Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Boodleheimer]

oh, and the moon landing was faked, JFK's assissination was a conspiracy between LBJ and the CIA, and Eisenhower agreed to give aliens cow lips in exchange for advanced technology.

can't think of anything else from Sneakers, but other contributions would be appreciated.

[jaderedux]

and here have a nice sip of this kool-aid its yummy

[Rteacher]

The term conspiracy may be properly applied to many actions involving "an evil, unlawful, treacherous, or surreptitious plan formulated in secret by two or more persons..."
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/conspiracy

Many Arabs and Muslims would argue that the invasion of Iraq by GW was a conspiracy. Any unlawful collusion by big businesses could be termed "conspiracies"... And all manner of surreptitious activities engaged in by governmental intelligence agencies (sometimes involving propagation of disinformation...) may be termed conspiracies (especially by political enemies or if laws are broken or unnecessarily nullified/suspended...)

The fact that "conspiracy theory" has developed a bad connotation reflecting on the person pointing to a possible conspiracy is probably at least partly due to the combined effort of influential conspirators and key elements of the mass media...

Associating practicioners of bhakti yoga/ Krishna consciousness with "kool-ade" (i.e. the mass suicidal Christian cult allegedly coaxed or tricked into drinking poison by its leader, Jim Jones ...) may seem like a witty jab at a bunch of people obviously out of the mainstream. But actually, many Krishna devotees have become part of "mainstream" society, holding respectable jobs and positions in academia...

Unfortunately, there are always some "bad apples" in every group, and there were several bad Hare Krishna "leaders" who (after evidently conspiring somehow to get too much unchecked power...) did some crazy stuff - especially in the ten year period following the founder's death in 1977...

[Rteacher]

Dang it! "JongnoGuru" had just made a provocative post (releasing pent-up negative feelings about a former Hare Krishna "new guru"/nutjob he was familiar with...) and he decided to delete it...

Actually, I was in a hotel room with a PC, and I wrote an elaborate reply, but the fricken computer crashed ... Although I was ready to crash myself, I headed out to a PC bang at 1:30am to rewrite my post in response to his - and his is mysteriously gone (possibly due to some international conspiracy to drive me crazy... )

Anyway, he made reference to one "Hamsadutta", who he said was hand-picked by Srila Prabhupada to be one of eleven gurus entrusted to initiate new disciples after he passed away... He was notorious for getting ISKCON banned in Germany for a while after encouraging devotee book distributer-fundraisers to claim that they were collecting money to help starving people in India (or Bangladesh...)

When Prabhupada found out what happened, he was furious and ordered everyone involved in fund-raising not to misrepresent, unnecesarily agitate people, or break laws. In Florida, I personally got permits and tried to maintain good public relations (which eventually was ruined by groups of renegade devotees - mostly from West Virginia - who felt they were above the law...)

Anyway, Hamsadutta was a real character. Reportedly, his father (or grandfather) had been a personal cook for Hitler. The pressure of acting as a "guru" - a position he hustled to get even though he was mentally unstable - really caused him to crack.

He later admitted to not being able to give Bhagavad-gita class in the temple without first downing a shot - or two - of whiskey. He started stockpiling weapons at his center in North California. He even sent out groups of thugish "disciples" to more-or-less rob banks and gas stations...

At one point, he went totally berserk, got really drunk, and drove around with a gun shooting at liquor store windows...

How was such a "loose cannon" selected to be a guru by Srila Prabhupada? ... Well, actually, Prabhupada wanted that all his disciples who sincerely followed devotional prinicples and preached effectively to serve as various types of gurus. He didn't want them actively involved in temple management, though. There was a governing board (GBC) that had been set up as the ultimate managing authority over many relatively autonomous local centers with their own temple presidents an boards of directors.

Somehow, these eleven guys appointed as only the first (of many) initiating gurus managed to usurp authority by setting up a "zonal guru" system which gave each of them free reign to rule the roost in their part of the world. The preferred organizational model of most of these guys was the Mafia. One of the "new gurus" who eventually shamefully fell down (Ramesvara in L.A.) actually watched Godfather films repeatedly to perfect his management style...

Besides Hamsadutta and Ramesvara, there were a number of others who apparently cracked under the pressure of being a "guru" - Kirtanananda, Bhavananda, Jayatirtha, Harikesa, and Bhagavan all messed up big time (after previously doing lots of good service as regular devotees...) Some of the gory details of their fall downs from spiritual life are interesting and can be found in the basically factual expose, Monkey On a Stick...

I probably stayed with the organization longer than most Prabhupada disciples because the "zonal guru" in charge of Florida was at least very intellectual, witty, and dynamic preacher (Hrdayananda Goswami...)

And it's probably just a coincidence that most of the eleven gurus "new gurus" were Jewish ...

I won't even get into speculations about FBI/CIA infiltration ...

(Dang, it's late...)

[tomato]

[tomato]

Rteacher, why didn't the Hare Krishna guru know better than to select these wayward disciples?

Any Christians reading this message, why didn't Jesus know better than to select Judas?

[Rteacher]

Arguably, they were only selected as officiating priests (rtviks) who would iniitiate on behalf of the real guru (Bhaktivedanta Swami Srila Prabhupada...)

On his death-bed, Srila Prabhupada was questioned by his leading disciples on how initiations would procede in his absence, and he said that he would select some senior men from various parts of the world to immediately act as rtviks on his behalf.

He further added, when pressed, that if they become qualified, they would become regular gurus on his order.

He never specifically ordered any of them to become regular initiating guru (diksa) before he passed away, but it has been rationalized that the Governing Board of Commissioners (GBC) reflects his will, and everyone should work cooperatively within that framework as far as possible.

Some argue that at some point spiritual orders gave way to corrupt mundane politics, but I don't think it's that black and white (though cooperation has been lacking, and ISKCON seems to be hanging on by a thread in some places...)

Because of free will (given by God) there is nothing to stop demons from posing as men of God (and Srila Prabhupada predicted that would be the case in ISKCON, saying that it could only be destroyed from within...)

And, in this age, both divine and demonic mentalities are present within the same body. As long as one rigorously follows regulative principles of devotion, the lower self can be held in check even if one is not on a high spiritual platform.

But, if one mistakenly thinks that he (or she) has attained some elevated level and neglects to follow basic principles (or makes offenses) such a person will inevitably fall back to previous demonic habits...

Everything is under the control of God - not only creation and maintenance of the universe, but also its destruction.

The point is that the material world was not created to be a really nice place where we can somehow make a permanent settlement and be happy.

There will always be suffering, corruption, and eventual death here... Intelligent people should desire to go back to our original home in the spiritual sky (Vaikuntha) where there are no material miseries, so we really can be happy forever.

The key is to sincerely follow instructions given by God and his pure representatives. It is not recommended to imitate them, however.

[JongnoGuru]

[Rteacher]

The devotee who wrote Guru Business was ultimately killed by a hardened (many killings of Viet Cong, villagers, etc...) Vietnam vet who acted as a hitman for Kirtanananda's West Virginia ("New Vrindavana") project.

Because there was some drug dealing there (as was probably the case in Hamsadutta's center...) there was naturally some violence. The main people involved were considered fringe devotees, and I don't think most devotees in that large community knew what was going on.

The author of Guru Business was very disgruntled that his wife had been initiated by Kirtanananda without his consent. He did some research and concluded that the authority of all the new gurus was illegitimate, and he decided that Kirtanananda was particularly evil - and should be killed.

When another crazy devotee actually attacked Kirtanananda with a lead pipe and nearly killed him (fracturing his skull and putting him in a coma) the author of Guru Business he reportedly thought it was a good idea to publicly call for someone to shoot him to finish the job...

In view of the large number of loyal/fanatical disciples that Kirtananda had (including "Tirtha" - the hardcore Viet nam vet...) he ("Sulocana") might as well have carried a large sign with a bulls eye and in bold letters: SHOOT ME!

Actually, there is some indication of FBI involvement (pre-dating Waco) at that point because an agent conveniently provided Kirtanananda's men a detailed list of "Sulocana's" various residences and hide-outs in his native California...

Several "New Vrindavana" people had him staked out for a while before Tirtha gunned him down in his small motor home. Kirtanananda served time for his part in the conspiracy - evidently he was aware that there was a plot but didn't want to know any details - and "Tirtha remains in prison.

(In my thirteen years as a full-time devotee I visited many centers and temples, including New Vrindavana, I never detected any sign of violence, abuse, or widespread corruption within ISKCON until this incident in the mid-80s - and even this was understandable on its face...

Up till then, most temple devotees that I knew thought it a big deal if someone was caught smoking a cigarette, let alone marijuana. It was shocking to discover that so many criminal activities were committed - especially at Kirtanananda's and Hamsadutta's centers.

I appreciate "JongnoGuru's" posting the link to the Guru Business article because I've never actually read it - just summaries and comments made by others. Having read some very inflammatory memos written by its author, Sulocana dasa, and having heard him derided as a pot-smoker, I expected that it would be similarly very strident and paranoid...

However, as I've started reading some of it, I can understand that he actually was more of a "Prabhupada man" than most of the so-called "new gurus" he strongly criticized. And he was murdured just two days after finishing this very incisive and personal piece of investigative writing (May 22, 1986, in Los Angeles ...)
http://www.harekrsna.org/pada/guru_biz.htm#A%20RUDE%20AWAKENING

The "zonal guru" system certainly proved to be a major bust for all concerned and caused problems that still haven't been fully resolved in ISKCON although there have been a lot of reforms instituted...

Here's a "New Vrindavana Time-Line" (posted on a website seemingly sympathetic to that controversial project) that gives a different perspective of events...http://www.hanover.edu/newvrindavan/timeline.html

This independent website gives some background to the murder of Sulocana mostly from the perspective of a devotee who was an involved insider: http://www.hare-krishna.org/articles/1003/1/quotTirtha-was-a-Mass-murdererquot/

And this recent article reprinted from a local newspaper includes some commentary by a state police officer assigned to investigate NV:
http://www.harekrsna.com/sun/features/03-07/features595.htm