SGI is saying they have 192 organizations around the world in SGI (Soka Gakkai International).

Some of the SGI-orgs are worth many billions, like in the US, Japan, perhaps places like SGI-brazil where they are growing, and likely buying up tons of property.
Places like the UK are close to 100 million, at least as reported.

So there is no question SGI is worth many tens of billions.
If each SGI had only 50 million in assets, x 192 = 9.6 billion.

But there are estimates SGI was worth 120 billion in Japan alone, over 15 years ago!
So what is SGI in total?
150 billion?
Certainly over 100 billion.
It could be far more, as SGI buys valuable real estate, and other properties which appreciate in value.

So yes, SGI needs more dues money from the unpaid SGI worker-bees, to buy more mansions and real estate in the UK, France, US, and everywhere else.
SGI is asset rich, but cash-poor, except for the fact they have billions in cash.

Its all very very suspicious, how SGI accumulated those massive assets like that in Japan so quickly, and then moved them around the world by the billions.
Religions get an extreme free pass in Japan, and so it seems anyone with billions of dollars they need to clean-up, starts a religion, or hooks up with some religions, to send out the "laundry".
Do the math on that.


How Money Laundering Works by Julia Layton
[money.howstuffworks.com]

[www.toride.org]
PROF. HIROHISA KITANO (Professor of law at Nihon
University): Nobody knows actually how rich Soka Gakkai is.
Experts estimate Soka Gakkai has more than 1,000 properties
throughout Japan with total assets of more than 10,000 billion
yen (125 billion U.S. dollars).

Thank you so much Anti-cult for your investigations and analysis. Some of the finest real estate minds in the world are Soka Gakkai. Let me give you an example. The New York Community Center, not only is prime real estate [Union Square] but a New York State historical site. How much did they receive from the government to help fix it up through the National Trust for Historical Preservation? I know for a fact that they bought it in the late 80's for $9,000,000 in a sweatheart deal orchestrated by one of their members who is now on the board of directors, Greg Wolpert. Greg, at the time, was an executive Vice President of Williams Reality. The members themselves renovated it, many of whom were not only construction workers but artisans. SGI supplied the finest materials, marble, etched glasswork, walnut, etc. Today it is worth nearly $50,000,000, if you compare it with similar properties in or around Union Square.

The main building at the FNCC [Florida Nature Culture Center] is 160,000 square feet. It lies on 125 pristine acres, adjacent to the best housing market in the entire United States, near the everglades and Fort Lauderdale:

[realestate.yahoo.com]

BTW, they are building a new headquarters in Tokyo Japan, nearly 50 stories tall and with millions of square feet of space. Do you think they will donate even 1,000 square feet to a struggling $GI entrepreneur? They have more than 1000 properties in Japan alone.

Nichijew

and the general public must always remember, since SGI-USA is registered as a "church" non-profit, there are no capital gains tax on any of those asset appreciation.
That is pure money.
And as seen by the SGI documents, they claim millions in depreciation as expenses! So they get it both ways.
And since they own the properties, they can borrow against it, and re-invest that.

A huge part of SGI is real estate investing.
Time and time again, they buy land/property for cheap, and get SGI volunteers to fix it up and donate money, and then the value skyrockets over the years.

And of course, since SGI preaches the gospel of greed is good, and chanting for a Rolex is wonderful, then they are going to attract people who are experts at things like real estate speculation.

The documents that are available shows SGI pays its financial experts a fortune, huge salaries.

In terms of the politicians, why is it that SGI can get these political favors and sweet deals?
Because they know how to do it.

Soka University is spending 1.25 MILLION per year on LOBBYING politicians. [forum.culteducation.com]
They target key politicians, and out comes the contributions.
Then they get a sweetheart deal on a distressed government property.


SGI-USA and SGI global, is simply a giant financial investment corporation, which exists to amass tens of billions of dollars for the person controlling SGI. Soon Ikeda II will take control once Ikeda dies.
The religion card is used as a fig-leaf for not paying taxes, which makes running a business easier.
No taxes, minimal salaries...

And since SGI claims to be in 192 countries or whatever, they can literally do anything they want.

If a person has even a passing knowledge of how money is washed by passing it around the world, especially through countries with no regulation, it all makes perfect sense.
All the SGI artwork, real estate, billions in stock market investments, probably tens of billions in cash in banks around the world, there is no end to it.

Its been interesting taking a look at SGI.
As was noticed many years ago at some initial meetings, they are in fact the opposite of Buddhism.
Its just a gigantic global financial investment corporation, hiding behind a little fig-leaf they call a "religion", exploiting every tax loophole that exists.

Maybe one day some investigators will break the entire thing wide open in Japan, which is the root.
But the USA is a very large part of SGI, due to the lax regulations for being a religion.

Never give SGI one dollar, or one minute of unpaid labor.

Quote

Time and time again, they buy land/property for cheap, and get SGI volunteers to fix it up

The donated labor and improvements by the SGI volunteers is what is termed 'sweat equity'

It has been suggested that the best way to target cults legally is not by focusing on their belief systems but by examining whether these illegal actions are being perpetrated

*Violation of labor law (safety, fair compensation)

*Profiteering/violation of non profit guidelines

*Stalking, harassment of defectors online and at home or at non cult related work.

So here is the bottom line on SGI-UK.
When they are telling their members that they are being bailed-out by loyal hard-working SGI-Japan members, they are lying.
There is no pretty word for it.
They are lying, and those who read their reports, know that they are lying.


Here is the proof. Here is their declared income.

----------SGI-UK 2010 report-------------
General donations and other similar types of voluntary income £ 1,774,078
Income from events & courses, shops, etc. £ 1,285,808
Bank interest receivable on short term cash deposits £ 761,685
----------------------

So donations from people in the UK, and fees paid from people in the UK for courses, etc =

£ 3,059,886

that is close to their entire budget, all from UK people.

What about the interest from the investments?
That is also from UK citizens, as that is on the backs of UK citizens, as those investments are not taxed, so that is coming out of the pockets of UK taxpayers.

And the £ 50,000,000 that is in SGI assets, controlled by SGI-Japan.

A modest 3% interest on that = £ 1,500,000 a year.
And SGI-UK only got half of that interest, collected tax-free on the backs of UK citizens. Some real estate jumps more than that per year in value.

So in fact, SGI-Japan is doing nothing for SGI-UK. Its the opposite.
SGI-UK is self-sustaining, and is turning a profit, as the interest from the massive assets is growing every year.

Never mind the UNPAID LABOR of all the SGI-UK volunteers, which adds to the wealth of SGI.


So there it is.
More brazen bald-faced lies by the SGI.
Sure, some of the lower end people, just believe what their superiors tell them. But anyone who is aware of their documents knows its a lie.
They lie to the SGI members, to try and make them feel guilty and inferior to SGI-Japan, to get them to work harder and give SGI more money.

Its all there in the numbers.
SGI-UK is bringing in close to $5 million US a year from UK members, all of which SGI spends to make SGI richer.
And SGI takes just a small portion of the tax-free interest from the UK, and puts a little into SGI-UK, just to beef it up a bit, probably to cover SGI Exec perks.. But again, all that money is being used for SGI promotion.


So far, nothing any SGI senior member has said in this regard has been truthful. They always tell lies.
Is it ok in SGI fake-Buddhism to lie, or what?
Is systematic lying and deception of the members and public official SGI policy?

Of course. Ikeda knows very well that the sheeple must be lead by the nose by deception and illusion, or they won't work for free, and will want to keep their own money for their own family. Those selfish little sheeple. Don't they know that Ikeda needs more billions, more than they need to fix their kids teeth?
Ikeda knows its easy.
Just tell the people that the more money they give away to SGI, the more money will magically appear in their bank account, by Karmic Magick! Ikeda knows people are superstitious like that. Magical Thinking.

Strange how their bank account gets smaller, while SGI billions multiply.

But it brings back the memories, of the SGI members who hound you to buy the SGI magazine, and hound you to start paying SGI dues, and hound you to come to meetings at their house implying its a bit of a dating scene, who pass you SGI brochures at 1am after a movie while having a drink, as they believe converting you to SGI is going to benefit THEIR karma! Such altruism.

SGI is an illusion, a gross distortion of reality, a gross distortion of actual Buddhism, and a fraud.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/26/2011 08:31AM by The Anticult.

Hi everyone,

I posted here quite awhile ago - about 100 pages back haha! I'm still here, lurking. I have this habit of pretending that my time in the SGI never happened. I drive by the SGI Culture Center on my way home from work almost every day and it barely registers in my brain - "oh yeah, I did a LOT of toban there." Then something happens that forces me to think about it. This time it's a member who sent me a friend request on Face Book. We spent a lot of time together doing YWD activites . I don't know if she's still part of the SGI.

I need to stop hiding from my SGI experience. I gave them 8 years of my life. I gave them money, my trust and almost all of my free time. It was never enough, of course. I'm ashamed of my participation in the whole Ghandi-King-Ikeda exhibit. Comparing Daisaku Ikeda with Martin Luther King Jr. and Ghandi - are you kidding me?! what a crock!

Sorry to ramble, I just needed to vent a little. I appreciate this forum and the folks in it so much. It's so nice to be able to come to a place where I can use words like daimoku, byakuren and ichinen sanzen and people know what I'm talking about.

Hello again Tibbs!

It's also been a VERY long time since I have posted on here. I really credit this forum for helping me to get the courage to leave SGI. Even after only two years my life was so entrenched in it that I didn't think leaving was even possible. But then reading others' stories about how they were able to leave, and have even happier lives afterwards gave me hope that there is life after SGI.

It's been about 11 months since I finally quit. I even gave back my Gohonzon before I moved away. I don't really talk alot with many SGI friends, though one has remained closer than others. She's an amazing person and I respect and love her very much. However, shes pretty high up in the area now. When speaking with her, I had to parse out what were her sincere thoughts and what she was told to tell/ask me. It was pretty painful but I got through it. Now we have about half a country between us, which sucks alot, but I hope she's happy in her life now.

As for my other friends, they don't really talk to me all that much. Once in a while Ill get a post on my FB asking where I've been. I don't reply.

As for my "karma", its in balance as always. good things happen, bad things happen, etc. im happy though! and whats great about that happiness is that its sincere and natural. its not a forced emotion i have to display in order to shakabuku someone, or keep a newer member from leaving. i truly believe that a forced state of being is not something that Buddha would support. It's a constraint, and the Buddha preached complete spiritual freedom.

Anyway, I want to thank everyone here for their continued support of those who are looking for a life after SGI:)

@Tibbs

Hey hon go back and read my story about two pages back it's before alot of Antcults posts. I hear you! It's all so clear now,how they get you to become slaves. I washed frikkin walls at that shit hole prison friendship center and cleaned toilets! I was in it for seven years,and you're right it was never enough. Feel free to vent here. You're free from that mind trap, and I actually feel for those leaders now,they're literally slaves, and are under the GRAND illusion they're handling lifes problems better than most people, because they chant. That's so arrogant, and we were a part of that.

I'm trying to be positive, and still see life as no mistakes all experiences so it's been part of a learning process. I meditate, and do yoga now,study some other Buddhisms ,and anchient teachings but NEVER will be a member of anything! One mountain many paths! No Buddhism is better than the other,thats self righteous and ego based to say that,NOT Buddhist!

Everyone gets scammed, duped, fooled, at least a few times in life.
SGI is a very clever and powerful sect, which exploits the good intentions of good people.
It also preys on the vulnerabilities of humans.

SGI also knows idle hands make trouble, so it keeps those hands busy. More importantly, Ikeda-SGI knows that too much thinkin' by the members also makes trouble, so they keep them chanting, and use that as a cultic mechanism to block out critical thinking.

SGI is no different than all these other organized sects, they are using the same series of techniques.
Except SGI is exceptionally advanced.

So studying cults and sects in general will help.

And if a person from SGI is now feeling guilty for what they did to other people, without knowing what they were doing, there are ways to make up for that.
Like exposing what SGI really is, by telling the truth of what really went on in there.

If a person lured many other people into a sect or group, by pointing out the ugly facts about that sect, and others, perhaps they can cause others to get out, or not get suckered at all.

More importantly, the general knowledge about these advanced modern cults is important for the public to be aware of.

I want to bring up something I'm fascinated with...the all-out crescendo of the Mentor-Disciple business. In one WT this past year, PI talks about how he and Mrs. Ikeda speak "incessantly" about their mentor, Josei Toda. Soooo, members read this and the die-hard ones absorb into their heads that, if PI does this, we must do it, too! Talk incessantly about our mentor, Daisaku Ikeda! I wonder, really, how much of a mentor Mr. Toda truly was, or was it something that sparked in young Daisaku's head, that yes, the flocks will come, and they will look at me as God...

Now that he is in his eighth decade, he probably wants to cement his legacy, making sure he is Forever Sensei. So henceforth, endless M/D loops.

For all well-meaning members, what a travesty. It's a bad cause to play people for fools. Very bad cause.