By Actaeon
What is so virtuous about being a victim?
Interesting thing about victimhood: it is widely assumed these days that being a victim provides an excuse, but this is a false assumption.
This is a relatively recent error, and is a consequence of our current victimhood culture. It also comes out of an equally mistaken dichotomy of good guys versus bad guys, either/or.
Victimhood has become a kind of social currency.
We should believe victims (why?)
Victims are automatically assumed to be good guys, we are supposed to automatically gravitate to their side.
Victims are to be assumed credible.
Victims aren’t to be held responsible.
Yet none of this makes logical sense. None of this is helpful at getting to the truth. Its appeal is emotional, not factual.
One doesn’t have to delve far into social media to see a kind of “Victimhood Olympics” going on, where the more downtrodden a person can be made out to be, the more virtuous they are assumed to be.
Bizarrely, being a victim, being weak and incapable, immature and unable to cope, has become a sure route to status and acclaim. Being bullied, suffering from a syndrome, being a “survivor” — sometimes of nothing more than the ordinary buffets of life – is the new heroism.
Allison Mack should be held responsible for what she has done – good or bad
So, in fact, the question of whether Allison Mack is a victim or not has no bearing on her responsibility for the things she did.
She was an active and enthusiastic part of the criminal conspiracy that was Nxivm. The evidence has come out in open court and the verdict is in: Nxivm and its various operations, including DOS, was a criminal racket. Allison Mack was Keith Raniere’s willing lieutenant in Nxivm and DOS, she was heavily involved in this for years, and she was loyal to the bitter end.
Mack has pleaded guilty to racketeering and racketeering conspiracy. The facts are no longer in question. She’s a convicted criminal and questions of victimhood have no bearing on this.
Facts matter and justice ought to be meted out impartially. The allegorical figure of Justice, blindfolded and holding a set of scales, exemplifies this ideal of impartiality. Allison Mack’s personal sob stories ought to count for naught. Interesting as her various insecurities and life story may be, they matter not a whit when it comes to meting out justice. This is the ideal at least, the Western concept of justice and applied law. It’s an ideal we should stick to as closely as humanly possible.
Poor thing, her career had stalled
Except Mack was still working on Smallville when she joined Nxivm and began recruiting for them. She cut back her episode count on the last year of the show so she could devote more time to Nxivm. She was on the show for 10 years, an exceptionally long run for any actor. And by that time she had earned many, many millions of dollars from this extraordinary lucky run of good fortune. She was far better off than the vast majority of actors.
Kristin Kreuk and Allison Mack enjoyed a 10 year run on the TV show Smallville. When Allison quit the show, her net worth was estimated to be $8 million. It soon was vastly reduced through the guidance of her mentor and later lover, Keith Alan Raniere.
And she was still in her 20s. She not only had an impressive resume as an actor, the Smallville producers had given her the opportunity to direct the show. So she had a double career path open before her.
She had professional contacts in LA and in Vancouver.
Her position was enviable. And what did she choose to do? Hook up with Keith Raniere and join his cult. Despite all the red flags, with never a moment of honest reflection, and despite dire warnings from friends and acquaintances, she chose to join a cult. Followed it into criminality, followed it to her destruction.
No excuses. She chose her path of her own free will and is now being held responsible for her actions.
Branding is not for everyone
First of all, what kind of idiot allows herself to be branded? Branded like a cow- yeah, really empowering, that!
How in hell’s bells is getting branded by your master – a “representation of your conscience, your higher self?” [As Allison Mack said].
This is the babbling of an idiot.
People will believe the most inane stuff… well, some people will, anyway. They’re fools. And, of course, this nonsense was all phrased in the idiom of spirituality and religion, empowerment and self-realization. Abandon all common sense, ye who enter here!
This is why I have a problem with religion and spirituality. Believe absurdities, and atrocities ensue. These women were partially coerced – that’s where the criminality enters the picture – but most of them seem to have been at least partially willing.
Mack certainly was downright enthusiastic. What an idiot.
The cruelty, the savagery, the downright barbarity of branding other human beings staggers belief. It’s literally sadism. Or sado-masochism. This is far beyond mere BDSM or role-play. This is sexual assault. And Mack was proud of it. Not merely proud of it; judging by her freedom in talking of it to a reporter, she seemed to believe that branding DOS slaves was meritorious. A great idea, “y’all”.
If any of these women bring charges of sexual assault in coming years, it looks to me like a slam-dunk.
Nicole’s testimony about Allison Mack made both of them look foolish
I’ve had my hard knocks in life. I’ve been bullied and browbeaten just like everyone else. I don’t think of myself as at all brave or physically capable or anything else. I understand, again just like everybody else, about psychological pressure and economic pressures.
I’ve had a knife pulled on me and I had an experience with ‘Chester the molester’ as a little kid. I don’t think I’m particularly strong mentally. I haven’t had much of an education, I went to public school in a depressed city that had lost its major industry. God knows I can identify. God knows I can sympathize.
But, my God, I read this testimony of Nicole’s, [in the Keith Raniere trial] putting up with all this shit and acquiescing.
She was apologizing to Mack – who had lied to her, entrapped her, blackmailed her – even after the DOS/Nxivm scam had begun to implode.
Even after she had been told her ‘collateral’ wouldn’t be released she still FELT AMBIVALENT about leaving DOS.
“What about your commitment? You gave your word!” – Mack told Nicole.
I read this testimony in utter disbelief. What the holy f**k did Nicole think she owed Allison Mack?
Mack f**king had her BRANDED for chrissake! And then she feels like she has to tell Keith – the man who raped her, enslaved her, the man whose initials are branded on her pussy – that she’s leaving, and why! I mean, what the holy f**k?!
Throughout my long life of hard knocks, I have somehow managed to retain my ability to say NO.
Everyone else that I know, many of whom have had it a lot rougher than I, have also had that ability. Always.
Maybe I travel in strange circles, I dunno. But seriously, reading this testimony by DOS initiates is like I’m reading tales from an alien civilization. What the hell is wrong with these people? Why did they put up with it? Why didn’t Nicole tell Allison to go screw herself? Punch the bitch in the nose, if it came to that? If somebody pushes me around, I’m sure as hell going to push back. Every woman I know would do it, so it’s not a gender thing.
What, they were all brainwashed? Bullshit. There is no such thing as brainwashing. Anyone who thinks different, point me to reputable studies that prove “brainwashing” is real. The victims of Nxivm/DOS are real victims, I feel sorry for them, and Raniere and his lieutenants need to do serious prison time.
Prison is the proper place for people who victimize the weak.
But these weren’t critical thinkers or the sort of people to think things through. They weren’t good at problem-solving.
I’ll go further: they were weak-willed. They were gullible. They were fools, they were lemmings, they were sheep. They’ve got no more sense than God gave a grasshopper. They were born victims with a target taped to their back. They had obviously been dropped on their heads as babies and weren’t fit to be let out in public alone.
Look, I’m sorry if this comes off as a bit…harsh.
I’m just truly perplexed: at what point did everyone start assuming that it’s okay to be a victim, unable to take care of oneself, irresponsible, incapable, and weak? And what the f**k is going to become of this country if the sh*t truly hits the fan and we have another World War or Great Recession?
Because these people who got themselves involved with Nxivm couldn’t find their own asses with both hands.
