How NOT to Defend Your Scheme, with an Example

This entire blog can be considered a "what NOT to do" by MLMers, which of course, is infuriating to some amateur MLMer who learned to do things the wrong way.

Recently, there was this poster by the handle of "worldventurehappy" who repeatedly posted unsupported opinions both on this blog and on BehindMLM on the topic of World Ventures. Whether World Ventures is a scam or not is not the question here (but you can read Oz's review at your leisure). The problem is what a lousy job "WorldVentureHappy" did to defend his favorite scheme.

Let's start from the beginning... several comments here on my blog. Here's the first:

Well, that's definitely hostile intent, right? That's hardly pleading for "fairness". It's basically "F*** U!"

My conclusion was that MLM and Travel doesn't go together. If you don't agree, give me some evidence on why you think I'm wrong. Telling me to "get a life" only proves that your feelings are hurt, nothing else. And if your feelings are hurt so easily, you should not be in sales.

But what prompted it? It seems to be some "cheerleading" remarks he posted over at BehindMLM (linked above) regarding World Ventures. However, Oz had apparently nuked the comments as spam. (which only upsets him as he considers that "censorship")

Nine days later I get this comment from the same guy:

Note the URL where this comment was posted: "Why is MLM not a pyramid scheme"

It wasn't even the same topic he posted prior, and then he accused me of saying "Every MLM is a pyramid scheme", when the topic of the post is the DIFFERENCES between MLM and pyramid scheme.

Is this guy f***ing BLIND?!?!?!  It's certainly not looking good for his intelligence.

EDIT: The It appears WorldVentureHappy deleted the comment, and continue to insist I'm equating MLM to pyramid scheme. Clearly, some people have problem dealing with reality... and prefer their fantasy where they insist on believing they read something that doesn't exist.

But wait, there's more!




The guy went ahead and made his own blog when he claimed to "defend [his] travel company". Does it?

It's interesting that

1) This author, i.e. WorldVentureHappy picked the Blogger Scheme that is IDENTICAL to my own when there are DOZENS that he could have picked.

2) There is only one post, EVER, on this blog, started in March, and no update EVER.

However, the intent of the author is quite clear in the first paragraph:

I feel strongly that these reviews are affecting a lot more people who want to change their lives, and unfortunately will realize later that they have no information whatsoever about the bloggers who seemingly want to save them from scam? WV is not a Scam!

There are two things to note here:

• Opinion: WV is not a scam
• Intent: I'm going to "expose" people who tell you WV is a scam

Instead of explaining why WV is not a scam (and the other guy's wrong), he outright stated that he is going to "expose" information about people who said bad things about WV, implying some sort of "conspiracy against him and the company. 

That is a MAJOR mistake, as it's completely irrelevant. It'd be like a criminal defense lawyer "defending" his client by claiming the prosecutor and the arresting cop are racists and criminals and a part of some nebulous global conspiracy to frame his client, instead of presenting some exculpatory evidence to prove his client's innocence. A lawyer doing that would be tossed out of court for contempt. Yet that's exactly what WorldVentureHappy did here: claiming some sort of nebulous "conspiracy" to debase/lie about his favorite opportunity, but provided absolutely NO proof (maybe in his mind they are proof...) to prove his view. 

The author subsequently went on to use more of the bad arguments presented here on this blog:

I have posted my comments on behind MLM, but they were not published and someone commented 2 weeks after me, and because they were negative about world ventures these were published…(I think this is weird). I have commented too on the blogger who said he’s giving an honest review of WV, but again because they were positive they were not published. At the end of the day why the hustle about WV, clearly there is a bigger motive than trying to save people you don’t know!. In fact they are doing the opposite they are taking away the ability of people to think without their judgement clouded with lies and disgusting information.

This is "plea for fairness" along with "conspiracy of censorship/persecution". He asserts that other people are giving "lies and disgusting information", but have not provided any proof that they are such.  

Then the author went on to claim "legitimacy by association" by claiming that the company was a finalist in Ernst and Young's Young Entrepreneur Award in 2010 (did NOT win, merely a finalist among two dozen or so companies in the particular region)  That *must* mean it was legitimate, according to WorldVentureHappy. 

Unfortunately, this does NOT prove legitimacy whatsoever. Here's a simple counter-example: Equinox. It appeared on the FRONT COVER of Inc. Magazine in 1996, as No.1 in the Inc 500 companies. Must be legitimate right? Wrong. Four years later it's closed by FTC as a pyramid scheme. 

No, I don't know if WV is a scam. However, using the E&Y nomination as "proof" that it's not a scam is wrong. It proves no such thing.

The author, WorldVentureHappy, offered no other "proof" to prove his own viewpoint: WV is not a scam. He offered a lot of other information, like "network marketing is popular", "network marketing is often understood", and so on, but nothing really specific about World Ventures.

Yet WorldVentureHappy has this to say about the critics:

Oz and others who we don’t even know their real names? Where they stay? And what they do? In fact what we know about people like Oz they spend much of their time replying and lying to people on MLM on the internet?

What does where the critics are and what they do have something to do with their analysis? As long as the analysis is sound, the other information does NOT matter! And what exactly was the "replying and lying to people on MLM" that he accused Oz of? 

WorldVentureHappy has made some simple mistakes in logic and trust.

When you encounter information that you doubt, you choose to trust it or not. How you make that decision depends on what supporting evidence you see and your priorities are. However, most normal people would check the supporting evidence, and if the evidence and conclusion look right, trust the information. It is only when the analysis / evidence are absent or cannot be understood, would the person then look into the trustworthiness of the presenter.

However, WorldVentureHappy here, because he does not agree with the information he got (from BehindMLM, about the shadiness of WV), he chose to IGNORE all the analysis and evidence presented by Oz, and instead, decided to emphasize evidence he claimed to support his view (WV is not a scam because _____)  then claimed Oz cannot be trusted, without giving any relevant reason why Oz's analysis was wrong.

WorldVentureHappy went straight to the trustworthiness of the presenter, instead of checking the information/ evidence presented first.

This is called confirmation bias: anything that agrees with what we believe is emphasized, and anything that disagrees with what we believe is ignored / ridiculed / bashed. We are all guilty of this at one time or another. However, most of us are aware of this cognitive bias and can work around it. It seems that WorldVentureHappy did not.

WorldVentureHappy concludes with "Be open minded and see the bigger picture"

The problem here is being "open minded" means "willingness to change your mind if the evidence demonstrates otherwise". WVH had not presented any evidence to cause anyone to do so. In fact, he deliberately IGNORED evidence that pointed to conclusion opposite to his view. If anything, WVH had just presented evidence that he is the exact opposite of open-minded, because he REFUSED to even consider the possibility, that Oz just may be right in his analysis of WV, even partially. But instead, he had to dig up some bull**** and irrelevant reasons to cast doubt on Oz's analysis.

It is as if WVH defines "open-mindedness" as "willingness to believe in anything, without evidence".

That's faith, not open-mindedness.

P.S. the comments are quite humorous as well. Out of 8 comments, 5 were anonymous, but all written in the same style. One of them mentioned a website started by a hater of BehindMLM, claiming that BM was posting "fake reviews", but the website itself was a fake review (of BM).


Conclusion

Don't make WorldVentureHappy's mistakes in trying to "prove" WV is not a scam. If anything, he only hurt his case by making his side look vindictive and petty just because they feel they got insulted, and appear to be willing to believe in things with no evidence at all, and dislbelieve something because it doesn't fit what they believe.

When you find the information or an opinion you do not agree with, you should examine the evidence presented and  combat evidence with contradicting evidence. Then examine the other opinion and make sure the evidence actually support the opinion and if there are alternative explanations that the evidence can also support.

When you can't confront the problem, don't. Attacking the presenter only proves you don't have much of contrary evidence. If you attack the critics themselves (claiming some sort of "conspiracy"), you risk being ridiculed as you have no proof whatsoever and had to resort to ad hominem attacks.

This is like high school debate 101. It's surprising how few people have any idea how to debate.

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