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The Most SICKENING S__ CULT In History _ Children Of God · The conspiracy

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Speaker 1: Crime, conspiracy, cults, murder, and you. All of which are
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Speaker 1: my favorite topics to talk about.
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Speaker 2: That's a little weird.
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Speaker 1: Anyway, let's start off with you look absolutely fabulous today,
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Speaker 1: all snuggled up. Or maybe you're not, but get snuggled up,
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Speaker 1: because we're going to talk about some not-so-snuggly topics. We're
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Speaker 1: talking about cults today. I put a vote up on
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Speaker 1: Instagram and I wanted you guys to tell me whether
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Speaker 1: you wanted serial killers or cults. And y'all said cults,
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Speaker 1: which I was excited about because I feel like a
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Speaker 1: lot of people focus a lot on serial killers for
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Speaker 1: these deep dives. And I'm excited to dive into this
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Speaker 1: cult because I don't think it's talked about enough. I
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Speaker 1: was going to go the Jim Jones route, which I
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Speaker 1: might do in the future. And I was thinking maybe
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Speaker 1: Charles Manson, but that feels overdone. So we're going to
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Speaker 1: do the children cult. of God. And it sounds nice,
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Speaker 1: but it's not. The main cult leader in charge, David Berg,
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Speaker 1: is the biggest POS you have ever heard of in
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Speaker 1: your life. And I'm excited to deep dive into this.
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Speaker 1: I'm very interested in how cult leaders come to be
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Speaker 1: and how they get these people to follow them and everything.
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Speaker 1: So let's unbuckle our seat belts, go Mach 5 down
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Speaker 1: the highway, slam on the brakes, and deep dive through
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Speaker 1: this windshield together. All right, so for those of you
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Speaker 1: who don't know, the Children of God, otherwise known now
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Speaker 1: as the Family International, is a far-reaching Christian cult that
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Speaker 1: started in the late 60s by David Berg. This Santa
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Speaker 1: Claus looking perverted... But it's always the 60s, isn't it?
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Speaker 1: Something about that time just is terrible. But it also
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Speaker 1: had its ups. Some trippy hippies, Elvis Presley, the invention
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Speaker 1: of the handheld calculator, and international criminal sex cults.
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Speaker 2: That's the not-so-good part, but that's what we're going to
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Speaker 2: talk about today.
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Speaker 1: Now, you may ask, why, Chris? Why are we diving
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Speaker 1: into this particular sex cult? And it's because over the years,
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Speaker 1: this cult has become involved in a plethora of sex
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Speaker 1: scandals involving, but not limited to... religious prostitution, child abuse,
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Speaker 1: and PDF-elia. But they have now reformed, whatever that means,
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Speaker 1: and are known to be somewhat of a reformed Christian
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Speaker 1: church now. But I'm not gonna take their word for it.
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Speaker 1: But that's not what we're gonna talk about today. We're
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Speaker 1: gonna be diving deep into the very beginnings of this cult.
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Speaker 1: and its leader, David Berg, and all the scandal and
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Speaker 1: abuse and crimes that lied within. So, David Berg was
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Speaker 1: born on February 18th, 1919, in Oakland, California. But during
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Speaker 1: his early years, he lived in Florida. So we're already
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Speaker 1: starting off on a bad note, okay? He was born
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Speaker 1: in a place where people signed contracts to El Diablo,
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Speaker 1: and then he was raised in Florida, where... Oh, it's Florida. Anyway,
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Speaker 1: he was the youngest of three children born to Virginia Brandt,
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Speaker 1: his mother, and Hilmer Berg, he's Swedish, can you believe it,
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Speaker 1: his father. And to really understand David Berg, I need
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Speaker 1: to tell you about his POS parents, Hilmer and Virginia.
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Speaker 1: Let's start with his mother. So David's mother, Virginia Brandt,
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Speaker 1: was a radio evangelist and a traveling preacher during the
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Speaker 1: Pentecostal revival, which was a time big on fire and brimstone.
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Speaker 1: And for those of you who don't know what that means,
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Speaker 1: it's a term used to represent God's wrath.
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Speaker 2: In Christian tradition.
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Speaker 1: Pretty metal. Along with speaking in tongues and laying of hands, etc.
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Speaker 1: What most people would consider old time religion practices. And
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Speaker 1: David's mother got hooked into religion from an event that
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Speaker 1: happened when she was a teenager where she got whipped
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Speaker 1: off a horse and buggy and broke her back. And
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Speaker 1: then she was bedridden for five whole years. But then
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Speaker 1: one day the heavens opened up and she rose from
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Speaker 1: the bed like the exorcist.
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Speaker 2: It's the power.
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Speaker 1: And she was just miraculously able to walk from then on.
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Speaker 1: And from then on, she was known as the Miracle Woman,
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Speaker 1: telling her tale of divine healing, something of which other
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Speaker 1: cult leaders such as Jim Jones used to preach and
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Speaker 1: claim as well. So from that tale on, she would
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Speaker 1: grow up and become the first female evangelist preacher in
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Speaker 1: America and would go on to host a radio show
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Speaker 1: called Meditation Moments. Something I feel like I had to
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Speaker 1: do several times while researching for this video. But isn't
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Speaker 1: that just like a nice story? Something that gives you
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Speaker 1: hope in life for humanity? Just miracles happening on their
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Speaker 1: own like that? That's pretty great.
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Speaker 2: SPOILER ALERT!
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Speaker 3: It was all bullshit!
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Speaker 2: It was fake!
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Speaker 1: Can you believe it? A religious leader trying to exploit
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Speaker 1: people for money and fame and favors? I've never heard
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Speaker 1: of such a thing! But disclaimer, no hate to anybody
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Speaker 1: that is religious, okay? I know plenty of people that
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Speaker 1: are religious, and they're some of the best people I know,
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Speaker 1: including my family. Alright? But let's not pretend there aren't
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Speaker 1: some slimy scumbags that use and abuse it for evil.
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Speaker 2: Okay?
4:35
Speaker 1: I digress. Let's continue. So like I was saying, all
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Speaker 1: David Berg's mother's claims were found out to be horse shit.
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Speaker 1: Because years later, one of David Berg's daughters would reveal
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Speaker 1: that the entire time she claimed to be bedridden for
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Speaker 1: five years, She was actually at the Texas Christian University
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Speaker 1: in Texas, healthy as a horse. So all this goes
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Speaker 1: to show that blatantly lying to use and abuse innocent,
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Speaker 1: vulnerable people for gain was already in David Berg's DNA.
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Speaker 1: But wait, there's more. David Berg's father, Hilmer Berg, I
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Speaker 1: really hope I'm saying that right. It's really fun to say.
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Speaker 1: A poor Swedish immigrant who before coming to America made
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Speaker 1: money performing musical numbers and acrobatic routines in a wandering
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Speaker 1: minstrel show.
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Speaker 2: In a minstrel show. Menstrual show? Minstrel show?
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Speaker 1: I definitely spelled it wrong. I said menstrual show, but
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Speaker 1: I feel like that's wrong. He was like a Swedish hippie,
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Speaker 1: which wasn't bad, necessarily, but just added a little bit
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Speaker 1: to the David Berg cult leader stew that we're cooking.
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Speaker 1: Having a mother who already practiced scamming people through religion,
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Speaker 1: and a father who was just like a naive hippie drifter,
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Speaker 1: along with the fact that David Berg was growing up
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Speaker 1: in a time where new religion, conspiracy, and cults were
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Speaker 1: absolutely rampant, it was just a recipe for disaster. So
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Speaker 1: after David was born, the Bergs threw themselves into the
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Speaker 1: Pentecostal church. And for those of you who don't know,
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Speaker 1: those are like the snake handlers, the faith healers, the
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Speaker 1: tongue speakers. These are the people that, in my opinion,
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Speaker 1: the Lord would claim went hard to the paint. And
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Speaker 1: by paint, I mean huffing it. This type of religion
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Speaker 1: and these type of people were basically just dramatic theatrical
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Speaker 1: performances put on for every sermon that happened. Which is
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Speaker 1: pretty fun, you know? If you're not hurting anybody.
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Speaker 4: I don't know.
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Speaker 1: But for those of you who don't know, the only
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Speaker 1: way I can describe it is what looks and sounds
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Speaker 1: like a bunch of severely intoxicated adults in a reptile
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Speaker 1: terrarium who think they have superhuman powers. So pretty, pretty
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Speaker 1: f * * * ing baller. So David's parents became
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Speaker 1: a big part of the church, whether they were preaching
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Speaker 1: or in charge or music directing, etc. And this church
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Speaker 1: grew rapidly over a very short period of time. Within
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Speaker 1: a year, it went from a dozen members to filling
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Speaker 1: up an auditorium of over 4,500 members. And this is
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Speaker 1: when David claims to remember less about the church and
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Speaker 1: more about his mother scolding him about touching himself constantly.
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Speaker 1: This guy was horny from the start. And I'm talking,
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Speaker 1: he's like five right now, by the way, like five.
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Speaker 1: And I know like kids do that, but he was
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Speaker 1: like doing it.
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Speaker 2: You know what I mean?
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Speaker 4: Which is... Strange.
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Speaker 1: Anyway, one night, Virginia, his mother, caught him touching himself
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Speaker 1: and then gathered the entire family into one room and
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Speaker 1: she grabbed a bowl and a knife. Do you see
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Speaker 1: where this is going?
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Speaker 2: I didn't.
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Speaker 1: And then proceeded to tell David, Hey, if you.
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Speaker 3: Do that again, I'm going to take this bowl, put
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Speaker 3: it under your... And then chop it off in front
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Speaker 3: of the entire family, okay?
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Speaker 1: But I thought my mom was scary when she called
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Speaker 1: family meetings, man.
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Speaker 2: Can you imagine your mom just calling you like.
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Speaker 3: Sweetie, you gotta come downstairs for a family meeting. We
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Speaker 3: need to talk about how you stuck out last night.
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Speaker 1: And you don't know whether you're gonna go downstairs and
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Speaker 1: get grounded.
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Speaker 2: Or get your f * * * ing legs.
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Speaker 1: Lobbed off by your entire family? What a great parenting tip.
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Speaker 1: Virginia's solid. Virginia should write a book, in my opinion.
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Speaker 1: She's dead now, though, so thank God. But alas, David
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Speaker 1: did not stop touching himself. Which we know, because.
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Speaker 2: I'm making this video. Looking back on this time, he said, quote-unquote, It.
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Speaker 1: Just felt too good to quit.
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Speaker 2: How horny do you have to be to risk getting
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Speaker 2: your dick cut off in front of your entire family? Like,
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Speaker 2: that's f * * * ing crazy to me, dude.
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Speaker 1: Anyway, this is clearly the obvious beginning of the f
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Speaker 1: * * * ed- up ex-cult leader picture being painted. He
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Speaker 1: would also claim that his Mexican babysitter, Maria, used to, quote-unquote, Suck.
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Speaker 2: Me to sleep before my nap every afternoon. What?
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Speaker 1: This is, this is unconfirmed.
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Speaker 2: This is his claim, but I hope to God it's
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Speaker 2: not true, but I think it might be.
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Speaker 1: Because he did use it as an excuse in the
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Speaker 1: future to... children in an act of calming them down,
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Speaker 1: and he would get other members of his cult to
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Speaker 1: do the same to their children.
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Speaker 2: To calm them down as well.
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Speaker 1: How about just giving him a shot of whiskey like
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Speaker 1: all our moms did, you know? It's just mine?
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Speaker 5: Oh.
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Speaker 1: And I know I'm like speaking very, you know, in
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Speaker 1: a funny way, and as I think this person is
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Speaker 1: the f * * * ing scum of the earth,
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Speaker 1: and I hope that he's just f * * *
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Speaker 1: ed Just burning in hell right now. So I just
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Speaker 1: want you to know this entire time, I have all
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Speaker 1: the sympathy for these victims, and I... hate David Berg.
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Speaker 1: Let's just make that very clear. But on a more
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Speaker 1: serious note, his daughter even spoke about these acts as
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Speaker 1: an adult, like plain as day, saying her father, David Berg,
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Speaker 1: used to put her to sleep by giving her a
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Speaker 1: front rubbin', which is just, just heartbreaking, you know? And
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Speaker 1: it's even more sad because everybody that talks in these
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Speaker 1: interviews that I watched that were a part of this
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Speaker 1: and that were okay with it or grew up in
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Speaker 1: the cult just thought it was completely normal and they
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Speaker 1: didn't really know that they were getting taken advantage of.
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Speaker 1: So it's just, it's just so sad, man. And I
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Speaker 1: hope all the people that participated in this are just burning,
9:32
Speaker 1: you know? So anyway, so it all really started with
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Speaker 1: his family and then eventually branched out into the cult,
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Speaker 1: but we will get to that. So obviously David's obsession
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Speaker 1: with sex started at a very young age and was
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Speaker 1: only amplified by the fact that David's mother chastised him
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Speaker 1: for having any sexual thoughts at all or committing any
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Speaker 1: self-inflicted sexual acts on himself because he was caught again
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Speaker 1: later in life when he was a teenager and didn't
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Speaker 1: get his cut off. Unfortunately, that would have solved a
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Speaker 1: lot of problems looking back right now. We wouldn't be
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Speaker 1: making a video. I wish she would have held up
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Speaker 1: to her threat, but alas, she did not. Instead, she
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Speaker 1: made Hulmerberg, his father, come in mid-stroke and she made
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Speaker 1: David finish in front of her and his father. So
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Speaker 1: a family that jerks together stays together. Don't pause that.
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Speaker 1: That's f * * * ing gross.
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Speaker 2: I'm kidding. I'm kidding.
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Speaker 4: But.
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Speaker 1: What the f * * *? But you can slowly
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Speaker 1: start to see that the punishments that his mother inflicted
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Speaker 1: on him slowly became David's fetishes later on in life.
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Speaker 1: Because you know that old saying, if you tell someone
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Speaker 1: not to touch wet paint, they're gonna f * *
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Speaker 1: * ing.
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Speaker 2: Hate in front of their family.
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Speaker 6: F * * *.
10:37
Speaker 1: But anyway, this rebellious behavior towards sex and punishments just
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Speaker 1: somewhat normalized the breaking down of any sexual barriers that
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Speaker 1: were in place at all, if any at all, with
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Speaker 1: his family, and just basically taught him that any sexual
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Speaker 1: activity was a-okay with the fam jam. Thanks, mom and dad.
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Speaker 1: I'll go.
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Speaker 2: Myself.
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Speaker 7: Literally.
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Speaker 1: And those boundaries would be dropped, allegedly, based on a
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Speaker 1: letter later in life that David Berg wrote about his mother.
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Speaker 1: Accounting a night him and his mother got stuck in
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Speaker 1: a cold, cold house on a cold, cold winter night,
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Speaker 1: in which she was naked and spooned him from behind,
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Speaker 1: and he regretted deeply that he did not make sweet,
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Speaker 1: sweet love to his mother. Ahhhh. And I would like
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Speaker 1: to believe that his mother had no intention of doing that,
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Speaker 1: but I'm gonna safely assume she might have.
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Speaker 2: I don't really know.
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Speaker 1: Either way, this is just catapulting him into the weird
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Speaker 1: mindset of, I need to have sexual intercourse with my family.
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Speaker 1: Shortly after that incident, It was World War II, and
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Speaker 1: David Berg was doing anything not to become part of
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Speaker 1: the army. And his way out of this was to
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Speaker 1: become an ordained minister and conscientious objector in 1941. And
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Speaker 1: married his first wife, Jane Miller, and had two little children,
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Speaker 1: Deborah and Erin. And this was when David was appointed
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Speaker 1: to be a minister in a rundown church in Arizona.
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Speaker 1: but was soon accused of inappropriate sexual acts and run
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Speaker 1: out of town. You'll see this is a pattern.
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Speaker 2: It happens a lot.
12:06
Speaker 1: After he was run out of town, he took him
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Speaker 1: and his family and started to work under a faith
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Speaker 1: healer named Orville Jaggers. What a fun name. I like
12:13
Speaker 1: that name, but it also kind of sounds like a slur,
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Speaker 1: but it's not. But alas, it did not work out.
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Speaker 1: I wonder why.
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Speaker 2: Maybe it's because he tried to have sex with somebody
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Speaker 2: that didn't want him to. I don't know.
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Speaker 1: I don't know how I turned into Jerry Seinfeld. And
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Speaker 1: after Jagger, he moved to working under an evangelist named
12:30
Speaker 1: Fred Jordan, who had founded the American Soul Clinic, which
12:34
Speaker 1: was also a missionary training school. Here, David would spend
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Speaker 1: 15 years working under him, but would eventually, of course,
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Speaker 1: have a fallout for probably having sex with somebody he
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Speaker 1: wasn't supposed to.
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Speaker 2: This guy.
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Speaker 1: But now, 50-year-old David would leave with his family and
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Speaker 1: take them on the road as the Berg family singers.
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Speaker 1: That's right, he made his family into the White Jackson Five,
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Speaker 1: but would fail miserably. And that's a pattern that happens
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Speaker 1: in his life. He's already 50 years old, and everything
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Speaker 1: that he has done in life has been a massive failure,
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Speaker 1: which is kind of a pattern for most cult leaders
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Speaker 1: that you look at. They are successful later in life
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Speaker 1: as being a cult leader, but it was due to
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Speaker 1: them failing constantly.
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Speaker 2: In life, just doing, you know, good stuff? Not really.
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Speaker 1: But you find that the only thing that they find
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Speaker 1: success in is manipulating people and being pieces of shit.
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Speaker 1: So what do you do when you're a massive failure
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Speaker 1: at 50 years old and your family resents you and
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Speaker 1: you can't take care of them?
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Speaker 2: You crawl back home to mommy.
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Speaker 1: And where is mommy? Mommy is in California.
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Speaker 2: California love.
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Speaker 1: This is when the hippie area was in full swing
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Speaker 1: and Virginia was out there taking advantage of it. She
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Speaker 1: would go out and give peanut butter sandwiches to the
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Speaker 1: homeless hippies and in exchange give them the word of God.
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Speaker 1: And I just picture her just on the boardwalk.
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Speaker 2: Hello. Would you like a peanut butter sandwich? No, no, no, come, come.
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Speaker 1: I need you to come in front of my husband first,
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Speaker 1: and then I'll tell you about Jesus Christ.
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Speaker 7: All right?
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Speaker 2: Remember that? Remember what she did to her kid?
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Speaker 8: I do.
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Speaker 1: So it was around this time that David and his
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Speaker 1: family joined Virginia in California. And David would change the
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Speaker 1: name of his family singing group to the Berg Family
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Speaker 1: Singers to the Teens for Christ. Much better, much better.
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Speaker 1: I would never see the Berg Family Singers, but the
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Speaker 1: Teens for Christ? You bet your sweet holy water I'm
14:20
Speaker 1: gonna be front row at that concert. And he would
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Speaker 1: get them to perform on the beaches of California to
14:24
Speaker 1: make some extra ends meet. But shortly after arriving, Virginia
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Speaker 1: Berg would die.
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Speaker 2: Oh no, no. Virginia, she's dead.
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Speaker 1: Oh no, I loved her so much. Just kidding. But
14:35
Speaker 1: this is when David would get a second wind and
14:38
Speaker 1: truly realize his potential in making the optimal, unstoppable sex
14:43
Speaker 1: cult he's always dreamed of. And that's how a lot
14:45
Speaker 1: of cults started back in the day. The 60s were
14:47
Speaker 1: a time of the hippie movement. No one really had
14:50
Speaker 1: any direction. Everyone was doing drugs and having... and partying
14:54
Speaker 1: and free living, living life on the road with no responsibilities,
14:57
Speaker 1: et cetera. And near the end of the movement, which
14:59
Speaker 1: is the time period we're kind of talking about right now,
15:01
Speaker 1: people were kind of over that and they were looking
15:04
Speaker 1: for a purpose and they were looking for something to
15:06
Speaker 1: live for. In comes religion and religious cults. And a
15:10
Speaker 1: lot of people found purpose in those because they were
15:12
Speaker 1: far away from their family. They didn't have any possessions
15:15
Speaker 1: or even if they did, it wasn't much. And these
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Speaker 1: religious groups would take them in and just.
15:20
Speaker 2: I can brainwash them.
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Speaker 1: So these semi-intelligent, manipulative, sex-crazed, power-hungry assholes like Charles Manson,
15:28
Speaker 1: Jim Jones, L. Ron Hubbard, and David Berg saw the
15:31
Speaker 1: potential of this perfect feeding ground, essentially. And I'd like
15:35
Speaker 1: to think that I was smart enough not to be
15:37
Speaker 1: a part of one of these groups, but I am
15:39
Speaker 1: such a people pleaser, and I love X and Drip.
15:42
Speaker 1: I'm kidding. I'm kidding.
15:43
Speaker 8: All right.
15:43
Speaker 1: So the not named yet group, the Children of God,
15:47
Speaker 1: would start out in a small coffee shop that also
15:49
Speaker 1: doubled as a Pentecostal youth ministry in Huntington Beach, California,
15:53
Speaker 1: which was essentially the perfect place for David Berg to
15:56
Speaker 1: come in and just start leading and manipulating because he's
15:59
Speaker 1: already had 50 years of practice being a minister. Not
16:03
Speaker 1: that well, but he has had practice in leading people.
16:06
Speaker 1: So this was just kind of the perfect breeding ground
16:09
Speaker 1: for him. And he would do exactly that. And he
16:11
Speaker 1: would use his child singing group to bring people in.
16:14
Speaker 1: They would sing on the beach and people that would
16:16
Speaker 1: vibe with them or whatever they thought needed help would
16:19
Speaker 1: offer them free food and beverages at the coffee shop.
16:22
Speaker 1: And they would come into the coffee shop and get
16:24
Speaker 1: the free food and beverages and they'd talk to them
16:27
Speaker 1: a little bit. And then they'd just like, shove in
16:30
Speaker 1: their pitch. I always think like, how dumb are these
16:33
Speaker 1: people that join cults and everything? But at that time,
16:35
Speaker 1: like these people had nothing, you know? They're all starving
16:37
Speaker 1: and stuff. And if people are offering free food, man,
16:40
Speaker 1: I probably would have gone in too, you know? Who
16:41
Speaker 1: hasn't wandered into a room they're not supposed to be
16:44
Speaker 1: in and saw a snack table with a sign that said,
16:46
Speaker 1: help yourself. And then later realized it was an AA
16:49
Speaker 1: meeting and your dad was there.
16:51
Speaker 6: Just me.
16:51
Speaker 2: All right.
16:52
Speaker 1: So Berg basically used his kids to prey on people
16:55
Speaker 1: that looked lost, helpless, poor, and sad. So they would
16:58
Speaker 1: befriend these people, get to know them a little bit,
17:00
Speaker 1: and then, like I said, would pitch them their master plan.
17:04
Speaker 1: Which Berg came up with this propaganda-type pitch, basically going
17:09
Speaker 1: against the system. You guys have probably heard of that, like,
17:12
Speaker 1: The system, man. The system is gonna get you down.
17:15
Speaker 1: That's the man, you know? Everything's a conspiracy, man. It's
17:19
Speaker 1: the government. Your parents are after you, man. You should
17:22
Speaker 1: be able to not wear a shirt and not wear shoes,
17:25
Speaker 1: you know?
17:25
Speaker 2: And just not wear underwear and pick up that pen
17:28
Speaker 2: that I threw over there.
17:30
Speaker 7: Whatever.
17:30
Speaker 4: What?
17:31
Speaker 1: But that's what his pitch was. The whole pitch during
17:33
Speaker 1: this time was that Jesus was a rebel. These type
17:35
Speaker 1: of people would later on become known as Jesus Freaks.
17:38
Speaker 1: And also, Elton John has lyrics saying Jesus Freaks in
17:41
Speaker 1: the song Tiny Dancer, which is fun. But David Berg's
17:45
Speaker 1: whole plan was to build up their confidence and to
17:48
Speaker 1: be independent religious rebels. Meanwhile, he was under their watch
17:53
Speaker 1: and we're gonna be under him soon. And unlike many
17:56
Speaker 1: other cult leaders who essentially claimed they were God themselves,
18:00
Speaker 1: David Berg only claimed that he was a prophet of God.
18:03
Speaker 1: Like Moses. You know, the guy that did the stick
18:06
Speaker 1: and the... that thing? So it was easier to convince
18:12
Speaker 1: people that he was merely a follower or a messenger
18:15
Speaker 1: of God and not God himself. Not the idol to
18:19
Speaker 1: which they were praising, essentially. But how nice would that be,
18:22
Speaker 1: you know? Just blaming all of your problems on just
18:25
Speaker 1: this being and not taking any blame for it. Like,
18:28
Speaker 1: I could just see him.
18:29
Speaker 4: Like, Listen. Melanie, I don't want you to give me
18:32
Speaker 4: a lap dance naked, okay? And I don't want to
18:35
Speaker 4: lick whipped cream off of your bosom. But the guy upstairs,
18:38
Speaker 4: I talked to him, and he's not budging, all right?
18:40
Speaker 4: He said that we got to do this, and I
18:43
Speaker 4: don't know what to tell you, all right?
18:46
Speaker 6: Let's get to it.
18:47
Speaker 1: So David had established this group and it was rapidly growing.
18:50
Speaker 1: Even the newspapers took notice and they would actually give
18:53
Speaker 1: them the name the Children of God. And at this
18:55
Speaker 1: point the church itself was pretty much asexual. David Berg
18:59
Speaker 1: was preaching purity and only really protesting against causes and
19:04
Speaker 1: focusing a lot on God. Basically like it was like
19:06
Speaker 1: pretty normal church to begin with. Meanwhile, behind the scenes,
19:10
Speaker 1: he was doing horrible things to his own kids and family.
19:13
Speaker 1: He wanted to reel these people in and make them
19:16
Speaker 1: feel safe and secure because they hadn't for so long
19:19
Speaker 1: during that early 60s era, being so freebird. So he
19:22
Speaker 1: basically was just trying to gain their trust and make
19:24
Speaker 1: them feel safe and comfortable, all to make them eventually
19:27
Speaker 1: bow down and give in to every sick request and
19:31
Speaker 1: sermon he would preach down the line. So in 1969,
19:35
Speaker 1: David Byrd began making his first prophecies. The first of
19:38
Speaker 1: which was that the whole of California was gonna get
19:41
Speaker 1: sucked in by a giant earthquake, which is pretty believable.
19:44
Speaker 1: I think that's pretty good. Some guys are saying like, oh,
19:47
Speaker 1: spaceship's gonna come and take us all up, but he
19:49
Speaker 1: actually went with a practical route because I feel like
19:51
Speaker 1: that might happen in California. Like a lot of call leaders,
19:53
Speaker 1: David Berg was using a fear tactic to split all
19:56
Speaker 1: these people up from anything they knew. If they had
19:59
Speaker 1: family or if they were questioning themselves in the church,
20:01
Speaker 1: he wanted to pick them up and move them so
20:03
Speaker 1: they didn't have time to think about anything. He did
20:05
Speaker 1: this by using Armageddon as a fear tactic. So he
20:09
Speaker 1: picked up the now 50 members of the Children of
20:12
Speaker 1: God and left California. But he also left a few
20:15
Speaker 1: behind just in case the earthquake didn't happen. And can
20:18
Speaker 1: you imagine being the people that left behind? Like he's
20:20
Speaker 1: just like, all right, everybody, get out. The earthquake's coming.
20:23
Speaker 1: And you guys, you stay here just in case it doesn't.
20:26
Speaker 1: Probably will, but it might not. So you just stay here.
20:29
Speaker 2: We're going to go.
20:29
Speaker 1: You got this, Caroline.
20:30
Speaker 4: You got it.
20:31
Speaker 1: Let it go.
20:31
Speaker 2: All right, bye! But he did this as a master
20:34
Speaker 2: plan to start spreading this cult around the world. He
20:37
Speaker 2: would do this.
20:37
Speaker 1: He would go to different places, drop off people, and
20:39
Speaker 1: go to another place, repopulate, drop off people, and it
20:42
Speaker 1: would become.
20:43
Speaker 2: A worldwide cult, but we'll get to that.
20:45
Speaker 1: So Berg went to Arizona with around 50 people, and
20:48
Speaker 1: it was here that he formed his 12 groups that
20:50
Speaker 1: were modeled after the 12 tribes of Israel and the
20:52
Speaker 1: children of God. And thus began the recruitment of hot women, basically.
20:57
Speaker 1: David Berg's whole strategy was to get attractive women, for
21:00
Speaker 1: the most part, and go out and fish for new recruits.
21:03
Speaker 1: And this would be called flirty fishing, we'll get into
21:05
Speaker 1: that a little bit later in the video, but it worked.
21:08
Speaker 2: Pretty damn well.
21:09
Speaker 1: And the irony is that his wife, Jane Miller, was
21:12
Speaker 1: one of the flirty fishers, and she would later pick
21:14
Speaker 1: up an attractive woman named Karen Zerbe, who's a piece
21:18
Speaker 1: of shit bitch, we'll talk about her later, but anyway,
21:21
Speaker 1: Karen would end up being David Berg's new wife. So
21:24
Speaker 1: Jane basically picked up David's new wife and she just
21:27
Speaker 1: got tossed out, basically. Which I think is absolutely savage
21:31
Speaker 1: and like just a little bit funny. I'm sorry, I
21:33
Speaker 1: need to put my glasses on. I'm starting to get
21:34
Speaker 1: a headache and I need to start wearing these more
21:37
Speaker 1: because I can't see. But before David Berg would ship
21:41
Speaker 1: off Jane, his old wife, he would convince Jane and
21:44
Speaker 1: Karen that the only thing to make things work would
21:46
Speaker 1: be Polygamy. And for those of you who don't know
21:48
Speaker 1: what polygamy is, this is what it is. But basically,
21:51
Speaker 1: it's allowing a man to have multiple wives. Or vice versa,
21:55
Speaker 1: I believe.
21:55
Speaker 2: I might be wrong. The description's right here.
21:57
Speaker 1: But anyway, how convenient for David.
21:59
Speaker 4: Again, he's just like, Well, I don't know, Karen and Jane.
22:03
Speaker 4: The guy upstairs, I don't want to have multiple wives.
22:06
Speaker 4: That's crazy. I definitely don't want multiple women doting on
22:09
Speaker 4: me all the time. But the guy upstairs just isn't budging, alright?
22:12
Speaker 7: So....
22:14
Speaker 4: Let's get it on.
22:15
Speaker 1: So later that year, David Berg would take his wives, children,
22:18
Speaker 1: and the now a hundred cult members and go to Quebec,
22:22
Speaker 1: a gathering that would now be seen as the founding
22:24
Speaker 1: convention of the children of God. So now they're going international, baby.
22:28
Speaker 4: All right.
22:28
Speaker 1: They're going pit bull with this thing. Mr. Worldwide.
22:31
Speaker 7: Sorry.
22:32
Speaker 1: But yeah, this is when they start to take the
22:33
Speaker 1: children of God international. And this is also when David
22:36
Speaker 1: would declare himself as Moses, calling himself Moses David. And
22:40
Speaker 1: that would later be shortened to the name Mo, which
22:43
Speaker 1: is so And this is when he began to convince
22:45
Speaker 1: his cult members even more that Armageddon was happening. And
22:49
Speaker 1: the only way to survive this Armageddon was to be
22:52
Speaker 1: a part of the cult. And he would preach that
22:55
Speaker 1: there were only 144,000 spots in heaven. And the only
22:59
Speaker 1: way to get those spots to go to heaven was
23:02
Speaker 1: to be part of the cult. But there's a little kicker.
23:04
Speaker 1: If there ended up being more than 144,000 members at
23:06
Speaker 1: some point, he said, Don't worry.
23:09
Speaker 7: If you're part of the cult and 144,000 positions are taken,
23:13
Speaker 7: you can pray an innocent person out of heaven and
23:16
Speaker 7: just steal their spot. Only if you're in the cult.
23:19
Speaker 1: So basically this guy's like, all right, there's a roller
23:21
Speaker 1: coaster to heaven. The park's about to shut down and
23:24
Speaker 1: you're almost at the gate, but the guy closes it
23:26
Speaker 1: right away. And he says, no, sorry, we're full. But
23:29
Speaker 1: David's like, if you're in the cult, you could say,
23:31
Speaker 1: get one of those motherfuckers out of the roller coaster.
23:33
Speaker 1: And one of them just gets ejected into oblivion. And
23:35
Speaker 1: then the guy with the gates just like, oh shit.
23:38
Speaker 2: All right, go ahead.
23:39
Speaker 1: Pretty baller. It's so ridiculous.
23:41
Speaker 2: I can't.
23:41
Speaker 1: Anyway, and the cherry on the cake was that if
23:43
Speaker 1: you join the cult, you get to sign a contract
23:45
Speaker 1: called the Revolutionary Contract, where you basically gave up all
23:49
Speaker 1: of your possessions and forfeited all your assets. And that's
23:52
Speaker 1: how the church made money and paid for trips and
23:55
Speaker 1: paid for everything that they had, basically. So it was
23:58
Speaker 1: a big communism cult. After gaining more members and more momentum,
24:02
Speaker 1: in 1970, he would take 200 members from the cult
24:05
Speaker 1: and move to Texas.
24:06
Speaker 2: Because everything good happens in Texas, right? So many terrible
24:10
Speaker 2: things happen in Texas.
24:11
Speaker 1: But anyway, they'd go to the Texas Soul Clinic, which
24:14
Speaker 1: was basically a ghost town in Texas that they filled.
24:16
Speaker 1: And here, any new members, new members being called Babe,
24:20
Speaker 1: would get new names when they enter the cult, usually
24:22
Speaker 1: coming from the Old Testament. And like in Quebec, everyone
24:25
Speaker 1: was split up into 12 groups. and were also assigned
24:28
Speaker 1: work assignments. But the point of these 12 groups really
24:31
Speaker 1: was just to separate everybody and the work assignments was
24:34
Speaker 1: just to get work done in the commune. Those work
24:36
Speaker 1: assignments including maintenance, cooks, livestock, etc. But none of these
24:40
Speaker 1: groups were actually able to take advantage of what they curated.
24:43
Speaker 1: All the good food and everything good that they procured
24:46
Speaker 1: went to the inner circle or the top of the
24:49
Speaker 1: food chain like David's family and then the rest of
24:51
Speaker 1: them would just get like scraps even animal feed they
24:54
Speaker 1: would have to eat, and not one person was allowed
24:57
Speaker 1: to be alone basically at any time. Everybody was assigned
25:00
Speaker 1: a buddy, even to go to the bathroom, And a
25:04
Speaker 1: torturous ambiance was constantly playing just like Jim Jones, which
25:07
Speaker 1: if you want me to talk about that, let me
25:09
Speaker 1: know in the comments below. But like Jim Jones, he
25:11
Speaker 1: would play Bible verses on speakers constantly throughout the day
25:15
Speaker 1: so people didn't have time to think. And these Bible
25:18
Speaker 1: verses were also ones of which they were expected to memorize,
25:21
Speaker 1: which was over 300. I can't even remember a phone number,
25:25
Speaker 1: let alone 300 Bible verses. But the whole point behind
25:28
Speaker 1: this was so people didn't have time to think about
25:31
Speaker 1: their shitty lives in this cult, basically. Because if you're
25:33
Speaker 1: memorizing Bible verses, you can't think about your shitty life.
25:36
Speaker 1: So everything in the Children of God cult was communal,
25:39
Speaker 1: even down to shoes. And it's like, I just kind
25:42
Speaker 1: of imagine like an old guy going up to David
25:44
Speaker 1: just like... Hey, uh, David, so I got these new
25:46
Speaker 1: work boots and, um, I can't, I can't seem to
25:49
Speaker 1: find them. Somebody took them. And, and I just, I
25:51
Speaker 1: just cannot tend the fields in these size six woman
25:54
Speaker 1: Louis Vuitton stilettos. They do make my ass look fantastic
25:58
Speaker 1: in life. Like I'm carrying a shelf, but I, it's
26:00
Speaker 1: just not practical. Like everything was shared. Nobody had a possession,
26:04
Speaker 1: but the only possession you could have was a Bible.
26:07
Speaker 2: Of course.
26:08
Speaker 1: So it all sounds really terrible and inhumane, and it
26:12
Speaker 1: makes no sense for us looking in. But at the time,
26:15
Speaker 1: all these people were so brainwashed, thinking that the world
26:17
Speaker 1: was going to end, and the only way that they
26:19
Speaker 1: could get into heaven was to continue to practice what
26:22
Speaker 1: they were practicing. So it's really just sad. And this
26:25
Speaker 1: is before it even gets terrible, you know? It's already terrible,
26:29
Speaker 1: but it gets.
26:30
Speaker 2: Way worse.
26:31
Speaker 1: At this time also there were several members who were
26:33
Speaker 1: actually going to be famous including Joaquin and River Phoenix
26:37
Speaker 1: and also Rose McGowan and also a member from Fleetwood
26:40
Speaker 1: Mac Jeremy Spencer would join in 1971 leaving the band
26:43
Speaker 1: which why the fuck would you leave one of the
26:46
Speaker 1: most famous bands to be a slave to a sex cult?
26:48
Speaker 1: I will never know.
26:49
Speaker 2: But anyway, I digress.
26:50
Speaker 1: But it just goes to show the impact that David
26:52
Speaker 1: Berg had on these people. And this is around the
26:54
Speaker 1: time when David Berg would start preaching that you need
26:58
Speaker 1: to save sex for marriage. You wouldn't even be allowed
27:00
Speaker 1: to hold hands, let alone kiss anybody before marriage. Meanwhile,
27:04
Speaker 1: he's having sex with all of his family members in
27:07
Speaker 1: his house and not keeping it a secret. He was
27:09
Speaker 1: making the people under him feel okay and safe and
27:13
Speaker 1: pure still, but he was practicing this on the side
27:15
Speaker 1: so they would see it and be like, oh, okay,
27:17
Speaker 1: so that's normal. And then he would just slowly trickle
27:21
Speaker 1: in his practices into the rest of the cult. But
27:23
Speaker 1: right now, he's preaching purity. And some of the things
27:25
Speaker 1: David Berg used to do with his family was sharing parties,
27:29
Speaker 1: which is where he would gather his family into one room,
27:32
Speaker 1: strip naked into his loose, saggy, decrepit nude form, and
27:37
Speaker 1: make his son's and daughters and their spouses all have
27:41
Speaker 1: sex together.
27:42
Speaker 2: Well, he watched, which is just so terrible and awful.
27:46
Speaker 2: And I can't even imagine, but.
27:48
Speaker 1: David was just a giant. So every sexual practice that
27:51
Speaker 1: Berg would eventually teach to his whole congregation was practiced
27:56
Speaker 1: beforehand with his family. For another example, Berg used to
28:00
Speaker 1: pin his sons against each other and ask them if
28:02
Speaker 1: he could sleep with their wives. And if one of
28:04
Speaker 1: them refused, which is normal, he would demote him in
28:08
Speaker 1: the inner circle or have him go out of the
28:10
Speaker 1: inner circle. And if the other one would let him
28:12
Speaker 1: sleep with his wife, then he would promote him. So
28:14
Speaker 1: the other one was forced to let David sleep with
28:17
Speaker 1: his wife so he would get promoted. So basically, they
28:20
Speaker 1: didn't want Berg sleeping with their wives, but he didn't
28:23
Speaker 1: really give them a choice, which is terrible. Can you imagine?
28:26
Speaker 1: I don't even want to... Anyway, and this is when
28:28
Speaker 1: Berg would eventually ship Jane Miller, his first wife, his
28:31
Speaker 1: old wine wife, as he'd call her, off into one
28:34
Speaker 1: of the other communes around the world, and he would
28:37
Speaker 1: keep his new wine wife, Karen Zerbe, with him, and
28:40
Speaker 1: she would become the queen of the children of God.
28:43
Speaker 1: And this was also around the time where Berg would
28:45
Speaker 1: start writing his infamous Moe letters, which were just a
28:49
Speaker 1: series of rambling newsletters that Moe slash Berg wrote himself.
28:53
Speaker 1: This is an excerpt from one of the letters that
28:56
Speaker 1: he wrote, and he would just send them out to
28:57
Speaker 1: the entire cult for them to read.
28:59
Speaker 2: One of them said, If you take a look at
29:01
Speaker 2: the Bible's history, you will make the shocking discovery that
29:04
Speaker 2: most of God's greats had oodles of wives, women, mistresses,
29:09
Speaker 2: and harlots, and what have you. So they were fun.
29:13
Speaker 2: It eventually started to become comic books, too. He started
29:15
Speaker 2: to draw. We'll put up some of them here.
29:17
Speaker 1: So polygamy was only the first step in the children
29:20
Speaker 1: of God becoming a full-on... cult. But while this was
29:22
Speaker 1: going on, there was another group forming that were determined
29:25
Speaker 1: to put an end to the children of God. And
29:28
Speaker 1: they called themselves Free Our Children from the Children of God.
29:33
Speaker 1: Which like the name, you know, good for you, but
29:37
Speaker 1: the name is so just nail on the head, you know.
29:39
Speaker 2: I just picture a couple of moms that made the
29:41
Speaker 2: group that are just like.
29:42
Speaker 3: Okay so me and debbie were just really putting our
29:45
Speaker 3: heads together just trying to think how we're gonna free
29:47
Speaker 3: our children from the children of god cult and we
29:50
Speaker 3: just thought we just thought the name should be something
29:52
Speaker 3: that explains that so we were thinking that it would
29:55
Speaker 3: be free our children from the children of god what
29:57
Speaker 3: do you think.
29:58
Speaker 2: And the guy in charge is just like, it's good.
30:01
Speaker 2: Maybe we'll try to get some other requests. I'm not sure.
30:04
Speaker 1: And she's just like, I'm the.
30:05
Speaker 3: One that brought the cookies and juice in the back.
30:08
Speaker 1: And he's just like, all right, free our children from
30:10
Speaker 1: the children of God it is. And this is also
30:11
Speaker 1: when Ted Patrick, a.k.a. Black Lightning, what a name, came
30:15
Speaker 1: into the picture as well. Now, Ted was a deprogrammer. Basically,
30:19
Speaker 1: he would... kidnap people from cults and deprogram them, sometimes
30:24
Speaker 1: making them even worse in the process. But the whole
30:26
Speaker 1: point of it was to take them from the cult,
30:28
Speaker 1: deprogram them, and give them back to their families. Was
30:31
Speaker 1: it illegal?
30:32
Speaker 3: Yes.
30:32
Speaker 1: But was it baller?
30:34
Speaker 2: A little bit.
30:35
Speaker 1: So he would go around trying to kidnap members of
30:37
Speaker 1: the Children of God and deprogram them as best he could.
30:40
Speaker 1: But eventually Black Lightning, unfortunately, would be put in jail
30:44
Speaker 1: for kidnapping, unfortunately. But I say, you know, give him
30:47
Speaker 1: a Nobel Peace Prize or like a Grammy or something.
30:49
Speaker 1: I know it was illegal, but he meant well. And
30:52
Speaker 1: also Black Lightning, what a name.
30:54
Speaker 2: That's awesome.
30:55
Speaker 1: So Berg would continue to write these Moe letters and
30:58
Speaker 1: in 1972 would convince his followers that these letters were
31:01
Speaker 1: basically now the voice of God that he was writing
31:04
Speaker 1: through him. And it would become the only way he
31:06
Speaker 1: would communicate with the lower circle. And the only way
31:09
Speaker 1: you could really see David Berg face to face is
31:12
Speaker 1: if he wanted to have sex with you, unfortunately. So just, like,
31:16
Speaker 1: don't see him, you know? There was a lot of
31:18
Speaker 1: members of this cult that actually never really saw David Berg,
31:20
Speaker 1: and they were kind of fine. Like, there wasn't anything
31:23
Speaker 1: that bad going on, but I digress. There was a
31:26
Speaker 1: lot bad going on. But anyway. But in these letters,
31:28
Speaker 1: he would promote things like polygamy. So this is when
31:31
Speaker 1: he started to really start.
31:33
Speaker 2: To ramp up the.
31:35
Speaker 1: Sexual innuendos and sexual preaching in these Moe letters. He
31:38
Speaker 1: would start to preach that people should be practicing polygamy,
31:42
Speaker 1: that they should be doing public.
31:46
Speaker 1: Wives swapping.
31:47
Speaker 2: And mo and mole. Sorry.
31:49
Speaker 1: Until these letters basically just became smut. And he would
31:52
Speaker 1: do things like use girls' periods as an indication as
31:55
Speaker 1: to when you should be allowed to sleep with them.
31:57
Speaker 7: He'd say, quote-unquote, Then why did God make girls able
32:00
Speaker 7: to conceive and bear children at such a young age,
32:03
Speaker 7: if it is wrong for them to marry at such
32:06
Speaker 7: an age? God made children desirable and able to have
32:09
Speaker 7: intercourse and bear children at those ages.
32:12
Speaker 2: What? Sky is flying.
32:14
Speaker 1: Just disgusting. So he's basically just preaching justification for PDF-elia
32:20
Speaker 1: to his people on a regular basis and just feeling
32:23
Speaker 1: it out, basically. And the only sexual activity that he
32:26
Speaker 1: didn't preach or preached against was homosexuality and pulling out.
32:30
Speaker 1: So he's like, you can sleep with kids and leave
32:33
Speaker 1: it in, but don't you dare sleep with a consensually
32:36
Speaker 1: accepting adult of the same gender, you sick piece of shit.
32:40
Speaker 1: But lesbian's totally fine! He's totally cool with lesbians, by
32:44
Speaker 1: the way.
32:44
Speaker 2: So you can just see how- how incredibly just sick
32:47
Speaker 2: and perverted this guy is. It just- gets worse.
32:52
Speaker 1: So David's motel letters would just get more and more
32:54
Speaker 1: graphic as time continued, and they would just eventually become
32:57
Speaker 1: excerpts of how he had sex, like almost like descriptions
33:00
Speaker 1: or instructions on how to have sex, like David Burke,
33:03
Speaker 1: the prophet Moses. He'd also talk about his preferences in
33:07
Speaker 1: women and girls, and how he would like them trimmed
33:11
Speaker 1: and bathed beforehand, and it's just... Gross. So naturally he
33:15
Speaker 1: would have a lot of followers be like, this is
33:17
Speaker 1: not what I signed up for. And to any of
33:20
Speaker 1: those people that were against anything that he was doing,
33:23
Speaker 1: he just purged them. He just said, get out. We're
33:25
Speaker 1: having fun here and you're lame.
33:27
Speaker 4: Get out.
33:28
Speaker 1: Now, eventually David would become sick and old and weak
33:31
Speaker 1: because he's a sick old weak.
33:34
Speaker 4: Sorry.
33:34
Speaker 1: And his wife, Karen Zerbe, would take over writing the
33:37
Speaker 1: Moe letters. And in one of them, she would write that, quote-unquote,
33:40
Speaker 1: So she was.
33:41
Speaker 3: Demanding that everybody in the upper and lower circle, if
33:43
Speaker 3: having intercourse, was to imagine Jesus.
33:46
Speaker 1: And if you didn't, you're... You're going against what they
33:58
Speaker 1: believe in. I don't, I don't even understand how you would,
34:01
Speaker 1: how you would regulate that. Like, what is she just
34:03
Speaker 1: going up to houses and just busting down the door
34:05
Speaker 1: while people are sleeping together?
34:07
Speaker 2: And she's like, hey, are you thinking about Jesus Christ?
34:09
Speaker 1: And they're just like, Jesus Christ.
34:10
Speaker 2: And she's just like.
34:12
Speaker 1: It's so weird. It's so weird. And to help their
34:15
Speaker 1: followers out, Karen would give them phrases to say during copulation,
34:20
Speaker 1: such as, but not limited.
34:21
Speaker 2: To, I want you inside of me.
34:23
Speaker 7: Give me your seeds.
34:25
Speaker 1: I want to woo you, Jesus.
34:27
Speaker 2: And to be wooed by you, I'm getting really horny
34:30
Speaker 2: for you, Jesus. Jesus Christ.
34:32
Speaker 1: There are so many more, dozens even. If you would
34:36
Speaker 1: like to read them, you can look them up on
34:38
Speaker 1: the internet. I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna say anymore
34:40
Speaker 1: because I already feel physically ill from saying that. But yeah,
34:43
Speaker 1: if you want to look up the Moe Letters, it's
34:44
Speaker 1: the Moe Letters under Cool Tips for Hot- X. I
34:47
Speaker 1: shit you not, that's what it's called. So by 1973,
34:50
Speaker 1: the Children of God had 2,400 full members and 140
34:55
Speaker 1: colonies in 40 different countries at this point.
34:58
Speaker 2: So they are.
34:59
Speaker 1: Spreading like a f * * * ing virus. But
35:01
Speaker 1: lo and behold, tragedy would strike in 1973 and one
35:06
Speaker 1: of David's sons, Aaron, would take his own life. He
35:09
Speaker 1: would walk up to the edge of a mountain and
35:11
Speaker 1: jump off a cliff. And the reasoning for this was
35:14
Speaker 1: most likely because he was just, just horrified with the
35:19
Speaker 1: life he's been living. You know, he's raised by this
35:21
Speaker 1: man who's having intercourse with his wife and children, and
35:25
Speaker 1: he just couldn't take it anymore. So he took his
35:27
Speaker 1: own life. And this was a very common practice in
35:29
Speaker 1: the cult of the children of God. A lot of
35:31
Speaker 1: people were taking their lives. If they left, they just
35:33
Speaker 1: couldn't live with themselves. And not shockingly, I guess, David
35:37
Speaker 1: Berg wasn't even really affected by this. He was so
35:40
Speaker 1: transfixed in this cult, almost immediately after this, he would
35:45
Speaker 1: begin a new recruitment process in which was called flirty fishing.
35:49
Speaker 1: And it was a tactic to get more members in
35:52
Speaker 1: because a lot of people were leaving or, you know,
35:54
Speaker 1: offing themselves because they didn't want to be there. So
35:56
Speaker 1: he was just trying to get more and more people
35:58
Speaker 1: in the cult. So flirty fishing was a form of
36:01
Speaker 1: religious prostitution. Based on Matthew chapter 4, verse 19.
36:05
Speaker 2: Follow me and I will make you a fisher of men.
36:09
Speaker 5: Dad got the terminology from fishing, what Jesus said in
36:12
Speaker 5: the Bible, to go out and fish for men. And
36:15
Speaker 5: so she was going to use the women to fish
36:18
Speaker 5: for the men, to bring the men to the kingdom
36:21
Speaker 5: of God through flirting. Only the flirting was more than flirting.
36:27
Speaker 5: It was actually, you know, religious prostitution.
36:29
Speaker 1: So these women would basically be hookers for Jesus. And
36:32
Speaker 1: I'm not just saying that, they actually had posters that
36:35
Speaker 1: said that. And their job was to basically go into
36:37
Speaker 1: the world and sleep with and recruit members to join
36:40
Speaker 1: the children of God. sometimes even getting impregnated by people.
36:44
Speaker 1: So that would force them to come in and then
36:46
Speaker 1: make new members for the children of God as well.
36:49
Speaker 1: And David would make his followers use this technique very
36:52
Speaker 1: strategically as well. He would make them target people of
36:55
Speaker 1: wealth especially to get money for the cult, including like
36:59
Speaker 1: oil millionaires, military officers, et cetera. It was also at
37:03
Speaker 1: this point when David put a requirement out to his
37:05
Speaker 1: members that they must be having sex with each other,
37:09
Speaker 1: including their own family members and including children, which is
37:13
Speaker 1: just so f * * * ing, ugh. It's just heartbreaking, dude. Now,
37:17
Speaker 1: David Byrd, still not being satisfied enough by only having
37:20
Speaker 1: sex with his family members, would force women, teens, and
37:24
Speaker 1: children to send videos of themselves dancing nude in a
37:28
Speaker 1: series called Glorify God in the Dance.
37:31
Speaker 8: When I was still at this music unit, Byrd sent
37:35
Speaker 8: out a letter called Glorify God.
37:36
Speaker 4: In the Dance.
37:37
Speaker 8: And we read it, and all the women were going
37:39
Speaker 8: to do these dances for Byrd's birthday. And he made
37:42
Speaker 8: a very detailed explanation of what they should do and
37:45
Speaker 8: how it's glorifying God if you disrobe in a very,
37:48
Speaker 8: I guess you'd say, gracious manner. And that's how he
37:52
Speaker 8: presented it, is you're like a heavenly woman who's dancing
37:56
Speaker 8: with veils. So women started making videos for him at
38:00
Speaker 8: his behest, and then someone got the bright idea that
38:03
Speaker 8: let's include the children.
38:04
Speaker 1: So although a lot of people were against these new practices,
38:07
Speaker 1: a lot of people were for it as well. So
38:10
Speaker 1: in 1974, David instituted the R & R, or the
38:13
Speaker 1: Reorganization Revolution, to purge any members who objected to his practices.
38:19
Speaker 1: And in that same year, Jim Jones had committed his
38:21
Speaker 1: mass suicide of over 900 people in Guyana. So there
38:25
Speaker 1: was a lot of public backlash at this point against cults.
38:29
Speaker 1: So David Berg, fearing that they would try to end
38:32
Speaker 1: the cult Children of God, faked disdaining the cult and
38:35
Speaker 1: just changed the name basically to Family of Love, which
38:38
Speaker 1: is just even... More gross somehow. And it was around
38:41
Speaker 1: this time Karen Zerbe, David's new wine wife, had claimed
38:45
Speaker 1: to have slept with over 18 men from one hotel
38:48
Speaker 1: over 137 times.
38:51
Speaker 3: Jesus Christ.
38:52
Speaker 2: Which I'm sure she was thinking about while having sex
38:54
Speaker 2: with them.
38:54
Speaker 1: And can you believe it? She got pregnant with a son.
38:57
Speaker 2: Now.
38:58
Speaker 1: In the book of Revelation, it says in the end times,
39:01
Speaker 1: two prophets of God would merge to battle and defeat
39:05
Speaker 1: the Antichrist. And David Berg believed that Karen was one
39:09
Speaker 1: of these prophets. And he also believed that her unborn child,
39:12
Speaker 1: who was not his child, but some rando... hotel staff member,
39:17
Speaker 1: was also a prophet and the new messiah, essentially. And
39:21
Speaker 1: this child would be known as Little Ricky. Now, Ricky
39:24
Speaker 1: would pretty much have the most documented and heartbreaking story
39:27
Speaker 1: out of this whole thing, because as soon as he
39:30
Speaker 1: was born, his entire life was documented in a book,
39:33
Speaker 1: in a 762-page book. describing all the horrific things that
39:38
Speaker 1: happened to him through being an infant into childhood. And
39:42
Speaker 1: the book to this day is one of the most
39:44
Speaker 1: disturbing cult artifacts to exist. Now this book was made
39:48
Speaker 1: as a guideline for the second generation. The second generation
39:51
Speaker 1: being all the children that were born into the Children
39:55
Speaker 1: of God cult. and how they should be raised. And
39:58
Speaker 1: the 8,000 members of the Children of God at this
40:00
Speaker 1: time would believe that Ricky was the new Messiah from
40:04
Speaker 1: reading this book when it was published in 1983. Like,
40:07
Speaker 1: I want to have some sympathy for these cult members,
40:10
Speaker 1: but at this point, you're just dumb and stupid and
40:13
Speaker 1: gross and a piece of shit if you're a part
40:16
Speaker 1: of this, okay? Because you know what you're doing is wrong.
40:17
Speaker 1: But I do have the utmost sympathy for all of
40:20
Speaker 1: these children born into this cult. And I think anybody
40:22
Speaker 1: that did anything to these kids should just be just.
40:26
Speaker 2: Beat down into the pits of hell.
40:28
Speaker 1: So Ricky, otherwise referred to as the Brown Prince, was
40:32
Speaker 1: used as an example of how the perfect child of
40:35
Speaker 1: God should be raised. And since his mother, Karen Zerbe,
40:39
Speaker 1: the bitch, was too busy doing other cult activities, he
40:42
Speaker 1: was raised by two of Berg's right-hand women, aka Elite
40:47
Speaker 1: Flirty Fishers, aka Sick F- Sarah Kelly and Angela Smith,
40:52
Speaker 1: and also Suzanne down the line. Sarah, for example, offered
40:56
Speaker 1: her seven-year-old daughter to Berg for sexual activities of his
41:00
Speaker 1: choosing without even blinking an eye. And she began practicing
41:05
Speaker 1: sexual acts on Ricky when he was only 17 months old.
41:10
Speaker 8: You're a piece of fucking shit.
41:12
Speaker 2: I fucking hate you.
41:13
Speaker 1: So honestly, there are a plethora of incredibly disturbing excerpts
41:18
Speaker 1: from this book in relation to Ricky growing up and getting...
41:22
Speaker 1: and abused as a baby and.
41:23
Speaker 2: As a child.
41:24
Speaker 1: And I'm choosing not to say a lot or most
41:28
Speaker 1: of these excerpts from the books, the story of David
41:30
Speaker 1: Ito in here, because it's, it's just, it's honestly too
41:33
Speaker 1: difficult to talk about and it's sick and disgusting and
41:36
Speaker 1: it just, it breaks my heart. Sorry, I'm trying to
41:38
Speaker 1: keep it light, but like, people are sick, you know?
41:41
Speaker 1: If you would like to research more and find out
41:44
Speaker 1: more about this, you can, you can look at the
41:46
Speaker 1: story of David Ito, but just All the trigger warnings
41:49
Speaker 1: tread carefully with that. So obviously Ricky was born into
41:52
Speaker 1: and had lived a life of abuse and trauma from
41:54
Speaker 1: a very early and young age and then unfortunately only continued.
41:57
Speaker 1: For example, he would be forced to have a girlfriend
42:00
Speaker 1: at the age of 12, a girlfriend of which was
42:02
Speaker 1: much older than him, almost in her 30s, and be
42:05
Speaker 1: forced to commit sexual acts with each other as well.
42:08
Speaker 1: And his mother would force him to have sex with
42:11
Speaker 1: him again.
42:12
Speaker 4: As well.
42:12
Speaker 2: This is Karen Zerbe.
42:14
Speaker 1: But in 1986, with immense pressure from the public and
42:17
Speaker 1: the tabloids, David Berg had to ban sexual activities between
42:22
Speaker 1: adults and children in the cult.
42:24
Speaker 2: Boo f * * * ing hoo.
42:25
Speaker 1: Good. And not that it did actually stop, but a
42:28
Speaker 1: lot of it did because he was told he had
42:30
Speaker 1: to ban it. And in 1887, flirty fishing was called
42:34
Speaker 1: off as well. But this was.
42:35
Speaker 2: Mostly because of the AIDS crisis that was happening.
42:38
Speaker 1: David Berg didn't want any new members coming in or
42:40
Speaker 1: spreading AIDS amongst the cult. So it was essentially just
42:44
Speaker 1: to keep his cult healthy and clean and pure as if.
42:48
Speaker 1: So during this time, although David Berg called off all
42:51
Speaker 1: sexual activity between adults and children, the abuse did not
42:54
Speaker 1: stop under David Berg's roof. He would continue to abuse
42:58
Speaker 1: and have sex with every woman and child in his family,
43:01
Speaker 1: including the daughter Mary Berg of the man that took
43:04
Speaker 1: his life jumping off the cliff, Aaron Berg, so David
43:07
Speaker 1: Berg's granddaughter. Berg would also make Ricky, his grandson, have
43:11
Speaker 1: sexual relations with Mary Berg, his granddaughter, in hopes that
43:16
Speaker 1: they would one day carry on his bloodline. So Karen,
43:19
Speaker 1: being the sick that she is, was jealous of Mary,
43:23
Speaker 1: her granddaughter, that she may possibly become the new queen
43:26
Speaker 1: of the god of children because she was having relations
43:29
Speaker 1: with her husband and grandfather, David Berg. So she sent
43:33
Speaker 1: Mary off to the Philippines to one of the teen
43:36
Speaker 1: training camps. which is basically where they put teens that
43:40
Speaker 1: would be rebellious against the cult. And Mary was put
43:43
Speaker 1: through six straight months of just abuse and being beaten.
43:48
Speaker 1: And she was tied to a bed for six months
43:50
Speaker 1: in this one room. And she would also go through
43:52
Speaker 1: multiple exorcists.
43:54
Speaker 6: And man, I started thinking, wow, how could I do it? Well,
43:57
Speaker 6: I wasn't the oldest. I was the oldest for a
43:59
Speaker 6: long time. But of course, at teen training, there was
44:02
Speaker 6: a bunch of girls there that were older than i
44:05
Speaker 6: was but you know let me tell you this is
44:09
Speaker 6: not something that you talked about with people anybody or
44:12
Speaker 6: you know are you gonna turn into a mean case
44:15
Speaker 6: they beat the devil out of you or whatever it's
44:18
Speaker 6: just insane.
44:20
Speaker 5: And my sister has such a fucked up time in
44:22
Speaker 5: team training.
44:24
Speaker 6: She's a six-year-old for god's sake animals i hate those
44:28
Speaker 6: they're gonna.
44:32
Speaker 1: So Ricky and Mary would undergo years and years of abuse,
44:35
Speaker 1: and would unfortunately, or unfortunately, only have one of their
44:39
Speaker 1: abusers pay for the criminal.
44:41
Speaker 2: Acts that they committed.
44:42
Speaker 1: And that was a woman named Susan Joy Counten. And
44:44
Speaker 1: the one to give out that punishment would be Ricky himself.
44:48
Speaker 1: Which is kind of f * * * ing baller. Like,
44:49
Speaker 1: I don't agree with murder, but... So David Berg, thank
44:53
Speaker 1: the Lord, would pass away of old age in 1994
44:58
Speaker 1: at the age of 74. I wish there was a better.
45:01
Speaker 2: Way he died, but he just.
45:04
Speaker 1: Flailed off like a flaccid Anyway, but I pray that
45:08
Speaker 1: he is just burning in hell and Satan is torturing
45:11
Speaker 1: him himself. But anyway, this left Karen Zerbe to be
45:14
Speaker 1: the leader of the children of God. And now Ricky
45:17
Speaker 1: being an adult, telling people of the public what happened
45:21
Speaker 1: to him as a kid and realizing that it was
45:23
Speaker 1: not remotely normal, not that he thought it was ever normal.
45:26
Speaker 1: He always knew even just growing up in the cult
45:28
Speaker 1: that there was something wrong, but now getting the outside
45:31
Speaker 1: perspectives from people saying, That's incredibly fucked up. You should
45:35
Speaker 1: do something about it. Ricky rightfully left the cult. But
45:38
Speaker 1: it was extremely tough for these kids that did leave
45:40
Speaker 1: the cult because a lot of them did. They would
45:42
Speaker 1: go out and a lot of them would end up
45:44
Speaker 1: ending their lives or becoming addicted to drugs or just
45:47
Speaker 1: not knowing how to live out in life because they
45:50
Speaker 1: were living in this like communism communal... cult, weird shit,
45:54
Speaker 1: so like going out into the real world was just
45:57
Speaker 1: too much for a lot of them. And that did
45:59
Speaker 1: include Ricky, including the looming memories of what happened to
46:02
Speaker 1: him and the kids in the cult, and the fact
46:04
Speaker 1: that it was still happening just haunted Ricky. And Ricky,
46:07
Speaker 1: being absolutely terrified to go to any sort of authorities,
46:10
Speaker 1: realized that he needed to take things into his own
46:13
Speaker 1: hands and cut the head off the beast and kill
46:16
Speaker 1: his mother, Karen Zerbe.
46:18
Speaker 2: And now, goddamn, I can f * * * ing
46:20
Speaker 2: shave at this f * * * ing place.
46:23
Speaker 5: So, one shot, one kill.
46:25
Speaker 2: Well, hopefully.
46:29
Speaker 6: Anyway, we'll see about that.
46:30
Speaker 1: So Ricky, knowing that one of the former members of
46:33
Speaker 1: the cult, Susan, who we just talked about, and also
46:36
Speaker 1: one of his worst abusers, was still in contact with
46:39
Speaker 1: his mother, Karen. Which at this point, no one knew
46:41
Speaker 1: where Karen was. So his plan was to invite Susan
46:43
Speaker 1: to a charity event where he could talk to her
46:45
Speaker 1: about possibly re-entering the cult.
46:48
Speaker 2: Or that was his plan.
46:49
Speaker 1: That wasn't actually what he wanted to do, but that
46:50
Speaker 1: was his plan to get her to come. And then
46:52
Speaker 1: on top of that, he was going to get her
46:54
Speaker 1: to come back to his apartment and then get the
46:56
Speaker 1: location of Karen Zerbe out of her with any means necessary.
47:00
Speaker 1: And this whole plan was shown on an over an
47:02
Speaker 1: hour video of him in the place where the charity
47:05
Speaker 1: event was going to take place, of him just talking
47:07
Speaker 1: to the camera, loading a gun, and basically just saying
47:10
Speaker 1: everything that's on his mind and how he's going to
47:12
Speaker 1: dismantle the cult. I would highly recommend going to watch
47:15
Speaker 1: this video. I'll try to link it down below. It's just...
47:18
Speaker 1: incredibly sad to watch. For growing up in the situation
47:22
Speaker 1: that he did, he's such an empathetic man at this point,
47:25
Speaker 1: young man, and you can just tell that he just
47:27
Speaker 1: wants to help people and to just dismantle this disgusting cult.
47:33
Speaker 1: Not that murdering anybody is the right thing to do
47:35
Speaker 1: at all, but it's a pretty heartbreaking video to watch,
47:38
Speaker 1: but I would highly recommend it because I can't show
47:40
Speaker 1: it all here. I'll show you some clips though. And
47:41
Speaker 1: the reason why he did film this video was so
47:44
Speaker 1: that when he did kill Karen Zerbe, he could show
47:47
Speaker 1: this video to the members of the cult so they
47:49
Speaker 1: would know what actually happened behind the scenes, because a
47:51
Speaker 1: lot of them were oblivious. So his plan, like I said,
47:54
Speaker 1: was to take Susan back to his apartment and extract
47:57
Speaker 1: the location of Karen Zerbe from her. while holding Susan hostage.
48:01
Speaker 1: So he actually did so, but in the midst of
48:04
Speaker 1: executing his plan, he was explaining to Susan why he
48:07
Speaker 1: was doing what he was doing, and he was repeating
48:10
Speaker 1: all of the abuses that she did to him and
48:12
Speaker 1: that Karen did to him, and in a full-on rage,
48:14
Speaker 1: he attacked Susan and stabbed her five times and then
48:18
Speaker 1: slit her throat. So being absolutely horrified with what he
48:22
Speaker 1: had done, he got into his car and kept driving
48:25
Speaker 1: out of state until he got to California, where he
48:27
Speaker 1: would first stop at a motel to shower and get
48:30
Speaker 1: something to eat, but then get back in his car
48:32
Speaker 1: and go drive to an industrial site, where he would
48:35
Speaker 1: put his phone on the console, take his gun out,
48:38
Speaker 1: put it to his head, and decided he could not
48:40
Speaker 1: live with what he had done, and he pulled the trigger.
48:43
Speaker 1: And to this day, we do not know where Karen
48:46
Speaker 1: Zerbe is, but we do know that she is still
48:48
Speaker 1: the head of the Children of God, now known as
48:51
Speaker 1: the Family International. And it still has over 10,000 members
48:55
Speaker 1: in 80 countries worldwide.
48:59
Speaker 6: Our brains, used us as slaves, because that's what we were,
49:01
Speaker 6: every last one of us, no matter how we were treated,
49:04
Speaker 6: we were fucking slaves, just there, for the sick fuckers pleasure,
49:10
Speaker 6: that's all it was, that's the way it was at
49:13
Speaker 6: grandpa and mama's house, okay, well, keep, fighting, keep the faith,
49:21
Speaker 6: and all that other stuff. And someday, in some way,
49:26
Speaker 6: some of us are going to be around to see.
49:28
Speaker 2: Those f * * * ers.
49:29
Speaker 6: Burn, literally or figuratively.
49:32
Speaker 7: They're going down.
49:35
Speaker 6: So, with that happy thought, I.
49:38
Speaker 2: Shall leave you.
49:43
Speaker 1: That is the unfortunate conclusion of this video. It's just,
49:48
Speaker 1: it's a heart, heartbreaking story. Reading about it and researching
49:52
Speaker 1: it was just, it was hard. Interesting, but I just
49:55
Speaker 1: can't believe that there's these evil people in the world.
49:58
Speaker 1: But I'm glad I get to talk about a kid
50:00
Speaker 1: that clearly fought through adversity and unfortunately lost in the end.
50:04
Speaker 1: But I highly recommend reading his story because it is heartbreaking,
50:08
Speaker 1: but also interesting. extremely interesting. I really hope that you
50:11
Speaker 1: enjoyed this type of video. I'm really enjoying doing these
50:14
Speaker 1: kind of more kind of serious but lighter videos and
50:17
Speaker 1: I get to research and learn about stuff and I
50:20
Speaker 1: get to teach you guys about stuff as well. And
50:22
Speaker 1: also just.
50:22
Speaker 2: Stay safe, okay?
50:23
Speaker 1: Don't listen to hot women in bars that are trying
50:25
Speaker 1: to get you into a cult, okay? And just be
50:28
Speaker 1: smart and stay safe, okay? I just want y'all to
50:30
Speaker 1: be safe, all right? I grew up watching Dateline and
50:33
Speaker 1: stuff and I feel like it's made me real, you know,
50:36
Speaker 1: aware of my surroundings and everything. But I just want
50:38
Speaker 1: you guys to know, I really appreciate you. I love you.
50:40
Speaker 1: And please be safe. If you liked the video, please
50:42
Speaker 1: like the video.
50:43
Speaker 2: If you want to subscribe, you can subscribe. This is
50:45
Speaker 2: obviously the best YouTube channel ever. And also, uh, I
50:47
Speaker 2: will see your beautiful face in the next video.
50:49
Speaker 5: Okay.
50:50
Speaker 2: Bye.