Hi Tsukimoto,

you just mentioned the mansion in California/Hawaii, certainly most on this board write from an American perspective. The ting is that even here in Europe most national HQ builidings will have a suite reserved for Ikeda...and its never ever being used. I know for a fact that the one in Villa Sachsen in Germany even has a Japanese style bathroom. ( As some of you might know the bathtub in Japan is like a minature pool is not being used to wash as such, one cleans oneself BEFORE entering the bathtub so the water in the tub is being used by more that one member of the family, so the bath tub is rather to relax)
At the time this alone made me wonder. An organisation that propagtes the idea of world citizenship and its leader is not able to accomodate to foreign customs. I myself travel with the idea that when I am outside of my country to try and do as the romans do. To my mind not doing so negates the need to travel and hence learn about other people.
To my mind the "I" in SGI is only international as long it brings the Soka Gakkai aspect to the world, its a one way street. Here in Europe this is quite easy to see that even though there are slight national differences amongst the national SGI groups the core structure is the same.
I live in a border region, once the members on both sides of the border decided to organise bi-national meetings. Now what should I say? The idea, even though members really enjoyed the meetings, did not survive very long as from both national SGI's there was little to no support. The idea that memebers took the intiative and live according to the idea of global citizens did not match the mediocre brain capacity of the national leadership and even worse the action to organsize such meetings was not ordered from Tokyo.
A while ago I read an article in a news magazine from 1972 (!!!), in it an SGI official was quoted saying that if Maoism was to die in China Nichiren Shoshu (well I guess what he really wanted to say way Soka Gakkai) could step in and fill the gap left by Mao. Hmmmm I wonder how many degrees does Ikeda have from China? SGI also remains to keep a low profile on human rights issues in China - wonder why that is. Maybe to make sure to create good condtions when entering the Chinese "market"?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/26/2009 02:54PM by Rothaus.

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tsukimoto
Why does President Ikeda have this beautiful mansion in California?
Why was he giving nude guidance to Women's Division and Young Women's Division members in his hot tub?

Is there more information about this? Some links?
President Ikeda was in hot-tubs nude with young women from SGI?
Was that happening in the luxury "private" SGI owned houses Ikeda uses?

Anticult, I copied the account of Ikeda's house at the Malibu Training Center from the Cult Awareness and Information Centre website. The CAIC website has several articles about SGI and Ikeda. The article I copied is on page 47 of this thread, midpage. I posted it on September 18, 2009.

In it, Steve Gore, the caretaker at Malibu and SGI member, discusses the care and expense that was taken in building President Ikeda's hot tub and sauna at his house at the Malibu Training Center in California. He also mentions that when Ikeda was in California, he would conduct "nude guidance sessions" with selected Women's Division and Young Women's Division members in this hot tub. Other than these women, SGI members were not allowed to enter the house or use the sauna and hot tub.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/27/2009 12:08AM by tsukimoto.

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Rothaus
Hi Tsukimoto,

you just mentioned the mansion in California/Hawaii, certainly most on this board write from an American perspective. The ting is that even here in Europe most national HQ builidings will have a suite reserved for Ikeda...and its never ever being used. I know for a fact that the one in Villa Sachsen in Germany even has a Japanese style bathroom. ( As some of you might know the bathtub in Japan is like a minature pool is not being used to wash as such, one cleans oneself BEFORE entering the bathtub so the water in the tub is being used by more that one member of the family, so the bath tub is rather to relax)

I live in a border region, once the members on both sides of the border decided to organise bi-national meetings. Now what should I say? The idea, even though members really enjoyed the meetings, did not survive very long as from both national SGI's there was little to no support. The idea that memebers took the intiative and live according to the idea of global citizens did not match the mediocre brain capacity of the national leadership and even worse the action to organsize such meetings was not ordered from Tokyo.

Rothaus, I don't know about European tax laws. Actually, I don't a lot about American tax laws either. My understanding is, that if a religious leader is taking too much of the organization's funds for personal use, the organization can lose its tax-exempt status. My concern is not so much that Ikeda likes Japanese baths --but that he's taking organization funds -- members' donations -- for his personal luxuries. He's claiming tax-exempt status but not following the laws for tax-exempt organizations. That sauna, hot tub and house in Malibu were expensively refinished -- made over with the most costly materials. And most members can't go near it. Who does that house really belong to? Who really owns the Villa Sachsen in Germany? Probably some fake corporation -- Ikeda has a better tax lawyer than you or I could ever afford. Someone who can find some sneaky but legal way for Ikeda to have the houses and suites, but have the records not show that he does.

It's terrible that the SGI leaders wouldn't support the bi-national meetings in your area. What was SGI so afraid of? You'd think they'd welcome members taking initiative to meet and chant with people from across the border -- what better way to encourage peace?

Yes, SGI talks about world peace -- and they're like the military. Obey the general, period! Can't have any idea or procedure that doesn't come from the general. If members can decide upon and plan their own activities, without help from Tokyo -- why, they might realize that they don't really need Tokyo at all! Then what would the senior leadership do?

This reminds me of the IRG's issues with the senior leadership of SGI--USA. The senior leadership was terrified -- members sharing their ideas in a venue that the senior leadership might not be able to control? Oh, no! Can't have that! Why, the IRG is communicating with taiten members of SGI, and members of other Buddhist groups! The nerve of them, to think they should be able to talk to anyone they want to!

I also think it's part of the reason we have had so few trolls on this thread....SGI members are not going to read anything about SGI on the web except official SGI-sanctioned websites. The leadership scares them away from "devilish functions" -- like Rick Ross! Can't have a discussion of SGI that the leadership can't control -- the members might hear or see something that SGI doesn't want them to know.

---------------------Beginning of Quote, from Byron Katie Thread, posted by "Stoic."------------------------------------------------------------
George Orwell nailed it, as he did with so much of how totalitarianism works, in his novel '1984'.

It's about pretending to accept the lie. Most totalitarian types do not expect the ordinary person to believe the lie, the ordinary person just has to pretend to believe it--out of fear, a wish to conform, belong, gain approval etc. The pretence at belief then becomes the overriding neccessity to maintain a congruent worldview and to avoid fragmenting as a congruent personality. The lie then has to be maintained to provide stability.

It's why corruscating personal honesty is a fundamental requirement of most traditional spiritual training. That kind of commitment to honest and often painful critical thought is necessary to build up the strength to withstand the very human needs and instincts to go along with the crowd, any crowd.

LGATs such as those run by BK are about reinforcing the lie and encouraging group-think.
---------------------------------------------End of Quote-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Tsukimoto: Cults are also about reinforcing the lie and encouraging group-think.]

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Rothaus
Hi there.

interesting thread. I never gave much thought about the issue of psychology and psychiatry in SGI, but in my more than 20 years in SGI I noticed that members who DID seek help by an expert were kind of shunned, eventually left the "scene".

When I read Stoic's quote about people knowingly accepting lies, I thought of Rothaus's post of how SGI members who sought professional help were shunned.

The common thread: a good psychologist or psychiatrist's goal is to get the client to look at his or her thoughts, feelings and actions with rigorous honesty. If you're going to lie to your therapist -- there's no point in going. This kind of honesty can be threatening to the client's family, friends -- and religious group sometimes. They would prefer that the client just go along with the lies like "Everything's fine, everyone's happy, there are no problems. Why are you upsetting everyone by saying that there ARE problems?"

SGI, like many groups, does encourage people to believe lies: Ikeda's a wise sage, we're just an organization that cares about world peace and our members' happiness, chanting and working for SGI will solve any problems that you have. I think that even some of the loyalists know, deep down, that this just isn't so, but they want to believe. They feel fragmented and as if their world is falling apart when someone questions the lies of SGI. So they lash out. The very idea of people being in a place where they can speak frankly -- the IRG's forum, a therapist's office, a meeting that SGI senior leaders didn't order, and control --- are huge threats. That a person could get help from something that is not SGI -- like a therapist, another group, reading --- is also threatening. It might mean that SGI and President Ikeda are really NOT the center of the world!

People who lie HATE people who tell the truth!

Well Tsukimoto, I do actually recall at least two incidents were people had serious mental problems, from one of them I know that they handed back their gohonzon - the leaders then said it was for their own good. I often wondered if it was rather for the good of SGI no to be associated with "such people".
Could it be that a therapy might reveal the negative influences of SGI?
If someone breaks this leg he/she will seek a doctor, in my books the same applies to the mind, when everything becomes just to much to face alone I do no see it as a failure to seek a helping hand. Now a seriuos religious practice but be supportive to such a step. One could now argue that a not so supportive "religious" practice WILL be indentified as being unsupportive in the hands of a professional.

Rothaus, the leaders actually made these mentally ill members give back their Gohonzons? Did they also tell these members not to come to meetings? That's pretty cold and uncaring.

I look at it as you do -- suffering from mental or emotional problems is not a weakness or moral failing any more than having pneumonia or a broken leg. In all of those cases, people should just get to a qualified medical professional who can treat the problem so they don't suffer unnecessarily.

I sometimes wonder what a psychiatrist would make of SGI. A good psychiatrist should encourage a patient who is an SGI member to think about, and question some of the things SGI teaches.

Interesting that you say that leaders might think "It was for the good of SGI" to shun mentally ill members. Maybe if prospective members saw mentally ill people in SGI meetings -- they'd think that there are some problems that chanting really can't fix.

I keep thinking about the border meetings in your area, Rothaus. There have been times when I lived fairly close to the Canadian border. We never had any Canada/U.S. SGI meetings. Why not? The Canadians members speak English, the driving distance wasn't that great -- SGI-USA members drove further to other states for meetings. Before 2001, it was incredibly easy to cross the U.S./Canada border, no passport was required. So why not have joint SGI-USA/SGI Canada meetings? Or have there been some that I just never knew about?

It just seemed that SGI Canada did its own thing and SGI USA did theirs, but if SGI is really so international, why is that? Did the SGI Canada leaders think that their members needed to be protected from us wild and crazy Americans -- or were the American leaders scared that the Canadian members would teach the Yanks to say, "Nam -myoho renge kyo, EH?"

For reference, below is the direct link to the Daisaku Ikeda hot-tub nude guidance sessions.
Obviously, bringing in groups of young women from SGI for the weekend, points toward sexual misconduct by Daisaku Ikeda, to add to his long list of other abuses of power.

With these groups, sometimes it takes years for the facts of what has really gone on behind closed doors to emerge, like with the sexual abuses of "Zen" guru Seung Sahn [forum.culteducation.com], or the sexual crimes of Sai Baba.



[forum.culteducation.com]
"**However, things were different for one portion of Women's Division leaders and Young Women's Division leaders. "From Friday night until Sunday, Ikeda would occasionally assemble a small number of top Women's Division leaders and Young Women's Division leaders and hold special guidance meetings. Since they would enter the stone hot tub together, they were called 'Nude Guidance Meetings.' This was an open secret between leaders in America." (Mr. Gore)"

[www.culthelp.info]

Quote
tsukimoto
The CAIC website has several articles about SGI and Ikeda. The article I copied is on page 47 of this thread, midpage. I posted it on September 18, 2009.

In it, Steve Gore, the caretaker at Malibu and SGI member, discusses the care and expense that was taken in building President Ikeda's hot tub and sauna at his house at the Malibu Training Center in California. He also mentions that when Ikeda was in California, he would conduct "nude guidance sessions" with selected Women's Division and Young Women's Division members in this hot tub. Other than these women, SGI members were not allowed to enter the house or use the sauna and hot tub.

Quote

Other than these women, SGI members were not allowed to enter the house or use the sauna and hot tub.

If this did indeed occur, Ikeda was guilty of dualistic, delusional thinking and therefore not in a state of enlightenment.

If one has pure view, one appreciates the Buddha Nature in everyone, old, young, male female, pretty, normal looking.

One doesnt just appreciate Buddha Nature in just a tiny sector of humanity (cute young girls of a particular 'type')

The latter would indicate an ego driven erotic preference, not 'pure view'.

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tsukimoto

[Copied from the Cult Awareness and Information Centre Website]

Mr. Gore entertained doubts about Mr. Ikeda, who used money as freely as water, and determined to leave the organization over a certain incident. "In 1974, it was discovered that Brazil Soka Gakkai General Director Robert Saito (currently Honorary General Director) was embezzling the organization's money. Vice President Satoru Izumi (currently Chief of the Supreme Guidance Council) came from Japan to handle the incident, and the three of us, he, NSA General Director George Williams (currently General Director Emeritus) and I, set off for Brazil. In the end, he was told that if he returned the money, no questions would be asked, and we collected $1 million.

**We put it into 2 suitcases and conveyed it to Los Angeles. At the same time, Williams said that he had purchased uncut gems as souvenirs and he asked me to carry them. He handed 3 boxes of gems over to me. But when we arrived at the L.A. airport, the customs agent called out my name and told me to show him the boxes of gems. When I did, rings and such with processed diamonds were rolling around inside the boxes. The customs form said they were uncut gems, so I was immediately arrested as a smuggler. In the meantime, Williams and Izumi passed through Customs carrying the suitcases. They used me as a scapegoat."**

Everyone is interested in the "nude guidance sessions" but I found this part of the article equally disturbing. If this article is true -- either George Williams, then the head of SGI-USA (called NSA back then) greedily chose to import processed diamonds and just didn't care if Mr. Gore got arrested for smuggling ---- or Ikeda, Williams and Izumi deliberately plotted this, intending to use Gore as a distraction to customs, so that they could carry suitcases of money into the United States. It really sounds like the latter, doesn't it? Like they planned it all -- and Gore, their loyal Young Men's Division member, was just going to be the fall guy.

In either case, they didn't care if a young man's future would be ruined with an arrest for smuggling. Hey, it was all for the greater glory of SGI.

I wonder if this is why George Williams was replaced, and is no longer spoken of around the SGI. Maybe he became a bit of a fall guy himself. I also wonder what ever happened to Gore.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/29/2009 11:12PM by tsukimoto.