Quote
The Anticult
there is so much information in there.


And the lady who worked for Landmark 9am-10pm 6 days a week, which is 78 hrs a week,
for $24,000 a year, (about $500 a week).
$500 wk / 78 hrs = $6.41 hr

$6.41 an hour.
Was that below the minimum wage?

Landmark has consistently underpaid their office staff. When I worked for Landmark my salary was around the $25k a year. at one stage our income was increased after we showed that they were paying us under legal minimum. but it was only increased to meet minimum wages as if we were doing a 40 hour week and like most landmark staff we did hours far inexcess of 40. I used to get to work at around 8 because it meant I got a couple of hours quiet and then often stayed till midnight. Lunch breaks were rare and dinner was nearly always something delievered or not taken.

As for the work load... it was never ending. You got one weekend off a month offically but that was a joke. You got sundays off offically but often you had to turn up on at a course because the forum leader or course leader wanted you there or the course supervisors were calling you constantly.

as for holidays that was the biggest joke of all. if you wanted a holiday you had to provide cover for you role. I remember the night before I was due to go on my first holiday after 13 months on staff and the centre manager was telling me unless I got the whole week covered I would not be allowed to go. I was lucky that I had a friend who did it even though they didn't want to so I could go on holiday. But even on holiday they called and faxed me and I had to do work in my hotel room and pay for the fax use to boot.

Leaving landmark was the best move I ever made.

Quote
sonnie_dee

Quote
The Anticult
there is so much information in there.


And the lady who worked for Landmark 9am-10pm 6 days a week, which is 78 hrs a week,
for $24,000 a year, (about $500 a week).
$500 wk / 78 hrs = $6.41 hr

$6.41 an hour.
Was that below the minimum wage?

Landmark has consistently underpaid their office staff. When I worked for Landmark my salary was around the $25k a year. at one stage our income was increased after we showed that they were paying us under legal minimum. but it was only increased to meet minimum wages as if we were doing a 40 hour week and like most landmark staff we did hours far inexcess of 40. I used to get to work at around 8 because it meant I got a couple of hours quiet and then often stayed till midnight. Lunch breaks were rare and dinner was nearly always something delievered or not taken.

As for the work load... it was never ending. You got one weekend off a month offically but that was a joke. You got sundays off offically but often you had to turn up on at a course because the forum leader or course leader wanted you there or the course supervisors were calling you constantly.

as for holidays that was the biggest joke of all. if you wanted a holiday you had to provide cover for you role. I remember the night before I was due to go on my first holiday after 13 months on staff and the centre manager was telling me unless I got the whole week covered I would not be allowed to go. I was lucky that I had a friend who did it even though they didn't want to so I could go on holiday. But even on holiday they called and faxed me and I had to do work in my hotel room and pay for the fax use to boot.

Leaving landmark was the best move I ever made.

How long were you on staff?

Excellent article in the July-August '09 Mother Jones magazine about Landmark -- "42 Hours, $500, 65 Breakdowns "My lost weekend with the trademark happy, bathroom-break hating, slightly spooky inheritors of est," by Laura McClure.

Side stories include "The Hunger Artist" and "Landmark Moments."

The Mother Jones stuff is always good quality.

John

Hi dtroy, I have just recently found this web-site, in my search for like minded individuals who want to rid the world of Landmark education. I would be a strong supporter of this cause and would like to decide in a course of action which will get these people out of my country - Ireland.

I'm not sure how you can get them out of the country unless you can demonstrate that they break laws. You can though attack their message through a website set up for that purpose. This would take a lot of thought and preparation because you have to avoid opening yourself to litigation and at the same time find ways to cut through their propaganda which is mainly carried by word of mouth. Most people are at a Forum because a friend or relative has recommended it to them. I think a good way to begin to make people think is to ask them if they really believe a three day event can 'transform their lives.' Even the most self deluded person has enough information to see how crazy this is. I think a concerted campaign can lessen the success of organisations like Landmark but I don't think they can be eliminated.

Do you have any ideas on what you want to do? - I'm not in Ireland by the way but I'm happy to contribute suggestions to a website against Landmark.

The first thing you can do it to help make information available. A lack of contrary information is what groups such as Landmark Education covet ... hence their loud roaring of the legal kind.

They especially don't like this video. Plenty of other goodies as well.

By all means make your own copies and go for it. Best therapy you can ever have.

John

It's a useful video - I could only find part 1 (lasted about an hour). Are the other parts on the web site?

I thought it was a pity that the woman in the studio who said she found the Forum useful wasn't listened to more carefully instead of just getting a lecture about how she'd been duped. It may be beyond the scope of a program like that but I think the most useful way of discrediting Landmark is to deconstruct some of their 'successes.' There were also a couple of volunteers who claimed their lives had been 'transformed.' Clearly the general tone of the program is anti-Landmark but if you watch it carefully the message, in the interests of balance - quite rightly, is mixed.

I did a Forum a number of years ago in London. I went along as a piece of personal research because I kept bumping into people who told me how great the Forum was. Importantly I went not buying into the premise of the show - that it would transform (or even change noticably) my life. Also I was in an abusive cult for a number of years and have worked through the experience and am no longer susceptible to emotional pressure-cooker tactics. At the end of the course I and a woman who was also not at all impressed looked on as all the other course members cheered wildly and the Forum leader (an obnoxious little shit who looked like Mussolini) took a triumphant bow.

The difficulty in creating anti-Landmark propaganda is that they operate on a purely emotional level. It's your friends and family who are telling you how great it was. Who are you going to believe, your best friend or some guy on a website? The other (massive) problem is that our pop-culture feeds the idea of the quick fix on which Landmark and so many other charlatans thrive. Maybe we need to start a campaign on the internet called 'Think For yourself' or 'Nobody Can Do It For You' or 'Gurus? Who Needs Them?' or whatever.

Hi Carlos,

I think one of the most difficult things to do would be to explain to someone (or show them) that they have been brainwashed as part of what is essentially a large group brainwashing session.

I'm not an expert on this, but I can only think of pointing out that when they emphatically rave/speak of how wonderful Landmark has been for them, yet are unable to give specifics or reason why ... there might be a problem. If you can, probe for details (an interview technique used when candidates give short rehearsed answers) and force them to engage in their critical thinking again.

If it is of interest, I have noticed people walk away from a Landmark session simply because of the pressure to sign up their friends and family. Kind of like Amway. You might find this angle to be successful when talking to people.

It's hard to compete for the people who prefer to have their ears tickled with words of an easy fix. But you can still do it.

John

Hi John,

well, it's a bit like trying to convince someone that chocolate ice cream doesn't taste so good. So far as Landmark goes prevention is easier than cure. On the bright side I would guess that most people who do the Forum are not affected too much one way or another once the initial euphoria has worn off. I've met a number of people who've done the Forum and liked it but none of them have gone on to do the 'advanced course' where I think people are really ripped to shreds. So something in them is saying this far but no further. The problem is they continue to act as recruiters.

The problem with the French TV documentary is that it doesn't really get behind what Landmark are doing. The most scary cults are always those where the leaders are not cynical and actually believe what they say. During the Forum I did the leader (Mussolini) kept giving examples of how the Forum had saved someone's life - "Thank God for the Landmark forum" he'd say. He'd come up through the ranks and seemed absolutely convinced that the purpose of all this repugnant psycho babble and abuse was noble rather than financial. The thing is though if you are amenable to what the leader is saying you won't be hammered - it's only if you resist that you get problems. So if you go in with a low level of self-awareness and are amazed to find out that people have 'rackets' (hardly original the idea that people have agendas or play self-serving games) and are appreciative of what the great leader is telling you about your behaviour you can come away with a warm fuzzy feeling.

So when the psychologist on the TV program tells the pro-Landmark woman that she's been brainwashed she's understandably confused. And the truth is that the psychologist seems to have very little idea of how concretely the Forum works. He has a broad brushstroke idea of how a cult operates but he's read it all in a book. Rather than listen to the woman the psychologist throws his version of absolute certainty at her. For example, when they talk about the document that they claim tells a Forum leader what to say at every moment during the three days the woman objects saying the leader doesn't know what the students are going to say so how can he know what to say in advance. This is a perfectly reasonable objection. It's true that much of the Forum is scripted but there are inevitably periods when it's simply an interaction between the leader and individuals. At this point the leader will improvise (within strict guidelines). Rather than acknowledge this the psychologist insists that the entire three days are scripted word for word.

So the poor woman is caught between a rock and a hard place. She has two sides of an argument hurling their certainties at her and her experience really counts for nothing. So I guess I've come the long way round here but I agree it's possible to to talk to people and help them get to grips with what really happened but to do that you have to understand what someone was looking for, and what they think they found, and these things will vary tremendously. But, but, but, before this can happen they have to drop the jargon and that's a tricky one.

Sorry if that's a bit rambling - stream of consciousness and all that.