Federal Officials Reportedly Investigating Group Where Women Were Branded

New York Times

By BARRY MEIER and PAULINA VILLEGAS

DEC. 21, 2017

 

The Justice Department has started an investigation into a self-described self-help group in which women were branded with a symbol containing its leader’s initials, several people contacted as part of the inquiry said.

Those people said that agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation had recently contacted or questioned them about the group, which is called Nxivm. They spoke on the condition of anonymity because officials asked them not to discuss the inquiry, which appears to be at an early stage.

In a related move, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo of New York is expected to soon recommend possible changes in how state regulators review complaints against doctors, a spokesman said. The decision follows the disclosure that health department officials declined to act on complaints about two doctors affiliated with Nxivm, including one who reportedly used a surgical device to brand women. Inquiries into those two doctors are now underway, a spokesman for the governor said.

John Marzulli, a spokesman for the office of the United States attorney for the Eastern District of New York, which is reportedly leading the inquiry, said he could neither confirm nor deny whether an investigation into Nxivm, which is based in Albany, was underway.

The developments follow an October article in The New York Times that disclosed how some women who joined a secret sorority within Nxivm were branded with a symbol that incorporated the initials of the group’s leader, Keith Raniere.

omen were also told that compromising information they had provided to join the sorority, such as naked photographs, would be publicly released if they disclosed its existence. The sorority revolved around “master-slave” relationships, former Nxivm members said, in which women faced punishments, including physical ones, for not following a master’s order.

Since the late 1990s, over 16,000 people have enrolled in courses offered by Nxivm (pronounced Nex-e-um), which the group says are designed to bring about greater self-fulfillment by eliminating psychological and emotional barriers.

Most participants take some workshops, like the group’s Executive Success Programs, and resume their lives. But other people have become drawn more deeply into Nxivm, giving up careers, friends and families to become devoted followers of Mr. Raniere. Critics and former members have described the group’s practices as cultlike.

Mr. Raniere, whose followers refer to him as “Vanguard,” urges women to follow near-starvation diets of 500 to 800 calories a day to achieve the body shape he finds appealing. Some women who have followed that diet have stopped menstruating and lost hair, according to former Nxivm members.

Mr. Raniere, 57, recently left the Albany area and traveled to Mexico, where Nxivm has hundreds of followers, to stay with an adherent in Monterrey. Former associates said Mr. Raniere had never previously gone to Mexico. A former Nxivm member in Mexico said that Mr. Raniere was seen recently in Monterrey, though his current whereabouts is not known.

Mr. Raniere and other Nxivm officials did not respond to requests for interviews or repeated emails. A lawyer who represents the group, Robert D. Crockett, also did not respond to written questions, including whether federal or state officials had contacted Nxivm.

In recent weeks, Nxivm’s leaders have posted statements on the website of Executive Success Programs, contending that the secret sorority was not connected to Nxivm and that Mr. Raniere was unaware of its practices.

Nxivm also stated that it has conducted an independent investigation of the sorority and determined that the women in it are healthy and happy.

”Our experts, a forensic psychiatrist of international repute, psychologists and ex-law enforcement say members of the sorority are thriving, healthy, happy, better off and haven’t been coerced,” Mr. Raniere said in a statement. The group did not name the experts.

Several former Nxivm members said that senior women in the group, including the daughter of its co-founder, were involved in the sorority and branding ceremonies. In addition, a text message sent by Mr. Raniere indicated that he was aware that women were being branded with a symbol that contained his initials.

“Not initially intended as my initials but they rearranged it slightly for tribute,” he wrote in that message. “(if it were abraham lincolns or bill gates initials no one would care.)”

Nxivm did not respond to requests for the report of its independent investigation or the names of the experts involved. But an actress, Catherine Oxenberg, said a well-known forensic psychiatrist, Dr. Park Dietz, recently contacted her and said that Nxivm had hired him to evaluate her 26-year-old daughter, India Oxenberg. .

In May, another doctor who examined Ms. Oxenberg’s daughter told her that the severe diet she was following had jeopardized her ability to have children. Ms. Oxenberg has tried without success to convince her daughter, who has followed Mr. Raniere for years, to leave Nxivm.

In response to written questions, Dr. Dietz said he has examined only one female participant in Nxivm, though he declined, citing issues of patient confidentiality, to confirm that it was Ms. Oxenberg.

He added that his initial examination of the woman had not found evidence of “brainwashing” and that she appeared “happy,” though troubled by what she described as false media reports about the group.

Dr. Dietz said that Nxivm had not hired him to examine matters related to the secret sorority, stating it was his understanding that the group “is not a Nxivm entity but rather a private sorority of women.”

In recent months, Nxivm has also attempted to hire lobbyists in Albany to represent it before politicians and regulators there. It has also sued or sought to bring criminal charges against former members.

For example, the Mexican branch of Nxivm recently sued a former member there who quit the organization after 13 years upon hearing about the secret sorority and the branding.

The man, Toni Zarattini, said that when he asked other Nxivm members in Mexico about those practices he was told to stop doing so. “There is no problem here, all is good, don’t ask more questions and don’t say a word to anyone else,” Mr. Zarattini said he was told.

Nxivm’s Mexican affiliate is headed by Emiliano Salinas, a son of that country’s former president. Its ranks include members of Mexico’s ruling elite, including a daughter of the publisher of one of the country’s biggest newspapers, Reforma. Several women who belong to the group in Mexico have traveled to Albany, where they were branded, two former Nxivm members said.

Asked about the practice, Mr. Salinas reiterated that the sorority was not affiliated with Nxivm and added that it was important to “respect the decisions” members make in their private lives.

He added the company had sued Mr. Zarattini because he and others had tried to extort Nxivm by asking for money in exchange for not revealing information, an assertion Mr. Zarattini has denied.

Earlier this month, a Mexican judge dismissed the lawsuit against Mr. Zarattini, saying it was based on inadequate evidence. A lawyer for Nxivm said the group has another action pending against him, but lawyers for Mr. Zarattini said they were unaware of it.

His friends “are in some ways kidnapped; their minds, their emotions have been taken for ransom,” said Mr. Zarattini, who was kidnapped and brutalized a decade ago by a drug cartel. “I can’t allow these secrets to keep going because that contributes in some way to that.”

William K. Rashbaum contributed reporting.

A version of this article appears in print on December 22, 2017, on Page A22 of the New York edition with the headline: Federal Officials Are Said to Investigate Group Where Women Were Branded

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/21/nyregion/nxivm-women-branded-federal-investigation.html

 

Coverdale Avoids Debt With Bankruptcy in JZ Lawsuit

Racist Rant Video Lawsuit: Judge Rules Knight Failed to Prove Coverdale Caused Willful and Malicious Injury

Andrew Kollar 
Nisqually Valley News
December 21, 2017

Following five years of legal battles, JZ Knight is awarded nothing after Virginia Coverdale violated a non-disclosure agreement for leaking footage of a video that some characterize as a racist rant.

Knight is the head of the Yelm-area based Ramtha’s School of Enlightenment. She has what she calls “students” world wide. She claims to channel the 35,000-year-old Lemurian warlord Ramtha. Coverdale is a past student at RSE.

According to court documents, drama began to develop in 2007 or 2008 when Coverdale had an affair with Knight’s then-boyfriend James Flick. Upon hearing the news, Coverdale was expelled from the school but attended events some time later. In February, 2012 Knight allegedly channeled Ramtha in front of a gathering filled with RSE students and made statements referring to Coverdale as a “whore.”

Coverdale released video footage obtained from a third-party where Knight made what some claim were racist remarks towards Mexicans, Jews and Catholics.

“F--- God’s chosen people. I think they have earned enough cash to have paid their way out of the goddamned gas chambers by now,” she said to RSE students in the videotape.

In the video, Knight also said Mexicans breed like rabbits and are poisonous, all gay men were once Catholic priests and organic farmers smell bad.

Coverdale posted the video to YouTube Oct. 18, 2012 and a lawsuit was filed by Knight 11 days later. The lawsuit was against Coverdale and anonymous ex-RSE students for a breach of contract and injunction under the terms of a confidentiality clause.

Ex-students created an online messaging board where they would discuss concerns about Knight and her school. Knight tried to discover who was a part of the group by having Michael Wright, legal liaison for RSE, contact members of the group through email for litigation against Coverdale, according to court documents. The judge found Wright to be disingenuous in his reasoning behind the efforts and found the emails to be intimidating and suppressive to those who oppose Knight and RSE.

Knight was successful in suing Coverdale for violating the non-disclosure agreement and was awarded over $600,000. Coverdale countered and filed for voluntary bankruptcy, causing her debt to be discharged.

When Coverdale filed for bankruptcy, Knight filed another lawsuit of “abuse of process” and tried to form an argument of “willful and malicious” injury. The court did not find Coverdale to have improper motive in her defense and Knight failed to prove Coverdale caused willful and malicious injury.

Coverdale declared victory following the court ruling.

“Finally a judge who saw it all for what it was,” Coverdale said on her Facebook page. “He has restored my faith in the system. I cannot thank enough all who supported me over the years. I know it was really hard for you to watch me getting beat up by a criminal.”

Wright disagreed.

“Ms. Coverdale filing for bankruptcy is hardly a victory,” Wright stated in an email to the Nisqually Valley News. “It is an admission that she got in way over her head and accumulated debts that she felt she was unable to repay at present or in the years ahead without intervention by the court. It is the financial equivalent of calling 911.”

http://www.yelmonline.com/news/article_9e740aca-e69d-11e7-9470-efe09f254e5a.html

The link between polygamy and war

The perils of polygamy
Plural marriage, bred of inequality, begets violence

The Economist
Christmas Specials
Dec 19th 2017| CAIRO, LAHORE AND WAU

IT IS a truth universally acknowledged, or at least widely accepted in South Sudan, that a man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of many wives. Paul Malong, South Sudan’s former army chief of staff, has more than 100—no one knows the exact number. A news website put it at 112 in February, after one of the youngest of them ran off to marry a teacher. The couple were said to be in hiding. To adapt Jane Austen again, we are all fools in love, but especially so if we cuckold a warlord in one of the world’s most violent countries.

Men in South Sudan typically marry as often as their wealth—often measured in cattle—will allow. Perhaps 40% of marriages are polygamous. “In [our] culture, the more family you have, the more people respect you,” says William, a young IT specialist in search of his second wife (his name, like some others in this article, has been changed). Having studied in America and come back to his home village, he finds that he is wealthy by local standards. So why be content with just one bride?

Few South Sudanese see the connection between these matrimonial customs and the country’s horrific civil war. If you ask them the reason for the violence, locals will blame tribalism, greedy politicians, weak institutions and perhaps the oil wealth which gives warlords something to fight over. All true, but not the whole story.

Wherever it is widely practised, polygamy (specifically polygyny, the taking of multiple wives) destabilises society, largely because it is a form of inequality which creates an urgent distress in the hearts, and loins, of young men. If a rich man has a Lamborghini, that does not mean that a poor man has to walk, for the supply of cars is not fixed. By contrast, every time a rich man takes an extra wife, another poor man must remain single. If the richest and most powerful 10% of men have, say, four wives each, the bottom 30% of men cannot marry. Young men will take desperate measures to avoid this state.

This is one of the reasons why the Arab Spring erupted, why the jihadists of Boko Haram and Islamic State were able to conquer swathes of Nigeria, Iraq and Syria, and why the polygamous parts of Indonesia and Haiti are so turbulent. Polygamous societies are bloodier, more likely to invade their neighbours and more prone to collapse than others are. The taking of multiple wives is a feature of life in all of the 20 most unstable countries on the Fragile States Index compiled by the Fund for Peace, an NGO (see chart).



Because polygamy is illegal in most rich countries, many Westerners underestimate how common it is. More than a third of women in West Africa are married to a man who has more than one wife. Plural marriages are plentiful in the Arab world, and fairly common in South-East Asia and a few parts of the Caribbean. The cultures involved are usually patrilineal: ie, the family is defined by the male bloodline. And they are patrilocal: wives join the husband’s family and leave their own behind. Marriages are often sealed by the payment of a brideprice from the groom’s family to the bride’s. This is supposed to compensate the bride’s family for the cost of raising her.

A few men attract multiple wives by being exceptionally charismatic, or by persuading others that they are holy. “There may be examples of [male] cult leaders who did not make use of their position to further their personal polygyny, but I cannot think of any,” notes David Barash of the University of Washington in “Out of Eden: The Surprising Consequences of Polygamy”. However, the most important enabler of the practice is not the unequal distribution of charm but the unequal distribution of wealth. Brideprice societies where wealth is unevenly distributed lend themselves to polygamy—which in turn inflates the price of brides, often to ruinous heights. In wretchedly poor Afghanistan, the cost of a wedding for a young man averages $12,000-$20,000.

By increasing the bride price, polygamy tends to raise the age at which young men get married; it takes a long time to save enough money. At the same time, it lowers the age at which women get married. All but the wealthiest families need to “sell” their daughters before they can afford to “buy” wives for their sons; they also want the wives they shell out for to be young and fertile. In South Sudan “a girl is called an old lady at age 20 because she cannot bear many children after that,” a local man told Marc Sommers of Boston University and Stephanie Schwartz of Columbia University. A tribal elder spelled out the maths of the situation. “When you have 10 daughters, each one will give you 30 cows, and they are all for [the father]. So then you have 300 cows.” If a patriarch sells his daughters at 15 and does not let his sons marry until they are 30, he has 15 years to enjoy the returns on the assets he gained from brideprice. That’s a lot of milk.

Valerie Hudson of Texas A&M University and Hilary Matfess of Yale have found that an inflated brideprice is a “critical” factor “predisposing young men to become involved in organised group violence for political purposes”. Terrorist groups know this, too. Muhammad Kasab, a Pakistani terrorist hanged for his role in the Mumbai attacks of 2008, said he joined Lashkar-e-Taiba, the jihadist aggressor, because it promised to pay for his siblings to get married. In Nigeria, Boko Haram arranges marriages for its recruits. The so-called Islamic State used to offer foreign recruits $1,500 towards a starter home and a free honeymoon in Raqqa. Radical Islamist groups in Egypt have also organised cheap marriages for members. It is not just in the next life that jihadists are promised virgins.

The deepest deprivation

In South Sudan, brideprices may be anything from 30 to 300 cows. “For young men, the acquisition of so many cattle through legitimate means is nearly impossible,” write Ms Hudson and Ms Matfess. The alternative is to steal a herd from the tribe next door. In a country awash with arms, such cattle raids are as bloody as they are frequent. “7 killed, 10 others wounded in cattle raid in Eastern Lakes,” reads a typical headline in This Day, a South Sudanese paper. The article describes how “armed youths from neighbouring communities” stole 58 cows, leaving seven people—and 38 cows—shot dead “in tragic crossfire”.

Thousands of South Sudanese are killed in cattle raids every year. “When you have cows, the first thing you must do is get a gun. If you don’t have a gun, people will take your cows,” says Jok, a 30-year-old cattle herder in Wau, a South Sudanese city. He is only carrying a machete, but he says his brothers have guns.

Jok loves cows. “They give you milk, and you can marry with them,” he smiles. He says he will get married this year, though he does not yet have enough cows and, judging by his ragged clothes, he does not have the money to buy them, either. He is vague as to how he will acquire the necessary ruminants. But one can’t help noticing that he is grazing his herd on land that has recently been ethnically cleansed. Dinkas like Jok walk around freely in Wau. Members of other tribes who used to live in the area huddle in camps for displaced people, guarded by UN peacekeepers.

The people in the camps all tell similar stories. The Dinkas came, dressed in blue, and attacked their homes, killing the men and stealing whatever they could carry away, including livestock and young women. “Many of my family were killed or raped,” says Saida, a village trader. “The attackers cut people’s heads off. All the young men have gone from our village now. Some have joined the rebels. Some fled to Sudan.” Saida’s husband escaped and is now with his other wife in Khartoum, the Sudanese capital. Saida is left tending five children. Asked why all this is happening, she bursts into tears.

“If you have a gun, you can get anything you want,” says Abdullah, a farmer who was driven off his land so that Dinka marauders could graze their cattle on it. “If a man with a gun says ‘I want to marry you’, you can’t say no,” says Akech, an aid worker. This is why adolescent boys hover on the edge of battles in South Sudan. When a fighter is killed, they rush over and steal his weapon so that they can become fighters, too.

Overall, polygamy is in retreat. However, its supporters are fighting to preserve or even extend it. Two-fifths of Kazakhstanis want to re-legalise the practice (it was banned by the Bolsheviks). In 2008 they were thwarted, at least temporarily, when a female MP amended a pro-polygamy bill to say that polyandry—the taking of multiple hubands—would be allowed as well; Muslim greybeards balked at that.

In the West polygamy is too rare to be socially destabilising. To some extent this is because it is serialised. Rich and powerful men regularly swap older wives for younger ones, thus monopolising the prime reproductive years of several women. But that allows a few wives, not a few dozen. The polygamous enclaves in America run by breakaway Mormon sects are highly unstable—the old men in charge expel large numbers of young men for trivial offences so they can marry lots of young women themselves. Nevertheless, some American campaigners argue that parallelised polygamy should be made legal. If the constitution demands that gay marriage be allowed (as the Supreme Court ruled in 2015), then surely it is unconstitutional to disallow plural marriage, they argue. “Group marriage is the next horizon of social liberalism,” writes Fredrik deBoer, an academic, in Politico, on the basis that long-term polyamorous relationships deserve as much legal protection as any others freely entered into.

Proponents of polygamy offer two main arguments beyond personal preference. One is that it is blessed in the Koran, which is true. The other is that it gives women a better chance of avoiding spinsterhood. Rania Hashem, a pro-polygamy campaigner in Egypt, claims that there is a shortage of men in her country. (There is not, but this is a common misconception among polygamists.) If more rich, educated Egyptian men take multiple wives, she says, this will make it easier for women to exercise their “right to have a husband”. Mona Abu Shanab, another Egyptian polygamy advocate, argues that polygamy is a sensible way to assuage male sexual frustration, a common cause of divorce. “Women after marriage just disregard their men [and] focus on their kids. They…always have an excuse for not engaging in intimate relations; they are always ‘tired’ or ‘sick’. This makes the men uncomfortable and drives them to…have a girlfriend.”

Some men see polygamy as a pragmatic response to female infertility. “My first wife was issueless,” says Gurmeet, a 65-year-old landlord in Lahore, Pakistan. At one point “she said our inability to have a child was because of my medical condition, not hers. I was enraged. I turned to religion and was guided [by God] to take a second wife.” He had been planning to try in-vitro fertilisation but God’s advice looked like a sounder investment. Initially, his first wife was “unwilling to share my affections with another woman”. But as time passed, she accepted the situation, says Gurmeet. He divided the house into two parts, so his wives could live separately. He divided his time equally between them. “It worked,” he says. The second wife had six children. But Gurmeet grumbles that she dressed less elegantly than his childless wife and did not keep her rooms as tidy.

Polygyny is hard work for men but good for women, says Gurmeet, because it is “undesirable” for a woman to be unmarried. Asked about polyandry, Gurmeet says, “I strongly disapprove. It is against nature for a woman to have multiple partners.” He elaborates: “As a young man I kept chickens. The cock has many hens, but he does not allow the females to mate with more than one partner. So it’s against natural law.”

Bad for brides

Polygamy “can work fine, provided you do justice to [all wives] equally,” says Amar, a Pakistani judge with two wives. “If you do not prefer any one over the others, no problem arises.” He admits that if two wives live together in the same home, “a natural rivalry” arises. Dividing property can also be complicated and leads to a lot of litigation.

But Amar thinks he gets it right. “My routine is: I spend one night with one wife and one night with the other. That way, nobody feels treated badly. And I give them exactly the same amount of money to spend: they get one credit card each. As a judge, it is [my] foremost duty to deliver justice.” One of his wives enters the room and offers to give her side of the story. Her husband banishes her, with visible irritation, before your correspondent can ask her anything.

Although women in a polygamous society find it relatively easy to get married, the quality of their marriages may not be high. Because such brides are often much younger, not to mention ill-educated, they find it hard to stand up to their husbands. And brideprice is not conducive to a relationship of equals.

In South Sudan, nearly 80% of people think it acceptable for a husband to beat his wife for such things as refusing sex, burning the dinner and so on. Divorce requires that the bride’s family repay the brideprice; they may thus insist that the abused woman stays with her husband no matter how badly he treats her.

Polygamy is also bad for children. A study of 240,000 children in 29 African countries found that, after controlling for other factors, those in polygamous families were more likely to die young. A study among the Dogon of Mali found that a child in a polygynous family was seven to 11 times more likely to die early than a child in a monogamous one. The father spends his time siring more children rather than looking after the ones he already has, Mr Barash explains. Also, according to the Dogon themselves, jealous co-wives sometimes poison each other’s offspring so that their own will inherit more.

For Akech, the South Sudanese aid worker, growing up in a polygamous family “wasn’t easy”. Her father, a former rebel commander, had eight wives and numerous concubines. She has 41 siblings that she knows of. When she was six, she used to fetch 20 litres of water each day for her mother to use to make siko, a form of moonshine. Sometimes her father would come round drunk, bang on the door and take her mother’s money to spend on another woman. Akech remembers her parents quarrelling a lot. That said, the extended family could pull together in an emergency. When her father was shot in the leg, his wives teamed up to bathe him, get him to hospital and pay his medical bills.

One day, when Akech was at university, her father asked her to come and see him. “We had never had a father-daughter bond, so I was excited,” she remembers. When she arrived, he introduced her to a fellow officer and ordered her to marry him. She was horrified. Her father’s friend was 65. Akech was 19.

She pretended to accept the proposal and said she just wanted to pop back to her college, which was in a neighbouring country, to collect her things. Her father agreed. She went back to college and stayed there.

That was more than a decade ago. Akech went on to complete university and find a good job. She recently bought her now-elderly father a house, partly to show him the value of her education, but also out of a residual sense of guilt at having once defied him. “In my culture, your parents are your earthly gods. I tried not to disappoint him,” she says. He has never said sorry for attempting to sell her.

This article appeared in the Christmas Specials section of the print edition under the headline "The perils of polygamy"



https://www.economist.com/news/christmas-specials/21732695-plural-marriage-bred-inequality-begets-violence-link-between-polygamy-and-war

The Nazi breeding and infanticide program you probably never knew about

German women carrying children of alleged aryan purity in a Lebensborn selection center in 1939.

Forced procreation, kidnapping, and execution of babies were all carried out in the name of a master race

Erin Blakemore

Timeline

December 18, 2017

It sounds like the stuff of dystopian fantasy: women encouraged to bear children to hand over to a totalitarian regime. But for thousands of Europeans, including ABBA singer Anni-Frid Lyngstad, such a program isn’t imaginary — it’s the story of their lives. Lyngstad and approximately 20,000 others are the Lebensborn, survivors of a Nazi breeding program designed to create racially “pure” children for the Third Reich.

Between 1935 and 1945, the secret program encouraged racially “fit” women to bear children for the Reich and protected babies thought to exemplify Nazi Germany’s Aryan ideals. Translated as “fount of life,” the Lebensborn program involved secret birthing facilities, hidden identities, and the theft of hundreds of thousands of children.

The program has its roots in World War I, which decimated Germany’s male population and contributed to a sharp decline in the country’s birth rates, which fell 43 percent between 1920 and 1932. This was a problem for Adolf Hitler and his Nazi Party, which came into power in 1933 with plans to usher in a new world order, one in which Nordic and Germanic “Aryans” — whom they considered the most superior of the races — would rightfully reign supreme. In order to carry out Hitler’s vision of a completely Aryan Europe, the Nazis would need address the country’s genetic shortage.

SS head Heinrich Himmler was convinced that abortion was the primary reason for the falling birthrate, and in 1935 he decided to strike back. He decided to make abortions of racially “pure” children less appealing by offering an alternative to their mothers. Women who could prove that their unborn child would fit Nazi racial purity standards could give birth to the child in secret, comfortable facilities.

But there was a catch: Once the babies were born, they had to be relinquished to the SS. The SS would then educate them, indoctrinate them in Nazi ideology, and give them to elite families to raise.

At first, Himmler urged the SS and German military to have children with Aryan women both in and out of wedlock, but as the war progressed, that became an mandate. When casualties further decimated the German male population, Himmler ordered his officers to marry and reproduce. Women in occupied countries were also encouraged to have children with German soldiers.

As it moved eastward, the Third Reich expanded the Lebensborn program to include wholesale kidnapping. Children thought to be racially pure were taken from their parents and temporarily placed in Lebensborn homes before being adopted by German families. In Poland alone, between 100,000 and 200,000 children were kidnapped; those who failed racial purity tests in Germany were sent to orphanages or summarily executed.

At its height, the Lebensborn program included dozens of birth centers in Germany and the countries it occupied. Comfortably furnished with the possessions of deported Jews, these homes were quietly advertised as places where unwed mothers could escape social ostracism, ensuring a bright future for their children. In occupied territory, they were also a place to escape the fury of locals who faced starvation and oppression at the hands of the Germans and resented the special privileges granted to women pregnant with “desirable” children.

It’s still unclear exactly how many children were born in Lebensborn homes; current estimates range up to 20,000. However, that number may never be fully known due to secrecy on the part of mothers, incomplete and destroyed records, and new names given to children who were placed in Nazi families.

What is clear is the trauma suffered by children who were part of the program. After the war, Lebensborn became social outcasts both inside and outside of Germany. At the time, single, unmarried mothers were seen as social misfits, and in occupied countries, those who had engaged in sexual relationships with German soldiers were seen as traitors.

Take, for example, Anni-Frid Lyngstad, who was born in 1945 after her Norwegian mother had a relationship with a Nazi sergeant. Though Lyngstad was given her mother’s surname, she was branded a Tyskerbarnas, or German child, and her mother became an outcast. The family later emigrated to Sweden, where Lyngstad grew up lonely and isolated.

When she was 22, she entered and won a Swedish talent contest; by the time ABBA formed, she had multiple number one hits. After her time with ABBA, one of history’s most recognizable and best-selling pop groups, Lyngstad became a princess by marriage.

 

Parents pose with a child adopted from a Lebensborn eugenics center during WWII. (Keystone-France/Gamma-Keystone via Getty Images)

Other Lebensborn haven’t been so lucky. As The Guardian’s Kate Connolly notes, Lyngstad’s success would have been almost unthinkable if she had remained in Norway. Educational and employment opportunities were rare for Lebensborn; the government sent many children to different countries in an attempt to get rid of them, and many ended up in children’s homes after their mothers were shipped off to concentration camps. Norwegian Lebensborn also allege they were used in secret military trials of drugs like mescaline and LSD; however, those claims have never been officially recognized.

In 2002, Norway offered about $31,000 to Lebensborn to make amends for the government’s treatment of children, but the country has never officially apologized. No other country has offered to compensate victims, who endured shaming and trauma.

Those who know they were Lebensborn face a harsh reckoning with the knowledge that their fathers — and possibly their mothers — were devoted Nazis. But perhaps the most horrifying part of the program is the fact that so many people who were kidnapped or adopted under Lebensborn ideology will never know their true identities. The Nazis never managed to create an Aryan super race, but their quest for racial perfection, ironically, damaged a generation of the children they claimed to cherish.

https://timeline.com/the-nazi-breeding-and-infanticide-program-you-probably-never-knew-about-cc5cc7b82fdc

Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints Fast Facts

CNN Library 
December 14, 2017

(CNN) -- Here is a look at the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (FLDS), a religious sect that broke away from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also known as the Mormon Church, over the practice of polygamy.

2002-present - Warren Jeffs is the spiritual leader of the FLDS. His brother, Lyle Jeffs, overseas daily affairs.

2011 - Warren Jeffs is sentenced to life in prison for sexual assault of a child under age 14, and 20 years for the sexual assault of a child under age 17.

About FLDS:The FLDS has an estimated 10,000 members, most of whom live in Colorado City, Arizona and Hildale, Utah. The group also has followers near Eldorado, Texas, and in South Dakota, Colorado, Nevada, British Columbia, and Mexico.

The spiritual leader of the FLDS church is considered a prophet of God. He is the only person able to perform marriage and can punish followers by "reassigning" their wives and children to other men.

They believe in practicing polygamy.

Critics of the FLDS maintain that underage females are often forced into marriages with older men.

Eleven of 12 suspects from the 2008 raid on the Yearning for Zion (YFZ) Ranch have been tried and convicted on charges of child sexual assault, bigamy, or performing an unlawful marriage. The charges against Lloyd H. Barlow, the doctor indicted on three charges of failure to report child abuse, were dismissed.

Timeline:1890 - The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, also known as the Mormon church, suspends the practice of polygamy in order to gain statehood for Utah. Members who continue to practice polygamy are excommunicated.

1930s - Fundamentalists who practiced polygamy are excommunicated by the Mormon church and settle in Arizona.

July 26, 1953 - Thirty-six men, 86 women, and 263 children are either arrested or taken into custody during a pre-dawn raid in Arizona.- The men are placed on probation after promising to discontinue practicing polygamy.- Most of the women and children return to the ranch after two years of being wards of the state of Arizona.

November 1986 - FLDS prophet and leader LeRoy Johnson dies at age 98, after leading the FLDS since 1954.

1986-2002 - Rulon T. Jeffs rules as prophet of FLDS until his death at age 92.

September 8, 2002 - Rulon T. Jeffs' son, Warren Jeffs, becomes prophet.

May 2005 - A Utah court freezes the assets of the United Effort Plan trust, which encompasses all of the FLDS sect's land, houses and other assets. The trust, established in the 1940s, is worth more than $100 million. While the trust was established for the benefit of all FLDS members, critics charge that Warren Jeffs has used it to punish dissenters by kicking them out of their homes.

June 9-10, 2005 - Warren Jeffs is indicted in Mohave County, Arizona, on felony charges of arranging a marriage between a 16-year-old girl and a 28-year-old man, who was already married. A state warrant is issued for Jeffs' arrest, although he hasn't been seen in public for months.

2006 - In the ongoing dispute over the United Effort Plan trust, a judge strips the trust of its religious tenets and allows former church members to join as beneficiaries.

April 6, 2006 - Jeffs is charged in Utah as an accomplice to rape for performing a marriage between a 14-year-old girl and an adult man.

May 6, 2006 - The FBI places Jeffs on its top 10 most-wanted list of fugitives.

August 28, 2006 - Jeffs is arrested after being pulled over for a routine traffic stop near Las Vegas.

January 28, 2007 - Attempts to hang himself in his cell while awaiting trial.

September 25, 2007 - Jeffs is found guilty of two counts of rape by accomplice in Utah. He is sentenced to ten years to life in prison.

April 4-7, 2008 - In response to phone calls to a family violence hotline alleging abuse and rape, police raid the FLDS Yearning for Zion (YFZ) Ranch in Eldorado, Texas.- 416 children are initially removed from the YFZ Ranch (The number of children removed rises to 468 after some of the mothers are determined to be younger than 18). About 130 women voluntarily leave the compound.

May 22, 2008 - The Texas 3rd Court of Appeals in Austin rules that the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (DFPS) illegally removed the children from their families.

May 29, 2008 - The Texas Supreme Court upholds the appellate court's ruling, 6-3.

July 22, 2008 - A Texas grand jury indicts Warren Jeffs and other FLDS members, on bigamy and sexual assault charges.

June 9, 2010 - An Arizona judge dismisses the four charges against Jeffs of being an accomplice to sexual conduct with a minor, due to his more serious pending charges in Texas.

July 27, 2010 - The Utah Supreme Court overturns Jeffs' two 2007 convictions by reason of erroneous jury instructions and orders a new trial.

November 30, 2010 - Jeffs is extradited from Utah to Texas to stand trial on two charges of sexual assault of a child and bigamy.

December 29, 2010 - Pleas of not guilty are entered on Jeffs' behalf. If convicted, he faces a maximum sentence of up to 99 years in prison.

July 25, 2011 - Trial begins in Texas on charges of sexual assault of a child. Jeffs is granted the request to represent himself.

August 4, 2011 - Jeffs is convicted of aggravated sexual assault of a child under age 14 and sexual assault of a child under age 17.

August 9, 2011 - Jeffs is sentenced to life in prison for sexual assault of a child under age 14 and 20 years for sexual assault of a child under age 17.

January 2012 - Texas prison officials find Jeffs guilty of "a major disciplinary infraction" for violating policy by making conference calls to preach to his congregation.

October 9, 2012 - The bigamy charges against already-imprisoned Jeffs and three other sect members are dismissed. The motion states "in the interest of judicial economy, the State moves to dismiss the indictment."

November 28, 2012 - The Texas Attorney General's Office announces it has begun legal proceedings to seize the 1,600-acre YFZ Ranch near Eldorado, Texas.

April 17, 2014 - Officials confirm that Texas authorities have initiated the seizure of the YFZ Ranch.

February 23, 2016 - Eleven FLDS members, including Lyle Jeffs, are indicted. They are accused of fraud and money laundering.

March 7, 2016 - A federal jury finds that the city governments in Short Creek -- Hildale on the Utah side and Colorado City on the Arizona side -- were so corrupted by the FLDS that they discriminated against non-members by denying them police service, water hookups and other utilities. A federal judge has set aside four days in late October for testimony to help him decide what steps to take.

June 2016 - While under house arrest awaiting a fraud trial, it is discovered that Lyle Jeffs has removed his FBI tracking bracelet and fled.

June 14, 2017 - A tip leads to Jeffs' arrest in Yankton, South Dakota. He had been on the run for over a year.

August 4, 2017 - The court announces Jeffs' trial is postponed until October.

September 5, 2017 - Warren Jeffs is ordered to pay $16 million to a former child bride.

December 13, 2017 - Lyle Jeffs is sentenced to 57 months in federal prison for his role in food stamp fraud and escaping house arrest.

http://www.kitv.com/story/37072899/fundamentalist-church-of-jesus-christ-of-latter-day-saints-fast-facts

'Nobody saved us': Man describes childhood in abusive 'cult'

Mitch Weiss And Holbrook Mohr
National Post
The Associated Press
December 13, 2017

SPINDALE, N.C. — Jamey Anderson vividly recalls being a skinny kid trembling on the floor of a dank, windowless storage room, waiting in terror for the next adult to open the door.

He was bruised and exhausted after being held down while a group of Word of Faith Fellowship congregants — including his mother and future stepfather — beat him with a wooden paddle, he said. As with most punishments at the secretive Christian church, Anderson said, it was prompted by some vague accusation: He had sin in his heart, or he had given in to the “unclean.” The attacks could last for hours until he confessed to something, anything, and cried out to Jesus, he said.

Sometimes even that wasn’t enough for redemption. Then, Anderson said, he would be locked in a dark place he called the “green room,” where he would bang his head against the brick wall, wanting to die.

“I just wanted it to end,” he recalled in a series of interviews with The Associated Press. “Of course, they told us that killing yourself is the unforgivable sin.”

Today, Anderson is a 29-year-old handsome, articulate attorney with a quick wit and a sarcastic side. At first glance, he seems well-adjusted. But he finds it hard to trust anyone.

He fled the secretive evangelical church when he was 18, but he is not free. More than a decade later, he still struggles to find his footing in a world that he doesn’t understand, having been raised, as he puts it, in a “cult.”

Night terrors jolt him awake. He fears people will think he’s delusional if he discusses his experiences in Word of Faith because the stories seem unbelievable. He missed a lifetime of pop culture, which makes it difficult for him to build connections with his peers.

Worst of all is the suffocating anguish that rushes in when he looks back on the beatings and isolation.

“There were times that mentally you just feel broken,” he said. “I mean, I was a kid — I couldn’t even process why this was happening to me.”

As part of an ongoing investigation into Word of Faith Fellowship, dozens of former congregants have told the AP that church members were regularly beaten in an effort to “purify” sinners — even children. But despite allegations of abuse spanning two decades, authorities have done little to intervene.

As a child, Anderson said, he was questioned by social services investigators in church co-founder Jane Whaley’s office, but was too afraid to tell the truth. In 2003, he said, the church forced him to sign an affidavit saying he had not been abused and that “church discipline” was “God’s mercy on my life.”

Anderson was about 4 years old when his mother joined Word of Faith. He describes his childhood as nothing short of hell.

Throughout his adolescence, he was singled out as a rebel and suffered some of the most brutal treatment in the church, nearly two dozen former congregants told the AP. Among his transgressions: making a funny face at a classmate.

His most traumatizing memories stem from the “green room,” a storage area named for the colour of its outdoor carpeting in a house his family shared with more than a dozen church members. The long stretches of isolation, the incessant hum of a dehumidifier and the pervasive smell of mildew almost drove him mad, he said.

“I remember thinking about it in that room, thinking, ‘I wish that someone cared. I wish that someone got me out of here,”‘ he recalled.

Former Word of Faith member Risa Pires said that when she visited her aunt, who lived with Anderson’s family, it seemed like “Jamey was always in that room.”

Pires, who left the church three years ago, said children were encouraged to tell on Anderson — and others — for the slightest perceived infractions in the church’s K-12 school, where she was in his class until the ninth grade.

Anderson would be pulled from the classroom and brought to another room where he would be “brutally paddled,” she said.

“You could hear the loud whacks through the wall,” she said. “You just sat there, hoping you weren’t next.”

After breaking with Word of Faith, Anderson lost all contact with his mother and brother, who remain in the church. He said Whaley even refused to let him attend the funeral of his grandfather, the most important male figure in his childhood, and that he was omitted from the list of family members in the obituary.

He is free and yet, he said, he cannot escape the church’s reach. It has branded him — permanently, he fears.

He is speaking out now, he said, because “I want to make sure that kids there, they know that there’s a better way to live. That people can love you for who you are. That they’re not going to mistreat you.”

Noell Tin, an attorney for Whaley, denied Anderson had been mistreated. “Mr. Anderson’s claims are disputed not only by Ms. Whaley, but also by members of the church,” he said.

To understand what Anderson lived through, it is necessary to understand Word of Faith. Founded in 1979 by Whaley, a former math teacher, and her husband, Sam, the church has grown to a congregation of nearly 750 people in rural Spindale with hundreds more followers extending to Brazil, Ghana and other countries.

Jane Whaley is the unquestioned leader, presenting herself as a prophet. Over the years, she has decreed ever more stringent rules, dictating how followers dress, where they live, who they marry and even when they have sex. Birthday celebrations, television and music are strictly off-limits.

A series of AP stories over the past year have documented widespread abuses within Word of Faith, prompting investigations in the U.S. and South America. In July, the AP revealed how the church mined its two branches in Brazil for a steady supply of young labourers who say they were forced to work for little or no pay in the U.S. at businesses owned by church leaders. In November, the AP documented how the sect used it power and influence to wrest children from poor single mothers.

Anderson said some of his earliest memories are of a church practice called “blasting,” in which congregants are shrieked at, sometimes for hours, to drive out devils. The sessions often graduate to slapping, punching and choking, according to more than 40 former members interviewed by the AP.

The members said Whaley quotes Acts 2:2 and other scriptures to justify the practice: “When suddenly there came a sound from heaven like the rushing of a violent tempest blast …”

From early childhood, Anderson always seemed to be in trouble, resulting in regular severe beatings, several former members said.

Anderson recounted a particularly brutal attack when he was about 9, when he said a female church member pinned his arms down while his mother sat on his legs and beat him with a paddle.

“It hit me in many other places than where it was supposed to. But they didn’t stop, because I needed a ‘breakthrough.’ The demons were ‘taking me over,’ as a kid. I was going to go to hell. And so they kept swinging the paddle, swinging the paddle,” he said.

Anderson’s mother, Patricia Dolan, did not respond to phone and text messages from the AP.

Former congregant Danielle Cordes said it was common for adults to hold children down by their arms and legs during attacks. It happened to her, too. “That was normal,” she said.

Forced child labour was another staple of life, several former members told the AP.

Anderson said his work details began around sixth grade — sometimes during school hours — on construction and real estate projects performed for church members. He recalled being diagnosed with asthma in middle school, a condition aggravated by the outdoor work, and being rebuked for “laziness and foolishness.”

Over the years, he said, the work increased. Anderson said he cleaned the Whaleys’ house, sometimes working until after midnight, then would return in the morning to mow their lawn. At times, he said, he was forced to work several nights a week, often doing remodeling work like painting and drywall repair. He said church leaders called it “volunteer work,” but that the punishment for refusing could be severe.

And though he thought his life couldn’t get any worse, it did.

When he was 14, Anderson said, Jane Whaley called a mandatory church meeting, on a weekday. Waiting in the sanctuary that day in early 2002, “we knew it couldn’t be good,” he said.

When Whaley arrived, she pointed to Anderson and a group of “troublemakers” she called the “five boys.” For two hours, he said, Whaley screamed and shamed them.

They were expected to fall to the floor and cry out to Jesus for forgiveness. Some did, but Anderson said he was too scared to move.

“That meant to Jane that my heart was hard. I was unreachable and that’s when she got very close to my face and called me everything she could think of, yelling at me at the top of her lungs,” he said.

Whaley placed Anderson and his four friends in isolation for a year, he said. Instead of attending class, he said they sat in a room watching videos of Whaley preaching and were confined to their homes after school and on weekends. Family members weren’t allowed to talk to them. When it was time to eat, someone would open the door and slide food in, “like in a prison,” Anderson said.

They were treated as if they did not exist — except when it came time for punishment and they were told they were full of “witchcraft and warfare,” he said.

Ministers constantly grilled them with questions that would devolve into the “sexual realm,” said Peter Cooper, another of the five, who called the ministers relentless. If the boys didn’t answer the “right way,” he said, they were blasted and beaten.

“After you’ve been told repeatedly that you’re unclean, you know it’s better to go ahead and admit it. You start confessing to things you didn’t think about. They destroy your will,” said Cooper, 28, who left the church in 2014.

To this day, Anderson said he can’t understand why the boys were singled out and considered so unworthy of love and acceptance.

“If there was ever a time I was broken, that was it,” he said, pushing back tears.

When Anderson walked away from Word of Faith, he left behind the only life he had ever known. He wanted “freedom,” even though he wasn’t quite sure what that meant.

Despite having an outgoing personality, his isolated upbringing makes it hard for him to fit in. If he’s hanging out with a group of peers and someone cites a scene from a movie or line from a song, he has no idea what they’re talking about. He doesn’t get their jokes. The loneliness can be crushing, he said.

It also remains difficult for him to maintain romantic relationships, crippled by the fear of questions about his past and embarrassment about his night terrors.

“I don’t trust anybody. With this thing, it can change the way people look at you,” Anderson said.

Still, he forges on, determined to build a happy life.

He graduated from law school and was hired by a respected firm in Charlotte, and his future — for a change — seemed bright. Then one night in October 2016, the police knocked on his apartment door and arrested him for trespassing on his brother’s property.

Nick Anderson had sworn to a magistrate judge that another church member spotted Jamey on his property. When presented with overwhelming evidence that Jamey was nowhere near his brother’s home that night, District Attorney Ted Bell dismissed the case. But Jamey said he was humiliated by having to explain to his neighbours and law firm that members of a “crazy church” had made false accusations against him.

Reached by phone, Nick Anderson declined to comment.

The district attorney said he considered charging Nick Anderson and the church member with intimidating a witness, but instead would “send them a strongly worded letter to not do it again.”

That provides little solace to Jamey. Like the skinny little kid locked away in the storage room anticipating the next beating, he still can’t escape the fear of what the church might do next.

Because he does not want any other child in Word of Faith to suffer like he says he suffered, he tells his story to “be the light that I used to see as a small child, that got extinguished when nobody saved us. . I don’t want to watch and see as other kids grow up and they start to leave and say, ‘Why didn’t someone come and help us? Why was our childhood destroyed, when you knew better?”‘

http://nationalpost.com/pmn/news-pmn/nobody-saved-us-man-describes-childhood-in-abusive-cult

Ex-Polygamous Sect Leader Gets Nearly 5 Years in Fraud Case

Lyle Jeffs

A former polygamous sect leader has been sentenced to nearly five years for his role in a carrying out an elaborate food stamp fraud scheme and for escaping home confinement while awaiting trial.

By BRADY McCOMBS
U.S. News & World Report
December 13, 2017

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — A former polygamous sect leader was sentenced Wednesday to nearly five years in prison for his role in a carrying out an elaborate food stamp fraud scheme and for escaping home confinement while awaiting trial.

U.S. District Judge Ted Stewart said during a hearing in Salt Lake City that Lyle Jeffs deserved the 57-month prison sentence because his behavior showed he doesn't respect U.S. laws and puts his allegiance to his brother and the sect's imprisoned prophet, Warren Jeffs, above everything else.

Stewart said Lyle Jeffs' religious beliefs provide context for his decision to follow his brother's orders, but don't justify the fact that he "cheated" taxpayers out of government funds.

Lyle Jeffs is lifelong member of the Mormon offshoot group based on the Utah-Arizona border known as the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints.

"Mr. Jeffs is an adult. He knows right from wrong," Stewart said.

Prosecutors accused Lyle Jeffs of running a scheme to divert some $11 million in food-stamp benefits to a communal storehouse and front companies.

Prosecutor Robert Lund asked for the maximum five-year sentence to send a message to Lyle Jeffs and other sect leaders that a "culture of corruption" in recent years won't be tolerated.

Lyle Jeffs was also ordered to pay $1 million in restitution. He had previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit benefits fraud and failure to appear.

Lyle Jeffs 57, spoke briefly and said he accepted responsibility for his mistakes and that he erred in not properly researching food stamp fraud laws.

"I do your honor humbly and respectfully say that I acknowledge my mistakes and decision-making," said Lyle Jeffs, his hands and ankles shackled. "I do humbly accept my responsibly for my actions. I don't blame anyone."

His attorney Kathryn Nester said the scheme wasn't malicious but meant to ensure everyone in the group had food to eat as part of the group's religious beliefs in communal living.

She said Lyle Jeffs has already suffered tremendously because he's been banned from the sect by his brother Warren Jeffs. That means he's lost his family, his job and his faith.

"If you're looking to humble him, I think we're there," Nester said.

Lyle Jeffs was first charged in February 2016 along with 10 other members of the sect in the fraud scheme. Cases against the others ended in plea deals without prison time or dismissed charges.

Lyle Jeffs compounded his legal problems when he became a fugitive after he slipped off an ankle monitoring device in in June of that year while out on supervised release. He was caught in South Dakota a year later after pawn shop workers spotted him and called police.

His brother Warren Jeffs is serving a life sentence in Texas for sexually assaulting girls he considered wives.

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/utah/articles/2017-12-13/ex-polygamous-sect-leader-gets-nearly-5-years-in-fraud-case

Self-Help Group Lured Man Into Sexual Cult, Lawsuit Claims

KELLY WEILL
The Daily Beast
December 13, 2017

So many people have Googled “Gratitude Training cult” that the self-help seminar company launched the webpage “GratitudeTraining.com/cult” to combat the allegations.

“Is Gratitude Training a cult?” it asks. “Well, the answer is simple...you decide!”

A new lawsuit has decided yes.

Mark Robbins claims he and his twin children joined the Florida-based group for its personal development seminars. Instead, Robbins claims, he got suckered into an exploitative club that left a dead rat on his doorstep after he left. In a new wage theft lawsuit, Robbins accuses Gratitude Training of being a cult. But Gratitude Training’s founder says they’re no more a cult than Apple fans are.

Gratitude Training advertises itself as a three-step self-improvement program to “awaken the planet, maximize joy and actualize peace.” That peace can be yours for $3,585, the combined price of Gratitude Training’s increasingly expensive and time-consuming sessions. (The final session clocks in at nearly 200 hours, spread out over three months.)

Robbins, who joined Gratitude Training in June with his twin children, says he made it through the program’s first two phases before his doubts began piling up. In his suit, he describes allegedly witnessing Gratitude Training staff bully a young woman into an “altered state” during an “exercise,” and berate a man with early onset Alzheimer’s disease.

Robbins claims Gratitude Training knowingly enrolled people with histories of sexual misconduct and that he witnessed those members participating in sexualized rites, “which include group stroking and massaging, lifting members in the air by their buttocks; and skits in which male members wear diapers.”

Jo Englesson, Gratitude Training’s founder who is named as a defendant in the suit, says that’s not true.

“There’s nothing immoral or sexually inappropriate going on in these trainings,” Englesson told The Daily Beast. “It’s a completely frivolous lawsuit and we’re filing a defamation suit against him next week.”

If Gratitude Training is a cult, then so are people who line up for the iPhone, Englesson said.

“If it’s a cult in the sense of the cult of Apple, people who like the computer product, then yeah,” she said. “But it’s not a cult in the way he’s alleging.”

But Robbins claims Gratitude Training suckered him out of time and money. In his suit, he accuses Gratitude Training of pushing members to work unpaid for the company. Robbins worked over 100 hours without seeing a penny, and one woman in the group “gave so many hours of unpaid service… that she was poverty stricken, and posted on Facebook that she would pose nude for food or money,” he claims.

When Robbins claims he complained about the lack of pay part way through the training’s third phase, he was booted from the group while his children remained on the inside, he alleges. Englesson said Gratitude Training members sometimes volunteer their time and that while Robbins might have volunteered to work security for the group, he never had reason to expect pay.

But other Gratitude Training students have also taken to the internet to complain about an alleged pressure to volunteer for the group. In a 2014 review on the consumer complaint website Ripoff Report, one person claiming to be a former student decried an alleged push for Gratitude Training members to “volunteer, work and recruit for free” while the company profited.

The former student accused Gratitude Training of being a “cult” that uses “public humiliation,” “manipulation,” “food and sleep deprivation,” and “psychological breakdown” to keep members hooked. Gratitude Training staff “keep you in a room for 12-14 hr days, scolded people if they needed to use the rest room other than the assigned few breaks,” the student alleged.

Another reviewer accused Gratitude Training of luring her daughter into a cult. “Not being aloud to speak of what just happened that night (of ‘class’), not coming home and staying at ‘elders’ of the group’s home, being evasive of what her weeks entails,” the reviewer claimed, “I have asked for opinions of others and they all say ‘cult.’”

It’s reviews like these, and numerous threads on cult-discussion forums, that led Gratitude Training to launch the webpage GratitudeTraining.com/cult to combat the cult allegations.

“We are aware that there are a few people - some that have actually completed a training with us and others that have not - who had an adverse experience of the Gratitude Training and has utilized cult forums on the internet to share this experience,” the page reads, under a picture of a person making a heart with their hands. “Their ‘testimonials’, even if only a handful, show up at the top of search engines.”

The page goes on to enumerate other “cults you may be part of,” including fans of the brands Apple, Mini Cooper, Ikea, and Lululemon. “Cult” is a misunderstood word, the company argues, while conceding that Gratitude Training might be a cult, depending on one’s definition.

“If we neutrally look upon the word ‘cult’ we can simply recognize that there is a deep faith,” one that Gratitude Training students share, the company claims. The page encourages skeptics to read former students’ reviews.

And most public testimonials are glowing, with some former students boasting of repeating their courses multiple times. On Gratitude Training’s Facebook page, nearly every review is five stars. But the negative reviews are vivid. “Crazy cult-like people comparable to Scientology or religious extremists,” one Facebook reviewer alleged in a one-star review in September. “Run. Away. Fast.”

But when Robbins left, his children remained in the group, which “intentionally and maliciously placed [distance] between Robbins and his sons,” his suit alleges. Since Robbins left, one of his children “was coerced in GT into dancing in a thong with 60 other scantily clad people,” he claims. Englesson told The Daily Beast no sexually inappropriate behavior happens in the trainings.

Robbins has also filmed himself calling “hey cult members” at people gathered outside a Gratitude Training center, and expounded on his Gratitude Training conspiracy theories on his blog, which Englesson claims is defamatory.

Both sides agree a rift has opened between Gratitude Training and the former member.

“Since leaving the Cult, Robbins has received death threats, and been the subject of false claims,” his suit alleges. “Robbins’ car was also vandalized. Cult members left a dead rat on his doorstep.”

The three-month course and the stress of splitting from it have left Robbins with “chronic headaches, nausea, vomiting, suicidal thoughts, anxiety, and depression,” he claims.

He also claims the group “filed meritless claims against [him] with police, and wrongfully obtained a restraining order against [him] based on baseless stalking allegations.”

Englesson confirmed she got a restraining order against Robbins. “He’s also, on a daily basis, contacting all the students who have done our leadership training on Facebook. He’s finding friends of friends of friends and sending them stuff daily from his blog.”

In October, she sent Gratitude Training’s high-level students an email apologizing for what she described as Robbins’ “continuous online harassment and publishing of defamatory content.” The email, which Robbins posted online, prompted students to fill out a questionnaire if Robbins’ emails had led them to cancel their classes—lost revenue that Gratitude Training could try to extract from Robbins if they sue him for defamation.

“We have tons and tons of proof it’s all just crazy talk,” Englesson said. “I’ve been going through this for like three months and it’s pretty hardcore.”

That’s almost exactly what Robbins alleges of her classes.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/self-help-group-lured-man-into-sexual-cult-lawsuit-claims

An excerpt from Meditation : A safety guide

TM-Free Blog

December 10, 2017

 An excerpt from "Meditation : A safety guide"

Here's an excerpt from a book written by a "meditation mentor" in Singapore. My posting of this excerpt is not to endorse any system of meditation or any religious tradition. It does serve as a rather thorough exploration of the downsides of meditation, and why it may not be recommended for a lot of people.

REAL DANGERS OF MEDITATION

[Abridged from Piya Tan, Meditation : A safety guide, Singapore: The Minding Centre, 2013 Intro.]

The meeting of western science and eastern meditation has not always been smooth [1]. On the positive side, we now know more about the nature and effects of meditation—and how to recognize the “real” thing—or at least avoid the negative aspects.

PROBLEMS WITH MANTRA MEDITATION

By the mid-1970s, clinical reports of negative outcomes of various mantra meditation programs began to appear in psychiatric literature [2] These included people becoming unemployable because they were unable to control their mental states (for example, everything around them seemed unreal), and even more serious problems ranging from depression and agitation to psychosis.

Leon Otis, a psychologist at Stanford Research Institute, found that adverse outcomes were related to how long that person had meditated using such methods [3]. Michael Persinger, neuroscientist at the Laurentian University, Sudbury, Ontario, Canada, found that, for some people, meditation can bring on symptoms of complex partial epilepsy, such as visual abnormalities, hearing voices, feeling vibrations, or experiencing automatic behaviours [4].

SELF-HYPNOSIS

Another concern, explored by Esalen founders, Michael Murphy and Steven Donovan, was that advanced practitioners of mantra meditation ranked high in suggestibility [5], not surprising given its similarity to self-hypnosis. A number of people in the US have successfully brought legal suits for damages suffered as a result of their participation in meditation programmes, especially commercialized methods such as TM (“transcendental meditation”) [6]. Legal suits against TM for damages were common [7].

Many people doing TM suffered from problems and difficulties regarding thinking and attention. Other impairments included emotional difficulties, blackouts, anxiety, “spacing out” [feeling drowsy, weak and bored], amnesia, and losing track of time [8]. In short, TM is not safe [9].

In the early years of Buddhism in the US, two approaches were common. The first was the empty-mind mantra meditation based on the Hindu tradition. The second, from the Judaeo-Christian tradition, is reflective meditation, where you reflect as a way of focusing the mind.

In the former, a close relationship between teacher and pupil included attention to individual differences and any problems which might arise. In contrast to earlier approaches, meditation today is often being sold by mass marketing, and often by individuals who have no religious affiliation or do not declare it [10].

FOOTNOTES

[1] This section is mostly based on http://www.ex-premie.org/pages/ismeditation.htm.
[2] Clinical reports of negative outcomes. A A Lazarus, “Psychiatric problems precipitated by Transcendental Meditation,” Psychological Reports 39 1976:601-602. For full biblio, see Meditation: A Safety Guide, 2013.
[3] N Mead, “Why meditation may not reduce stress,” Natural Health 23,6 Nov-Dec 1993: 80-85. For full biblio, see Meditation: A Safety Guide, 2013.
4] Michael A Persinger, “Transcendental Meditation and general meditation are associated with enhanced complex partial epileptic-like signs: Evidence of ‘cognitive kindling’?” Perceptual and Motor Skills 76, 1993:80-82. For full biblio, see Meditation: A Safety Guide, 2013.
[5] Michael Murphy & Steve Donovan, The Physical and Psychological Effects of Meditation, Big Sur, CA: Esa¬len Institute, 1989.
[6] On the dangers of TM (Transcendental Meditation) (a detailed insider report by Joe Kellett), see http://www.suggestibility.org/. Another comprehensive insider’s website is www.minet.org.
[7] Legal suits for damages. John Doe I-VI and Jane Doe vs Maharishi Mahesh Yogi; World Plan Executive Council-United States; Maharishi International University for the US District Court for the District of Columbia, 95-2848, 2849, 2851, 2852, 2853, 2854 (consolidated); Jane Green vs Maharishi Mahesh Yogi et al. US District Court for the District of Columbia, 87-0015-OG. Patrick Ryan vs World Plan Executive Council-United States et al. US District Court for the District of Columbia, 87-0016-OG.
[8] Problems found in therapy. M T Singer & R Ofshe, “Thought reform and the production of psychiatric casualies,” Psychiatric Annals 20,4 1990:189-190.
[9] On the ineffectiveness and problems of TM, see A Lutz, Donne & Davidson 2007:41-43.
[10] On various aspects of the commercialization of meditation and pseudoscientific claims, see eg Barry L Beyerstein, “Pseudoscience and the brain: Tuners and tonics for aspiring superhumans” at http://www.sfu.ca/…/…/articles/06Pseudoscience-and-Brain.pdf.

http://tmfree.blogspot.com/2017/12/an-excerpt-from-meditation-safety-guide.html

Russian court turns properties of banned Jehovah’s Witnesses over to government

Tass
December 08, 2017

According to the court findings, the Jehovah’s Witnesses administrative center in Russia transferred an estate on the shore of the Gulf of Finland to the Society as a donation in 2000

ST. PETERSBURG,  A district court in St. Petersburg passed a resolution on Thursday to confiscate 16 items of real estate in St. Petersburg worth more than 880 million rubles [$14.9 mln], which belong to the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania registered in the U.S., and to turn them over to the government, the united press service of city courts said on Thursday.

The Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania received the immovable property from the Jehovah’s Witnesses administrative center in Russia that has been banned by the Russian authorities.

"The Sestroretsk district court entertained a lawsuit filed by the Prosecutor’s Office of the Kurortny district against the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania legal entity and confiscated in favor of the state the entity’s properties consisting of 16 items [land plots, residential houses, buildings] having the cadastral value of 881,407,566 rubles [$ 14,939,111]," the press service said.

According to the court findings, the Jehovah’s Witnesses administrative center in Russia transferred an estate on the shore of the Gulf of Finland to the Society as a donation in 2000. Later on, however, it continued using the compound - a fact proceeding from which the court recognized the transfer null and void.

The real estate will be turned over to government property.

The Supreme Court of the Russian Federation declared the Russian affiliation of Jehovah’s Witnesses an extremist organization and banned its activities in this country.

http://tass.com/world/979788/amp

Girls are found after Amber Alert issued in Utah; their father, a member of a group called Knights of the Crystal Blade, is linked to their disappearance

Nate Carlisle
Aubrey Wieber
Salt Lake Tribune
December 4, 2016

Police have found two young girls allegedly kidnapped by their father, who court records say is a “doomsday prepper” belonging to a new religious group.

An Amber Alert that was sent about the two girls Monday afternoon was canceled at 7 p.m. The girls, 4 and 8 years old, were recovered shortly after a friend of their father was found and taken into custody west of Cedar City, in the Lund area.

Lt. Del Schlosser of the Iron County Sheriff’s Office confirmed Monday evening that Samuel Warren Shaffer, 34, was in custody of the Sheriff’s Office .

Shaffer was booked into the Iron County jail early Tuesday morning on suspicion of two counts of child kidnapping and four counts of reckless child abuse.

“For us, the value of the Amber Alert system, that was key in locating Mr. Shaffer and recovering the girls,” Schlosser said.

Shaffer was believed to be traveling with his two daughters and the two daughters of his associate, John Coltharp. Shaffer allegedly sees himself as a prophet for a new fundamentalist Mormon group, of which Coltharp, 33, is a member. Coltharp was arrested and booked into the Sanpete County jail Friday on suspicion of kidnapping and obstructing justice. Formal charges have not been filed.

Schlosser said a person called to report a single male walking about Lund. The male was Shaffer, and officers apprehended him. Shortly afterward, they located two young girls. One was one of Shaffer’s daughters, and the other was one of Coltharp’s daughters, Schlosser said.

Police found the other two girls shortly afterward, within 5 miles of Shaffer and the other pair.

“They were in good conditions,” Schlosser said, adding that they were cold and hungry before they were taken to Cedar City Hospital for medical evaluations.

“They were shaken, but as they got warmer, they became much more calm and talkative,” he said.

The girls had been with their father, who does not have legal custody of them, since September. The circumstances of their lives over the past few months are being investigated, Schlosser said.

Deputies from the Iron County Sheriff’s Office raided a compound in that county Monday, said Spring City Police Chief Clarke Christensen, and found Coltharp’s two boys, who also had been reported missing. A KUTV reporter tweeted video of law enforcers searching a train in Lund as a helicopter flew above.

Coltharp may have put his daughters in danger, said Kelly Peterson, an attorney representing Coltharp’s ex-wife, “and he has stated, according to my client’s understanding, that he would rather see the kids dead than with the police.”

On Friday, 4th District Judge Derek Pullan imposed a $100,000 cash bail in a divorce case between Coltharp and his ex-wife, citing Coltharp’s unwillingness to tell police where his daughters were.

Christensen said Coltharp refused to disclose the location of the children, even though the county prosecutor visited him in jail and offered him a deal in return for his cooperation.

“The information this morning was that he was going to make bail, and then the concern would be that he would be in the wind,” Peterson said.

Coltharp’s sister, Cindi Ray, on Monday said her brother has fundamentalist Mormon beliefs, including support for polygamy, though he has never practiced plural marriage. Coltharp and Shaffer, Ray said, started a religion called Knights of the Crystal Blade and have baptized each other and Dinah.

On a website titled “The kingdom of God or nothing!!!,” Shaffer outlines a religious doctrine he says was handed down to him by God on the morning of June 22, 2015.

God told him the Book of Mormon is law, he says on the site, as is plural marriage, including coupling with children. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has not endorsed polygamy since 1890.

Ray worried her nieces were being hidden so they could be placed in a marriage at an early age.

According to her, Coltharp has “said to all of [his] siblings in the past that girls are meant to get married at the age of 12 — their bodies are ready.”

According to court records from Coltharp’s divorce, his ex-wife said he is a survivalist “doomsday prepper” who distrusts modern medicine and refused to allow her to use pain medication during childbirth.

Coltharp’s ex-wife also says, Pullan wrote in a September ruling, that Coltharp carries a pistol and “has threatened to send any DCFS [Division of Child and Family Services] worker or police officer to the next life if they try to take the children from him.”

The court records say Coltharp’s group is called Knights of the Crystal Blade and is led by Shaffer, who is referred to as a prophet. He also goes by Fredrick Shaffer and has published writings and videos espousing fundamentalist Mormon beliefs.

Pullan, in that September ruling, denied a temporary restraining order that would have granted the ex-wife custody of all four children. Pullan said Coltharp’s religious beliefs were not extreme enough to constitute an immediate threat to the children.

But as normal divorce and custody proceedings continued, Pullan granted the ex-wife full custody on Nov. 27. Coltharp is accused of not turning the children over to their mother. Besides their two daughters, the former couple have sons, ages 7 and 6.

Samuel Shaffer’s brother, Benjamin Shaffer, said Monday that his brother is no threat to any of the children, and that he is probably just taking care of the girls to do a favor for his friend.

“I certainly hope they don’t go in there, guns blazing, threatening my nieces just because he’s taking care of other kids,” Benjamin Shaffer said before the girls were found.

Benjamin Shaffer also disputed the characterization of the Knights of the Crystal Blade in court documents. It is not a church, he said, but more of a club or fraternity that Samuel Shaffer and Coltharp formed to discuss philosophy and religion.

There is no record of Knights of the Crystal Blade being incorporated with the state, as most churches are.

http://www.sltrib.com/news/politics/2017/12/04/search-underway-for-utah-girls-whose-father-is-said-to-belong-to-religious-sect-called-knights-of-the-crystal-blade/