The co-founders of SF-based female-orgasm evangelism group/"wellness startup" OneTaste, Nicole Daedone and Rachel Cherwitz, are on trial in New York for labor-law violations, and that trial began on Monday.

We've been talking about OneTaste on this site since the middle of the last decade, when they were a trending Bay Area self-help purveyor with workshops that only wealthy techies could afford, and a co-founder, Nicole Daedone, who was big on the TED Talk circuit for preaching the importance of the female orgasm.

The group's woo-woo workshops brought in both men and women who were struggling to discover themselves sexually and had money to burn in trying. They billed their practice as "orgasmic meditation," and at one point it had expanded to nine countries, with offices in LA, New York, London and elsewhere.

OneTaste's lineage actually has Bay Area roots that go back much further than the 2010s, with Daedone being a disciple, of sorts, of Purple People f0under Victor Baranco — whose 57-year-old group, based on a 23-acre commune in Lafayette, in the East Bay, has often been referred to as a "sex cult."

Daedone and her second-in-command, former OneTaste head of sales Rachel Cherwitz, were indicted by the feds in 2023 on charges of forced labor conspiracy, with federal investigators saying that they engaged in "a years-long scheme to obtain the labor and services of a group of OneTaste members — including volunteers, contractors, and employees of OneTaste — by subjecting them to economic, sexual, emotional and psychological abuse, surveillance, indoctrination, and intimidation."

The indictment further said that the pair "groomed OneTaste members to engage in sexual acts with OneTaste’s current and prospective investors, clients, employees and beneficiaries, for the financial benefit of OneTaste and, in turn, themselves." And, prosecutors said, they "instructed the OneTaste members to engage in sexual acts — including acts the members found uncomfortable or repulsive — as a requirement to supposedly obtain freedom and enlightenment and demonstrate their commitment to OneTaste and Daedone."

The whole thing has the familiar whiffs of the NXIVM case, with the difference being that there was not one charismatic man at the helm getting his own sexual gratification as well as money, but two women.

The OneTaste story landed on the site Gawker in 2013, in a piece titled "My Life With the Thrill-Clit Cult," and subsequently they were the subject of a 2018 expose by Bloomberg that may have led directly to the federal investigation. Subsequently, there was a 2022 Netflix documentary titled Orgasm Inc: The Story of OneTaste, which included allegations of sex trafficking.

And while OneTaste still exists as a free app, and its CEO, Anjuli Ayer, says told the Wall Street Journal in January that the company is still pursuing a franchise model, neither Daedone nor Cherwitz is still involved. (It's also unclear if they still have an office in San Francisco, and their original Market Street offices are closed.)

As the New York Times reports, jury selection began Monday in federal court in Brooklyn for Daedone and Cherwitz, who face up to 20 years in prison if they are convicted.

Part of the defense appears to hinge on discrediting some of the incendiary details that appeared in the Netflix doc. As this legal blog notes, the DOJ has acknowledged that the content of some incriminating journal entries that appeared in the doc could not be authenticated. The journals belonged to former member Ayries Blanck, and the defense has argued that Blanck's sister was paid $25,000 to participate in the Netflix film.

Per the Times, the prosecution plans to call other former members and employees as witnesses at the trial.

Previously: SF-Founded Sex Cult-y Group OneTaste Has Founder, Top Executive Indicted For Forced Labor, Sex Traffic