whatever. I will not be your good girl if it means me sharing what I witnessed from this predatory industry. So yeah, my channel name is not the good girl. And I do a lot of anti MLM content in the future. I'll be branching out into other types of content with like deep dives and my thoughts on certain issues. Anti MLM will always be a theme on my channel because of what I witnessed in the industry. And yeah, that's me. I don't have Facebook. I don't have Instagram or Twitter so I can't promote those. Sorry. For email to me was just that I'm working on another MLM story now that is slightly broader than the quick news hit. Would you have time someday next week? We're off on Monday, but yadda yadda. And I was like, yeah, sure. And then like we scheduled and the first call was the, all about the breakaway movement, which I just thought, I don't know about that. And I said, I don't know about the breakaway movement that much. And I kept referring your video on it, which was really good and in depth. And then I preferred the recovering hun bot cause I think Alonda did a video on the breakaway movement. So I kept referring heard of those cause I was like, I don't really know much about them. All I can tell you is that all commercial cults, all cults use the same tactics. And that's when I brought up the bite model and I went into those and I gave like, you know, examples of how those have been used on people, on vulnerable men and women. I wrote like, I wrote up my notes for this cause I was like, I don't want to, number one, I don't want to speculate on anything. I want to make sure that I'm looking at the journalist words. And I also wanted to say like, before I talked with you, I posted that article on my community tab on YouTube. And I said that like this was solid journalism. And I praised it from the perspective that we should be looked at critically. Anybody in the anti-MLM community should be looked at critically. And people should be asking themselves, do I feel that this person is involved in this movement for the right reasons? Not thinking critically enough is what got me into an in an MLM in the first place. I felt, in my opinion, it felt like a bit bait and switch with what the reporter and I talked about and then what she used. But at first I figured maybe I misunderstood the questions on the call or like the direction the article was going. And that was disheartening. I remember after talking with you and after hearing what you had to say and what Heather had to say, I thought to myself, I don't ever want to do another interview again with somebody where you can't hear my voice, you can't see my face because I felt like it was taken out of context. And I was like, what if this was like even on a more serious topic, like this was a serious topic, but even worse, you know, the fact that she won't take that picture down, that you're a minor in, like it makes me think that her intentions are not great. And normally like, you know, I don't have a problem with journalists. I'm a fan of free speech. I'm a fan of journalists. I like, I wanted to be one. I totally respect journalists, but everything that's happened after, like it, it makes me think her intentions were not good for this. One thing she said, I believe it was in the beginning. She wrote, for the most part, they, talking about MLMs, they were an unremarkable part of women's lives. And she was talking about before social media, MLMs were an unremarkable part of women's lives. And I'm like, this is so, this is inaccurate. This is inaccurate reporting because if there have been lawsuits against MLM companies forever, since I mean at least like the 70s, 80s, there have been prominent lawsuits taken against these companies for their predatory practices. And I just was really surprised to see that because I've had, I've talked with women who, I'm 34, I've talked with women who are in their 40s, 50s and 60s. And they know that these, they call them pyramid schemes. Like they know that these are not good companies to be around with. Like they've affected people's lives for a long time. So she said anti MLM is still diffused and disorganized, but its rise poses an existential threat to multi-level marketing companies that rely on the constant recruitment of new participants. And its newfound popularity is already presenting challenges for the community which critiques capitalism on commercial platforms. If criticizing multi-level marketing is a good way to get views and followers and personal attention, how long will it be before that becomes the reason to criticize multi-level marketing? And I believe that like capitalism absolutely has major flaws, but that's not what we do at all here. Like that's not what we do. And I kept mentioning to this reporter over and over the cult tactics that are used by these predatory companies on men and women, you know, like the gaslighting, the black and white thinking, the toxic positivity, the thought programming. I felt like that journalist like really didn't wanna hear it. You know, like it was just like, I don't know. And I just kept trying to bring it up again. Cause I'm like, this is significant. This is, this is why there's a movement. Like people are hurt, have been hurt by this significantly. She went on to say, setting aside the silliness of mugs with rude slogans, the incentive structures of YouTube, which at the moment seem to be rewarding anti-MLM content have complicated the community's self-perception. Videos that go viral often have dramatic clickbait titles about shocking horror stories and culty overheard phone calls. So dictionary.com describes clickbait as misleading internet content or shocking headline titles that aim to drive traffic to a website. And Urban Dictionary describes it as bait for clicks. The bait comes in many shapes and sizes, but it's usually intentionally misleading and or crassly provocative. Clicking will inevitably cause disappointment. Clickbait is usually created for money, unquote. So I thought that was so interesting because I don't believe that the anti-MLM community uses clickbait. When we say we have a shocking story, we have a shocking story. Like when we say we, like there's culty things used, like we show that through the bike model. It's almost like, like she's using like, I don't know, like double speak to, to take away from the true pain that the victims haven't do word, which is why this movement was started in the first place. Don't feel that when they click on those shocking headlines that they walk away and think that was nothing, that wasn't shocking. Like the reason we're getting views is because this stuff has been hidden. It has been tried to be swept under the rug and it is completely shocking. I just really wish, and I don't even think it's just this reporter. I feel like a lot of reporters, several who have interviewed me, I feel like when I talk about the bike model and the fact that that is a tool that is used globally to identify cults and high-control organizations, they don't wanna hear it. And I think it's because maybe they're afraid of the word cult. But now with what's going on in our mainstream media with QAnon and all these far-right cult groups, they're not gonna be able to look away from it. And so I do hope in the future that that has brought more to the forefront because it's what made this entire industry, the MLM industry so predatory. I wrote that the journalist mentioned my first anti-MLM video where I came out of the anti-MLM closet had the third highest views. And then she went on to write, but there is some evidence that the MLM is struggling to recruit new participants, which Nikoi noted as tentative proof that viral videos and massive commercial or massive comment threads may be working. The industry needed charming influencers and exciting social media messaging to keep it growing. And now those things are being weaponized against it. So first off, I specifically mentioned with her cause she would ask me stuff about the drama that was happening in the anti-MLM community. And I was like, you know, I don't have Facebook, I don't have Twitter, I don't have Instagram. So I might not see everything. I just wanna like let her know that up front, that things that she might have seen about the community I may not have seen. But if you're going to imply that I'm a charming influencer, which I hate that word, like at least show the other side that I don't have all these social media platforms that I only have YouTube. And it just felt disingenuous to not mention that. And I feel almost like we're the anti-influencers, right? Like we're the ones coming out saying it's not pretty. It's not all sunshine and rainbows. Like what they're showing you online is complete BS and this is how it really is, you know? I mean, I left the MLM industry and the coaching industry because I was like, screw this. Like if I have to like show this facade, this lifestyle to get clients, to get customers, like it's just sick and it's nothing but toxic positivity and gaslighting that you're supposed to use on others. And no, so I think we are like the anti-influencers. And my husband at the time was like, or my husband now, but at the time when I showed him the article, he was like, he goes, did you know you had the third highest views on that video? No, I don't because I'm not like- Who said that stuff? Right, like of course we have YouTube analytics, but I'm not comparing my channel to like Kiki Chanel or to you or whatever. I wouldn't even think to do that or know how to go about doing that. To me, that would take forever and it's pointless. That's a lot of time. So it was just very bizarre to me to point that out. I was monetized before on YouTube, before I came out of the anti-MLM, or out of that, yeah, out of the anti-MLM closet, I was monetized already. And I would have been completely fine talking about how creators are monetized and maybe how they're trying to create a brand or whether the anti-MLM community is being taken advantage of for coin. Like I would have been happy to talk about that because sure, that's a story, but that was never, that intent was never shown in the interview. I think that journalists should remain unbiased and I don't feel that this was an unbiased article. Yeah, it really feels like she did have an idea of the point she wanted to make in this article before even researching or diving into it. And that was like the weird saying to me. Which was not shared with me. Yeah. And I don't feel like from what you told me that it was shared with Heather. And it would have been fine if it was, because like I said, like look critically at us. Like there are bad faith actors in every community. There will always be people in any movement, civil rights, religion, politics, whatever, that do it just for views and coin. There will be, but it doesn't define a whole movement at all. Like I said, there are bad faith actors in every movement. And I remember being in some anti-MLM groups when I first found the anti-MLM community and thinking, oh, I don't like how they're shaming people who were in these companies because I already feel ashamed myself. You don't need to shame us anymore. We already feel it enough if you were in an MLM. And so I left those groups and then I found really great groups that were super supportive. And yeah, we still talk about people's posts that they make, you know, but it was a supportive, non-shaming group. And I wonder if maybe she just only felt the hate in a few small circles. And that's unfortunate because I do think that this community is very uplifting and very transparent and honest. Yeah, totally. Thank you for having me. Thank you so much. Thank you so much to Josie as well for having the courage to speak out and to speak with me about her experiences. I loved how she mentioned that with any movement, there's going to be bad actors. With any movement that's growing in popularity and in size, there are going to be people that are in it for the wrong reasons. But does that mean that a movement should be generalized off of the few people who may or may not be in it for the right reasons? And does that mean that everyone should just be assumed as being in a movement for selfish reasons without any probable cause except for the fact that they're speaking out? The most frustrating thing is by hyper-focusing on the possibility that there could or could not be bad actors in the movement completely distracts from what the movement is trying to relay. The information, the message that the movement is trying to get across. It distracts from any of the possible good that the movement's trying to create and gives way to a possible reason to discredit the movement as a whole. And we've seen that with a lot of movements in 2020 and now in 2021, and I'm done with it. If people are speaking out, if a large group of people are speaking out about an issue that they see and or have experienced, maybe let's listen to them before thinking of reasons to discredit them. She's like so happy in my arms, but I have to move soon. So to summarize the Atlantic article in the most unbiased way as possible and this entire situation in as unbiased of a way as possible, my face was used on the cover photo of this article without my permission or without me being able to have the ability to give my input on this topic. The article was purportedly rushed by this reporter and seemingly because of that, this reporter got key facts and information on the history of MLMs incorrect. And also made hasty generalizations. The anti MLMs who were quoted in the article felt that the heart of what they were saying was taken out of the article or that their quotes were cherry-picked to fit the article's narrative or points that it was trying to get across. The reporter was dismissive when those shown and quoted in the article came to her and expressed their, well, dissent. So all this begs the question, is this standard journalism? Is this all completely normal? And is there a common standard in ethics in which journalists follow when reporting on a story? Well, I ended up finding out that there is a society of professional journalism or SPJ and the SPJ does have a code of ethics. So I thought I would read out the SPJ's code of ethics so that we can figure out whether or not this particular article and what we know off of this particular article follows those standard code of ethics. I'll also link this down below so you can read the full code of ethics since I'm only gonna include parts that pertain to this article. First off, we have the category seek truth and report it. Journalists should take responsibility for the accuracy of their work. Verify information before releasing it. Use original sources whenever possible. Remember that neither speed nor format excuses inaccuracy. So the fact that this reporter had a rushed deadline isn't really an excuse for getting key or critical information incorrect. Provide context, take special care not to misrepresent or oversimplify in promoting, previewing or summarizing a story. I mean, that's really what this entire article was in oversimplification of a very complex movement. Avoid stereotyping. Journalists should examine the ways their values and experiences may shape their reporting. Us women are just mocking the industry and acting in hateful ways. Not a stereotype at all, at all. Never deliberately distort facts or context, including visual information, clearly label illustrations and reenactments. Act independently. Avoid conflicts of interest, real or perceived. Disclose unavoidable conflicts. Refuse gifts, favors, fees, free travel and special treatment and avoid political and other outside activities that may compromise integrity or impartiality or may damage credibility. Deny favored treatment to advertisers, donors or other special interests and resist internal and external pressure to influence coverage. Distinguish news from advertising and shun hybrids that blur the line between the two. Prominently label sponsored content. Be accountable and transparent. Respond quickly to questions about accuracy, clarity and fairness. This journalist never responded to me and they never responded to Heather. So, great. A report done by the media, the media and the media and the media did not recognize that the news was published. They acknowledged mistakes and corrected them promptly and prominently. Explained corrections and clarifications carefully and clearly. No updates were ever made to the article. So that was the society of professional journalism's code of ethics and I think it's up to the individual watcher A report done by the ethical journalism network titled, Untold Stories, How Corruption and Conflict of Interest Stock the Newsroom that covers 18 countries and exposes how financially stricken news media are being overwhelmed by political and corporate forces finds that in countries both rich and poor there are dark arts at work in newsrooms. Media managers are doing deals with advertisers to carry paid for material disguised as honest news. Reporters and editors accept bribes in irregular payments and a culture of dependence on political and corporate friends makes it increasingly difficult to separate journalism from propaganda and impartial reporting from public relations. The EJN says journalism requires new rules on transparency, conflicts of interest and ethical governments to be drafted and implemented across the whole landscape of journalism both online and offline. I mean linking the full study below that was conducted by the ethical journalism network but some key points that I want to highlight found in the study is that the elimination in most countries of the invisible wall separating editorial and advertising has created a surge of so-called native advertising, hidden advertorials and paid for journalism. The political and economic environment combined with the lack of policies protective of public interest media vulnerable or forces them into corrupt relations with different centers of power the influence of political and economic elites on media is pervasive. Media are tied into networks driven by politics and finance through controversial and non-transparent funding and ownership. So overall what has been found is that there is very little transparency in terms of potential conflicts of interest that journalists and major publications have. Much of this has to do with native advertising. Native advertising is basically saying to corporations that want to advertise we will camouflage your ads to make them look like news stories. That's essentially it. Native advertising is the central digital review stream for the publishing industry. It makes up some 60% of the market or 32.9 billion according to a 2018 forecast by market research firm eMarketer. The relationship between publishers and advertisers shapes what we see in our news sources. An abundance of media channels provides us with more choices meaning producers of material published under a newsroom's aegis from journalists to advertisers must work harder to secure the increasingly scarce resource of attention. As a consequence of this newly widened media landscape, legacy news publishers are no longer able to exclusively capture ad revenue at the same scale and with the same ease as they were when print was their primary medium. Native ads take on the appearance of real news stories and are crafted by people inside news publications who want to create and spread commercial messages that don't resemble traditional advertisements. That is only maybe slightly concerning that Native ads take on the appearance of real news stories especially considering the fact that they have taken up so much of the publishing industry and the publishing industry's ad revenue. 100% of our revenue comes from limited content so we have a lot of partners who are marketers and major brands who work with 76 of the top 100 brands now. As long as the consumer knows the difference between what's editorial and what's native I don't see any problem with it at all. But it is a problem though because the consumer cannot tell the difference. A recent study showed that less than half of visitors to a news site could distinguish native advertising from actual news. There is also branded content which attempts to engage its audience and advertise it as the ads and pop-ups may do. Branded content isn't necessarily native advertising. Those two are different but publishers have now created branded content departments that are tasked with selling original marketing to advertisers by guaranteeing reader engagement with content and so many respected publishers are jumping onto this. The New York Times opened T brand studio. The Atlantic has rethink post-storywork so pretty much everything on the Atlantic rethinks platform is sponsored content that they are doing for brands which is really fascinating. I think the overall takeaway is that new media avenues are pretty much taking over a lot of news sources especially online. People are getting information from so many different avenues that major publishers are having a hard time keeping up and profiting with less traffic to their site. A lot of publishers are trying to make ad revenue in more and more creative ways but the question becomes with the lack of transparency how many shady ways are these publishers making money? Someone I thought would be a great person to reach out to is Savvy Wright's books who is an author, journalist and YouTuber who speaks on anti-malem topics. So I sat down and did an interview with Savvy and we also went into the article itself and thought on the writing of it so here is that interview. So first off I guess to start out from your perspective what is your experience in journalism as well as anti-malem and just kind of those two worlds since that makes you like a very good middle ground unbiased person I guess. Yeah sure so I mean I've been working in the writing world in general for a long time as people know I'm Savvy Wright's books as my channel so because I write books and other things. I first started working in journalism back in 2015 so it's been it was the end of 2015 so it's been about five years now. I got a job at a magazine reporting on music and like this was like specifically like marching band music which is fun and I still work for that magazine I've done other stuff since then too but yeah I started working there and even like at that point I had never worked professionally in journalism before so I did make a lot of mistakes towards the beginning and you know I had a wonderful editor still do still have a wonderful editor who works with me and you know gives excellent feedback on my writing so I've been working for that magazine for five years I worked for another music magazine for a little while that ended up going on hiatus for the pandemic for that other magazine that went on hiatus I worked as an assistant editor for that magazine so that was cool so I ended up editing a lot of other people's writing and you know restructuring things where I needed to and that kind of thing that's my overall journalism experience I'll just clarify that my youtube videos do not count as journalism in my opinion which I know I mentioned earlier but I feel like that was during conversation you might edit out so either way I want to say right here that my youtube videos are not intended to be journalism I like to report on things as objectively as possible in my videos but I also really do like to insert my own opinion I like to get really emotional and really animated because it's youtube I get to be myself on screen and I really like that my videos are completely different than the paid work I do for articles and magazines and things like that when you do like feature in narrative journalism you should be telling a story you should be descriptive and colorful with your language and interesting with all of that but you do still have to keep to the facts of the story not making stuff up not like you can have you should have an angle that you attack it from but that angle needs to be something that you can substantiate so you want to attack from an angle but you don't want the angle to be like something you're speculating on if that makes sense yeah totally I see I do get really frustrated honestly with like the kind of articles that get a lot of clicks and that are clearly like oh we have ad revenue from every click that we get so we need to make this headline as dramatic as possible and then sometimes the headline it just doesn't even have to do with the story or it's just ridiculous so would you say click baiting exists in the world of journalism as well I yeah I would think so and I guess that's the thing is I'm not the gatekeeper of what does yeah if you read an article you have to wonder like this point that's made could I formulate an argument against it and I think like even the concept and this is philosophical I guess but the concept of what a fact is is not as hard as people say it is that's why I criticize Ben Shapiro all the time he says facts don't care about your feelings like that's not entirely true like facts exist in the context of how humans interpret them some people genuinely look at something and they're like this is just all a fact and like this is just factual and it's it's hard to differentiate like the voice behind it which makes sense when you're established as a person of authority whether you're Ben Shapiro or your reporter people want to listen to what you have to say and take it in as all factual but I think you bring up a good point where it's important to kind of step behind that and look at the voice of who's saying that and and kind of look at the context behind the information that's being presented what I'm starting with is I feel like this article is I don't know if it's trying not to be opinionated it's just very opinionated and I don't like there's so many places and like I feel like this is an article that didn't have to be opinionated this is like this is you know presented as how the pandemic stoked a backlash it's supposed to framed in a very like factual way like this is how it did it like even just for the start multiple marketing companies had it easy like how so like it says like they had it easy what to sell to people they had they had first of all had it easy like sure that's a colloquial statement that anyone can use but in an article where this is the topic sentence of your entire piece what did they have easy selling to people recruiting people finding an audience getting away from government regulations swindling the FTC like what did they have easy they just had it easy like that's that says nothing and it talks about like these were inoffensive products sold at weeknight wine parties later in theme facebook groups for the most part they were an unremarkable part of women's lives again that is an opinion because I just interviewed someone today who has been who has joined MLM companies 27 times since 1982 and is finally out and is joining the anti MLM force now and so she just didn't interview with me today and it was a fantastic conversation we had but it was like I don't know what you're saying for decades this woman was getting roped into these companies back in 1982 and they were not an unremarkable part of her life because she kept being pressured into joining Tupperware every time she'd get out of a military assignment this same thing here rarely encountered as a serious threat like a serious threat to what if you're talking about like it wasn't considered like the FTC didn't consider it a serious threat like in Ponzi Nox we see the reasons why that there were FTC people who were in had direct ties to the founders of these companies sure and I'm not expecting her to go into all of that but like it rarely encountered a serious threat from the government from people expressing negative opinions because people have been expressing negative opinions for a while like there's just not enough information there I can't say that that's false because it might be true depending on what you meant by it but like it's too vague to mean anything this stuff I'm pretty sure nothing I didn't see anything wrong in this section like while I know that there are links to things here I feel like this article would have been better if there had still been some examples included and I know with journalism it's hard because you want to hit a word count but like could have got rid of all of this fluff that didn't say anything I just find it weird like the what she claims is the 2018 income disclosure statement so as I said I work for a magazine that's fairly small publication and then even but I know that this is true across the board because I also studied journalism when I was take getting my master's degree in writing so during that time I also you know wasn't taking journalism classes and it was basically the idea of if you interview someone and you write the article and then you realize you don't have enough information it is common practice to reach back out to them to get the information that you didn't get yet and that in fact most people who get reached out to for an interview should overall come to expect that instead of expressing uncertainty it's common practice for her to have reached back out to Heather and asked her to confirm that interesting or to send her proof of that and if she didn't even do that that's just lazy get the tight deadlines but I'm like for the past five years I've worked in print journalism so it's like the deadline is the magazine has to go to the printer and then once it's printed it's in print forever this is online article there is no such restriction you can update or you know like it's asterisk we edited and added this in on this date or whatever like there's no reason not to do that is it true that men participate in smaller numbers oh the dsa is not a valid source for her she linked the dsa fun it says men participate in smaller numbers and I've always said I don't have a source for this but I'm always like I just based on what I see it seems like women participate more in product based MLMs but men often participate more in idea based MLMs which tend to be more on the hard pyramid scheme side whether or not men participate in smaller numbers I guess we'll never know because the dsa can't be trusted at all anti-mlm is still diffuse and disorganized but its rise poses an existential threat to multi-level marketing companies that rely on the constant recruitment of new participants like again how I'm not saying it's not diffuse and disorganized but I'm saying how I feel like it's just like being presented it's being like trust me bro like this is what's going on I'm reading an article because I'm expecting to learn from the article so if you are going to say it's disorganized I'm okay with somebody classifying it that way but I need to know in what ways it's disorganized I just feel like again there's a lack of specificity that makes it like impossible to know really what it means like it's disorganized because I feel like this article is disorganized this article is disorganized but this article still poses an existential threat to me so I get it I'm curious what you're going to say about the next sentence too okay so I don't think I've found popularity is already presenting challenges for the community which critiques capitalism on commercial platform I can't do that okay so if we live under capitalism and you want to critique capitalism the only way you can critique capitalism is while living in capitalism like it's you've seen that comic where someone is like I think we need to improve society and the other person's like but yet you live in society it's like what the fuck is statement is that like it critiques capitalism yet it uses commercial platform as opposed to what on top of that like also the it kind of very much boils down the entire anti-malem conversation because I do think there are also people who are anti-malem who aren't necessarily anti-capitalism like for example Josie mentions how her main focus is on the cultish behavior of MLMs Josie's main thing that she talked about with the reporter is about cult behavior in MLMs and that was like the main thing she discussed is like that's my main message that's the main thing I'm interested in um this whole thing is like just like what members mock the industry all day long first of all that is like not even a well written sentence when I think about it that has more of a connotation of like making it into a joke which some people do some people do some memes and stuff like that but I think that there's more so than jokes there's more criticism than jokes so I would say they mock the industry part of the day and then the other part of the day they post critical information and resources members mock the industry all half day long first of all why would you use a phrase like all day long because that's never going to be true members happens all day long I was breathing all day long like that's probably true where is your example again this is like you're making a bunch of generalizations without saying anything it would be one thing and maybe she had interviewed a pro MLM and they had said oh yeah that subreddit just mocks the industry all day long and included that as a quote to show what someone else's opinion was and report that as here is one viewpoint that is out there I wouldn't have a problem with that however if she's going to promote it this way as in like there's plenty of anger and cost of humor I need you to give me an example because there's plenty of anger and cost of humor like am I just to trust me on that one don't look into it don't look at the subreddit just trust me there's also this is such a small thing but just as like a writing thing this is something that my editor at the magazine I work for is constantly on me about so this is a mistake I make all the time too but like in journalism if you start a sentence with like there is plenty of anger or something the start of like the sentence has no subject which is not inherently it's not grammatically incorrect or anything like that you can write this way if you want to and it's a very casual way of speaking like I say that kind of thing in conversation all the time but when you're writing a sentence like that that has no subject and is also making a big claim it it leaves the sentence unclear what you're actually saying so it says there is plenty of anger where is plenty of anger there like what what is the subject of that sentence who does the anger what is the anger what tangible examples of anger it says there is plenty of anger I keep going back to the title of this story how the pandemic stoked a backlash to Emily and how talk about the pandemic in forever yeah and how like that was how the what the article was posed to be about it's really not focused on that at all it's really just going into like well there's the subreddit and then there's this person on tiktok and then there's this person on YouTube and then it's like okay but you don't like this article has clear thesis so in articles we have in journalism there's the thing called the nut graph so the nut graph is like after you generally want to have a catchy opening to your article and the nut graph is basically the thesis and it's not a thesis in the sense that you're not necessarily taking a position or making an argument but it's kind of the not entirely roadmap of what it's about doesn't have to really be like it's a term paper or anything but more just like this is the main thing that this article is going to talk about we're focusing on this key details this one I notice there isn't there isn't really much of a clear not graph normally the nut graph would be in the beginning it would normally be towards the end of the opening um yeah but like this this is already into the details so I assume it should be up here somewhere I think it's supposed to be this I think this is supposed to be the nut graph right here so it's kind of indicating to the reader that the title plus that as like the thesis is indicating that this article should be focused on how the pandemic caused an increase in both MLM recruitment and in pushback within the movement but then it just it but then it just goes into chaos like and we'll get there but it just feels like it goes increasingly more and more into just like like not that at all and I don't know why um yeah okay it even says right here the forum was started in 2011 and it even says it took off in August 2017 guess what there was no pandemic in August 2017 so once again you're not proving that this is related at all and it has nothing to do with like whether MLMs are good or bad that's not related to this it's just like this article is just a bad example of an article I like that she includes a quote from Josie here and includes like Josie's story which I imagine the rest of it is paraphrase but I imagine I mean have you interviewed Josie? I will say I'll point out something that this writer did well that I think is an example of what she could have been doing throughout this whole article to make it better which is this sentence right here since tiktok banned MLM recruiting on its platform in December creators have mentioned that other social media companies might take similar action right so if she had like the type of writing she's been doing throughout this article would be if the sentence had something like tiktok or like since tiktok banned the companies maybe other social media platforms it's only a matter of time right which is yeah she's been saying things like that like here's where she says creators have mentioned and it's like that's fair because you've interviewed multiple creators and you're framing that as it's from the perspective of people who would have said that as opposed to pure speculation instead you're saying something that's true which is that creators are thinking this and like I don't know why she couldn't frame the other arguments that way because right now this author hasn't proved to me that there's anyone who's actually worried about that other than maybe she's worried about it in this case she's showing that there is an actual an actual people who are saying this so like that would be the right way to frame a speculation as opposed to what she was doing earlier so I'm like you're capable of it okay and then we just have more crediting the direct selling association which I don't take seriously at all I feel like it's kind of irrelevant but I'm also wondering why she never asked like Josie or how their thoughts are on the DSIR since she like quotes them multiple times who would think that would I necessarily think that if I hadn't been so deep into watching videos on this and I didn't already have so many friends who do regular research on this I wouldn't know that the DSA is so biased and so awful it just feels like Sia referencing Autism Speaks for her music movie it feels exactly like that basically if she talked to anyone about Autism Speaks then they would have been like who is autistic they would have been like do not talk to them they're horrible that's a perfect comparison because it's like if she had asked anyone in this movement about the DSA we would have all been like don't don't no you're not going to get anything accurate there like do not trust the DSA this sentence is also entirely opinion like the industry needed charming influence and exciting social media messaging to keep it growing like not in the 1940s it didn't like not in the 1950s it didn't and it's like I'm not saying it's wrong but like iMarkets Live needs college students to go out on college campuses and recruit other college students like they don't know social media for like vector marketing and cutco and things like that those things are still done like the old fashioned way so here's a few things in these sections that I think is frustrating so first of all like she literally brings up cults right here why did she not include any of the million cults that Josie gave her about cult behaviors yep like she gave her all of that information she's like right here it's like they have dramatic clickbait titles and it's like first of all can you in good faith call them clickbait when Josie has provided one of your sources for this provided you ample proof that the cult stuff is actually happening like why couldn't you even say like it could include the title about culty things according to Josie who studied how while in the top percent of her MLM company studied how these paralleled cults there she says this and then has a quote from Josie about why people can often equate MLMs and cults yeah either that or like you just don't even need to include this but like if you're going to which I think is more interesting you might as well show what your sources actually had to say about that as opposed to just saying videos have titles such as this like cool I'm on YouTube too I see the titles of videos like why didn't you why didn't you include your sources on how that ties together that would make such a better article the relatively small circle of popular anti MLM users is disgust is a distraction no we're not in fact there's I'm very active on the subreddit I used to post on the subreddit before before I made my channel I don't think people because I had a post that got really popular on the subreddit I don't think people realize on the same person but I get I read the post all the time and it's like this youtuber like we were I really like this youtuber like this person made a really good video usually it's frustration of the drama that like I've noticed the only ones that get talked about negatively are people who are starting shit so so that's that's where Leia gets pissed because she's starting shit this is from five months ago I hate that YouTube creators are now deeming the entire anti MLM community as toxic blah blah blah blah blah I mean this this post is true like it's yeah they got into conflicts for no reason but like is there literally only two comments on this yeah 10 at first it was 10 up votes apparently it's 12 now okay but let me try something else that it's that's all the tea it's not even tea it's boiled Gatorade at this point which is actually that's a good statement I love it let's try this oh this is one where it's just like post your favorite youtubers oh look there's me there's you yeah they like us some people are talking about drama whatever favorite anti MLM youtubers look it has way more comments there's way more just literally I just saw one right below that too I like moon cat I like Illuminati I like Margaret like yeah cool everyone's talking positively about it here's another one who are your favorite content creators Kiki Madison that's you so it's like okay you found one reddit post where someone was saying that two specific youtubers were distracting those were people are talking on reddit about how they like MLM anti MLM but like so also like how did they find that one 10 up vote you comment reddit post like what five months ago not only that but what they were saying was completely taken out of context because it was five months ago and it was about Kimberly and Emily Leah saying that all of anti MLM is bad and so they're no longer anti MLM which is you know and they were expressing frustration not only that but on top of that when they say they're the flashy faces of a movement that is really made up of and then they quote they took the entire quote out of context because they made it sound like the persons saying that they are flashy faces of a movement like the reddit commenter themselves didn't say that anti MLM is flashy faces that's from Caitlin's own mouth like it just doesn't it was so weird yeah that feels intentional because it's like if you go on the anti MLM subreddit and search YouTube there's so many results that come up why choose specifically that one to base your entire I had to dig yeah it's like dude I get that you're on a deadline but like writing this article was your job we're living under capitalism bold of you to accept payment for this article so that's talking about how we get derailed because Kimberly said that it's just that she apologized for showcasing Monet in a negative way you know the companies that the anti MLM community hates the most we just hate them I'm sorry I'm getting too comfortable companies we hate most yeah that's an opinion as well because yeah we don't like Monet because we don't like any MLM companies but also like I personally think Amway is the worst of them objectively and then probably some of the essential young livings probably up there with the way that it promotes people eating essential oils and using them in place of medicine I'd say some of the pseudoscience ones are probably the most harmful to society overall where did it where did she gather that we hated the most probably Kim that would be my guess because she seems to be her source for this entire oh yeah and Kimberly said they are full of hatred the reporter can quote Kimberly is saying that because she did say it so this is this is not inaccurate however it's like why didn't you use something like especially because she said she felt like she was in a cult when she was in this community that again would have been a great place for Josie who actually knows about cult stuff but you have all of this good information and you are intentionally ignoring it why was that never I'm just I don't understand that it's such a good point too I didn't even realize how often the word cult is mentioned the word cult keeps getting used in this and yet she's ignoring all of Josie's stuff that she said about cults why like it's usually if you're interviewing people because you want to get a complete story you're intentionally ignoring stuff that is relevant to the story yes so she she's able to include Josie's Josie and Kimberly are saying opposite things of each other here she clearly knows how to show when two of her sources say opposite things but she could not show the opposite thing when Josie talked about cults over here yeah like also up there like why didn't you think of this like maybe I don't want to I don't want to read her mind and say like you intentionally didn't do this because it's possible maybe it just didn't cross her mind but it seems like just a big missed opportunity mm-hmm yeah so the rest of this is all just opinion like the whole rest of this article's opinion like it's it almost be redundant to say every single sentence what I find sad is that like it seems like she interviewed a Cornell graduate student who is writing a thesis on this yeah and that's the only thing she included from her like did you have you been able to talk to Megan I actually didn't reach out to her I think I was so focused on everything else in these two paragraphs and what was said that I completely forgot to reach out to her but that's such a good point that like she's interviewing someone that did a thesis on this and provides one quote from her just calling it a huge phenomenon what is going on here what is this right like you have someone who's been doing research on this like she's been ignoring like this is what like from a journalism perspective this is what really bothers me is that you have she interviewed all of these people who have so much information and so much research and has all of these sources at her disposal and it's just not using them like she's just like ignoring them and just making like state like just making statements yeah offhanded like quotes that just back up her opinion whenever they can but but if they don't then she's not going to include them actually yeah any I'm just so confused by this I'm so confused by it like why because I know that if I had sent this article to my editor she would be like savvy you interviewed this graduate student and like what did she have to say about all of these things like my editor is regularly like oh I saw that in this part of this thing you have something that says this do you perhaps have a quote from this source that would go along with that since I know that this source also knows about this or whatever like and it's something like oh I didn't think of that cool like a part of it I guess is also where was your editor also what is this conclusion have to do with the title and initial product of the article it doesn't she hasn't oh this is just such a poorly written article do you have any like final thoughts on the article and like takeaways or just kind of like a summary of like how you how you as like a reporter but also someone who covers anti-malem content feel or perceive the article to be I just I feel like I feel overall like the article could have made so much better use of the information that the source is provided and I think that the article also didn't have like a clear nut graph it didn't have a clear thesis that it was sticking to when I say thesis I don't mean it has to take a position or have an argument but it didn't have a clear like goal of like this article is going to take you through how the pandemic has led to an explosion of both MLM and anti-MLM pushback like that would be like that's a great idea for a story like but follow it through I feel like it veered off course too many times there were too many statements that were opinion based that didn't have a direct example or when there was an example it might just be linked which like I know this is online stuff but like it I think it's better to just find a way to weave it in in a concise way that still shows an example of what you're talking about again this is my opinion as a writer I'm not the writing police you know like every writer can can do whatever they want but I personally found this article to be really unhelpful just because it was it didn't really say a lot and when it did say a lot and feel like there were often especially based on what you've told me about how much information these sources actually did give her it seems like she squandered some of the potential of how in depth she could have gone with these sources and just like go it like I feel sometimes like when I read something I'm like if I were your editor I would have marked up this and this and this and this so I like I wish I could have been the editor for it and then I guess as a you know someone a participant in the anti-malem movement reading that article also from that perspective what was your perspective and was it kind of different than your journalistic perspective or similar I don't know if that makes sense yeah I know what you mean I'd say it's pretty similar I think that like I wasn't expecting to read an article where she took the stance that the anti-malem movement is greater something like that because I would also feel that that's biased in terms of this kind of article like I wasn't expecting that from her and like on an objective level I don't necessarily think that would have been more beneficial to have that but at the same time I feel like like I said because she was she didn't include so much information and because the article didn't have a clear focus I feel like I'm not I don't think necessarily that it did any harm to our movement but I think it just did like it didn't do anything it had the potential to really educate people about the fact that there is a movement out there and that there are some people who disagree with it and there are some people who are really for it and there are different avenues and like to inform people without even taking a side on whether it's good or bad but to inform people that it exists and that it's boomed in the pandemic and all of that and she just didn't really give enough information about all of that I was really happy to do this with you I'll definitely I'll be anytime you need any other input on anything I'm always happy to help you out Sounds good dude Thank you so much to Savi for taking the time out of her day to talk with me and give her perspective I am also wondering why Caitlin never included any quotes about cults and cult behavior from Josie considering she discussed it so much in the article I also want to give Savi a shout out for a competition that she's getting into for her small business she talks about it a little bit in our chat so I want to provide that clip right here You guys know me as Savi writes books on YouTube I talk a lot on my channel about being a small business owner I am an author and small business owner and I run a company called Forever Home Friends that produces picture books, plushies and toys based on rescue dogs and right now I'm in a pitch competition to try to win a grant for my business and there's like a small business like FedEx the shipping company is running a small business grant competition to help small businesses recover from the effects of the pandemic so I entered the competition and right now it's in the voting stages so if everyone goes to the link I'll send you the link to if everyone goes to my page on the site and you vote for me for it that'll help me advance to the next round so everyone can vote for me every 24 hours the same person can vote again if they want so I just want to let everyone know it's free just vote for me and help me get a grant to help me expand on it That is a noble cause to put on a capitalist platform Yes, I mean I'm sorry that I'm remoting on a capitalist platform that also like FedEx is a capitalist company that makes you pay to ship things but like and my company is a capitalist company where you have to pay me to buy my books I think it's I mean I think most anti-malemars support small businesses you know and that's something I've noticed so yeah I'm hoping that not everyone watching this will do that and support Awesome, thank you I appreciate it I'll be linking all the information to that down below so that you can support her if you'd like The strangest thing is the reporter of this article Caitlyn Tiffany criticized the anti-malem movement for what she insinuated was creators bandwagoning on to the movement for personal gain but Caitlyn herself before this article has also made two other articles on anti-malem topics or on the MLM world but the weirdest thing about this other articles that Caitlyn's writing was completely different than this anti-malem article in a lot of ways one of the most prominent ways that I noted is in the other articles when Caitlyn would have an opinion or a conclusion that she reached on her own she would include it in parentheses something she did not do at all in this anti-malem article where she had a lot of opinions and insinuations inserted into it so this whole situation is just so bizarre to me at the very best this reporter just has no leg to stand on none of her arguments hold up logically reasonably they're just not valid arguments and at the very worst case there's something really really shady going on here and this is not the first time something really really shady happened in the world of The Atlantic The Atlantic tried to take down as much coverage as they could on this situation but in 2013 The Atlantic published a sponsored article written by the Church of Scientology Yes, The Atlantic this esteemed publication posted an article that the Church of Scientology wrote because the Church of Scientology sponsored The Atlantic and this article was seemingly undisclosed as a sponsorship this was something that was in fact an ad for Scientology and of course people were very weirded out by this the article praised Scientology and the Church's alleged growth the post talked positively of Scientology leader David Miss Kavage and talked about Scientology's plans for expansion after all of the backlash The Atlantic took down the post or seemingly blatant propaganda and put up a disclaimer that they're looking into the sponsored situation in place of the once Scientology article but this extreme situation is not the only sponsored content that The Atlantic puts out sponsored content has proved to be better ROI than other ad formats for The Atlantic sponsored content drives more than 60% of The Atlantic's ad revenue in 2016 native advertising as a whole reached around 75% of The Atlantic's ad revenue so while The Atlantic did update its advertising policies and sponsored content policies after the Scientology debacle that does not mean that sponsored content has gone away from The Atlantic or any other publications at all in fact it is still very very very much a thing on these publications does that mean that anti-malem articles sponsored no does that mean that you should never trust another article on The Atlantic ever ever again because it could possibly be sponsored not necessarily but it does mean that shady situations do happen with publications and that it is important to be wary of what content and what news and what sources you're reading from and to try and evaluate how this article is coming to the conclusion that it's coming to what its sources are whether it provides reasonable context to make the conclusions it makes and whether logical fallacies like hasty generalizations and ad hominin attacks are used in the article something I didn't realize as being kind of strange until looking back on the situation is that before this entire situation no reporter had ever reached out to me but around the same time that Caitlin reached out to me for an interview on the breakaway movement another completely different publication also reached out to me about the breakaway movement that just seemed bizarre to me because my video on the breakaway movement was months and months and months ago same with all of the other videos that were done on the breakaway movement and there wasn't really any new news seemingly so why did two completely different reporters from completely different publications all of a sudden want to talk about the breakaway movement at the exact same time I'm not really sure but here are the emails and what these reporters said to me Caitlin had initially said when she reached out to me about the breakaway movement hi Madison I'm a reporter at the Atlantic working on a story about the breakaway movement I came across your YouTube video and was hoping you might be free to chat about it briefly would you have some time tomorrow by any chance the other reporter that reached out to me said hi Madison I hope this finds you well my name is Sydney Bradley and I cover the influencer industry for Insider I'm looking into the breakaway movement how it works with influencers and how the MLMs overlaps with the influencer industry I watch your YouTube video and would love to set up a time to chat are you available next week for a call let me know if you have any questions too I sent her an email back saying hi Sydney I'm curious what prompted you to want to cover the breakaway movement and she never responded all I can say on that subject is I am really really curious what these breakaway movement articles are going to be and what their stance outlook position on everything is going to be I don't necessarily think that this article was sponsored by an MLM or is an undisclosed sponsorship I don't want to spread misinformation like that because there is really no evidence or reason for me to think that but this whole topic did make me interested about whether or not it's even possible for MLMs to infiltrate a publication or to influence a reporter or any sort of public relations and honestly after digging into it yes it is very very possible for this to happen and I'll explain why I think that one way that the MLM industry tries to influence government and public relations is through the DSA not the Democratic Socialist of America DSA but the Direct Selling Association DSA Hi everybody I'm Angus Smith I'm the chair of the UK Direct Selling Association and after 35 years in this wonderful industry of ours the important it is to be members of the association whether it's a direct seller or indeed as a member companies themselves In 2004 Heidi and I had an idea for a business she went online and found the Direct Selling Association unfortunately there was a meeting in New Orleans coming up we rubbed our credit cards together and I came a little reluctantly but I found here friends and mentors that have guided me and our company for the last eight years since he is what it is today because of things we learned at Direct Selling Association events I can still remember the first workshops that I went to there were speakers that inspired us that we have used in our own meetings we met friends, compared notes figured out what it took to build a great company whether it's the annual meeting, the communication seminar there's always something that we could take back home and put to work right away so when people ask me why did since he belong to the Direct Selling Association I can speak to the lobbying efforts and the government relations I can talk about the affinity programs the insurance that we use at since but for me it's the friends and the mentors that come with being a part of this association one of the reasons why the FTC doesn't care why the multi-level marketing industry has been so strong is they have an organization called the Direct Selling Organization Direct Selling Association, DSA the DSA tells everyone that what it is is a member-based organization where these multi-level marketing companies come together to help promote standards within their industry the truth is it's a lobbying organization millions of dollars are pumped into it every year by the members the DSA goes to Washington DC actually they're based there I think and they sit and lobby the politicians to make sure that the current laws against pyramid schemes are not enforced and no new laws against pyramid schemes or multi-level marketing are created the Direct Selling Association is a trade association in the United States that represents Direct Selling Companies the companies themselves not the individuals within the companies primarily those that use multi-level marketing compensation plans on behalf of its members companies the DSA engages in public relations aka PR aka articles written about multi-level marketing and lobbying efforts against regulation of the multi-level marketing industry and it funds political candidates through a political action committee the DSA serves as a public relations and lobbying group acting on behalf of its member companies the DSA played a role in petitioning the Federal Trade Committee to exempt multi-level marketing companies from consumer protection regulations outlined in the FTC's 2006 proposed business opportunity rule encouraging people to write 17,000 form letters complaining about the rule from 2006 to 2008 the law was passed in 2012 with most multi-level marketing companies considered exempt the DSA also supported and allegedly drafted much of the language of the Anti-Pyramid Promotional Scheme Act introduced by US Representative Marsha Blackburn and in amendment to the US House of Representatives Omnibus Financial Services and General Government Appropriations bill for fiscal year 2018 that would have limited the ability of the FTC and other agencies to classify companies as pyramid schemes and to investigate whether MLMs are pyramid schemes so the DSA which supposedly purportedly claims themselves to be anti-pyramid scheme is also trying to limit the FTC's ability to determine anything to be a pyramid scheme. Interesting isn't that? On the DSA website this is what it has to say regarding itself the Direct Selling Association is the National Trade Association for companies that market products and services directly to consumers through an independent entrepreneurial sales force. Interesting how they call MLM reps a sales force that is entrepreneurial not entrepreneurs. DSA serves to promote, protect and police the direct selling industry while helping direct selling companies and their independent sales force become more successful. We work with congress, government agencies, consumer protection organizations and others on behalf of our nearly 130 member companies. 130 MLMs are members of the DSA. That's a lot of money and a lot of power behind it. One of the most pivotal roles we play is through our commitment to self-regulation and our code of ethics. The DSA often conducts their own research which is meant to look legitimate but it's research that's conducted by a quote on quote trade association that is meant to help 130 MLM companies and promote the MLM message of course there's going to be bias and shadiness within those studies. The DSA's policy priorities are to seek to preserve the legal and tax status of independent direct sellers so they can pursue meaningful independent work. That means protect the independent contractor's status of direct sellers. Labeling MLM reps as independent contractors as opposed to employees of MLM companies is very intentional because it clearly benefits the MLM companies the most above the MLM reps within the companies. As someone who worked as a personal trainer before I know for a fact that being an independent contractor tax wise is a lot more complicated than being an employee and puts a lot more pressure and burden on the individual as it goes to the company that they're working so hard to promote. The DSA also seeks to help stakeholders differentiate between legitimate direct selling companies and illegal pyramid schemes to protect consumers a.k.a when the DSA tried to lobby to make it so that the FTC couldn't look into whether or not MLMs were pyramid schemes. So it almost sounds threatening when they say that they want to work with government officials to ensure a clear and mutual understanding of legal compensation structures for multi-level marketing companies and ensure that FTC enforcement action is administered consistent with federal law. They don't want the FTC shutting down any MLMs. So the lobbying is a whole other video topic in itself the lobbying that the DSA has done but what interested me the most is the part where the DSA talks about managing public relations of MLMs. That was very fascinating to me and interestingly enough it is extremely extremely hard to find any information on how much the DSA has influenced public relations and where it can be found. For fun I checked whether Enagic the company behind the breakaway movement was a member of the DSA and I ended up finding out that yes Enagic is a member of the DSA. In an age of overwhelming media formats and information available at our fingertips it's hard to know what to trust, who to listen to and it's only going to get harder and harder. So I really want to emphasize on my channel that I am not the only source that you should get information from I'll always link my sources below so that you can look through them and see where I got information but I also want to encourage you to seek out information on your own as well and to take in other sources apart from just my own perspectives I truly believe the more and more information you seek out from a different variety of perspectives the more fuller picture you're going to get on a situation. And I hope my videos can be a starting point to dive into important topics instead of the end all be all or the only point or source of information and that's really all I have to say for this video thank you so much if you watch all the way through to this point of all of these twists and turns and things that I had to say regarding this situation shout out to all my Patreon members up on the screen I appreciate you guys so much and I will see you guys in the next video click