Protecting Kids from Cults and Traffickers with Robin Boyle-Laisure (Part 1)
A Little Bit Culty
Sarah Edmondson & Anthony “Nippy” Ames
4.6 • 2.7K Ratings
🗓️ 18 August 2025
⏱️ 50 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This episode is sponsored in part by Betterhelp.
What happens when a street-corner “religious” pitch nearly ropes in a teenage girl—only for her to dodge the hook and spend the next three decades dismantling the playbook that tried to claim her? In Part 1 of our conversation with Professor Robin Boyle-Laisure—St. John’s University School of Law faculty, board member of the International Cultic Studies Association, and author of the upcoming Taken No More: Protect Your Children Against Traffickers and Cults—we follow the twisted parallels between cult recruitment and human trafficking.
Robin breaks down how predators groom, coerce, and control—whether they’re fishing for followers in a dorm lounge or luring teens through online games. We talk NXIVM’s “collateral” bombshell, the grooming-to-control pipeline, and why charisma is just the sugar coating on a rotten core. You’ll never look at “just talking” to strangers online the same way again.
Catch Robin’s new book, Taken No More, this fall, and keep an eye on robinboylelaisure.com for free downloadable articles and updates. Follow Robin on Instagram (@robin.boyle / @robinboylelaisure) and Facebook (Robin Boyle). Learn more about ICSA at icsahome.com.
Trigger warning: This episode contains frank discussion of sexual abuse, coercive control, grooming, trafficking, and cult exploitation.
Also… let it be known that:
The views and opinions expressed on A Little Bit Culty do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the podcast. Any content provided by our guests, bloggers, sponsors or authors are of their opinion and are not intended to malign any religion, group, club, organization, business individual, anyone or anything. Nobody’s mad at you, just don’t be a culty fuckwad.
**PRE-ORDER Sarah and Nippy's newest book here
Check out our lovely sponsors
Join ‘A Little Bit Culty’ on Patreon
Get poppin’ fresh ALBC Swag
Support the pod and smash this link
Cult awareness and recovery resources
Watch Sarah's TEDTalk
CREDITS:
Executive Producers: Sarah Edmondson & Anthony Ames
Production Partner: Amphibian.Media
Co-Creator: Jess Tardy
Associate producers: Amanda Zaremba and Matt Stroud of Amphibian.Media
Audio production: Red Caiman Studios
Theme Song: “Cultivated” by Jon Bryant co-written with Nygel Asselin
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Ready to launch your business? Get started with the commerce platform made for entrepreneurs. |
| 0:04.8 | Shopify is specially designed to help you start, run and grow your business with easy customizable |
| 0:10.3 | themes that let you build your brand, marketing tools that get your products out there. |
| 0:14.7 | Integrated shipping solutions that actually save you time. From startups to scaleups, online, |
| 0:20.1 | in person and on the go. Shopify is made for |
| 0:22.8 | entrepreneurs like you. Sign up for your $1 a month trial at Shopify.com slash setup. |
| 0:29.6 | This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered legal, medical, |
| 0:34.0 | medical, or mental health advice. The views and opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the podcast and are not intended to malign any |
| 0:41.5 | religion group, club, organization, business, individual, anyone, or anything. |
| 0:55.8 | I'm Sarah Edmondson. |
| 0:57.6 | And I'm Anthony Nippy Ames. |
| 1:00.3 | And this is A Little Bit Calti. |
| 1:01.9 | Cults are commonplace now. |
| 1:04.3 | From fandums to fads, we're examining them all. |
| 1:08.6 | We look at what happens when things that seem like a great thing at first go bad. |
| 1:12.0 | Every week we chat with survivors, experts, and whistleblowers for real culty stories told directly by the people who lived through them, because we want |
| 1:16.7 | you to learn a few things that we've had to learn the hard way. For example, if you think |
| 1:21.1 | you're too smart to get sucked into something culty, you might be prime recruitment material, |
| 1:25.5 | and who knows, you could already be in a cult. |
| 1:28.2 | If you're not aware of your programming, you're probably being programmed. |
| 1:31.4 | So keep listening to find out. |
| 1:33.2 | We'll talk about all sorts of topics on the show, but be aware. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Sarah Edmondson & Anthony “Nippy” Ames, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Sarah Edmondson & Anthony “Nippy” Ames and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.