BKs' own production of self-promotion

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jann

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BKs' own production of self-promotion

Post09 Apr 2016

Lies, or not telling the truth and not even embarrassed about it? :shock:

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Pink Panther

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Re: BKs own production of selfpromotion

Post10 Apr 2016

Well, Denise begins by choosing a definition & the judgement made according to that definition which suits her position. Then wanders off. There’s no real examination of what other ways any group, or even a major religion, may be a ‘cult’ in the common use of the word - a member of a group which encourages an unquestioningly favourable & homogenous mindset in its adherents. (TBH, I did not watch it all through, so she may have gone to that later, if anyone watches it through, let us know in a reply)

Even if one stays with the original source & judgement based on the definition she prefers, that of the Vatican:
    Does she question the definition? No.
    Does she question or analyse upon what basis their judgement of the BKs is made? No.
    Do any of the allegations or evidence available that may challenge these judgements get presented? No.

”He is not guilty your honour, because his PR material says so"!

Such materials are ”self-promotional” in more than one way. They are made by them to promote themselves. But also, they are made for promoting TO themselves, i.e. anyone who may have questions or doubts will be pointed to watch these to find their answers or reassurances.

If anyone was able to survey who watches these videos, I bet you’d find the vast majority are BKs or those with connection - like here, family of-, friends of -, and ex- BKs.

I have always respected Denise’s clarity of communication and intelligence but if you reviewed her talks etc over the decades you would pick up more and more equivocations and rationalisations ‘excusing' the BKs in comparison to other beliefs and the mainstream.

Her talks in earlier days were more definite about what the BKs are (rather than "are not") and their uniqueness, stating a positive thesis. They were not concerned, as recent ones are, with being reassurances of how benign they are, or for ameliorating the public's (or a wavering BK's) concerns, or with being ecumenical ”me too” statements.

GuptaRati 6666

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Re: BKs own production of selfpromotion

Post10 Apr 2016

Hello Pink.

You have presented many important questions, which have greater value than the answers the BKs may present to the public to maintain their name brand, East and West.

One question I add to your questions is: How authentic is Denise? How authentic is her absolute and relative standards of legal and spiritual ethics?
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Pink Panther

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Re: BKs own production of selfpromotion

Post10 Apr 2016

How authentic is Denise? How authentic is she absolute and relative standards of legal and spiritual ethics?

As authentic as anyone who has devoted their life to a "cause” or a faith whose pride and self-worth is dependant on never admitting they may have made a fundamental mistake.

This is the motivation for convincing others. The more people that are convinced and give acclaim (including the already converted), the more they validate her and her choices. Its the ”drug" of success based on others feedback.
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ex-l

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Re: BKs' own production of self-promotion

Post10 Apr 2016

I remember her from back in the early days but did not have much contact.

She was a a bit of a "star" BK in the early days, in that she was intelligent and capable. A model Western BK with her neat sari and tightly braided hair. If I was to add my interpretation, was an equal or even challenger to Jayanti (probably smarter but not a Sindi). Without a doubt, if she had not fallen into the BKWSU, she could have gone on to have a successful academic or professional career. It would be interesting to take a closer look at her experience.

I heard at one stage she had some kind of burn out/breakdown and went back to her natural family to recover, and had "issues" with Big Mohini in the USA.

She was one of the first Western BKs and certainly widened the horizons for BK expression, e.g. with her more New Agey meditation commentaries but I got the feeling she was sidelined a little for not being Indian and, perhaps, for being too intellectual in comparison to the Indian average ... in a sense, they kept her down.

What is her story?

For a while, perhaps after the burn out, she spent time in India developing some published materials for them. Now she is being given this purpose as official apologist for the cult ... like you say, Pink, offering Western BKs a script to work from.

To answer Gupta's question ... "null points". Basically, no BKs have. The only BKs with ethics are ex-BKs because if have ethics, you rapidly come to a point where you have to say, "I am not having anything to do with ... I am not support this".

I've been reading about the difference between Asia "morality/amorality" and post-Christian Western morality from the point of view of Asians who have converted to Christian values and put great value onto the influence of the Puritans.

My primary criticism of the BKs is that they have no understanding of the idea of absolutes and ethics ... what matters for them is just expedience (what is useful or not). "Values" only as in the "extra added value" marketing spiel. That their religion is still very much based on propitiation ...

That is to say, it is still very much a religion based on appeasing or satisfying their god spirit and leaders in order to gain favours and rewards rather than having value for right behaviour. A system which tolerates a lot of wrong behaviour (corruption/cover up/immorality/illegalities).

Indeed, the quickest way to find yourself sidelined as a BK is to question the right behaviour of their leaders and other BKs. What is taught and rewarded is; not looking, not questioning, and towing the party line.

So, to that end, who or what is Denise?

I have no idea if she is working to reform the BKs at all. I suspect that she really has very little real power within the BK machine ... therefore, at best, all she is doing for me is polishing a very poisoned turd. One might compliment her polishing skills ... but be forced to ask, could she not be applying them somewhere else more beneficial.

I wonder when her faith will collapse ... or whether she's just towing the party line, as doing so will mean she gets to spend her retirement living in comfort with servants on Mount Abu, being looked after by their huge wealth?
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ex-l

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Re: BKs' own production of self-promotion

Post10 Apr 2016

There's an increasing number of English language videos with her now, including one on racism which I will watch later, but they are all very staged ... just an extension of their usual public service programme formula.

What would be more impressive if they were willing to face an independent, informed and critical interviewers instead of just themselves. It's funny how they behave as if we don't exist.

Remember when "Power to Face" was a divine virtue?

Here's what Denise says about herself. I wonder how it stacks up from other individuals who knew her and the BKs?

I think their "About Brahma Kumaris" website was largely a direct response to issues raised on this and other ciritical websites, but is just more PR material rather than anything substantial, let alone reform.

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Re: BKs' own production of self-promotion

Post10 Apr 2016

Denise was influenced by Janki Dadi. She came to the BK system as a journalist for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. Janki, in many respects, was her mentor.

In addition to her seva in Canada, she played a significant role in the seva in the United States. Denise was instrumental along with Chandru bhen in founding of the centers in San Antonio and Tuskegee in the spring of 1978. In the fall of 1978, Denise and Chandru, after Janki Dadi's visit to the USA for the first time, departed the center in San Antonio for the West Coast and later started service in Los Angeles, and before the service center in San Francisco. Errol in the summer of 1980 spent time at the San Francisco center assisting in the service as he had done in the summer of 1978 in association with Denise and Chandru in San Antonio.

I will be interviewing Errol later this week and I will ask him about his experiences with Denise and Chandru.

Errol arrived in the USA in the later summer of 1977 following his visit to Abu, Bombay and Delhi in 1976/1977. In the spring of 1978, he spent a weekend in San Antonio as Denise and Chandru were commencing seva in Texas. He then spent his spring break of 1978 assisting in the service in Texas and returned to Tuskegee with Denise and Chandru.

Errol at that time was a pre-veterinary student at Tuskegee on a Government of Guyana Scholarship. Chandru and Denise assisted him in the service at Tuskegee during their week long visit to the South East USA. Due to his service in San Antonio in the summer of 1978, the two yoginis urged Janki Dadi to visit Tuskegee and accompanied her in the late summer of 1978. Barbara Moore by that time had become a full BK, after less than a year of study. Errol, in 1978, was accepted into Tuskegee University School of Veterinary Medicine and graduated in 1984 as a DVM.

GuptaRati 6666

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Re: BKs' own production of self-promotion

Post10 Apr 2016

In the summer of 1980, Errol was a visiting research student at the Cardiovascular Research Center of the University California Medical School in San Francisco. He studied experimental fetal and neonatal cardiovascular surgery in the laboratory of Professor Dr. Abraham Rudolph. Errol also assisted in the service of the San Fran Center. That year was his last association with Denise and Chandru. He would in the rest of the 1980's assist in the service of Texas.

Simon Vivian arrive on the North American scenes in the winter of 1979. Mohini Panjabi arrived in NYC in the later summer or early fall of 1977 after spending more than year in Guyana and the British West Indies. Guyana was the base for launching BK service centers in the West Indies and North America. This a just a bit about Denise.

There is a dark patch in the fabric of her service in North America. A lady with professional back in a white sari and with some intellectual and cultural peerage was bound to create some clash of sanskars between herself and the likes of Mohini bhen. Errol learned from day one to read the BKs, loud and clear, and was able to protect himself as a neophyte Raj Yogi.
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ex-l

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Re: BKs' own production of self-promotion

Post11 Apr 2016

I watched a couple of the videos. It was not enjoyable. In short, the South African interviewer (Magela Pillay) comes across as warm, intelligent, down to earth and has a little sparkle to her; Denise comes across as slightly cold, definitely controlling, a bit condescending and does those freaky "Indian" things some BKs pick up ... voice inflections and typical hand movement/"finger mudras" type things; the flick, the A-OK sign. At various points she become quite combatant claiming. I think there a hardness or shiftiness in her eyes, and she comes across as calculating.

Magella has been a BK for 22 years, it seems.

She promotes the false/inaccurate history story and, I think, allows a false claims to be made of her, e.g. that she was the first person in the West to convert. I am pretty sure that was actually Stephan Nagel of Germany (in Delhi, 1970). And I think she is plain wrong when it comes to her explanation of the white sari which she claims is "the colour of celibacy". It's actually the colour of death (the sadhus use saffron) and was an emblem of Gandhi's movement which the BKs later adopted.

She completely misses the point when it comes to the perfectly reasonable questions an rambles on and on and on ... at one point the interview looks like she is falling asleep or yawning and the look on her face says, "who is this person?"

And Denise spouts complete bullsh** about the white sari as a uniform ... claiming that, "only one dozen others globally, outside of India, wear the sari" at 15:30.

The look on Magela face says, "you've got to be kidding me" ... she looks as if she is going to laugh at the claim.
BK Denise Lawrenece wrote:The one dozen people in the world who are dressed like this (Brahma Kumaris in white saris) out of India ...

The interview poses a theoretical question about someone walking into a centre in Stuttgart and seeing a BK in a white sari. Denise steams in insisting that, "it just would not happen ... it is not ... information wrong there", completely missing the point that it was a hypothetical question, and going off on how Brahma Kumaris in Germany have no uniform because the government banned organizations with uniforms after WWII.

That's probably just an excuse the German BKs use not to dress up Indian!

It's also BS because priest and nuns all wear "uniforms" in Germany too.

Then she calls it "ceremonial dress" ... which is, of course, a uniform!

Knowing BKs from the inside, it funny to watch how she spouts bullsh** about Amrit Vela posing it as merely "my quiet time", and how everything everyone does in BKism is their choice ... that "everything a person does they do because they decide to" ... That is not the military ... (actually, their god spirit calls it the Shiv-Shakti Army) ... and there's no one tell anyone what to do ... that it's not prescriptive.

Well, that's not true ...

There's a lot of pressure to follow Maryadas, demands even if you want to go to Madhuban ... and it's certainly not universally true because it certain does not apply to, say, young girls in centres in India.

That's how they like to present it to relative wealthy and free Westerners.

When pushed, I was quite surprised by such responses like, "I do not really need to justify myself ... not about proving who is right or wrong" falling back on the subjective and how it's all about how we "feel". Quoting the Japanese quack Dr Emoto as scientific proof of her hypotheses.

Then the funny part ... when asked why all the construction when the End of the World is coming, Denise claims they are building buildings "to relieve distress of large numbers of people" come natural disasters ... that the BKs are "fundamentally philanthropic" ... and then goes off on some total tangent about the BKs "provide medical care for car accidents" and starts to lecture on road safety, driving skills and power cuts!!! It's bizarre ... but by that time I guess the watchers have forgotten when the question was.

The road safety angle seems to be a link to Magela's work/BK PR in South Africa.

Oh yes ... "Why when Destruction is about to happen, are you sucking up millions of dollars and building multi-million dollar buildings and solar energy plants?"

It's for the "power cuts", she says ... utterly sidestepping any response regarding Destruction, a word she never uses in all the talk about "transformation" etc.

But her words that struck me the most carried what almost seemed like a kind of relish over the idea of ...

In BKism, "you are on your own".

I'd re-state that, "you are entirely cut off from others".

There was another video, "My Yagya, My Life" but it contained zero autobiographical information.

What surprised me the most was how unchanged the waffling lectures were from 30 years.

Denise is current the head of the "Overseas Coordination Centre", whatever that is.

Laughably, considering she is being asked about whether the BKs are an End of the World cult, the open graphics of Godlywood Studios include a head with a suicide bomb inside of it!!! Five sticks of dynamite with some wires as a watch ticking off the final seconds until the head blows up!

GuptaRati 6666

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Re: BKs' own production of self-promotion

Post12 Apr 2016

The BKs now and in the future can use their solar energy reserve to become players in the Grand Chess Game as described by Henry Kissinger and President Carter's former National Security Adviser. Professor Dr. Michio Kaku, a nuclear physicist and the grand architect of String Theory, has predicted that solar hydrogen electrical energy will become an important source of energy above nuclear energy. The super-powers, including China are paying close attention to advancing the alternative energy industry. There is a connection between the alternative energy industry, the global economy, and the alternative health industry.

A few years ago, Dr. Gary Null indicated that the chaos in the global economy and failure of allopathic medicine will contribute to the increased dependence on alternative medicine by consumers globally. It is possible that the BKs can be posturing to play major roles in the global alternative health market and the alternative energy industry. Both industries are of strategic importance to the super-powers. I suggest watching: Knocking At The Devil's Door.
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Pink Panther

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Re: BKs' own production of self-promotion

Post12 Apr 2016

Thanks for the run down. I cannot watch such stuff for very long without either my stomach churning or the fur on my back rising. You deserve a medal for courage.

Denise was the first female westerner to join the BKs. If Stephan Nagel no longer identifies as a BK then, based on how she phrases it, she might get away with saying she is the first of current BKs.

The rest might be seen as the BKs being hoisted on their own petard, including the explosive opening graphics, probably could be psycho-analysed!

Re: Destruction. She also uses the word ”renovation” instead of "transformation" in the other video. Which goes against the Murli metaphor which is that the old house is beyond further patch-ups so it needs to be knocked down and rebuilt.

GuptaRati 6666

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Re: BKs' own production of self-promotion

Post12 Apr 2016

Here is a link to the documentary from Dr. Helen Coldicott's website: Knocking on the Devil's Door 1-8

My apologies for the title in the post. It should be: Knocking On The Devil's Door. It was produced and directed by Dr. Gary Null.
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Re: BKs' own production of self-promotion

Post12 Apr 2016

Helen Caldicott has been a decades-long campaigner against nuclear energy, not just weapons. As a medical doctor she has organised many events and groups involving doctors and scientists who work in the very complex fields of medicine, biology and genetics to educate the public and governments of what radioactivity does to the human and other animal genomes.

Radioactivity lasts for a verrrrrry long time - multiple kalpas in fact, but somehow the god of BKs doesn’t know this and has taught that nuclear war is inevitable and the only way to ”cleanse” the world quickly of all remnants of Kali yuga, cities, civilisations, and the billions of human, animal and plant life who are not karmically worthy of entering Sat- Yuga.

So next time you talk to a BK about their beliefs, don't just ask ”what is the population of Sat Yuga (Golden Age) and how do we get from 7 billion to that?”. You should also ask, ”how does that much radioactivity that will cover vast areas of the globe disappear so fast and leave nature in better shape than before?”

A quick look up of Dr Gary Null shows he is someone who profits from being an anti-science spokesman -> marketer of his own brands of ”health supplements” and a bit of a conspiracy theorist, all mixed in with some valid social criticism (you have to mix some truth into your BS otherwise people won’t latch on).
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ex-l

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Re: BKs' own production of self-promotion

Post12 Apr 2016

Pink Panther wrote:Re: Destruction. She also uses the word ”renovation” instead of "transformation" in the other video. Which goes against the Murli metaphor which is that the old house is beyond further patch-ups so it needs to be knocked down and rebuilt.

I think that observation must stand as yet another key twist in the re-marketing of themselves.

Soon it's not that the old world needs to be destroyed in Destruction ... Lekhraj Kirpalani's raging ego death wish at being rejected for not being god ... it just needs a little renovation around the edges which, presumably, they will take credit for by channeling their god spirit's vibrations into the "mindspace" as she calls it.

On a science note, the feasibility of a virtually emissions free solar hydrogen economy has been proposed since the early 1970s (see Professor John O. M. Bockris and others) during which time the BKs were still wishing the world to be 'Destruction-ed' in 1976.

The Brahma Kumaris have added nothing to it technically or scientifically, just added their usual yukti or getting someone else to pay for it ... in their case including millions from the German and Indian governments ... and I suspect they are taking that model international, and attempting to get other foreign governments to pay for other solar energy installations.

Nothing wrong with intermediate technology style solar energy ... it's just the ethics of it which stinks when it comes to the BKs. Getting donors to pay millions of dollars when you are leading them to believe the world is going to be over in 2 to 3 years is just not on.

The real payback period for such solar energy systems might be anything from 25 to 50 years or more.
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Pink Panther

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Re: BKs' own production of self-promotion

Post13 Apr 2016

Soon it's not that the old world needs to be destroyed in Destruction ... Lekhraj Kirpalani's raging ego death wish at being rejected for not being god ... it just needs a little renovation around the edges which, presumably, they will take credit for by channeling their god spirit's vibrations into the "mindspace" as she calls it.

Paradoxes and Dissonances.

Denise acknowledges the BKs are an ”apocalyptic" religion but tries to ”defuse" that as being ”cultish” by comparing it to the Abrahamic monotheistic religions of Christianity and Islam which also have strong apocalyptic teleology. Apocalypses seem to go with a "winner take all” final confrontation of good vs evil, God vs Satan, Ahura Masda vs Ahriman.

Judeaism is fundamentally less apocalyptic, It appears in the later books of the Old Testament, around 200BC along with the rise in mentions of Satan, who is conspicuously absent in the early books.

The word ”Apocalypse” comes form the Greek word for "revelation" - and the Christian gospel of John is called the Book of Revelation, concerned with the end of the world and Judgement Day etc.

But one of the things that differentiates the major world religions that are apocalyptic from apocalyptic cults is that cults see the apocalypse as imminent. So we get Christian cults that teach "the End Days” or Armageddon (scene of the final battle) is definitely happening on a specific date or in the lifetimes of its members.

The BKs obviously are more similar to these cults than to, say, the Anglican church.

One of the paradoxes of the BKs is their constant belief in the imminent apocalypse but continuing to accumulate vast property holdings and infrastructure including long-term projects like their solar-powered energy to be ”environmentally responsible" while, at the same time, placing large and increasing demands on the water-deficient environments of Rajasthan (it’d be interesting to compare water usage per BK versus local bheel).

Paradoxes like these must initiate a cleavage in a person’s psychological integrity which in turn leads to the cognitive dissonance evident in so many otherwise intelligent people who are pukka BKs.

Your line about ”Lekhraj Kirpalani’s raging ego death wish” triggered a thought or three. I have come to understand, through the stories of various BKs I’ve known, how the whole ”destruction” scenario is real for them, because their childhoods saw their whole world destroyed, through sexual, physical or psychological abuses shattering any security any child needs.

Your line today gave me insight into Lekhraj Kirpalani’s psyche.

The I Ching (ancient chinese 'Book of Changes') says ”When the Way comes to an end, change. Having changed, you pass through.”

The journey of self-awareness, whether you call it spiritual or psychological or whatever, often sees us project outside, onto others or the world, what we are not willing to see or change in ourselves. The journey of self-knowledge is burdened or blocked, as most of us here will have experienced at some time, with ego.

Ego is a useful mechanism, it brings together memories, habits and awareness (among other things) to create a functioning identity separating me from ”the not-me” by which we can act and survive as individuals.

(Stay with me)

But, by its very necessary function of continuity of consistent consciousness that is independent of others or the immediate unconscious impulses (so we like to think), it ”doesn’t like” to change, it seeks to sustain itself. What we might call a healthy ego is one that functions well, the person is both confident and open to learn and change, whereas the unhealthy one, whether through having an inflated (superior) or deflated (inferior) sense of self, resists learning and changing, more ”fixed” in its assessment of ”who I am”.

Such a more fixed or rigid ego cannot see or do what the I Ching suggests. When the world is no longer going your Way, serving you, change. Become what will be served by the world, or circumstances, then the way is open again.

That tipping point is where ego changes one way or another. The choice is made whether to ”hold or fold” (a card game analogy) to accept what is outside and change ourselves, or to not accept and make it change like a social activist. The paradox is in becoming yourself through letting go of who you think you are, or how you desire others to see you. (Do you know who I am? - say the self-important when they are being treated the same as others).

I’d assert that Lekhraj Kirpalani reached such a tipping point. His ”choice”, likely motivated by unconscious impulses but informed by culture, personal history and ego desires, was that he (the ego ”he”) was superior, and the world was what had to change to recognise that superiority. ”It’s not me, it's you”.

How could such a vast, complex, unyielding, disrespectful therefore obviously corrupt, adulterated, inferior world ever come around to acclaiming him as the prince and king he once was (as all infants once were)? It would not, so it has to be destroyed and replaced by one that suits.

Know what I mean?
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