Word: peeping
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...Childhood's End. It was born in 1975 when a distinguished-looking couple held a series of West Coast meetings to announce that a spaceship would soon arrive to swoop up properly trained apostles into the "next level" of existence. The pair called themselves only "Bo and Peep" or-because of their claim to be the "two witnesses" of the End Times in Revelation II-"The Two." With end-of-the-millennium enthusiasm, as many as 200 people forsook jobs and possessions, even spouses and children, and suddenly followed Bo and Peep into the wilderness...
After the flock vanished, the press identified Bo as Marshall Herff Applewhite, a former music teacher at the University of St. Thomas, a Roman Catholic school in Houston, and choirmaster of an Episcopal church. Peep was formerly a Houston nurse named Bonnie Lu Nettles. In 1976 two University of Montana sociologists, Robert Balch and David Taylor, located the nomads' wilderness camp and found it noncoercive but sometimes troubled by doubts...
...group is still camping out. Groll's account of life there cannot be corroborated because he "promised" Bo and Peep not to reveal the location. He says only that there are about four dozen people, and that they are normally encamped in the Wyoming Rockies, moving to a ranch in northern Texas when the snows come. Unarmed sentries guard the perimeter of the compound to fend off outsiders. As Groll tells it, the relaxed life-style that the sociologists found seems to have changed drastically. Even with today's can-you-top-this cult scene, his account...
...Peep have "thousands of rules," reports Groll, but "they never force anyone to do anything." During one three-month phase, members constantly wore hoods over their heads and peered out through mirrored eye slits. The usual uniform is a brightly colored windbreaker over a jumpsuit. Gloves are worn at all times. Members can say yes, no or "I don't know" but otherwise communicate only by written messages. They study the Bible, forswear sex, drugs and alcohol. They are, however, permitted to watch TV newscasts and read newspapers to emphasize the differences between the values of the camp...
...daily meals (called "lab experiments") a blackboard in the dining tent lists "formulas" that specify the menu (PA for potatoes, CA for cake). The food must be consumed with meticulous care to reduce noise. Bo and Peep usually shop for food and supplies personally. They always pay cash, once explaining to cult members, Groll recalls, that we "didn't have any need to wonder" about money...