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A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

arxiv.org

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Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#81

Post by dbl000 »

mothballed wrote: post #65
jiggawatts wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I knew some Scientologists in the late nineties, and there are many parallels. Ironically, they were also devout Christians, and one later became a priest. Something very eye opening is know precisely who L Ron Hubbard is, what kind of person he was, and nonetheless seeing a real religion building up around him made me realise that all of the major religions must have started similarly. Watching Trump's followers tur…

Politics in general has a lot of parallels to religion. People need to segment into belief groups, and politics is the new church. Only this church is a popularity game to decide who controls a vast federal standing domestic army of armed police, as well as an outward projecting armed forces. The scary thing is that everyone seems to believe their church is correct, and willing to employ the machine of violence to en…

This is kind of one of the points Jonathan Rauch made in his book "Cross Purposes"[0]. He talks about how the common zeitgeist went from being christian and conservative to being christian because you were a conservative and because of that people are treating politics with the same fervor that they would have treated religion in the past.

[0] https://www.amazon.com/Cross-Purposes-Christianitys-Bargain-...

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#82

Post by PaulHoule »

jiggawatts wrote: post #64
pavlov wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone might argue that Donald Trump's political career is the most successful pig-butchering scam in the history of the world.

I knew some Scientologists in the late nineties, and there are many parallels. Ironically, they were also devout Christians, and one later became a priest. Something very eye opening is know precisely who L Ron Hubbard is, what kind of person he was, and nonetheless seeing a real religion building up around him made me realise that all of the major religions must have started similarly. Watching Trump's followers tur…

Scientology has gone through phases. Up until the revelation of "Operation Snow White" [1] it was oriented towards recruiting large numbers of footsoldiers into "staff" roles and set prices that made their services accessible to a rather broad "public". Notably L. Ron Hubbard had written that it was immoral to ask for donations without giving something in return so it was all oriented around getting people to pay for training and auditing.

I don't know about the exact causality but in terms of chronology they started raising prices rapidly around the time Snow White broke eventually putting the auditing route out of reach for a lot of people.

Under David Miscavige the church made a transition to soliciting donations for "Ideal Orgs" [2] and to the IAS in general. The model now seems to be to get large donations from a few whales and if there is a role for less well heeled members it is to have extras to populate the scene and look as if there was a broad-based movement to contribute to.

One interpretation is that social inequality has increased and that the plain ordinary Joe doesn't have enough money to be worth soliciting and if you wanted to build a cult today it would be oriented 100% around finding people in the intersection of rich and vulnerable. Sometimes I think 'rationalism' is all about that -- there's no point in scooping up aimless students at airports in 2025 and making them live in communal houses making money selling candles when you could make a movement which is all about getting the rich to donate money, e.g. "effective altruism". You don't want people's time anymore, it just isn't worth anything.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Snow_White

[2] https://tonyortega.org/2021/12/23/insider-how-scientologys-i...

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#83

Post by PaulHoule »

mothballed wrote: post #65
jiggawatts wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I knew some Scientologists in the late nineties, and there are many parallels. Ironically, they were also devout Christians, and one later became a priest. Something very eye opening is know precisely who L Ron Hubbard is, what kind of person he was, and nonetheless seeing a real religion building up around him made me realise that all of the major religions must have started similarly. Watching Trump's followers tur…

Politics in general has a lot of parallels to religion. People need to segment into belief groups, and politics is the new church. Only this church is a popularity game to decide who controls a vast federal standing domestic army of armed police, as well as an outward projecting armed forces. The scary thing is that everyone seems to believe their church is correct, and willing to employ the machine of violence to en…

It's certainly true about a certain kind of evangelical Christian who doesn't go to church [1] but it's also true about many of the left-coded groups that started out on Twitter and Tumblr and moved on to Mastodon and Bluesky. For that matter it was true about Marxism back in the day, The God that Failed [2] was a criticism that took this tack.

My current feeling is that there's nothing more dangerous than "Man's Search for Meaning" and if people can't find meaning in the little things they do every day that search for meaning inevitably leads to trouble.

[1] often the ones who actually go to church are these kind of people: https://bsky.app/profile/did:plc:dx3ay6rcqediw2gbhb4bp76l/po...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_God_that_Failed

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#84

Post by mothballed »

PaulHoule wrote: post #83
mothballed wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Politics in general has a lot of parallels to religion. People need to segment into belief groups, and politics is the new church. Only this church is a popularity game to decide who controls a vast federal standing domestic army of armed police, as well as an outward projecting armed forces. The scary thing is that everyone seems to believe their church is correct, and willing to employ the machine of violence to en…

It's certainly true about a certain kind of evangelical Christian who doesn't go to church [1] but it's also true about many of the left-coded groups that started out on Twitter and Tumblr and moved on to Mastodon and Bluesky. For that matter it was true about Marxism back in the day, The God that Failed [2] was a criticism that took this tack. My current feeling is that there's nothing more dangerous than "Man's Sea…

It's funny, Hoppe wrote a similarly named book about the same issues with democracy.

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#85

Post by jacknews »

shellfishgene wrote: post #78
jacknews wrote: post #66

Are there not some more direct interventions? I know of a building housing one of these. Obviously they pay the local police and have cover so just filing a complaint or whatever is not an option.

The article states than an estimated 75 billion dollars have been lost since 2020, the corruption goes way beyond local cops, and in Myanmar probably involves the government directly. Whole cities are being built for scamming. https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2025/sep/08/m...

I believe Cambodia is another case where the government is directly involved.

The question is are there any effective interventions, short of war (which, happened), given that.

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#86

Post by Theodores »

karel-3d wrote: post #35
Theodores wrote: post #5

My dad passed away about three weeks after being fully pig-butchered, losing all of his money and reputation with family/friends. We all tried to talk him out of it, but it was like he joined a cult, for he cut us off and lost his mind. The whole sorry saga is very hard to live with. The sums of money were vast, cocaine addiction would have been a more cost effective way to go. The pig-butchers had some type of bot/A…

They are using actual slaves, not "wage slaves". They kidnap people, lured for work in Thailand, and take them to Myanmar/Burma, where there is a civil war ongoing and a form of lawlessness; while there is a relatively good internet connectivity and electricity. They beat people and force them to do this. It's mostly run by Chinese. (But they scam Chinese too. It originated as scamming older single Chinese ladies, ac…

Actually no. Cyprus was where we got scammed from. I think there might be a bit of 'yellow peril' going on in your imagination.

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#87

Post by BrandoElFollito »

wiether wrote: post #79
BrandoElFollito wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same here (I am French, so the language is yet another barrier). I thought this was about viral actions by extreme ecologists that get into butchering companies and expose how the animals suffer. And I thought - "these are scams?" But hey, everything is possible. And then got to the comments and learned a few things :) The article is very good and the comments as well.

A croire que c'est un problème de compréhension uniquement chez nous autres pauvres Français !

Bah ouias, j'avais les actions de L-quelque chose en tête mais non :)

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#88

Post by beAbU »

gadders wrote: post #70

I got one of those scam texts last week that begin with "Dad save my new number..." it then escalated to where they asked for money. (I knew it wasn't genuine as I'm still paying for my daughter's cellphone) Anyway, I played a long for a bit but finally told them that I knew it wasn't genuine as my daughter is not that polite when she asks for money.

The age old "hey it's me ur brother" scam.

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#89

Post by jmkni »

Hackbraten wrote: post #74
wodenokoto wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I saw a YouTube who had planted a mole inside one of these farms. Each guy ran something like 10 WhatsApp on his PC and when needed they had girls in a waiting room “on call” to do FaceTime.

Was it Jim Browning’s video? [0] (WhatsApp screencast starts at 5:42 [1]) [0]: https://youtu.be/vu-Y1h9rTUs [1]: https://youtu.be/vu-Y1h9rTUs?t=342

Jim Browning is such a legend

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#90

Post by throwup238 »

K0balt wrote: post #41
qnleigh wrote: post #6

I got sucked into reading this paper, and it has completely changed my perception of these scams. They are incredibly thorough and realistic. Here are some quotes that drove this home for me. "The bond phase showed that scammers had tremendous patience; this phase lasted anywhere from 3 to 11 months before the scammer moved on to the next stage of the scam." "When I spoke to her on a video call, it was the same perso…

It was a pretty wild ride, for an arvix paper lol. Easily as good as a provocative work of fiction, It had me questioning my marriage briefly until I rolled over and looked at my toddler, and briefly thought “holy shirt this runs deep!” (And then obviously broke out of the spell of the story lol) Still, it’s a testament to the level of emotional damage that these scams must levy on their actual victims.

The wild part will be when you find out that the toddler is actually the mastermind.
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