A highly abusive LW moderator endangered dozens of people with COVID dishonesty

Many people in the rationalist and EA scene already know about this, including the LW administration, but they have been slow to take any action. Kaj “xuenay” Sotala’s conduct and behaviour is far too dangerous to continue to pretend nothing is happening.

Kaj was my best friend who destroyed my life with psychological, emotional and sexual abuse and used several of his “friends” as instruments in that abuse (as well as other abuse of his other “friends”). He also endangered many people with his highly reckless behaviour and dishonesty regarding COVID in March 2020. A few months ago, he paid for me to have trauma therapy with an IFS/somatic experiencing therapist specializing in sexual abuse, which ironically made me understand much better how atrocious his behaviour towards me and several other people has been, and that it needs to be public, for my sake, the sake of public safety and the sake of his own mental health.

A lot of people probably won’t believe me, as Kaj is such an idolized and beloved figure in the rationalist scene. People think that abusers are “bad people” who are easy to recognize, which sadly is very far from the truth. Most abusers are pleasant, even charming (and this has usually nothing to do with narcissism, most abusers are not narcissists). People are incredibly complex, including most of those who do serious harm to others—Kaj certainly has incredibly nice and pleasant sides, while sadly also sides that are extremely dishonest, sadistic and minimize, gaslight, control and manipulate others.

Unfortunately, I also idolized Kaj for a long time, as “everyone else seemed to do that” (I’ve never been a member of the rationalist scene, though you could call me rat adjacent, but several of his other friends also idolize him in dangerous ways). This was what allowed the abuse to happen in the first place—I was so convinced he could never really do bad things, or if he did, he could always fix his behaviour. Sadly, his real ability for introspection, let alone actual self-work, is severely limited, likely because of the severe dissociation he suffers from due to early childhood trauma.

In February 2020, Kaj participated in a TMI meditation retreat, even though his mental health was way too poor to attend (thanks, peer pressure...). He lied about his dissociative symptoms in the intake form, listing all of them as mild while many were severe, as he knew he likely wouldn’t be allowed to attend otherwise. I was very worried, after having watched several people I personally know develop severe side effects from TMI, including a case of psychosis.

Also, Kaj’s basically entire “TMI practice” was (and likely still is) based on dissociation, something that is deceptively easy to confuse with nonself experiences. He was convinced he could fix his dissociation with TMI, as Culadasa’s concept of “unification” suggests—an idea the teacher of his retreat called “delusional”. He had had half a dozen sessions of professional IFS therapy for the dissociation, but cut it short. He promised me he’d return to therapy after the retreat, he had already chosen a new therapist specializing in anger management issues and challenging behaviour (while I suggested he should see someone focusing on dissociation).

Sadly my fears weren’t unwarranted. Kaj’s dissociation deteriorated after the retreat and he developed paranoia shockingly similar to my ex husband, who had paranoid schizophrenia (schizophrenia and dissociative identity disorder have a lot in common, are many interesting papers on Medline if you’re curious). His depression and anxiety got much worse and he had to go back on meds. He never went back to therapy like he had promised.

In March, Kaj was part of organizing a small D&D event in real life despite the lockdown and despite taking care of me (I have six risk factors for severe COVID). I tried to get him to call it off as unsafe (come on, you can play D&D via group voice/videocalls, as they have continued to do since), but he got very angry and never forgave me for this. He was so paranoid he seemed to actually think “I didn’t want him to have fun” while I was worried about catching COVID. Which unfortunately I did thanks to the event (and from what I heard, several other people present likely did, too).

When I got sick, I told Kaj he has to tell the others attending the event so they could quarantine, but he never did, as that would have exposed his dishonesty to his oldest “friend” who was present (and got sick, too). The others who got sick thought they just had a cold or got COVID elsewhere, so to my knowledge, they still don’t know COVID was spread at the event almost a year later. My acute COVID was luckily very mild, but ten months later, I still struggle with some long-term effects such as thrombocytopenia (impaired clotting, the opposite of the more common increased clotting from COVID, but also well documented), chronic fever and occasional bouts of difficulty breathing.

To you, I’m no doubt just a random stranger on the Internet making unbelievable statements about your self-therapy guru, I do realize that, of course. Kaj is likely going to deny most of this, this is what abusers almost always do (and he is a very skilled liar). Abusers almost universally consider themselves to be good guys. Most abusive men even claim they are the victims, and unfortunately they tend not to leave a paper trail nor do the victims get receipts to show for the abuse.

I’m thankful for a lot of support I’ve received from rat (adjacent) people, many of whom know Kaj. For those who do believe me, whether this changes the way you relate to Kaj’s writings is up to you. I’m of course not denying there’s a lot of useful content among his articles, but he also used IFS (and some other techniques) as a part of the abuse, while refusing to do work on his own dissociation and destructive parts. (I also find it bizarre and appalling that someone who destroys his fragile mental health on a meditation retreat, which he lied to get into, has an essay about meditation published in the LW book.)

IMO the best way you can help both Kaj and his victims is to exclude him from your life until he seeks treatment, fixes his abusive tendencies and makes amends for the horrible things he has done. He has had too many fanboys and enablers in his life. I feel like shunning him is the only way that will motivate him to seek treatment and prevent further abuse. I’m of course not talking about a permanent cancellation, I have no doubt that with professional help he can get better, and then you can welcome him back. I know the rationalist community can do this.

P.S. Please stop idolizing people, whether it’s Kaj or Yud or that guru on the podcast you just listened to. Culadasa’s case and so many other cases serve as reminders that people are people and people are very flawed. Those who gather the largest following often tend to be the most flawed. For me, idolizing the wrong person cost me everything I had in life.