The Welcomed Consensus + OneTaste

Special Guest: Sasha Nelson

Born in Rome and raised in Berlin, Sasha Nelson is a writer, designer, animal rescuer, beach comber, and truth seeker living in Northern California.

She has written about her experience of living with the The Welcomed Consensus here.

Special Guest: Christine Talbott Acosta

After 40 years Christine Talbott Acosta left RJ Testerman and his high-demand cult The Welcomed Consensus. She was only 12 when she met 32-year-old RJ. He would go on to sexually abuse and traffick her as she grew from a minor to a young woman. Christine then helped RJ to establish and build what became The Welcomed Consensus cult in the San Francisco Bay Area and Northern California.

Now, after having been a member and supporter for decades, Christine works to expose RJ with her blog www.TruthAboutRJ.com.

She lives in the Pacific Northwest with her husband and 2 children. Christine hopes her site will help others to recognize and heal from the group’s damaging beliefs and practices, as well as warn others about their continued operations.

Special Guest: Ruwan Meepagala

Ruwan Meepagala helps people overcome their blockages and find happiness in intimacy and life. He joined OneTaste seeking the same kind of help in his own life, and got a little more than he bargained for... He feels his cult experience taught more about how the mind creates reality better than any other study he's pursued. He has shared his story on BBC, Bloomberg, Playboy, and many other platforms with the hope of helping others understand how malleable the mind is--- which can be used both for good and evil. His full story and views on cult psychology is in his upcoming memoir, Infinite Play: Coming of Age in the Matriarchal Cult of Orgasm.

EPISODE DETAILS

Written and Hosted by Sarah Steel

Music by Joe Gould

Engineered by Andrei Patrushev

Edited by Corey Green at Transducer Audio

Part 1

November 18th, 2020

1 hr 28 mins

Season 4

Transcript

Part 2

November 25th, 2020

1 hr 16 mins 21 secs

Season 4

Transcript

Season 4 presenting partner:

ABOUT THIS EPISODE

Natasha Tiku wrote for Gawker in 2013, “Everyone is interested in doing fun things with their bodies. But the impulse to systematize, replicate, package, sell, and build an ideology around it is uniquely Silicon Valley.” She was writing about an organisation that was monetising the female orgasm. And they weren’t the only ones doing so.

EPISODE LINKS

The Pleasure Principle — by Patricia Leigh Brown and Carol Pogash, New York Times, 13 March 2009
Lafayette Morehouse — official website, accessed October 2020
Lafayette Morehouse, Inc. v. The Chronicle Publishing Co., No. A067522. — 37 Cal. App. 4th 855, 44 Cal. Rptr. 2d 46, California Court of Appeal, First District, Division 5, 9 August 1995
Sgt. Bilko Meets The New Culture — by Robin Green, Rolling Stone, 9 December 1971
Inside The Purple People House, The Freaky, Stand-Offish Sex Cult In Northern California — by Anna Lindwasser, Ranker, 7 November 2018
The Truth about RJ Testerman — Christine Talbott Acosta’s website
Suit: It's hooking, not sex training — by Peter Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle, 27 June 2000
The Ruwando Podcast — Ruwan Meepagala’s podcast, with episodes about his time in OneTaste
The Dark Side of the Orgasmic Meditation Company — by Ellen Huet, Bloomberg Businessweek, 18 June 2018
Inside the Implosion of OneTaste, San Francisco’s Orgasmic Meditation Cult — by Roc Morin, Playboy, 9 October 2018
Nicole Daedone's mission of orgasmic meditation — by Nellie Bowles, San Francisco Chronicle, 12 June 2011
Twelve Women Who Changed the Way We Look at Sex — by Melanie Berliet, Vanity Fair, 23 July 2009
My Life With the Thrill-Clit Cult — by Nitasha Tiku, Gawker, 16 October 2013
"Like you're touching your closed eyelid": (Mis)adventures in orgasmic meditation — by Julie Metz, Salon, 10 July 2015

Nicole Daedone — March 2016 archived version of Nicole’s now suspended website
Nicole Daedone — September 2014 archived Wish Summit bio of Nicole
Institute of OM — official website
OM Sydney — Meetup group
Former Playmate claims she had 11 orgasms in one day with meditation method — by Rheana Murray, New York Daily News, 8 August 2013
Members of orgasmic meditation group where men stimulated women for 45 mins every day claim they were left deeply in debt and told to have sex to attract potential clients in a 'kind of prostitution ring' — by Chris Spargo, Daily Mail, 19 June 2018
Doing it in the altogether is what makes this yoga practice altogether free from distractions — by Carolyne Zinko, San Francisco Chronicle, 24 May 2005
TEDxSF - Nicole Daedone - Orgasm: The Cure for Hunger in the Western Woman — video from 11 June 2011, flagged as falling outside the TEDx Content Guidelines
FBI Is Probing OneTaste, a Sexuality Wellness Company — by Ellen Huet, Bloomberg, 14 November 2018
My Run In With a California Cult — a blogger’s diary of her experiences at The Welcomed Consensus ranch from June 2016, posted 12 July 2016
“We Are the Female Orgasm People!” – My Close Encounter With a Modern Day Cult — another blogger’s diary of his experiences at the ranch, 16 June 2016
Free the Need — Google Maps listing
The Welcomed Consensus — official website, accessed October 2020
BenchMarks in San Francisco — Meetup listing, with 595 members as of October 2020 (last event on 5 June with 14 attendees)
“I took my boyfriend to orgasmic meditation – it was as awkward as it sounds” — by Melissa Shedden, Body + Soul, 24 February 2017

Report alleges 'sexual servitude' at San Francisco-based 'orgasmic meditation' company — Michelle Robertson, SFGATE, 18 June 2018

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