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whether one of the district members should be allowed to have a toso or not

Good lord - why should such a thing even be an issue? Isn't it supposed to be a GOOD thing if people want to chant more??

Reminds me of back when I was a YWD in Minneapolis. The YWD and YMD were planning a series of youth division study meetings, and our leaders told us we weren't allowed to. Why not? "Because the YWD will be studying the YMD and the YMD will be studying the YWD!" Can you believe that crap? 3/4 of our YMD were GAY, for goshsakes!

It floored me then and it floors me now - making it HARDER for people to do what they supposedly want them to do?? Whatever happened to "faith, practice, and study" being the core components of being an SGI Buddhist??

I'll bet President Ikeda never even showed. Hell, he's probably an oozing weeks-old corpse or worse by now. No pictures, I'm guessing? Then it never happened. NO ONE ever misses an Ikeda photo op - that's the whole point of his being there! "Take the picture quick - then I'm outta here, losers!"

Yeah, want to know too. I was never so close to the Master that I received directly a cake from him. Delicious it was, she said, maybe Kaneko had spent hours in the kitchen for cousin rufus icing in gakkai- tri- colours. Imagination and strong faith is required, the yellow buttercreme had exact the same tone as Sensei's fresh face!

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sixtyseven
Yeah, want to know too. I was never so close to the Master that I received directly a cake from him. Delicious it was, she said, maybe Kaneko had spent hours in the kitchen for cousin rufus icing in gakkai- tri- colours. Imagination and strong faith is required, the yellow buttercreme had exact the same tone as Sensei's fresh face!

Sorry to disillusion you, I was delegated to buy cakes and refreshments on several occasions. They came from the local supermarket. They were then announced as being from Senseless and handed out in breaks between lectures on 'courses' (aka mind control sessions). Oh god, the doublespeak and cognitive dissonance, those are painful memories. Needed a load of carbs to quiet that down. But hey, maybe Senseless owned the supermarket?

Some random replies to many of the recent posts here:

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Nichijew
SGI and Codependency

Control patterns:

--I believe most other people are incapable of taking care of themselves. — Giving guidance whether or not guidance is sought.
--I attempt to convince others of what they “should” think and how they “truly” feel. — “President Ikeda says we should…”
--I become resentful when others will not let me help them. — “You lack faith”.
--I freely offer others advice and directions without being asked. — see above

N

That sums up just about every annoying gakkai cult org. "leader" that I've ever known or encountered. Especially the first and last ones:

"Giving guidance whether or not guidance is sought." / "I freely offer others advice and directions without being asked."

The arrogance (and ignorance, because they go together) was sometimes staggering.

Being in the gakkai cult org. programs you to lose all sense of normal social decency boundaries while interacting with others. They are either super fake with non-members or slip into super-caregiver-all-knowing-oracle mode when dealing with members (those below them in "faith" of course). Members above them in "faith" or "leadership" position, reverses the roles again, with them becoming the subservient one.

I used to ask fellow members, "Who asked them (the "leader") for their advice and what exactly qualifies him/her to comment on the situation??" What made it all the more absurd, was if you bothered to look beyond the superficial facade, the "leader's" own personal or family life was often not in an ideal state worthy of emulation in and of itself to begin with.

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sixtyseven
A posting from today on facebook by a young woman from soka university:

"President Ikeda came to Soka University last Saturday(29th June). Seikyo Shinbun reported about it. :D No one saw him though but he was with the President of Soka University and other senior professors. Today we received a delicious cake from him. And now I just wait for the day when I will meet him ♥ Sensei... sensei. .♥ Yaayyy :D"


Oh so mystic, no one saw Ikeda the good man and Seikyo Shinbun reported about it? It seems that the cake trick is still working. (The &#9829 are heart symbols)

If she chanted enough, maybe she got a piece that The Dear Leader licked his fingers with before touching it, too. Talk about a genuine benefit experience for the next zadankai meeting ...

With this kind of mindset, I'm sure the intelligent $oka Cult U. student is enjoying her piece of Dear Leader cake, with one of these "official" gakkai cult U. kewpie ("QP") dolls dangling from her cellphone, too: [sogakuservice.co.jp] / [sogakuservice.co.jp]

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corboy
Was the cake home made, or at least from a good bakery?

Or the sort of thing one can get from a supermarket/Costco?

Inquiring minds want to know.

At least make the cake using real butter, real eggs. And if chocolate, the frosting should contain melted hard chocolate, powdered sugar, and butter, with genuine vanilla and a touch of salt.

Mr. Williams-Sadanga once splurged for McDonald's lunch (one thin hamburger, small fries and small coke) for us "YOUTH!" once! We were so grateful, too and I remember, it was good (I was a starving YMD at the time). I even remember some of the more hardcore faith gakkai-bots sansho'ing (is that a word?) and thanking the general director in spirit before even opening their bags.

(Btw, sansho = the magic chant, x3, [www.youtube.com])

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TaitenAndProud

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whether one of the district members should be allowed to have a toso or not

Good lord - why should such a thing even be an issue? Isn't it supposed to be a GOOD thing if people want to chant more??

Reminds me of back when I was a YWD in Minneapolis. The YWD and YMD were planning a series of youth division study meetings, and our leaders told us we weren't allowed to. Why not? "Because the YWD will be studying the YMD and the YMD will be studying the YWD!" Can you believe that crap? 3/4 of our YMD were GAY, for goshsakes!

It floored me then and it floors me now - making it HARDER for people to do what they supposedly want them to do?? Whatever happened to "faith, practice, and study" being the core components of being an SGI Buddhist??

The gakkai cult org. tries to program it into you that you should not take any direction or make any independent decisions in life, without first obtaining cult org. "leader" blessing or approval. They even tell their salaried leaders, where to go, what to do and where to live, in service of the cult org.. Such a mindset is a prerequisite to surviving and climbing the cult org. ladder.

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simplify

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sixtyseven
Yeah, want to know too. I was never so close to the Master that I received directly a cake from him. Delicious it was, she said, maybe Kaneko had spent hours in the kitchen for cousin rufus icing in gakkai- tri- colours. Imagination and strong faith is required, the yellow buttercreme had exact the same tone as Sensei's fresh face!

Sorry to disillusion you, I was delegated to buy cakes and refreshments on several occasions. They came from the local supermarket. They were then announced as being from Senseless and handed out in breaks between lectures on 'courses' (aka mind control sessions). Oh god, the doublespeak and cognitive dissonance, those are painful memories. Needed a load of carbs to quiet that down. But hey, maybe Senseless owned the supermarket?

I can second "simplify's" "experience." I saw the hardcore YMD automatons dispatched to the local McD's, after being barked at with the orders; the same ones who later handed out the bags with the cold fries and the luke warm melted ice drinks to all of us. They looked worn out from all the running around trying to please their own "leaders" and terrified of making any mistakes in the process.




- Hitch

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eyzopn
Horrific. (re: Blockbuster News @ Buddha Jones) What remains to be seen is how the organization responds. Will the award be rescinded or will the whole thing be swept under the rug? Will the org. close ranks to protect its image or make a public statement against human rights violations? It's the worst case scenario of the fallacy of equating enlightenment with earthly desires. One could justify anything.

The cult org. simply won't talk about it. Typical confirmation bias at work in the minds of the membership & leaders. It'll be spoken about in hushed whispers in halls and behind closed doors, but otherwise, ignored. If it snowballs or cannot be ignored completely, then they might spin up some twisted logic guidance to dress it up with the goal to have it forgotten about again.

Hey, LOOK!, we give this award to people to scratch their backs and they'll scratch ours (publicity). Ooops! That one was a mistake. Oh well, don't think about it and LOOK! here's another award for somebody else. Keep movin' on . . . .

That's the gakkai cult org. . . . . . and the attention span for many, unfortunately.

Things mean something, when they want it to, and mean nothing, when they need it to. That's the gakkai cult org.



- Hitch

PS - Edit: Basically, members won't know what to think (what they are allowed to think or how to frame it), until they are told "officially" how to do so by others on up the cult org. ladder.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/02/2013 07:13AM by Hitch.

Re: Cake . . . we have a large Asian grocery store here, and believe me - the cakes there are more punishment and reward. My district my not miss me for my wit and intelligence, but they damn-skippy will miss me for my home-made baked goods and candy! Ha!

The toso issue was most definitely about control. While other members had been free to contact me to let people know about tosos being scheduled at the last minute (and there was never an issue from the leaders), this particular woman hadn't been to a district or study meeting since November. Her husband was killed in a car accident in early December; she had scheduled tosos every Sunday after that for a couple of months with no problem. She kind of faded out for a bit, then started offering to have meetings at her house which, for one scheduling reason or another just never worked for everyone. It was very difficult for her . . . her 12-year son was having a lot of issues (understandably), and she was struggling to be both mom and dad, attending a lot of athletic activities that her husband had gone to, trying to fill in the best she could. When she contacted me about having the toso, I thought that it was great . . . she was reaching out for support and, foolishly, I thought that's what sgi was all about. I got a snotty email from the md district leader saying that we should hold off, and that leadership should really decide about it. I was super-pissed; this guy had been appointed to the district in January with the geo-reo, and had rubbed me the wrong way a number of times. He had this unpleasant habit of going to someone's home for a meeting and (without invitation) plopping his sorry, arrogant ass in front of the gohonzon and leading gongyo. I'd always been told that that's tantamount of walking into someone's house and having sex with your dog on the couch. Most people deferred to him - I say most, because there was a certain member (who shall remain nameless, but her initials are meh) who made a point of landing her own ass in front of the big G. and starting gongyo herself. I don't suffer fools or pompous asses gladly.

Anyway, I was furious about this jerk-wad's email and responded in kind, naively reminding him that "the org is for the members, not the other way around." Mr. Pompous-Ass took umbrage, and went running to the WD chapter leader, who called me. As I wrote previously, in not so many words, she said tough shit, so-and-so hasn't been going to meetings, so we shouldn't allow her to have a toso. She said that she and this woman were "just like this" (picture Oliver Hardy in The March of the Wooden Soldiers, crossing his fingers demonstrating to Stan how close he was with the toymaker), and that the woman and her son were just fine and there was no reason why she couldn't be attending meetings. I'm sure she was oozing compassion at her end of the call.

To make a long story short, I went to my district leader for guidance, and in her heavily-Japanese-accented voice said, "you so nice and polite - I woulda tole her fucka you." A week later, they had the leadership meeting where they decided I should be deprived of benefit-gaining activities like having meetings at my place and doing the schedule (yeah, that's why I did them, to gain benefits - nothing to do with me being a nice person and sick of having three or four people sending out screwed-up schedules). The fucka-you lady called to tell me, couching the whole thing in fluff and lies.

After a few days of consideration, I decided to say "fucka you" to the whole sorry lot of them.

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eyzopn
Thanks, Nichijew for your greetings to us new folks here!

Horrific. (re: Blockbuster News @ Buddha Jones) What remains to be seen is how the organization responds. Will the award be rescinded or will the whole thing be swept under the rug? Will the org. close ranks to protect its image or make a public statement against human rights violations? It's the worst case scenario of the fallacy of equating enlightenment with earthly desires. One could justify anything.

Great point eysopn.

Things mean something, when they want it to, and mean nothing, when they need it to. That's the gakkai cult org.

- Hitch

PS - Edit: Basically, members won't know what to think (what they are allowed to think or how to frame it), until they are told "officially" how to do so by others on up the cult org. ladder."

Insightful.

Nchijew

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The gakkai cult org. tries to program it into you that you should not take any direction or make any independent decisions in life, without first obtaining cult org. "leader" blessing or approval. They even tell their salaried leaders, where to go, what to do and where to live, in service of the cult org.. Such a mindset is a prerequisite to surviving and climbing the cult org. ladder.

I remember back when I was a YWD group leader. I'd been attending this group, which was named for a woman I'd never seen. And I'd been at every meeting! She was a consistent persistent no-show! I kept asking why the group wasn't named after *me*, since I was hosting it in my house. That makes sense, right? I think it got named after me less than 6 months before I got promoted out of it *shrug*

So anyhow, at the group (or was it district? Can't remember) planning meeting, everyone was asking for ideas. So I suggested that we each choose someone we admire from history or society and do a brief overview of that person's contributions/positives/etc. the way President Ikeda does in the World Tribune.

You know what my men's division district leader said?

He looked at me through his glasses with his beady eyes and balding head and said, "But we're not President Ikeda."

O_O

At the time, I thought that President Ikeda would be terribly disappointed that his "followers" were such drones, completely lacking initiative, but from what I realize now about the cult, that MD district leader was actually doin it rite O_O

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Hey, LOOK!, we give this award to people to scratch their backs and they'll scratch ours (publicity). Ooops! That one was a mistake. Oh well, don't think about it and LOOK! here's another award for somebody else. Keep movin' on . . . .

That's the gakkai cult org. . . . . . and the attention span for many, unfortunately.

Things mean something, when they want it to, and mean nothing, when they need it to. That's the gakkai cult org.

The fact that they were able to ashcan Mr. Williams means they can put anyone they want in the allegorical ce-ment overshoes and toss him into the ocean. The fact that Mr. Williams' ouster - so sudden and so complete - did not cause a complete crisis within the US SGI shows that the members were well conditioned to stick with the cult no matter what it did, or to whom.