For an updated list of news articles on the Raelian clone topic:
http://www.factnet.org/LatestCultNews.htm?FACTNet

The Raelian cult actually has its headquarters in Canada. You can read more about them here:
http://www.rickross.com/reference/raelians/raelians26.html
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QUOTE IN PART:
In the small farming community of Valcourt (northeast of Montreal) the group has established UFOland as their
headquarters and embassy to the world. The building itself is part office complex and part museum. For two weeks every summer Raelians gather
there for meetings and meditation.

In 1998 Vorilhon announced to his followers that the alien creators of Earth would soon return to Earth and it was necessary to expedite preparations
for this second coming. One of the essential first steps was the recruitment of a number of young women members into the Order of the Angels to
serve as hostesses and sexual mates for the arriving progenitors of humans. Within this order was a select group who agreed only to sleep with the
aliens and their prophets, including of course Vorilhon. Vorilhon, however, emphasizes that the angels are under no pressure to sleep with him,
since the Raelians teach sexual freedom and not coercion.

The movement thrives on media attention and Vorilhon deliberately seeks it out, especially on sex issues. For example, to protest a 1992 decision in
Quebec barring condom machines at certain Quebec high schools, the Raelians passed out condoms to students from a van adorned with large
spaceships. The group also bought billboard space in Toronto to welcome extraterrestrial visitors. Vorilhon also makes pronouncements about some
world-shaking events which will take place but which only true Raelians will know of. Like others who make such statements, those which have
become known are sufficiently vague to meet almost any chance occurrence. ..... "
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More information can be found on this page:
http://www.rickross.com/groups/raelians.html

Claude Vorilhon, the cult leader and founder, uses the classic techniques of control exhibited by totalistic cults. He recruits using psychological manipulation and undue influence, the ideology is made more important than personal human rights, with sexual partners being recruited for his use by convincing them that their compliance is part of the sect's belief system.

The Raelians are only one of many, many cults using psychological coersion, undue influence, and other unethical tactics to recruit and retain members. Our freedom of belief in the US is one of our greatest strengths and also our Achilles heel, because anyone can start a religion based on anything. People who are vulnerable to persuasion and influence can be led into groups like this and used for the leader's purposes. It happens every day, to intelligent, talented people. With the right "hook", someone can easily be led step by step into a cult, if what the cult is offering is an "answer" to the person's particular dilemma or search at that time in their life. Cult thinking is akin to the fundamentalist fanaticism that is behind terrorism.

The current administration is completely naive about the problem of cults. The Washington Times, owned by the Moonies, is deliberately using its influence to gain more power in the US for Sun Myung Moon. The Bush family has been used many times as a front for the Moonies. Other cults are less public but just as insidious in draining away the financial resources, talent, time, and labor of their recruits.

Alice