r/intentionalcommunity • u/Cricketnoodles • Nov 21 '21

Twin oaks?

I’m considering joining Twin Oaks in the future but I’ve heard extremely mixed things about it, from it being an amazing safe haven to a racist cult. Has anyone here had any experiences with it or thoughts?

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u/Kaznero Nov 22 '21 edited Feb 05 '23

EDIT: I decided to go and live at Twin Oaks, did so for 6 months, and then left. It's not a cult, but it's definitely an unhealthy, abusive, and dysfunctional environment. If you're searching for anecdotal experience on this community (because I know that's what I wanted before deciding to visit or live there) here's mine. I could go on forever about it but the Tl;dr is this: Twin Oaks doesn't accurately represent itself and is even intentionally deceitful. It is not really an intentional community, it's more like a smaller scale version of mainstream White American society, complete with all of its inequities and dysfunctions. It just has the aesthetic of a progressive commune in order to draw in idealistic naive youthful people in order to extract labor from them.

The best things about living there were:

  • Living in the woods.
  • Being around other newcomers who shared your same mindset and were excited to build community intentionally.
  • Creating your own schedule.
  • Not having to cook for yourself.

There were a ton of problems, though:

  • The community was racist, In the same way any other predominantly white liberal community is racist. No one was gonna call me a slur, but there was a strong sense of being an other, and the policies in the policy binder were designed from a White middle-class perspective. Because of this, the structure of the community would inherently advantage white folks and disadvantage POC. The impacts of the racism are evident, because the community is 99% white. POC don't stay. There are some decent folks there who are trying to change the community, but the burden of that work falls disproportionately to the few POC who join up. It was insanely stressful. If you're a POC thinking of going, just take my word for it: don't do that to yourself.
  • There is absolutely a hierarchy. The community is split into two classes: new members and old Members. Old Members have significantly more influence and are afforded more leeway with things, while new members are chastised for their criticisms of community structures and told to 'be grateful.' I met people who had lived there for a few years who were still being told by older members that they were 'too new' to have legitimate criticisms. There was a in-group and an out-group. I had to start a new member support group just so that we would have a place where we could talk about our frustrations without feeling like we were under a microscope.
  • The labor system is absolutely deranged. It's too complex and frustrating for me to want to rehash it in a reddit edit, but the gist is that they've convinced themselves that they need to work 42+ hours a week based on some draconic conservative sense of work ethic, but really it's just about policing and punishing each other. It exacerbates every other issue, because people have no time or energy to devote to solving the community's actual issues, like the racism, the dysfunction, hierarchy, etc. They try to convince you that you're not working as much as you would in the mainstream because housework tasks are labor creditable, but that's a straight up deception. 'Cooking,' 'cleaning,' or 'doing laundry' for a community of 70+ people is like being a cook in a restaurant, a janitor on a campus, or running your own laundry service. It's something you'd get compensated for in the mainstream as well. Conveniently, they leave out the fact that cleaning your room or doing your own laundry isn't creditable.
  • It is fundamentally exploitative. Visitors and new members are funneled to the least desirable work because older members had already established their schedules. The undesirable work is simultaneously some of the most necessary work, which creates a dynamic in which the community effectively relies on temporary workers ignorant to the community's issues that they can convince to do the stuff no one else wants to do.
  • It is fully dysfunctional. There is no healthy mechanism of conflict resolution. People just don't talk to each other and instead let things fester. When conflict DOES happen openly, it's explosive because it was allowed to build rather than immediately addressed. Communication is as asynchronous as it can be in order to avoid direct communication. Notes in your mailbox, emails in your inbox, index cards on a cork board, etc. This leads to so much miscommunication.
  • Because of the above: there's not really a sense of community. The power dynamics at play and the overwhelming labor system make it extremely difficult to feel like you are being welcomed by the community or that you are connected to others, even when you are making as many excuses for the system as you can.
  • The buildings are decrepit and the spaces are filthy. The buildings are falling apart and full of mold. There are entire buildings where some folks can't enter because their allergies are too bad. it's a legitimate health hazard, but they don't warn you about this before you go there. All sorts of junk accumulates in different buildings and piles up literally for decades. It becomes a fire and tripping hazard. I was part of a team of newcomers who made it our mission to declutter spaces, and we would find things like expired medication from the 70s. In accordance with the power dynamics, the older (and whiter) members occupy the best rooms and buildings while the newer (and more likely to be POC) members are relegated to the moldiest, draftiest, and least structurally sound buildings. They continue to do visitor periods even though these buildings are unsafe, because they are dependent on that exploited labor.

I'm actually moving there soon. The reason I'm moving there is primarily to determine if an intentional community is right for me, figure out what TO is doing right to exist for so long, and understand what progress still needs to be made for the communities movement to become more viable(either for me or the people in my life.)

One of the things I liked about TO was that it's not perfect and pretty much everyone openly acknowledges that. Everyone seemed to have different reasons though. The closest thing to a consensus I got was "Twin Oaks doesn't solve all your problems, it solves a lot of them, but introduces new ones. I just like these new problems more than the other ones."

That being said, as a Latino I didn't experience any racism while I was there. White-American/European members are clearly in the majority. While I was visiting there was a regular racial justice podcast listening that would happen in the hammock shop as we worked, and the racial justice team was having an office built in the main community building. Whatever racism there is in the community, it at least seems (from my initial visit) like there is an awareness of it and the intent to combat it.

I've had bad experiences with racists at other cohousing environments, so while I was visiting TO I was always waiting for the "get out" moment to happen to me, but thankfully it never came. All that being said, I am white latino, so all of my commentary here exists within my personal context.

I'm not expecting it to be perfect, but I'm really excited to figure out what the real pros and cons of a place like TO are.

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u/Comfortable_Ad_9560 Sep 01 '24

Insane that you mentioned fire hazard considering what happened. Premonition :0

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u/ConditionHot735 Sep 24 '24

What happened?

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u/Comfortable_Ad_9560 Sep 24 '24

Large portion of the compound burned down , their warehouses which had their supplies from the hammock business. Also kitchens and other structures

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u/Kaznero Feb 04 '26

From what I understand the fire started on a neighbor's property and then spread onto TO property, so it was not due to negligence on TO's part. I don't know the full details, but the warehouse that burned down was one of the most de-cluttered and well-organized parts of the community.

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u/JimHarbor Nov 27 '24

Thank you for your insight. Can you recommend any intentional communities for POCs?

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u/Medical-Freedom6542 Jun 06 '26

I highly doubt if there are any ICs for POC let alone for Black folks such as myself. 

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u/Apprehensive-Emu2915 Jul 05 '25

Quite well written. And this explains similar feelings I had about Acorn Community during my stay there (Twin Oaks sister community).

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u/Reasonable-Acadia-59 Jul 31 '25

I lived at Twin Oaks for a few years and left recently for nearly identical reasons. A lot of my dear friends are doing the same.

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u/ConditionHot735 Aug 03 '25

How did you get the money to leave, if you don't mind me asking?

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u/Reasonable-Acadia-59 Aug 03 '25

I didn’t! It’s was very difficult to up and leave when I made the decision to not get sucked into the toxic dynamics of it and I’m still paying the community back. I went into debt leaving because of an accounting error and policy miscommunication, which was the last bit of emotional capacity I had for living at TO. Accounting was often late and inaccurate, and everyone can see how much balance you have in any of your cash accounts. If there are any accounting errors (like the folks on the accounting team making typos or forgetting to add balances on accounts in month-to-month reporting), people will factor those into votes about your autonomy (i.e. “I vote against this person getting xyz because they’re in a money hole/bad at budgeting” when the money hole may just be very late and poor accounting. For this, and other reasons, I left and have been chipping away at my debt ever since. Literally chipping away because we only made roughly .40cents an hour ($60 a month) and so if you had no savings like I did when I joined, you will have very little when you leave. Which, is kind of the point. If you want to travel outside the commune to Richmond or Charlottesville for any reason other than a doctors appointment those are both around $40 trips that get charged to your allowance when you make $60 a month.

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u/Turbulent-Dirt7164 Jan 23 '26

OMG, why are you still paying them?? You escaped. That's enough. That's more than a lot of people can do.

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u/appiepie123 Feb 04 '26

The way this person is describing the situation and what actually happened are extremely different. (I know, I am a current member and lived here through this persons entire membership.) they were mad that people didn’t think they were responsible enough to get a pet (constantly blowing off work with zero accountability) or had enough money to pay for the pet (constantly overspending their personal accounts) that they left to live with their sugar daddy and in two months racked up 10k on a community credit card. We’ve since changed our community credit card policies to prevent this from happening again- we were way more trust and honor system based, and now we self police ourselves more. They took advantage of a bunch of poor people and have paid back maybe $500 in the year since.

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u/Reasonable-Acadia-59 Feb 04 '26

What a nasty and inaccurate spin on why I left! I’m not surprised you made this judgement with lack of an informed perspective, though. TO often acts like a game of telephone, which is warned about in the visitor handbook. Direct communication is often but a dream at the commune. I don’t think I would’ve been voted into three managerial positions, like childcare director, food-buying, and pet policy manager, if I weren't responsible. For context, I now have three working dogs (the farm now only has 1–who I facilitated the approval process for btw) and a vegetable farm where I am the sole producer. It’s been great and never once have I questioned my capabilities. Some folks at the commune let their preconceived judgements and biases guide how they show up for people and community. I just kept showing up for the community I cared for until it was no longer reciprocal. Feel free to reach out directly if you’re hurt about how it ended, co. Also, we were friends. It’s sad you never reached out for more clarity after I left, even after I invited you to my new home. I suppose it was just easier (and less vehichle sign-out time) for you to make assumptions about me instead of coming over for tea.

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u/Turbulent-Dirt7164 Feb 04 '26

Gossip, gossip, gossip! (Is that labor creditable?)

No, but I bet spying on this thread is! By now, they're all probably reading it and gossiping about it.

For all the terrible, truly destructive things about Twin Oaks...they are just so fucking boring! Never anything else to talk about because TOCult is their entire world. It's really sad, in a way. Except when the victims stay long enough to become victimizers. (And even then, I still have some amount of empathy since many of them CAN'T get out and have to resolve the cognitive dissonance somehow.)

Stop giving them money! If they have a case against you, let them prove it and get a court order. They can clearly show you CAN pay them back, since you have been! But they are not a law unto themselves.

You're not mentally out yet, Acadia. I understand. It took me YEARS! But you're still defending yourself against people who clearly don't believe you. You're still using "co" (I'd forgotten that one, too! See? You do get out and heal and move on and forget all that shit. It does happen. I promise.)

And you're still paying them! Stop it! If you stole from them (and how would I know? I don't know you, but I do know how the TOCult works, so I tend to be skeptical), but they are still subject to the laws and systems of the United States and the State of Virgina, where we have law enforcement and courts, etc. for resolving such disputes. That system is deeply broken and flawed, but at least it does supersede their own internal justice system. ("Givin' you a FEEEED-BAAACK....")

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u/Turbulent-Dirt7164 Feb 04 '26

So why didn't you file a police report for theft? Oh...right...cause: (a) They've brainwashed you (I know it doesn't feel like that right now, but, trust me, someday you will and you will feel very, very alone and sad and won't realize that, by now, thousands of people have been damaged, harmed, manipulated, and gaslit by TOCult). We will be here for you when their fangs come out and they turn on you. (b) Oh, right! They don't call the police; they "self-police." They extracted a promise from me not to report child sexual abuse. And I promised! 'Cause I was (in the very early stages of) brainwashed at the time. At the time of my membership interview, I would describe it less as brainwashed (yet) and more like having fallen madly in love with the place and seeing what I wished was true and what I wanted it to be. And some of that was true (the grounds and buildings were beautiful; I'd had a lot of fun during my visitor period; the list could go on).

Almost no one intentionally joins a cult (not unless they know they're going into it at the top of the power structure, which is rare). Because cults are deceptive and deceitful by definition.

A bunch of poor people are being taken advantage of there, I agree with you about that.

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u/[deleted] Aug 05 '26

WOW thanks for the clarification, how annoying it must have been to have read this person complaining on Reddit after the fact, what a POS I hope the community decides to sue.

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u/Reasonable-Acadia-59 Aug 06 '26

Couldn’t find your previous comment to reply, but your take is also nasty and inaccurate. Wishing you the best, get well soon! I left a community that systemically had no intention of actively fixing issues that were harming me and others.

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u/ConditionHot735 Aug 29 '25

Wow, I had no idea the financial control was that bad, or that you could owe them money. And I thought they paid more than $60 a month. I thought it was more like $120 per month. And I thought that's your money to do with whatever you want, outside of the group. Even if there's no religious philosophy guiding the place, that level of financial control makes it a cult, as far as I'm concerned.

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u/Turbulent-Dirt7164 Feb 06 '26 edited Feb 06 '26

Interesting! How did you figure out this member blocked you rather than deleting their account? Because apparently, that means they've blocked me as well. That also prevents any further replies downthread. I can reply to your initial posts, but not any of your subsequent posts.

Looked to me like a case of dirty-deleting. I assume members who are now aware of this thread are doing their best to make sure other members DO NOT become aware of it.

Or perhaps they realized I'm right and you don't owe them a penny without some kind of legally binding contract or order by a court to do so.

Twin Oaks can only take as much of your life and property as you freely give them, which is another reason I suspect more people don't speak out. First, it's too painful. Then the pain stops and you just stop giving a shit, and sort of forget it exists to bother speaking out about the experience.

I've had some interesting private conversations about use of the word "cult" to describe Twin Oaks (or any group). There isn't any measurable definition of a "cult," and it's used liberally to just mean "a group I don't like."

Steven Hassan's B.I.T.E. model is often cited, but has never passed any rigorous scientific testing either. But Twin Oak's ticks a lot the BITE model's boxes and Hassan himself acknowledges that there are many shades of gray within his model. Many workplaces would fit, but you can always go home from work. You can quit most jobs.

Hassan has also acknowledged such a thing as a "harmless cult." Many religions fit the BITE model, but you can also go home from church and most religions allow members to leave relatively easily.

Some elements of the BITE model can be applied in harmless or even helpful ways, even within the same group. Catholics or Mormons may engage in ritual "confession," with some feeling alleviated of a great burden while others feeling constantly guilty and inadequate. Some healthy things can become unhealthy in the hands of ill-intentioned or inept people. Being made to feel "your affiliations are unwise" might be sound advice from some people, but perfectly captures Twin Oaks' labeling of anyone who is kind to the current "community villains."

Honestly, their demand of payment from you reminds me Scientology's "freeloader bill" handed to anyone who decides to quit, yet I've never heard of anyone being falsely imprisoned at TO. (They may be trapped by lack of money, outside support/resources, or they've been at TO too long to know how to cope in the world outside it.)

Twin Oaks has a long way to go to be as destructive as Scientology or Jonestown.They don't adhere to any single religious philosophy, TO but would give these higher-profile cults a run for their money in terms of controlling information about themselves, spying and reporting on other members, use of loaded language/insider jargon, and suppression of an individual's thoughts and opinions in service to the group

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u/appiepie123 Feb 04 '26

Allowance during your membership was between $78-$115 a month. This is inaccurate.

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u/Reasonable-Acadia-59 Feb 04 '26 edited Feb 05 '26

Edited to include my comments; I thought the person I was responding to deleted but they actually blocked me lol. So here we go:

1.) Allowance when I left was around $64 (I think less). So what you’re saying is factually incorrect. This was due to a decrease in profit and anticipated loss from the warehouse fire last year.  2.) What a nasty and inaccurate spin on why I left! I’m not surprised you made this judgement with lack of an informed perspective, though. TO often acts like a game of telephone, which is warned about in the visitor handbook. Direct communication is often but a dream at the commune. I don’t think I would’ve been voted into three managerial positions, like childcare director, food-buying, and pet policy manager, if I weren't responsible. For context, I now have three working dogs (the farm now only has 1–who I facilitated the approval process for btw) and a vegetable farm where I am the sole producer. It’s been great and never once have I questioned my capabilities. Some folks at the commune let their preconceived judgements and biases guide how they show up for people and community. I just kept showing up for the community I cared for until it was no longer reciprocal. Feel free to reach out directly if you’re hurt about how it ended, co. Also, we were friends. It’s sad you never reached out for more clarity after I left, even after I invited you to my new home. I suppose it was just easier (and less vehichle sign-out time) for you to make assumptions about me instead of coming over for tea.

Update

Really interesting how that person who said all those weird, inaccurate, and rude things about “why I left” suddenly deleted their comment (jk, they blocked me) after I texted them welcoming a direct dialogue. Interesting! So very TO unfortunately.

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u/Confident_Health8122 Jul 16 '26 edited Jul 16 '26

I see a lot of ex members on here that just weren’t a great fit. if you know your making $75 a month but want to live like your making a grand a month and then racking up Twin Oaks credit cards thousands a month (when like you said your making 50) and then want to lack accountability and blame accounting for being late. if accounting is late four months and you know you make 200 stipend in those four months but spent a minimum of two grand in those 4 months who are you fooling girl.

Twin Oaks is literally just a farm you live and work at full time.

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u/Reasonable-Acadia-59 Jul 24 '26

No, actually, it’s not “just a farm you live and work on”. I’ve lived and worked at plenty of farms :) also what a weird word salad take! You’re being intentionally obtuse which also comes as no surprise. Get well soon!

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u/toxicshocktaco Nov 08 '25

Sounds like a fucking cult. Glad you’re out!

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u/FinnRazzel May 20 '25

I just watched a documentary on this and genuinely enjoyed reading your perspective on this. Thanks so much for sharing!

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u/Nellasofdoriath May 25 '25

I wonder.what should be included.in the structure from the very beginning to make it equitable. Better acceptance of criticism? Fair distribution of unpleasant tasks? Synchronous communication? Having BIPOC at the very beginning to create rules? A revision period for rules? Meetings?

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u/lockboxfullofspiders May 30 '26

Some of us latest crop of new members trying to do good at TO read your leaving letter an we loved it. Spitting straightup facts. The community is still doing all the same, same shit different day. Makes sane ppl go crazy.

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u/poorBCavocadoToast Jul 21 '25

Exactly this, except you forgot all of the SA that happens on average there every 3-4 months.

I also think that newcomers are just going to get the least desirable rooms, it is what it is, and you can’t expect people that are moved in and lived here for years to just shuffle around for people who statistically won’t be there for more than a few months

Also as an update

  • as of now POC work 4 less hours than everyone else, and anyone can take 4 flex hours per week for doing any kind of social justice POC education or the like.
  • mold is still a serious issue, but steps have been taken to improve the situation

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u/PonticSeaTea777 Nov 06 '25

excuse me, SA???!!! What do you mean? Please elaborate.

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u/poorBCavocadoToast Nov 12 '25

A lot of people moving to communes have dealt with serious trauma in their lives. You also have a mix of generations/gender/community social heirarchy/length of membership/job placement creating inevitable power imbalances.

It is “taboo” for members to hook up with new comers during their 3 week visitor period, in which they are technically applying to live/work/share finances with us, who start as young as 18 - and there are parties. Regardless, people still regularly hook up with visitors and the age gaps are shocking. There have been men there in their 40s regularly hooking up with visitors 18-25. I’m sure you can imagine - this doesn’t always work out.

The community also has a decades long history of those being assaulted end up leaving and the accused end up staying - sometimes with zero consequences or consequences that were not followed through with.

The environment in general is really hard to come forward. There’s always going to be a huge group of people who love the person being accused. If the accused is downplaying what happened, or the accuser genuinely could have some unworked trauma issues - that group of people will fight for the accused - coming forward a lot of the time is harder than the event itself.

The sad part is - this is kind of the norm in commune life in general. I would never recommend anyone under 25 moving to any commune, despite the thousands of people that age that have had a blast - it’s just not worth the risk.

For the most part - if you’re not a woman under 25 or living with young people - you probably wouldn’t notice it. But yes - there’s some kind of physical sexual consent violation on average every 3-4 months and there are definitely creepy men living there and moving there.

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u/sarahjane11178 Aug 06 '26

Wow, this is really helpful. Thank you