On Keith Raniere & NXIVM 3: Jim Heller, Maharaji Comparisons
Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen
Publication (Outlet/Website): The Good Men Project
Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2024/11/27
Jim Heller is a former Canadian ashram premie. Currently, he is a criminal lawyer in Victoria, B.C., Canada, and a guitarist in a band called X-Flies. He has critiqued Maharaji’s past claims and his followers’ evasion of accountability. Heller looks at the parallels between Maharaji and NXIVM’s Keith Raniere, emphasizing manipulation, the surrender of autonomy, and the importance of critical thinking.
Scott Douglas Jacobsen: Today, we are here with Jim Heller. You were a member of a cult, but you got out. I’m focusing on a series about NXIVM and DOS, founded by Keith Raniere, also known as Vanguard. When you reflect on reading a bit about Raniere for this session, thank you for taking the time to do that and for your reflection on time in Maharaji’s cult. What can you note as some of the consistency between these two systems and their leaders? That seems like a good starting point.
Jim Heller: I didn’t know much about NXIVM; honestly, it didn’t interest me much initially. But after you contacted me, I spent a little more time looking into Raniere, and what immediately stood out from the Wikipedia page and other sources I read was a parallel with the cult leader I followed for some time.
Maharaji came from a Hindu tradition, and his followers believed he embodied the cosmic force—essentially, God. He was God in human form, and as bizarre as that sounds, we believed it. We believed it was possible.
We adhered to a whole narrative and ideology: God regularly manifested in human form throughout the ages. There’s always one, only one. It was Maharaji’s father before him. It wasn’t Maharaji’s three elder brothers; it was Maharaji who took on the mantle from his father when he was just a child. We believed all of that. So when I look at Raniere, I think, okay, here’s another guy.
Raniere didn’t claim to be God or anything like that, but he had a smooth, powerful personality, and I know how it works. You can create a machine if you get a few good followers to promote you correctly. People can fall under the sway of it, and I’m sure that’s what happened with him. That’s how it was with my guru. Maharaji wasn’t doing this alone, either.
When Maharaji first came to the West, he had a coterie of saffron-robed, bald Mahatmas that we considered saints from India. They were propping him up, talking about how their profound meditations allowed them to see how incredibly cosmic and powerful he was. It all worked together as a cohesive narrative, and I’m sure Raniere had a similar setup. When someone is even slightly susceptible to that kind of thing—and I think anyone can be—they’re no match for it.
You find yourself in a group of people, and you won’t be the outspoken renegade because that will immediately push you to the outside. Something within the group dynamic appeals to you, and you don’t want to let that go. With Maharaji, it was the idea of enlightenment. We believed that if we stayed the course with him, overcame our doubts, and received his grace, we could rise higher and higher. One day, we thought, we could become saintly like those same saffron-robed, bald Mahatmas. We were promised incredible meditation experiences and believed we would eventually attain cosmic bliss. Nobody wanted to miss out on that.
We were manipulated, and he was manipulative. I’m sure there was something similar with Raniere.
Jacobsen: What was he offering? What did people see in him?
Heller: I can’t say for sure, but I believe it followed the same path. To me, it’s all about the information you have. Can you ask the hard questions? Is there room for critical inquiry?
You don’t have to have the branding or the sex, but it’s on a continuum away from autonomy, free thought, objectivity, argument, and debate. I see everything like that. To me, “cult” isn’t that powerful a word anymore because I see cult-like thinking across the spectrum—politically, religiously, and ideologically.
Jacobsen: What are your top signals or red flags about those particular contacts for people who are lured into one, have seen someone slowly fall into one, or are in one? What should they be looking for? Also, there are ways they can either rapidly or slowly decouple themselves from that, in your terminology, such as informationally closed systems or systems becoming more closed over time.
Heller: So, the most fundamental aspect of our autonomy is our mind. A human being who’s lost their mind—whether through Alzheimer’s, an accident, or whatever. It becomes questionable what’s left of them as a human being. Our mind makes us who we are, and our mind needs the ability to assess things independently.
The problem with the cult I was in is that we surrendered that ability. We turned our ultimate judgment to someone else—essentially to the group and Maharaji. I imagine that Raniere’s followers did the same. So, I think that’s where the tug of war has to be with anybody. If I had a young friend or anyone I thought was sliding into a closed thinking system, I would try to talk with them about that issue: what happens when they no longer have their thoughts to make decisions?
It gets scary because, once you hand over that level of judgment, you may not have a mind. You’re no longer thinking for yourself. I can give you many examples from my old cult. I’m sure ex-Raniere followers would say the same. Getting branded with disguised initials, for example—that’s just a small indication of what it’s like when someone hands over their autonomy. So, I would say to anyone that there’s nothing worth giving up your autonomy for. Nothing.
The problem, though, Scott, is this: cults offer different things in exchange for a person’s autonomy. In my case, we were told straight out that, yes, you’re being asked to surrender your mind, but if you do that, you’ve got the promise of incredible ecstasy through cosmic consciousness. So, maybe that’s a good trade-off. Some people may think it is. Maybe there are cults where people say, “I’m prepared to become a total slave of Muhammad and sacrifice my children or myself in martyrdom because of the ultimate reward.” So, the problem is that people don’t necessarily value the autonomy we have as human beings as something better than what a cult environment offers.
Sometimes, we don’t want that autonomy. That’s a problem. We have to make the best case possible for personal autonomy. And maybe it’s not as compelling to everyone. Maybe someone would say, “Jim, I get what you’re saying, but if I stay with a Raniere-type system, I’m promised certainty, maybe more sex than I would’ve otherwise gotten, and that appeals to me, or a certain status within the group. I’d rather be a big fish in that tiny, insular pond than deal with my status in the world.” People make those kinds of decisions. So, it’s difficult, but what’s the best reason for us not to do that?
You’ve got to have the best arguments for why it matters to be yourself—that’s the best thing you can get in life. That if you don’t have you, nothing else is worth it. But some people don’t think that. That’s the reality.
Jacobsen: Raniere made a big claim of being one of the smartest people in the world and then developed this so-called ethical system. So, he wasn’t just the smartest person but potentially also the most ethical—that’s the implicated claim.
It’s a sense of grandiose superiority. He positioned himself as a leader who could guide and teach others. Was Maharaji given to similar styles of grandiose claims about himself?
Heller: Totally. Worse. Maharaji makes Raniere look like nothing.
Jacobsen: Raniere looks like nothing?
Heller: Maharaji was considered the Lord of the Universe. He was the current, living embodiment of the cosmic forces we call God, and there was one like him on the planet at any time. How could that be? According to all sorts of ancient Hindu scriptures, the universe dictates that there is only one manifestation of God on Earth at any one time. There’s always one, but just one, and that was Maharaji. So, who could compete with that? Come on. I mean, the setup was perfect.
So, what do people need to understand about cult leaders and cult systems? You can say, “There’s something wrong with this miniature community.” Yeah, there’s something wrong with the personality structure of the cult leader or what they’re mimicking. And now, in many different dimensions of life, we’ve lost our sense of danger. It’s a dangerous time. We’ve lost a profound and natural taste for evidence. One of the greatest contributions of the Enlightenment—our care for evidence and following it wherever it leads—is being obscured. It might challenge your beliefs, but that’s good because, ultimately, you’re pursuing truth, and truth is an objective thing.
Raniere, because that’s who you first contacted me about and who I know you’re writing about—he sounds like a monster. May he rot in jail?
The extraordinary ridiculousness of Raniere’s claim that he was the smartest person in the world just another thing that pales compared to some of the other nonsense that gets allowed without challenge in our ongoing conversation. So, hell in a handbasket, Scott.
Jacobsen: Do you have any final thoughts or feelings based on today’s conversation about trolls?
Heller: No, not really. I look forward to a time when we can look back on this period as one of imbalance and when we’re back to arguing about everything. That would be great—nice and healthy—arguing with evidence, arguing with first principles, and agreeing on some first principles. First, principles and evidence—that’s all we need.
Jacobsen: All right. Thank you so much for your time today. Appreciate it.
Heller: Sure. My pleasure.
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