Hacker Cinema
The Vow
2020 · TV series · documentary · 56 min episodes · 2 seasons
The docuseries follows people deeply involved in the group NXIVM — which is faced with various charges, including sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy — over the course of several years.
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3 comments on Hacker News
Having worked closely but briefly as a technical contractor for a firm that later turned out to be a scam, I figured this is it.
A combination of compartmentalization and churn can keep the charade up for quite a while, and if executed well you can have a pretty big operation with only one or two people being in on it.
I figured something was off but there's a whole gradial spectrum of Schroedinger's Accomplices where most people can seem to be conners or conned.
For this reason, I found the documentaries on NXIVM (Seduced, The Vow) quite interesting - the way the protagonists are framed and how everyone seems to have plausible deniability even with all the video material.
I disagree with your moral conclusion - we all have responsibility as individuals with regards to what our work contributes to. This goes for anything from military personnel to software engineers. That you don't have legal risk doesn't mean you don't have ethical responsibility.
I think "The Vow" was really interesting where the first episode made you think "wow, they've really developed a revolutionary technique for self-help" but by the last episode you were completely disgusted.
It made me realize why people actually get sucked into these things.
This whole case in general is absolutely crazy. Literally decades of people telling various authorities about Raniere, and nothing. Even the Dalai Lama got duped into supporting Nxivm!
If anyone is interested in this, HBO has a docuseries called "The Vow" out. It focuses on Edmonson's story, as well as on some other people she worked with to get the info out. The whole thing is absolutely nuts -- the rabbit hole just keeps going deeper.