Yachts, Sex & NXIVM

In this episode: How my film, "What the Bleep Do We Know?!" led to a weird encounter with a clinical psychologist on a yacht. My eventual induction into NXIVM and my confusion about Keith Raniere's 'Sex Den'. I talk about death anxiety, power dynamics, and the behavior of leaders who claim to have achieved a higher state of consciousness yet engage in questionable practices. 

Transcript

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My name is Mark Vicente. I'm a director, producer, writer, and troublemaker. I'm most known as the director of the film What the Bleep Do We Know? and as one of the Nixxiim whistleblowers featured in the HBO series The Vow. Let's just say I know a thing or two about cults. I don't consider myself a cult expert, but I'm definitely an expert in being screwed over, waking up, and knowing how to spot them. And let me tell you, they're everywhere. My mission is to help people see patterns of abuse across multiple contexts. from personal to family to group to societal. It's all the same pattern at every scale. As you'll hear, I have a pretty salty approach to most things. So there might be some blasphemy. One or two sacred cows might get knocked over and there'll likely be some foul language. You never quite know what you're gonna get because it really does depend on what the fuck is on my mind. Well, top of the morning to you. Actually, I don't know if you guys listened to this in the morning. I generally release the podcast on Sunday mornings, on the Sundays I do release it. But I have no idea if you guys listen to it in the morning or when you listen to it. I am curious. Let me know in the YouTube comments or on Instagram if you're just an audio listener. Today, I, well, not today. Something has been on my mind and today's the day that I wanna express it. Years ago, 2004, when we released What the Bleep Do We Know, I got a lot of people reaching out to me, a lot of organizations. And what they wanted was they wanted me to make a film about their organization, their guru, their psychology, their movement, their whatever. And for those of you who don't know what What the Bleep Do Do we know is it's a film that I made in 2000. Well, we put it out in 2004. We started making it in 2001. It took about three years to make. And it's sort of a pseudo science, sort spiritual docudrama with Marley Mathlin. It was kind of a cool film back then trying to blend, you know, science and spirituality and neurobiology and quantum physics and a whole bunch of things. There's been a lot written about it, negative and positive. And one day I will share more of my thoughts about where we went wrong. But anyway, so all these people reached out to me and I was thinking about something that occurred. think it was 2004. I was in LA and I got a email from an organization. I'm not going to say which organization and they wanted to meet me because they were raving about the film and They wanted me to know what they were doing. So I meet them in Marina Del Rey in Los Angeles in the harbor. And they are on a yacht. Now the leader of this particular movement or group was at that point a clinical psychologist or had been a clinical psychologist. I'm not gonna mention the names. I'm sure some of you can figure it out. So I get invited onto this big yacht and we go into this boardroom. It's the man, the much older gentleman and a number of young women or younger woman, I should say, than him. And we sit down in this sort of all wood paneled boardroom. I believe it was on the yacht. I don't think it was on the harbor. I think it was on the yacht. And when I say yacht, I mean, it wasn't like a tiny boat and it wasn't like, you know, a super yacht like you'd see in the Cannes Film Festival. And was, it was a pretty reasonably sized yacht. And he and they, I think it was mostly him began sharing their particular philosophy and the philosophy was really fascinating. And what it was about was overcoming the anxiety about death and about dying, which everybody has. And what they had said is that they work with a whole bunch of people to overcome people's anxieties and their fears of death. And what happens is people feel. enormous joy and they feel enormous freedom. And I thought that was really cool, you know. And at that point, I hadn't really delved too much into that fear of dying in a sort of philosophical way. Of course, I had meditated about it and, I've been in a few situations that were pretty life threatening and I thought about it, but I hadn't ever thought to myself, maybe there's a protocol for overcoming death anxiety because everybody has it. And the meeting was going, you know, it was very interesting. I could tell what they wanted pretty soon. They wanted me to make a film about them. And I wasn't really feeling it at that point. So I had a bunch of other things I was working on. And there was this really strange moment. I don't remember why it happened, but it seemed to me to be out of the blue, like out of nowhere. And what he said, and it felt like a hard right turn in the conversation, and what he said to me as he pointed to the number of women that were sitting around the table, and I think it was, I feel like it was five women, but maybe it was three, I'm not sure. And let me just say something about the woman that was sitting there. They were very quiet. They were very seemingly docile, and they seemed very constrained. And so he said to me, you know, I sleep with all the women at this table. And I was like, huh? Now I tried not to show any concerns or reservations on my face, but I remember thinking like, well, that's fucked up. Like, why are you sharing that with me? That's just fucking odd. And I think I glanced at some of them. And again, there was no emotion on their face that I could tell. and they seemed incredibly docile. And I just thought it was weird, like really, really odd. But I remember at that point, I thought to myself, I need to get off this boat. This is not for me. What the fuck is going on? But I think what I did is I exchanged a bunch of pleasantries and I said, you know, we'll stay in touch. And I did a bunch of weird fawning. And I do believe they reached out a number of times after that. And I just kept their information. thinking to myself one day I kind of want to talk about this and apparently today is the day and again I'm not going to mention names but I thought it was so odd that a a a man who had created a movement and he was now in his elder years had found some kind of personal freedom internally and had helped many other people find this internal freedom as well And they seemed very joyful, certainly from the photographs that I saw. I'm going to get to that later. They seemed very joyful and they seemed very free. And I thought, well, that's beautiful. But why do you need to diddle your female staff? Like, I don't get that. Like, why is it that if you have this kind of freedom, you now need to have sex with all the women around you? Like, why? I don't get it. And again, I didn't understand this at the time, but much, much later, like in the last few weeks, I've been thinking about the power dynamics at play, you know, in that room where the woman were so docile and he was the grand poobah talking about having sex with them in front of them to some other guy. And I guess maybe what he was thinking was like, somehow that would be attractive to me and that would be interesting to me. Maybe he felt like I wasn't quite on board with their mission and maybe that would be interesting, which is a weird play. and certainly a play that's intelligence agencies have done with me before, cause I don't know if I've mentioned on this podcast, but, two attempts were made to recruit me, in the past. And one was using one was using sex. Not that easy to recruit me that way. Not really my highest value going around, diddling everybody, but you know, it got me thinking, okay, so You're working on death anxiety. Lovely. You're helping people face death. Lovely. They feel this incredible sense of freedom and joy and they can live life in the present. Lovely. And you want to fuck the woman. Like why? What the fuck? So anyway, I walked out and I sort of had this thought of like, fuck no. What is it? You know, what is it? Is it that the feeling of freedom like releases somebody's suppressed and forbidden thoughts? Is it that like there's all these forbidden battles going on internally? And then when a person like this guy and a few others, I mean, this is a common thread amongst leaders that when they find this place of freedom or they realize they have all these... Directions they can go and not feel afraid that that the place they go to is you know What I really want to do with all my freedom is I want to go diddle my staff my female staff my beautiful perhaps young female staff but at least this guy was upfront about What he was doing and what was going on in the organization? So let me now fast forward to I think it was the same year that I get a letter from somebody at executive success programs. I don't think they call it that at that point. You guys all know it as NXIVM, but I got a letter from Barbara Boucher, who was very high up in the organization. Barbara Boucher has since left. In fact, she left way before we did because she saw what was going on. And the letter was amazing. And it was inviting me to a symposium, you know, with all these incredible scientists, know, minds like Fritchoff Capra. I have to find the letter at some point and then read it. It was a good letter. Like it really nailed my values. Like it was as though they were like, you know, channeling my most inner, in my innermost desires. Now later I found out they kind of were because later I found out from Susan Dunes that they had had meetings where they sat down and they evaluated every single newspaper article, magazine article, interview I'd ever done, TV interview, and they got a sense of what does Marc Vicente want? And so from those meetings that happened, I guess in their sales meetings or whatever, I'm not sure at what level it happened, but all the high ups were there. They crafted this letter and it was a good letter. And it made me respond because after this whole yacht thing and a bunch of other things, I was like, you know what? All you people are saying you can do all the shit we talked about in this movie, but you can't and you're all weird. So this letter comes by and I'm like, this is really interesting because the idea of being in a symposium with people I deeply admired and deeply respected was like fucking crack cocaine to me. I was like, my God, that's awesome. Cause understand I didn't feel very smart myself. I just liked being around smart people. So I respond to the letter and I've talked about it at great length. And finally, you know, I go to an intensive. And when I'm there, I remember noticing some interesting things. Like I spent an evening at one point at Nancy Salzman's house and we were watching movies. In fact, at that point, Keith Ranieri was doing his very best to try to deprogram me about another organization I'd been in, run by Jay-Z Knight. It was called RSC, Ramp the School of Enlightenment. And so he was playing a news magazine article, sort of a TV magazine thing that had come out about her years before. he was trying to show me, see, that doesn't make sense. And that doesn't make sense. And that doesn't make sense. You know, she can do whatever she wants, but that doesn't make sense. And I'll get into more of that at some other point. But the other thing I noticed as I spent time there was the enormous amount of women that were always around and they seemed very happy and joyful. as I spent more time with people as I was taking intensives, it was like these constant cuddle puddles with the higher ranks. Like there was one particular high ranking male who invited me over to watch a movie at his place and like... There was this massive couch and pretty soon there was a cuddle puddle of him and like three or five other, I don't know how many women, it was a bunch. And he says, come sit on the couch. I'm like, no. But I wanted to play it cool. you know, it didn't, it didn't, you know, it wasn't affecting me. It wasn't weirding me out, but it kind of was. Now, but why was all this okay with me? Well, all of this was okay with me because I had been told that Keith Raniere was a renunciate. Whereas this clinical psychologist, you know, earlier that year, I think it was, had told me I'm sleeping with all these women. everybody had told me Keith Raniere, he was a renunciate. In other words, he had renounced the external world. So his whole thing, you know, with, with next thing with the SP was nothing in the external world can actually create joy for you. It doesn't create joy. Joy is an internal thing. And so what he'd gotten to in his life is he no longer felt that anything in the external world could do anything for him. So he was a renunciate. He didn't need anything. He didn't need pleasure. He didn't need this. He didn't need that. So that was the. the idea, the belief that I was operating under. And the thing is at that point in my life, I took things at face value. When somebody said something, I believed them. So he's a renunciate. And so all these things I see, I don't file into the bucket of, you know, the clinical psychologist in the yacht. I file this in the bucket of, but he's a renunciate. They're just all very happy. That's great. A while later, I was, because they'd asked me to shoot some stuff of him and I said, I'd love to find a library or something. I we have an executive library. And somebody who was in charge of the executive library said they would take me to it. And so what I did is I went to this little townhouse and walked up the spiral staircase and there was this kind of den and this was lined with books everywhere. And there was a jacuzzi. And there was a bed, but like the like a loft bed, you know, high up. And those of you who followed the trial closely or the story closely know that I'm talking about Keith Rennery sort of den, you know, what would later be known as his sex den. And I have video of that, by the way. The FBI asked me before the trial, do you have any images of inside that thing? And I happened to find a whole bunch right before trial, which was played at at the trial. I might actually show some of that stuff. You know, I'm thinking what I might do is I might just for my Patreon members, screen some of that stuff and talk about it. But, I will, I will certainly let them know about that, but I might do that. But anyway, so I'm looking around this executive library, looking to see if this is a good location to shoot Raniere, the wise and fantastic man of high intelligence. with a bunch of books in the background. And I think to myself, it might be good. And I remember that the woman who showed me the library, I think she went downstairs or somewhere else. She saw me back. So I was left alone in the lair, the executive library. And I remember something really interesting. I looked up at the loft bed, which was sort of an eye level. You had to climb up a little set of stairs to get onto the bed. And it was a really, really big mattress and it was unmade and disheveled and everything. And I had this sort of Far back in the recesses of my sort of limbic brain, I smelled sex. Like I smelled a bed that had had sex in it, right? And I immediately denied it because I'm like, well, that doesn't make sense because he's renunciate. And like, maybe that's just me, you know, making associations. I see a bed and it's very big and it's like, you know, all ruffled and everything and the sheets and the blankets are all over the place. And I just immediately assume sex like, God, Mark, get sex out of your brain. So I kind of filed it away and I filed it away again because, you know, he was a renunciate. Now what's interesting is, is when I start to realize what's really going on in 2017. So understand this was 2004, maybe it was 2005 actually, I don't remember. This probably was 2005. So 12 years later, I'm revisiting memories in my mind and I'm thinking, motherfucker, it was the smell of sex. That's what it was. That's what it was. And it was such a weird contrast, because back in 2005, you know, Nancy was showing me pictures of all the happy people. That's the thing I wanted to mention, you all these happy people look how happy they are. Look at, look at what our tech does. And by the way, part of the tech, I think it was around about 2008 or nine, maybe these things called death, fear sourcing started. And they were like, I could be wrong, but the 12 different most horrible ways you could die. And so you would put yourself in your mind in one of those situations. I think one of them was for instance, you know, being eaten. alive from the inside out, know, being being, you know, drowned on being able to breathe all these terrible ways you could die fast, slow, whatever. And the idea was to go in there using the tech and work on freeing yourself from the fear and the anxiety of those things. Now it was interesting because people reported, this is amazing because like, you know, it frees you and you know, it feels so afraid of death and dying. Honestly, it just always scared the fuck out of me. I mean, it always put me in a complete trauma state. So all that same stuff was happening. And, you know, as I said, Nancy was showing me all these happy people. And so, you know, I started to connect later thinking, well, maybe they're all so happy because they've overcome, you know, so many things. And I saw the higher ranks much higher than me as being pretty, you know, even and calm and cool earlier on. Later, I realized how psychotic everybody was and I thought, well, this is, you know, this is, this is good tech. Now. I say all this because I'm so fascinated at what I did in my mind is that compared to the yacht where that guy was upfront about what was going on and I was like, there's no fucking way I'm being part of any of this shit because I don't think this is right. To NXIVM where I take on face value the belief that he is a renunciate, doesn't need anything from the external world. And why would he do anything with any of these people? Because he doesn't need to. to realize that I was lie to A. Like if they had told me upfront on day one, like by the way, this, this, this, and the leaders boning all the young woman, I'd be like, you know what, fuck you, I'm outta here. And I'm still really, to be honest, really angry with certain people. I'm not gonna name their names, but certain people that they just fucking told me, you know? And like I relied on the information that they gave me that this was a man who didn't need anything from the external world. It still pisses me off. But I'm fascinated at with my sort of investigative brain that I did not investigate that. And part of it was because I believed that he was an Anciet. I wanted to believe that as well. I wanted to believe that that level of freedom was possible where you no longer felt that the pull and the tugs and the gripping from all the external forces, you know. I wanted to believe that that was possible because I wanted that for myself. You I wanted the cessation of suffering and of fear and of like, you know, the addictive feelings and all that stuff. So I wanted to believe it and in wanting to believe it, I filed those things away. I filed away that I smelled bodily fluids and pheromones and sex. I smelt it, but I told myself it couldn't be, it couldn't happen. So anyway, that was the... a bunch of the stuff I was thinking about. And I guess I have some questions and I have these questions of you, my audience, because I'm really curious what you guys think. And what I would love you to do is those of you watching on YouTube, you know, give me some of your thoughts in the comments section on YouTube. And those of you that listen to my audio podcast, do me a favor, go to Instagram. I'll post something on Instagram with these questions. And I'd love you to share your ideas with me, your thoughts. And guess there are two main questions, you know, and the one main question is not the one main, the one question is, should we get rid of our death fears? Like, should we? You know, cause I see people, have you seen those people on like, I don't know, TikTok or YouTube or whatever that have no fear whatsoever. They jump on buildings and they walk up high and like, in essence to me, they seem like psychopaths that have no anxiety because a true psychopath has no anxiety. Is it good to have zero anxiety? Like, is it good to not have a fear of death? And a part of me thinks I can see benefits and I can see downsides. And there is a reason that we human beings are wired up to be afraid of getting hurt. It's to survive, obviously. But so is it good to get rid of death anxiety? That's the one thought. One question I should say. And the other question is, and this I'm just really struggling to understand, why do leaders who have supposedly overcome their fears and now feel unbounded freedom that they can do whatever they want, why of all things do they need to diddle the woman around them? For those that don't understand diddle, why do they need to fuck the woman around them? Why? Of all the things they could do, why that? You know, and I know there's could be theories about, you know, when the Kundalini activates, it activates all the chakras and activates the first chakra. And it has to be expressed and like, okay, so what you do is you, okay, let's say that's true. So what you do is you create a whole organization so that you can express your first chakra and like convince these women that what they need is magic dick because you have some urge going on. Like really it's that, that's what it's about. I just don't understand why. with unbounded freedom. Why with this sudden, you know, you have the sudden revelation of like, you're completely at peace with death. You know, you're living in the moment. You feel this connection to all. And the thing you need to do is you need to get in their pants. Like fucking why, right? This is a burning question I want to understand. And I, and I'm certain that I'm going to have some very spiritually quote unquote enlightened people in the common sections tell me why it's so necessary that you must diddle the woman around you, especially the young attractive ones. And I'm certainly open to hearing the perspective, but I don't know that that's going to satisfy me. So maybe somebody out there can help me understand why, why with this so-called higher consciousness, this immense freedom, this immense connection to all things as people who have had these quote unquote enlightened moments as they purport to they tell us that this is the experience they have. Why then need to go and fuck around with the woman around you who believe that you are some kind of enlightened being and are likely trauma bonded to you? And why can't you tell that they're trauma bonded? Like what the fuck? So yeah, it's one of my burning questions as well. So those are my two questions. I would love to hear your thoughts. I am ever curious about how all the shit works. I am constantly learning. I don't have the shit figured out, but I'm just really fascinated at this. I think I may need to make a film about this one day because it's really fascinating. Anyway, thank you for listening to my Patreon subscribers. Thank you very much. If you want to become a subscriber, please go to patreon.com for slash Mark Vicente. As always, stay curious.