Women in the UK and MLMs: Thank You Mumsnet

[arranbubonicplague]

A decent piece in the Guardian about MLM scams: They have you in a cultish grip': the women losing thousands to online beauty schemes:
Multi-level beauty businesses are akin to pyramid schemes – once someone signs up under you, you become their ‘upline’ and take a portion of their earnings.
It sounds too good to be true – earn money selling makeup on social media. And for many, it is. What really happens when you join a multi-level beauty business

There's a good shoutout to Mumsnet for adopting an ethical stance:

Mumsnet decided in 2017 not to allow MLMs to advertise on the parenting site. “We thought about it long and hard because we know that home-based, flexible opportunities are very popular,” says founder Justine Roberts, “but many Mumsnet users have posted about what they see as MLMs’ invidious marketing techniques and the effects on vulnerable individuals, and we came to the conclusion that business models based primarily on recruiting have too much potential to be exploitative.”

www.theguardian.com/fashion/2019/jun/01/online-beauty-schemes-selling-social-media-younique-arbonne

In case you have friends and family who are being nagged to become part of a similar MLM, it's worth reading about the way women are encouraged to be predatory towards other women with fractured social circles who are victimised by relationship breakdown, disability, chronic illness, social stressors etc.

Just read this and am horrified, particularly at the bit which says recruiters are encouraged to prey on women who have just had children.

Also that they are sold it to women as a ‘friendship opportunity’ (ironically having the opposite effect). I find that so sad.

There's this in The Times today about targeting teenage girls www.thetimes.co.uk/article/teens-targeted-in-coffee-sales-scam-fj9bzg0ps?shareToken=58eab366aab5d6d71c5319b23badaf4c

There were huge series of threads on MLM that I got a lot of info from very knowledgeable posters. Was a godsend as I've been very financially vulnerable and I'm glad mumsnet has taken such a consistent stance against them.