The Friend Exception

"But Dean!", the cry comes from the audience, "How can you speak so harshly about those who are in the Multi-Level Marketing business?  My dearest friend sells Mary Kay, and she's just wonderful!"

Great.  Glad to hear it.

I don't care.

This is like when someone talks about politicians and lists every bad characteristic that we all know that they all have, and then someone pipes up to share about their perfectly darling son who's a Town Councilman or State District Representative out in some Nowheresville area.

Then everyone is supposed to rush to assure her that, "Oh, of course, we just meant most are those things, we know some are great folks, heart of gold!" while inwardly thinking, "Whatever.".

I'm just the guy saying it out loud.  Whatever.  Politicians are in it for themselves, sorry if your cousin is one.  And those who are making some bucks at MLM are scamming others to do so, at the least with the pushing of the not so valuable products, and more likely by the peddling of false hopes in trying to recruit them to their downline.

If your only argument is to try and personalize it, so that I must be afraid to speak for fear of offending you, then that's really no argument at all. 

It's quite possible for a person to be good in any number of areas, and still be bad or sleazy in another area.  We are all aware of religious leaders who while leading millions to Jesus still get caught with a harlot in a hotel room.  This does not mean the man was wholly bad, he did still lead millions to Jesus, but it does mean that he was bad to the extent that - oh, yeah, he was caught with a hooker!

Likewise, there can be many great men and women out there who are good spouses, wonderful parents, stalwart church members, pillars of the community, love dogs, etc.  But when they engage in MLM, then they are bad to that extent, and their goodness does change the bad of MLM scams any more than Jimmy Swaggart's goodness in speaking of Jesus changed the bad of his adultery. 

This isn't High School.  You can't take the "A-" of how great you are leading the Little League, the "A" of you providing for your family, the "A+" of church going and balance that against the "F" of ripping off people with MLM scams and come out with a "B-" average and call it good.  That's not how life works.

Good people, even your friends, even your mommy, can succumb to drugs, to vices, to sins of all kinds.  And yes, they can also succumb to get rich quick schemes.  Who can't?  We're all sinners, we all have our flaws and foibles, I don't write from some perfected level.

I'm a nice guy, and I have sins, flaws and foibles.  Those you know may be nice, but they have sins, flaws and foibles, too.  And if they're telling you that MLM is a wonderful opportunity, then that is one of their flaws.  Because trying to scam others to make money is definitely a flaw.  And while I'm not going to get into whether it's a sin, it certainly doesn't strike me as something Jesus would do.