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Stories of flourishing cult-like businesses and their messianic leaders are fascinating, as well as terrifying.

There was the guy from WeWork, and the women from ‘Love Has Won’.

But now we bring you this story about a woman who made a cult out of the female orgasm.

Let’s dive right in, shall we?

It started when Nicole Daedone felt immense sexual satisfaction from a man looking at every inch of her in great detail.

She describes this scene in a TEDx talk that has since received over two million views.

We’ve got the talk down below if you’re interested.

Here’s what she says in her TEDx talk:

“The Western woman’s mantra: I work too hard, I eat too much, I diet too much, I drink too much, I shop too much, I give too much – and still there’s this sense of hunger that I can’t touch.”

Like a good businesswoman, she provides the solution to this problem; women can learn to orgasm through meditation.

She has also published a book called Slow Sex: The Art and Craft of the Female Orgasm.

Daedone spent a lot of time learning from other sexual health and healing groups like The Welcome Consensus and Lafayette Morehouse, which also teach people about connection and orgasms.

Combine those teachings with her studies in Buddhism and you have what she called orgasmic meditation, or ‘OM’, which is the product of the company Daedone founded in 2004, called OneTaste.

Via The Telegraph, here’s more about the product OneTaste sells in the form of courses and training retreats:

A woman lies on what Daedone called ‘a nest’ of pillows, and ‘butterflies’ her legs (again, Daedone’s term), draping one leg over the knee of a man, who is fully clothed, seated beside her. He sets a timer [for 15 minutes]. Wearing latex gloves smeared with lubricant, he would then stroke ‘the upper left quadrant’ of the clitoris.

…Men stroked women, and sometimes women stroked women; nobody stroked men. But everybody paid.

With centres in nine cities, including New York, San Francisco, and London, OneTaste was reported to be making $12 million (around R170 million) a year at its peak.

Celebrities even backed the brand; Khloé Kardashian says she ‘swears by’ OM, and its most celebrated champion is Gwyneth Paltrow.

Daedone has been lauded as “a God figure” by some within OneTaste, and is apparently very charming and attentive.

That’s where the business started to become more like a cult.

Now, OneTaste is under investigation by the FBI over allegations linked to prostitution, sex trafficking, and violations of labour law.

A couple interviewed in The New York Times said that they “found the environment manipulative, unhealthy and disempowering,” adding that they in no way endorse anything OneTaste has to offer.

As per NewsAU, another woman identified as Michal, who spoke to BBC podcast The Orgasm Cult, also came out with some damning evidence about the company.

She revealed how the salespeople for OneTaste schmooze you into spending way more than you can afford on their products and encouraged people to use their credit cards, as if it wouldn’t be a problem later on.

As a result of these money woes for many of the women joining, Michal mentioned there was something similar to prostitution happening with sugar-daddy vibes:

 “There were many very well-paid men who were part of OneTaste. They usually had tech jobs or other high-paying jobs.

“Some were older but others were in their 20s, 30s and 40s. The ratio between men who had money and women who didn’t was pretty extreme.

“So men who came into OneTaste looking for more sexual experiences with women were in this perfect position where they could pay for women’s classes, take those classes with them, and in that way become their partners or boyfriends.”

She also mentions that OneTaste trainers reframed what could lead to feelings of sexual abuse as ‘aversion’:

“I remember being told that orgasm happens outside of your preferences so if you‘re feeling an aversion, like an actual physical aversion to someone, it actually means if you were to get with him, you would have really hot sex.”

As a result, Michal developed dissociation, a disorder that can cause physical and psychological problems, and which she says she is still dealing with:

“I thought that they were supposedly so attuned to a woman’s body and such experts in OneTaste that they knew what they were doing so well that if I would have told them to stop, or that if something didn’t feel good or that I didn’t like what they were doing that I would in some way seem not so sexually evolved.

“I remember several times that I had sex and I felt like my voice was stuck in my throat. I remember thinking ‘this is hurting me’ but being unable to say so.”

If you’re into psychoanalysis, there might be something in the fact that Daedone’s father was arrested for the sexual molestation of two young girls, although she says he never touched her.

Oh, and here’s the TEDx talk that we promised:

Obviously, OneTaste denies all the allegations and Daedone was said to laugh at her company being likened to a cult.

But OneTaste has changed face recently, which may be telling.

Now in place of the OneTaste website, and instead of in-person sessions, there is a new organisation called The Institute of OM that describes itself as ‘an education company dedicated to helping people increase health, happiness and connection through Orgasmic Meditation (OM)’ and offers training online.

While I don’t believe the female orgasm deserves any more stifling, Daedone does need to think carefully about how she’s spreading her agenda.

Wherever she is, because apparently, she’s out of reach, I hope she’s thinking beyond just getting off.

[sources:telegraph&newsau]