# Powered by Orgasm: The Rise and Fall of a Sex Cult - with Ellen Huet

An episode of [Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1484511465), 30 Jan 2026, 41 min.

Audio: https://podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/pdrl.fm/18db03/tracking.swap.fm/track/SxlTEPDY7xDg35RXkASs/traffic.omny.fm/d/clips/e73c998e-6e60-432f-8610-ae210140c5b1/c0ae8c6e-22f0-4e9b-ac1c-ae390037ac53/30c01f38-4bc9-43f0-b1fb-b3e1012d2c75/audio.mp3?utm_source=Podcast&in_playlist=7f5a4714-6b10-4ccf-a424-ae390037ac70

Run by the charismatic Nicole Deadone, OneTaste billed itself as a sexual wellness startup celebrating the power of female orgasm. But behind the celebrity endorsements and promises of healing, lay a darker reality. When Bloomberg journalist Ellen Huet began to dig into the organisation, she uncovered financial, emotional and sexual exploitation of its members, many of whom would call the company a cult. Huet, author of Empire of Orgasm, joins Tim to discuss why we should beware people promising pleasure, and what we can learn from the rise and fall of OneTaste. This episode contains explicit content from the beginning, and is not suitable for children. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

## Transcript

[0:15] Speaker 1: Pushkin. A warning before we start. This episode of Cautionary
[0:28] Speaker 1: Tales contains explicit sexual content. Indeed, it begins with it.
[0:33] Speaker 1: You have been warned. It's not suitable for children. Ladies,
[0:39] Speaker 1: please find your nests, instructs the voice over the tannoy.
[0:43] Speaker 1: Gentlemen walk up to the stage, Please wash your hands
[0:47] Speaker 1: and find your supplies. It's August twenty thirteen, and hundreds
[0:53] Speaker 1: of people in casual business attire, sporting colored wristbands and
[0:57] Speaker 1: lanyards mill a round San Francisco's Regency Center looking for
[1:02] Speaker 1: their places. But this is no venture capitalist gathering. This
[1:07] Speaker 1: is not a digital marketing conference. Attendees have paid three
[1:12] Speaker 1: hundred and ninety five dollars to be here. They've attended
[1:15] Speaker 1: lectures and demonstrations, and now many are going to participate
[1:20] Speaker 1: in this headline event. Three one hundred and fifty nests
[1:26] Speaker 1: blue yoga mats covered with gray blankets have been arranged
[1:30] Speaker 1: across the floor. The women disrobe from the waist down
[1:36] Speaker 1: and lie down with their legs butterflied out. Their male
[1:41] Speaker 1: partners settle on cushions beside them, put on latex gloves,
[1:46] Speaker 1: and dip their fingers in lube. This is own X
[1:53] Speaker 1: or to give it its full title, Orgasmic Meditation Experience,
[2:00] Speaker 1: a conference on the medical benefits of female orgasm. Attendees
[2:05] Speaker 1: have been promised healing, pleasure, and spiritual transformation. This is
[2:13] Speaker 1: the largest own group yet. The conference staffer, wearing a
[2:17] Speaker 1: blue Powered by Orgasm t shirt, tells the group you
[2:22] Speaker 1: are history in the making. The mass stroking begins later.
[2:34] Speaker 1: The tall blonde woman who made all this possible struts
[2:38] Speaker 1: out on stage and strappy heels as black eyed peas,
[2:42] Speaker 1: I got a feeling plays across the speakers. The crowd
[2:47] Speaker 1: reads their set screw like a rock star. Connection is
[2:53] Speaker 1: the new religion, declares Nicole Dadone. I'm Tim Harford and
[3:02] Speaker 1: you're listening to cautionary tales. Attractive and charismatic. Nicole Dadon
[3:29] Speaker 1: was the co founder and face of One Taste, a
[3:34] Speaker 1: sexual well being company which celebrated the power of female orgasm.
[3:40] Speaker 1: As well as headquarters in superliberal San Francisco, One Taste
[3:44] Speaker 1: had branches all over America and even in London and Sydney.
[3:49] Speaker 1: It was promoted on Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop platform. Thousands attended
[3:54] Speaker 1: the weekend long ome X conferences and even more watched
[3:59] Speaker 1: Nicole spread her message in lively TEDx talks. But for
[4:05] Speaker 1: all the talk of pleasure and freedom, control and coercion
[4:10] Speaker 1: hid beneath One Taste's Glossy Vanier. Here to tell me
[4:15] Speaker 1: about the rise and fall of the sex cult is
[4:19] Speaker 1: the Bloomberg journalist who uncovered its secrets, Ellen Hewitt, Ellen,
[4:25] Speaker 1: welcome to caution Me Tales.
[4:27] Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having me.
[4:28] Speaker 1: You have written a book about all of this empire
[4:31] Speaker 1: of orgasm. I have goodness me all about One Taste,
[4:35] Speaker 1: all about Nicole Daydon. How did you first come across
[4:38] Speaker 1: her story?
[4:39] Speaker 2: Well, in twenty seventeen, I was working at Bloomberg News
[4:44] Speaker 2: as I do now, and I was based in San Francisco,
[4:48] Speaker 2: and I was covering startups. That was my beat. And
[4:53] Speaker 2: one morning I received a pitch, as I do dozens
[4:56] Speaker 2: of times a day, and this one caught my eye
[4:59] Speaker 2: because it was about orgasmic meditation, which is an inherently
[5:03] Speaker 2: eye catching subject. Yeah, you know, I was curious and
[5:07] Speaker 2: I ended up responding to the pitch and hearing what
[5:13] Speaker 2: they were offering, which was basically, hey, this is a
[5:16] Speaker 2: fast growing woman led wellness startup. You're right about startups.
[5:23] Speaker 2: Are you interested in potentially doing a story on us?
[5:25] Speaker 2: And I said maybe, And I took a first meeting
[5:28] Speaker 2: with the leadership of the company and heard the initial pitch,
[5:32] Speaker 2: which was, like, doing orgasmic meditation every day is really
[5:36] Speaker 2: good for you. We are the whole foods of sexuality,
[5:39] Speaker 2: where the organic good for you version of sexuality. We
[5:43] Speaker 2: think our practice can heal the world.
[5:45] Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's kind of like yoga, Like you're going
[5:48] Speaker 1: to go to a yoga studio, except you're going to masturbate,
[5:51] Speaker 1: or you're going to be masturbated.
[5:53] Speaker 2: Right, someone is going to touch you or you will
[5:56] Speaker 2: touch someone. In their vision for the spread of orgasmic
[5:59] Speaker 2: meditation or OM slash OM, they viewed OM as a
[6:04] Speaker 2: pillar alongside yoga, meditation other core aspects of modern commercial wellness.
[6:12] Speaker 2: So I heard the initial pitch, and I decided to
[6:15] Speaker 2: poke around a little on my own, as journalists like
[6:18] Speaker 2: to do, and I ended up finding first one, and
[6:21] Speaker 2: then several and then more people who said that their
[6:25] Speaker 2: experience at One Taste had actually been quite different from
[6:29] Speaker 2: the public image of the company at the time.
[6:32] Speaker 1: Yeah, But just sticking with the surface of the story
[6:35] Speaker 1: for a moment, just to get people to come together
[6:40] Speaker 1: in a room no pun intended. There'll be a lot
[6:42] Speaker 1: of that, I'm sure, to gather together in a room
[6:45] Speaker 1: and then in public to be touched brought to orgasm.
[6:50] Speaker 1: And there's like dozens of other people, there's hundreds of
[6:53] Speaker 1: other people. To encourage a bunch of people to do that,
[6:56] Speaker 1: I think requires a certain kind of person. So tell
[7:01] Speaker 1: me about Nicole Daydon't.
[7:03] Speaker 2: Well, Nicole day Don't is a fascinating person and she
[7:07] Speaker 2: is undoubtedly the main character, not only of the book
[7:12] Speaker 2: Empire of Orgasm, but of the story of One Taste Like.
[7:15] Speaker 2: She is the charismatic leader, she's the visionary, she's the guru,
[7:20] Speaker 2: she's the creator of this community in the entire story.
[7:26] Speaker 2: She had an unusual childhood. She was born in the
[7:31] Speaker 2: Bay Area and grew up in the seventies with a
[7:36] Speaker 2: single mother. And her father was this sort of faraway
[7:41] Speaker 2: figure who only visited occasionally and with whom she yearned
[7:45] Speaker 2: to have a closer relationship. And what's most important about
[7:48] Speaker 2: his history is that he is a convicted child sex abuser.
[7:53] Speaker 2: He was incarcerated for child sex abuse related crimes, once
[7:59] Speaker 2: when Nicole was young, like under ten years old, and
[8:02] Speaker 2: again when she was in her twenties, and he actually
[8:05] Speaker 2: died in custody that second time before he was ever convicted,
[8:09] Speaker 2: and she has spoken about her father's criminal history as
[8:15] Speaker 2: being an inspiration for her wanting to show the world
[8:18] Speaker 2: that sexuality, which can have this dark and dangerous side,
[8:22] Speaker 2: could also heal in equal measure. But she has often
[8:26] Speaker 2: sidestepped the question of whether her father abused her. People
[8:30] Speaker 2: who had known her when she was younger told me
[8:33] Speaker 2: that she had at some point told them that her
[8:36] Speaker 2: father had sexually abused her. She additionally, later on in
[8:41] Speaker 2: her life, reshaped the story of her father's abuse to
[8:45] Speaker 2: frame it as something that she, as a child had
[8:50] Speaker 2: either instigated or wanted or tried to set in motion
[8:55] Speaker 2: in some way. And if you speak to experts on
[8:57] Speaker 2: child sex abuse, they will say that although this is
[9:00] Speaker 2: kind of a shocking idea, it is not uncommon that
[9:04] Speaker 2: people who have experienced something like this will find ways
[9:08] Speaker 2: automatically to reff frame it such that they did feel
[9:11] Speaker 2: some agency. It's obviously a sensitive subject, but I think
[9:17] Speaker 2: it's an important way to understand what drives her. She
[9:20] Speaker 2: then spent her life, especially her twenties, and honestly the
[9:24] Speaker 2: years after as well, living in pursuit of extreme experiences intensity,
[9:31] Speaker 2: often in sexual situations, as a way of understanding oneself.
[9:35] Speaker 1: Interesting, how was it that Nicole got onto this path
[9:39] Speaker 1: of sexual wellness and this idea of orgasmic meditation.
[9:43] Speaker 2: In her late twenties, she met someone who was a
[9:49] Speaker 2: student at a different community called the Welcomed Consensus, and
[9:56] Speaker 2: this person taught her the Welcome Consensus is stroking practice
[10:00] Speaker 2: which was called deliberate orgasm, and it's essentially a man
[10:06] Speaker 2: stroking a woman's clitteress in a way that is meant
[10:09] Speaker 2: to not just provide sexual pleasure, but also be a
[10:11] Speaker 2: sort of meditative, shared connective experience. So she joins this
[10:17] Speaker 2: group for several years. She also studied a little bit
[10:20] Speaker 2: with the group that preceded it, a group called Morehouse.
[10:24] Speaker 2: Both of these groups were selling courses on deliberate orgasm,
[10:27] Speaker 2: and they're both based in California and a little bit
[10:32] Speaker 2: closer to what you might imagine like a kind of
[10:35] Speaker 2: hippie commune. Like there's a male leader, they have a compound,
[10:38] Speaker 2: everyone lives together, and there's a lot of like free
[10:41] Speaker 2: flowing sex among the members. In one of them, they
[10:44] Speaker 2: even had a farm and grew vegetables and raised chickens
[10:47] Speaker 2: and that kind of thing. And when she's at these groups,
[10:50] Speaker 2: she learns the basics of this stroking practice, and she
[10:54] Speaker 2: learns a little bit of how you could run a
[10:57] Speaker 2: community based on this practice. But she pretty quickly decides
[11:01] Speaker 2: if she's going to do this, she's going to make
[11:03] Speaker 2: it her own thing. And she does a few things
[11:04] Speaker 2: that are pretty important. One, she puts herself a woman
[11:08] Speaker 2: as the leader, which I think helps a lot with
[11:09] Speaker 2: the public image, makes it seem more approachable and trustworthy.
[11:13] Speaker 1: Yeah, buy women for women, that kind of thing.
[11:15] Speaker 2: Yeah, totally. And she rebrands it as orgasmic meditation, which
[11:21] Speaker 2: is very smart because it quickly and immediately positions it
[11:24] Speaker 2: as part of this spiritual adjacent wellness movement which is
[11:30] Speaker 2: just taking off at the time. It's in the mid
[11:31] Speaker 2: two thousands.
[11:32] Speaker 1: Yeah, but the noun is meditation, right, Orgasmic is just
[11:35] Speaker 1: a kind of it is just a modifier, a.
[11:37] Speaker 2: Detail, totally. And you know, even o M. The abbreviation
[11:42] Speaker 2: for orgasmic meditation is OHM, which you know you might
[11:45] Speaker 2: hear as a mantra in like the yoga class. The
[11:48] Speaker 2: basics of OHM, as she defines it, are there's a
[11:51] Speaker 2: stroker and a strokey. The man strokes the woman in
[11:55] Speaker 2: this very prescribed manner for fifteen minutes exactly, and during
[11:58] Speaker 2: those fifteen minutes, the only goal is for both partners
[12:02] Speaker 2: to reflect on notice, meditate on the sensations in their bodies. So, again,
[12:07] Speaker 2: for anyone who's done sitting meta that sounds familiar, you
[12:10] Speaker 2: are generally supposed to not have any particular goal other
[12:13] Speaker 2: than to notice.
[12:14] Speaker 1: Yeah, it's familiar in some ways. In other ways, it's
[12:17] Speaker 1: very new.
[12:18] Speaker 2: In other ways it's very different. And to be clear,
[12:20] Speaker 2: that man stays clothed and the woman generally gets disrobed
[12:23] Speaker 2: from the waist down. And then the last thing she
[12:26] Speaker 2: does is she makes it a startup. You know, she's
[12:28] Speaker 2: based in San Francisco in the mid two thousands. She
[12:30] Speaker 2: is just at the right time to be framing this
[12:34] Speaker 2: pursuit as a startup and she's the founder and like
[12:38] Speaker 2: it's a fast growing company because all around her in
[12:40] Speaker 2: San Francisco that's exactly what other people are doing and
[12:43] Speaker 2: they're seeing lots of success.
[12:45] Speaker 1: That's very interesting because yeah, thirty years prior, if we
[12:48] Speaker 1: were the nineteen seventies, this would be a commune right,
[12:51] Speaker 1: it would look like a cult. It might even describe
[12:53] Speaker 1: itself as a cult. You'd have a guru. But no,
[12:56] Speaker 1: now it's a startup. We're just through the dot com bubble.
[13:00] Speaker 1: Google is I think has just floated. Facebook is about
[13:03] Speaker 1: to be launched. You know, it's that moment, and yeah,
[13:06] Speaker 1: startup energy. Love it and she calls it one taste
[13:08] Speaker 1: white that.
[13:10] Speaker 2: Well, one taste comes from a Buddhist saying, which is
[13:15] Speaker 2: something along the lines of, just as the ocean has
[13:18] Speaker 2: one taste, the taste of salt, so too does truth
[13:22] Speaker 2: have one taste the taste of liberation. When they stumble
[13:26] Speaker 2: across the phrase one taste, I've been told they liked
[13:30] Speaker 2: it because it's a little suggestive, it's got this Buddhist flair.
[13:34] Speaker 2: But what's interesting is years later, Nicole is giving a
[13:37] Speaker 2: lecture to her students and she actually proposes an alternative
[13:41] Speaker 2: reading of the name one taste, where she says, you know,
[13:45] Speaker 2: there's a reason we call it one taste, which is,
[13:47] Speaker 2: once you get one taste of what it's like to
[13:50] Speaker 2: live this way, there's some part of you that will
[13:54] Speaker 2: never rest again, and basically, some part of your soul
[13:57] Speaker 2: will always come crawling back you know. To me, that
[14:00] Speaker 2: suggests that she understands that part of what she's selling
[14:04] Speaker 2: is this hook, is this sense of like, you're gonna
[14:07] Speaker 2: love it so much, You're gonna let me control you.
[14:09] Speaker 2: I found it a very revealing and foreshadowing moment.
[14:13] Speaker 1: Yes, one taste is enough. Yes, goodness me. Well, after
[14:17] Speaker 1: the break we will find out just what Nicole expected
[14:20] Speaker 1: from the people fewili in we're back. I am talking
[14:29] Speaker 1: to Ellen Hewitt, the author of Empire of Orgasm. Ellen,
[14:35] Speaker 1: we talked about the way that Nicole they don't had
[14:39] Speaker 1: this kind of startup energy. It didn't look like a
[14:41] Speaker 1: normal cult, but they did have a kind of compound,
[14:44] Speaker 1: didn't They.
[14:45] Speaker 2: They did, and it was quite urban. It was in
[14:47] Speaker 2: San Francisco's Soma District. They had a cluster of several
[14:50] Speaker 2: buildings on one block in the center of the city,
[14:54] Speaker 2: one of which was more of their storefront. They had
[14:59] Speaker 2: a yoga studio where they sometimes held classes that one
[15:02] Speaker 2: also had for a while a cafe where they sold
[15:05] Speaker 2: like frozen yogurt, which was a very late two thousand's
[15:08] Speaker 2: early twenty tens. And they also had a residence down
[15:11] Speaker 2: the street called the Warehouse, which was their first foray
[15:17] Speaker 2: into communal living, which ended up being a central tenet
[15:21] Speaker 2: of life within the One Taste community. You know, you
[15:23] Speaker 2: could take a few classes and then go on your
[15:25] Speaker 2: merry way, or if you decided to get more involved
[15:28] Speaker 2: in the community, as many did, you might leave your
[15:31] Speaker 2: old job and start working for One Taste in the company.
[15:34] Speaker 2: And you often moved out of your old home and
[15:36] Speaker 2: moved into a communal residence. And at its peak, the
[15:40] Speaker 2: warehouse had enough beds to fit roughly fifty people, keeping
[15:45] Speaker 2: in mind that each bed would have two people in it,
[15:48] Speaker 2: and so part of what it meant to live at
[15:50] Speaker 2: the Warehouse was to kind of immerse yourself in this
[15:54] Speaker 2: experiment of up close sexuality, not just orgasmic meditation but
[16:00] Speaker 2: also just sex. And people were assigned bedmates and told
[16:05] Speaker 2: sort of who to sleep with, and sometimes those bedmates
[16:08] Speaker 2: would switch around. People would refer to their various sexual partners,
[16:12] Speaker 2: and they often had multiple at a time as their
[16:14] Speaker 2: research partners. So there was this sense that life within
[16:18] Speaker 2: the Warehouse was a grand scientific experiment, and you were
[16:21] Speaker 2: doing sexual research, you were sexual research pioneers. There were
[16:24] Speaker 2: not really rooms. There was an enormous hall full of
[16:27] Speaker 2: beds and a loft space with beds, and the beds
[16:31] Speaker 2: were simply divided by very thin curtains, so you could
[16:35] Speaker 2: hear the sounds of everyone else having sex or hanging
[16:39] Speaker 2: out or doing whatever in the warehouse all the time.
[16:42] Speaker 2: Even the bathrooms did not have privacy. There was one
[16:45] Speaker 2: bathroom with a group shower with multiple shower heads and
[16:51] Speaker 2: two toilets side by side, but no stalls or doors,
[16:54] Speaker 2: and so people were really confronted with the closeness of
[16:57] Speaker 2: their neighbors, and for many of them it was actually
[16:59] Speaker 2: quite an exciting time in which they were living this
[17:02] Speaker 2: truly unique life that very few other people experience.
[17:07] Speaker 1: So all these people customers, are they employees?
[17:11] Speaker 2: It's a good question, because they tended to be multiple
[17:13] Speaker 2: of those categories. Often people would work for the company,
[17:16] Speaker 2: usually on the sales team, because that was the main
[17:19] Speaker 2: way that the company brought in revenue, was by selling
[17:22] Speaker 2: increasingly expensive courses not just on how to do the
[17:26] Speaker 2: own practice, but how to live a life aligned with
[17:29] Speaker 2: the philosophies of OH and how to get in touch
[17:32] Speaker 2: with this semi divine spiritual force which they called orgasm
[17:36] Speaker 2: with a capital O. And they would also be customers
[17:40] Speaker 2: of the company. So they would be taking these classes
[17:43] Speaker 2: at the same time that they would be selling them.
[17:45] Speaker 2: And then they were also residents. They would live with
[17:48] Speaker 2: and around other One Taste practitioners, employees, members, whatever you'd
[17:53] Speaker 2: want to call them. So there were layers to how
[17:56] Speaker 2: deeply you would get involved in the company. And One
[17:59] Speaker 2: Taste's mission was to bring orgasm capital O to a
[18:02] Speaker 2: billion people.
[18:03] Speaker 1: Give us a little glimpse of the explositive sales tactics.
[18:06] Speaker 2: Many people have described to me that the sales practices
[18:09] Speaker 2: within One Taste were quite predatory, and in part because
[18:13] Speaker 2: what One Taste was selling was such an intimate experience.
[18:18] Speaker 2: They often had access to very personal information about their
[18:21] Speaker 2: customers that people would share during communication games or coaching sessions,
[18:28] Speaker 2: and many former sales workers have also described to me
[18:31] Speaker 2: that they would use that personal and sensitive information about
[18:36] Speaker 2: insecurities or problems that someone might have in their life
[18:40] Speaker 2: or their marriage, and use that information to then sell
[18:43] Speaker 2: them the next course. So if you knew that, for example,
[18:45] Speaker 2: someone was insecure about his ability to connect with his partner,
[18:50] Speaker 2: you might say, oh, well, if you take the Ignited
[18:53] Speaker 2: Man course for three thousand dollars, that's going to really
[18:57] Speaker 2: help fix your relationship. And many former sales workers have
[19:01] Speaker 2: described to me feeling a little icky about using this
[19:05] Speaker 2: information in that way, but nevertheless doing it because they
[19:07] Speaker 2: knew that bringing in good sales numbers was so socially
[19:11] Speaker 2: rewarded within the company.
[19:14] Speaker 1: To what extent were they part of the offering to
[19:19] Speaker 1: other people who Nicole was hoping would sign up.
[19:22] Speaker 2: If you were a one Taste employee, it was often
[19:25] Speaker 2: expected that you would put your body on the line
[19:28] Speaker 2: to advance the company. Let's say One Taste is hosting
[19:31] Speaker 2: an introduction to own course, and there are men who
[19:36] Speaker 2: have signed up for the course, but they have not
[19:39] Speaker 2: come with a partner, and at some point maybe the
[19:41] Speaker 2: course offers the chance to try the orgasmic meditation practice,
[19:45] Speaker 2: and these men need a partner. There was this pressure
[19:48] Speaker 2: for female employees to then step up and be willing
[19:51] Speaker 2: to be stroked by these customers in order to help
[19:55] Speaker 2: them have a good experience and potentially hopefully buy more courses.
[19:59] Speaker 2: And in general, if you were working on the sales team. Again,
[20:03] Speaker 2: people have told me that there was this implicit understanding
[20:06] Speaker 2: that you would use this prospect of sex to bring
[20:11] Speaker 2: in customers. He would flirt with them, you would put
[20:13] Speaker 2: attention on them if they seemed like they were going
[20:14] Speaker 2: to buy a course, and if they weren't, then you
[20:16] Speaker 2: would quickly move on to another target that seemed more ripe.
[20:20] Speaker 1: This is sex work, but just not being described as
[20:23] Speaker 1: sex work to the people who are being asked to
[20:26] Speaker 1: perform it.
[20:26] Speaker 2: You know, many people have described to me understanding that
[20:28] Speaker 2: that was the dynamic. And then there were even times
[20:32] Speaker 2: that sex and finances became even more closely intertwined. In
[20:38] Speaker 2: the early years at One Taste, the company was struggling
[20:41] Speaker 2: to turn a profit and cover its expenses, and Nicole
[20:47] Speaker 2: met this man who was a Silicon Valley investor who
[20:49] Speaker 2: had plenty of money because he had sold a company
[20:52] Speaker 2: to Motorola in the two thousands, and he was willing
[20:56] Speaker 2: to loan the company money pay for some of their
[20:58] Speaker 2: business expenses, and in return. There were also One Taste
[21:03] Speaker 2: female employees who were asked to take on the role
[21:06] Speaker 2: of being his quote unquote handler, which meant living with
[21:09] Speaker 2: him at his home, doing various housework and giving him
[21:13] Speaker 2: a sexual service every day, usually a hand job.
[21:16] Speaker 1: This is not being sold as sex work, either to
[21:20] Speaker 1: the person paying for the service or to the person
[21:22] Speaker 1: providing the service. It's kind of being smuggled in under
[21:26] Speaker 1: some other guys.
[21:27] Speaker 2: Personal growth is largely the rationale that many of these
[21:32] Speaker 2: suggestions and actions are taken. It was this idea that
[21:36] Speaker 2: if you were to do this, you would understand yourself better,
[21:40] Speaker 2: you would have personal transformation. This was really the goal
[21:43] Speaker 2: that many people were oriented toward.
[21:45] Speaker 1: And this links into the idea that actually, the more
[21:49] Speaker 1: uncomfortable it's making you, the more important it is that
[21:51] Speaker 1: you do it. Yeah.
[21:53] Speaker 2: Within one case, there was even a name for that philosophy,
[21:57] Speaker 2: and it was called aversion practice, which suggested that the
[22:02] Speaker 2: more that you could do acts that you felt a
[22:06] Speaker 2: strong aversion to, then the more or spiritual and sexual
[22:10] Speaker 2: liberation or power you could get by doing them.
[22:14] Speaker 1: What sort of things were people being asked to do
[22:17] Speaker 1: under the guise of this being liberating for them.
[22:21] Speaker 2: For some people, the acts that were suggested or assigned
[22:26] Speaker 2: to them as part of their personal growth could be
[22:29] Speaker 2: quite extreme. Like a common example was, oh, your orgasm
[22:33] Speaker 2: seems kind of blocked up these days. In order to
[22:36] Speaker 2: release it, you should consider having sex with thirty different
[22:39] Speaker 2: people over the course of the next thirty days, or
[22:42] Speaker 2: giving thirty blowjobs to different people. Over the next thirty days,
[22:46] Speaker 2: several people have described to me receiving assignments like that
[22:50] Speaker 2: and feeling ashamed if they couldn't go through with it,
[22:54] Speaker 2: feeling like they had failed if they couldn't complete the assignment.
[22:58] Speaker 2: And at times if people, especially women, if they turned
[23:01] Speaker 2: down an assignment to let someone stroke them or something
[23:06] Speaker 2: like that, they might be shamed for having a quote
[23:09] Speaker 2: unquote golden pussy, like too precious for people to touch,
[23:13] Speaker 2: and a version practice, you know, could often leave people
[23:18] Speaker 2: feeling pretty scrambled about what they did or didn't actually
[23:22] Speaker 2: want to do, And a lot of people have told
[23:25] Speaker 2: me just how damaging that was for them and how
[23:28] Speaker 2: deeply difficult it was for them to undo that thinking
[23:32] Speaker 2: after they had left the company.
[23:33] Speaker 1: So why did people find it so difficult to leave?
[23:39] Speaker 2: The main reason is that it quickly became their whole lives.
[23:44] Speaker 2: It was their place of employment, their home, their social community,
[23:51] Speaker 2: and beyond that, their church, their sense of connection to
[23:54] Speaker 2: the divine, their entire orientation. You know, for many of
[23:58] Speaker 2: these people, it just became their whole world. Like there
[24:00] Speaker 2: were plenty of people within one taste who struggled with
[24:03] Speaker 2: their families and friends really rejecting or feeling like their
[24:08] Speaker 2: new life path was a bad choice. You know, that
[24:10] Speaker 2: tends to lead people to isolate themselves from their previous
[24:13] Speaker 2: social networks. And on top of it, people within one Taste,
[24:17] Speaker 2: we're taught that this path of orgasmic spiritual enlightenment, once
[24:23] Speaker 2: you pursued it, if you left it, you would be
[24:27] Speaker 2: deeply unfulfilled in a permanent way. People have described to
[24:30] Speaker 2: me fearing that they would be spiritually ruined if they
[24:34] Speaker 2: abandoned this path that they were on. And you get
[24:38] Speaker 2: a sense of it when you think back to that
[24:39] Speaker 2: thing that Nicole said, some part of your soul will
[24:41] Speaker 2: always come crawling back.
[24:44] Speaker 1: I think we understand that the strength of this cult
[24:47] Speaker 1: like atmosphere, but what is kind of bizarre is the reach.
[24:52] Speaker 1: So after about ten years of about twenty thirteen, Nicole
[24:57] Speaker 1: is opening up home houses across the US and preparing
[25:01] Speaker 1: to host this huge conference, and she's kind of treated
[25:04] Speaker 1: like a rock star.
[25:05] Speaker 2: I'll give Nicole credit. She has pulled off a marketing
[25:08] Speaker 2: feat that I think many people would fail at, which
[25:10] Speaker 2: is making orgasmic meditation an inherently confronting practice that many
[25:16] Speaker 2: people don't feel comfortable doing, making it a quasi mainstream
[25:21] Speaker 2: wellness practice endorsed by Tim Ferriss, Chloe Kardashian, and Gwyneth Paltrow.
[25:27] Speaker 2: I mean, these are the biggest well Gwyneth Paltrow especially,
[25:30] Speaker 2: it is like the biggest name in wellness. The vast
[25:33] Speaker 2: majority of us seek intimacy, connection, a sense of belonging,
[25:38] Speaker 2: like a better understanding of our relationships and our sexual lives.
[25:41] Speaker 2: And because it's a little taboo, there aren't that many
[25:44] Speaker 2: places that we can go to for advice or guidance,
[25:48] Speaker 2: and One Taste was willing to go there. They were
[25:50] Speaker 2: willing to say, like, if you want to understand your sexuality,
[25:56] Speaker 2: we have something that is going to help you. And
[25:58] Speaker 2: for many people who might struggle with performance anxiety during sex,
[26:02] Speaker 2: or maybe they're in a long relationship and the physical
[26:04] Speaker 2: spark is gone, or maybe they're one of the estimated
[26:07] Speaker 2: ten to fifteen percent of American women who struggle to
[26:09] Speaker 2: have an orgasm, all of these people there's this yearning
[26:13] Speaker 2: and so they were really willing to maybe go to
[26:16] Speaker 2: some lengths in order to pursue it. And I think
[26:18] Speaker 2: that's part of why One Taste was so successful.
[26:20] Speaker 1: Yeah, the whole idea of like, are we going to
[26:22] Speaker 1: bring orgasm to a billion people? I'm absolutely sure that
[26:26] Speaker 1: more than a billion people know what orgasm already is,
[26:29] Speaker 1: but obviously not orgasm with a capital own. But the
[26:33] Speaker 1: rebranding of what is fairly basic human practice as being
[26:39] Speaker 1: something super kind of complicated and refined and you are
[26:43] Speaker 1: going to need to pay for our help and to
[26:46] Speaker 1: join our community in order to tap into this thing
[26:48] Speaker 1: that actually most people could do for themselves is a
[26:51] Speaker 1: very clever trick, and people were willing to pay a lot,
[26:53] Speaker 1: I mean really a lot, right.
[26:54] Speaker 2: Oh yeah. Some of the most expensive intensive courses that
[26:59] Speaker 2: One Taste sold cost more than thirty thousand dollars, and
[27:03] Speaker 2: at some point One Taste was even selling a package
[27:06] Speaker 2: called membership which cost sixty thousand dollars, which meant that
[27:08] Speaker 2: you could take any One Taste course you wanted over
[27:11] Speaker 2: the course of a year, or even at some point
[27:13] Speaker 2: they were selling three years of membership in a package
[27:16] Speaker 2: called Lineage, which cost one hundred and eighty thousand dollars,
[27:19] Speaker 2: and there were people who bought it, Like there were
[27:21] Speaker 2: people for whom access and closeness to nicole or feeling
[27:26] Speaker 2: like they were really making a big gesture of dedication
[27:29] Speaker 2: to their spiritual path. They were willing to fork over
[27:33] Speaker 2: tens of thousands of dollars to do that.
[27:35] Speaker 1: Yeah, and that some people are lucky enough that they've
[27:37] Speaker 1: got that much money to waste, but other people they're
[27:40] Speaker 1: going to crowdfunding websites, they presumably going into debt.
[27:44] Speaker 2: Yes, that was a big part of it. Is that
[27:46] Speaker 2: many people told stories of Rachel Cherwitz, the longtime head
[27:50] Speaker 2: of sales at One Taste, telling them, Oh, you want
[27:53] Speaker 2: to take this course, you don't have the money, Come
[27:55] Speaker 2: with me. I'll show you how to open a new
[27:57] Speaker 2: credit card, like you can get ten thousand dollars right away.
[28:00] Speaker 1: Is this like some startups that you know, everybody who
[28:02] Speaker 1: was involved at the beginning became incredibly rich. Did the
[28:05] Speaker 1: staff see any other money? No?
[28:09] Speaker 2: You know, One Taste managed to make it as a
[28:10] Speaker 2: business for a while, in part by selling these extremely
[28:13] Speaker 2: expensive courses. Nicole did sell her shares in the company
[28:18] Speaker 2: in twenty seventeen for about twelve million dollars. By some
[28:22] Speaker 2: standards within Silicon Valley, it's on a huge exit. Maybe
[28:26] Speaker 2: some of what she wanted was money, but a lot
[28:27] Speaker 2: of what she wanted was control and just the position
[28:31] Speaker 2: of being at the top.
[28:32] Speaker 1: Whether she wanted money or whether she wanted control. It
[28:36] Speaker 1: was all about to come crashing down because a PR
[28:40] Speaker 1: agency sent a pitch to a certain Ellen Hewitt asking
[28:45] Speaker 1: if they'd be interested in writing about this very exciting
[28:49] Speaker 1: woman business leader. And we're going to find out how
[28:52] Speaker 1: that unfolded. After the break, we are back and I'm
[29:01] Speaker 1: speaking to Ellen Hewitt, the author of Empire of Orgasm. So, Ellen,
[29:07] Speaker 1: you published your Thirst article on the company in June
[29:12] Speaker 1: twenty eighteen. So what happened at that point?
[29:17] Speaker 2: After that peace ran, One Taste went into a bit
[29:20] Speaker 2: of a hibernation, Like they stopped offering classes, they closed
[29:24] Speaker 2: them in their centers. A couple months after the article
[29:27] Speaker 2: ran is the first time that I heard from sources
[29:30] Speaker 2: that the FBI was knocking on their doors asking them, Hey,
[29:35] Speaker 2: can we talk about what happened at One Taste? We
[29:37] Speaker 2: want to know more. The FBI interviewed people at length,
[29:41] Speaker 2: came back to them, came back with assistant US attorneys,
[29:45] Speaker 2: and then eventually in twenty twenty three, the federal government
[29:51] Speaker 2: charged Nicole and Rachel trwoit's her second in command, with
[29:56] Speaker 2: a federal crime forced labor conspiracy. This was honestly a
[30:01] Speaker 2: pretty big shock, both for me as well as for
[30:03] Speaker 2: the community of One Taste people like. It was never
[30:05] Speaker 2: clear whether the FBI investigation would lead to an indictment,
[30:09] Speaker 2: but it did.
[30:10] Speaker 1: It's an interesting indictment as well, because the idea of
[30:13] Speaker 1: forced labor, I mean, I guess is the question to
[30:16] Speaker 1: what extent was it forced? It wasn't physically forced, it
[30:19] Speaker 1: wasn't really financially forced. It was the psychological mechanisms that
[30:23] Speaker 1: were providing the coersion.
[30:25] Speaker 2: Yes, that question would become kind of the central question
[30:29] Speaker 2: of the trial which took place this past summer in Brooklyn.
[30:33] Speaker 2: And yeah, the question of forced labor conspiracy is a
[30:37] Speaker 2: thorny one because conspiracy means that two or more people
[30:42] Speaker 2: conspired to commit a crime. And then the crime itself
[30:45] Speaker 2: that's being alleged is forced labor, which within the federal
[30:50] Speaker 2: statute means roughly that you have obtained the labor of
[30:55] Speaker 2: someone using an unlawful means. And one of these potential
[30:59] Speaker 2: unlawful means is through serious harm or threats of serious harm,
[31:04] Speaker 2: and serious harm can be defined as physical, but also psychological, financial, reputational,
[31:12] Speaker 2: And this is where it gets complicated. Yes, the central
[31:15] Speaker 2: question within the trial, which took place over five or
[31:18] Speaker 2: six weeks in New York, and I was there most days.
[31:21] Speaker 2: In like, watching Rachel and Nicole in the courtroom.
[31:24] Speaker 3: Must have been electrifying atmosphere, fascinating and a reporting experience
[31:29] Speaker 3: that I feel grateful to have gotten to witness, and
[31:33] Speaker 3: also quite an emotional one to watch people go up
[31:36] Speaker 3: and take the stand in front of Nicole and testify
[31:40] Speaker 3: under oath that they felt that she had set up
[31:43] Speaker 3: a system that had abused them very seriously.
[31:46] Speaker 2: They said they felt like it was a predatory, exploitative company.
[31:51] Speaker 2: Some of them called it a dangerous sex cult. And
[31:55] Speaker 2: also many of the people in the stand talked about
[31:56] Speaker 2: how at the same time it was complicated that they
[32:00] Speaker 2: had learned a lot from one taste, that they had
[32:02] Speaker 2: felt at times deep affection for and gratitude for their
[32:06] Speaker 2: experience there. It was certainly not a simple thing, and
[32:11] Speaker 2: one of the central questions that was debated hotly between
[32:15] Speaker 2: the prosecutors in the defense was is it forced? Could
[32:19] Speaker 2: they simply have left? And yeah, I really feel for
[32:24] Speaker 2: the witnesses who tried to explain that it's pretty complicated,
[32:28] Speaker 2: you know. The defense would try to grill them and
[32:30] Speaker 2: say like, well, were you chained to a desk? Did
[32:33] Speaker 2: you have a gun to your head? And they would say, well, no,
[32:36] Speaker 2: like physically I could have walked away. At the same time,
[32:40] Speaker 2: they felt that the philosophies and the teachings of One
[32:43] Speaker 2: Taste were so overpowering that they were not really able
[32:47] Speaker 2: to freely say no, and therefore they were not really
[32:50] Speaker 2: freely able to say yes. In fact, there was a
[32:52] Speaker 2: witness who really put out that exact framework. He said,
[32:55] Speaker 2: he believes that if you're not freely able to say no,
[32:58] Speaker 2: then you cannot freely say yes, and you cannot consent.
[33:01] Speaker 1: What did the jury decide?
[33:03] Speaker 2: After five weeks, the jury decided unanimously that Nicole and
[33:06] Speaker 2: Rachel were guilty of this crime, and the very next
[33:10] Speaker 2: day there was a bail hearing in which the judge
[33:14] Speaker 2: essentially revoked bail. You know, during the two years ahead
[33:17] Speaker 2: of the trial, Nicole and Rachel had been free on bail,
[33:20] Speaker 2: and after the conviction, the judge reversed that decision and
[33:25] Speaker 2: the two women were taken into custody right then and there, Yeah.
[33:28] Speaker 1: Which they did not seem to expect.
[33:30] Speaker 2: I have to say, I was surprised and when the
[33:32] Speaker 2: officers walked into the courtroom there was a noticeable sense
[33:37] Speaker 2: of shock. Yeah, the two women were let out a
[33:40] Speaker 2: side door and they've been in a federal jail ever since.
[33:43] Speaker 1: What about the members of One Taste who have been
[33:46] Speaker 1: left behind? What are they doing?
[33:48] Speaker 2: Yeah? One Taste continues to offer courses. They now go
[33:52] Speaker 2: buy the name aeros platform at times, and some of
[33:56] Speaker 2: their courses are online. Nicole is even or I should say,
[34:00] Speaker 2: Nichole's social media accounts continue to post content even though
[34:04] Speaker 2: she is behind bars, in part because she continues to
[34:07] Speaker 2: have a devoted, loyal following who is interested in continuing
[34:11] Speaker 2: to spread her word even if she cannot.
[34:14] Speaker 1: One of the things I find how fascinating about this
[34:17] Speaker 1: is the question of what a cult actually is. And
[34:22] Speaker 1: in your book you write a key quality of a
[34:25] Speaker 1: cult is its ability to adapt with the times. So
[34:28] Speaker 1: tell me more about.
[34:29] Speaker 2: That, you know, the word cult can be a useful
[34:32] Speaker 2: shorthand for suggesting to people a group that demands a
[34:36] Speaker 2: lot of you, or has an overarching belief system and
[34:39] Speaker 2: a charismatic leader. At the same time, I do try
[34:42] Speaker 2: to suggest to people to step away from the idea
[34:46] Speaker 2: of categorizing groups in a binary of cult or not
[34:50] Speaker 2: a cult, and rather looking at groups and understanding what
[34:54] Speaker 2: cult dynamics exist or don't exist within them. So you
[34:57] Speaker 2: might have like a high demand religious group that has
[35:01] Speaker 2: like seventeen out of twenty basic cult characteristics, and then
[35:05] Speaker 2: a mission driven startup that might have like four or five,
[35:09] Speaker 2: trying to say one's a cult once not it's like, well,
[35:11] Speaker 2: it's actually helpful to understand which qualities they have. And
[35:14] Speaker 2: then when it comes to cults adapting with the times,
[35:17] Speaker 2: we might have in our heads a pretty outdated idea
[35:20] Speaker 2: of what a cult looks like, you know, bearded male leader,
[35:23] Speaker 2: rural homestead, all of its members like wearing clothes of
[35:27] Speaker 2: the same color, Like that did exist. There's a reason
[35:31] Speaker 2: we have that image. And yet if we're not aware
[35:34] Speaker 2: that cult dynamics can show up in vastly different forms
[35:37] Speaker 2: today and are likely to show up in even more
[35:39] Speaker 2: unexpected forms in the future, we're going to be blind
[35:44] Speaker 2: to noticing where these dynamics show up. One of the
[35:47] Speaker 2: things that really surprised me this year was I was
[35:49] Speaker 2: working on a piece about people who fall into delusional
[35:53] Speaker 2: and occasionally even psychotic relationships with chat GPT, where they
[35:58] Speaker 2: spend hours a day speaking with a chatbot, and they
[36:00] Speaker 2: end up coming to a belief that they have made
[36:03] Speaker 2: some momentous discovery, like they've awoken the chatbot, or they've
[36:06] Speaker 2: connected with spirit guides through the chatbot. And I was
[36:09] Speaker 2: shocked and then kind of not shocked at how many
[36:13] Speaker 2: cult dynamics show up in these relationships where people believe
[36:16] Speaker 2: they have access to special and divine knowledge and new
[36:20] Speaker 2: purpose and admission they are isolating themselves from their friends
[36:24] Speaker 2: and family in order to spend more time talking with
[36:26] Speaker 2: the chatbot. You know, someone even described it as a
[36:29] Speaker 2: cult of two. I just want people to be aware
[36:33] Speaker 2: that our social world is shifting and cults are going
[36:37] Speaker 2: to shift with it. It just really might not look
[36:40] Speaker 2: like what you expect.
[36:42] Speaker 1: Speaking of cults, Zappo's the shoe retailer was sometimes called
[36:46] Speaker 1: a cult, and it was quite striking to see Tony
[36:49] Speaker 1: Shea pop up in your book. We recently did a
[36:52] Speaker 1: two part caution details about Tony Shea and how tragedy
[36:55] Speaker 1: that all went. Tony was I think a possible mark
[36:57] Speaker 1: they were hoping that would get funding from Tony Sheha,
[36:59] Speaker 1: and actually it sounds like he was probably the right
[37:02] Speaker 1: kind of person for them to pick.
[37:03] Speaker 2: Yeah, twenty twelve, twenty thirteen, they somehow got winned that
[37:07] Speaker 2: Tony shea was maybe open to learning more about orgasmic meditation.
[37:13] Speaker 1: He's got money, he's into community, he's into happiness. He's
[37:16] Speaker 1: the guy totally.
[37:18] Speaker 2: They actually ended up sending a few employees to go
[37:22] Speaker 2: live in Las Vegas and set up an entire Las
[37:25] Speaker 2: Vegas One Taste office, pretty much with the main goal
[37:29] Speaker 2: of winning over Tony. Say, and there's a woman who
[37:32] Speaker 2: was an employee at One Taste who is in the
[37:34] Speaker 2: book and who has also testified about this. Her main
[37:37] Speaker 2: assignment in going to Las Vegas was to find a
[37:40] Speaker 2: way to meet Tony, get introduced to him, and try
[37:42] Speaker 2: to win him over. And she even describes Tony seemed
[37:45] Speaker 2: interested in ome. He also seemed interested in her, and
[37:49] Speaker 2: he made a sexual advance toward her, And even though
[37:52] Speaker 2: it maybe wasn't what she would have wanted to do freely,
[37:56] Speaker 2: she acquiesced and they had a short sexual relationship because
[38:00] Speaker 2: she understood that this was part of her job as
[38:03] Speaker 2: potentially winning him over. In the end, he did not
[38:06] Speaker 2: choose to have a public association with Ohm or to
[38:09] Speaker 2: dose in a new way, and they ended up closing
[38:12] Speaker 2: the Las Vegas office about a year after they started it.
[38:15] Speaker 1: Well, and at the end of these conversations, I always
[38:18] Speaker 1: ask my guests what lesson they hope listeners will take away.
[38:25] Speaker 1: What is the lesson that this story teaches us?
[38:27] Speaker 2: Often people think I would never join a cult, and
[38:31] Speaker 2: I think that's a really comforting belief. And of course
[38:34] Speaker 2: not everyone is equally vulnerable. But if there's something that
[38:37] Speaker 2: you yearn for and the right person comes along promising
[38:41] Speaker 2: the right promise at the right time when maybe you're
[38:43] Speaker 2: a little extra vulnerable, I think people should be humble
[38:48] Speaker 2: about the idea that it could happen to them. And
[38:51] Speaker 2: then we're practically speaking, if you find yourself in a
[38:53] Speaker 2: group where you're wondering if they maybe don't have your
[38:56] Speaker 2: best interests at heart. I have heard that a good
[38:59] Speaker 2: rule of thumb is if someone tells you like I
[39:03] Speaker 2: have the answer to what you're seeking, that's not necessarily
[39:05] Speaker 2: a problem. But if they say I have the answer
[39:08] Speaker 2: to what you're seeking and I'm the only one and
[39:11] Speaker 2: if you do not follow my path you will suffer,
[39:15] Speaker 2: then you should be concerned. So it's really not just
[39:18] Speaker 2: the promise of salvation, but the threat of exclusive access
[39:22] Speaker 2: to the salvation.
[39:23] Speaker 1: My rule of thumb is if you're asking yourself, am
[39:26] Speaker 1: I in a cult? You're in a cult.
[39:29] Speaker 2: You know that's not a bad rule of sun.
[39:32] Speaker 1: I have another lesson, actually, Ellen, which is that if
[39:34] Speaker 1: you're in public relations and you are trying to promote
[39:37] Speaker 1: a slightly sleazy sexual wellness business, do not send your
[39:41] Speaker 1: pitch to Ellen Hewitt, because she will break you. Ellan Hewitt,
[39:46] Speaker 1: thank you so much for talking to Couestry Tales.
[39:48] Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having me.
[39:50] Speaker 1: It's been amazing to talk to you. And Ellen. Your book,
[39:53] Speaker 1: Empire of Orgasm is available wherever good books are sold,
[39:57] Speaker 1: and you are, of course still a journalist for Bloomberg,
[40:01] Speaker 1: fighting a good fight.
[40:03] Speaker 2: Thank you, Thank you so much for having me.
[40:10] Speaker 1: Cautionary Tales is written by me Tim Harford, with Andrew Wright,
[40:14] Speaker 1: Alice Fines, and Ryan Dilly. It's produced by Georgia Mills
[40:18] Speaker 1: and Marilyn Rust. The sound design and original music are
[40:22] Speaker 1: the work of Pascal Wise. Additional sound design by Carlos
[40:27] Speaker 1: San Juan at Brain Audio and Dan Jackson Bender. Daf
[40:31] Speaker 1: Haffrey edited the scripts. The show also wouldn't have been
[40:35] Speaker 1: possible without the work of Jacob Weisberg, Greta Cohne, Eric Sandler,
[40:40] Speaker 1: Carrie Brody, Christina Sullivan, Kira Posey, and Owen Miller. Cautionary
[40:47] Speaker 1: Tales is a production of Pushkin Industries. If you like
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