'Amway's' survival in the UK was nothing short of miraculous

Shyam

A wise correspondent of mine, has observed that my analysis of the 'MLM' racket as a dissimulated form of unlawful, closed-market bookmaking (where all losing-bets have simply been laundered as 'purchases'), which has been maliciously-designed to provoke a form of chronic gambling addiction, reveals 'Amway's' recent escape from closure in the UK to be nothing short of miraculous; for how is it possible that, when faced with such a wide-open-goal, the UK government brought on a team of short-sighted lawyers who failed to score?

Despite my calls for an intellectually-rigorous criminal inquiry, in 2007, the UK government Trade Minister only filed a low-level public-interest civil bankruptcy petition against 'Amway UK Ltd.', on the technical grounds that the company had been breaking not only UK trading schemes legislation, but also UK lotteries legislation. UK government lawyers and forensic accountants subsequently produced a mountain of unchallenged documentary evidence to demonstrate that, out of the approximately 35 000 British 'Amway' adherents registered in 2006, the hidden loss-rate was effectively 100%, and that, for the insignificant percentage of winning 'Amway' participants to receive some payment, the overwhelming majority had to keep paying into the 'scheme.' In presenting their far-from-intellectually-rigorous case to the UK High Court, UK government lawyers described the minority of chronic-losers in this demonstrably-dangerous, rigged game of 'commercial' make-believe, as being 'deluded.' However, no psychotic 'Amway' victim, nor expert witness to his/her dangerous state of mind, was called to give evidence. Instead, after a lot of legalistic arguments, Mr. Justice Norris accepted the UK government's simplistic claim that the 'Amway trading scheme' had been in breach of trading schemes legislation (because unlawful registration fees had been required), but curiously, he rejected the government's other simplistic claim that the 'Amway trading scheme' had been in breach of lotteries legislation (because it was not advertised as a 'lottery' and a few lucky participants had apparently been paid out). The Judge then broke established legal precedent and refused to order  'Amway UK Ltd.'  to hand over all the millions of pounds of what he accepted to be unlawful registration fees (which would have forced the company into technical-bankruptcy and obligatory-closure), when 'Amway's' lawyers made the demonstrably-false declaration, and absurd related-promise, that their employer's previous unlawful activities had all been completely involuntary, but had now been completely reformed, voluntarily.

Later, the UK Appeal Court (in a two to one majority verdict), upheld Judge Norris' controversial decision to accept the word of 'Amway's' lawyers, and not to order the immediate-closure of  'Amway UK Ltd.', after the UK government's short-sighted legal team had challenged it on the not-unreasonable grounds that it was neither safe for the public, nor correct in law. This typically-complicated legalistic outcome allowed the 'Amway' Ministry of Truth to pretend that the 'Amway MLM income opportunity' had now received the full-approval of the UK Courts. In other words, 'Amway UK Ltd.' effectively plead guilty to running an unlawful trading scheme for 34 years, and was duly found guilty of running an unlawful trading scheme for 34 years, but received no punishment other than that which the demonstrably-dishonest legal representatives of this demonstrably-dishonest organization, falsely-claimed to have imposed on itself.

Yet, consider for a moment, if the demonstrably-fake 'Amway MLM income opportunity' had been advertised as a 'viable gamble' rather than as a 'viable trading scheme'. Also, consider for a moment, if the wider-evidence had been presented to the UK Courts, in an intellectually-rigorous, criminal prosecution. 

What would any honest Judge have said when it was proved, beyond all reasonable doubt that, for 50+ years, tens of millions of constantly-churning  'Amway' adherents around the world (including at least one million from the UK) have been deceived into participating in a completely-incomprehensible, endless-chain recruitment game (presented as a viable income opportunity), in which they haven't had a hope of winning, but in which they have been subjected (without their fully-informed consent) to co-ordinated devious techniques of social, psychological and physical persuasion, designed to shut-down the individual losing-players' critical and evaluative faculties, and oblige them to keep betting on themselves to win, no matter what suffering this has caused ?

David Brear (copyright 2011)