What is the structure of the 'Economic System' of the BKWSU?

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ex-l

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What is the structure of the 'Economic System' of the BKWSU?

Post11 Apr 2012

From: Janki: Shiv Baba through BB from 1937-1969
Dadi Janki 8.4.2012 wrote:See how Shiv Baba through Brahma Baba from 1937-1969 made us belong to Him with the study, sustenance and attainments ...

Funnily enough I was thinking of Dadi Janki yesterday and who she was once recorded as saying, "any money given to her would go directly to Madhuban". What do you make of that?

What I make of it is that she was encouraging individuals to give cash to her on the basis that she would supposedly take it to Madhuban, thereby exploiting the superstition taken from Hinduism that to give money to Madhuban is magically more karmically beneficial.

Who knows where it goes or went though ... international airfares ... her own pocket money ... how much of it actually is accounted for? What is does mean is that she circumvents any donations that might have been going to be given to the local center and used there.

Someone else just asked "what the structure of the BKWSU was?". I'd like to specifically ask what the 'economic structure' of the BKWSU is?

I'd say it was not so much a "trickle-up" economic system ... but a "gush up" economic system.

It's a bad joke ... "trickle-down economics" is a theory in right wing politics which suggests that tax breaks or other economic benefits to businesses and the wealthy will benefit poorer members of society by improving the economy as a whole, e.g. the rich spend and the poor earn a trickle on the way down.

I am suggesting that with the Brahma Kumaris, it is the other way around, the money goes from the poor to the rich and powerful in gushes ... and all that 'trickles down' is a used sari or a piece of toli and a gaze from time to time.

Of course, it is not written down anywhere in an operating manual. The unwritten and flexible nature is one of the strengths of the Brahma Kumari system but is open to abuse, e.g. we had one case where a sponsor made a big donation to a local center only for the zone-in-charge to fly in and take the cheque away never to be seen again. I understand the local center failed and the individuals responsible for attracting the donation have since left.

The BKs call themselves a family ... but then so does the Mafia. If it is financially run like a family, then it still operates to patriarchal model where "Dadi decides" and the children are never told what is going on except when they need to get out and earn more.

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