Talk:Criticism of Prem Rawat/Archive 1

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Why was the external link of forum 8 removed? That is an an important source of information. I re-inluded the link. Andries 17:50, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

since when a discussion forum/bulletin board is an "Important source of information"? A discussion forum is just that. The crotics have a website in which they present their vies and that is already listed. With this approach Wikiepdia will become transient resource. I'll wait for your response before reverting.

I would like to tak to you outside of wikipedia. email?--Jossifresco 15:04, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

In this case the forum provide useful information because it will allow people to check the assertion by the Elan Vital website whether they are really a hate group. 21:20, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

You are not serious, are you? Show me any other page in Wikipedia in which a discussion forum is an "important source of information". Thus reverted to previous edit.--Jossifresco 22:17, 1 Jul 2004 (UTC)

My name is John Brauns and I am the webmaster of www.ex-premie.org, one of the wesites run by former followers of Prem Rawat. I have followed the recent dispute here and have a couple of comments/suggestions. First, thank you for the link to my site and to the pro-Rawat sites. Having access to all POVs is important for readers to make a balanced judgement. I agree with Jossi Fresco that there is no need to have a link to the ex-followers discussion forum, Forum8.

Regarding the current version of the article, one glaring area of bias is the 'Maharaji in the Press' section, which consists solely of pro-Rawat articles, many of which are paid advertorials. May I suggest a link to the Press Room of ex-premie.org which contains independent newspaper and magazine articles going back over 30 years? The link is http://www.ex-premie.org/pages/press_room.htm. This can be usefully compared to the press Room on Rawat's site, http://www.tprf.org/media_press_room.htm.

You can add these. Nobody is stopping you... that is the beauty of wikipedia.--jossi 18:58, 2 Jul 2004 (UTC)

One final point - Jossi Fresco rightly criticises Andries for his bias. I don't claim to be unbiased, but I wonder if Jossi Fresco has declared his bias? I hope Jossi won't deny that he was refering to Prem Rawat when he wrote this on an earlier website he ran:- 'For me there is more to life than we assume. Life is filled with such beauty and feeling if we have the eyes to appreciate it and the heart filled with gratitude to feel it with. I thank my Master for his love, his inspiration and for the many, many gifts. I just hope to keep my cup empty, to be filled again and again.' ::::John Brauns, 2nd July, 2004

Wow, Wow... you do keep tabs on followers... What is it? do you have a database of which follower said what and when? That is indeed very strange, whoever you are... That is a very scary thought.... Who are you?

I signed my real name, I live in Latvia, and I am well known to the pro-Rawat activists. Jossi is also prominent as a web designer of pro-Rawat sites, and I'm sure he has no problem with his heartfelt sentiments being published here. Why is this scary?

The issue is not if one is biased or not. I am biased of course. But if you look at my performance in Wikipedia, you will see that I am trying to follow NPOV guidelines. That is write an article in a NPOV manner. That is why it was I that created the controversy page in which critics can present their POV, (hopefully in a NPOV manner). As you have never written an article for Wikipedia I would suggest you read the NPOV guidelines.--jossi 18:58, 2 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Jossi, I agree with you, which is why I raised the issue about press coverage. Thank you for declaring your bias. I've have amended the article to include links to all articles about Rawat. I hope you agree that in that respect the article now conforms to NPOV guidelines.--JohnBrauns 2 Jul 2004

Hope it does and that no more Vandalism is excerted on these pages.--jossi 22:57, 2 Jul 2004 (UTC)

user:Zappaz' assertion that ex-followers are a small minority is, I think, untrue. First of all they claim to be speaking on behalf of the many people who have left Maharaji/DLM/Elan Vital silently but I have to admit that this is difficult to prove. The many people who have left silently made implicit criticism that they found the message of Maharaji and the meditation not worthwhile, in spite of the great promises by Maharaji. It should be taken into account that some of the critics were close assistants to Maharaji, like Bob Mishler, ex-President of Divine Light Mission (DLM) between 1972 and 1977. [1]You cannot expect the ex-followers to form an organization with members that will provide you with the number of ex-followers etcetera because people want to forget and move on. I do not know of any group of ex-followers of any cult or NRM that has done that and I have studied many. I think the vocal critics are people who want to forget too but are or were unable to do so because they had been too deeply involved emotionally. Thirdly, Maharaji received strong criticism in the press [2] and from the anti-cult movement back in the seventies. E.g. from Margaret Singer. Nowadays few people care except the (ex-)followers (plus me). See also http://www.ex-premie.org/pages/faq.htm#numberfollowers And http://www.ex-premie.org/pages/movingon.htm stating: “"At the height of Maharaji's popularity in the west in the late 70's, he could command 20,000 to attend a two week outdoor festival. Now, after a further 22 years of teaching 'Knowledge', he has difficulty getting 5,000 to attend a two day international event in the US, in spite of most followers being more affluent than they were in the 70's. "” By the way, some controversial NRMs like Sathya Sai Baba and Scientology have separate article that deal with the controversy because there is too much to put in the main article. This used to be the case with Maharaji too but the article was removed and re-directed to this article. I do no agree with this removal because there is clearly too much controversy to put in the main article. Kind regards, Andries 08:36, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

To Wikipedia Administrators from John Brauns, webmaster of www.ex-premie.org. The problem with the current article can be illustrated with an example. Would you expect the marketing department of Philip Morris to write a fair article about cigarettes? Sure they might mention that some smokers have health problems, but they are unlikely to give lung cancer or thrombosis appropriate prominence in the article. Jossi is a devoted follower of Rawat and his article is a blatant advertisement for Rawat (which I note is against NPOV guidelines) in spite of the nod to his critics. The press section and links are the most glaring evidence of this, with prominence given to TPRF paid advertorials over genuine newspaper articles; and 95% of the links are to websites with no additional information on Rawat, except how to get his product. This is like the Philip Morris article having a list of shops selling cigarettes. If Philip Morris did write an article on cigarettes, you wouldn't use that article as the basis for writing a fair article. No, you would scrap it and find someone with less bias to write the article. I accept that a lung cancer victim may not be the ideal candidate but the resulting article wouldn't be an advertisement like Jossi's article. John Brauns, July 10th.

Andries, before you complain, read.

I have made several edits. Mostly presenting the POV of the supporters. I have not removed anything you have added, unless it was completely erroneous. For example the allegations of secual misconduct. I used the text on the main article that is factually accurate. In the future, if you want to edit or add to this page, it will be good if you can avoid presenting your POV )or the POV of the ex-followers) as a fact. --jossi 22:55, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Merge

Eventually the Criticism of Prem Rawat article should be merged into Prem Rawat. I have the language skills to do this myself, but not the time.

We all need to agree on a plan for what a merged article would look like. What I myself would like to see is some early biography about the man, an outline of his rise to prominence, a section about his teachings (summary or detailed doesn't matter to me), a section about disgreements with his teachings, and a section on general reactions to his career/movement. The 'reactions' section could have gushing testimonies about how wonderful his devotees' lives have become, as well as bitter denunciations by ex-followers about how much time they wasted, how they were duped, etc. And if anyone has the stomach for it, a list of charges (like he seduced my daughter in an Indian ashram in 1987) and official rebuttals (like no way, man I was in Canada the whole year!). --Uncle Ed 18:07, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

That could work. Now, who is going to do this? maybe Zappaz has time? --4.60.12.136 18:34, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I agree we need a plan. My concern with your proposal to merge is that the main article is already too big. This, by the look of it, is a pretty small NRM with a very polarized situation. Giving it more weight than Scientology, for example, is just not right. The Scientology article is much smaller (and probably because of that it managed to stabilize itself). So far we have had pressure from a small group of ex-followers to expand on their POV, mainly those responsible for the ex-premie website. Wait until a group of followers join the discussion to push their POV (so far I have only seen one of them active in the discussions) and we will end up in an escalating and never ending situation. My counter proposal is as follows. Reduce the fluff on the current article and reduce the criticism as well to at least 25% of current size. Both pro and con have their own websites, so what is the point of repeating the points made on these? A couple of references to these sites will suffice. Proposed structure: 1. Short Intro; 2. History of movement (1971 to present day); 3. Practices and Beliefs; 4. Controversy and Critics; 5. Testimonials ( a few testimonials from current followers, and a few from ex-followers, Short one paragraph each); 6. External links; 7. References. I'm willing to give it a try, but I don't want to waste my time unless there is concensus on this proposed treatment. Comments? (copying this to main article discussion as well)--Zappaz 21:15, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)