Dear Turq, interesting critique.
Different now from a decade or two ago around here (the TM Movement) is that
meditating folks do not really want very much from the TM org any more. So
there is not that leverage over people using 'that need to belong' over them.
There is very little need for access. Fewer kids needing financial aid. Just
a couple hundred getting money as financial aid from Howard Settle to be
employed as full time practicing meditators in the domes. The lifer-staff
people are a small circle. The lifer-staff are potentially the victims
remaining who could be left vulnerable to spritual bullying. Generally there
is no longer a need to meat out access to Maharishi or access to a powerful
center. Most people of the old TM-movement have melted away. Yes, there is a
goodwill around about meditating but, there are lots of options otherwise for
spiritual progress now.
The TM-movement is nearly irrelevant even in Fairfield, except that they
facilitate a large group meditation up there, and still offer to teach a
meditation to some in the general public. Yes there are some people hold up,
like Bevan in Vedic City and some people around him. But not many. Some of
the potential nuts who still would be inclined to terrorize people are around,
but not many. As was described to me by one of Bevan's direct peers in the
movement the other day, Bevan's lack of social skills is an essential problem
still. However, over the years most of the real nuts have either died, drifted
away, and in some cases got shunned by some of the better angels in the middle.
TM is at a different point from the cult of Scientology but the similarities
are instructive. Thanks. To be forewarned is to be fore-armed, as the olde
saying goes. You've obviously seen a lot.
I love you,
-Buck
--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, turquoiseb <no_reply@...> wrote:
>
> There are many ludicrous things about the COS (Cult
> Of Scientology). The whole story of Xenu, for example.
> But IMO the thing that has done them the most damage,
> and may in fact bring them down eventually, is the
> policy that they first proudly proclaimed as part of
> their essential dogma, and now practice in secret,
> even though they claim that they don't.
>
> That is their policy of "Fair Game," in which anyone
> who doubts or criticizes the COS is declared an "enemy
> of the Church" and is therefore subject to "whatever
> is necessary" to demonize, silence, or marginalize
> them. With the COS, this has taken the form of lawsuits,
> planting "evidence" in attempts to get its critics
> arrested, putting live rattlesnakes in critics' mail
> boxes, and much, much worse.
>
> THAT is not just belief, or the faith of True Believers.
> THAT is embarrassing, and the stuff of paranoia and
> destructive cult behavior. And THAT is what is going
> to eventually bring the COS organization down.
>
> My contention is that there is a similar policy in
> the TMO. It's not "official," of course, and it's not
> written down anywhere, but anyone who has been an
> actual part of the organization knows that it exists,
> and that it's religiously practiced.
>
> TM teachers who chooses to leave the TMO are *not*
> just allowed to do so, as expressions of their own
> free will. They are first characterized as having
> something wrong with them ("unstressing," or actual
> mental illness), and if they commit the Ultimate Sin
> and "go public" with their views, that's only the
> beginning. The TMO pursues them with lawsuits, and
> in public by consistently challenging their motives
> (by ascribing nefarious or profit-driven motives to
> them), their sanity, their reputations, and their
> credibility. Their former friends shun and diss them.
> It's the very essence of cult behavior, and IMO will
> be as destructive to the TMO in the long run as the
> COS's Fair Game policy will be to them.
>
> And the thing is IT'S JUST NOT NECESSARY. On
> Fairfield Life or in the press, everybody is Just
> Another Person Expressing An Opinion. *Consistent*
> attempts to demonize these Persons With Opinions
> and to try to characterize them as part of some
> organized conspiracy are perceived by most people on
> the planet as exactly what they are -- expressions of
> paranoia, self-importance, and out-of-control anger
> and attachment on the part of the people acting these
> behaviors out.
>
> But on another level, it seems that for the people acting
> these petty, high school vendettas out, they are very
> NECESSARY indeed. I would go so far as to say that
> those who have demonstrated a *consistent* need to
> demonize and dump on critics of TM and the TMO on this
> forum HAVE NO CHOICE. They couldn't stop this behavior
> if they tried. It's been demonstrated to them for so long,
> and by so many peers in the TMO, that they have come to
> think of it as normal, and admirable.
>
> It's not. And it's not a sign of strength. It's a sign
> of weakness. And that weakness is going to eventually
> bring down the organization they're trying so hard to
> "defend." So in a very real sense, IMO, the "Gotta get
> the critics" players on this forum are the worst enemies
> that the TMO has.
>
