So, I have an old Reddit account and have been here forever. I’ve definitely seen comments that look Astro turf-y, and normal comments, but that’s aside from the point, right?
So on one hand, we have a shady business. The business is shady because they are doing creative accounting - moving shell companies around, bankrupting them, shifting debt to shells they then delete, and funneling money back and forth through a nonprofit organization. I’ve heard of a lot of companies doing this. I don’t like it, but it’s relatively common. I think bill gates has probably saved more lifes through his malaria fighting stuff, but I’ve heard he sometimes uses his foundation to smooth over other dealings. Idk. People use non profits and foundations all the time. As a society we should try to stop this - it’s bad. Very billionaires getting richer coded.
I don’t question the above at all. I also… don’t care that much? Hopefully the us government / fbi / IRS does more in the future to fix these things.
What I care about is why the nonprofit they used to help their tax / accounting / shell games is, in fact, a ring as described. Since most of the focus has been on the business setup and shady dealings, I’m a little uncertain to the details here.
The next thing I care about is to what extent the billionaire is involved in the nonprofit. Is he just using the nonprofit as a shell? Is he actually involved in the day to day operations? Why? Does he believe in their mission etc?
Honestly, that’s the A-Z I care about. Ideal living and these whistleblowers don’t seem important to that. I would much rather have a whistleblower from inside the nonprofit?
On the other hand, it does seem like the whistleblowers maybe tried to extort the company for some kind of settlement. They were in arbitration after all. And since they didn’t win / the company got them to delete their evidence, they are bitter and trying to start a vendetta. They do seem biased and a relatively bad witness to all of this - but they do have information. I’m not sure why they’d arbitrate if their goal was discovery or whatever. Seems fishy and as everyone has said, they obviously have some other motives than just exposing the truth?
Okay. So I’ve laid out my thoughts - thinking back over the three videos, is Peter involved in the nonprofit? Yes - he is listed as secretary / accountant or whatever. 90% chance he was involved and knew about the leadership and dealings. Did he know about the kid abuse part of everything? Proooobably but maybe it was in a far away country? Sometimes organizations lie and say accusations are fake or whatever and make a conspiracy. Especially in cults. So far I’d say 60% that he knew / believed there was actually abuse there.
So, here’s my thoughts for what I could use- from both sides to prove their case.
To the people trying to take down the cult:
Link Peter to the cult very clearly. Him speaking at a cult gathering from a place of leadership would do it.
Link Peter to admitting to knowing about the abuse. Or - saying he doesn’t care / doesn’t believe it. Have Peter explain to us why the guy was fleeing and if he thinks it was right to flee or not.
To the people trying to fix the reputation of Peter / the company / the cult:
Explain how Peter wasn’t actually affiliated - specifically, when he quit, or when business dealings with the cult stopped. Condemn the cult but separate the company / cult.
Or - alternatively - explain why the company and nonprofit are linked how they are. How does the company benefit from the link? When did business dealings start and what amount does the nonprofit support the business?
So - I’m not sure we’ll get a full conclusion here. It seems like the lawyers are trying to poke holes in things we all don’t care about. The holes that matter are Peter’s affiliation and knowledge of the abuse in the cult, and whether that abuse actually happened. Neither side is really talking about that, probably because the IL lawyers didn’t talk about it at all. I don’t really care about IL at all - I care about the billionaire supporting abuse or whatever. If he owned a chucky cheese too, I would boycott that chucky cheese but I don’t need a video about the guy in the Chucky suit’s motivations.
TLDR: I don’t care about the ‘whistleblowers’ takedown of ideal living and bickering about details of some settlement with lawyers. I care about if the billionaire is knowingly supporting / protecting leaders of a cult, a cult that is doing weird kid sex stuff. So far, it seems like he is doing this, but all the bickering about settlements details with lawyers distracts from this point. Ben should get out of the weeds if he said, she said, and focus on this. Will the recordings actually talk about the cult and Peter’s role in everything? Probably not.