The Vow: Season 1, Episode 3 “At Cause”

At the end of the last episode we learned a little about the secret women’s group Sarah has joined.

We open with a recorded phone call between Sarah and Lauren Salzman. We haven’t met Lauren officially yet but we will. Lauren is talking to Sarah about DOS and the branding:

“The group started out like, what if women could really do something and it grew kind of out of that over a couple of years. It became more of a sorority recently… And, that was kind of when I got involved in it… And thinking like, we have to fucking do something in the world.”

Ah, the endless preparation “to do something” that drove the people of Nxivm.

“The women who were doing it were experiencing wonderful things about their commitment and they wanted to memorialize it permanently,” Lauren explains. Oh, no. “I-I-I don’t know who exactly the person was,” she says with a small laugh, “but I know somebody raised the concept of branding. Because what building a principle of self is, you choose self above fear.”

They could have just gone to a bar, gotten hammered and ended the night getting regrettable tattoos like a normal sorority. But, self above fear! Intro.

We cut to hearing a recorded phone call between Sarah and Mark. He tells her DOS is really about having sex with Keith:

Sarah: “I’m kind of shocked right now. And yet, not shocked… you know what I mean?”

Mark: “This shit’s been there right? You’ve seen it.”

Sarah: “Oh, yeah, no— Right from the beginning.”

We then see clips of Keith flirting, kissing and hanging on various women. Sarah is mad at herself for not seeing the truth sooner, but Mark tells her waking up comes in stages. For himself, he is done with Nxivm and is officially resigning.

In Sarah Berman’s “Don’t Call It A Cult,” the audio recording between Mark and Sarah is a bit more extensive than what we hear from this episode. Sarah expresses her fear of her collateral, which there was quite a lot, being released, “I’m trapped,” she tells Mark. If you stay you’re complicit, Mark replies. “You have to make peace with it. So maybe your naked body is going to be on the internet, fine. Make peace with it.”

Back to the audio on the show. Sarah is worried about her ESP center in Vancouver. She depends on that for her income. Mark tells her to smile and not let on there is a problem. She needs some time to figure it out, but Mark promises to have her back.

There has been plenty of discussion on the net accusing Sarah of knowing the organization was bad news earlier than this, but staying in because the money was good. I don’t see how you can draw that conclusion when she leaves shortly after she wakes up, but not before she gets branded for God’s sake. That doesn’t make any sense. I have read comments by people being very stubborn about this. I see you and I’m judging you.

We cut to Sarah who explains what it means to be at cause. Being at cause means never choosing to be a victim. We cut to video of Nancy Salzman, sporting a tragic perm, who tells us that how we feel and behave in all situations is a matter of choice. We cut back to Sarah who explains that means all of our emotions are created by ourselves alone. Therefore, you can choose to feel whatever you want, at anytime, in any situation. Sarah found this empowering.

Sarah worked really hard to climb her way up the stripe path. She came to appreciate the system, because each scarf and each stripe was a means to measure her growth and progression in the organization. Once she got to a certain level, she was able to earn commissions on her recruits. Barbra Bouchey was her mentor and Keith himself taught Sarah all his tricks to get people to sign up.

In footage we see Keith leading an ESP sales training session. “It’s all marketing,” Keith tells the group. You can tell he really enjoys sales and is good at it. Keith taught them the tactics they used were a manipulation, but the good kind of manipulation, Sarah tells us. She definitely got into being a successful salesperson and earning a living. She felt proud about being the number one recruiter for Nxivm.

We cut back to the recorded phone call with Mark and Sarah. She doesn’t know what to do or who is trustworthy. She trusts Mark, but she also trusts Lauren and she feels torn between those still in and those that are out. Mark tells her to just record everything.

Lauren Salzman

Lauren is Nancy Salzman’s daughter. Sarah tells us she and Lauren hit it off right away. They were like family. Lauren was a combination of best friend, therapist and boss. You can see the power dynamic with that though. Not the traditional balance between friends, but Lauren was who Sarah trusted the most.

We see footage of Lauren as Sarah tells us she was considered the most talented EM (Exploration of Meaning) coach in ESP. In the clips the filmmakers show, she seems genuinely likable. She also comes across like she could have been a talented therapist of some kind. If she had followed the above board route, gone to school for it and had been licensed. Instead she ended up working for an organization run by her mom and a sociopath.

We cut to hearing a phone conversation between Sarah and Lauren. Lauren is complaining about the members that have left and the hassles that has caused. One woman left and then told Mark and Bonnie about DOS. Now Bonnie and Mark have left and there has been talk about branding and DOS. It’s hurting business, Lauren complains.

Sarah kind of struggles to tell Lauren she is having a lot of doubts about being involved in DOS herself. She is wondering if maybe there is fucked up shit going on Lauren herself may not be aware of. Lauren is annoyed that only now is Sarah expressing these concerns. “I’m just scared of what I have on the line,” Lauren tells her.

Sarah and Nippy

Sarah met Nippy in Nxivm and I think they joined about the same time. Nippy is American, but they are both actors so they had that in common. He got involved with ESP, because he was struggling during auditions and needed help with that. He and Sarah hooked up at the event known as Vanguard week.

Ugh, Vanguard week. A week long celebration of Keith’s (a.k.a Vanguard) birthday. Held annually at the YMCA resort in the Adirondacks. Sarah tells us it was really like adult summer camp and quite a lot of fun. All sorts of activities during the day, singing and dancing at night. “Support the mission. Build community. Celebrate Keith. Celebrate his birthday” Sarah says. “It’s all for you, for your birthday*,” we hear Lauren say as we watch footage of Keith blowing out candles on many cakes.

*I made The Omen joke in the 1st recap so I won’t repeat myself.

A couple of years after they first hooked up, Nippy and Sarah got married. It was a huge ESPian celebration and Lauren was Sarah’s maid of honor and officiant. Nippy smashed the glass in honor of Sarah’s Jewish heritage while everyone cried “Mazel Tov!” Allison Mack sang.

Sarah felt incredibly fulfilled during this period in her life. She decided she wanted to open an ESP center in Vancouver which she did with Mark Vicente as her business partner. The advantage of that was she and her fellow Canadian ESPians could create that New York community, only in Vancouver. We see footage of actresses Nicki Clyne, Kristin Kreuk, Grace Park and Allison Mack. I think Hollywood does a lot of filming in Vancouver which is why there was this intermix of Canadian and American actors coming in from that location. Anyway, the center was a hit.

We cut back to another phone conversation between Sarah and Lauren discussing Sarah’s brand. “What if [Nippy] wants me to get it removed?” Sarah anxiously asks. “Can I get it removed?” Lauren, sounding mildly annoyed, says, “It’s a scar so, I don’t know.” Then Lauren gives her this claptrap about how it’s totally okay to have something of her own (a brand? Really, Lauren?) and it wasn’t about Nippy. “Anything I can do to support you and not feel fearful…” Oh yes, the problem is that Sarah is feeling “fearful”.

Sarah and Nippy had a son (year? I am not sure), and shortly thereafter she was promoted to green sash (senior proctor). It’s a big deal to earn the green sash, because very few people in the organization advance beyond that level. Sarah and Nippy were being pressured to move to Albany at this time too, even though Sarah had that whole set up in Vancouver. We cut to footage of Keith joking that Albany was “the Rome of the modern world.” Sarah never wanted to move there, but she didn’t want to “stagnate” in her growth. And Nippy wasn’t all that happy living in Vancouver—he didn’t know people and he didn’t feel purposeful. As head of SOP, he felt he needed to be in New York.

SOP

Society of Protectors. Basically a men’s group where men learn to be honorable. Or at least Keith’s definition of what it means to be honorable? God, I hope not. Though you know many hours were spent with Keith rambling on about the issue of masculinity and the role of men in society. Nippy, Mark and another guy named Jim were the head of the organization.

Dominus Obsequious Soroium or DOS

At the end of January of 2017, Lauren came to Vancouver to lead an intensive at Sarah’s ESP center. While she was there, she talked to Sarah about the next step she needed to continue progressing on the stripe path.

It is interesting how Keith and Nancy were able to keep everyone so hungry to keep climbing up the stripe path. With all that was going on in Sarah’s life at this time, you’d think she’d allow herself a degree of complacency about her “growth.” But, no way. Constant anxiety about stagnation.

Dennis Yusko, a reporter for the Albany Times Union, shared an anecdotal example of this in Sarah Berman’s book “Don’t Call It A Cult.” He had been hot on the tail of Nxivm for years. In an effort to score an interview with anyone in the organization (they wouldn’t return his calls) he decided to crash V-week. The vibe was like a Grateful Dead concert, he said, with all the “free spirit” energy. However, “People were kind of floating around, but there wasn’t the love that’s usually in the air. It was more confusion—just a sense of people really convinced if they take enough courses… they would improve themselves or their minds.” Sounds really fun.

Back to Lauren and Sarah. Before Lauren could explain to Sarah what this important next step should be she needed Sarah to swear to secrecy and give collateral as back up. Sarah was intrigued and the word collateral didn’t faze her, because as she tells us, it was part of the Nxivm vernacular.

Cut to footage of Keith twaddling on about how commitment has to be collateralized, because your word isn’t enough. But then he says “your word is your bond.” I’m kind of taking it out of context, but my eyes, they roll.

What Lauren needed from Sarah before she would tell her anything had to be the kind of stuff that would be very damaging if it ever was revealed. Once Sarah submitted her collateral, Lauren told her about DOS.

It’s like a sorority, but for badasses. A force for good, but secret. A group of women, but super disciplined women who live outside of their comfort zone. Cool, said Sarah. But then Lauren added it was a vow of obedience and a lifetime commitment. This wasn’t an issue, because Sarah already saw herself as being a part of Nxivm for life anyway. Lauren described it as like a heightened version of the ESP coaching relationship except it was called master/slave.

Sarah thought it was a little weird, but so much is weird in Nxivm this didn’t faze her either. The master/slave thing is like a metaphor, it’s an exercise, Lauren told her. Sarah handed over some more collateral and was in. Sarah was now accountable to Lauren all the time, she tells us. Sarah liked the daily contact with Lauren because they were usually so busy they would only talk every few months before.

The initiation

Six weeks after joining, Lauren asked Sarah to come to Albany for a secret initiation ceremony. Lauren told her they were all getting a tattoo and it would be based on the four elements. Sky, mountains, river, something else, I forgot.

During the ceremony the “slaves” were blindfolded and driven to a secret location. Sarah cheated and peeped though. She recognized the secret location as Allison Mack’s house. They were taken to a bedroom where it was revealed that instead of getting a tattoo, each woman, one by one, would be held down, naked, while getting branded with a cauterizing pen. And it would be filmed. The procedure would be performed by Dr. Danielle Roberts a member of Nxivm and an osteopath.

India Oxenberg said in her doc “Seduced” the stench of burning flesh was unbelievable. Sarah describes how the skin of the first woman branded “started to burn and smoke and sizzle.” Jesus. It took a while too, because there were pauses while Lauren read some ceremonial words or something.

Sarah had not wanted to go through with it, but Lauren was like, you’re green (senior proctor). You have to set an example. Sarah felt like she wanted to run, but at the same time, if she did, that meant she was giving in to her fear and being weak. This group was supposed to be about being strong. A badass! Overcoming fear! The whole point was full surrender for personal growth. Don’t question it, just do it.

Sarah says she basically disassociated. She impressed everyone, because she didn’t even react to the pain. Once the ceremony was over, Sarah did feel like a badass. It was so scary and so painful that getting to the other side of it felt like an accomplishment. Sarah experienced such a 180 degree turn in feelings, she literally went home on a high.

Now it was time for Sarah to get some slaves of her own. She got one, but she tells us in present day she never knew what to do with her. Which is kind of funny in a macabre sort of way. Lauren wanted more collateral, too. Every month as a matter of fact. Like, how about the deed to Sarah’s home? What?!

Sarah was getting concerned about where all this stuff was being stored. “You don’t need to know,” Lauren told her. “That’s just your control issues.” This was not what Sarah signed up for but, she was “at cause.” That stupid ESP term for never being a victim. Being in DOS was her own choice, after all. Okay, that’s true, but somehow that translated to never being allowed to have second thoughts or change her mind? As a member of DOS, with “collateral” hanging over her head, that’s exactly what it meant. Lauren was really pressuring her to enroll more women into DOS, too. Preferably skinny, pretty girls. Just “recruit, recruit, recruit… There were so many things that were not okay in a very short period of time,” Sarah tells us.

Sarah was starting to put things together. One day she took a good hard look in the mirror at her brand. Suddenly, it was obvious. The initials AM, for Allison Mack, came into focus. This made sense given the whole branding ceremony took place at Allison’s house. Sarah’s “slave” noticed that when she looked at the brand from the side, she could see it was KR, for Keith Raniere.

What’s kind of ironic about this is later it was discovered the initials Sarah thought she was seeing—AM—weren’t for Allison at all. There was an A, but it was for Keith’s middle name. (I don’t know what it is and I don’t care.) But because of what Sarah thought she saw, her “slave” looked closer at Sarah’s brand and noticed Keith’s initials, too. This discovery is what lead to the initial thread being pulled, so to speak, that lead to the whole unraveling of DOS. It’s just one of life’s little coincidences.

After the scandal broke, pictures of the brand were all over the internet. I remember reading about it on Twitter. It was still thought then that the brand contained AM for Allison’s initials. It really gave a false impression of Allison and her relationship with Keith as like a co-leader of DOS. I remember thinking how pathologically arrogant she must be to want her initials on another person’s body. “How sick is this woman?” I thought. She even had a little line in her bio “…woman of 34 and counting,” which was referring to her age. But gossip was like, “Omigod! She “owns” 34 slaves and she’s bragging about it!” Crazy, but the whole thing was shocking and no one knew what to make of it.

We cut to a phone call between Sarah and Lauren: “I didn’t make the brand,” Lauren says somewhat defensively. “I have Keith’s initials beside my vagina,” Sarah says, just a wee bit pissed. What’s her husband going to think? Is Keith the one who organized DOS? Sarah has some questions. “It’s not something we discuss, Sarah,” Lauren says in a tone that manages to be both haughty and sheepish.

Lauren admits Keith knows about the group. He gave permission to use “his tools” she says and he knows about the branding but he didn’t um… cause it or anything. Sarah asks Lauren to please delete all of her collateral. She kind of pleads rather than demanding it. Lauren says she will. Sarah’s like, I don’t care if Keith wants to have sex or whatever, but I am not down with having sex with him. Lauren laughs at the idea and says in a somewhat mocking tone, “You don’t have to have sex with Keith… and it’s not something I am doing.” Sarah tells us in hindsight she realized she was brought in to DOS not to be part of Keith’s sex ring, but to recruit, because she’s so good at it. Plus, she had the connections to women in the entertainment field who tend to be very attractive.

In a present day phone call with Mark, Sarah says she feels really responsible for bringing so many people into the organization. Mark is like, yup, I relate. Mark is the one that brings up the fact they both had connections to the entertainment industry filled as it is with pretty women. Though Mark used the word “girls” instead of saying “women” and that pissed off some internet commentators to no end. Sarah and Mark speculate lots of women have probably been invited to join DOS, not to mention been hit on by Keith. But, they were probably too scared to say anything. Mark and Sarah are upset thinking about it.

We cut to Nippy talking to one of the filmmakers. At first, he didn’t think Keith was a part of it and he blamed Bonnie, he tells us. I’m not sure why. I mean, Bonnie was the first of their friends to leave, but how was she to blame for Sarah’s involvement with DOS? Nippy was struggling to accept the truth about Keith and was doing some mental gymnastics, I guess. But once he did face the truth? “I’ve been out there peddling this fucking shit for how many years?” Nippy says sounding disgusted. One of the filmmakers asks him how he felt after realizing the truth about Keith. “Pissed and scared,” he says. “But mostly scared. If this isn’t true, what I was doing… How do I know—what’s real?”

We then cut to a recorded confrontation between Nippy and Lauren. Nippy recorded it on the sly with his cell phone, I heard later in an interview. He tells her branding his wife with Keith’s initials “in her fucking crotch” is some fucked up shit. Between that and the collateral it sounds illegal to him. They go back and forth. Lauren says he’s upset because he doesn’t fully understand the situation. Nippy says he doesn’t want to understand it. Lauren snots, “I am sorry you feel that way.” Then Nippy gets really pissed and shouts, “I’m sorry you branded my fucking wife!” He softens a bit and says, “You’re my good friend and I love you, but if you can’t see how this is bad…” He resigns from SOP and says he is OUT.

Cut to a phone call between Lauren and Sarah post confrontation. What did you tell him? Lauren asks. That I had the brand, Sarah says. Lauren insists Sarah needs to explain what DOS is to Nippy and if she did that, he would understand. Sarah’s like, I don’t have time for this bullshit. I have to focus on my family. Though she says it in a gentler way. I’m paraphrasing.

Sarah tells Lauren she just doesn’t feel good about DOS, no matter what she says. She wants to go back to how things were between them before all of this. “Okay,” Lauren snits. Did you delete all my collateral? Sarah asks. Nooo, of course she didn’t. “You made a vow which I view as a sacred vow,” says Lauren, sounding mildly insane. Sarah “violated” that vow by “disclosing” to Nippy. Sarah starts to sputter because it’s so nonsensical. She’s like, what was I supposed to do? I have a fucking brand next to my vagina! For the love of God, Lauren, use your head! <—-That’s me talking.

Then Lauren goes next level batshit. She tells Sarah she “understands” if she wants to “choose Nippy” and that is “okay” with her. Naturally she says it in a tone of voice that sounds like a disappointed mom. Lauren continues, “You and I did discuss this before you came in and you promised… to uphold our relationship above your relationship with Nippy.” Sarah gets totally exasperated and tells Lauren she’s not going to choose her over her husband, for crying out loud. The whole thing isn’t actually real. It’s an exercise, a metaphor. She is not Lauren’s actual slave. “Okay,” says Lauren, again in that snitty tone. “I don’t think you have bad intent about this,” Sarah adds, “but this is not what you said it was.”

Then we cut to a shot of a text conversation between Lauren and Sarah. “Hey Laur, I hear you are telling people I am “unhinged.” DON’T FUCK WITH ME. I WON’T FUCK WITH YOU.” Tell her. On the one hand, when I saw that I was glad Sarah put Lauren in her place. On the other, it’s sad that it got so fucked up between them.

We cut to present day and Sarah is looking at footage of Lauren on a laptop with one of the filmmakers. In the footage, Lauren is saying some pretty wise words (for real) about the nature of friendships. Lauren says something about helping people sometimes by saying things that are hard to hear, but how that can be done in a way where the person feels supported, not abused. Sarah looks heartbroken and starts to cry.

We cut back to Nippy and one of the filmmakers asks Nippy if he feels like he failed to protect Sarah. This is kind of a pointed question, since Nippy was one of the leaders of SOP. He says he doesn’t, because he stood up for her once he knew what was going on. He had trusted Lauren. He had trusted the whole Nxivm thing.

We see some past footage of Nippy and hear recorded conversation where he talks about how much he wants to bring some good into the world. We hear Nancy tell him he is the most principled person she has ever met. “I know,” Nippy replies. It’s kind of funny.

We cut back to present day Nippy and he says bluntly, “I was the jackass,” which makes me like him. He then says once you have accepted you have fucked up, you fix it.

Summer 2017

The date really shows you how fast shit went down. It was the end of January 2017 when Sarah first heard of DOS.

Present day and Sarah goes to the airport to pick up Mark. They go to the Vancouver ESP center. I think Mark was filming with his cellphone, because we see Sarah tell a couple of staffers in a hurried, almost frantic voice about the kind of shit that has been going down. She is leaving Nxivm and she advises them to not enroll anyone else into the program. “It is illegal, unethical and immoral,” she says. The staffers say they understand, but one woman looks too stunned to fully process everything she’s hearing. Eh, you can’t really blame her. Sarah grabs some files from the office and the stunned woman looks like she is near tears. No snark, I feel bad for her. Sarah tells them about the collateral and says she doesn’t give a shit if everyone sees it.

Back at Sarah and Nippy’s condo, she and Mark talk. Both of them are near tears and Mark feels like everything is his fault, “because all these people came in through us, you know?” Sarah’s like, we brought them in, we’re gonna get them out.

I believe the tears and the guilt they feel and that’s my gut reaction to this. Some on the net don’t agree. It just seems like on the discussion sites that I have read talking about this series, people come down really harshly on Sarah and Mark believing they are more culpable than they are portrayed. It’s not my job to be their internet defenders, but I do want to be honest about how I feel about this or that. They have plenty of supporters too, though. I don’t want to distort what’s out there. Anyway…

Next week: Episode 4 “Building Character ” We meet Catherine Oxenberg whose daughter India was still in DOS at the time of filming. And we meet “Jane Doe” who tells us about her experience being in the secret group.