[lifestyleguru]

> Rainbow vacuum cleaner

There was a wave of this in 90s and 00s but in Poland. In my eyes parents signed a loan for "Mercedes of vaccum cleaners" for an amount of over 2k USD. Average salary back then was something below 700 USD. Fuck this American scammers. Eat shit and bankrupt Rainbow. Rest of the above were occuring as well. People were looking at the west with hope and sympathy, while the west came over with smiling brutal extortionist rape fest.

[delta_p_delta_x]

> parents signed a loan for "Mercedes of vaccum cleaners"

Somehow I think the problem is less the 'American scammers' and more the fact that your lot decided it was worth taking out a loan for a vacuum cleaner, of all things.

[lifestyleguru]

They were in some lunatic trance agitated by manipulative sales tactics. Any other loan they would have research beforehand and actively apply for.

> fact that your lot decided it was worth taking out a loan

Let's use analogy - currently American elderly are aggressively profiled and targeted by various scams starting from a phone call because they are gullible, lonely, and vulnerable. Perhaps they simply decide it's worth to give away 1000-3000 USD here and there? Maybe they decide that few calls with a guy with Indian accent is worth 2000 USD, of all things. Honestly I feel certain satisfaction that it bites back.

[cynicalsecurity]

Jehovah's witnesses is another vile scam that hugely spoiled the image of the West in the eyes of the people who just broke free from the Soviet occupation. I don't understand how such evil and disgusting cult is allowed to exist. If a person would hide a list of thousands of child molesters or would endorse killing children by giving fake medical advice to their parents, they would be put straight to jail. How are cults allowed to do the same without any repercussions?

[to11mtm]

Well it's a nuanced answer. The United States has freedom of Religion, and a large separation of Church and State. It leads to some bad but theoretically some good.

> If a person would hide a list of thousands of child molesters or would endorse killing children by giving fake medical advice to their parents, they would be put straight to jail.

Unfortunately any progress our country has made in this regard has been utterly regressed in the last 5 or so years....

But to better understand the other side of this as far as religion, consider the Catholic sacrament of Confession. A priest is not supposed to divulge confessions to anyone.

Then, let's consider the danger on the other side. Historically, Governments swooping in and grabbing lists of church members, what happened next was not looked well upon.

And so the US has this sometimes almost horrifying level of separation of church and state, where people do have the freedom to worship, however other benefits are abused [0][1] and we even have let folks that infiltrated three letter organizations keep their church status [2]

[0] - I still remember the baptist sermon of "I am not telling you how to vote! I am not telling you how to vote. But the bible says X will go to heaven and Candidate Y does not X"

[1] - Churches do not have nearly the same level of oversight as a normal nonprofit

[2] - "Operation Snow White"

[lifestyleguru]

It's not about some faith nuances, Jehovah's Witnesses are predators and stalkers.

[lifestyleguru]

I used to ignore or look down on them. After they stalked me with some profiling and unwanted weekly visits while I lived abroad, I actively hate Jehovah's Witnesses. They stalk intercoms in the buildings. Another American smiling predators and lunatics.

[Beijinger]

"a) list of thousands of child molesters or b )would endorse killing children by giving fake medical advice to their parents"

I do neither associate with Jehovah's witnesses. Would you be willing to share some details?

[jstarfish]

> How are cults allowed to do the same without any repercussions?

I am not a friend of the JW, but as an adult, you're expected to be your own advocate. You opted in to a system of faith, not science.

Regarding child molesters, any organization that spells out a code of silence in its doctrine is always fun to deal with. The JW are hardly unique with their theocratic warfare, there's also mesirah, deceivers-yet-true, keep sweet, omerta, "snitches get stitches", etc. You can't penetrate such a culture from the outside, so no witnesses testify, hence no repercussions.

[vdaea]

I don't understand this. Why did they sign up for a $2000 loan if they could barely afford it?

[nonrandomstring]

In Prague or Budapest about '88 - hazy now as we were moving about a lot - before the wall came down, but the "thaw" had started. McDonalds just opened a restaurant, first in the city. Anyway there we were looking at this enormous queue... the biggest damn queue I ever saw, It went round the block, and the next block... like how people camp out for black Friday but thousands and thousands of people. Each burger was the equivalent of a few weeks wages. But nothing could stop them, all hungry for a bite of "freedom".

[lifestyleguru]

Meantime porn producers and other creeps were swarming Prague and Budapest to "taste the Communism". Hard to find a woman who was in her teens or twenties at that time who wasn't curious if free market penis is as hard as post-Communist one.

[delta_p_delta_x]

> porn producers and other creeps were swarming Prague and Budapest to "taste the Communism"

A significant majority of white sex workers in Western Europe and porn actresses still tend to be from Eastern Europe—Czechia, Hungary, Poland, Ukraine, Belarus, Russia.

[wruza]

This scam was popular in post-soviet too. Basically a very annoying salesman who reiterates on all sorts of reality bending pushes once you let them in. You may think it shouldn’t work but it does, on people whom you wouldn’t call idiots. As I understand it, it leverages the tendency to respect authority and avoid conflict, among other sales tricks.

There’s an old joke about it:

Salesman: (enters the room and dumps trash on the floor) If our vacuum cleaner can’t clean this, I will eat this trash!

Dwellers: You can start eating cause electricity is off for three days.

[eesmith]

A variation of that joke was in the "Sales Resistance" episode of I Love Lucy from 1953 at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVJNQhGpwSw .

At the end, Lucy tries to make her money back by using the same sales techniques used on her. The vacuum cleaner doesn't work because electricity is turned off because the resident hadn't paid the power bill.

[lifestyleguru]

Colleagues in workplace started buying and were receiving commission by referencing next client. Trained salesman visited home and used all dirty sales tricks and pitches. Until now I remember "don't say this vacuum is expensive, this is Mercedes of vacuum cleaners, everyone desires even a substitute of Mercedes", or "a salesman enters someone's home with an attitude that they own him the commission money". You grew up in Communism with an absolute shortage of everything and are unable to evaluate good value in market economy. Fuck this manipulative psychopats.

[AussieWog93]

>Colleagues in workplace started buying and were receiving commission by referencing next client.

You can blame the West as much as you want, but it sounds like Poles were stabbing Poles in the back too.

[lifestyleguru]

In novel free market and democratic ways. That was extremely bitter realization. The reward for hardships so far was a new wave of MLMs, cults, sects, scams, and whatnot.

[cynicalsecurity]

It was still way better than Soviet occupation. But I get it, it was hugely disappointing.

[to11mtm]

We do still have them right here in the US-of-A but they tend to be more clever in packaging... Mary Kay, Amway [0], people working IT at state colleges known for IT but paid for a weird 'stock tip' ponzi email thing, heck I know between 2007ish-2013ish a couple close friends bought into this weird "I'm a cellular reseller" MLM thing...

[0] - Still remember when some otherwise very bright folks got wrapped up in 'Team of Destiny' which was basically Amway over the internet back in 2001-2002ish times.

[mik1998]

PRL was not "Soviet occupation", unless you're referring to parts of Poland during 1939-45