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At the upper levels, members of NXIVM wereparticipating in master-slave relationshipswith their mentors.
Women were encouraged to starve themselves for the sake of personal growth.
No question, the branding is horrific.
The starvation is horrific.
The sashes are weird.
The Albany thing could be something to do with real-estate prices?
Because long before anyone got to the point of branding, there was volleyball.
It shows up first inThe Vowssecond episode, and its presented as just another unusual thing about the organization.
On paper, it seems sort of fun.
you’ve got the option to see it in everyones faces as they traipse around this beautiful property.
So, yeah, it feels obvious that theyd also be really into their regular volleyball meet-ups.
When you see it, though, the volleyball is something else entirely.
There are nets, shorts, and sweat bands.
Its in an ordinary gym with bad fluorescent lighting.
Volleyball only happens in the dead of night.
Come to volleyball, come to volleyball, Vicente remembers Raniere telling him.
It was, if you will excuse the pun, a place where Raniere could hold court.
Those workshops, though, are designed to seem as anodyne and unthreatening as possible.
They scribble on it with big markers.
They hold enormous cups of takeout coffee while they talk about being your best self.
Theyre standing in rooms that look like badly lit, budget hotel meeting rooms.
Thats the point, of course.
Its definitely a cult, but its also indistinguishable from a regional insurance brokers conference.
She looks at him with awe, a stunned expression on her face.
Meanwhile, Raniere sits on the bleachers looking like a minor character in a Danny McBride show.
Not even beach volleyball!
But its also distinctly second-tier in the pantheon of American sports.
It is, if were honest with ourselves, the Albany of sports.
That disconcerting combination is what makes the volleyball scenes the most unnervingly cult-ish material in the series.
