1
00:00:00,120 --> 00:00:02,279
Speaker 1: If you have your own story of being in a cult,

2
00:00:02,279 --> 00:00:03,720
Speaker 1: are a high control group.

3
00:00:03,640 --> 00:00:06,760
Speaker 2: Or if you've had experience with manipulation or abusive power

4
00:00:06,760 --> 00:00:07,840
Speaker 2: that you'd like to share.

5
00:00:07,680 --> 00:00:10,039
Speaker 1: Leave us a message on our hotline number at three

6
00:00:10,080 --> 00:00:12,520
Speaker 1: four seven eight six trust that's.

7
00:00:12,400 --> 00:00:16,079
Speaker 2: Three four seven eight six eight seven eight seven eight.

8
00:00:16,200 --> 00:00:19,920
Speaker 1: Or showed us an email at trustmepod at gmail dot com.

9
00:00:20,320 --> 00:00:23,279
Speaker 2: Trust me, Trust trust me.

10
00:00:23,600 --> 00:00:26,360
Speaker 3: I'm like a swat person. I've never lived. To you,

11
00:00:27,400 --> 00:00:28,280
Speaker 3: I never live.

12
00:00:28,640 --> 00:00:31,600
Speaker 2: If you think that one person has all the answers,

13
00:00:31,800 --> 00:00:35,520
Speaker 2: don't welcome to trust me. The podcast is about cold's

14
00:00:35,560 --> 00:00:39,560
Speaker 2: extreme belief and manipulation from two world travelers who've actually

15
00:00:39,640 --> 00:00:43,160
Speaker 2: experienced it. I am Lola Blanc and I'm Megan Elizabeth.

16
00:00:43,200 --> 00:00:46,479
Speaker 2: Today our guest is Daniella Mestenek, young survivor of the

17
00:00:46,560 --> 00:00:49,080
Speaker 2: Children of God and former member of the military. In

18
00:00:49,120 --> 00:00:51,239
Speaker 2: part one of our two part interview. Today, she's going

19
00:00:51,320 --> 00:00:53,200
Speaker 2: to talk about being raised in the Children of God,

20
00:00:53,320 --> 00:00:56,080
Speaker 2: the various forms of punishment and control she and the

21
00:00:56,120 --> 00:00:59,760
Speaker 2: other children experienced. Now, child sexual abuse is not only encouraged,

22
00:00:59,760 --> 00:01:01,400
Speaker 2: but part of the belief system.

23
00:01:01,560 --> 00:01:04,360
Speaker 1: We'll also discuss how she and the other kids were

24
00:01:04,400 --> 00:01:07,680
Speaker 1: taught to practice for raids and lie to protect the group,

25
00:01:07,840 --> 00:01:10,480
Speaker 1: how her family's reaction to nine to eleven began to

26
00:01:10,560 --> 00:01:13,160
Speaker 1: open her eyes to the truth about the children of God,

27
00:01:13,240 --> 00:01:14,960
Speaker 1: and how she finally left the cult.

28
00:01:15,160 --> 00:01:17,640
Speaker 2: And next week we'll discuss her experiences in the military

29
00:01:17,720 --> 00:01:20,600
Speaker 2: and the parallels she saw with her childhood cult. It's

30
00:01:20,840 --> 00:01:24,000
Speaker 2: very very interesting. Before we get into it with her, Megan,

31
00:01:24,080 --> 00:01:26,360
Speaker 2: can you kindly tell me your cultiest thing of the week?

32
00:01:26,480 --> 00:01:28,840
Speaker 1: Yeah, So, my cultiest thing of the week is something

33
00:01:28,840 --> 00:01:32,160
Speaker 1: that I've been seeing in the news. It's a murder case.

34
00:01:32,400 --> 00:01:36,000
Speaker 1: It's called the Delphi killer. It was a murder that

35
00:01:36,120 --> 00:01:38,319
Speaker 1: took place in a small town. It seems to have

36
00:01:38,360 --> 00:01:40,960
Speaker 1: a suspect, and it's a very cut and closed case.

37
00:01:41,000 --> 00:01:43,720
Speaker 1: But as the defense attorneys are saying that it actually

38
00:01:43,840 --> 00:01:48,120
Speaker 1: wasn't him who committed the crime, it was members of

39
00:01:48,360 --> 00:01:53,800
Speaker 1: a Satanic cult called Odonism. So his defense is that

40
00:01:54,600 --> 00:01:59,640
Speaker 1: there is a white supremacist devil worshiping cult that is

41
00:01:59,720 --> 00:02:03,040
Speaker 1: in the area. And on the girl's bodies, there were

42
00:02:03,080 --> 00:02:07,200
Speaker 1: two adorable thirteen year old girls murdered together. There were

43
00:02:07,240 --> 00:02:11,560
Speaker 1: these very odd like twigs placed around their bodies in

44
00:02:11,600 --> 00:02:17,040
Speaker 1: a way that apparently signifies this devil worshiping cult. So

45
00:02:17,560 --> 00:02:22,480
Speaker 1: interesting stuff, curious to see where it leads. Sounds fake,

46
00:02:22,600 --> 00:02:25,640
Speaker 1: I hadn't Yeah, I thought you might be sounds quite fake.

47
00:02:25,720 --> 00:02:26,679
Speaker 1: I hadn't seen.

48
00:02:26,480 --> 00:02:29,160
Speaker 4: Anything like this in a really long time.

49
00:02:29,280 --> 00:02:33,839
Speaker 2: As a defense, Yeah, it's that's super interesting. I mean,

50
00:02:34,160 --> 00:02:37,799
Speaker 2: for all y'all who haven't seen the documentary about the

51
00:02:38,160 --> 00:02:41,519
Speaker 2: West Memphis Three, there are three documentaries about them, check

52
00:02:41,560 --> 00:02:44,440
Speaker 2: them out because it's interesting used as a defense, actually,

53
00:02:44,480 --> 00:02:46,839
Speaker 2: because being a part of a Satanic cult was used

54
00:02:46,840 --> 00:02:51,400
Speaker 2: to prosecute these three boys who ultimately were wrongfully imprisoned.

55
00:02:51,680 --> 00:02:54,519
Speaker 2: But it totally makes sense to me that this would

56
00:02:54,560 --> 00:02:58,680
Speaker 2: be something because cults are so zeitgeisty, because Satanism, like

57
00:02:58,720 --> 00:03:01,519
Speaker 2: the Satanic panic is bad, that this would be something

58
00:03:01,560 --> 00:03:03,320
Speaker 2: that people would now be trying to use as a

59
00:03:03,400 --> 00:03:05,440
Speaker 2: defense for murder.

60
00:03:05,760 --> 00:03:08,680
Speaker 1: The articles that I've been found are a little bit confusing,

61
00:03:08,760 --> 00:03:11,040
Speaker 1: but I think that they're saying that their client is

62
00:03:11,080 --> 00:03:13,560
Speaker 1: not in this cults. He has nothing to do with

63
00:03:13,600 --> 00:03:16,160
Speaker 1: the murder. There's like a cult nearby.

64
00:03:16,280 --> 00:03:18,280
Speaker 2: Yeah, they're saying he didn't do it, a cult did it.

65
00:03:18,480 --> 00:03:20,640
Speaker 4: He didn't do it. He's not a part of the cult.

66
00:03:20,680 --> 00:03:24,799
Speaker 1: They're really going deep down into this being the work

67
00:03:25,040 --> 00:03:25,600
Speaker 1: of a cult.

68
00:03:25,800 --> 00:03:31,560
Speaker 2: I hate that. I that's so much. Yeah, see, it's

69
00:03:31,600 --> 00:03:34,920
Speaker 2: so interesting because like it's great that we have language

70
00:03:34,960 --> 00:03:37,640
Speaker 2: around cults. We have language around some of these things now,

71
00:03:37,680 --> 00:03:40,000
Speaker 2: but the way that can kind of get perverted and

72
00:03:40,800 --> 00:03:45,320
Speaker 2: turned into this really cartoonish thing is a little dangerous.

73
00:03:45,400 --> 00:03:49,960
Speaker 2: Sometimes maybe a little dangerous, imo, But that's super interesting.

74
00:03:50,000 --> 00:03:53,040
Speaker 2: I'm dying to follow the case and see like what

75
00:03:53,120 --> 00:03:55,800
Speaker 2: they actually point to is alleged evidence for this.

76
00:03:56,120 --> 00:03:58,920
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're gonna have to take a deep dive into it.

77
00:03:58,920 --> 00:04:02,920
Speaker 1: It's pretty interesting and obviously horrific. What about you, what's

78
00:04:02,960 --> 00:04:04,920
Speaker 1: the cultiest thing that happened to you this week?

79
00:04:05,520 --> 00:04:08,280
Speaker 2: So I'm in Utah right now. I came back because

80
00:04:08,280 --> 00:04:11,880
Speaker 2: of my brother's medical stuff, and I'm staying in an Airbnb.

81
00:04:12,280 --> 00:04:14,480
Speaker 2: And as we were driving here, my mom and I,

82
00:04:14,560 --> 00:04:16,800
Speaker 2: she pointed to the high school that's very close to

83
00:04:16,800 --> 00:04:20,080
Speaker 2: where we're staying, and she said that our cult leader,

84
00:04:20,279 --> 00:04:22,719
Speaker 2: our prophet that we believed in, not only went to

85
00:04:22,839 --> 00:04:26,800
Speaker 2: high school there, but he was the class president of

86
00:04:26,839 --> 00:04:29,440
Speaker 2: the high school and we are staying down the street

87
00:04:30,080 --> 00:04:33,000
Speaker 2: from this place. Which, first of all, sorry Mom, I

88
00:04:33,040 --> 00:04:35,679
Speaker 2: did not I would never have booked that to remind

89
00:04:35,760 --> 00:04:39,320
Speaker 2: you of those things while we're staying here. But also

90
00:04:39,360 --> 00:04:41,320
Speaker 2: I had no idea he was class president. She was

91
00:04:41,360 --> 00:04:43,640
Speaker 2: also class president. Isn't that interesting?

92
00:04:44,080 --> 00:04:47,200
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, especially because he seems so batshit.

93
00:04:47,520 --> 00:04:50,280
Speaker 2: He does seem so bat shit, but he obviously, you know,

94
00:04:50,320 --> 00:04:52,479
Speaker 2: a lot of people have believed him at this point,

95
00:04:52,520 --> 00:04:56,159
Speaker 2: Like he obviously is charismatic and good at talking. It's

96
00:04:56,200 --> 00:05:00,400
Speaker 2: interesting how she was incredibly smart and ambitious. He was

97
00:05:00,400 --> 00:05:04,640
Speaker 2: incredibly good at talking and ambitious, but like total opposite

98
00:05:04,680 --> 00:05:08,280
Speaker 2: intentions and he ends up becoming her abuser, you know,

99
00:05:08,320 --> 00:05:11,320
Speaker 2: controller or whatever. I just would never you'd never think

100
00:05:11,320 --> 00:05:12,520
Speaker 2: they'd have something in common like that.

101
00:05:12,640 --> 00:05:15,359
Speaker 1: I don't know how eerie to be so close to

102
00:05:15,960 --> 00:05:18,680
Speaker 1: his high school. And I don't know. I don't think

103
00:05:18,720 --> 00:05:20,720
Speaker 1: time is real. I think it's all just playing out

104
00:05:20,760 --> 00:05:23,040
Speaker 1: at the same time. So in some world.

105
00:05:22,920 --> 00:05:23,960
Speaker 2: Energy is mentioned.

106
00:05:24,360 --> 00:05:27,960
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's so strange, that's so wild, that's eerie.

107
00:05:28,040 --> 00:05:31,240
Speaker 2: Yeah, But yeah, I we're gonna use this time to

108
00:05:31,320 --> 00:05:34,760
Speaker 2: replace those memories and make better ones and get rid

109
00:05:34,800 --> 00:05:37,360
Speaker 2: of those associations. So you should go stage the school,

110
00:05:39,640 --> 00:05:41,599
Speaker 2: or at least go to dance around. I don't know,

111
00:05:41,640 --> 00:05:44,360
Speaker 2: I feel like I'm gonna do something anyway. So that's

112
00:05:44,400 --> 00:05:44,919
Speaker 2: that my.

113
00:05:45,000 --> 00:05:49,000
Speaker 1: Oh well, we're all thinking about him, and I hope

114
00:05:49,000 --> 00:05:51,440
Speaker 1: the school doesn't bring too much stuff up.

115
00:05:51,520 --> 00:05:54,560
Speaker 2: Thank you, thank you. We'll be fine. We were all right.

116
00:05:54,600 --> 00:05:56,400
Speaker 2: Should we talk to Daniella now?

117
00:05:56,480 --> 00:05:59,440
Speaker 1: Absolutely? I'm so excited for y'all to hear this episode.

118
00:05:59,520 --> 00:06:00,000
Speaker 3: Let's do it.

119
00:06:11,480 --> 00:06:14,840
Speaker 2: Welcome Daniella mestinek Young to trust me. Thank you so

120
00:06:14,920 --> 00:06:17,400
Speaker 2: much for joining us, Thank you for having me. Are

121
00:06:17,400 --> 00:06:18,080
Speaker 2: you knitting?

122
00:06:18,360 --> 00:06:20,080
Speaker 3: I am? I'm always knitting.

123
00:06:20,240 --> 00:06:22,560
Speaker 4: All of her videos she's knitting.

124
00:06:22,680 --> 00:06:25,400
Speaker 3: And there's about seventy thousand people on TikTok that like

125
00:06:25,480 --> 00:06:28,640
Speaker 3: to watch me knit and talk about cults and group paper.

126
00:06:28,720 --> 00:06:29,640
Speaker 4: I'm one of them.

127
00:06:29,920 --> 00:06:32,640
Speaker 3: This is one of my cult coats, we call it,

128
00:06:32,720 --> 00:06:35,040
Speaker 3: and it was inspired by the coat that Taylor Swift

129
00:06:35,040 --> 00:06:39,040
Speaker 3: wears in her song Karma and Yes I'm a Swiftie

130
00:06:39,080 --> 00:06:41,520
Speaker 3: and yes I'm digging into super fan culture in my

131
00:06:41,600 --> 00:06:44,240
Speaker 3: next book Amazing. I was like, Oh, I can knit

132
00:06:44,360 --> 00:06:47,840
Speaker 3: something that looks like that, And now I'm knitting ten

133
00:06:48,040 --> 00:06:51,560
Speaker 3: for all my girlfriends for when the streaming aroostour drops.

134
00:06:51,800 --> 00:06:53,800
Speaker 1: Is it crazy that the weirdest part of that is

135
00:06:53,839 --> 00:06:55,400
Speaker 1: I'm like, you have ten friends.

136
00:06:57,400 --> 00:07:00,960
Speaker 3: That's amazing. I'm jealous, which is something really relevant to

137
00:07:01,360 --> 00:07:04,800
Speaker 3: deconstructing cults, because before I wrote my book, when I

138
00:07:04,960 --> 00:07:07,240
Speaker 3: was trying to cover up my past and like be

139
00:07:07,400 --> 00:07:10,239
Speaker 3: this perfect girl, I did not have ten friends.

140
00:07:10,400 --> 00:07:13,080
Speaker 2: Well, tell us about that cult. So we've done a

141
00:07:13,120 --> 00:07:16,200
Speaker 2: couple episodes on the Children of God. Your story is

142
00:07:16,400 --> 00:07:19,200
Speaker 2: very unique. You have another chapter to your story after

143
00:07:19,240 --> 00:07:21,640
Speaker 2: the Children of God that we'll get into later. But

144
00:07:21,800 --> 00:07:24,440
Speaker 2: can you give us for any audience member who maybe

145
00:07:24,520 --> 00:07:26,320
Speaker 2: doesn't remember who they are or it's been a while

146
00:07:26,360 --> 00:07:28,920
Speaker 2: since they've heard about them, who are the Children of God?

147
00:07:29,080 --> 00:07:31,240
Speaker 3: Yeah? So the Children of God was one of your

148
00:07:31,480 --> 00:07:36,400
Speaker 3: many cults that was born out of the late sixties seventies,

149
00:07:37,360 --> 00:07:41,080
Speaker 3: you know, sort of hippie culture and people leaving religion

150
00:07:41,160 --> 00:07:45,080
Speaker 3: and looking for their purpose. Children of God was started

151
00:07:45,160 --> 00:07:49,160
Speaker 3: in nineteen sixty eight by a sort of failed preacher

152
00:07:49,960 --> 00:07:55,000
Speaker 3: who started recruiting very young teenagers off the beaches of California.

153
00:07:55,520 --> 00:07:57,920
Speaker 3: And you know, in the beginning, it was love, faith,

154
00:07:58,040 --> 00:08:02,120
Speaker 3: Jesus and preparing for the apocalypse in the end time.

155
00:08:03,520 --> 00:08:05,400
Speaker 3: And the way people talk about cults is like, in

156
00:08:05,440 --> 00:08:07,720
Speaker 3: the beginning, it was good, and then it turned into

157
00:08:07,720 --> 00:08:10,520
Speaker 3: something different. I really like to push back on that narrative.

158
00:08:11,040 --> 00:08:14,880
Speaker 3: It was a group of followers started by an alcoholic,

159
00:08:15,040 --> 00:08:19,760
Speaker 3: narcissistic pedophile, and that's always what it was. And the

160
00:08:19,920 --> 00:08:22,320
Speaker 3: con that was gotten over on these people was that

161
00:08:22,400 --> 00:08:25,840
Speaker 3: it was about serving God. And so the Children of

162
00:08:25,840 --> 00:08:30,040
Speaker 3: God eventually became famous as a sex cult because one,

163
00:08:30,680 --> 00:08:34,840
Speaker 3: all of our beliefs revolved around sex. Two, he famously

164
00:08:34,960 --> 00:08:39,560
Speaker 3: used religious prostitution to lure followers and money into the group.

165
00:08:40,440 --> 00:08:44,120
Speaker 3: And then finally he actually had a doctrine which I

166
00:08:44,200 --> 00:08:48,200
Speaker 3: refer to as pedophilia for God. But one of the

167
00:08:48,240 --> 00:08:51,080
Speaker 3: big things that about Children of God is it was

168
00:08:51,400 --> 00:08:56,520
Speaker 3: just like any of your uber conservative evangelical churches, which

169
00:08:56,559 --> 00:08:59,800
Speaker 3: is the tradition he came from. All he did was

170
00:09:00,080 --> 00:09:03,720
Speaker 3: take this control of sex and flip it. I call

171
00:09:03,760 --> 00:09:08,960
Speaker 3: it forced polyamory, and I think it's the exact natural

172
00:09:09,480 --> 00:09:12,880
Speaker 3: evolution of purity culture into pedophilia.

173
00:09:13,000 --> 00:09:13,600
Speaker 1: Wow.

174
00:09:13,760 --> 00:09:17,600
Speaker 2: So what do you think was the appeal of this

175
00:09:17,760 --> 00:09:19,000
Speaker 2: group or groups like it?

176
00:09:20,000 --> 00:09:24,040
Speaker 3: So my grandfather's personal story was that he and my

177
00:09:24,080 --> 00:09:26,680
Speaker 3: grandfather was a bit older. He'd already graduated college. He

178
00:09:26,800 --> 00:09:30,360
Speaker 3: was a CPA, you know, so well educated. He had

179
00:09:30,360 --> 00:09:34,199
Speaker 3: a bad LSD trip one day and swears that he

180
00:09:34,280 --> 00:09:37,840
Speaker 3: met Satan. And the next day, as he's sitting in

181
00:09:37,840 --> 00:09:39,920
Speaker 3: a park with his head in his hands, trying to

182
00:09:39,920 --> 00:09:43,360
Speaker 3: decide what to do with his life, along comes the

183
00:09:43,440 --> 00:09:47,079
Speaker 3: children of God and that was all she wrote. He

184
00:09:47,120 --> 00:09:50,800
Speaker 3: goes off with them. He immediately becomes a very important

185
00:09:50,960 --> 00:09:56,240
Speaker 3: finance person, and then my father ends up being his coworker,

186
00:09:56,760 --> 00:10:00,280
Speaker 3: actually a few years older than him, who impregnates his

187
00:10:00,400 --> 00:10:01,439
Speaker 3: fourteen year old daughter.

188
00:10:02,040 --> 00:10:03,920
Speaker 2: Can you tell us about you and your and your

189
00:10:03,960 --> 00:10:04,959
Speaker 2: mother and.

190
00:10:05,080 --> 00:10:08,160
Speaker 4: Fourteen years old she's having fourteen?

191
00:10:08,520 --> 00:10:10,559
Speaker 2: And how old was your dad at that time?

192
00:10:10,840 --> 00:10:12,280
Speaker 3: So my dad's thirty nine?

193
00:10:12,360 --> 00:10:12,840
Speaker 2: Wow?

194
00:10:13,080 --> 00:10:13,640
Speaker 4: Wow?

195
00:10:13,920 --> 00:10:14,160
Speaker 3: Yuck.

196
00:10:14,920 --> 00:10:17,760
Speaker 2: What are some of your earliest memories from the group.

197
00:10:18,120 --> 00:10:23,040
Speaker 3: My earliest memories are when I'm three years old, and

198
00:10:23,080 --> 00:10:24,840
Speaker 3: this was when I was living in a commune in

199
00:10:24,840 --> 00:10:27,280
Speaker 3: Peru with about one hundred, one hundred and fifty people.

200
00:10:28,200 --> 00:10:31,080
Speaker 3: One of my earliest memories is shared and on Cultured,

201
00:10:31,120 --> 00:10:33,800
Speaker 3: which is my mom sneaking me out of the group

202
00:10:34,000 --> 00:10:39,280
Speaker 3: to teach me to read. And it's not that we

203
00:10:39,280 --> 00:10:42,440
Speaker 3: weren't taught to read, we were at very young ages,

204
00:10:42,720 --> 00:10:46,760
Speaker 3: but it was having private personal time with your parent,

205
00:10:47,360 --> 00:10:49,920
Speaker 3: that would be something that was very looked down upon,

206
00:10:50,520 --> 00:10:52,600
Speaker 3: and I think this is you know, one of the

207
00:10:52,640 --> 00:10:55,440
Speaker 3: things that made my childhood different from many of my

208
00:10:55,559 --> 00:10:59,319
Speaker 3: peers was that my mom also was born and raised

209
00:10:59,679 --> 00:11:03,040
Speaker 3: in the cults, and so sometimes I think I had

210
00:11:03,040 --> 00:11:05,679
Speaker 3: a little extra help. You know, she was locked into

211
00:11:05,720 --> 00:11:09,640
Speaker 3: the same system, but she was much much kinder in

212
00:11:09,720 --> 00:11:13,439
Speaker 3: the way that she administered that than other people were

213
00:11:13,600 --> 00:11:15,320
Speaker 3: because she had also gone through it.

214
00:11:15,600 --> 00:11:17,360
Speaker 1: For people who haven't read the book yet, which please

215
00:11:17,360 --> 00:11:18,800
Speaker 1: get the book, it's unbelievable.

216
00:11:18,840 --> 00:11:21,240
Speaker 4: But your private time with your mom is limited.

217
00:11:21,400 --> 00:11:24,720
Speaker 1: Like there's children's quarters and there's adult quarters, and you

218
00:11:25,400 --> 00:11:28,640
Speaker 1: kind of call everyone aunties, you call everyone uncles, and

219
00:11:28,720 --> 00:11:30,840
Speaker 1: so to spend some private time with your mother is

220
00:11:30,880 --> 00:11:31,760
Speaker 1: a really big deal.

221
00:11:32,240 --> 00:11:34,680
Speaker 3: We only saw our parents for an hour a day,

222
00:11:34,920 --> 00:11:38,640
Speaker 3: which included dinner, dinner in about thirty minutes afterwards to

223
00:11:38,840 --> 00:11:41,959
Speaker 3: hang out with your family, but it still wasn't private

224
00:11:42,000 --> 00:11:45,679
Speaker 3: time with your parents, because we are talking about massive families.

225
00:11:45,920 --> 00:11:50,520
Speaker 3: I have twenty five siblings in cult math. You know,

226
00:11:50,640 --> 00:11:54,040
Speaker 3: my mother started at fourteen and had seven kids by

227
00:11:54,040 --> 00:11:57,440
Speaker 3: the age of thirty. So any sort of private time

228
00:11:57,480 --> 00:12:01,439
Speaker 3: with your parent is definitely a very rare thing, and a.

229
00:12:01,400 --> 00:12:04,040
Speaker 2: Lot of people were separated from their parents altogether, right,

230
00:12:04,120 --> 00:12:06,200
Speaker 2: living on totally different compounds from them.

231
00:12:06,440 --> 00:12:09,360
Speaker 3: Yes, well, and my mom is one of those. So

232
00:12:09,840 --> 00:12:13,880
Speaker 3: my grandmother who joined the cult with my grandfather, she

233
00:12:14,000 --> 00:12:16,880
Speaker 3: was his girlfriend, followed him into the cult, and when

234
00:12:17,320 --> 00:12:20,760
Speaker 3: it started, when she started to realize how nasty the

235
00:12:20,840 --> 00:12:25,800
Speaker 3: teachings were getting, she left, and she left with her

236
00:12:25,840 --> 00:12:29,440
Speaker 3: two youngest and she was not able to get my mom.

237
00:12:29,280 --> 00:12:32,360
Speaker 1: Out, which caused a big problem for your mom because

238
00:12:32,400 --> 00:12:37,120
Speaker 1: she became this like this like mythical story of right one.

239
00:12:37,160 --> 00:12:41,240
Speaker 3: Because saved, That's exactly, and we were told so not

240
00:12:41,280 --> 00:12:44,080
Speaker 3: only that, it was that her mother had had left

241
00:12:44,080 --> 00:12:47,560
Speaker 3: her behind to stay in God's service. Right, her mother

242
00:12:47,679 --> 00:12:51,920
Speaker 3: became a backslider, she couldn't handle it anymore, but she

243
00:12:52,040 --> 00:12:56,439
Speaker 3: left Christy behind to grow up in God's service, right.

244
00:12:56,520 --> 00:12:59,359
Speaker 3: So I mean it was a tale of parental kidnapping

245
00:12:59,520 --> 00:13:03,200
Speaker 3: that we were told as this was what happened for God.

246
00:13:03,920 --> 00:13:07,560
Speaker 3: But I grew up, you know, we were very much

247
00:13:07,600 --> 00:13:10,520
Speaker 3: told this like you have to forsake your family to

248
00:13:10,640 --> 00:13:14,560
Speaker 3: follow Jesus, and we knew that they would split up families,

249
00:13:14,600 --> 00:13:17,520
Speaker 3: and so I always grew up with this fear that like,

250
00:13:18,160 --> 00:13:22,200
Speaker 3: if I do anything wrong, who's the only person on

251
00:13:22,280 --> 00:13:23,199
Speaker 3: earth that I have.

252
00:13:23,559 --> 00:13:26,160
Speaker 2: This was able to happen because there were compounds all

253
00:13:26,240 --> 00:13:31,240
Speaker 2: over the world, right, you lived in Japan, Peru, Brazil, Mexico,

254
00:13:31,320 --> 00:13:32,320
Speaker 2: eventually where else.

255
00:13:32,840 --> 00:13:35,720
Speaker 3: Yeah, we were ten thousand people strong all over the

256
00:13:35,760 --> 00:13:40,240
Speaker 3: world and just about like most countries that you can

257
00:13:40,280 --> 00:13:42,000
Speaker 3: think of. I think at one point we had a

258
00:13:42,040 --> 00:13:47,040
Speaker 3: presence in ninety different countries, and so yeah, they could

259
00:13:47,040 --> 00:13:50,040
Speaker 3: like move you around kind of military style, just send

260
00:13:50,080 --> 00:13:53,200
Speaker 3: you wherever they you know, in the first let's call

261
00:13:53,240 --> 00:13:55,760
Speaker 3: it twenty years of the cult, they really really encouraged

262
00:13:55,800 --> 00:13:59,640
Speaker 3: having huge families, and then they started splitting up those

263
00:13:59,679 --> 00:14:06,680
Speaker 3: family because they didn't want nuclear, close tied families. And

264
00:14:06,720 --> 00:14:09,679
Speaker 3: so that's actually what happened to the man my father

265
00:14:09,760 --> 00:14:12,199
Speaker 3: was eventually married to, is that he was split from

266
00:14:12,200 --> 00:14:15,960
Speaker 3: his wife who he'd had seven daughters with and just

267
00:14:16,000 --> 00:14:17,480
Speaker 3: sent somewhere completely different.

268
00:14:18,280 --> 00:14:22,760
Speaker 2: So did you feel like you belonged in the group

269
00:14:22,960 --> 00:14:25,240
Speaker 2: or did you always kind of feel like something was off?

270
00:14:25,360 --> 00:14:26,720
Speaker 2: Like what was it like when you were young?

271
00:14:27,160 --> 00:14:30,320
Speaker 3: Even to this day, I say, the label cult survivor

272
00:14:30,520 --> 00:14:34,680
Speaker 3: doesn't really always feel like it fits me because I

273
00:14:34,840 --> 00:14:38,080
Speaker 3: was never like in it in my mind, like I

274
00:14:38,160 --> 00:14:42,280
Speaker 3: was always just a prisoner of these people. And literally

275
00:14:42,320 --> 00:14:45,480
Speaker 3: at the age of six, which is the probably the

276
00:14:45,560 --> 00:14:49,480
Speaker 3: most intense part of the book, where I remember thinking like, Nope,

277
00:14:49,600 --> 00:14:51,760
Speaker 3: if you're telling me this is love and this is God,

278
00:14:52,200 --> 00:14:54,640
Speaker 3: I'm out. You know, Hell's going to suck, but I'm

279
00:14:54,680 --> 00:14:58,240
Speaker 3: not doing this. And then for me for the next

280
00:14:58,640 --> 00:15:01,040
Speaker 3: you know, I guess eleven years, it was just trying

281
00:15:01,080 --> 00:15:03,680
Speaker 3: to survive until I could find a way to get away,

282
00:15:04,360 --> 00:15:06,200
Speaker 3: you know. So like when my mom at three years

283
00:15:06,240 --> 00:15:08,560
Speaker 3: old has this beautiful moment with me and teaches me

284
00:15:08,640 --> 00:15:11,240
Speaker 3: that books are great because that's where we get ideas from.

285
00:15:11,640 --> 00:15:13,320
Speaker 3: And then for the next twelve years of my life

286
00:15:13,320 --> 00:15:18,360
Speaker 3: books are banned. My neurodiverse brain is just going, Nope, sorry,

287
00:15:18,360 --> 00:15:20,880
Speaker 3: you're not following your own rules. This doesn't make any.

288
00:15:20,800 --> 00:15:23,680
Speaker 1: Sense, right right, I mean, they were trying to make

289
00:15:23,680 --> 00:15:26,800
Speaker 1: the outside world as terrifying as possible. I believe they

290
00:15:26,840 --> 00:15:31,040
Speaker 1: called them systemites and like you already mentioned, your mother backslided.

291
00:15:31,680 --> 00:15:34,040
Speaker 4: What are all these terms meaning? Were you scared of

292
00:15:34,080 --> 00:15:34,920
Speaker 4: the outside world?

293
00:15:35,080 --> 00:15:37,520
Speaker 3: Was that one of the things? Yeah? Absolutely, this is

294
00:15:37,880 --> 00:15:40,320
Speaker 3: a big part of cults is you have the US

295
00:15:40,400 --> 00:15:44,240
Speaker 3: versus them language, right, like you have your own language,

296
00:15:44,400 --> 00:15:47,840
Speaker 3: and a big part of that language is identifying who's

297
00:15:47,840 --> 00:15:51,600
Speaker 3: with us, who's against us. So you have systemites. That's

298
00:15:51,600 --> 00:15:54,800
Speaker 3: all of you, right, we are the family, your systemites,

299
00:15:55,280 --> 00:15:57,600
Speaker 3: and then you have your you know, in every cult,

300
00:15:57,680 --> 00:16:01,800
Speaker 3: the worst category of outsiders is the backsliders, right, the

301
00:16:01,800 --> 00:16:06,800
Speaker 3: ones who leave. In the epigraph of Uncultured, I actually

302
00:16:06,880 --> 00:16:08,840
Speaker 3: say the first rule of cults is you're never in

303
00:16:08,920 --> 00:16:12,280
Speaker 3: a cult. And then I say the second rule of cults.

304
00:16:12,600 --> 00:16:16,200
Speaker 3: The cult will forgive any sin except the sin of leaving,

305
00:16:16,680 --> 00:16:19,680
Speaker 3: So if you leave, you are by far the worst.

306
00:16:20,480 --> 00:16:23,120
Speaker 3: And then the Children of God specifically did this thing

307
00:16:23,200 --> 00:16:26,280
Speaker 3: called traumatic testimonies, but every cult will do it in

308
00:16:26,360 --> 00:16:29,360
Speaker 3: some way, which is, you know, they took all these

309
00:16:29,400 --> 00:16:32,960
Speaker 3: teenagers off the streets, off of drugs, off of alcohol,

310
00:16:33,480 --> 00:16:37,960
Speaker 3: and then right in their happiest heyday of love bombing moments,

311
00:16:38,000 --> 00:16:41,320
Speaker 3: they had them right down their stories, kind of like

312
00:16:41,360 --> 00:16:43,200
Speaker 3: your rock bottom or kind of what you would see

313
00:16:43,200 --> 00:16:45,680
Speaker 3: in AA right when people get up and tell their

314
00:16:46,120 --> 00:16:49,760
Speaker 3: worst stories. And then we grew up reading books like

315
00:16:49,800 --> 00:16:53,720
Speaker 3: as children, Like as a five year old child, I

316
00:16:53,800 --> 00:16:56,880
Speaker 3: was reading about like what happens to someone when they're

317
00:16:56,880 --> 00:17:01,360
Speaker 3: getting assaulted on drugs, you know, for example. And so

318
00:17:01,600 --> 00:17:05,960
Speaker 3: it was very much like the outside world was frightening

319
00:17:06,520 --> 00:17:08,520
Speaker 3: to the point that, you know, when I leave and

320
00:17:08,520 --> 00:17:11,439
Speaker 3: get to high school, I'm really trying to show in

321
00:17:11,520 --> 00:17:13,320
Speaker 3: the book how like all I wanted to do was

322
00:17:13,359 --> 00:17:15,640
Speaker 3: be out of this cult and go to school. But

323
00:17:15,720 --> 00:17:17,560
Speaker 3: all I've been taught my whole life is to be

324
00:17:17,600 --> 00:17:19,879
Speaker 3: afraid of school in the outside world.

325
00:17:22,560 --> 00:17:26,800
Speaker 2: When you were still in some of the discipline methods

326
00:17:26,840 --> 00:17:30,320
Speaker 2: you described are just like horrifying. Can you tell us

327
00:17:30,440 --> 00:17:31,639
Speaker 2: about some of those?

328
00:17:32,400 --> 00:17:37,440
Speaker 3: Yeah, So the Children of God famously recommended spanking babies

329
00:17:37,760 --> 00:17:41,159
Speaker 3: at six months of age for poor behavior. You know,

330
00:17:41,320 --> 00:17:43,720
Speaker 3: all kinds of physical punishments. We had a lot of

331
00:17:43,800 --> 00:17:48,399
Speaker 3: group punishments, like group spankings, and that's actually what the

332
00:17:48,440 --> 00:17:52,000
Speaker 3: book opens up with as a group spanking scene. And

333
00:17:52,040 --> 00:17:55,400
Speaker 3: then there was a lot of like thought reform type punishments,

334
00:17:55,480 --> 00:18:00,160
Speaker 3: so isolation or enforced silence for saying the wrong thing,

335
00:18:00,240 --> 00:18:04,200
Speaker 3: so kind of your solitary confinement. And you know, one

336
00:18:04,200 --> 00:18:06,119
Speaker 3: of the things they would do if you were not

337
00:18:06,600 --> 00:18:09,080
Speaker 3: being put in solitary, but you were not allowed to

338
00:18:09,160 --> 00:18:12,520
Speaker 3: speak to anyone. So basically the whole cult is supposed

339
00:18:12,520 --> 00:18:15,560
Speaker 3: to kind of shun you while you're on this punishment,

340
00:18:15,720 --> 00:18:18,320
Speaker 3: and they would make these signs, make you wear a

341
00:18:18,400 --> 00:18:22,440
Speaker 3: sign that says, for example, don't talk to me I'm disrespectful.

342
00:18:23,240 --> 00:18:24,760
Speaker 3: I would like you to know that I now have

343
00:18:24,840 --> 00:18:27,119
Speaker 3: that sign on a T shirt and I sell them

344
00:18:27,200 --> 00:18:30,919
Speaker 3: and women love them. That's how I get my revenge.

345
00:18:32,800 --> 00:18:35,119
Speaker 3: Don't talk to me, I'm disrespectful, and don't talk to me,

346
00:18:35,160 --> 00:18:36,040
Speaker 3: I'm out of the spirit.

347
00:18:36,800 --> 00:18:41,600
Speaker 2: Hilarious As a kid, though, that kind of ostracizing, that

348
00:18:41,760 --> 00:18:45,040
Speaker 2: just sounds like the most painful thing in the entire world.

349
00:18:45,280 --> 00:18:47,920
Speaker 2: You also about how they would wash your mouths out

350
00:18:47,920 --> 00:18:50,720
Speaker 2: with so kind of had a different method of doing it,

351
00:18:50,760 --> 00:18:54,480
Speaker 2: and it just sounds so invasive and disgusting.

352
00:18:54,160 --> 00:18:56,520
Speaker 5: And they would forget you in time out and you'd

353
00:18:56,560 --> 00:18:59,120
Speaker 5: just be in time out for like a day. Sometimes

354
00:18:59,119 --> 00:19:02,520
Speaker 5: it wasn't even forgetting, like the one time I think of,

355
00:19:02,640 --> 00:19:05,240
Speaker 5: like I was put in time out at like nine

356
00:19:05,320 --> 00:19:08,400
Speaker 5: am by a leader who then took off and never

357
00:19:08,480 --> 00:19:12,320
Speaker 5: came back, and nobody in charge of the kids felt

358
00:19:12,320 --> 00:19:14,479
Speaker 5: like they could take me out of time out, So

359
00:19:14,560 --> 00:19:18,200
Speaker 5: I just sat in time out the entire day, had

360
00:19:18,200 --> 00:19:19,320
Speaker 5: a really fun run.

361
00:19:19,080 --> 00:19:22,480
Speaker 3: In with a tarantula while I was there, you know,

362
00:19:22,680 --> 00:19:25,600
Speaker 3: So yeah, stuff like that, you know, just yeah, sort

363
00:19:25,640 --> 00:19:31,040
Speaker 3: of your typical group behavior very similar to military punishments

364
00:19:31,080 --> 00:19:32,879
Speaker 3: actually in a lot of ways.

365
00:19:33,119 --> 00:19:35,800
Speaker 2: And your book you said you couldn't remember a single

366
00:19:35,840 --> 00:19:38,880
Speaker 2: day of your childhood where you weren't hit. So were

367
00:19:38,920 --> 00:19:41,720
Speaker 2: you just constantly in fear? Like how were you even

368
00:19:41,760 --> 00:19:42,760
Speaker 2: off there? Oh yeah in that?

369
00:19:42,840 --> 00:19:45,840
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, I mean, first of all, I would just say,

370
00:19:45,840 --> 00:19:49,040
Speaker 3: like there were so many group punishments, and everything in

371
00:19:49,080 --> 00:19:52,840
Speaker 3: these high control groups is about keeping kids controlled. But

372
00:19:53,000 --> 00:19:54,720
Speaker 3: you know, when you have a group of twenty two kids,

373
00:19:54,800 --> 00:19:59,480
Speaker 3: like sometimes they make noise, Like we were probably always

374
00:19:59,560 --> 00:20:03,439
Speaker 3: getting groups bankings at least once a day, and in

375
00:20:03,480 --> 00:20:05,520
Speaker 3: this case, the worst thing you could do is try

376
00:20:05,520 --> 00:20:10,239
Speaker 3: to justify yourself or say that you were not participating it,

377
00:20:10,800 --> 00:20:12,960
Speaker 3: because then you just get told well this is for

378
00:20:13,080 --> 00:20:15,479
Speaker 3: all the times you did do something wrong and you

379
00:20:15,600 --> 00:20:20,560
Speaker 3: didn't get caught, and usually just get more swats. But yeah,

380
00:20:20,600 --> 00:20:24,120
Speaker 3: I mean, any adult could hit any child, and it

381
00:20:24,200 --> 00:20:27,159
Speaker 3: was like that that was what they believed in. They

382
00:20:27,320 --> 00:20:30,600
Speaker 3: believed that if you spare the rod, you spoil the child,

383
00:20:30,880 --> 00:20:34,720
Speaker 3: and so you know, we had wooden spoons. We had

384
00:20:34,800 --> 00:20:38,040
Speaker 3: carving paddles, like you know the fraternity paddles that they

385
00:20:38,080 --> 00:20:41,399
Speaker 3: have to haze each other, like, we basically had those

386
00:20:41,520 --> 00:20:45,040
Speaker 3: in all of our communes for people to use to

387
00:20:45,119 --> 00:20:47,719
Speaker 3: beat the children. I have to say too, and I

388
00:20:47,760 --> 00:20:49,760
Speaker 3: know this is hard to hear, but all of this

389
00:20:49,840 --> 00:20:54,520
Speaker 3: would be pants down spankings, which also puts it directly

390
00:20:55,000 --> 00:20:59,679
Speaker 3: in the sexual assaults arena, not to mention, usually in

391
00:20:59,680 --> 00:21:00,680
Speaker 3: front of an audience.

392
00:21:01,080 --> 00:21:04,720
Speaker 1: On top of like the hunger, but like reading your book,

393
00:21:04,920 --> 00:21:08,520
Speaker 1: just I could feel how hungry you all were, and

394
00:21:08,840 --> 00:21:12,359
Speaker 1: that was also just really hard to process and.

395
00:21:12,280 --> 00:21:16,800
Speaker 3: It still still influences me to this day. I would say,

396
00:21:16,840 --> 00:21:20,520
Speaker 3: because when when I feel hunger, my first response is

397
00:21:20,600 --> 00:21:25,199
Speaker 3: breathe through it. It's not go get a snack, you know.

398
00:21:25,400 --> 00:21:29,520
Speaker 3: And we were, we were so food controlled. But the

399
00:21:29,600 --> 00:21:32,480
Speaker 3: control is the big thing I think that we all

400
00:21:32,520 --> 00:21:35,200
Speaker 3: want to get across. You know, people love to focus

401
00:21:35,280 --> 00:21:38,919
Speaker 3: on the sexual abuse or even the physical abuse, but

402
00:21:39,640 --> 00:21:42,680
Speaker 3: what I say was the worst thing about growing up

403
00:21:42,720 --> 00:21:45,240
Speaker 3: in the Children of God was just growing up in

404
00:21:45,280 --> 00:21:49,160
Speaker 3: two straight lines with no spontaneous moments of joy allowed.

405
00:21:49,880 --> 00:21:53,120
Speaker 3: You know. So for example, if you go to a recital, right,

406
00:21:53,200 --> 00:21:55,600
Speaker 3: and like three and four year olds are being brought out,

407
00:21:55,840 --> 00:21:58,160
Speaker 3: and you know how one of them always breaks rank

408
00:21:58,240 --> 00:22:01,840
Speaker 3: and it's like me and everyone in the audience thinks

409
00:22:01,840 --> 00:22:05,119
Speaker 3: it's adorable. Yeah, nobody would have done that, and the

410
00:22:05,200 --> 00:22:08,320
Speaker 3: Children of God like not a two year old nothing.

411
00:22:08,520 --> 00:22:12,520
Speaker 3: We would stand in line and wait to perform. And

412
00:22:12,640 --> 00:22:14,360
Speaker 3: that was our life.

413
00:22:14,480 --> 00:22:16,439
Speaker 2: I think that's an important point. It is easy to

414
00:22:16,480 --> 00:22:20,200
Speaker 2: focus on what happens physically, but so often the most

415
00:22:20,200 --> 00:22:23,600
Speaker 2: painful experiences are just what's happening inside of our brains.

416
00:22:23,600 --> 00:22:25,320
Speaker 2: We're not allowed to be ourselves or people.

417
00:22:25,320 --> 00:22:27,960
Speaker 3: Well, and I put the term in the book on

418
00:22:28,080 --> 00:22:31,680
Speaker 3: Culture that we grew up in religious prison camps. That's

419
00:22:31,720 --> 00:22:35,920
Speaker 3: what it was like. Because you know, that helps other

420
00:22:36,040 --> 00:22:39,320
Speaker 3: people understand some of the children that grew up in

421
00:22:39,359 --> 00:22:43,520
Speaker 3: the Children of God that maybe didn't get outrightly sexually

422
00:22:43,520 --> 00:22:46,760
Speaker 3: abused in the way that I did. They sometimes don't

423
00:22:46,880 --> 00:22:51,720
Speaker 3: understand why they have so much trauma or such issues, right,

424
00:22:51,760 --> 00:22:54,439
Speaker 3: And it's what you said, you know, it's like we

425
00:22:54,520 --> 00:22:58,680
Speaker 3: didn't we didn't get to develop personalities. We were raised

426
00:22:58,720 --> 00:23:04,679
Speaker 3: inside acalyptic anxiety disorder. So like we have all of

427
00:23:04,720 --> 00:23:08,640
Speaker 3: these things about our personalities that just are what they are.

428
00:23:09,080 --> 00:23:11,440
Speaker 2: Did you have friends, were you close to your siblings?

429
00:23:11,480 --> 00:23:13,120
Speaker 2: Like what was the social dynamic?

430
00:23:13,520 --> 00:23:16,199
Speaker 3: I mean yes and no. Yes, we were all in

431
00:23:16,240 --> 00:23:19,040
Speaker 3: there together and those were the only peers we ever

432
00:23:19,080 --> 00:23:23,000
Speaker 3: had access to. But you also could never really ever

433
00:23:23,119 --> 00:23:26,480
Speaker 3: trust anyone because they would be convicted by the Lord

434
00:23:26,640 --> 00:23:29,640
Speaker 3: to go report on you, or they would just tell

435
00:23:29,680 --> 00:23:33,000
Speaker 3: on you so that they would get less punishment. And

436
00:23:33,080 --> 00:23:37,320
Speaker 3: I really didn't delve into this in the book because

437
00:23:37,880 --> 00:23:40,600
Speaker 3: I didn't want to have to demonize anyone else that

438
00:23:40,800 --> 00:23:43,840
Speaker 3: was growing up in this society who was also a victim,

439
00:23:43,960 --> 00:23:47,240
Speaker 3: Like we were all victims of this. But the way

440
00:23:47,280 --> 00:23:51,280
Speaker 3: to survive in any cult or hierarchy is usually by

441
00:23:51,440 --> 00:23:54,000
Speaker 3: tearing other people down so that you are on top,

442
00:23:54,640 --> 00:23:58,560
Speaker 3: and that dynamic was very much present for us as children.

443
00:23:58,800 --> 00:24:03,400
Speaker 3: I think something else is, you know, people always assume

444
00:24:03,560 --> 00:24:06,800
Speaker 3: that in this the abuse is going adults to children,

445
00:24:07,400 --> 00:24:10,680
Speaker 3: but there's also a lot of child on child abuse,

446
00:24:11,280 --> 00:24:14,639
Speaker 3: because you know, the older boys are being taught to

447
00:24:14,680 --> 00:24:17,399
Speaker 3: be our predators. They are being raised as we are

448
00:24:17,440 --> 00:24:20,560
Speaker 3: being raised to be submissive. The women and girls, they

449
00:24:20,560 --> 00:24:24,159
Speaker 3: are being raised to be our predators. And I saw goosebumps.

450
00:24:24,320 --> 00:24:27,919
Speaker 3: That is so petrifying. That was even the part in

451
00:24:27,960 --> 00:24:31,200
Speaker 3: the book that we had to really cut down. It

452
00:24:31,240 --> 00:24:33,960
Speaker 3: was a whole scene and it was too much. This

453
00:24:34,080 --> 00:24:37,080
Speaker 3: is too much for the reader to watch, like the

454
00:24:37,119 --> 00:24:40,399
Speaker 3: eleven year old boys of using the younger girls because

455
00:24:40,480 --> 00:24:41,600
Speaker 3: that's what they've been taught.

456
00:24:42,040 --> 00:24:44,040
Speaker 4: Wow, that's awful.

457
00:24:44,200 --> 00:24:48,720
Speaker 2: It's horrible. Were there any like pockets of fun or

458
00:24:48,840 --> 00:24:51,720
Speaker 2: like moments of freedom that you remember?

459
00:24:52,280 --> 00:24:55,680
Speaker 3: I mean, in some ways, yes, because there has to be,

460
00:24:55,800 --> 00:24:59,760
Speaker 3: but I would not say completely free, like we have,

461
00:25:00,280 --> 00:25:02,359
Speaker 3: you know, an hour a day that we were sent

462
00:25:02,400 --> 00:25:07,399
Speaker 3: out into the prison yard to exercise. And you know,

463
00:25:07,720 --> 00:25:10,320
Speaker 3: I was usually growing up in the Global South, so

464
00:25:10,359 --> 00:25:15,400
Speaker 3: we usually had swimming pools stuff like that. But I mean, yeah,

465
00:25:15,520 --> 00:25:18,720
Speaker 3: as a child, you snatch joy where you can, right,

466
00:25:19,800 --> 00:25:24,360
Speaker 3: But I don't have those memories as much. And one

467
00:25:24,400 --> 00:25:26,800
Speaker 3: of the things for me, and this is also why

468
00:25:26,840 --> 00:25:30,399
Speaker 3: I think their programming didn't work, because this kind of

469
00:25:30,480 --> 00:25:34,760
Speaker 3: like indoctrination, programming, brainwashing, whatever we were going to call it,

470
00:25:34,880 --> 00:25:38,760
Speaker 3: Like there's a formula for it, and it goes physical pain,

471
00:25:39,160 --> 00:25:44,880
Speaker 3: isolation from the world, indoctrination, small acts of kindness, right,

472
00:25:44,920 --> 00:25:48,359
Speaker 3: and this is exactly the pattern that child sergeants follow

473
00:25:48,440 --> 00:25:52,119
Speaker 3: in basic training. But because I was the person that

474
00:25:52,119 --> 00:25:54,960
Speaker 3: would never stop asking why, because I was the kid

475
00:25:55,000 --> 00:25:58,520
Speaker 3: that was always in trouble, I almost feel like they

476
00:25:58,600 --> 00:26:01,359
Speaker 3: missed me with them all lacks of kindness and the

477
00:26:01,440 --> 00:26:05,400
Speaker 3: small moments of joy, you know, And so because of that,

478
00:26:06,000 --> 00:26:08,480
Speaker 3: I feel like it didn't work where I feel like

479
00:26:08,560 --> 00:26:12,440
Speaker 3: some of my colleagues and siblings, even and my mom,

480
00:26:12,600 --> 00:26:15,480
Speaker 3: who were much more go along to get along type

481
00:26:15,520 --> 00:26:20,920
Speaker 3: of personalities, they do have better memories of the fellowship

482
00:26:20,960 --> 00:26:24,879
Speaker 3: and the community. It's honestly similar to my experience in

483
00:26:24,880 --> 00:26:27,840
Speaker 3: the military. When you're getting out, they will tell you, oh,

484
00:26:27,880 --> 00:26:30,960
Speaker 3: you're going to miss the camaraderie, and us women look

485
00:26:31,000 --> 00:26:33,800
Speaker 3: at them and go, what camaraderie? Right? Like, we were

486
00:26:33,920 --> 00:26:35,240
Speaker 3: always on the outside.

487
00:26:35,440 --> 00:26:37,639
Speaker 1: You were always taught that you are a soldier, You're

488
00:26:37,680 --> 00:26:40,440
Speaker 1: a soldier for God, You're about to fight a giant

489
00:26:40,480 --> 00:26:41,520
Speaker 1: war for God.

490
00:26:42,040 --> 00:26:45,760
Speaker 4: And you guys are practicing like grades and stuff. Can

491
00:26:45,800 --> 00:26:47,359
Speaker 4: you give them to a little bit of what that

492
00:26:47,600 --> 00:26:48,000
Speaker 4: looked like?

493
00:26:48,320 --> 00:26:50,800
Speaker 3: And I think this is the best way to describe

494
00:26:50,840 --> 00:26:53,800
Speaker 3: growing up in any high control religion. It's just like

495
00:26:53,920 --> 00:26:56,800
Speaker 3: we weren't kids. We were little soldiers, and we were

496
00:26:56,880 --> 00:27:00,399
Speaker 3: expected to be perfect little soldiers all the time time,

497
00:27:00,880 --> 00:27:04,119
Speaker 3: and so like, like you mentioned, the prologue of Uncultured

498
00:27:04,240 --> 00:27:06,800
Speaker 3: opens up with me holding this fifty pound Duffel bag

499
00:27:06,840 --> 00:27:10,480
Speaker 3: over my head, getting yelled at and thinking, oh, I

500
00:27:10,560 --> 00:27:13,679
Speaker 3: just joined another cult. It's very dramatic. It gets you

501
00:27:13,720 --> 00:27:16,760
Speaker 3: into the story. But I wasn't scared when I thought that.

502
00:27:16,960 --> 00:27:19,360
Speaker 3: I literally was like looking around myself, going, oh, I'm

503
00:27:19,400 --> 00:27:20,919
Speaker 3: going to be so much better at it than all

504
00:27:20,920 --> 00:27:24,480
Speaker 3: of these suckers army. I know how to do this, right,

505
00:27:24,600 --> 00:27:29,520
Speaker 3: I'm just going from God's army into Uncle Sam's army. Right.

506
00:27:29,600 --> 00:27:32,840
Speaker 3: And in basic training I didn't even notice this. I

507
00:27:32,880 --> 00:27:35,520
Speaker 3: thought my trigger point was when I deployed, when it

508
00:27:35,560 --> 00:27:39,679
Speaker 3: was sexually violent environment and I got assaulted. My editor

509
00:27:40,240 --> 00:27:44,600
Speaker 3: notices that in the basic training chapter, I'm having flashbacks, right,

510
00:27:44,680 --> 00:27:48,360
Speaker 3: like I'm having flashbacks to these battle drills we were

511
00:27:48,359 --> 00:27:51,320
Speaker 3: doing when I was seven years old, running through the woods,

512
00:27:51,400 --> 00:27:55,800
Speaker 3: you know, fighting the anti Christ soldiers. The programming on

513
00:27:55,960 --> 00:27:59,920
Speaker 3: us as soldiers and to represent the organization to lie

514
00:28:00,080 --> 00:28:04,040
Speaker 3: to the outside world was very extreme. Actually, Chapter three

515
00:28:04,080 --> 00:28:06,240
Speaker 3: of my book is about that, and that was published

516
00:28:06,240 --> 00:28:09,359
Speaker 3: in Rolling Stone magazine for anyone that wants to sneak

517
00:28:09,359 --> 00:28:13,080
Speaker 3: peek talking about the cult, the cult, the way that

518
00:28:13,320 --> 00:28:17,120
Speaker 3: the children are programmed. But like when I went over

519
00:28:17,160 --> 00:28:19,680
Speaker 3: into the Army, and this is significant because the Army

520
00:28:19,720 --> 00:28:23,880
Speaker 3: pulls a lot of children from high control religions into

521
00:28:23,920 --> 00:28:27,440
Speaker 3: the military, and we do very, very well because we've

522
00:28:27,480 --> 00:28:32,080
Speaker 3: been taught from birth to tamp down our individuality for

523
00:28:32,119 --> 00:28:35,320
Speaker 3: the purpose of the group. So the big shock to

524
00:28:35,440 --> 00:28:40,400
Speaker 3: me was realizing that the culture of sexual violence was

525
00:28:40,600 --> 00:28:44,400
Speaker 3: as bad in the beloved US Army as in the

526
00:28:44,520 --> 00:28:48,240
Speaker 3: reviled religious sex cult. And like that was the big

527
00:28:48,280 --> 00:28:51,160
Speaker 3: cult parallel that shocked me that I like put down

528
00:28:51,160 --> 00:28:51,840
Speaker 3: in the book.

529
00:28:53,680 --> 00:28:55,920
Speaker 2: What was the deceivers yet true doctrine?

530
00:28:56,360 --> 00:28:58,960
Speaker 3: Oh? Yes, so this is what I was talking about,

531
00:28:59,040 --> 00:29:01,160
Speaker 3: And this is in that chapter that was published in

532
00:29:01,280 --> 00:29:05,640
Speaker 3: Rolling Stone. This was a comic book drawn by Jeremy

533
00:29:05,640 --> 00:29:08,320
Speaker 3: Spencer or Fleetwood mac who was quite a talented artist

534
00:29:08,360 --> 00:29:12,560
Speaker 3: as well and my stepfather who raised me. And it

535
00:29:12,920 --> 00:29:17,760
Speaker 3: was basically a fun comic book to teach us how

536
00:29:17,800 --> 00:29:21,760
Speaker 3: to lie for God. And almost again every high control

537
00:29:21,800 --> 00:29:25,360
Speaker 3: religion or cult has some version of this. In the

538
00:29:25,440 --> 00:29:28,000
Speaker 3: Children of God, it was called deceivers, yet true. And

539
00:29:28,040 --> 00:29:30,400
Speaker 3: it was this whole idea of like, we know that

540
00:29:30,440 --> 00:29:34,320
Speaker 3: the things we do in our communes are not wrong,

541
00:29:34,920 --> 00:29:39,440
Speaker 3: but the outside world doesn't understand. Therefore we must present

542
00:29:39,480 --> 00:29:42,560
Speaker 3: it in this way, right, Not that different from abusive

543
00:29:42,680 --> 00:29:45,280
Speaker 3: families who had this whole concept of the circle of

544
00:29:45,320 --> 00:29:48,000
Speaker 3: trust and you know, nothing goes outside the family.

545
00:29:48,280 --> 00:29:50,080
Speaker 2: Something that's so interesting to me about the Children of

546
00:29:50,080 --> 00:29:53,000
Speaker 2: God is that some of these like blatantly illegal and

547
00:29:53,080 --> 00:29:55,880
Speaker 2: bad things that they were doing, they just had fucking

548
00:29:56,400 --> 00:29:59,000
Speaker 2: books of them that you could just look.

549
00:29:58,800 --> 00:30:00,280
Speaker 4: At, a cartoon book.

550
00:30:01,520 --> 00:30:04,240
Speaker 3: Like a picture book, yeah, circulating.

551
00:30:04,320 --> 00:30:06,440
Speaker 2: I had the evidence a little more or something. I

552
00:30:06,480 --> 00:30:06,880
Speaker 2: don't know.

553
00:30:07,240 --> 00:30:09,840
Speaker 3: I mean, the Children of God famously produced what has

554
00:30:09,920 --> 00:30:13,120
Speaker 3: been called the worst cult artifact of all times, which

555
00:30:13,240 --> 00:30:17,240
Speaker 3: is a seven hundred and sixty two page manual on

556
00:30:17,920 --> 00:30:22,080
Speaker 3: pedophilia for God. And it was done on a real child,

557
00:30:22,120 --> 00:30:25,200
Speaker 3: which was the son of the current leader, stepson of

558
00:30:25,240 --> 00:30:28,440
Speaker 3: the founder, and he was raised to be a sexually

559
00:30:28,480 --> 00:30:32,680
Speaker 3: liberated child and basically had nannies that were sort of

560
00:30:32,800 --> 00:30:36,320
Speaker 3: ordered to be raping and abusing him from birth and

561
00:30:36,400 --> 00:30:39,560
Speaker 3: documenting it all and putting it down. And this is

562
00:30:39,600 --> 00:30:43,360
Speaker 3: one of those things in hindsight that people like members

563
00:30:43,360 --> 00:30:45,800
Speaker 3: of the Children of God will try to say, we

564
00:30:45,920 --> 00:30:48,560
Speaker 3: didn't know, right. Sure it was bad at the top,

565
00:30:48,600 --> 00:30:51,800
Speaker 3: but we didn't know. They all read the Dabadito book.

566
00:30:52,360 --> 00:30:56,400
Speaker 3: They all read it, They all saw those pictures. They

567
00:30:56,400 --> 00:31:00,280
Speaker 3: were so confident that their way was right, but they

568
00:31:00,320 --> 00:31:04,280
Speaker 3: had no qualms about putting it down. And they were

569
00:31:04,320 --> 00:31:07,600
Speaker 3: also so confident that they had trained us children to

570
00:31:07,760 --> 00:31:11,920
Speaker 3: perform perfection within an inch of our lives, that nobody

571
00:31:12,000 --> 00:31:14,400
Speaker 3: was going to question it. And sure enough, the Children

572
00:31:14,440 --> 00:31:17,800
Speaker 3: of God was raided in four different countries, and nobody

573
00:31:18,200 --> 00:31:21,560
Speaker 3: was ever able to make charges stick, and always we

574
00:31:21,640 --> 00:31:24,120
Speaker 3: were given back to a pedophile cult.

575
00:31:24,360 --> 00:31:25,480
Speaker 4: Whatever happened to davidydo?

576
00:31:25,760 --> 00:31:29,880
Speaker 3: Yeah, So, Davidito, this boy who was raised to also

577
00:31:29,960 --> 00:31:32,360
Speaker 3: be the prophet who was going to take over the

578
00:31:32,440 --> 00:31:36,440
Speaker 3: Children of God, the left the Children of God and

579
00:31:37,480 --> 00:31:40,440
Speaker 3: went through a lot of the processes that we all

580
00:31:40,440 --> 00:31:44,120
Speaker 3: go through trying to understand what happened to us. And

581
00:31:44,480 --> 00:31:48,400
Speaker 3: he eventually decided he was going to fight back, and

582
00:31:48,520 --> 00:31:54,760
Speaker 3: so he made a vigilante manifesto, and then he lured

583
00:31:55,040 --> 00:32:01,600
Speaker 3: one of said nanny's to his apartment and throat and

584
00:32:01,680 --> 00:32:05,920
Speaker 3: then drove to another state where he took his own life.

585
00:32:06,440 --> 00:32:09,960
Speaker 3: His plan was really to go on a giant rampage

586
00:32:10,040 --> 00:32:13,400
Speaker 3: and to find his mother who's still leading the cult.

587
00:32:14,880 --> 00:32:18,080
Speaker 3: And you know what he said, I think is so

588
00:32:18,720 --> 00:32:22,000
Speaker 3: so intense and it really just explains cult think that

589
00:32:22,040 --> 00:32:25,160
Speaker 3: this woman, as she's lying on the floor bleeding to death,

590
00:32:25,800 --> 00:32:30,480
Speaker 3: still has no idea what she did wrong. And then

591
00:32:30,560 --> 00:32:34,280
Speaker 3: he himself realized, like, it is so hard to take

592
00:32:34,320 --> 00:32:36,520
Speaker 3: a life, even after what they did to me, I

593
00:32:36,560 --> 00:32:40,959
Speaker 3: can't keep doing this. So yes, very very sad ending.

594
00:32:41,120 --> 00:32:44,200
Speaker 3: And this for me was two years after I left

595
00:32:44,240 --> 00:32:47,000
Speaker 3: the cult, and I'm just getting ready to go to

596
00:32:47,040 --> 00:32:49,920
Speaker 3: school in a normal day. Have not realized that I

597
00:32:50,000 --> 00:32:52,960
Speaker 3: grew up in a cult, and I'm watching this and

598
00:32:53,000 --> 00:32:55,560
Speaker 3: it's just saying children have got cult over, Like on

599
00:32:55,640 --> 00:33:01,240
Speaker 3: the national news on electional news, I literally went, oh,

600
00:33:01,280 --> 00:33:05,280
Speaker 3: I grew up in a cult. That's why I'm like this.

601
00:33:06,000 --> 00:33:09,720
Speaker 3: And then my literal next thought was like, no, wonder

602
00:33:09,760 --> 00:33:13,880
Speaker 3: we spent so much time talking about why we weren't cults.

603
00:33:16,600 --> 00:33:18,960
Speaker 3: I think I tell people on TikTok all the time.

604
00:33:19,040 --> 00:33:22,000
Speaker 3: I'm like, if your church or your organization is constantly

605
00:33:22,040 --> 00:33:24,959
Speaker 3: going over arguments about why they're not a cult, it's

606
00:33:25,000 --> 00:33:25,400
Speaker 3: a cult.

607
00:33:25,480 --> 00:33:28,800
Speaker 2: Probably alt Or saying they are a cult in a joking.

608
00:33:28,880 --> 00:33:32,280
Speaker 3: Joking that is, yes. That one is also kind of

609
00:33:32,320 --> 00:33:35,240
Speaker 3: a sign for me. A lot of I see a

610
00:33:35,280 --> 00:33:38,200
Speaker 3: lot of nonprofits get into this like, oh, we're kind

611
00:33:38,200 --> 00:33:40,720
Speaker 3: of a cult, but don't worry, we're a good cult.

612
00:33:40,760 --> 00:33:45,760
Speaker 2: I'm curious about when David Berg died. You said a

613
00:33:45,800 --> 00:33:51,080
Speaker 2: woman took over. What change when that happened so publicly?

614
00:33:51,200 --> 00:33:54,280
Speaker 3: She was trying to protect the children, which is really

615
00:33:54,400 --> 00:33:58,760
Speaker 3: rich for someone who was having sex with her own child. However,

616
00:33:59,360 --> 00:34:02,320
Speaker 3: she says she trying to protect the children. What she

617
00:34:02,600 --> 00:34:08,440
Speaker 3: did is create a charter of rights and responsibilities. I

618
00:34:08,480 --> 00:34:10,520
Speaker 3: think what she was really trying to do was just

619
00:34:10,560 --> 00:34:14,720
Speaker 3: put in more control. And you know, so for example,

620
00:34:14,800 --> 00:34:17,440
Speaker 3: she said stuff like, you have the right to question

621
00:34:17,640 --> 00:34:21,480
Speaker 3: any doctrine that we have, but you have the responsibility

622
00:34:21,920 --> 00:34:24,960
Speaker 3: to do it in a way that doesn't create schism

623
00:34:25,239 --> 00:34:28,840
Speaker 3: and doubt, right, which actually gives you less right to

624
00:34:28,960 --> 00:34:34,040
Speaker 3: question than before. You would say things like we will

625
00:34:34,040 --> 00:34:37,239
Speaker 3: never hit children more than six times when they're under

626
00:34:37,280 --> 00:34:39,640
Speaker 3: ten years old, no matter what they do. But that

627
00:34:39,800 --> 00:34:43,080
Speaker 3: also means that every time you get spanked, you will

628
00:34:43,120 --> 00:34:46,000
Speaker 3: be hit six times with a giant paddle and nobody

629
00:34:46,000 --> 00:34:50,239
Speaker 3: will question that. Right. What I think she don't realize.

630
00:34:50,320 --> 00:34:53,239
Speaker 3: She didn't realize was that the Charter of Rights and

631
00:34:53,239 --> 00:34:58,480
Speaker 3: Responsibilities was the beginning of the end. Because in no

632
00:34:58,640 --> 00:35:02,400
Speaker 3: society have we ever seen people give back rights without

633
00:35:02,400 --> 00:35:02,759
Speaker 3: a fight.

634
00:35:03,480 --> 00:35:06,200
Speaker 4: So interesting. Can you say a little bit more about that?

635
00:35:06,560 --> 00:35:09,640
Speaker 3: Yeah, So when you have this population who for thirty

636
00:35:09,760 --> 00:35:13,120
Speaker 3: years has given up all of their rights, right, that's

637
00:35:13,480 --> 00:35:16,960
Speaker 3: part of joining a cult is you are slowly giving

638
00:35:17,040 --> 00:35:20,160
Speaker 3: over all of your rights, all of your visuality, and

639
00:35:20,239 --> 00:35:23,680
Speaker 3: you're coming under what we call bounded control. Well, when

640
00:35:23,719 --> 00:35:27,640
Speaker 3: you give somebody back their rights, just the idea that

641
00:35:27,680 --> 00:35:31,239
Speaker 3: we have rights, it grows from there because humans do

642
00:35:31,280 --> 00:35:34,880
Speaker 3: not like to live in bondage. And so between that

643
00:35:35,160 --> 00:35:39,400
Speaker 3: and then between the Internet happening, which really changed everything

644
00:35:39,440 --> 00:35:41,960
Speaker 3: for us because they started wanting to use the Internet

645
00:35:42,000 --> 00:35:45,120
Speaker 3: to reach more people. But by doing that, we became

646
00:35:45,239 --> 00:35:48,560
Speaker 3: less isolated, and so it became much easier for us

647
00:35:48,560 --> 00:35:51,360
Speaker 3: to leave or find alternate information.

648
00:35:51,719 --> 00:35:57,520
Speaker 2: Except can you tell us how you finally left?

649
00:35:58,000 --> 00:36:03,000
Speaker 3: Yeah? It's very traumatic. First, you know, I say, I

650
00:36:03,080 --> 00:36:06,399
Speaker 3: had this big like crack in the brainwashing moment on

651
00:36:06,520 --> 00:36:09,320
Speaker 3: nine to eleven. So on nine eleven, I'm fourteen years old.

652
00:36:09,800 --> 00:36:11,839
Speaker 3: This is the first time I've seen live news on

653
00:36:11,880 --> 00:36:16,720
Speaker 3: television ever, and I'm watching, you know, this horrific scene happen,

654
00:36:17,360 --> 00:36:20,800
Speaker 3: and my people are praising God for his promised judgment

655
00:36:20,920 --> 00:36:24,640
Speaker 3: on America. And so even though I never believed it,

656
00:36:24,920 --> 00:36:27,319
Speaker 3: I felt like I was a prisoner. I thought the

657
00:36:27,360 --> 00:36:30,680
Speaker 3: problem was me, right, like, I just don't belong here.

658
00:36:31,320 --> 00:36:33,480
Speaker 3: That was the moment I was, like, I heard the

659
00:36:33,560 --> 00:36:37,799
Speaker 3: term religious extremists on the news, and I kind of

660
00:36:37,840 --> 00:36:42,120
Speaker 3: had this are we the bad guy's moment? And that

661
00:36:42,280 --> 00:36:44,560
Speaker 3: was when I decided I was going to launch my

662
00:36:44,680 --> 00:36:48,120
Speaker 3: campaign to leave. Why did I have to do that? Well,

663
00:36:48,160 --> 00:36:51,080
Speaker 3: it's hard to reject your family, but also I had

664
00:36:51,120 --> 00:36:53,919
Speaker 3: nowhere to go, and I was only fourteen, and all

665
00:36:53,960 --> 00:36:57,680
Speaker 3: of my parents and grandparents are in the cults where

666
00:36:57,719 --> 00:37:00,200
Speaker 3: we are living. Right then, I was living in San

667
00:37:00,200 --> 00:37:04,120
Speaker 3: Diego briefly, and then we went to Mexico, and so

668
00:37:04,280 --> 00:37:08,000
Speaker 3: from Mexico is where I launched my rebellion and just

669
00:37:08,600 --> 00:37:11,560
Speaker 3: I'm trying to break different rules, I'm trying to get

670
00:37:11,560 --> 00:37:15,480
Speaker 3: in trouble. Unfortunately, the problem with cults is if they

671
00:37:15,480 --> 00:37:18,920
Speaker 3: think they can save you, they try, and exorcisms are

672
00:37:18,960 --> 00:37:22,880
Speaker 3: not fun. And so I realized I needed to break

673
00:37:23,280 --> 00:37:27,080
Speaker 3: kind of like the biggest, baddest rule. And I also

674
00:37:27,200 --> 00:37:29,800
Speaker 3: had a ticking cluck because now I'm fifteen and a

675
00:37:29,840 --> 00:37:33,399
Speaker 3: half and at sixteen you become a full adult, which

676
00:37:33,440 --> 00:37:36,640
Speaker 3: means you are expected to have no birth control sex

677
00:37:36,680 --> 00:37:41,000
Speaker 3: with anyone who wants and so, and especially from my

678
00:37:41,160 --> 00:37:44,040
Speaker 3: mom being stuck because she had kids, I was like,

679
00:37:44,160 --> 00:37:47,160
Speaker 3: I have to get out of here. So you know,

680
00:37:47,239 --> 00:37:51,719
Speaker 3: this all climaxes with me scaling the walls of the commune,

681
00:37:52,200 --> 00:37:56,759
Speaker 3: going out into Guadalajara, Mexico and having sex with somebody

682
00:37:56,920 --> 00:38:02,440
Speaker 3: from the outside. Now like the biggest right no fellowship

683
00:38:02,480 --> 00:38:05,920
Speaker 3: with outsiders taken to the extreme, which.

684
00:38:05,719 --> 00:38:08,920
Speaker 2: Is ironic because flirty fishing specifically was that.

685
00:38:09,120 --> 00:38:13,399
Speaker 3: No. It is, but also not, I guess, because it's

686
00:38:13,440 --> 00:38:14,480
Speaker 3: just about the control.

687
00:38:14,680 --> 00:38:18,040
Speaker 6: So yeah, and you weren't bringing him back right right,

688
00:38:18,320 --> 00:38:23,760
Speaker 6: ringing people in. Yeah, in the eighties, when the AIDS

689
00:38:23,760 --> 00:38:28,880
Speaker 6: epidemic happened, they stopped flirty fishing, at least that's what

690
00:38:28,920 --> 00:38:29,920
Speaker 6: they told the whole group.

691
00:38:30,080 --> 00:38:34,400
Speaker 3: Of course, people with political power continued to get sex

692
00:38:34,480 --> 00:38:37,680
Speaker 3: all around the world from members of the children of God,

693
00:38:38,160 --> 00:38:42,120
Speaker 3: and I also think that we were always used in

694
00:38:42,200 --> 00:38:44,799
Speaker 3: that way. So like how Meghan said, it's not like

695
00:38:44,840 --> 00:38:48,359
Speaker 3: he was bringing her back. I actually did bring him

696
00:38:48,440 --> 00:38:52,080
Speaker 3: to the commune several times for Bible studies. Right, we

697
00:38:52,400 --> 00:38:55,280
Speaker 3: weren't making us go all the way with people anymore,

698
00:38:55,360 --> 00:38:59,920
Speaker 3: but we were absolutely supposed to be using our whiteness

699
00:39:00,080 --> 00:39:05,000
Speaker 3: and our sexuality to bring people in in Mexico.

700
00:39:05,400 --> 00:39:08,280
Speaker 2: Right, so go on. So then what happened?

701
00:39:08,440 --> 00:39:12,799
Speaker 3: Okay, so I got caught. Actually I fell asleep and

702
00:39:12,880 --> 00:39:16,319
Speaker 3: forgot to sneak back in. I got caught, but I

703
00:39:16,360 --> 00:39:19,480
Speaker 3: wanted to get caught. I had this very dramatic moment

704
00:39:19,480 --> 00:39:21,680
Speaker 3: where I got to just yell at my father, I

705
00:39:21,760 --> 00:39:27,800
Speaker 3: want to leave the family. And then I started wavering

706
00:39:28,320 --> 00:39:32,560
Speaker 3: because psychologists estimate that leaving our high control groups is

707
00:39:32,600 --> 00:39:36,319
Speaker 3: the closest to death that we can experience. And as

708
00:39:36,400 --> 00:39:38,680
Speaker 3: much as I wanted to get away, I was really scared.

709
00:39:39,239 --> 00:39:43,080
Speaker 3: The leaders also realized that the best way to put

710
00:39:43,120 --> 00:39:45,440
Speaker 3: it is I was just very famous in the cult

711
00:39:45,520 --> 00:39:49,280
Speaker 3: and from a very famous family, and I was the oldest,

712
00:39:49,360 --> 00:39:52,239
Speaker 3: third generation and they were like, oh, this will be

713
00:39:52,280 --> 00:39:57,160
Speaker 3: a media disaster if Daniella leaves so they were trying

714
00:39:57,160 --> 00:40:00,839
Speaker 3: to hook me to stay with all of their cool things,

715
00:40:01,640 --> 00:40:04,319
Speaker 3: and my mother, bless her heart, took me on a

716
00:40:04,360 --> 00:40:08,160
Speaker 3: long walk away from the commune and was like go wow.

717
00:40:08,160 --> 00:40:11,680
Speaker 3: She was like, take this opportunity. They found a place

718
00:40:11,719 --> 00:40:14,760
Speaker 3: for me with an older stepsister i'd met three times,

719
00:40:15,320 --> 00:40:16,799
Speaker 3: and she was like, just go go.

720
00:40:16,920 --> 00:40:20,799
Speaker 2: Now did your mom not believe anymore? Like where was

721
00:40:20,840 --> 00:40:21,239
Speaker 2: she at?

722
00:40:21,560 --> 00:40:24,919
Speaker 3: So at that point she did what she says at

723
00:40:24,960 --> 00:40:27,920
Speaker 3: the time was she just knew that I was miserable.

724
00:40:28,080 --> 00:40:31,440
Speaker 3: She just saw that this was killing me my whole life,

725
00:40:31,560 --> 00:40:34,440
Speaker 3: and she wanted me to get away. And you know,

726
00:40:34,480 --> 00:40:37,479
Speaker 3: when I wrote Uncultured, I really did kind of think

727
00:40:37,520 --> 00:40:40,400
Speaker 3: of my mom as the ultimate true believer in me,

728
00:40:40,719 --> 00:40:44,440
Speaker 3: as the one that never got with it. But the

729
00:40:44,480 --> 00:40:47,840
Speaker 3: more I study this, the more I don't think children

730
00:40:48,400 --> 00:40:51,760
Speaker 3: children don't brainwash the same way as adults, because adults

731
00:40:51,960 --> 00:40:55,560
Speaker 3: buy into their own programming. And so I do think

732
00:40:55,600 --> 00:40:59,200
Speaker 3: that my mom, in her own way, never really truly

733
00:40:59,239 --> 00:41:03,840
Speaker 3: believed it, but was just kind of stuck there and

734
00:41:03,920 --> 00:41:07,080
Speaker 3: it took her another eight years to get herself and

735
00:41:07,239 --> 00:41:11,560
Speaker 3: her remaining children out. But I'm so very grateful that,

736
00:41:12,120 --> 00:41:14,080
Speaker 3: you know, she told me to go, because I would

737
00:41:14,080 --> 00:41:16,920
Speaker 3: have been transferred to a different commune, away from my parents,

738
00:41:17,080 --> 00:41:19,960
Speaker 3: expected to work like an adult, probably further away from

739
00:41:20,040 --> 00:41:23,480
Speaker 3: the US. It would have been so much more complicated.

740
00:41:24,600 --> 00:41:27,239
Speaker 3: Even me leaving from Brazil, where I grew up, would

741
00:41:27,239 --> 00:41:31,680
Speaker 3: have been incredibly much more difficult. So I got really

742
00:41:31,760 --> 00:41:35,320
Speaker 3: lucky that I was only in Guadalajara, Mexico, and I could,

743
00:41:35,400 --> 00:41:38,960
Speaker 3: you know, take a bus across the border and drop

744
00:41:39,040 --> 00:41:42,880
Speaker 3: into high school in Houston, Texas. Which is what happens

745
00:41:43,000 --> 00:41:44,680
Speaker 3: is I show up to the high school I'm zoned

746
00:41:44,719 --> 00:41:47,719
Speaker 3: for with a passport and a Social Security card, which

747
00:41:47,719 --> 00:41:51,359
Speaker 3: are the only two documents I own, and they're like, so,

748
00:41:51,960 --> 00:41:55,959
Speaker 3: we can't enroll you because you don't exist, but now

749
00:41:55,960 --> 00:41:58,399
Speaker 3: that we know you exist, we need you to bring

750
00:41:58,520 --> 00:42:01,760
Speaker 3: proof that you're in school somewhere in the next five days,

751
00:42:01,840 --> 00:42:04,040
Speaker 3: otherwise being to send the cops to your house.

752
00:42:04,239 --> 00:42:06,920
Speaker 2: Oh my god, So how did you get in? How

753
00:42:06,960 --> 00:42:08,680
Speaker 2: did you start going to school?

754
00:42:08,800 --> 00:42:13,640
Speaker 3: You know? Fortunately, fortunately my sister had a boyfriend who

755
00:42:14,160 --> 00:42:17,239
Speaker 3: had been obviously in the American school system and had

756
00:42:17,280 --> 00:42:21,439
Speaker 3: also been to college, and he was just like, no,

757
00:42:21,560 --> 00:42:25,080
Speaker 3: this is not happening. This is a fifteen year old child,

758
00:42:25,440 --> 00:42:28,160
Speaker 3: and you're telling her she's not allowed to go to

759
00:42:28,200 --> 00:42:31,879
Speaker 3: school because she doesn't have the right documents. We had

760
00:42:31,920 --> 00:42:34,520
Speaker 3: to go all the way up to like the city level,

761
00:42:35,080 --> 00:42:37,319
Speaker 3: and we had to get like not only permission to

762
00:42:37,320 --> 00:42:39,719
Speaker 3: get enrolled, but I also had to take twenty two

763
00:42:40,239 --> 00:42:44,320
Speaker 3: tests to test out of subjects so that I could

764
00:42:44,520 --> 00:42:46,600
Speaker 3: Because at first they were like, Okay, we can enroll you,

765
00:42:46,760 --> 00:42:50,160
Speaker 3: but you'll graduate when you're twenty and I was like, no,

766
00:42:50,280 --> 00:42:54,719
Speaker 3: not doing that. Finally we worked out a drug deal.

767
00:42:55,000 --> 00:42:58,319
Speaker 3: I took twenty two tests of classes that I'd never

768
00:42:58,360 --> 00:43:01,319
Speaker 3: taken in my life and pass most of them and

769
00:43:02,120 --> 00:43:03,960
Speaker 3: was able to get into high school.

770
00:43:04,200 --> 00:43:09,400
Speaker 4: Even yeah, not math, I mean this is a really.

771
00:43:09,320 --> 00:43:13,400
Speaker 3: Important math and not science, and this is this is

772
00:43:13,440 --> 00:43:15,840
Speaker 3: one of those things though when we talk about growing

773
00:43:15,920 --> 00:43:18,040
Speaker 3: up in cults and like who I would have been,

774
00:43:18,120 --> 00:43:19,680
Speaker 3: who we would have been. I think I would have

775
00:43:19,680 --> 00:43:21,759
Speaker 3: been a scientist. My mom thinks she would have been

776
00:43:21,800 --> 00:43:26,960
Speaker 3: a doctor. Eventually I came back around to organizational psychology

777
00:43:27,080 --> 00:43:31,040
Speaker 3: group science soft sciences is really the only place I

778
00:43:31,040 --> 00:43:34,880
Speaker 3: can live because we just weren't given enough, you know.

779
00:43:34,920 --> 00:43:37,879
Speaker 3: I was taking Algebra one and two at the same

780
00:43:37,920 --> 00:43:40,080
Speaker 3: time in high school I.

781
00:43:40,040 --> 00:43:41,839
Speaker 1: Think I would have been a dancer if I would

782
00:43:41,880 --> 00:43:44,399
Speaker 1: have been allowed to do things outside of my high

783
00:43:44,440 --> 00:43:47,800
Speaker 1: control religion, which probably isn't true. But I think something

784
00:43:47,800 --> 00:43:50,640
Speaker 1: that we're skipping over because you're too modest to say it,

785
00:43:50,680 --> 00:43:54,239
Speaker 1: is that you're really fucking smart. The fact that you

786
00:43:54,280 --> 00:43:56,120
Speaker 1: were able to jump ahead in the way that you

787
00:43:56,400 --> 00:43:59,640
Speaker 1: were able to is not some stroke of life.

788
00:43:59,800 --> 00:44:04,520
Speaker 3: Well, some of it was the cults programming right, Like

789
00:44:04,719 --> 00:44:07,399
Speaker 3: I was taught from a very young age to read

790
00:44:07,680 --> 00:44:13,480
Speaker 3: very dense literature and then write these like very responsive

791
00:44:14,360 --> 00:44:18,759
Speaker 3: analysis or critique about right and so you know, I

792
00:44:18,920 --> 00:44:21,960
Speaker 3: was jokes that in college I studied literature, but anytime

793
00:44:21,960 --> 00:44:24,040
Speaker 3: I had an essay question that I didn't know how

794
00:44:24,080 --> 00:44:28,560
Speaker 3: to answer, I would just write three extra paragraphs. It

795
00:44:28,760 --> 00:44:35,000
Speaker 3: always worked. Some of my like skills at like bising

796
00:44:35,560 --> 00:44:40,200
Speaker 3: and just telling them what they wanted to hear served

797
00:44:40,280 --> 00:44:42,760
Speaker 3: me really well when I had to go into school.

798
00:44:43,040 --> 00:44:46,160
Speaker 3: Why did that? And like knowing the Bible and when

799
00:44:46,160 --> 00:44:49,440
Speaker 3: you study literature everything starts off mythology.

800
00:44:49,880 --> 00:44:53,240
Speaker 2: I'm glad that they you know, it's not a real education.

801
00:44:53,400 --> 00:44:56,920
Speaker 2: Obviously you didn't know anything about parts of life that

802
00:44:57,000 --> 00:44:59,200
Speaker 2: you should have known about. But I'm glad that they

803
00:44:59,280 --> 00:45:02,120
Speaker 2: gave you that at least, because a lot of cults

804
00:45:02,160 --> 00:45:05,760
Speaker 2: don't let Oh yeah, any reading happened, especially for girls,

805
00:45:05,800 --> 00:45:06,680
Speaker 2: you know, you know, and.

806
00:45:06,760 --> 00:45:09,879
Speaker 3: For sure we were I say we were. We were

807
00:45:10,120 --> 00:45:14,600
Speaker 3: educated to the point that we could shut down complaints

808
00:45:14,640 --> 00:45:18,200
Speaker 3: of abuse, right. So they were very big on early reading,

809
00:45:18,320 --> 00:45:21,520
Speaker 3: early writing. In fact, I was actually used as an

810
00:45:21,600 --> 00:45:24,400
Speaker 3: actress for most of my life. So like Little Apocalypse

811
00:45:24,480 --> 00:45:29,760
Speaker 3: Lindsay Lohan videos, like we had these videos teach me time,

812
00:45:29,880 --> 00:45:32,400
Speaker 3: and it's all about like reading and writing and like

813
00:45:32,560 --> 00:45:36,320
Speaker 3: incredibly young kids. Like when I was eighteen months old,

814
00:45:36,400 --> 00:45:38,319
Speaker 3: someone dropped a bunch of raisins on the floor and

815
00:45:38,360 --> 00:45:41,799
Speaker 3: I looked down and I said, twenty four sure enough,

816
00:45:41,840 --> 00:45:44,279
Speaker 3: it was right. And so like we were, we were

817
00:45:44,360 --> 00:45:50,839
Speaker 3: essentially taught to present as precociously smart and then we

818
00:45:50,840 --> 00:45:54,040
Speaker 3: were you know for the early generations. Like my mom's

819
00:45:54,040 --> 00:45:56,399
Speaker 3: like once you can read and write and do basic math,

820
00:45:56,600 --> 00:46:00,720
Speaker 3: like you're done. She became a secretary when she was twelve. Wow.

821
00:46:01,280 --> 00:46:05,080
Speaker 3: But it is also like very true, like you mentioned,

822
00:46:05,120 --> 00:46:08,960
Speaker 3: like the FLDS, like some cults, the survivors don't even

823
00:46:09,000 --> 00:46:11,800
Speaker 3: know how to read, and they have a whole different

824
00:46:12,080 --> 00:46:14,120
Speaker 3: path to trying to survive.

825
00:46:14,760 --> 00:46:18,400
Speaker 2: Side note, So are there videos of tiny you somewhere?

826
00:46:19,080 --> 00:46:22,839
Speaker 3: Omg, yes there is a I used to show this

827
00:46:22,880 --> 00:46:25,319
Speaker 3: to my soldiers who didn't believe me when I said

828
00:46:25,360 --> 00:46:27,520
Speaker 3: I grew up in a cult. And it is me

829
00:46:27,640 --> 00:46:31,000
Speaker 3: at the age of ten and six other white children

830
00:46:31,560 --> 00:46:37,080
Speaker 3: wrapping Apocalypse Bible versus in downtown Rio.

831
00:46:38,160 --> 00:46:41,279
Speaker 4: I mean kind of sligh, honestly, did you express me?

832
00:46:41,400 --> 00:46:45,040
Speaker 3: The thing I'm still bitter about is that I wrote

833
00:46:45,400 --> 00:46:48,040
Speaker 3: all of the non biblical lyrics at the age of

834
00:46:48,120 --> 00:46:49,800
Speaker 3: ten and I got no credit.

835
00:46:50,040 --> 00:46:56,200
Speaker 6: Uncredible, Oh my god, wait paid but didn't even get

836
00:46:56,200 --> 00:46:56,799
Speaker 6: credit for it.

837
00:46:57,160 --> 00:46:58,600
Speaker 4: Yeah, this is not Lindsay Lohan.

838
00:46:58,719 --> 00:47:01,879
Speaker 3: Actually this is the opposite. She was making millions of lease.

839
00:47:02,239 --> 00:47:05,319
Speaker 4: Did you guys dress a certain way? Like did you

840
00:47:05,400 --> 00:47:06,000
Speaker 4: look odd?

841
00:47:06,360 --> 00:47:08,759
Speaker 3: So yes and no. And this is one of the

842
00:47:08,840 --> 00:47:13,759
Speaker 3: things that people will think cults always have uniforms, uniform appearance.

843
00:47:14,400 --> 00:47:18,239
Speaker 3: So we because we were all over the world, like

844
00:47:18,320 --> 00:47:22,000
Speaker 3: they never tried to standardize a thing. You know, that

845
00:47:22,040 --> 00:47:26,200
Speaker 3: would have been ridiculous. Women weren't supposed to wear bras.

846
00:47:26,719 --> 00:47:28,799
Speaker 3: Young girls were not supposed to sleep with underwear on

847
00:47:28,880 --> 00:47:32,839
Speaker 3: at night. Sure, you know, two big things, and you

848
00:47:32,880 --> 00:47:36,600
Speaker 3: were supposed to see covering your body as a sign

849
00:47:36,640 --> 00:47:40,280
Speaker 3: of shame, which is a sin. So you know, cults,

850
00:47:40,320 --> 00:47:43,839
Speaker 3: there's four things about appearance that cults will control, which

851
00:47:43,880 --> 00:47:49,080
Speaker 3: is hair, body size, body coverage, and underwear. Right, so

852
00:47:49,120 --> 00:47:52,400
Speaker 3: we hit all of those, but then we also had

853
00:47:52,760 --> 00:47:57,560
Speaker 3: this thing like you couldn't look too cool. If any person,

854
00:47:57,760 --> 00:48:00,520
Speaker 3: any person in the cult decided they that you were

855
00:48:00,520 --> 00:48:04,680
Speaker 3: trying to be cooler than Jesus, bad day for you.

856
00:48:04,960 --> 00:48:08,000
Speaker 2: Well I would have not been in fit in there

857
00:48:08,000 --> 00:48:10,120
Speaker 2: because all I wanted was to look cool. That was

858
00:48:10,160 --> 00:48:11,720
Speaker 2: my primary call in life.

859
00:48:11,800 --> 00:48:15,960
Speaker 3: But this also really worked in high control groups, as

860
00:48:16,400 --> 00:48:19,799
Speaker 3: you never know if you're right. You never know if

861
00:48:19,800 --> 00:48:22,720
Speaker 3: the leader is going to decide that today the leggings

862
00:48:22,760 --> 00:48:25,279
Speaker 3: that you wore yesterday look like they're trying to be

863
00:48:25,360 --> 00:48:28,560
Speaker 3: cool and fun. Fact, jumping ahead to the army. The

864
00:48:28,719 --> 00:48:31,360
Speaker 3: army that has pages and pages and pages and pages

865
00:48:31,400 --> 00:48:34,600
Speaker 3: of regulations on how you are allowed to look, also

866
00:48:35,120 --> 00:48:39,560
Speaker 3: has a prohibition on looking too fatish, which I mean

867
00:48:40,080 --> 00:48:42,960
Speaker 3: that anyone that does. I literally have been told to

868
00:48:43,000 --> 00:48:46,959
Speaker 3: take my hair down out of an authorized hairstyle because

869
00:48:47,000 --> 00:48:52,280
Speaker 3: it looked too good in uniform. And so we find

870
00:48:52,440 --> 00:48:57,120
Speaker 3: in group behavior that regulations or rules that are arbitrarily

871
00:48:57,160 --> 00:49:01,920
Speaker 3: applied are often used for the oppression of groups without power,

872
00:49:02,280 --> 00:49:03,760
Speaker 3: demographics without power.

873
00:49:04,200 --> 00:49:07,520
Speaker 2: All right, So that concludes part one of our interview

874
00:49:07,520 --> 00:49:11,000
Speaker 2: with Daniella. Part two is super super interesting. Stay tuned

875
00:49:11,080 --> 00:49:15,239
Speaker 2: next week to talk all things military. You know, I've

876
00:49:15,239 --> 00:49:17,320
Speaker 2: asked you before if you had joined the Children of God.

877
00:49:17,560 --> 00:49:18,880
Speaker 2: I can't remember what your answer was.

878
00:49:18,960 --> 00:49:21,759
Speaker 1: What was it, I don't know, but I'm guessing yes,

879
00:49:22,280 --> 00:49:27,520
Speaker 1: just because it involved hippies and before it unraveled into

880
00:49:27,560 --> 00:49:30,719
Speaker 1: what we know it became. At the very beginning. I

881
00:49:30,760 --> 00:49:34,720
Speaker 1: can see myself in the sixties or seventies thinking free love,

882
00:49:34,960 --> 00:49:40,440
Speaker 1: beautiful worship, love, live on communes and not realize what

883
00:49:40,560 --> 00:49:42,040
Speaker 1: it was going to turn into.

884
00:49:42,360 --> 00:49:46,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, I think about our interview with Diane Lake,

885
00:49:46,120 --> 00:49:48,640
Speaker 2: totally a lot who was a Manson girl, and she

886
00:49:48,800 --> 00:49:52,239
Speaker 2: was talking about how it was so common at that

887
00:49:52,400 --> 00:49:55,880
Speaker 2: time to join a commune. Everybody, it was just a

888
00:49:55,880 --> 00:49:59,239
Speaker 2: part of the culture. Everybody was doing it. And she

889
00:49:59,320 --> 00:50:01,480
Speaker 2: also of course talked about how it was sort of

890
00:50:01,520 --> 00:50:04,000
Speaker 2: marketed as free love, but what it actually ended up

891
00:50:04,040 --> 00:50:06,839
Speaker 2: being a lot of the time was sexual abuse and

892
00:50:06,920 --> 00:50:11,680
Speaker 2: sort of coercion of labor. Yeah, uh huh. But at

893
00:50:11,719 --> 00:50:14,160
Speaker 2: the time, the way it's being sold is, you know,

894
00:50:14,239 --> 00:50:16,320
Speaker 2: something that was very attractive to a lot of people,

895
00:50:16,440 --> 00:50:20,359
Speaker 2: especially because it was such a tumultuous time, and as

896
00:50:20,400 --> 00:50:23,480
Speaker 2: we know, that's when people seek out community and structure

897
00:50:23,760 --> 00:50:27,600
Speaker 2: and answers. So yeah, I get in the beginning, as

898
00:50:27,600 --> 00:50:32,040
Speaker 2: long as I wasn't being told what the actual what

899
00:50:32,080 --> 00:50:36,399
Speaker 2: it's actually about and what's actually going on right exactly. Yeah,

900
00:50:36,440 --> 00:50:39,640
Speaker 2: it's so interesting. It's so interesting. I'm I'm so curious

901
00:50:39,640 --> 00:50:41,520
Speaker 2: to see what's gonna happen ten years from now when

902
00:50:41,560 --> 00:50:44,120
Speaker 2: we look back on like this era, for example, and

903
00:50:44,239 --> 00:50:48,279
Speaker 2: see how many people were in colts during the you know,

904
00:50:48,320 --> 00:50:50,840
Speaker 2: Trump and post Trump era with all of the division

905
00:50:50,920 --> 00:50:54,759
Speaker 2: and everything, like how many people were driven to communes

906
00:50:55,239 --> 00:51:00,160
Speaker 2: and self help programs and religions that you know is

907
00:51:00,160 --> 00:51:03,759
Speaker 2: happening right now. Yeah, I don't know, that's all I got.

908
00:51:04,000 --> 00:51:08,160
Speaker 1: Mm. Yeah, it will be really interesting on all sides

909
00:51:08,160 --> 00:51:11,719
Speaker 1: of it. And like we said, we can't wait to

910
00:51:11,760 --> 00:51:13,800
Speaker 1: talk to her next week. I mean, what she says

911
00:51:13,840 --> 00:51:16,600
Speaker 1: about her experience in the military and how it mirrors

912
00:51:16,600 --> 00:51:19,320
Speaker 1: her experience and the children and the children of God

913
00:51:19,760 --> 00:51:23,399
Speaker 1: is super super interesting stuff, so can't wait to see

914
00:51:23,400 --> 00:51:26,600
Speaker 1: you again here next time, and as always, remember to

915
00:51:26,640 --> 00:51:28,480
Speaker 1: follow your gut, watch out for red.

916
00:51:28,280 --> 00:51:31,759
Speaker 2: Flags, and never ever trust me.

917
00:51:32,480 --> 00:51:35,520
Speaker 1: Bye bye.

918
00:51:37,320 --> 00:51:40,000
Speaker 2: Trust Me is produced by Kirsten Woodward, Gabby Rapp and

919
00:51:40,040 --> 00:51:41,440
Speaker 2: Steve Delemator.

920
00:51:41,000 --> 00:51:42,960
Speaker 1: With special thanks to Stacy Para.

921
00:51:42,840 --> 00:51:45,319
Speaker 2: And her theme song was composed by Holly amber Church.

922
00:51:45,520 --> 00:51:48,400
Speaker 1: You can find us on Instagram at trust Me Podcast,

923
00:51:48,560 --> 00:51:51,919
Speaker 1: Twitter at trust Me Cult Pod, or on TikTok at

924
00:51:52,000 --> 00:51:53,640
Speaker 1: trust Me Cult Podcast.

925
00:51:53,840 --> 00:51:57,200
Speaker 2: I'm Ula Lola on Instagram and Ola Lola on Twitter.

926
00:51:56,920 --> 00:51:59,840
Speaker 1: And I am Megan Elizabeth eleven on Instagram and the

927
00:52:00,000 --> 00:52:01,680
Speaker 1: Abraham Hicks on Twitter.

928
00:52:01,840 --> 00:52:04,160
Speaker 2: Remember to rate and review and spread the word

929
00:52:09,960 --> 00:52:10,000
Speaker 3: M