Now that the internet is so accessible, tons of information flows freely and some of the dark secrets of the Amway Lines Of Sponsorship have been exposed. Also, as times passes, it is becoming clear that a bunch of upline leaders are major hypocrites, apparently motivated by greed and personal gain. I believe this trend will continue. It appears that these same Amway leaders have managed to get around Amway's accreditation guidelines, which appears to be toothless.
Many upline leaders appeal to their audience by talking about how the Amway business can save marriages. I remember sitting in an audience when some WWDB diamonds spoke about how couples who build the business have a less than 2% divorce rate as compared to the national figure of 50% or so. One major reason cited was the financial stress that J-O-B people had (not enough cash). But now we see some upline diamond leaders getting divorced and in some cases, no explanation is offered, as if the missing spouse was beamed up by aliens. Many leaders simply revise history or deny that certain events happened. Some leaders just pretend nothing happened and it seems like IBOs are very forgiving, thus no real accountability has ever been applied to upline leaders. (As if the stress of losing money in Amway doesn't hurt marriages either?)
People also found that some Amway diamonds make a lot of money from tools. When I was an IBO, we were told very clearly, that nobody made profits from tools. That profits went back into the functions to make them better and cheaper. (Has any function gotten cheaper in the last 20 years?) In fact, when I was an IBO, I was told that WWDB was a non-profit entity, which was a bold lie. I will admit that upline later changed their story to WWDB was a for profit company, but nobody kept profits, thus the channeling money to make events better and cheaper. Again, when have events ever been cheaper? Now I don't think that events should be run pro bono, but the leaders should be transparent about it rather than the lies and shroud of secrecy that often accompanies talk about tools and tool income. When you do the math for these conventions, you can easily see that millions can be made in a single weekend. (i.e. 20,000 IBOs attending a function and paying $125 each is 2.5 million gross, not including sales of cds and other materials that get peddled at the function)
Some upline leaders also spoke of how utterly stupid it was to take out a loan as the banks make so much money off the interest. We now see some of these very leaders having their homes foreclosed! Some of these diamonds were the very ones who said their pay cash for everything, including their homes and cars. It is not in the hopes for these folks to suffer, but it is exposing the lies and deception that leaders used to entice IBOs to join and to purchase tools that were supposed to help IBOs to attain the same lifestyle as the diamonds. However, rather than more diamonds, I believe WWDB and some other LOSs, at least in the US, have fewer diamonds now than 15-20 years ago. Where's the evidence of success? Where's the "fruit" on the tree that they talk about?
What's even more amazing is how the hypocrisy of some of these leaders are exposed to downline and the downline simply ignores it and continues to follow blindly without an explanation or questioning the leaders after the incidents are exposed.
IBOs should ask their leaders questions when these kinds of issues arise. And you should think twice if the answer you receive is silence or deflections
3 comments:
Nice post Joe!
I too had the "Amway saves marriages" spiel at every Amway function I attended (I believe I attended 3), and yet I was told in a private conversation with an Emerald that my fiancee may have to be dumped if I want to be successful in the "business". This was only moments after an Amway diamond had been on stage espousing their evangelical Christian values and saying, nothing strengthens a marriage like Amway. It was such a bizarre moment, and honestly a bit traumatic, but can be looked upon as comical because I didn't succumb to the nonsense.
The revision of history to suit their narrative is fascinating. The way these conartists can create a narrative that suits their current agenda is incredible, and if they had taken that creativity and used it for good, then I think they could have made a great wholesome living. The problem is the defect in their morality, and their inability to distinguish the positive they are creating for themselves at the expense of many others. Most people have a generally good moral compass and understand they don't want to hurt others for self-gain, but these Amway apologists are missing that filter and have a severe narcissism.
I'm not sure why, but many people do not care to ask, "How did that person get to where they are, and is it something I can, or should do?" They simply see an end result and think, that's what I want, therefore I can trust this person completely. It's a strange phenomenon, and it seems to develop from a lack of education. I don't mean a formal education necessarily, but more so an education on social awareness. An example of this is, the strange man at the park offering children candy. For some reason, people can't make the correlation that Amway leaders are EXACTLY the same as those creepy people. Much like the creepy guy getting caught, Amway leaders can't justify why there are so many complaints and so many losses.
It is an interesting phenomena. I know during the recruitment phase, the speakers use many little "agreements" that IBOs concur with and it develops a trust with the prospects/IBOs. For example, we can all agree that we pay too much tax, and that waking up early to go to a job for 30-40 years sucks and that we can all use a few hundred dollars a month or more. The prospects/IBOs agree and they see the speaker as credible.
The they see the end results. The speaker implies that they are wealthy beyond belief and that they control their lives and their time. They have the secret behind the success in Amway and they will share it with you if you are "teachable". Being teachable means not questioning upline, attending all functions, and purchasing all the training materials.
I too, had upline suggest I dump my fiance' because he felt she was holding me back in the business. Well, that was the last straw and I winded up leaving the business. I told my group and they all left with me. 1 or 2 of them were brainwashed enough where they stayed in the business but I haven't had contact with them since.
Part of the problem is that many persons are so weak-willed and vulnerable that they have a deep need to believe someone or something, even if it is idiotic. So even when you show an Amway freak that he's being lied to by his up-line and being cheated in the tool scam, he'll simply shut his eyes and refuse to listen.
This deep-seated NEED TO BELIEVE is at the core of Amway, and all cults. It makes nearly a thousand people in a compound in South America drink poisoned Kool-Aid at the command of some malignant crackpot. The need to believe is stronger than all evidence, and even stronger than the fear of death.
With people of this type, logic is useless. That's why when defenders of Amway come to this website, they sound so irrational and off-the-wall. They're not engaging in analysis and clear thought. They're just reacting viscerally.
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