Oct 29, 2019

CultNEWS101 Articles: 10/29/2019




Kosmic Fusion, Podcast, Universal Medicine, Australia, Solar Temple, Netherlands, Yoga

"Followers of a woman living in suburban Auckland believe she is the reincarnation of an Indian deity, who can tune into people's souls through special frequencies. But two former volunteers for her group, Kosmic Fusion, have described a frightening experience where they were subjected to gruelling "confession" sessions. Steve Kilgallon and Tony Wall report on the implosion of a New Age cult.

She's short, for a living God.

Despite being, literally, five foot nothing, Kaveeta Bhavsaar is a far more imposing presence than her much taller, quieter husband, Sunil Kumar Porumamilla.

But then he can't cure your ailments with a high-frequency light wave.

In their rented Mission Bay villa, which combines views of Rangitoto with water stains on the ceiling, smells of incense waft through the house as Bhavsaar explains how Kosmic Fusion, a spiritual movement she started seven years ago, was sabotaged from within by "malignant narcissist snakes"."

Let's Talk About Sects: Universal Medicine
"Universal Medicine teaches that entities known as The Four Lords of Form rule over 9-foot-tall spirits that are all around us, and that most people have lived at least 2,300 lives before.
Former student Matt Sutherland told Sunday Night journalist Matt Doran that he would describe Universal Medicine's founder Serge Benhayon as 'a human wrecking ball.'"

Toronto Sun: Solar Temple Massacre: Mystery endures 25 years later

"The cult members thought the baby boy was the anti-Christ.

Emmanuel Dutoit was three months old and this tragic child was stabbed repeatedly. His killers used a wooden stake.
That was October 1994.

In a matter of days it would become clear to cops in Quebec and Switzerland the slain baby was the first salvo in the war for control of the Order of the Solar Temple cult.
Several days later in two quiet Swiss villages, 13 cult members enjoyed a last supper, then killed themselves by poison.

By the time the carnage was finished, 53 cult members were dead by poison, bullets or smothering. Eleven of the dead were Canadians."


BBC: Dutch family 'waiting for end of time' discovered in basement
"A family who spent nine years in a basement "waiting for the end of time" have been discovered by police in the Netherlands after the eldest son turned up at a local pub, reports say.

A man, 58, and his six children - aged 16 to 25 - were living at a farm in the northern province of Drenthe.

They were found after the son ordered beer at a bar in the nearby village of Ruinerwold, and then told staff he needed help, broadcaster RTV reported.
Witnesses said the man looked confused.  

"Yoga is about finding your center. There's a new trend to track down tranquility, but it's a more alternative twist to the usually peaceful exercise.

Amanda Kauffman strolled into the back room at Cinder Block Brewery Monday night with a beer in one hand and a yoga mat in the other. She was there to teach the first ever rage yoga class in Kansas City.

"It's a little bit different than your traditional yoga," she said. "You have dim lights, you have soft music. This is the complete opposite. It's yoga with an attitude basically."

She started practicing yoga seven years ago, but two years back, she came across a new technique she said is more her style."

News, Education, Intervention, Recovery



Intervention101.com to help families and friends understand and effectively respond to the complexity of a loved one's cult involvement.
CultRecovery101.com assists group members and their families make the sometimes difficult transition from coercion to renewed individual choice.
CultNEWS101.com news, links, resources.
Cults101.org resources about cults, cultic groups, abusive relationships, movements, religions, political organizations and related topics.

Selection of articles for CultNEWS101 does not mean that Patrick Ryan or Joseph Kelly agree with the content. We provide information from many points of view in order to promote dialogue.

Children 'spanked 30 times a day' in secretive sect, ex-member says

Eighteen years on from his time inside the Twelve Tribes religious sect, Matthew Klein is still scarred.
Alison Piotrowski
9News
October 29, 2019

Eighteen years on from his time inside the Twelve Tribes religious sect, Matthew Klein is still scarred.

"They not only control your medical care, they control your food, when you get to see your family, they try to control when you make love to your wife, they try and control your children," he told A Current Affair.

"Once you've been there a while, you realise that not everyone is equal. There are leaders and there's a whole hierarchy within it. It's very similar to Animal Farm."

Klein, his wife Tysha, and their two children joined the Twelve Tribes in 1999, drawn to their communal lifestyle and strong faith.

The Twelve Tribes present themselves as a welcoming religious group, growing produce on their New South Wales properties, and selling food through their cafes. For Klein, it felt like a simple way of life.

In the first six months within the Australian arm of the group, Tysha gave birth to another son. A few weeks later, their baby began having breathing difficulties. The elders discouraged them from seeking outside medical help.

This was not the only practice that concerned Klein.

According to Klein, the Twelve Tribes child training manuals provide detailed instructions about severe disciplinary measures for children, starting as young as six months old.

"They would get spanked from morning and night," he said.

"They would get spanked 20 to 30 times a day. Each one of them is six strikes on the hand with a thin rod."

The Twelve Tribes was started by former high school teacher and carnival showman Eugene Spriggs in Chattanooga, Tennessee, in the 1970s. Spriggs created the Twelve Tribes as a loose hybrid of Judaism and Christianity, preaching to his followers to live by the "first testament".

When members join, they're baptised with Hebrew names, hand their money and possessions, and live together in a commune.

The Australian arm of the tribe was formed in the early 90s, when Spriggs sent two Americans to set up the group in the Blue Mountains – Scott Sczarnecki and William Nunnally.

Today members live in one of their two Sydney bases: bedroom heritage house in Katoomba, and a 45-acre property just outside of Picton.

The group operates The Yellow Deli in Katoomba and The Common Ground Bakery in Picton.

"They don't pay wages, they don't pay superannuation, they don't pay insurances, they don't pay anything. They don't pay tax because apparently, they're a church. And where all this money goes, I don't know," says Klein.

Children in the Twelve Tribes are put to work from a very young age. Klein's now 23-year-old daughter Tessa remembers being sent out to work in a candle factory when she was five years old.

"Working with this boiling wax, like dipping into it making candles, like completely alone," she tells A Current Affair.

Rosemary Cruzado left the Twelve Tribes in 2010 after nearly 14 years.

"I was brainwashed the whole time I was there … like I was unable to critically think of anything."

Cruzado had two pregnancies during her time there. At 38 weeks during her last pregnancy, the baby stopped kicking and Rosemary experienced seizures.

The Australian leaders of the tribe did not want her to go to hospital. She recalls William Nunnally explicitly telling her "You can't end up in hospital."

Cruzado's baby died in utero, and the baby was taken away immediately.

"They laid it so thick on us on both my husband and I, they said it was all our fault that god couldn't really blessed us with a live baby because of our sin," she said.

While he was living within the Twelve Tribes, Matthew Klein convinced himself that the fanatical religious group was not a cult.

Once he got out, he quickly changed his mind. He's hoping by speaking out, he will prevent others from joining.

"I think it's my social duty to warn other people of what goes on in this place," he said.

"It's the kids who don't have a choice and it's just not on."

A Current Affair has approached The Twelve Tribes for comment.



https://www.9news.com.au/national/twelve-tribes-a-current-affair-investigation-religious-sect-claims-from/5b7e2ad4-cede-4a58-842c-7a6e4c78c527

Oct 25, 2019

U.S. Supreme Court Rejects Appeal by Jehovah’s Witnesses of 2015 California Trial Court

Press Releases
The Zalkin Law Firm
PRESS RELEASE

U.S. Supreme Court Rejects Appeal by Jehovah’s Witnesses of 2015 California Trial Court Order

The Supreme Court rejected the Appeal of a 2015 Civil Lawsuit Filed by the Zalkin Law Firm on Behalf of their client who alleges they were sexually molested as a child by a JW church leader. The appeal concerned the lower court order for the Watchtower to produce child sexual molestation files in this sexual abuse Civil lawsuit.

U.S. Supreme Court Rejects Appeal by Jehovah’s Witnesses of 2015 California Trial Court OrderSan Diego, CA, October 24, 2019 --(PR.com)-- On October 7, 2019, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the Petition for Writ of Certiorari filed by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc. (“Watchtower”), requesting that the Supreme Court review a case filed by the Zalkin Law Firm in 2013. In the case of JW v. Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc. et. al., the Riverside Superior Court of California awarded the Plaintiff, “J.W.,” a judgment of $4,016,152.39 plus interest at 10% per year after terminating Watchtower’s defense, because it refused to obey the Court’s order to produce files of known child molesters within the JW organization. In 2018, the Fourth District Court of Appeal in California upheld that decision. The U.S. Supreme Court’s rejection of Watchtower’s Petition (essentially a request for an appeal) lets stand the original judgement and damages granted by the lower court.

In the Brief in Opposition to the Petition filed by the Zalkin Law Firm, attorneys Irwin Zalkin and Devin Storey allege a long history of Watchtower violating similar court issued discovery orders to produce the molestation files in other sexual abuse cases, in particular another Zalkin Law Firm case (Lopez, supra, 246 Cal.App.4th 566), where the court found that “[t]here is no question that Watchtower willfully failed to comply with the document production order.” And just two years later in another court ruling (Padron, supra, 16 Cal.App.5th at p. 1249), that court stated the following:

“Watchtower has abused the discovery process. It has zealously advocated its position and lost multiple times. Yet, it cavalierly refuses to acknowledge the consequences of these losses and the validity of the court’s orders . . .”

Irwin Zalkin, attorney for the Plaintiff, alleges: “Our client has endured years of distress from the sexual abuse she suffered as a child from this convicted pedophile who was protected by the Jehovah’s Witnesses. That suffering has continued for the last six years as the Watchtower has obstructed the legal process. Now the JW’s will finally be held accountable for protecting a known pedophile and our client will receive the justice she deserves.”

Background on the Case
The Plaintiff, “J.W.,” alleged in the civil case that she was sexually molested on July 15, 2006 by Gilbert Simental, a trusted religious leader of her congregation, while attending a pool party at the Simentals' home. Simental was convicted in a criminal jury trial of three counts of lewd and lascivious acts on a child under the age of 14 and sentenced to 45 years in prison. That criminal case involved the sexual abuse of two young sisters aged 9-10. Like JW, those victims were friends of Simental’s own daughter and were molested while attending a sleep over at Simental’s house. A second criminal prosecution was commenced as a result of the allegations by JW, but Simental took a plea.

Although Simental confessed to some of the allegations to congregation elders investigating the charges made by parents, allegedly, the elders did not report to law enforcement despite being mandatory reporters under California law.

Jehovah’s Witnesses Promoted Known Pedophile to Position of Leadership - Letter from 1997 Confirms Awareness of Sexual Predators in Their Midst

During the civil case against Simental, it was alleged that allegations of child sexual abuse had followed him for 30 years, as his own niece went public with allegations that she had been abused by him at age 7. Allegedly, a March 14th, 1997 letter to all Elders within Jehovah’s Witnesses congregations from Watchtower headquarters confirmed they were aware of child molesters within the church and were in the process of compiling a comprehensive database of known pedophiles in positions of leadership. Also, allegedly, o⁹a July 20, 1998 follow-up letter to all Elders makes clear that the information about known abusers was being compiled because of concern for potential legal liability to Watchtower and the JW Organization, and was kept strictly confidential for internal use with no stated intent of alerting law enforcement about cases of child sex abuse.

Despite the evidence in the criminal case, during the civil case brought against it by the parents of "JW," Watchtower attempted to avoid liability by claiming that it had no prior knowledge of Simental’s pedophilia, that the abuse occurred after he had stepped down as a leader in the church and not at a church sponsored event. During the nearly 5 year-long lawsuit, there were numerous court orders for Watchtower to provide documents pertaining to known child molesters and the internal handling and investigation of allegations of child sexual abuse that were ignored and refused by the JW Organization and Watchtower.

About The Zalkin Law Firm
With offices in San Diego, CA and New York, NY, the firm's lawyers have represented hundreds of survivors of sexual abuse and sexual assault and achieved results in numerous high-profile sexual abuse and assault cases across the United States. The Zalkin Law Firm has aggressively represented survivors who suffered child sexual abuse and sexual assault while members of religious and other organizations, including the Catholic Church, Jehovah’s Witnesses, foster care, Boy Scouts, recovery homes, foreign student exchange programs, colleges. Irwin Zalkin was appointed a lead negotiator by United States Magistrate Judge Leo S. Papas on behalf of over 144 victims of childhood sexual abuse against the Roman Catholic Bishop of San Diego. These negotiations resulted in a global settlement of almost $200,000,000. He also was one of the lead trial lawyers and part of the trial team against the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Los Angeles where a global settlement was reached in the amount of $660,000,000.

For more information visit: www.zalkin.com
Contact Information
The Zalkin Law Firm
Irwin Zalkin
858-259-3011

Oct 24, 2019

'Teen Mom' Leah Messer Joins Alleged Cult Accused of Sexual Violation, Brainwashing

Danielle Long
IBT
October 24, 2019

"Teen Mom 2" star Leah Messer has seemingly joined Mastery in Transformational Training, an organization that has been accused of being a cult. 

The California-based group characterizes itself as a self-help group and offers a series of workshops that are a "caring, inspirational, and educational environment for generating breakthroughs in the most crucial aspects of your life. You will realize new ways to be more effective, giving and fulfilled in both your personal relationships and your career while experiencing new levels of self-confidence, vitality, joy, and satisfaction," according to their website. 

However, one former student's account of what happened in those workshops claimed the training imposed "brainwashing techniques," among other things. That student, Dana Sabre, filed a lawsuit against members of the organization in 2017. The case has since been dismissed, but the claims are shocking.

Radar Online reported the court filing, which read, "Such non-consensual imposition of brainwashing techniques generated massive psychiatric stress, which caused Plaintiff to suffer a psychiatrically diagnosed psychotic break."

The document continued, "Such psychiatrically diagnosed psychiatric break rendered Plaintiff to suffer severance from reality which included cycling among extreme confabulations, violent acting out and a catatonic state requiring four-point restraint and psychiatric hospitalization."

In addition, MITT was also accused of sexual violation, fraud, intentional infliction of emotional distress, negligent infliction of emotional distress, invasion of privacy, and more. 

Leah first appeared to make her involvement with MITT known when she posted an Instagram photo on Oct. 7. 

Oct 18, 2019

MEDIA ALERT: Dutch Farm Group Are Not 'Unification Church' Members

NEWS PROVIDED BY

Family Federation for World Peace and Unification 

Oct 17, 2019, 22:56 ET


NEW YORKOct. 17, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Family Federation for World Peace and Unification (FFWPU), commonly referred to as 'the Unification Church', was deeply alarmed to hear of the family being held in inhumane conditions on a farmhouse in the Netherlands. While we can confirm that one of the victims, Mr. Gerrit Jan van Dorsten was briefly a member of our movement in the mid-1980's, he is known to have suffered from mental health issues and left our organization in 1987. His estranged brother Mr. Derk van Dorsten, a long-time member of the Unification Church said, "I have not heard from my brother since 1984." In addition, we are unable to confirm any records of Mr. Josef Brunner, the alleged captor, having ever been associated in any way with the Unification Church.

Family Federation champions three ideals: family, peace, and unification. We are grateful that the 6 victims in this tragedy are now under the care of the local authorities and pray that they will be able to heal from their ordeal with time and professional help.

Family Fed USA
Nancy Jubb
212-997-0057
press@familyfed.org

Irving Street Rep
Ron Lucas
973-643-6262
rlucas@irvingstreetrep.com

SOURCE Family Federation for World Peace and Unification

Related Links

http://familyfed.org

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/media-alert-dutch-farm-group-are-not-unification-church-members-300941037.html

Dutch farm mystery: Father held as police unpick secret farm 'sect'


BBC News

October 18, 2019

The 67-year-old father of a family found living in a secret room on an isolated Dutch farm has been arrested.

His arrest came hours after an Austrian man who rented the property was remanded in custody.

Six grown-up children apparently spent the past nine years in seclusion on the farm, near the village of Ruinerwold.

Reports suggest the two arrested men may have formed their own sect, and police said they believed the children were held against their will.

Police confirmed that the six children, aged 18-25, included four women and two men and that their father had suffered a stroke.

How the story unfolded

The alarm was raised when the 25-year-old eldest son, Jan, turned up at a local bar in Ruinerwold in the northern province of Drenthe.

The bar-owner raised the alarm with police after the son revealed he had never been to school and said he had run away and needed help.

Police went to the farm where they found Jan's five siblings, his father and the 58-year-old Austrian man. The Austrian, a handyman named Josef B, appeared before an examining magistrate on Thursday and was detained for 14 days on suspicion of unlawfully depriving the children of their liberty and money laundering.

Police said the children had identified the man arrested, named locally as Gerrit Jan van D, as their father, but authorities had not yet confirmed the link.

A large sum of money was said to have been found on the farm.

Were they part of a sect?

In a statement, police said they were investigating whether the lifestyle of the eight people on the farm was connected to a particular philosophy of life or religious conviction.

According to Dutch media, the father and the farm's Austrian tenant had once been neighbours and got to know each other through the Unification Church, the worldwide movement often known as the Moonies which originated in South Korea.

In Austria, Josef B's brothers told the Kronen Zeitung website that he had joined a sect and had not turned up for the funerals of his parents in the past four years. "He thought he was better than Jesus," brother Franz told the paper.

Unification Church spokesman Willem Koetsier said the father, Gerrit Jan van D, left in 1987.

"At the same time he also broke off contact with the family," a nephew told Algemeen Dagblad. "At one point he got some crazy ideas in his head, but nobody in the family wants to talk about that."

Mr Koetsier said older members who knew him in the 1980s had described him as a very "ritual" person who had set up his own group with his family. "But it's not our outlook to go and live on a farm and hide from the outside world," he added.

"Sometimes people who are spiritual start their own church of movement, and I reckon that's what happened to him," he said.

Residents in the father's home town of Herxen thought he had joined the Moonies and died in South Korea. But it is thought Gerrit Jan van D moved to a sister group in Germany before marrying the children's mother and returning to the Netherlands. The mother died in 2004.

What have police found out?

Janny Knol, North Netherlands deputy police chief, confirmed that the children had been banned from going outside the house. "On the farm there was actually a separate, closed-off area and its main aim was to keep the outside world out," she told Dutch TV.

Since Tuesday, police psychologists have had a chance to speak to the family and have found out they were occasionally allowed out of the house but only on land immediately surrounding the farmhouse. Local reports said motion detectors and security cameras had been installed on the farm.

Ms Knol said it was not clear where the children were born but they had never been to school and were not registered by local authorities. She said they were having to tread a careful line between looking after the family's welfare and finding out what was necessary for the investigation.

The eldest of the six, Jan, who was not at the farm when police went there, is being cared for in a separate place. He has had several social media accounts running for the past few months.

Police have admitted going to the farm in the past, following up reports of a cannabis farm on the property, but say they never entered the building.

A team of 30 police are now trying to solve the mystery of the farm at Ruinerwold. The farmhouse is still being investigated and other properties have also been searched.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-50094828


Oct 17, 2019

Solar Temple Massacre: Mystery endures 25 years later

Police carry bodies out of a farm in Cheiry, Switzerland where 23 cultists died in a mass murder-suicide.
Brad Hunter
Toronto Sun
October 5, 2019

The cult members thought the baby boy was the anti-Christ.

Emmanuel Dutoit was three months old and this tragic child was stabbed repeatedly. His killers used a wooden stake.

That was October 1994.

In a matter of days it would become clear to cops in Quebec and Switzerland the slain baby was the first salvo in the war for control of the Order of the Solar Temple cult.

Several days later in two quiet Swiss villages, 13 cult members enjoyed a last supper, then killed themselves by poison.

By the time the carnage was finished, 53 cult members were dead by poison, bullets or smothering. Eleven of the dead were Canadians.

***

The Order of the Solar Temple was a secret society that took their cues from the Knights Templar.

Frenchmen Luc Jouret and Joseph Di Mambro founded the cult in the late 1970s or early 1980s in Geneva, Switzerland.

The sect’s beliefs were the usual gumbo of aliens and the godly. For example, they believed in the spiritual over the secular and preparing for the return of Jesus Christ as a “solar-god king.”

In addition, they wanted to unite the world’s great religions under the umbrella of the Solar Temple.

According to the Montreal Gazette, the cult planted roots in Quebec in the mid-80s.

There, they allegedly threatened a number of Quebec MNAs and were suspected of bombing Hydro Quebec transmission towers and plotting to obliterate Indigenous reserves.

For cops and residents, the chilling aspect was that the dead found in Quebec didn’t look like cult members.

“It came as a real shocker,” one relative of the dead told The Gazette. “It wasn’t written on their faces: ‘Hey, I’m a sect member.’”

***

Cult leader Luc Jouret preached doomsday and hellfire.

The 46-year-old was a homeopath who had been born in Africa and had lived in Belgium and Canada before establishing the Order of the Solar Temple.

And he brainwashed his wealthy followers with a chilling ease.

“They saw themselves as superior human beings whose survival was needed to ‘relaunch’ the human race after a cataclysm they saw coming because of the deterioration in world affairs,” Montreal Crown prosecutor Jean-Claude Boyer told The Canadian Press in 1994.

Jouret himself had the air of a “gentleman,” Boyer added, saying other members “looked like businessmen, there was nothing crazy about them.”

But one former member whose ex-hubby fell under the guru’s dark spell said the cult was only really about taking money from rich rubes.

Rose-Marie Klaus said she and her hubby were burned for about $500,000 in an organic farm scheme near Trois Rivieres. Others lost millions.

“Jouret thinks he’s Christ,” Klaus said in 1993.

“He told people that a great cataclysm is going to take place and that only the chosen will survive,” she said, adding a number of people relocated from Europe to Quebec to wait for the end.

***

By the early 90s, there was trouble in brain-scrambled paradise.

Jouret’s increasing doomsday vision and alleged messiah complex was causing friction inside the sect.

Some believed a significant amount of money was involved given the horde of cash the cult had shaken loose from wealthy members.

Cult kingpin Jouret apparently split off with his own group of followers after being ousted in favour of grand master Robert Falardeau.

The stage was set for mass suicide — and murder.

***

On Sept. 30, 1994 cops believe cult members Antonio Dutoit, his wife Nicky Robinson and their three-month-old son Emmanuel were stabbed to death in Morin Heights, Quebec.

Four days later, their chalet was found ablaze. Inside were their charred bodies. Swiss citizens Jerry and Colette Genoud were found dead at a nearby chalet.

Detectives believe the killers were cult members Joel Egger and Dominique Bellaton who flew from Montreal to Geneva in the wake of the murders.

But there was more horror to come.

On Oct. 5, 1994, in the tiny Swiss village of Cheiry, firefighters were called to a raging blaze at a farmhouse.

When it was cleared they discovered a horror show — bodies all over the place.

Twenty-three to be exact.

All were wearing ceremonial robes. Most had been shot in the head.

“It was frightful to enter a place like that and find so many dead,” Swiss police spokesman Beat Karten told reporters. “It’s atrocious. Atrocious.”

Among the dead were the mayor of Richelieu, Quebec Robert Ostiguy, his wife Francoise, Le Journal de Quebec reporter Jocelyn Grandmaison and Falardeau, a civil servant.

Less than an hour later and about 160 km away, 25 more bodies were discovered in two smouldering chalets. Among the dead was Jouret.

So what happened?

The European branch didn’t want to send money to Quebec anymore.

Cops came to believe the bloodbath was a purge of threats to Jouret’s leadership. They never believed Falardeau and the others would willingly kill themselves.

One widower of the slaughter pointed the finger at Jouret.

“Wherever Jouret goes, s— follows,” the man told The Gazette.

bhunter@postmedia.com

https://torontosun.com/news/world/solar-temple-massacre-mystery-endures-25-years-later

Dutch family 'waiting for end of time' discovered in basement

Police discovered a hidden room at a remote farmhouse in the Netherlands
BBC News
October 15, 2019

A family who spent nine years in a basement "waiting for the end of time" have been discovered by police in the Netherlands after the eldest son turned up at a local pub, reports say.

A man, 58, and his six children - aged 16 to 25 - were living at a farm in the northern province of Drenthe.

They were found after the son ordered beer at a bar in the nearby village of Ruinerwold, and then told staff he needed help, broadcaster RTV reported.

Witnesses said the man looked confused.

His family had been living in isolation waiting for the end of time, RTV reported.

"He ordered five beers and drank them. Then I had a chat with him and he revealed he had run away and needed help... then we called the police," bar owner Chris Westerbeek told the broadcaster.

He added: "He had long hair, a dirty beard, wore old clothes and looked confused. He said he'd never been to school and hadn't been to the barber for nine years."

"He said he had brothers and sisters who lived at the farm. He said he was the oldest and wanted to end the way they were living."

Officers visited the remote farmhouse and carried out a search. They discovered a hidden staircase behind a cupboard in the living room that led down to a basement room where the family were housed.

Ruinerwold is a village with a population of less than 3,000. The farm is outside the village and is accessible by a bridge over a canal.

The farm, which is part-hidden behind a row of trees, also had a large vegetable plot and a goat.

A neighbour told Dutch media that he had only ever seen one man on the farm and no children and that there had been animals on the grounds of the farm, such as geese and a dog.

The local postman said he had never posted a letter there. "It's actually pretty strange, now I come to think about it," he told Algemeen Dagblad news website.

People in the area tweeted the news and one reporter posted images of the farmhouse, saying he had been asked to keep at a distance.

Police in Drenthe confirmed that a 58-year-old man had been arrested and was under investigation after refusing to co-operate.

"Yesterday someone reported to us [that they were] worried about the living conditions of people in a house in Buitenhuizerweg in #Ruinerwold," they wrote in a tweet. "We went there."

"We still have many unanswered questions," they said, adding that all scenarios were open and their investigation was fully under way.

The farmhouse and the surrounding grounds were cordoned off.

It was unclear how long the family had been in the basement or what had happened to the children's mother. Some reports suggested the father had suffered a stroke and had been confined to his bed.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-50054044

Booze and cursing are at the center of a new yoga rage

Yoga is about finding your center. There's a new trend to track down tranquility in the metro, but it's a more alternative twist to the usually peaceful exercise. WDAF photo
MEGAN DILLARD WDAF
STLtoday.com
October 16, 2019

KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Yoga is about finding your center. There's a new trend to track down tranquility, but it’s a more alternative twist to the usually peaceful exercise.

Amanda Kauffman strolled into the back room at Cinder Block Brewery Monday night with a beer in one hand and a yoga mat in the other. She was there to teach the first ever rage yoga class in Kansas City.

“It’s a little bit different than your traditional yoga," she said. "You have dim lights, you have soft music. This is the complete opposite. It’s yoga with an attitude basically.”

She started practicing yoga seven years ago, but two years back, she came across a new technique she said is more her style.

“A lot of people stay away from yoga because they think, 'Oh well, you know, I’m not good enough for that, or what are people going to think about my poses,'" she said. "And in here, you can just be yourself.”

Kauffman now teaches rage yoga.

“The technique is different. Instead of calming your mind, you’re bringing everything out instead," she said. "Instead of just trying to push it out quietly, you’re going to push it out, and it’s going to be loud!”

Monday night’s class participants each got a beer that they drank throughout their time on the mat, and traditional hand motions and positions were replaced with gestures and sounds you’d more likely see at a rock concert.

“I’ve never done rage yoga before," attendee Hillary Luppino said. "I had recently seen something online about it, and then I saw that it was available here, so I just jumped on the opportunity.”

She appreciated the alcohol twist, but also “the idea of also kind of incorporating the stress release of like yelling or screaming or flipping somebody off, you know what I mean?”

Kauffman described the scene before the 7 p.m. class began.

“We’ll be listening to loud explicit music, we will be cussing, using profanity, yelling, screaming, just letting all the negative energy out tonight. That’s the goal," she said.

The instructor said mental health is as critical as physical maintenance, and the combination of these two things appealed to her.

“In my house, I practice yoga to rock music, to metal music, to loud music," Kauffman said. "That’s just what I enjoy. So when I saw the teacher training program for rage yoga, it spoke to me. It’s the perfect combination of anyone who’s into yoga and into an alternative lifestyle as well.”

The rage yoga practice began in Canada, and there have been two instructor training courses so far. The next class here in the metro is scheduled for 7 p.m. Nov. 1 at Anytime Fitness in Excelsior Springs.

https://www.stltoday.com/lifestyles/health-med-fit/booze-and-cursing-are-at-the-center-of-a-new/article_23a1cf74-f020-11e9-8f7c-9f167b4b6d38.html

Family found at Dutch farm 'could have been held against their will'

 Drenthe residents react after Netherlands police discover family locked away for years
Police say family was in space that could be locked and may have been there nine years

Jon Henley Europe correspondent
@jonhenley
The Guardian
October 16, 2019

Dutch police are questioning an Austrian man after a family of six were found in a secret room at a remote farmhouse in the Netherlands where they are believed to have been living for nearly a decade.

The five adult siblings, said to be aged between 18 and 25, and an ailing older man they said was their father, were receiving medical treatment after police discovered them at the farm near the village of Ruinerwold, in the north-eastern province of Drenthe.

It was unclear whether the family was, as Dutch media reported, “waiting for the end of time”. Recent posts on social media by one of the children suggested they may instead have been held in the farmhouse against their will.

“We found six people in a small space in the house which could be locked, not a cellar. It is unclear if they were there voluntarily,” police said in a statement. “They may have been there for nine years. They say they are a family, a father and five children.”

The statement said none of the six people were registered with the local authorities. Their mother had apparently died before the family moved to the farm, said the local mayor, Roger de Groot, adding that he had “never seen anything like this”.

Officials would not confirm local media reports that the family was waiting for the end of days. “We understand everyone has lots of questions,” the police statement added. “So do we. We will investigate properly and carefully.”

A 58-year-old man who was renting the farm but was not the father of the children has been arrested, police confirmed, but they would not reveal his identity. Dutch media identified him as Joseph B, an Austrian odd-job man who had a small workshop on an industrial estate in the nearby town of Meppel.

The Austrian foreign ministry has confirmed an Austrian citizen from Vienna was being held in relation to the case, but said he did not want contact with officials. The ministry did not know the grounds for his arrest, it said.

One neighbour told the Telegraaf newspaper that the man, who was seen daily driving an old Volvo car, was “very sharp … You only needed to go near the place and he’d send you packing. He watched everything through binoculars”.

Dutch media said the oldest of the children, a 25-year-old named only as Jan, had a Facebook account and began posting updates in June for the first time in nine years. “Started a new job at Creconat,” De Telegraaf newspaper quoted it as saying.

The firm, affiliated to another company in Meppel, was raided by police on Monday and belonged to the Austrian man, the paper said. According to the Algemeen Dagblad newspaper, the son also wrote on LinkedIn that his parents had run a successful business until his mother died in 2004.

The group was discovered after Jan visited a local bar, the Kastelein cafe. On the first occasion, 10 days ago, he “ordered and drank five beers on his own”, the owner, Chris Westerbeek, told the local broadcaster RTV Drenthe.

When the man reappeared last Sunday, he “looked confused”, Westerbeek said. “He was unkempt, with long tangled hair. We got talking. He said he had run away and needed urgent help, and that he had never been to school. Then we called the police.”

RTV Drenthe said police had found a hidden staircase leading to the family’s hiding place behind a cupboard in the living room. The father was bedridden having suffered a stroke some years ago, it said.

Dutch media reported the family appeared to have had little or no contact with the outside world and lived a largely self-sufficient life, apparently growing their own vegetables and keeping a goat and geese.

The farmhouse’s owners, Klaas Rooze and Alida ten Oever, said the tenant had always paid his rent on time and they were flabbergasted by the news.

“We knew absolutely nothing of this,” Ten Oever said. “We rented the house for years to one man and now we learn someone was living there with children. We have no idea who it can be.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/oct/16/family-found-at-dutch-farm-could-have-been-held-against-their-will

CultNEWS101 Articles: 10/17/2019





LevTahor, Religion Research, Jordan Peterson, Cult Contradictions

"Documents presented last Thursday at a US federal court show that leaders of the fringe Hasidic cult Lev Tahor last year requested asylum from Iran and swore allegiance to its supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

According to the documents, first reported late Saturday by Yeshiva World News, the ultra-Orthodox cult in November 2018 asked Tehran for "asylum, protection and religious freedom of the families of its loyal members in Cheshek Shlomo community."

Lev Tahor declared "loyalty and submission to the Supreme Leader and the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran" and called for 'cooperation and help to counter Zionist dominance in order to peacefully liberate the Holy Land and the Jewish nation.'"

"In 2015, a paper by Jean Decety and co-authors reported that children who were brought up religiously were less generous. The paper received a great deal of attention, and was covered by over 80 media outlets including The Economist, the Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times, and Scientific American. As it turned out, however, the paper by Decety was wrong. Another scholar, Azim Shariff, a leading expert on religion and pro-social behavior, was surprised by the results, as his own research and meta-analysis (combining evidence across studies from many authors) indicated that religious participation, in most settings, increased generosity. Shariff requested the data to try to understand more clearly what might explain the discrepancy."

" ... To Decety's credit, he released the data. And upon re-analysis, Shariff discovered that the results were due to a coding error."

" ... "Decety's paper has continued to be cited in media articles on religion. Just last month two such articles appeared (one on Buzzworthy and one on TruthTheory) citing Decety's paper that religious children were less generous. The paper's influence seems to continue even after it has been shown to be wrong."

" ... Last month, however, the journal, Current Biology, at last formally retracted the paper. If one looks for the paper on the journal's website, it gives notice of the retraction by the authors."

"Our own research on the topic at the Human Flourishing Program at Harvard, published last year in a paper in the American Journal of Epidemiology, has likewise suggested results more in line with Shariff's meta-analysis. Moreover, rather than looking at whether religious children are more or less generous as children, we examined how a religious upbringing shaped children over time from adolescence into young adulthood. We found that during childhood and adolescence, those who attended religious services regularly were subsequently 29 percent more likely to have high levels of volunteering than those who did not. Those who attended services regularly were also 87 percent more likely to subsequently have high levels of forgiveness; and those who prayed and mediated regularly were 47 percent more likely to have a high sense of mission. Again, the effects of a religious upbringing seemed to contribute to a greater generosity toward others many years later during young adulthood.

Our study also indicated that those who were raised religiously were also protected from what are sometimes called the "big three" dangers of adolescence: depression, drug use, and risky behaviors. They were also more likely to have higher levels happiness in young adulthood."

"A self-help guru who's widely celebrated in some circles—and reviled in others—has gone into rehab, the Daily Dot reports. Jordan Peterson's daughter announced the development Thursday on YouTube and Peterson himself tweeted a link to the video, saying, "At least life isn't dull." The 57-year-old began taking clonazepam, or Klonopin—an anti-seizure drug that also helps with panic disorder—when his wife Tammy Roberts was diagnosed with cancer and underwent surgery.

He also took other drugs to beat the clonazepam, and ultimately went to New York for rehab, per the New York Post.

"He decided to check himself into a place because he didn't want to stress mom out, wanted to get off of this as quickly as possible, and honestly needs the medical help," says his daughter, Mikhaila.

"I've never seen my dad like this. He's having a miserable time of it. It breaks my heart." On the bright side, his wife is apparently doing better after complications from kidney surgery."

"Cult contradictions exist in how destructive cults work, in what the leaders say, and because the doctrine is totalitarian in nature, typically there are cult contradictions here as well. They are usually a product of the leaders thinking and are used by the cult leaders to justify their own actions, to manipulate the members, or both."




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