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NarCONon crooks surrender
01 Jul 2002
Forward: For a systematic, detailed, professional exposure of Scientology's "Narconon" front group, visit the Narconon Exposed web site.
From: "Fredric L. Rice"
To: IDAJ007@aol.com
Date: 01 Jul 2002
Subject: NarCONon crooks surrender
I've received a photocopy of a letter sent by the NarCONon crooks to the city of Bowdon, Georgia wherein the crooks announce their surrender. I'll have to post the text right now and, if nobody else posts the photograph by the time I [censored by flr], I'll also post the photocopy of the letter.
Now that the Bowdon incident has been resolved I'll be able to add all the e-mails and letters and everything to the Crackpots.ORB web site that specifically addresses the NarCONon fraud. I hope that the events which took place in that small township serve as something of a standard for activists and for local governments who likewise face the threat of Scientology.
This was the second time in my knowledge that the Internet played a massively important role in opposing organized crime of this level. The next time a quack medical fraud tries to set up shop in a town -- whether it's a Scientology criminal enterprise or some other quack medical scam making use of "faith based charoty" tax dollars or tax-money-based "school voucher" frauds, I'd hope that the lesson of Bowdon is well disseminated among other townships which find such frauds attempting to set up operations.
http://www.crackpots.org/bowd47.htm?FACTNet
One of the most controversial and hotly debated questions about Narconon is the nature of its relationship with Scientology - both the religion and the Church. Narconon's critics frequently claim that it is little more than a front for Scientology, used to recruit people into Scientology and to covertly introduce Scientology doctrines into wider society. The Church of Scientology and Narconon naturally deny this, stating that "Narconon drug rehabilitation and drug education is a secular social betterment program with highly effective results. It is a separate and autonomous charitable program that is independent of the Church of Scientology." ["Narconon: A New Life for Drug Addicts" - <http://www.scientology.org/wis/wiseng/25/25-nn.htm>]
But does it matter if Narconon is, as its critics claim, a front for Scientology? It does, for a number of reasons:
Truthfulness. If Narconon is lying about its links with Scientology, why is that and what is it trying to achieve by doing so?
Legality. The United States is the most prominent of a number of countries which have strict legal restrictions on what activities may be undertaken by religious organisations or funded by public bodies.
Fairness. Drug addicts are amongst the most vulnerable individuals in society, who by definition are not in full control of their faculties. They may often be unable to make fully rational decisions about their futures; a particular concern if they are potentially exposed to the often high-pressure recruiting tactics of Scientology.
There is very strong evidence that Narconon is in fact inseparable from Scientology. When one examines the facts in detail, it becomes apparent that there are very close links between the Church of Scientology and that Narconon itself is, in effect, virtually undiluted Scientology. The connections fall into three distinct categories:
Doctrines (similarities between Narconon and Scientology doctrines)
Organisations (links and similarities between the Narconon organisation and the Church of Scientology)
Personnel (the manning of Narconon by Scientologists).
http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Narconon/
The Cult Test
Questions 1 to 10
by A. Orange
1. The Guru is always right.
2. You are always wrong.
3. No Exit.
4. No Graduates.
5. Cult-speak.
6. Group-think.
7. Irrationality.
8. Suspension of disbelief.
9. Denigration of competing sects, cults, religions...
10. Personal attacks on critics.
11. Insistence that the cult is THE ONLY WAY.
12. The cult and its members are special.
13. Induction of guilt, and the use of guilt to manipulate cult members.
14. Dogma, Unquestionable Dogma, and Sacred Science.
15. Indoctrination of members.
16. Appeals to "holy" or "wise" authorities.
17. Instant Community.
18. Instant Intimacy.
19. Surrender To The Cult.
20. Giggly wonderfulness and starry-eyed faith.
21. Personal testimonies of earlier converts.
22. The cult is self-absorbed.
23. Dual Purposes.
24. Aggressive Recruiting.
25. Deceptive Recruiting.
26. No Humor.
27. You can't tell the truth.
28. Cloning -- You must redefine yourself and your life in cult terms.
29. You must change your beliefs to conform to the group's beliefs.
30. The End Justifies The Means.
31. Dishonesty, Deceit, Denial, Falsification, and Rewriting History.
32. Different Levels of Truth.
33. Newcomers can't think right.
34. The Cult Implants Phobias.
35. The Cult is Money-Grubbing.
36. Confession Sessions.
37. A System of Punishments and Rewards.
38. An Impossible Superhuman Model of Perfection.
39. Mentoring.
40. Intrusiveness.
41. Disturbed Guru, Mentally Ill Leader.
42. Disturbed Members, Mentally Ill Followers.
43. Create a sense of powerlessness, covert fear, guilt, and dependency.
44. Dispensed existence
45. Ideology Over Experience, Observation, and Logic
46. Keep them unaware that there is an agenda to change them
47. Thought-Stopping Language. Thought-terminating clichés and slogans.
48. Mystical Manipulation
49. The guru or the group demands ultra-loyalty and total committment.
50. Demands for Total Faith and Total Trust
51. Members Get No Respect. They Get Abused.
52. Inconsistency. Contradictory Messages
53. Hierarchical, Authoritarian Power Structure, and Social Castes
54. Front groups, masquerading recruiters, hidden promoters, and disguised propagandists
55. Belief equals truth
56. Use of double-binds
57. The cult leader is not held accountable for his actions.
58. Everybody else needs the guru to boss him around, but nobody bosses the guru around.
59. The guru criticizes everybody else, but nobody criticizes the guru.
60. Dispensed truth and social definition of reality
61. The Guru Is Extra-Special.
62. Flexible, shifting morality
63. Separatism
64. Inability to tolerate criticism
65. A Charismatic Leader
66. Calls to Obliterate Self
67. Don't Trust Your Own Mind.
68. Don't Feel Your Feelings.
69. The cult takes over the individual's decision-making process.
70. You Owe The Group.
71. We Have The Panacea.
72. Progressive Indoctrination and Progressive Commitments
73. Magical, Mystical, Unexplainable Workings
74. Trance-Inducing Practices
75. New Identity -- Redefinition of Self -- Revision of Personal History
76. Membership Rivalry
77. True Believers
78. Scapegoating and Excommunication
79. Promised Powers or Knowledge
80. It's a con. You don't get the promised goodies.
81. Hypocrisy
82. Denial of the truth. Reversal of reality. Rationalization and Denial.
83. Seeing Through Tinted Lenses
84. You can't make it without the cult.
85. Enemy-making and Devaluing the Outsider
86. The cult wants to own you.
87. Channeling or other occult, unchallengeable, sources of information.
88. They Make You Dependent On The Group.
89. Demands For Compliance With The Group
90. Newcomers Need Fixing.
91. Use of the Cognitive Dissonance Technique.
92. Grandiose existence. Bombastic, Grandiose Claims.
93. Black And White Thinking
94. The use of heavy-duty mind control and rapid conversion techniques.
95. Threats of bodily harm or death to someone who leaves the cult.
96. Threats of bodily harm or death to someone who criticizes the cult.
97. Appropriation of all of the members' worldly wealth.
98. Making cult members work long hours for free.
99. Total immersion and total isolation.
100. Mass suicide.
Bibliography
To go back and forth between the questions and the answers for Alcoholics Anonymous, click on the numbers of the questions and answers.
1. The Guru is always right.
The Guru, his church, and his teachings are always right, and above criticism, and beyond reproach.
In some cults, the guru is dead, but the principle is the same. I use the word "guru" loosely here; in many cults the charismatic leader has the title of minister, priest, yogi, swami, prophet, or all-knowing wise man. Or even, "Chairman Mao." In any case, the leader is always right.
Jeffrey Masson had this to say about phony gurus:
Every guru claims to know something you cannot know by yourself or through ordinary channels. All gurus promise access to a hidden reality if only you will follow their teaching, accept their authority, hand your life over to them. Certain questions are off limits. There are things you cannot know about the guru and the guru's personal life. Every doubt about the guru is a reflection of your own unworthiness, or the influence of an external evil force. The more obscure the action of the guru, the more likely it is to be right, to be cherished. Ultimately you cannot admire the guru, you must worship him. You must obey him, you must humble yourself, for the greater he is, the less you are -- until you reach the inner circle and can start abusing other people the way your guru abused you. All this is in the very nature of being a guru.
My Father's Guru, Jeffrey Masson, 1993, page 173.
(Please note that there is another kind of "guru" -- the genuine kind. Jeffrey Masson was writing about his own experiences with a "spiritual teacher" -- Paul Brunton -- who was a fraud and a fake. But there are some real ones around, even if they sometimes seem as rare as hens' teeth.)
Lafayette Ronald
"L. Ron" Hubbard
The degree to which the cult glorifies the leader is often absurd. L. Ron Hubbard, the leader of Scientology, was lauded as the most magnificent person who had ever lived -- indeed, he was single-handedly the greatest cause of human advancement in all time, because he had been reborn in lifetime after lifetime, returning to Earth again and again, each time bringing yet another great discovery or advancement to humanity. It seemed that L. Ron Hubbard had been, in successive reincarnations, most all of the greatest and most famous men who had ever lived, throughout all of human history.
The Scientology organization publishes a series of 20 books -- the "RON series" -- which exalt L. Ron Hubbard in all of his aspects: RON the Filmmaker, RON the Master Mariner, RON the Auditor, RON the Philosophy of Administration, RON the Adventurer/Explorer, RON the Artist, RON the Photographer, RON the Writer, RON the Humanitarian, RON the Horticulturist, RON the Music Maker, RON the Poet/Lyricist, etc... Hubbard's practice was to dabble in something a bit, like sailing a sailboat for the summer, and then declare himself a Master of the art, deserving of another book...
In many of the cover photographs on those books, Hubbard gazes upwards, towards Heaven, to tell us that he is a spiritual visionary who is above mundane earthly concerns. Coincidentally, on the cover of the Hari Krishna (ISKCON) book The Science of Self Realization, the creepy fraudulent guru A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada strikes exactly the same lofty "spiritual" Heaven-gazing pose. Those phony gurus sure do like to gaze up towards Heaven a lot. (Perhaps because they know that that's about as close to Heaven as they are ever going to get...)
L. Ron Hubbard
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
L. Ron Hubbard
A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
Not to be outdone, Moon's Unification Church claims that Sun Myung Moon and his wife are "The Perfect Parents," the only two perfect people on the planet Earth. And Moon is the new Messiah, here to finish the work that Jesus Christ didn't quite manage to get done right...
Reverend Sun Myung Moon and his wife, and some expendable followers.
The Reverend Sun Myung Moon is boss of the Unification Church, more commonly known as the "Moonies". Now into his eighties, the South Korean sage proclaims that the Virgin Mary was not a virgin and that he and his wife -- the "True Mother" -- are Christ's heirs, on earth to finish Christ's work and unite all Christian churches into his. He has also done time in a US penitentiary for tax evasion.
And the Rajneeshees raved that Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh was actually God Himself returning to Earth in Poona ("Bhagwan" is actually a title that means "embodiment of God"), and they bowed and swooned in ecstasy when he did his daily "drive-by", riding very slowly past them in one of his many Rolls Royces...
Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh
Rajneesh's teachings included, "sex is fun, materialism is good and Jesus was a madman," and the claim that he was "the world's greatest lover." Materialism was so good that he had to spend millions of dollars just to build a huge garage to house all of his Rolls Royces. (By 1985, he had 93 of them.)
From his commune in rural eastern Oregon, his people launched the only germ warfare attack on the USA since the Revolutionary War (when the British deliberately infected Gen. George Washington's troops with smallpox). The Rajneeshees infected the salad bars of several restaurants in The Dalles, Oregon, with salmonella just before election day, in an attempt to make everyone but their own people too sick to vote, so that the Rajneeshees could take over the county government. Rajneesh finally fled back to India to avoid prosecution on a number of charges.
It just goes on and on. In cult after cult, the leader is just the greatest thing. "Ultimately you cannot admire the guru, you must worship him."
If you have any doubts about whether the cult worships the guru, just ask a member, "What are the 10 biggest mistakes that the guru made in setting up the organization and formulating its doctrines?" True believers will give you a look of horror and insist that the guru has never made any mistakes... "The very idea is unthinkable."
There is one big disadvantage for the guru when the cult declares that he is perfect -- he has to act that way, and at least do a good job of faking it. If he is found to be stealing all of the money and screwing all of the girls, it can hurt his believability. A few cults have a clever work-around that spares the cult leader from having to be perfect: Somebody Else, like a dead saint, or an angel, or Jesus, or the Virgin Mary, is the perfect one, and the cult leader merely "channels" the Perfect Master's messages. In that way, what the leader says is still unquestionably true and unchallengeable, because it comes from a Higher Power, but the cult leader can indulge in all of the pleasures of the flesh himself without creating a contradiction. After all, he never said that he was perfect, or any more holy than anybody else. He is just more attuned to the Higher Spheres, and able to hear the Voice of a Higher Power...
Oh, and of course the received messages will suit the leader's whims. Suppose, for instance, that there is a cute young woman whom the leader fancies, but she has gotten involved with another male member of the group. Well, suddenly the Angel or Ascended Master is criticizing that other fellow for indulging in base desires, and telling him to knock it off and have nothing to do with women. Then, when the cult leader jumps on the same young woman, the Ascended Master has no criticism of him... Funny how that works. You can use your own imagination to dream up another dozen similar tricks.
2. You are always wrong.
The individual members of the cult are told that they are inherently small, weak, stupid, ignorant, and sinful, and are in no way qualified to judge the Guru or his church. Should you disagree with the leader or his cult about anything, see Rule Number One.
This cult characteristic is sometimes expressed in the infantization of the cult members: They refer to the leader as "Father", while he refers to them as "my children."
A corollary to this rule is the practice of lowering members' self-esteem by a variety of methods:
Elders or higher-ranking members will berate the newer members and tell them that their work or their spirituality isn't good enough. Again, the beginners are abused by the guru and his henchmen until they reach the inner circle, at which time they can turn around and do it all to someone else.
It is almost a universal cult characteristic that, in the opinion of the cult leader and other elders, newcomers cannot think correctly. They are too "new", or "unspiritual", or not off of drugs and alcohol long enough, or they haven't chanted enough, or meditated enough, or something...
Members will criticize themselves and confess all of their sins and faults, sometimes engaging in public self-criticism or confession sessions. This is used by everybody from Maoist Chinese Communist groups to Christian cults.
Sometimes other members will attack them and criticize them in "group therapy" sessions, or Synanon games.
Members are taught not to trust their own minds or their own judgement:
Your thinking has been corrupted by sin.
Your judgement is no good.
Your thinking is no good.
Your mind is no good.
You have a criminal mind.
You have an alcoholic mind.
You need a complete make-over.
Your thinking is controlled by your addictions.
Your thinking is controlled by your sexual desires.
Your thinking is controlled by Satan.
You haven't been chanting or meditating or doing yoga long enough to have a clear head.
You haven't been off of drugs and alcohol long enough to have a clear head.
Members are taught not to trust their own motives:
Your motives are no good; everything you do is just for yourself.
You are selfish, vain, egotistical, self-seeking, and always trying to get your own way.
You are just seeking ego-gratification.
You are lazy.
You are always trying to do things the easier, softer way.
You just want to get laid.
You just want to get drunk or high.
You just want to avoid the hard work of getting right with God.
Members are taught not to feel their own feelings.
Steven Hassan wrote
Since mind control depends on creating a new identity within the individual, cult doctrine always requires that a person distrust his own self.
Combating Cult Mind Control, Steven Hassan, 1988, page 79.
The fawning hero-worshipper and sociology professor Dr. Lewis Yablonksky praised Synanon's mind-control tactics like this:
The development which takes place is best described as a "resocialization process." The individual is, in a fashion, "brainwashed" to give up his old deviant patterns.
The Tunnel Back, Synanon, Lewis Yablonsky, page 261.
Yablonsky seems to have really gotten a kick out of watching tough old thugs beating up on the wimpy newcomers -- he just gushes with praise for their skill in tormenting the newcomers:
Attacking the Criminal Past: A "Haircut"
The criminal-addict's self-concept makes him inept and keeps him on the wrong side of the law. A postulate at Synanon is that this face to the world must be changed and a new one developed. At Synanon, this is vigorously attempted. It involves a "180-degree" turn from the offender's past patterns of behavior.
...
Charles "Chuck" Dederich
Chuck [Dederich] described part of Synanon's resocialization process in this area to my graduate class in Social Welfare at U.C.L.A.:
"First you remove the chemical. You stop him from using drugs, and you do this by telling him to do it. He doesn't know he can do it himself, so you tell him to do it.
...
The next thing you do is attack the language. Eliminating their criminal language is very important."
...
Language is, of course, the vehicle of culture and behavior; and at Synanon, it is instrumental in shifting the behavior patterns that the addict has used in the past. He begins to use a new, still-undeveloped set of social-emotional muscles. This shift is not accomplished by loving and affectionate cajoling or by discussion of the criminal's symptoms of addiction and crime. There is minimal symptom reinforcement of criminal patterns. Behavior and thinking are modified by verbal-sledgehammer attacks. The attack is modulated and tuned by the expert synanist. The individual is blasted, then supported, and he seems to learn to change his behavior as a result of this positive traumatic experience.
...
An important method of attack therapy in Synanon is the "haircut." This form of verbal attack employs ridicule, hyperbole, and direct verbal onslaught. In part, the "haircut" attack keeps the rug pulled out from under the recovering addict. As Chuck [Dederich] describes it: "If he gets set, begins to feel a little complacent, and feels he's in control of himself -- which, of course, he isn't -- he may even think he can reward himself with a little dope or a pill. Then, of course -- BLOUIE -- he's dead again." This, of course, is also the classic pattern of the rise and fall of the alcoholic.
...
The elements of exaggeration and artful ridicule are revealed in this "haircut." In addition, the pattern of attack and then support is demonstrated. A typical "haircut" goes beyond the bad behavior of the moment and into a more serious problem, and this is also revealed in the session. Unlike synanons, it is not interactional. A "haircut" is usually delivered by several older Synanon members to younger members.
The Tunnel Back, Synanon, Lewis Yablonsky, pages 239-242.
So the member is always kept off balance and the rug is constantly pulled out from under him by the attacks of the elders. He is taught that he cannot trust his own thinking, because he is just a criminal addict, and newcomers can't think right. All of that is in addition to the regular confession sessions, called "synanons" and "The Game", and "The Perpetual Stew". And that was supposed to brainwash the member into being a wonderful new drug-free person. Too bad it didn't work.
Also note the assumption that the member never recovers. He cannot ever be allowed to feel healed and in control of himself -- he must be knocked down every time he tries to stand up -- which leads to the next item, No Exit.
Incidentally, the pattern of behavior described there as a "positive traumatic experience" -- "blasted, and then supported" -- is actually a textbook example of the classic pattern of abuse called "battering". It's what abusive wife-battering husbands do to their wives: beat them up, and then sooth and comfort and reassure them, and then turn around and beat them up again, then sooth and comfort and reassure them again... And the effect it has on the wives is to paralyze them with fear and anxiety -- they never know what to do because they never know what's going to happen next. And plenty of wife-beating husbands rationalize their actions by saying, "Well, I had to teach her a lesson. It was for her own good." And while Yablonsky was describing only nonviolent attacks on the junior Synanon members, it didn't stay that way. As Chuck Dederich later said, "Nonviolence was just a position we took. We change positions all of the time."
3. No Exit.
There is simply no proper or honorable way to leave the cult. Period. To leave is to fail, to die, to be defeated by evil. To leave is to invite divine retribution.
Members are often taught that all kinds of bad things will happen to them if they leave: They will lose all of the spiritual progress that they made while they were in the cult, or they won't be able to get into Heaven, or the Devil or demons will get them, or they will relapse and die of drugs and alcohol... That is another standard cult characteristic: The Cult Implants Phobias, and more of the usual threats and fears are listed under that item.
Obviously, if everybody leaves the cult, then the phony guru's game is over. So he is the one who really has reason to fear people leaving.
There are often tremendous obstacles to leaving. There is usually some form of peer pressure, where loyal cult members will work 'round the clock on any member who has doubts about the cult and longs for his or her old life. The obstacles may be physical ones, like where the cult lives communally in an isolated area, and the cult won't give the member a ride back to "the evil other world". Often, the cult has taken control of all of the members' checkbooks and credit cards, and the member is literally pennyless and will have great difficulty getting out. In extreme cases, like in Rev. Jim Jones' People's Temple, they even shot those who tried to leave.
William Olin wrote about Synanon:
The only subject you could never talk about in Games was splitting, for once you did, no one trusted you any more, and your former brothers and sisters couldn't squeeze you out fast enough. As [the cult leader] Chuck [Dederich] was fond of saying, "That's just the way it is."
Escape From Utopia: My Ten Years in Synanon, William F. Olin, page 179.
The Scientology "Code of Honor" includes these items:
2. Never withdraw allegiance once granted.
3. Never desert a group to which you owe your support.
And Scientologists who are members of the "Sea Org" (sea-going organization) sign a billion-year contract, swearing to serve the cult leader L. Ron Hubbard in all future reincarnations for the next billion years. How's that for not ever leaving the group?
A corollary to the "No Exit" rule is the demonization of those who leave:
They are evil, weak, and selfish.
They are stupid and foolish.
They are wandering in darkness, unable to see.
They are traitors, quitters, turn-coats, disloyal, deserters.
They have sold out.
They are Enemies of the Cross.
They have chosen Evil over Goodness.
They are losers, trying to throw stones at winners.
They didn't chant enough, or they didn't meditate enough, or they didn't do enough yoga.
They weren't really trying.
They didn't follow the procedures correctly.
They were unable to resist the temptation to sin.
They hid their problems, and didn't reveal them to the group.
They couldn't overcome their cravings for sex, alcohol, or drugs.
They couldn't give up their attachments to money and possessions.
They couldn't be honest.
They were always stupid, real losers.
They never could get it right.
They are the spawn of Satan.
They were always trying to destroy our movement.
We are much better off without their bad influences.
The musician Carlos Santana was an admirer of Sri Chinmoy for a while, he said in a Rolling Stone interview, but, "Everything about [Chinmoy] turned to vinegar." And he said that after he left, the group became "vindictive."
When some people left Jim Jones' People's Temple commune in Guyana:
In a barrage of angry meetings, Jones vilified the defectors as "murderers" -- defectors not merely from Jonestown but from socialism, who would rather "pay taxes which buy guns to kill black babies" than stand with the poor and oppressed trying to build a better society in Jonestown. With a no-more-Mr.-Nice-Guy edge in his voice, he announced the beginning of a campaign to fight dangerous bourgeois backslipping within the community; and then fell silent for another few weeks.
Awake in a Nightmare, Ethan Feinsod, 1981, page 142.
In some cults, members are told to absolutely avoid any contact with people who have left the cult. They are told that the departees are evil and dangerous, and must be shunned and ostracized. Good Scientologists may not have any contact with people who have been "declared Suppressive Persons." Jehovah's Witnesses may not talk to or associate with those who have been "disfellowshipped." Likewise, good Moonies may not communicate in any way with those who have left. This is an act of self-preservation for the cult: They don't want to risk their members being told some sensible things by people who were lucky enough to get out. This is also a strong deterrent to people who may be thinking of leaving.
Cardigan, in "Mainstream Cults," makes the point that the fact that every member of the cult knows for certain what will happen if they leave is a potent psychological threat. It goes beyond a vague, remote, "you'll burn in Hell for eternity" threat. It's an immediate, here-and-now threat: "We will not associate with you ever again. You will be completely cut off and alone." No one wants to risk being completely ostracized by his or her friends. And since most cult members associate almost exclusively with just other cult members, such ostracism means being cast completely adrift, and left totally friendless and alone.
Michael Rogge describes the dilemma of those who leave this way:
The true nature of the so-called friendships within the group will only be revealed after a devotee has left the fold. Members have seen this happen, but did not give it a thought at the time, because it happened to someone else. But when they undergo the same fate themselves they will feel the humiliation of not being greeted anymore, marriage gone -- even not being recognized by one's own children anymore.
The outcast feels thrown in an abyss. He is cut off from social contacts, his life in pieces.
The magnitude of this desperate experience should not be under-estimated. The renegade will feel deep shame. He may have confessed in the group intimate secrets, which are now being ridiculed by his former so-called friends.
The expulsee, deeply hurt, may become embittered and even enter into a suicidal mental state.
ON THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SPIRITUAL MOVEMENTS, Michael Rogge (URL)
A few cults, like Yogi Bhajan's 3HO, specialize in kicking people out as a means of practicing terrorism; you either instantly obey all orders and believe everything you are told, or you are gone, banished in disgrace. But that still isn't an honorable exit. In the Jehovah's Witnesses, Jehovah 'sifts out' those not truly 'in the truth', those without 'the right heart condition' which is why people leave or must be "disfellowshipped". In the eyes of the cult, no one leaves for legitimate reasons.
On the other hand, some other cults, like Scientology, are extremely possessive: they won't allow members to leave at all, under any conditions. Some cults, including Scientology, will even track down and physically retrieve runaways. Scientology actually maintains fortified and armed prison camps where out-of-favor Scientologists are hand-cuffed, chained, and imprisoned, like the "Gold Base" -- the Gilman Hot Springs Scientology base, and the "Happy Valley" camp near Hemet, California. Members who attempt to run away are sent there for "RPF" -- "Rehabilitation Project Force".
In the earliest days of Alcoholics Anonymous, the alcoholics were all just a part of the Oxford Group cult. Clarence Snyder had started an A.A. group in Cleveland, Ohio, which made the weekly trek to Akron to attend Oxford Group meetings. Then he decided that the alcoholics would be better off separated from the Oxford Group. When Snyder announced that they would henceforth be holding their own independent meetings, the Oxford Group attacked:
Clarence said, "I made the announcement at the Oxford Group that this was the last time the Cleveland bunch was down as a contingent -- that we were starting a group in Cleveland that would only be open to alcoholics and their families. Also we were taking the name from the book 'Alcoholics Anonymous.'
"The roof came off the house. 'Clarence, you can't do this!' someone said.
"'It's done.'
"'We've got to talk about this!'
"'It's too late.'
"The meeting was set for the following week [May 11, 1939]," Clarence said. "I made the mistake of telling these people the address. They invaded the house and tried to break up the meeting. One fellow was going to whip me. All in the name of pure Christian love!"
Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, page 164.
Clarence's wife added,
"As a matter of fact," Dorothy said, "at one of our very first meetings, all the strict Oxford Group contingent came up from Akron and was very bitter and voluble. They felt we were being extremely disloyal to everyone in doing this. It was quite a step to pull away from Akron."
Dr. Bob and the Good Oldtimers, page 165.
This was William Olin's exit experience. First, he spoke to the group about the problems that were making him think about leaving Synanon, and the cult's response was harsh:
There once was a time, however, when I had been convinced from the top of my pointed head to the soles of my flat feet that we did have a very important answer -- the Synanon Game. ... I had been a true believer in its almost limitless possibilities, as I used to ponder a big mural in the Oakland House which depicted a circle of Game chairs superimposed on the United Nations building.
Ever since moving in, however, my enjoyment of and trust in the Game had gradually diminished until the root beer incident, when both took a nosedive. The magic circle had deteriorated into a monodimensional psychic cattle prod for keeping us troops in line -- especially regarding whatever the Founder's latest fad was. If you didn't like it, of course you could scream yourself blue in the face, but that wouldn't affect policy one iota. The Synanon Game had become a placebo and I felt disenfranchised. I supposed that newcomer Games still served their original purpose of positioning animals fresh off the streets as well as giving them a chance to vent their spleen. But that didn't do much for me personally -- not at this point in my life.
Besides, the torrent of newcomers had become just a trickle as our population steadily dwindled. Although the doors were still nailed open, character-disorders who had even one cylinder working peeked inside at the madness awaiting them and opted for the program down the block, which usually resembled Synanon in the early sixties. The decline in popularity held true for squares as well. ... ...Game Club attendance was way down, and consequently, so was the influx of new lifestylers. Over the years, the box had obviously flipped on us, but since nobody was willing to admit this, the movement seemed doomed. Instead of thoughtful dialogue, all I heard from the little Chucks were silly rationalizations laced with the latest buzzwords like, "Pressure always reduces quantity but improves quality" and "At this time, we are tacking towards population compression." Bullshit, Synanon was dying of arrogance.
...
I expressed misgivings about the explosive combination of no-think and extremism -- especially in light of current directions in Chuck's "great conversation," such as childlessness and physical violence. Young men clamoring for vasectomies so they could lay their balls on the line for Synanon and their devout female counterparts gaming about abortions did not entirely thrill me. Worst still was singling out anyone "standing in our way" -- either a bureaucrat like the county planning director or a simple soul like Gambonini -- as an "enemy of Synanon." Nobody had been more positive about self-protection than I was, but once again, we had "gone right past the money." Did anyone in the Temple really know what the hell we were up to anymore? Not only had my faith in the Game process diminished, but my trust in the entire movement was rapidly disintegrating, and I suspected that everything was not being made public, as I had once so naively believed. Instead of stirring slogans like "Character is the only rank," the well-worn chestnut about the corruptive propensities of power kept running through my head like an old song.
A newer dopefiend, who had taken an open chair to talk to his girlfriend, got visibly agitated as I babbled on. Finally, he blurted angrily, "Hey, motherfucker, if you don't like it here -- why don't you just get the fuck out?" After thanking him for his astute comment, I admitted that the question he raised was the very one that had plagued me for a year.
... Before long, Phyllis [Olin] returned from her break, looking as white and drawn as when she had left. Apparently, she hadn't slept very much. Several of the stewers immediately positioned her with, "Your asshole husband says he's going to split. How about you?" She neither flinched nor answered directly, but instead used her Stew to talk about the black cloud that had hung over our marriage for so long and how she had looked forward to this moment with both anticipation and dread. Even though she had watched me suffer for months and knew what was on my mind, this would be our very first conversation about the possibility of my leaving Synanon -- God, how straight we had played it.
...
After a fitful nap in the Stew Dorm, I boarded a Synacruiser for my return to the Homeplace, where I had work to do. Was it my imagination, or did I pick up a certain coolness from my fellow passengers? Well of course! I already knew that part of my Stew had been broadcast, and no communal gossip traveled faster than split talk.
...
What turned out to be an abbreviated stay at the Homeplace was positively unreal. It began the moment I picked up my farbus (now filled with drawings and papers) and headed for the Connect to check in. The Lodge door opened and out popped a long-stemmed beauty wearing a T-shirt I hadn't seen before. Emblazoned in red across her chest were the words, "I Love It Here." My knees jellied and I had to fight the impulse to jump back on the jitney. Everyone's automatic smile seemed more mechanical than ever and their "hihowareya" greetings even more perfunctory. I felt like an undesirable alien in an island of humanoids.
Things were no better at the translator's office. Old friends were unmistakably distant -- especially Bob Greenfeld. After brief conversation about a couple of projects, he disappeared and I lost myself in the familiar narcotic of work for the rest of the afternoon. Not surprisingly, I found myself in a Game with Bob that night. He immediately let me have it with both barrels. I had never seen him so angry. Apparently, after I had "spilled my guts" in the Stew, he had been decimated in a Big-Shot Game for his "sick contract" with me. The specific indictment had been that his lust for my translator skills had blinded him to the obvious truth that "I was no longer on Synanon's side -- just a sour, ungrateful asshole on the way out the door."
Bob got lots of support in our game, and I was urged to leave in a rich variety of rhetoric. Betty, a sweet woman who had once worked with Phyllis in the School, was especially scathing in her remarks. Two weeks later, she was gone herself. A Synanon truism was that "All projections are valid."
...
Charles "Chuck" Dederich
For some reason, Chuck wasn't inviting me to lunch these days. I couldn't even look at him -- I felt like such a traitor. After hurriedly eating with two of our cooks whose table conversation ranged from vegetable roughage to mid-term abortions, I slipped off to the bunkhouse to read and think. Just as I was about to go running, Jady Dederich's dog-robber came by to inform me that my presence was requested in a Game that was already in process. Oh-oh, I thought, I'll bet this is it! I put my pants back on, jogged over to the 'Big Game' room, and took a seat, surrounded by 'Homeplace heavies'.
After the wrap-up of some weighty action between our princess/director and her commoner consort, the focus shifted to me. Someone began an indictment about the gross impropriety of my sour presence at the Homeplace, when Jady imperiously interrupted and positioned me unambiguously, "I want to hear your answer to one question -- right here and right now and I don't give a shit about anything else you might have to say. Are you making plans to split from Synanon?"
... I heard my own voice from far off somewhere, intoning, "Yes... I am." The Game shifted off me immediately, and after a few minutes I left and went for my run.
Bob Greenfeld invited me to supper, where he announced that my services were no longer required at the Homeplace. In Synanese, I was 'being shipped out on a door.'
...
The following afternoon, I jitneyed over to the Executive Offices at the Ranch for my appointment with Dede [Chuck Dederich Jr.]. I was surprised to find that Pete was there too. They asked me if what they had heard about my splitting was true. All true. What, in God's name, did I have waiting for me out there? Nothing -- except, perhaps, my freedom. They both laughed and agreed with each other that I had gone totally crazy. Freedom to what -- starve? Die of loneliness -- or maybe, boredom? Yeh, I admitted, it did look a little rough, but I'd survive. ...
[A few days later...]
A few hours before departure time for San Francisco, an old friend served me with divorce papers from Phyllis. I hadn't expected that. Upon a moment's reflection, though, I should have. A real Synanite doesn't muddle around indecisively for very long but takes a strong position -- Boom, just like that! And Phyllis was certainly one of the most loyal soldiers of them all.
Escape From Utopia: My Ten Years in Synanon, William F. Olin, pages 248-249, 251-252, 254, 255-256, 257, 258.
Bill Olin's reward for ten years of selfless service to Synanon was that they hated him for leaving, and harshly condemned him for it. Of course. The departure of a respected elder shook the certainty of the true believers, and planted doubts in their minds, and made them ask themselves what they were really doing and why they were doing it. They couldn't tolerate that, so they angrily blamed Olin for their discomfort.
Olin's story also illustrated several other common cult characteristics, besides No Exit:
The Guru is always right. Everything Chuck Dederich said was always right, period. His orders, or his lastest fad, were to be followed without question, even if it meant being sterilized or aborting a much-longed-for baby.
You are always wrong. Olin actually felt bad -- guilty -- for standing on his principles and speaking up for what he believed was true and right, and choosing to not participate in the evil any longer. He was made to feel like a deserter and a traitor for choosing right over wrong, truth over falsehoods, and freedom over slavery. "I couldn't even look at him [Chuck Dederich] -- I felt like such a traitor."
That "You are always wrong" attitude also clearly shows in the demonization of those who choose to leave.
Likewise, the cult members gave us lots of examples of Ad Hominem and Personal Attacks On Critics.
"You are a piece of dirt if you dare to criticize our cult, the Founder, or his wonderful teachings. And you are insane if you are thinking about leaving the wonderful cult."
When Olin criticized the faults of the cult, they responded by calling him a "motherfucker" and an "asshole". And Dede and Pete agreed that Bill Olin "had gone totally crazy" when he decided to leave Synanon.
Grandiose claims and bombastic idealism. "We are special. We are the wave of the future. The United Nations could learn something from us. Only we have a style of life worth living. Everybody else is dying of loneliness and boredom, while we build Heaven on Earth."
Sacred Science. "We have the new technology, the panacea, that will save the world -- The Synanon Game."
Confession sessions. "The Game" and "The Stew" were just modified confession or self-criticism sessions, very similar to the Red Chinese brainwashing self-criticism sessions where they reversed the logic and everyone had to criticize someone else. In The Game and The Stew, everyone ganged up on one person at a time, and ripped them to shreds. Then they would "flip the box" and lavishly praise the person they had just crushed. Then they would rotate the target to someone else and repeat the routine until everyone had had his ego destroyed.
Pseudo-democracy. You can voice your opinion, and even scream it in Game sessions, but your opinion doesn't really matter and will actually change nothing.
Royalty and The Inner Circle -- "Saint Charles" Dederich, "Princess Jady Dederich", 'Prince Dede', the "Homeplace heavies", and "The Big-Shot Game". Any purported "equality" in the cult is a hoax.
Everybody is equal, but some people are more equal than others.
And the slogan was "Character is the only rank", but that wasn't how things really worked.
Different levels of information -- The general membership didn't know everything that was happening; that knowledge was reserved for the inner circle.
Which brings up, Dual Purposes. Synanon began as an idealistic drug and alcohol rehabilitation program, and ended up being whatever Charles Dederich said it was. Lastly, he said it was a religion and a research project exploring how Synanon could supply the leaders with rich, luxurious, elegant lifestyles. (No joke. That's the literal truth. That's what he said.) At the end, "fine dining" -- two-hour, multiple-course dinners of the finest available cuisine -- was one of the inner circle's major daily tasks.
True Believers and Inability To Tolerate Criticism. They all intensely believe in their cause -- they believe that it is perfect, and they can't stand any doubts or criticism of their group or its activities.
Cloned copies of the leader -- the "little Chucks".
Isolationism or separatism. The cult has a siege mentality of "us versus them out there." And there is no reality outside of the cult. Life outside of the cult is seen as absurd, shallow, lonely, hard, boring, and pointless.
Enemy making. Anybody who won't do what the cult wants is an enemy of the cult. Olin mentioned the county planning director, whom Olin found to be an okay guy when he went and talked with him, or Gambonini, the rancher next door, who had done nothing to Synanon. --Which, in turn, revealed the growing paranoia of the cult. And even the old-timer Olin was labeled "no longer on Synanon's side" for telling the truth about some of the faults of Synanon.
Cult-speak, Slogans and Thought-terminating Clichés.
"Character is the only rank."
"Pressure always reduces quantity but improves quality."
"We are tacking towards population compression."
"All projections are valid."
"Take a strong position."
"Flip the box."
Denial. True believers deny the truth, and cannot tolerate any criticism.
Isolation, ostracism, and shunning of splitters.
A system of rewards and punishments. When Olin announced his desire to leave, all respect, praise, and positive feedback vanished. He was subjected to numerous rounds of torment and torture, verbal assaults and psychological attacks, as well as ostracism and shunning. Olin was also punished by the group attacking his co-worker, Bob Greenfeld, for Olin's "crime" of leaving.
Obligation and reversal of reality. Even though William Olin was a non-addict "lifestyler" and a successful architect who had joined Synanon because he had believed in it as a utopian social movement, and even though Olin had given Synanon his life savings and had worked for Synanon for free for ten years, the cult claimed that Synanon had given him everything, and that he was "just a sour, ungrateful asshole."
Note the statement that Olin would starve outside of Synanon. There was no recognition of the reality that he was a competent non-addict architect who was quite capable of making a living and taking care of himself outside of Synanon. That little "you will starve" slur also smacks of Phobia Induction -- trying to make Olin afraid to leave. And, it may also be the other cult members giving voice to their own suppressed fears that they would starve if they tried to leave the cult.
Conditional friendships and conditional love. Your "true friends for life" who give you "unconditional love" will withdraw their "love" in a flat minute if you violate the cult's rules, and fall out of favor, by doing something stupid like saying that you want to leave. Your own wife might even immediately divorce you.
Members get no respect. They get abused. The rank-and-file membership worked more than full time for wages that ranged from $2 to $25 per week, while the inner circle explored elegant lifestyles and fine dining. And still, the leader Chuck Dederich often berated the members by saying that he was forced to support all of their incompetent lazy asses. That's another example of "You Are Always Wrong.", and it's also an example of "You Owe The Group".
And then the leader Dederich said that he didn't want any more children around, and he actually felt entitled to order that all men had to get vasectomies, and pregnant women had to get abortions -- even women who really wanted their babies, and had been trying to get pregnant for years.
4. No Graduates.
No one ever learns as much as the Guru knows; no one ever rises to the level of the Guru's wisdom, so no one ever finishes his or her training, and nobody ever graduates.
Sometimes the wording of "graduates" is deceptive. In Werner Erhard's "est" "human potential" cult, people were called "graduates" as soon as they had completed their first 2-weekend course of "training." But then they were immediately pressured to take another course, so that the "benefits" of the first course would really take hold. And then they were supposed to take yet another course, and then another and another (and each course cost hundreds of dollars, of course). So they may have "graduated" from the first course of training, but they were never really finished with their expensive est training.1
Scientology does the same thing too. First you are a "pre-clear", and then you graduate and become a "Clear", but then you need to become an "Operating Thetan", but then you need to become a higher-level Operating Thetan, working your way up through the levels from "OT I" through "OT VIII", which are increasingly expensive, many tens of thousands of dollars for each of the higher levels. (And, as long as the cult leader L. Ron Hubbard was alive, they kept inventing yet another higher level.) And then they have something else called a "Class XII"... Then you need to learn how to do it all to somebody else -- you need to learn how to be an Auditor, or a Case Supervisor (C/S), and brainwash other people. There are many more levels of that. It costs at least $375,000 to do all of the levels and all of the courses. Only rich celebrities like John Travolta and Tom Cruise could afford it all.
5. Cult-speak.
The cult has its own language. The cult invents new terminology or euphemisms for many things. The cult may also redefine many common words to mean something quite different. Cult-speak is also called "bombastic redefinition of the familiar", or "loading the language".
"Loaded Language" is one of Robert J. Lifton's Eight Conditions of Thought Reform -- an essential part of any effective brainwashing program. The cult-speak may include a bunch of well-worn slogans, which Lifton called "thought-terminating clichés. The special words constrict rather than expand human understanding, and the slogans stop thought.
Beginners have to learn all of the new terminology in order to fit in, and understand what is being said. Then, the new language has the effect of separating the newcomer from his old world, and from his old circle of friends. His new cult friends will tell him that "Only another cult member understands", and it will be true. When he babbles nothing but cult-speak, nobody but another cult member will be able to understand.
Loading the language and redefining words has a long history. Lewis Carroll described it very well in the Alice in Wonderland sequel, Through the Looking Glass:
"... and that shows that there are three hundred and sixty-four days when you might get unbirthday presents."
"Certainly," said Alice.
"And only one for birthday presents, you know. There's glory for you!"
"I don't know what you mean by 'glory,'" Alice said.
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. "Of course you don't -- till I tell you. I meant 'there's a nice knockdown argument for you.'"
"But 'glory' doesn't mean 'a nice knockdown argument,'" Alice objected.
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said in a rather scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things."
"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master -- that's all."
Alice was too puzzled to say anything, so, after a minute, Humpty Dumpty began again. "They've a temper, some of them -- particularly verbs, they're the proudest: adjectives you can do anything with, but not verbs. However, I can manage the whole lot of them! Impenetrability! That's what I say!"
"Would you tell me please," said Alice, "what that means?"
"Now you talk like a reasonable child," said Humpty Dumpty, looking very much pleased. I meant by 'impenetrability' that we've had enough of that subject, and it would be just as well if you'd mention what you mean to do next, as I suppose you don't mean to stop here all the rest of your life."
"That's a great deal to make one word mean," Alice said in a thoughtful tone.
"When I make a word do a lot of work like that," said Humpty Dumpty, "I always pay it extra."
"Oh!" said Alice. She was too much puzzled to make any other remark.
"Ah, you should see 'em come round me of a Saturday night," Humpty Dumpty went on, wagging his head gravely from side to side; "for to get their wages, you know."
(Alice did not venture to ask what he paid them with; and so, you see, I can't tell you.)
Alice in Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass, by Lewis Carroll, p. 238.
Back in the "real world", because leaving the cult is one of the worst crimes that a member can commit (according to the cult), most cults have a special term for leaving, like "going tai-tan", "backsliding", "leaving the fold", being "lost in maya", being "trapped in samsara", "straying from the path", "falling from grace" or simply "going out." When that dreaded phrase is uttered, everyone knows what it means.
Sometimes euphemisms or redefined phrases can take on truly evil dimensions. Adolf Hitler's "special handling" of the Jews, and sending them to the "final solution", are classic examples. And this one is really gruesome: the poison gas Zyklon B, with which millions of Jews were killed, was called "material for the resettlement of Jews".
Likewise, Mao Tse Tung sent his enemies and critics to slave labor on remote farms for "re-education" so that they would learn to "blossom properly".
When Rev. Jim Jones gave the order to murder the 276 children at the Jonestown People's Temple commune, he didn't say, "Kill those kids" or "Give them the cyanide." He asked, "Would someone help those children in crossing over?"
Throughout the entire second half of the twentieth century, various United States Presidents used the term "police action", rather than "war", to get around limitations on Presidential powers, and to avoid having to tell the public that we actually were in yet another war. President Nixon would not say that the U.S. and South Vietnamese armies had actually "invaded" Cambodia; it was only an "incursion".
"An important art of politicians is to find new names for institutions which under old names have become odious to the public." -- Talleyrand.
Carl Sagan called such terminology "weasel words".
There are plenty of contemporary examples of loading the language, or bombastically redefining words:
In one cult, "Sharing the love of God" means practicing prostitution to get money for the cult, and "Allowing God to bless others" means cheating people out of money which then goes to the cult.
In David Berg's "Children of God" cult, "FF" means "Flirty Fishing", which means women members practice prostitution to get more money and new male members for the cult.2
Likewise, in The Children of God, "forsaking all and following the Lord" means giving all of your worldly wealth, including your house, to the church, and then obeying the orders of David Berg,3 which often includes the women practicing prostitution, and their husbands pimping them on the streets, to get the cult more money.
And David Berg redefined "true spiritual freedom" and "perfect love" to mean that all of the women in the Children of God cult, even his own daughter, should freely have sex with him.4
To the Moonies, "heavenly deception" means misleading, deceiving, and lying to nonmembers to promote the church's goals.
Scientologists are actually supposed to read Scientology literature with the Scientology dictionary in hand. Any time they read something that they do not understand, or disagree with, they are supposed to look up the words in the Scientology dictionary to get their new official meanings. Thus, the members allow Scientology to redefine the whole language, and actually, to redefine reality.
In Scientology, "EOC", or "End Of Cycle", is church jargon for suicide. Scientologists have actually been sent out as assassins, to kill critics of Scientology, with instructions to EOC after the target had been terminated.6
The most outrageous one I've heard recently is "aggressive accounting practices". That's what Enron used to do things like turn $3 billion of very real losses into $1 billion of phony paper profits, which made the stock price rise, which was very convenient for the Enron executives who were happily dumping their worthless shares on an unsuspecting public in the world's biggest pump and dump stock swindle... "Aggressive accounting practices" indeed.
Another aspect of loading the language is constant redefinition or reinterpretation of anything and everything, whenever it is convenient. For instance, you may be reading the teachings of a phony guru, and find errors and logical inconsistencies in his teachings, and point it out to members. The true-believer cult members will answer, "Oh, you don't understand. What it really means is..." And then they will explain and reinterpret the guru's words until he sounds like a genius who deserves the Nobel Peace Prize. Eventually, it seems like everything means something else, and nothing is as it appears...
Another twist on that constant redefinition game is that some groups let words have two very different definitions, simultaneously. Which definition will be used at any given time depends on the circumstances. Thus, the very same sentence can have different meanings at different times. This is especially true of cults that hide the truth from newcomers. An innocent-sounding saying may have an entirely different meaning after you learn the real meanings of the words.
When it comes to sheer density of incomprehensible psycho-babble or techno-babble, Scientology is hard to beat. This quote comes from someone who quit Scientology, and is now criticizing it, but he still hasn't quite "cleared" his language yet:
I sec-checked a new OT VIII completion from Spain on the subject shortly after he completed OT VIII (I was ordered to sec-check him despite that I was OT VII and he was OT VIII because I was the only OT 7 Nots auditor there was...
I had given him his whole upper level bridge from OT Eligibility to Solo Nots EP check. ...
Three people who were in their early 50's died of cancer, months after completing new OT VIII. As a result, the New OT VIII C/S was RPFed (Laura Wolfe, wife of Milton Wolfe who was jailed on behalf of the GO and later ended up as CO FSSO (FSSO: Flag Ship Service Org, The service org on board the Freewinds.) The replacement C/S, Sue Walker, wife of Jeff Walker, one of the original Class XII who was Snr C/S Int at the time (and who later blew and got declared I'm told - If he got declared he should be contacted, he was a very good friend of mine and we had much respect for each other. ...)
http://www.whyaretheydead.net/krasel/aff_96.html
Wow. Can you believe that they talk like that all of the time?
6. Group-think, suppression of dissent, and enforced conformity in thinking.
The cult has standard answers for almost everything, and members are expected to parrot those answers. Willfulness or independence is seen as bad. Members accept the leader's reality as their own.
There are two corollaries:
A) Independent or critical thinking is discouraged, especially critical thoughts about the leader or group.
B) Positive thoughts and statements about the leader and the group are encouraged.
No criticism of the guru, his teachings, or the group is seen as valid -- such criticism is always automatically wrong, just because it criticizes the guru, his teachings, or his group. (Such criticism of the guru or his group breaks Cult Rule Number One: "The Guru Is Always Right".)
Many cults claim to have some divine, infallible teachings, "Sacred Science", "The True Word of God", "so of course any criticism of the guru or his teachings is always wrong, and downright evil, because it is going against God." Or because it is going against The Spiritual Principles of the Cosmos, or it is going against Nature, or whatever the purported Higher Principle is...
In some cults, dissent is considered synonymous with demon possession. Criticism of the cult is seen as proof that Satan opposes the group's great works.
Dissenting members are advised to seek a consensus in all matters. One fundamentalist Christian cult taught, "In the abundance of counselors there is safety. He who trusts his own mind is a fool."
Likewise, the Love Family cult told members who tried to think critically, "What's inside your mind is lies. We are your mind. The group is your mind."5
Cults can be quite harsh in punishing deviant or critical speech or thought.
Group-think usually means no real thought at all; just repeat the buzz-words and slogans and follow the program. And group-think usually just means that the group thinks that the Guru is always right.
Jeffrey Schaler wrote in his paper Cult Busting:
One way of testing the cult nature of a group is by challenging the ideology binding the group together. We can discover something about the nature of a group by how well its members tolerate opposition to the ideology that holds the group together. How well do members tolerate difference of opinion, opinion that challenges the very ideological heart of the group?
Members of the cult are like a colony of insects when disturbed. A frenzy of activity and protective measures are executed when core ideologies are challenged. The stronger the evidence challenging the truthfulness of the group ideology, the more likely members of the cult are to either lash out in a more or less predictable fashion, fall apart, or disband into separate cult colonies.
Another aspect of group-think is something that might be called "group-feel." The cult dictates what feelings or emotions good members are supposed to feel. Usually, all members are supposed to maintain a cheerful disposition all of the time, happily proclaiming that the guru and his teachings are just wonderful and will save the world, or some such thing. Anger is permitted only when criticizing non-conforming or under-performing cult members, or when faulting outsiders -- especially when condemning "enemies" of the cult and other outsiders who criticize the cult, and when condemning competing cults or groups. Otherwise, everybody wears a smiley happy face. Negative emotions about the cult or its leader are considered especially bad -- a sure sign that someone is failing the standards of holiness.
7. Irrationality.
The beliefs of the cult are irrational, illogical, or superstitious, and fly in the face of evidence to the contrary. The Hari Krishna cult (ISKCON), for example, believes that the Earth is flat, still, today, in spite of our astronauts' journeys into space, and all of those beautiful pictures of a big blue round Earth.
Scientologists believe that you can be harmed by memories of injuries that happened to you during previous lifetimes. They also believe that, if you pay enough money to Scientology and take enough courses of treatment and training, you can become immortal -- a fully-developed being with mind-over-matter powers who is above physical death.
Many cults believe that God will answer all of their prayers and rearrange the world to suit them.
And many cults believe in faith healing -- that somehow, one way or another, God will answer their prayers and cure whatever ails them. We could devote an entire chapter just to the insanity of some people's belief in faith healing, and the circus side-show manner in which it is practiced, but I'll just mention one thing:
Haven't you ever noticed how God only heals invisible ailments that cannot be verified?
God never instantly strips 200 pounds of ugly fat right off of an immensely obese bikini-clad woman with a glandular problem, right there on stage in front of the TV evangelist, the TV cameras, and some independent witnesses. God never puts new legs or arms on amputees on Sunday Morning TV shows, or on the Trinity Broadcasting Network.
Nope, it's always cancer, arthritis, paralysis, gall bladders, blindness, pinched nerves, or other things that the TV camera cannot see; things where independent verification is not possible. And, where verification is possible, like with the VietNam Veterans who have been paraplegics since the War, well, God doesn't bother to fix any of them in faith-healing ceremonies. God never fixes their broken spinal cords or replaces their lost legs. God doesn't seem to like the VietNam Vets who have authentic medical records. The Lord sure does work in mysterious ways.
Nichiren Shoshu Buddhists chanting and praying to a scroll called a Gohonzon. The scroll is on the wall, just beyond the left-hand edge of the picture. The priests in the far-left center of the picture are bowing to it.
The Prayer Gohonzon
More irrational beliefs:
The Nichiren Shoshu Buddhists (Soka Gakkai) believe that a printed scroll, called a Gohonzon, will grant all of your material wishes if you chant to it enough. It's a real Santa Claus cult. At every church get-together, people stand up and give testimonials about all of the wonderful things they have gotten by chanting to a Gohonzon, and then they talk about what they are going to chant for next: a better job, more money, a new car, a house, or whatever.
They also believe that they can achieve world peace if one third of the people on Earth chant their chant. They offer no explanation of how this will happen; it is just a given. They happily ignore the obvious possibility that even if one third of the world does chant peacefully, the other two thirds can continue to gleefully slaughter each other, and blow each other off of the planet, just the same as usual, not at all inconvenienced by the chanters.
The Moonies, that is, Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church, have a good racket going: The main plank of their belief system, as laid down in Moon's "Divine Principle", is that you can help people after they die. So recruits are encouraged to buy expensive trinkets from the church that, they are told, will assist loved ones who are suffering deprivations in the afterlife. A settlement of $150 million was made to former members of the Unification Church in Japan who claimed that they had been subjected to undue pressure to buy the otherwise worthless artifacts.
8. Suspension of disbelief.
The cult member is supposed to take on a childish naïveté, and simply believe whatever he is told, no matter how unlikely, unrealistic, irrational, illogical, or outrageous it may be. And he does.
For example:
Fortunate coincidences are accepted as proof that God favors the Guru and his cult: "The Big Man upstairs is really looking out for us."
Superstitious, religious, or magical rituals and ceremonies are performed without skepticism.
Some cults pray or chant incessantly for almost everything imaginable, as if God were Santa Claus, and they actually believe that their amateur magic ceremonies will really work, and will really change reality and get them what they want.
If the Guru starts seducing all of the 14-year-old girls in the religious community, you are supposed to believe that he is just giving them spiritual lessons (Swami Muktananda).
If the guru claims that he is the Son of God, and has the right, even the spiritual duty, to have, sexually, all of the post-pubescent girls and women in the community, in order to create the Grandchildren of God, you are supposed to believe it and hand over your wife and daughter (Vernon Howell, a.k.a. David Koresh of the Branch Davidians -- the wacko from Waco).
And if the guru suddenly starts performing miracles, this is to be accepted as believable (Rev. Jim Jones, People's Temple).
People's Temple children had seen the "miracles" Jim Jones performed and had heard both their parents and him say he was God. When they begged on the streets, they never took any of the money, for Jones had warned them that if they did, he would know it and punish them severely. One street-wise boy took the chance, however, and stole ten dollars. He waited for Jones' lightning. When nothing happened, he realized they were all being duped, and left the church before the Guyana exodus. His cynicism saved his life.
The Children of Jonestown, Kenneth Wooden, page 80.
Jones believed that the end justified the means, which meant that he was continually asking people in his movement to override the boundaries of what they felt was appropriate because it was "good for People's Temple." Even outrageous behavior on the part of Jones was interpreted as a lesson, and the people around him would ask "what is he [Jones] trying to show us?"
Hearing the Voices of Jonestown, Mary McCormick Maaga, page 65.
Well, one of the things he was trying to show them was his male organ.
Deborah (Linda Berg) Davis, the daughter of David Berg (a.k.a. Moses David), the founder of the Children of God cult, wrote a book about the cult which contains a very perceptive explanation of the role of the suspension of disbelief in the process of brainwashing new cult members. She explains that we voluntarily suspend disbelief in order to enjoy a movie like Starwars. For a few hours, we allow ourselves to believe in a fantasy world of spaceships and robots and Jedi knights. But we return to reality when the movie ends and we leave the theater.
The person who joins a cult goes through a similar process. In order to become one of the group, he must embrace all of the beliefs and teachings of the cult, so the newcomer suspends his disbelief and enters into the movie. But the person who joins the cult doesn't leave the movie theater.
Unlike the movie-goer, however, a cult victim who suspends his disbelief doesn't necessarily come out of it. He stays in that state. The cult and its doctrine become his reality. It is significant that when we go to a movie theater we are already prepared to suspend our disbelief. We fully intend to enjoy the movie. So it is with the cult victim. In many cases he is ready to suspend whatever mental reservations he has in order to "enjoy" life. Stoner and Park, the authors of All God's Children, write, "These young people are idealistic and are frequently searching for a goal, a purpose, and a sense of community, so the promises of the cults appeal strongly to them. Many are willing, even anxious, to be persuaded."[Page 240.]
The enjoyment a prospective cult member seeks lies on a much deeper level than mere entertainment; he is hoping to find fulfillment, purpose, and direction for life. But like the movie-goer who attends Star Wars seeking enjoyment, an individual joins a cult because he wants to enjoy the movie of life.
...
When a cult recruit crosses the invisible barrier in his mind -- when he enters the world of the cult and its doctrine at some point in his flirtatious sampling of the cult -- he is tripping the switch of his voluntary suspension of disbelief. Brainwashing or mind control then occurs naturally, sometimes effortlessly. In many cases the new cult member will struggle hard to brainwash himself. He must do this in order to balance out the guilt he feels. When doubts rush in like a flood, he tells himself, "I am following the truth. The rest of the world may be going to hell, but I am following the truth!"
Other brothers and sisters are there to encourage the new recruit. He either accepts their help and counsel, or he rejects it. If he rejects it, he doesn't stay around long. If he receives their help, he goes deeper into the cultic doctrine. He will sell flowers, chant, memorize, litness [witness and raise funds with literature], or read Mo Letters, whatever it takes, to the utmost of his ability to prove to himself and others that he is right. The brainwashing that occurs in cults is the finest, purest, and most effective around. The Communists have something to learn from Moses David.
The Children of God; The Inside Story, Deborah (Linda Berg) Davis, pages 171-172.
Note the voluntary nature of the process. Deborah Davis makes the point that joining a cult is not just a process of being fooled by a slick phony guru or of being quickly brainwashed without knowing what is happening. On some level of his mind, the newcomer must voluntarily buy into the game, or else he will leave the cult.
This leads to another cult characteristic: Mentally Disturbed Followers. Meaning: You need your head examined if you insist on staying in a cult and believing in the proclamations of a phony guru.
Wanting to believe is perhaps the most powerful dynamic initiating and sustaining cult-like behavior.
The Wrong Way Home: Uncovering the Patterns of Cult Behavior in American Society, Arthur J. Deikman, M.D., page 137.
"The world longs for authority, finality, and conclusiveness. It is weary of theological floundering and uncertainty. Belief exhilarates the human spirit; doubt depresses."
Billy Graham
quoted in Holy Terror: The Fundamentalist War on America's Freedoms in Religion, Politics, and Our Private Lives, Flo Conway and Jim Siegelman, page 144.
Also see: The Wrong Way Home: Uncovering the Patterns of Cult Behavior in American Society, Arthur J. Deikman, M.D., page 143.
Certainty (as Billy Graham testified) is one of the great benefits of religious belief.
The Wrong Way Home: Uncovering the Patterns of Cult Behavior in American Society, Arthur J. Deikman, M.D., page 144.
Part of the attraction of believing the leader's views and actions to be of paramount importance is that the follower's own sense of importance is heightened.
The Wrong Way Home: Uncovering the Patterns of Cult Behavior in American Society, Arthur J. Deikman, M.D., page 67.
So the suspension of disbelief is also another veiled ego game, where the follower likes to believe that he is very important, involved in very important work, doing the Lord's Will and saving the world... "If the leader and his religion are saving the world, and I follow the leader, then I am saving the world, which makes me very good and very important."
9. Denigration of competing sects, cults, religions, groups, or organizations.
This is common, and hardly needs any explanation. What is curious is the degree to which the hatred of others is based on similarity. That is, the closer two groups are in their beliefs, goals, activities, philosophies, appearances, and everything else that defines the group, the more they seem to hate each other. For instance, two Christian cults may viciously attack each other for only the tiniest of differences in beliefs, while neither has such intense passionate feelings about the Democratic or Republican political parties, both of which must presumably have some very large philosophical differences from the Christian cults, on at least some issues.
Similarly, the extremist Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland -- Irish Christians, one and all -- hated and killed each other for the better part of a century, and yet, they had no such vicious hatred of Hindus, Buddhists, Moslems, or Communist atheists, people with very different religious beliefs... Likewise, during the Middle Ages in Europe, the Christian Catholics and Protestants slaughtered each other by the millions, in the Twenty Years War, the Forty Years War, and the Hundred Years War. Those Christians also waged war on Muslims, in the Crusades, but the Muslims got off easy, in comparison to the other Christians.
And Scientology has a pathological hatred of psychiatry and psychiatrists, who offer a very different model of the human mind, and how to improve it, than the model that Scientology sells to its members. Scientologists are very vocal in denouncing modern psychiatry and its pharmacology.
10. Personal attacks on critics.
Anyone who criticizes the Guru, the cult or its dogma is attacked on a personal level. Rather than honestly and intelligently debating with critics, using facts and logic, the cult will resort to low personal attacks on the critic, using name-calling, slander, condescending put-downs, libelous accusations, personal slurs, accusations of bad motives, and casting aspersions on the critic's intelligence and sanity.
Another red flag to watch for is how angrily cult members react when the cult or its guru is criticized. Most ordinary or "normal" people can tolerate some questioning and criticism of their organizations and leaders without blowing up and insisting that the critic is satanic, or working for the forces of evil, or part of a big conspiracy to destroy the organization. Cult members often cannot. They go non-linear very rapidly when you point out too many faults or shortcomings of the group or its leader. It is just in the nature of true believers to require absolute certainty in their beliefs. They like black-and-white thinking, and they have little or no tolerance for doubts and uncertainty. (See Eric Hoffer, The True Believer.) So they irrationally attack the speaker at the first hint of criticism.
http://www.orange-papers.org/orange-cult_q0.html#cq_personal_attacks
Having sex with a negative person will damage your spiritual body.
http://www.orange-papers.org/orange-cult_q1.html
In Scientology, the leader L. Ron Hubbard bragged that he had made breakthroughs in human psychology that no person had ever accomplished before, and that he had then developed a new technology of the mind unknown to humankind before. (And you couldn't prove him wrong about anything because you weren't an advanced Scientologist -- you are so primitive and brain-damaged, they say, that you cannot even see the truth that Hubbard saw.)
Irrationality in the group's beliefs and teachings is one of the big red flags to watch for. Another giant warning sign is the refusal to fix things that are wrong, and refusal to even admit that something is wrong. The cult will usually claim that all of its beliefs, teachings, and tenets are sacred and cannot be changed. If you find something that is wrong -- even an obvious error -- they will either deny it, and claim that it is right and you are wrong ("You don't understand"), because of some explanation that often involves redefining a bunch of words, or they will rationalize the error and say that it's all okay anyway and shouldn't be changed, for some reason or other. They simply will not modify their beliefs to agree with the facts. It's like the old saying, "I won't allow my opinions to be swayed by mere facts."
.....
Some of the most outrageous cult tenets are statements that are unverifiable, unprovable, or unevaluable (at least, in this world). For example:
I have tested you before. We were both monks in ancient Egypt, and I was your teacher then. (Paul Brunton, see Jeffrey Masson.)
I am from Venus.
My real home is Sirius, and when I die, I will return there.
I was voluntarily, consciously, reborn on this planet to help get mankind through this crisis.
God is pleased when you follow these principles. (Dr. Frank N. D. Buchman and William G. Wilson)
The reason you feel all of that tension and stiffness in your neck is because the way you died in your last incarnation was you were beheaded.
The reason you feel such hostility towards her is, she killed you in your last incarnation.
Having sex with a negative person will damage your spiritual body.
Master is the Messiah. (Moonies, Rajneeshees, Premies, and many others)
The Devil is trying to get into your mind and influence your thinking, and lead you astray. (Moonies)
The only reason we are born in this world is to attain Self Realization. (ISKCON, the Hari Krishnas)
Buying these expensive trinkets for your dead ancestors will make them happy. (Moonies)
When we get one-third of the world chanting, we will achieve World Peace. (Nichiren Shoshu, aka Soka Gakkai)
There is a flying saucer hiding behind the Hale-Bopp comet, just waiting to take us to Heaven. All we have to do is discard our physical bodies and go hitch a ride on it, to get to Heaven. (Heaven's Gate)
Ten generations of your ancestors are stuck at a lower level in the spirit world, and they are depending on you for their salvation. If you don't follow Rev. Moon, all of those ancestors will accuse you throughout eternity of failing your responsibility. (Moonies, see Hassan, RTB, p.236.)
Our leader has reincarnated time after time, throughout history, bringing mankind yet another great invention or discovery each time. He has been many of the greatest and most famous men in history. Without our leader, mankind would never have progressed beyond the dark ages. (Scientology, see John Atack.)
LOL..that was quick - I just posted it there.
Just another example of "blind" trust.
One couple who said they have $17 million at stake has known Lewis for 20 years as a friend, and has attended weddings and funerals with him. But their calls weren't being returned. They eventually staked out Lewis' office, said the wife of the couple: "My husband's been kind of sitting there, hoping to catch him coming or going."
Posted on Sat, Dec. 20, 2003
DON THOMPSON
Associated Press
SACRAMENTO - The president of a Southern California investment firm has told clients he needs no license to handle millions of dollars in assets, a contention being investigated by both state and federal regulators.
In a letter faxed Friday to investors, James Lewis said Financial Advisory Consultants has "never charged for financial advice, nor have we ever sold any securities." He said that means he doesn't need to be registered with the state Department of Corporations or the federal Securities and Exchange Commission.
However, the Orange County firm's reports to investors say it charges a 5 percent "management fee" on any profits it earns for its clients.
"As an individual, if you want to buy or sell any property, be it a home or a business, you do not need a license to do so," Lewis wrote. "We do not believe that any license is required for the business we conduct. However, we are investigating the need for any licensing and, if required, we will do everything necessary to obtain the needed licenses."
Lewis' letter was obtained by The Associated Press from one of his investors. Lewis has not responded to requests for comment made by the AP in person at his office or in numerous telephone messages left with an assistant over two weeks. Letters sent to him by registered mail and overnight delivery have not been answered. There was no response Friday.
The AP reported last week that the firm has no license to handle investments with the federal government, California or other West Coast states, and has been reporting extraordinary profits that experts say raises concerns about the firm's legitimacy. The AP has interviewed investors or their attorneys from Arizona, California, Colorado, Michigan, Oregon and Washington.
Spokesmen for the SEC and state Department of Corporations wouldn't comment on their investigation, but investors said they've talked to investigators from both agencies. The regulators are examining documents provided by Barry Minkow, a convicted felon turned anti-fraud investigator for San Diego-based Fraud Discovery Institute.
In the letter, Lewis said his firm has been providing professional services from the same three-room suite of offices in the Orange County town of El Toro for 21 years, and is "committed to doing everything within our power to protect the integrity of our business." He said the firm's lawyers "are reviewing our legal recourses and exploring the necessary legal steps to take next."
The AP's offer to talk with a legal representative of the firm drew no response last week.
Lewis' assistants have told investors that Lewis met in Washington, D.C., with SEC officials and is sending information to the California Department of Corporations. Neither agency would comment.
Lewis' assistants told investors he also has been trying to get the federal government to lift a freeze on $8.4 million from investors in Iran and Syria. But officials at the Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Treasury said they can find no record such a freeze has ever existed.
Concerns about Lewis' claim the Homeland Security freeze had held up money led one family of investors to contact their local congressman, who discovered what the AP had also learned: There was no record of any asset freeze.
Investors said they've talked to investigators from both the SEC and state Corporations Department. The regulators are examining documents provided by Barry Minkow, a convicted felon turned anti-fraud investigator for San Diego-based Fraud Discovery Institute.
Financial Advisory Consultants started as an insurance firm before moving into investments, said Gerald Van Reusen, who partnered with Lewis from 1980-85. Several investors have said they first became involved with the firm when Lewis sold them insurance. Van Reusen said he was a broker there, and purchased life insurance from Lewis himself.
According to state Department of Insurance records, Lewis lost his insurance license in 1989, while he was affiliated with Pi Omega Delta Insurance Services.
Lewis and Van Reusen Inc. was incorporated in 1982 to sell real estate, records show.
"I had my real estate license and he didn't, so I did everything," said Van Reusen. He considers a Lewis a friend, though he hasn't seen him in 10 years: "He's always been honest and above board with me."
In interviews, nine clients and a lawyer for investors in Arizona, who all asked to remain anonymous, said they received no response to requests to withdraw millions of dollars or for a financial accounting of their investments.
One couple who said they have $17 million at stake has known Lewis for 20 years as a friend, and has attended weddings and funerals with him. But their calls weren't being returned. They eventually staked out Lewis' office, said the wife of the couple: "My husband's been kind of sitting there, hoping to catch him coming or going."
http://www.bradenton.com/mld/bradenton/business/7539502.htm
Investors fear they'll lose millions in alleged Ponzi scam
DON THOMPSON
Associated Press
SACRAMENTO - More than 5,200 clients across America trusted James Paul Lewis Jr. with their life savings, pouring hundreds of millions of dollars into his Southern California investment funds on the word of a few friends.
Many heard about Financial Advisory Consultants through fellow churchgoers, although professional athletes and at least one movie actor are said to be investors.
As their own retirement accounts sagged with the stock market, they marveled at Lewis' reports of consistently returning upward of 40 percent from one fund and 20 percent from another, year in and year out for two decades.
They scrambled to give him money, any caution or doubts pushed aside as they saw their fellow investors periodically withdraw as much as $250,000.
Their financial future came crashing down this week, when a federal judge froze the company's assets and the FBI carted away documents and computers from Lewis' three-room Orange County office suite.
No charges have been filed, but the FBI alleges Lewis was operating a "Ponzi scheme," in which early investors are paid with money from later investors. The federal Securities and Exchange Commission says the "fraudulent scheme" involved $813 million from more than 5,200 investors.
"It's a house of cards," said Barry Minkow, himself once imprisoned for seven years for defrauding investors through his ZZZZ Best carpet cleaning company. "It will go down as the longest-running Ponzi scheme in history, and the mutual fund that didn't exist."
Minkow, who now works as an anti-fraud investigator for San Diego-based Fraud Discovery Institute, provided state and federal regulators with documents questioning Lewis' legitimacy, also prompting an investigation and story by The Associated Press earlier this month.
The FBI's search warrant and the SEC's civil complaint listed the same warning signs as the AP's story: the 57-year-old Lewis was investing tens of millions of dollars for clients and claiming extraordinary financial returns without being licensed or regulated as required.
Moreover, the El Toro-based firm has never provided clients with any details on how it invests their money. Since June, Lewis has been delaying withdrawal requests with the false excuse that millions of dollars in investments have been frozen by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
Yet investor after investor told the AP that they missed or ignored the warning signs in what the FBI and other scam experts said appears to be a classic case of affinity fraud.
"He's a family man, he's a religious man, he goes to church every Sunday. He sent us pictures of his grandchildren," said Tom Parsa of Irvine. "This is devastating, devastating news."
Parsa was vacationing in Mexico when he heard that the more than $3 million invested by his family was in jeopardy.
"We always likened him to a poor man's Warren Buffett," said Kevin Haugh, 47, of Woodbridge, Va. He sent Lewis $30,000 three weeks ago to add to the roughly $2 million three generations of his family thought they had squirreled away. "I was planning on retiring in a few years. That obviously isn't going to happen."
Lewis has not responded to multiple telephone messages left by the AP over three weeks, nor to letters sent to him by registered mail and overnight delivery. His attorney, Douglas J. Pettibone, also did not return repeated telephone messages.
At the same time Lewis began spreading what federal investigators call the bogus Homeland Security freeze story and delaying withdrawals requested by more than 150 investors last summer, he raised the minimum investment from $25,000 to $100,000 for his growth fund and from $10,000 to $25,000 for his income fund.
Though Lewis has blocked most withdrawals from his funds since June, he withdrew $3 million from his own account on July 1, SEC records show.
He "continues to live well," his administrative assistant, Mary Lopez, told federal investigators last week.
Lopez, who has worked with Lewis since 1997, told investigators that Lewis not only has a home in Laguna Niguel, but a vacation home in Palm Desert and a membership in the nearby Indian Ridge Country Club where the initiation fee goes for $95,000 and the monthly fee is $785.
He owns at least one Mercedes Benz automobile and is awaiting delivery of another, Lopez said in a sworn statement to the SEC.
The firm operated with no more than three employees, and Lewis himself rarely showed up at the office after the first year she worked there. When Lewis did show up, he spent his time trading on his computer. Lopez said Lewis told her he was trading Swiss francs on his own time and account.
The only funds that flowed into the firm were from investors themselves.
In six years, Lopez saw no business activity or any indication of the lucrative projects Lewis wrote about in his monthly newsletters. Clients accepted the newsletters and Lewis' monthly statements as the only evidence they needed that investments were soaring in good times and bad. When one client demanded more information, Lewis told him to take his business elsewhere, authorities said.
Many of Lewis' investors learned of Financial Advisory Consultants through friends at church, and were eager to get in on a semisecret investment opportunity that appeared open to only a lucky few. Many considered Lewis a friend, some attending weddings and funerals with him.
Clients say Lewis is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or Mormons, and his first clients came from that community. But over the years, his investors came from churches of many other denominations as well.
Most said they accepted the word of their fellow churchgoers, and were reassured when Lewis periodically paid out as much as a quarter-million dollars to mostly wealthy investors who rarely withdrew the bulk of their contributions.
Yet Robert FitzPatrick, the co-author of "False Profits" and president of Pyramid Scheme Alert, said Financial Advisory Consultants had all the earmarks of "a classic Ponzi scheme."
They include the promise of financial returns that are too good to be true; a total lack of details or accounting on how the company is making its money; and word of mouth recruiting among friends and associates.
"The only transactions occurring are later transactions paying for earlier transactions, with the whole thing run through one individual," FitzPatrick said. "This company doesn't even have to show the cash. All they're doing is sending out a sheet of paper saying, 'Hey, you're worth all this money.'"
Even allowing investors to periodically withdraw a portion of their money is a routine part of a confidence scheme, FitzPatrick said.
One San Diego investor, who asked to remain anonymous, said he'd invested about $500,000 - most of his net worth - but had been slowly withdrawing several hundred thousand dollars to care for his 4-year-old autistic son.
With the firm's collapse, "I'll have to pretty much sell my house, sell everything," he said. "My life's pretty much devastated."
"It's not a very merry Christmas," sighed another investor who asked to remain anonymous. He fears he's out more than $1 million.
ON THE NET
Pyramid Scheme Alert: http://www.pyramidschemealert.org
Brilliant riposte.
It's what drunks tell to their offspring, real or imagined...
Nurshery ryme? Misplaced "H"?
Why don't you stop giving unwanted advice? This isn't your "personal" message board. If you want to babble in private, set up your own web site.
If you don't want to answer questions, don't. Try making yourself clear in the first place.
What qualifies HTDS to do the packaging? Do they have an approved packaging operation, and if so, where?
SO..everything in the PRs is true, and any SEC filings are unreliable, is that what you're trying to tell us?
I see a disclaimer on the PRs, but disclaimers are not allowed on SEC filings. Any SEC filings made must contain a certification under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.
Free and Clear Foundations of Japan to Clean Up Bad Debts
Free and Clear Foundations. Working with The Financial Services Agency (FSA) of Japan Financier Gabor Sandor Acs to structure a transaction to acquire all of the outstanding shares of Resona Holdings Inc., a troubled bank in Japan that has been infused with over 2 trillion Yen by the agency over the past few years. Free and Clear Foundations to be set up in Japan.
Tokyo-Japan (PRWEB) December 9 2003--The Financial Services Agency (FSA) of Japan is being approached by financier Gabor Sandor Acs to structure a transaction to acquire all of the outstanding shares of Resona Holdings Inc., a troubled bank in Japan that has
been infused with over 2 trillion Yen by the agency over the past few years.
The FSA announced that it would infuse an additional 1 trillion Yen ($9 billion) next year to shore up the troubled Japanese banking system. The money would go to the government guarantee fund to be set up under the Deposit Insurance Corp. (DIC) Law next fiscal year.
http://www.prweb.com/releases/2003/12/prweb93560.htm
What development?
Richard Gere is a Buddhist. Travolta, Cruise and and some other notable movie people are Scientologists.
What we need is Arnold to do some action hero teminating of the church tax-free status of Scientology...
Just a reminder of how things "work" on Raging Bull...
By: ragingbullrep (RB Staff)
30 Jul 2003, 10:38 AM EDT
Msg. 226 of 419
(This msg. is a reply to 225 by new_sun_rising.)
Jump to msg. #
Thanks. We get to know people by surfing and reading a history of their posts. We can tell who is serious and who is not.
http://ragingbull.lycos.com/mboard/boards.cgi?board=COMMENT&read=226
By: new_sun_rising
28 Jul 2003, 05:55 PM EDT
Msg. 225 of 419
(This msg. is a reply to 222 by ragingbullrep.)
Jump to msg. #
RagingBullRep - I would beg
to differ on that - having seen some good friends, who are very serious and respected posters, as well as myself, targeted by a vindictive trouble-maker. I'm sure that he did his complaining and attacking on the boards sd well as flooding you with tos complaints - while our one defense was off the boards via TOS reports - and YES - we were complaining very loudly indeed about 3 very decent boards being turned into a vulgar shambles - yet if you visited those boards - you would find that we are serious and respected posters on those boards.
So what your saying is not always the case.
That's one of the benefits of your people surfing - that will help them put some of the complaining in context and see if it's justified.
Thanks,
Sun
http://ragingbull.lycos.com/mboard/boards.cgi?board=COMMENT&read=225
By: ragingbullrep (RB Staff)
28 Jul 2003, 01:44 PM EDT
Msg. 222 of 419
Jump to msg. #
We can tell pretty quickly who the serious posters are and who is on here to make trouble using multiple aliases, etc. Usually, the ones who complain the loudest about others are the trouble makers.
http://ragingbull.lycos.com/mboard/boards.cgi?board=COMMENT&read=222
Which of the aliases posting here and on Raging Bull should be making disclosure as required by 17b.?
Section 17 -- Fraudulent Interstate Transactions
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
a. Use of interstate commerce for purpose of fraud or deceit
It shall be unlawful for any person in the offer or sale of any securities or any security-based swap agreement (as defined in section 206B of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act [15 USCS § 78c note]) by the use of any means or instruments of transportation or communication in interstate commerce or by use of the mails, directly or indirectly--
1. to employ any device, scheme, or artifice to defraud, or
2. to obtain money or property by means of any untrue statement of a material fact or any omission to state a material fact necessary in order to make the statements made, in light of the circumstances under which they were made, not misleading; or
3. to engage in any transaction, practice, or course of business which operates or would operate as a fraud or deceit upon the purchaser.
b. Use of interstate commerce for purpose of offering for sale
It shall be unlawful for any person, by the use of any means or instruments of transportation or communication in interstate commerce or by the use of the mails, to publish, give publicity to, or circulate any notice, circular, advertisement, newspaper, article, letter, investment service, or communication which, though not purporting to offer a security for sale, describes such security for a consideration received or to be received, directly or indirectly, from an issuer, underwriter, or dealer, without fully disclosing the receipt, whether past or prospective, of such consideration and the amount thereof.
Exemptions of section 3 not applicable to this section
The exemptions provided in section 3 shall not apply to the provisions of this section.
Limitation
The authority of the Commission under this section with respect to security-based swap agreements (as defined in section 206B of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act [15 USCS § 78c note]) shall be subject to the restrictions and limitations of section 2A(b).
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Oh...the Subway...what a surprise.
BELLEAIR BEACH MARINE, INC.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PRINCIPAL ADDRESS
4100 W KENNEDY BLVD
327
TAMPA FL 33609 US
Changed 11/14/2002
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MAILING ADDRESS
4100 W KENNEDY BLVD
327
TAMPA FL 33609 US
Changed 11/14/2002
Document Number
P98000092542
FEI Number
592549995
Date Filed
10/29/1998
State
FL Status
ACTIVE
Effective Date
NONE
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Registered Agent
Name & Address
HAIBI, YAMILE, ESQ
4100 W KENNEDY BLVD
SUITE 327
TAMPA FL 33609
Name Changed: 01/15/2003
Address Changed: 01/09/2002
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Officer/Director Detail Name & Address Title
HAIBI, YAMILE
4100 W KENNEDY BLVD
TAMPA FL 33609 US D
Yamile Haibi
7210 SW 57th Ave.
South Miami, FL
http://www.attorneyweb.net/us/fl_southmiami.html
Belleair Beach Marine is inactive, Florida corporate records state. Tampa lawyer Yamile Haibi is listed as the registered agent.
She confirmed that Dakota Land Co. contracted to purchase the 12 acres but declined to disclose financial details.
"We haven't closed on it," Haibi said. "We don't have a hard and fast closing date, but it will be some time in December."
DAKOTA LAND COMPANY
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PRINCIPAL ADDRESS
2519 MCMULLEN BOOTH ROAD
SUITE 510-270
CLEARWATER FL 33761
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MAILING ADDRESS
2519 MCMULLEN BOOTH ROAD
SUITE 510-270
CLEARWATER FL 33761
Document Number
P01000085565
FEI Number
APPLIED Date Filed
08/29/2001
State
FL
Status
INACTIVE
Effective Date
NONE
Last Event
ADMIN DISSOLUTION FOR ANNUAL REPORT Event Date Filed
09/19/2003 Event Effective Date
NONE
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Registered Agent
Name & Address
LEONETTI, FRANK JR.
66 ST. JAMES DRIVE
BALLENISLES
PALM BEACH GARDENS FL 33418
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Officer/Director Detail Name & Address Title
COOPER, HOWARD M
2519 MCMULLEN BOOTH ROAD
CLEARWATER FL 33761 PS
Largo provides site for upscale homes
Development: Trees, acreage attractive to trio at Dakota Land
Jane Meinhardt
Staff Writer
LARGO — Up to 30 unusual homes, starting at about $500,000, are planned for one of Pinellas County's prime vacant parcels.
The Dakota Land Co. has contracted to buy 12 acres on the northwest corner of Belleair and Belcher roads near a neighborhood of upscale homes on large lots.
Property appraiser records show the property's most recent sale for $1.7 million came in February 2001. The current owner of record is Belleair Beach Marine Inc. The corporation's Clearwater address listed on property records is the office of Weiss' former attorney, who also was the registered agent until December 2001.
....
Belleair Beach Marine is inactive, Florida corporate records state. Tampa lawyer Yamile Haibi is listed as the registered agent.
She confirmed that Dakota Land Co. contracted to purchase the 12 acres but declined to disclose financial details.
"We haven't closed on it," Haibi said. "We don't have a hard and fast closing date, but it will be some time in December."
The Dakota Land Co. and its principals plan to develop Plantation as a private land reserve centered on the lake, which has been named Swan Lake.
Howard M. Cooper, president, teamed with his son, Torrey Cooper, and Richard S. Truesdale as developers of the project.
....
Public promotion of the homes begins Nov. 1. Five of the homes have been reserved, Cooper said.
The Plantation's planned water works centered on the lake is reminiscent of another of Torrey Cooper's projects.
In 1987, he attempted to develop Swan Park, an $8.6-million office and shopping complex in the 1700 block of 68th Street North in St. Petersburg. A 2-acre lake was the focal point of a complex that would have included waterfalls and fountains.
Swan Park never materialized because of problems with storm water pipes and litigation with nearby property owners, Cooper said.
In the mid-1990s, Cooper was the chief executive officer of a company that ran into legal trouble. A Pinellas County circuit judge ordered the company, Credit Life Corp., dissolved in 1995 and banned Cooper from ever operating that type of business in Florida.
Cooper and the company were accused of buying insurance policies from the terminally ill and failing to pay for them.
"We were one of the first companies in this business," Cooper said. "What happened was a funding source in Orlando backed out, but all the policies were settled."
To reach Jane Meinhardt, call (727) 507-0663 or send your e-mail to jmeinhardt@bizjournals.com
performance bond
A form of guarantee, given by the seller in a contract, that in the event of the terms of the contract not being fulfilled, the buyer will be able to claim compensation in the form of money.
Beats me, but here are some reference links to "PB trades" - shorting stocks seems to be the theme.
http://www.alert-trading.com/calls/012700.html
http://moneycentral.communities.msn.com/CanadianTechnicalAnalysisCommunity/booksquotes.msnw?action=g...
PB TRADES,INC.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PRINCIPAL ADDRESS
2357 STAG RUN BLVD.
CLEARWATER FL 33765
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MAILING ADDRESS
2357 STAG RUN BLVD.
CLEARWATER FL 33765
Document Number
P02000058394
FEI Number
300096343
Date Filed
05/24/2002
State
FL Status
ACTIVE
Effective Date
NONE
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Registered Agent
Name & Address
HARLAN, BRUCE M
19196 U.S. 19 N.
SUITE 101
CLEARWATER FL 33761
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Officer/Director Detail Name & Address Title
BALVIN, PAT
2357 STAG RUN BLVD.
CLEARWATER FL 33765 PST
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Annual Reports Report Year Filed Date
2003 04/05/2003
CRIMINON INC. Florida Non Profit
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PRINCIPAL ADDRESS
107 1/2 N. GREENWOOD AVE N
CLEARWATER FL 33755
Changed 04/27/2000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MAILING ADDRESS
PO BOX 7727
CLEARWATER FL 33758
Changed 04/27/2000
Document Number
N49709
FEI Number
593132503
Date Filed
07/07/1992
State
FL Status
ACTIVE
Effective Date
NONE
Last Event
REINSTATEMENT
Event Date Filed
01/10/1997
Event Effective Date
NONE
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Registered Agent
Name & Address
HARLAN, BRUCE M ESQ.
326 BELCHER RD. N.
CLEARWATER FL 34625
Name Changed: 01/10/1997
Address Changed: 01/10/1997
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Officer/Director Detail Name & Address Title
LAN, JEANIE
2357 STAG RUN BLVD.
CLEARWATER FL 34625 D
BALVIN, PAT
2357 STAG RUN BLVD.
CLEARWATER FL 33765 D
ZWAN, JUNE B
PO BOX 2944
CLEARWATER FL 33757 D
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Annual Reports Report Year Filed Date
2001 09/25/2001
2002 08/22/2002
2003 02/11/2003
Working on that - there's just so much damned stuff to sift through, but I'll get there...
BTW, any information on those two young ladies that work with Bruce in Florida?
HARLAN is the obvious connection.
The posts are long..but I don't have enough time to make them shorter..
SCIENTOLOGY MISSIONS INTERNATIONAL
6331 HOLLYWOOD BLVD STE 501
LOS ANGELES, CA 90028
EIN: 95-3739098
This organization is not required to file an annual return with the IRS because it is a church. It is a 501(c)(03) public charity.
http://www.guidestar.org/search/report/gs_report.jsp?npoId=339137
More of - The Internal Revenue Service Guide to Scientology (not affiliated with the US Government).
Management Organizations
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Applied Scholastics Eastern United States
1701 Drew Street
Clearwater, FL 33755
Financial Summary
1999 2000
Revenue n/a $189,127
Expenditures n/a $172,315
Net n/a $16,812
Assets $0 $22,022
Liabilities $0 $1,126
Net $0 $20,896
Employee/Contractor Summary
Name Position Compensation
Debbie Shadd President $22,900
Ruth Siacuinas Secretary $19,430
Gary Reikin Treasurer $0
Notes
Year Description Amount
2000 License Fees received $185,939
2000 Payment to Applied Scholastics Dominica $3,821
2000 License Fees paid $64,525
More Information
2000 Form 990
GuideStar Financial Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Applied Scholastics Western United States
12640 Euclid St. Suite 200
Garden Grove, CA 92840
Financial Summary
1999 2000
Revenue n/a $471,143
Expenditures n/a $419,697
Net n/a $51,446
Assets $0 $77,954
Liabilities $0 $4,574
Net $0 $73,380
Employee/Contractor Summary
Name Position Compensation
Sara Brooks President $12,994
Billy Chalmers Director $0
Joni Ginsberg Trustee $0
Dan Irwin Director/Secretary $14,556
Joanne Takano Irwin Trustee $0
Dani Quevedo Treasurer $0
Kevin Richards Director $0
Laurie Zurn Trustee $0
Notes
Year Description Amount
2000 License Fees received $323,772
More Information
2000 Form 990
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bridge Publications, Inc.
4751 Fountain Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90029
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Building Management Services
6331 Hollywood Blvd Suite 1200
Los Angeles, CA 90028
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Church of Scientology International, Inc.
6331 Hollywood Blvd. Suite 1200
Los Angeles, CA 90028
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Church of Scientology Religious Trust
6331 Hollywood Blvd Suite 1011
Los Angeles, CA 90028
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Church of Scientology Western US
1404 N. Catalina Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90027
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Church of Spiritual Technology
419 Larchmont 162
Los Angeles, CA 90004
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dianetics Centers International
6331 Hollywood Blvd Ste 500
Los Angeles, CA 90028
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dianetics Foundation International
6331 Hollywood Blvd Ste 1200
Los Angeles, CA 90028
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Flag Ship Trust
Sussex Rh194Jy
England
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Foundation Church of Scientology
118 N Fort Harrison Ave
Clearwater, FL 34615
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Foundation International Membership Services Administrations
210 S. Fort Harrison Ave.
Clearwater, FL 34616
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hubbard Dianetics Foundation
4751 Fountain
Los Angeles, CA 90029
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Association of Scientologists
Sussex RH194JY
England
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
International Hubbard Ecclesiastic League of Pastors
6331 Hollywood Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90028
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Membership Services Administration UK Ltd.
Sussex RH194JY
England
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
New Era Publications International APS
Copenhagen 1264
Denmark
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Religious Technology Center
1710 Ivar Ave. Suite 1100
Los Angeles, CA 90028
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Scientology International Reserves Trust
Sussex RH1 94JY
England
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Scientology Missions International
6331 Hollywood Blvd Suite 501
Los Angeles, CA 90028
More Information
GuideStar Organization Summary
The Internal Revenue Service Guide to Scientology (not affiliated with the US Government).
http://parishionerinfo.org/orgs.html
Criminon
Turning Criminals into
Scientology Cultists
http://www.reprogram.net/
Scientology's Criminon ® organization has been routinely exposed to be a Church of Scientology ® recruitment front which has never been favorably evaluated by any independant review board. Criminon has never been proven to be an effective "Crime Prevention" organization and claims by the Scientology organization to the contrary have in the past been both unverifiable given the vague and unspecific nature of Scientology's claims, and false when ever the organization offered enough references to check their validity.
This web site is dedicate toward the effort to expose Scientology's Criminon front group as:
A Scientology front, not an independant organization
Virtually non-existant, existing almost entirly as a letter-writing recruitment campaign with one envelope-stuffing office in California
Unproven and ineffective contrary to Scientology's claims
Staffed by dishonest Scientologists who won't even admit they're Scientologists
A recruitment organization for the "Church" of Scientology
Dangerous and deadly when Scientology's "Purification Rundown" ritual is used.
To meet these goals, this web site will contain everything that's known about the Criminon organization including the known newspaper articles and official reviews, horror stories from real people who subjected themselves to Criminon, and detailed, truthful information about the organization from Scientologists and ex-Scientologists who work to halt the organization's criminal abuses.
If you find anything that's inaccurate, incorrect, mistaken, or just outright wrong on this web site, please contact Fredric Rice, the Organized Crime Civilian Response's Special Projects Director so that the mistake can be corrected.
It is the policy of OCCR to solicit corrections to its web sites so that information can be as accurate as possible. Submit corrections with testable evidence so that any inaccurate information you find here may be corrected quickly -- with our thanks. Also, if you have factual information concerning Criminon, please submit it to us so that it may be included on this web site. Thanks!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A first look at Scientology's Criminon And Narconon
The Mirror: TOM CRUISE SECT PREYS ON DRUGS PRISONERS
Scientologists Deny They Are Looking For Members In Irish Prisons
West Covina: Murphy Trip Disclosure Reflects Links to Scientology
West Covina Judge with Scientology Ties Back To Work
Beverly covers Scientology's 'ABEL' front
Scientology admits Criminon, Narconon, Way to Happiness, Applied Scholastics religious?
Gregg Hagglund: OPPOSITION CANADA: Narconon-Chilocco: Affidavitt of Jerry Whitfield
Criminon Community Education Center of West Covina: Doesn't Exist
PTSC offers background photos of officials with notorious cult leaders
#2 Intercepted secret e-mail from cultist about Criminon
West Covina: Scientology's favorite judge: Patrick B. Murphy
West Covina Judge with Scientology Ties -- More Exposure
West Covina Judge in hot water: Scientology connections exposed
Classes for defendants have ties to church
Criminon's Head Quarters in Studio City: More Exposure
Ireland: Prisons failing to prevent rape, says report
Investigating Scientology's Criminon: Does it even actually exist?
Fredric Rice discusses Criminon with a Scientologist
#1 Intercepted secret e-mail from cultist about Criminon
Research into Criminon turns up dry hole
Criminon -- I don't think it actually exists
London: Scientology faces ban over jail `infiltration'
Time Magazine described Criminon and Narconon
Criminon Netherlands and Belgium
Cult lies: 'Criminon Community Education Center' doesn't even exists!
The Mirror: Church of Scientology Targets Murderers and Rapists
Tilman Hausherr answers the question: What is Criminon?
Researched Answers the cult does not want you to see.
JustWog: Reply from Ken Livingstone's office, Mayor of London
Scotland: CULT LURES PRISON BEASTS
Scientology Ruined My Life. SALLY JESSY RAPHAEL Transcript #741
A look at who owns the criminon.org and criminon-inc.org web sites
Irish newspaper: Recruiting rapists and murderers in crowded system
Science doesn't support Scientology's bizarre quack medical claims
Scientology one of many notorious cults looking for 'Faith Based' handout
The views and opinions stated within this web page are those of the author or authors which wrote them and may not reflect the views and opinions of the ISP or account user which hosts the web page. The opinions may or may not be those of the Chairman of The Organized Crime Civilian Response®.
The name "Criminon"® is trademarked to the Scientology organization through one of their many front groups. The name "Scientology"® is also trademarked to the "Church" of Scientology. Neither this web page, nor this web site, nor any of the individuals mentioned herein assisting to educate the public about the dangers of the Narconon scam are members of or representitives of the Scientology organization.
Trademark usage at the Turning Criminals into Scientology Cultists web site
E-Mail Fredric L. Rice / The Organized Crime Civilian Response
Host name: www.criminon-inc.org
IP address: 207.90.57.153
whois whois.arin.net 207.90.57.153:
OrgName: Intelligence Network Online, Inc.
OrgID: INO
Address: 1224 Rogers Street
City: Clearwater
StateProv: FL
PostalCode: 33756
Country: US
ReferralServer: rwhois://rwhois.intnet.net:4321/
Domain ID:D2172633-LROR
Domain Name:CRIMINON-INC.ORG
Created On:12-Oct-1998 04:00:00 UTC
Last Updated On:14-Nov-2003 01:14:39 UTC
Expiration Date:11-Oct-2004 04:00:00 UTC
Sponsoring Registrar:R39-LROR
Status:OK
Registrant ID:5FF6BE63FA74D22D
Registrant Name:Domain Registrar
Registrant Organization:Domain Registry Group Inc
Registrant Street1:2316 Delaware Ave #266
Registrant City:Buffalo
Registrant Postal Code:14216-2687
Registrant Country:US
Registrant Email:support@droa.com
Admin ID:5FF6BE63FA74D22D
Admin Name:Domain Registrar
Admin Organization:Domain Registry Group Inc
Admin Street1:2316 Delaware Ave #266
Admin City:Buffalo
Admin Postal Code:14216-2687
Admin Country:US
Admin Email:support@droa.com
Tech ID:5FF6BE63FA74D22D
Tech Name:Domain Registrar
Tech Organization:Domain Registry Group Inc
Tech Street1:2316 Delaware Ave #266
Tech City:Buffalo
Tech Postal Code:14216-2687
Tech Country:US
Tech Email:support@droa.com
Name Server:NS1.INTNET.NET
Name Server:NS2.INTNET.NET
Criminon™ means “no crime.” and is an organization realizing the goal of rehabilitating adult and juvenile offenders.
An international organization based in Los Angeles, California, Criminon has chapters throughout the world. Criminon Inc. is based in Clearwater, Florida.
Success Stories
To learn of the success of Criminon, read the stories of some of its participants.
Sponsor an Inmate
You can sponsor an inmate's participation in the Criminon program. Click here for more information.
Faith Community Network
We are a participant in the Faith Community Network in coordination with the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice.
More Information
Click here for more information or to contact us .
http://www.criminon-inc.org/
CRIMINON INC. Florida Non Profit
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PRINCIPAL ADDRESS
107 1/2 N. GREENWOOD AVE N
CLEARWATER FL 33755
Changed 04/27/2000
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MAILING ADDRESS
PO BOX 7727
CLEARWATER FL 33758
Changed 04/27/2000
Document Number
N49709
FEI Number
593132503
Date Filed
07/07/1992
State
FL Status
ACTIVE
Effective Date
NONE
Last Event
REINSTATEMENT
Event Date Filed
01/10/1997
Event Effective Date
NONE
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Registered Agent
Name & Address
HARLAN, BRUCE M ESQ.
326 BELCHER RD. N.
CLEARWATER FL 34625
Name Changed: 01/10/1997
Address Changed: 01/10/1997
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Officer/Director Detail Name & Address Title
LAN, JEANIE
2357 STAG RUN BLVD.
CLEARWATER FL 34625 D
BALVIN, PAT
2357 STAG RUN BLVD.
CLEARWATER FL 33765 D
ZWAN, JUNE B
PO BOX 2944
CLEARWATER FL 33757 D
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Annual Reports Report Year Filed Date
2001 09/25/2001
2002 08/22/2002
2003 02/11/2003
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Site Maintenance
We are currently conducting a scheduled maintenance of the site.
As a result, you will not be able to access Raging Bull for a little bit.
We hate doing it to you, but we have to every once in a while!
Should you continue to experience any difficulties after this time period, please email general@ragingbull.com with details about your problem. Our community advocates will get back to you.
As always, thank you for your patience and support.
Best regards,
The Raging Bull Team
Yes, but he resigned as an officer the same day he resigned as agent...
It has come to the attention of Hard to Treat Diseases Incorporated that unrelated third party individuals or entities are releasing information about the Company through mass fax and/or email blasts. The Company is moving ahead with the testing of Tubercin. The Company urges all investors and potential investors to review the company's press releases and web site rather than relying on non-Company disseminated information.
That’s what HTDS claims – "unrelated third party individuals or entities are releasing information about the Company through mass fax and/or email blasts." However, the "unrelated third party individuals" share the same web site address as HTDS.
HTDS -- Hard to Treat Diseases, Inc. (FL)
http://www.pinksheets.com/quote/company_profile.jsp?symbol=HTDS
Com (1 Cent)
Address:
P.O. Box 218
Del Ray Beach
FL 33447-0218
USA
Phone: 561-272-6900
Company Website: http://httd.com
Officers:
Colm J. King, Pres. & CEO
1.
Hard to Treat Diseases Incorporated - HTDS - Request to Shareholders and Interested Investors
DELRAY BEACH, Fla., Dec 5, 2003 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Hard to Treat Diseases Incorporated (Pink Sheets:HTDS) - It has come to the attention of Hard to Treat Diseases Incorporated that unrelated third party individuals or entities are releasing information about the Company through mass fax and/or email blasts. The Company is moving ahead with the testing of Tubercin. The Company urges all investors and potential investors to review the company's press releases and web site rather than relying on non-Company disseminated information.
Operating out of Delray Beach, Florida, Hard to Treat Diseases Incorporated ("HTTD") holds the international marketing rights, except South Korea, to Tubercin, a patented immunostimulant developed for combating Cancer under medical patent (US Patent 6,274,356). The unique properties unlike other cancer products are clearly stated in the abstract summary of the patent... "A carbohydrate complex, which is a mixture of low molecular-weight polysaccaharides of an arabinomannan structure extracted from Mycobacterium tuberculosis, is highly effective in treating various cancer patients without incurring any adverse side effects."
Statements in this press release that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended. Those statements include statements regarding the intent, belief or current expectations of the Company and its management. Such statements reflect management's current views, are based on certain assumptions and involve risks and uncertainties. Actual results, events, or performance may differ materially from the above forward-looking statements due to a number of important factors, and will be dependent upon a variety of factors, including, but not limited to, our ability to obtain additional financing and access funds from our existing financing arrangements that will allow us to continue our current and future operations and whether demand for our product and testing service in domestic and international markets will continue to expand. The Company undertakes no obligation to publicly update these forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances that occur after the date hereof or to reflect any change in the Company's expectations with regard to these forward-looking statements or the occurrence of unanticipated events.
SOURCE: Hard to Treat Diseases Incorporated
CONTACT: Hard to Treat Diseases Incorporated, Delray Beach
Colm King, 561/272-6900
2.
Hard to Treat Diseases Inc. welcomes you to this presentation regarding the use of TUBERCIN. This product has demonstrated it is an immunostimulant agent against Cancer.
The Chairman and President of Hard To Treat Diseases Inc. has been notified there is an interest to use TUBERCIN in hospital clinical settings overseas.
As an emerging small company, HTTD is focused on developing alliances with established, well-financed strategic partners to effectively manufacture, distribute, and market TUBERCIN internationally. HTTD envisions TUBERCIN as a product, which could ultimately be utilized worldwide.
The Company will operate as part of an integrated strategy establishing regional markets in Asia, Europe, and Africa, which will contribute to revenues of the first market in North America.
Our strategy is to develop a immunostimulant that could be manufactured at the highest quality and the lowest cost. Certain delivery systems will be proposed, while the location of the manufacturing is under review and is being determined, whether the FDA compliance of the requirements for manufacturing and marketing can be carried and maintained by the prospective manufacturers. Ultimately, HTTD expects to form strategic alliances for product development, manufacturing, and distribution with major pharmaceutical and diagnostic companies in the United States and Europe. We believe our technology will be assured more rapid development and marketing success in the near future through this approach.
There can be no doubt, strategy for "Fast Track" approval by FDA will be of paramount importance. To this end, HTTD will address this consideration that could make the product TUBERCIN readily available after successful treatment of patients abroad in the last Fourteen Years.
Copyright HTTD. All rights reserved
http://216.239.59.104/search?q=cache:3mr2wkimmLkJ:www.httd.com/+HTTD&hl=en&ie=UTF-8
3.
US Stock Market - Stock Profile of the Week
Symbol: HTDS Market: PK Sector: MEDICAL RESEARCH
BARCHART Rates HTDS an 80% BUY - http://quotes.barchart.com/texpert.asp?sym=HTDS
Before we begin our profile we have very exciting, breaking news...
Tubercin Passes Toxicity Trials - Ready To Proceed To Live Cancer Trials
BREAKING NEWS - DELRAY BEACH, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Hard to Treat Diseases Incorporated (Pink Sheets:HTDS) announces that Tubercin® has passed the toxicity tests required to proceed to the live cancer trials. Testing Tubercin® on live Melanoma, Lung and Breast cancer cells will begin immediately. The President and CEO, Mr. Colm J. King, met with the spokesperson of the medical group at their offices in Oklahoma City. Mr. King was advised that the tests were conducted under strict FDA guidelines. Full test results will be available at the corporate offices as soon as the reports and findings are printed.
"These are the most promising results to date regarding Tubercin® and we're looking forward to additional positive results in the near future," stated Mr. King. "These tests prove that Tubercin® is non-toxic and is the first step on the way to human clinical trials as well as the first positive breakthrough conducted in the United States with an independent medical group for Tubercin®."
Operating out of Delray Beach, Florida, Hard to Treat Diseases Incorporated ("HTTD") holds the international marketing rights, except South Korea, to Tubercin®, a patented immunostimulant developed for combating Cancer under medical patent (US Patent 6,274,356). The unique properties unlike other cancer products are clearly stated in the abstract summary of the patent... "A carbohydrate complex, which is a mixture of low molecular-weight polysaccharides of an arabinomannan structure extracted from Mycobacterium tuberculosis, is highly effective in treating various cancer patients without incurring any adverse side effects."
STOCK PROFILE OF THE WEEK
HTDS is now at an emerging and potentially explosive stage. As stated in their press release, Tubercin is now ready to proceed (after tests conducted under strict FDA guidelines) to human clinical trials. While they have jumped one very big hurdle, they are still in the early stages of development and now is a great time for investors to take heed.
TUBERCIN
Over the past ten years, epoch making anticancer agents have continuously been introduced, but the mortality of cancer patients have been rising in the U.S. and the European countries not to mention Japan and Korea. The decisive measure to cope with cancer is surgery.
When the cancer cells spread throughout the body instead of remaining on the original spot, the treatment should take into consideration chemotherapy, radiation therapy and immunotherapy. The drawback of such therapies, however, is they incur damages not only on cancer cells, but also on the normal cells.
Chemotherapy and radiation therapy are not suitable for application on weakened patients, especially those above 70. Historically, various forms of immunotherapy have been performed, falling short of therapeutic expectation. When Bacille calmetteguerin is used as an active no-specific immunotherapeutic agent, however, the patient's prognosis turns better through a simulative action on immune system of the cancer case.
Professor T.H. Chung of Korea extracted carbohydrate complex Tubercin from microbacterium tuberculosis to be used as immunostimulant. This was meant to activate the T-lymphocyte of the cancer patient to produce lymphokine. This process strengthened and promoted immuno surveillance activities in deficient state and alleviated the pain and prolonged the life of cancer patients.
Of late the pharmaceutical industry in advanced countries started to put on the market so called cancer vaccines (active specific immunotherapy). The vaccines, bacterial extracts, as adjuvants, with autologous and or allogenic cancer cells to generate antibodies to cancer cells, facilitating the killer T-cells to recognize and destroy cancer cells.
The laboratory work to modify autologous or allogenic cancer cells are not ordinary and simple. When our lab work augments the active specific immunotherapeutic agents, the Tubercin will be one of the best adjuvants. Meanwhile, the main point of AIDS is its virus killing T-cells and Tubercin helps maintain healthy T-cells. Consequently, we focus our effort on the application of Tubercin to AIDS.
TUBERCIN is derived from micro bacterium tuberculosis. As an immunostimulant, TUBERCIN strengthens the human body's own immune system and assists the body in seeking out and combating cancer cells. HTTD is potentially able to develop TUBERCIN into a low-cost product to treat cancer patients on an international scale. Salient treatment, through the administration of TUBERCIN, could positively affect thousands of lives in North America. In addition, Europe and Asia have millions of lives at risk each year because of viral diseases such as cancer.
TUBERCIN IS A FINISHED PRODUCT. Tubercin as an inmunostimulant has been administered to human patients in stages three and four of terminal cancer. There have been no indications of any adverse side effects in human trials There has been encouraging results of patients with TUBERCIN in the last fourteen years. Various forms of cancer were involved and many of the patients survived.
A review of clinical studies indicate TUBERCIN has no side effects and could possibly be administered in conjunction with other such modalities for the treatment of cancer without any adverse effects. The scientific presumption would be the distinct possibility of a strengthened immunity system and the administration of treatment such as chemotherapy at the later stages of tumor growth would not be impeded by the weakened condition of the terminal cancer patient. To this end the Company has been assisted by outside consultants reviewing the research data and human trials involving TUBERCIN to see specifically whereby incidents of dual treatment produced favorable results in terms of moving toward indication of prolongation of the life of the cancer patient.
There is recognition that morphine is an trusted pain killer, but in totality it cannot be said that it has no side effects. In the maintaining of patient care, there is the strong possibility that TUBERCIN could be also considered as a candidate for a pain management. The Company's scientists describe TUBERCIN as having the high propensity of deadening the nerve endings in specific areas of the body where cancer has caused erosion and consequently much pain.
PATENTS
Presently, HTTD has the patent rights for Korea, Japan and the United States. The Korean patent was issued on October 29, 1998 (Registration No. 173362). The Japanese patent was issued on June 12, 1998 (Registration No. 2790447). The United States patent was issued on August 14, 2001 (Registration No.6,274,356). Currently, patents are pending for Canada and Europe (the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy and Spain).
CANCER IN OUR TIME
In the 20th century, the number of cancer patients has been on the increase. Although many anti-cancer agents were developed and an enormous study on its essence continued, the mortality by cancer still is increasing. Mankind may be chronically threatened with cancer in the 21st century. Nine million new case of cancer occur annually and five million people die from breast cancer, reports the World Health Organization. Dramatic increases in life expectancy and change in lifestyle are estimated to increase the number of new cancer cases to 20 million annually by 2020 and cancer deaths to more than 10 million.
About 552,200 Americans - more than 1,500 people a day - are excepted to die of cancer this year. In the United States, one of every four deaths is attributed to cancer. Cancer is the second-leading cause of death in the United States. Exceeded only by heart disease. About 5 million lives have been lost to cancer since 1990 and about 13 million new cases have been diagnosed. In 2000, more then 1.2 million new cancer cases are expected to be diagnosed. The number of cancer cases will continue to grow, spurred by the aging population. By 2009, this patient group could total 8.4 million. In 1997, about 6.3 million people worldwide died from some form of cancer, and most major international cancer agencies expect this number to double by 2022.
Please note that HTDS had absolutley nothing to do with this report and is not a participant in any way.
No more advertisements: http://doubleopt.biz/optout.html
Stock Market Today is an independent research firm. This report is based on Stock Market Today's independent analysis but also relies on information supplied by sources believed to be reliable. This report may not be the opinion of HTDS management. Stock Market Today has also been retained to research and issue reports on HTDS. Stock Market Today may from time to time purchase or sell HTDS common shares in the open market without notice. The information contained in this report shall not constitute, an offer to sell or solicitation of any offer to purchase any security. It is intended for information only. Some statements may contain so-called "forward-looking statements". Many factors could cause actual results to differ. Investors should consult with their Investment Advisor concerning HTDS. Copyright 2003 © Stock Market Today Ltd. All Rights Reserved. This newsletter was distributed by MMS, Inc. MMS was paid eight hundred and fifty thousand shares HTDS stock to distribute this report. MMS is not affiiated with Stock Market Today and is not responsible for newsletter content.
http://www.onescience.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=569
4.
HTDS -- Hard to Treat Diseases, Inc. (FL)
Com (1 Cent)
Address:
P.O. Box 218
Del Ray Beach
FL 33447-0218
USA
Phone: 561-272-6900
Company Website: http://httd.com
(Error message when trying to access the web site:
Forbidden
You don't have permission to access to this document on this server.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Apache Server at httd.com}
Domain: httd.com
Registrant
SecureWhois, Inc.
SNpJMnMbTWY@securewhois.com
904 S. Roselle Road #136
Schaumburg, IL 60193 US
+1.6306727455
+1.6306727455 (FAX)
Administrative
SecureWhois, Inc.
QcHrKqpYHQG@securewhois.com
904 S. Roselle Road #136
Schaumburg, IL 60193 US
+1.6306727455
+1.6306727455 (FAX)
Billing
SecureWhois, Inc.
QcHrKqpYHQG@securewhois.com
904 S. Roselle Road #136
Schaumburg, IL 60193 US
+1.6306727455
+1.6306727455 (FAX)
Technical
SecureWhois, Inc.
QcHrKqpYHQG@securewhois.com
904 S. Roselle Road #136
Schaumburg, IL 60193 US
+1.6306727455
+1.6306727455 (FAX)
Record created on January 02, 2001
Record last updated on December 03, 2003
Record expires on January 02, 2004
5.
HTDS -- Hard to Treat Diseases, Inc. (FL)
http://www.pinksheets.com/quote/company_profile.jsp?symbol=HTDS
Com (1 Cent)
Address:
P.O. Box 218
Del Ray Beach
FL 33447-0218
USA
Phone: 561-272-6900
Company Website: http://httd.com
Officers:
Colm J. King, Pres. & CEO
Current Capital Change: None
Dividends: None
State of Incorporation: FL
Company Notes:
Formerly=International Foam Solutions, Inc. until 6-03
Transfer Agents:
Florida Atlantic Stock Transfer, Inc., Tamarac, FL 33321
http://www.pinksheets.com/quote/company_profile.jsp?symbol=HTDS
Which companies?
"He has been CFO of two publicly traded companies."
The new President and CEO is Mr. Colm J. King who has an extensive background in the public arena. Mr. King has held positions at midsize and international accounting firms as director of SEC auditing and compliance as well as a consultant to various public companies.
He has been CFO of two publicly traded companies. HTTD and its shareholders will benefit from Mr. King's extensive experience as a turnaround specialist in moving this company forward. HTTD will be well represented by Mr. King at the helm. The company will continue to conduct its daily business.
PAQMAN (FLORIDA) LLC
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PRINCIPAL ADDRESS
640 EAGLE DRIVE
DELRAY BEACH FL 3344
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MAILING ADDRESS
640 EAGLE DRIVE
DELRAY BEACH FL 3344
Document Number
L01000017006
FEI Number
651139721
Date Filed
10/01/2001
State
FL Status
INACTIVE
Effective Date
NONE
Last Event
ADMIN DISSOLUTION FOR ANNUAL REPORT
Event Date Filed
09/26/2003
Event Effective Date
NONE
Total Contribution
0.00
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Registered Agent
Name & Address
KING, COLM
640 EAGLE DRIVE
DELRAY BEACH FL 3344
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Manager/Member Detail Name & Address Title
GRIECO, MICHAEL
520 LINDELL BLVD.
DELRAY BEACH FL 33444 P
KING, COLM
640 EAGLE DRIVE
DELRAY BEACH FL 33444 ST
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Annual Reports Report Year Filed Date
2002 04/22/2002
Nov. 5, 2003 - Resignations Of Dr. Ronald Shinn, Ph.D. As President, CEO And Chairman Of The Board
DELRAY BEACH, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Nov. 5, 2003--Hard to Treat Diseases Incorporated ("HTTD") (Pink Sheets:HTDS - News) announces today the resignations of Dr. Ronald Shinn, Ph.D. as President, CEO and Chairman of the Board, Mr. Gerry Knight, Secretary / Treasurer, Director and Zenaida Shinn, Director in letters dated October 13, 2003 and mailed on October 15, 2003. The new President and CEO is Mr. Colm J. King who has an extensive background in the public arena. Mr. King has held positions at midsize and international accounting firms as director of SEC auditing and compliance as well as a consultant to various public companies. He has been CFO of two publicly traded companies. HTTD and its shareholders will benefit from Mr. King's extensive experience as a turnaround specialist in moving this company forward. HTTD will be well represented by Mr. King at the helm. The company will continue to conduct its daily business.
PAQMAN (FLORIDA) LLC
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PRINCIPAL ADDRESS
640 EAGLE DRIVE
DELRAY BEACH FL 3344
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MAILING ADDRESS
640 EAGLE DRIVE
DELRAY BEACH FL 3344
Document Number
L01000017006
FEI Number
651139721
Date Filed
10/01/2001
State
FL Status
INACTIVE
Effective Date
NONE
Last Event
ADMIN DISSOLUTION FOR ANNUAL REPORT
Event Date Filed
09/26/2003
Event Effective Date
NONE
Total Contribution
0.00
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Registered Agent
Name & Address
KING, COLM
640 EAGLE DRIVE
DELRAY BEACH FL 3344
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Manager/Member Detail Name & Address Title
GRIECO, MICHAEL
520 LINDELL BLVD.
DELRAY BEACH FL 33444 P
KING, COLM
640 EAGLE DRIVE
DELRAY BEACH FL 33444 ST
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Annual Reports Report Year Filed Date
2002 04/22/2002
Paqman, LLC
Developed various seafood fillings for this Florida company. Assisting with customer presentation at Wal-Mart and Sam's. Currently designing and sourcing manufacturing equipment.
http://www.aeschbachinc.com/projects.html