True Lies: The Strange, Twisted History of the "New Friends of the True Course"
Hi again! The Free Though Sage is back with another look into the weird world of cults, fringe religions, pseudo-science, and MLMs. Today, I'll be taking another look at the alleged UFO cult New Friends of the True Course (or NFTC for short). If you haven't read previous posts about this group's latest B.S., I'd recommend checking out my earlier reports before reading this post. But if you need a quick refresher or don't have time to read my old stuff, tl;dr: I first encountered these characters handing out their bizarre literature in the Bay Area, and have previously investigated their beliefs in the paranormal, and their predatory financial practices.
This post will provide a brief overview of the history of the group from what I've been able to glean from my research over the past few weeks...I wanted to post sooner, but this blog doesn't pay the bills, and information has been hard to come by! I'll also try to explain how the cult's current decline (good riddance!) has it roots in petty squabbles among various factions going back decades. Strap yourself in, this is gonna be a weird one.
Paranormal Reports: 1951 - 1956
From what I can tell, the origins of this organization date back to a handful of independently published pamphlets written by an anonymous UFO enthusiast in the early 1950s. Many other sources have covered the Cold War era interest in UFOS, so I won't belabor the obvious connection between paranoia and the paranormal, except to say that the author of these pamphlets appears to have served during WWII that might have shaped his worldview and interest in this research project.
The first of these pamphlets, the innocuously titled "Recorded Aeronautical Observations of the Nineteenth Century" is in some ways a minor entry in the wave of literature on the extraterrestrial during this decade. I personally have not been able to get my hands on this or any of the "independent reports" in this series (facsimiles occasionally show up on eBay, but I can't justify the expense at this time). From what I can tell, this first entry is an attempt of an amateur historian to record all of the details from a supposed UFO sighting in New England that occurred in the nineteenth century (the dates of this dubious event are inconsistently reported as 1883 and/or 1838).
Subsequent pamphlets seem to have become increasingly unhinged, as the author gave up on historical research in favor of incoherent conspiracy theorizing and claims of personally witnessing any number of extraterrestrial phenomenon, always described in terms of a brilliant luminescence. The last pamphlet I'm aware of "True Visions of Light and the Course of History: An Attestation of Witnessing in the Atomic Age" was published in early 1956.
These obscure pamphlets would likely have been consigned to the dustbin of history, if not for its reclamation by the counterculture. In 1971, the fly-by-night Pacific Books Publishing semi-legally compiled these writings into a single volume under the title True Visions of Light and the Course of History, subsequently shortened to True Course in later editions. Although it is now virtually impossible to track down, I have found entries in the catalogs of occult and antiquarian book sellers.
It seems to me that the anonymous author's millenarian worldview and descriptions of overwhelming perceptual experience resonated with the counterculture's interest in psychedelia, mysticism, and the occult. True Course became an object of fascination for a certain type of collector of esoterica. The anonymous author was a sort of ersatz Aleister Crowley, Aldous Huxley, or William S. Burroughs for the extraterrestrially-minded set.
The Course Online: 1988-1993
The contemporary NFTC organization really begins in 1988 with the establishment of a USENET group organized by fans of the True Course book. This group helped to further popularize the book for a younger, tech-savvy audience unfamiliar with its earlier history as a totem for the counterculture. Some of these original USENET members remain in positions of power at NFTC.
The first instance of the phrase "New Friends of the True Course" that I could find was on a fan page devoted to True Course that went online in 1993. It appears that this fan page was initially an outgrowth of the USENET group, but soon became the primary locus of online activity for the community. During this time, the site's pseudonymous administrator emerged as the de facto leader of the movement, adopting the title of the "Honorable Founder."
A Dishonorable Founder: 1996-1999
New Friends of the True Course was officially constituted as a legal entity in 1996 by the so-called Honorable Founder. Moving to monetize the online community's interest in the philosophy of the True Course, the founder organized a never-ending series of seminars, workshops, and retreats at the new NFTC headquarters in San Francisco (actually little more than a run-down office suite in the city's Sunset neighborhood). In the following years, the organization became increasingly cult-like, demanding time and money from new members expected to orient themselves around the whims of a singular, charismatic leader who became the conduit for all truth. Few new members of the organization are aware of the publication history of the texts outlined here.
By 1999, senior NFTC leadership n successfully removed the Founder from the organization under the guise of a philosophical disagreement over the interpretation of core texts. From my vantage point, it's clear this excommunication was in fact motivated by widespread distress at the self-appointed guru's exclusive hold over NFTC finances.
New Beginnings: 2000 - 2022
Beginning in 2000, with the introduction of a modified pedagogical program called "i/O Light Science", NFTC has followed the playbook of a run-of-the-mill MLM while still dabbling in cult-like activity. The new leadership in the 'Organizational Committee' seem to have reached a detente with the veteran 'Anchorite VP' members, although relations clearly remain strained. In recent years, the group has displayed a keen interest in technology, and periodically threatens to introduce its own cryptocurrency.
If you or anyone you know has become involved in this NFTC BS, I hope that this post will serve as a wake up call to leave as soon as possible. Keep on checking back for more!
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