FYI people:
International Society for Krishna Consciousness is still active and out there
recruiting.
The smiley "Hare Krishna" recruiter will not tell you that you're a 'karmi'
On the Freak Street in our town, ISKON people are out there every day smilingly passing out copies of the books. This is tourist season, with visitors from all over the world.
The fellow is not telling em about the Krishna boarding schools, nor about
the status of females as second class beings in ISKON.
Take a good look at ISKON members. Many of them look pale and undernourished.
High carb diet, not enough protein or minerals, which greatly enhances risk for
developing early onset heart disease, and Type 11 diabetes.
The Krishna diet is also a set up for anemia - hence their pale complexions.
[www.madafterkrishna.com]
International Society for Krishna Consciousness is still active and out there
recruiting.
The smiley "Hare Krishna" recruiter will not tell you that you're a 'karmi'
On the Freak Street in our town, ISKON people are out there every day smilingly passing out copies of the books. This is tourist season, with visitors from all over the world.
The fellow is not telling em about the Krishna boarding schools, nor about
the status of females as second class beings in ISKON.
Take a good look at ISKON members. Many of them look pale and undernourished.
High carb diet, not enough protein or minerals, which greatly enhances risk for
developing early onset heart disease, and Type 11 diabetes.
The Krishna diet is also a set up for anemia - hence their pale complexions.
[www.madafterkrishna.com]
Quote
Besides the strict control of diet, the cult tightly controlled the devotees' sleeping habits. They typically slept for six hours or less per night. They usually performed their duties, including driving, while half awake. Again, the devotees often expended large amounts of energy trying to sneak a little extra sleep.
The message to the devotees was that they were unworthy of a square meal or a good night's sleep. Furthermore, the cult tried to rationalize and falsely spiritualize the mechanisms of control by making such assertions as, "You are not your body," and "Your body belongs to Krishna." Whatever the merits of these statements as religious teachings, it is undeniable that they were convenient for unscrupulous persons who would try to reduce others to the status of slaves.
Another aspect of daily behavior over which the cult tried to exert control was personal cleanliness. There were many rules, such as "Never wear shoes in the temple" and "Always wash your hands and mouth after eating." The implications of the dogma concerning cleanliness were clear: the devotees were clean and godly, and the karmis were dirty and ungodly.
Prabhupada required the devotees to renounce everything associated with the world outside the cult. He instructed them to give up everything he regarded as incompatible with their duties and responsibilities in the cult. These included money, possessions, jobs, religion, and even, in many cases, spouse and children.
When devotees became ill, the cult offered them Hindu home cures or no treatment at all. There were several reasons for this. First, the cult preached the superiority of Hindu medicine over Western medicine. Second, the cult insisted that the devotees' illnesses were caused by their lack of faith, their forgetfulness of Krishna, or the slackness of their devotional attitudes. That is, illness was God's punishment for one's sins, and the way to cure an illness was to "surrender" one's life to the guru and Krishna. Third, the cult was reluctant to suffer the loss of money incurred by removing devotees, however temporarily, from the sankirtan team, and sending them for medical help. The leaders did permit some seriously ill devotees to see Western doctors, but only if their parents agreed to pay the bill.
An outside doctor reported that many of the Krishna women he examined were anemic, and that others had irregular or nonexistent menstrual periods. The cult interpreted the lack of a period not as a sign of potential illness, but rather as a sign of spiritual achievement, of having "transcended" the demands and restrictions of the body. Some sankirtan devotees developed premature varicose veins, apparently from standing for many hours every day. Male devotees often lost some of their facial or body hair, possibly due to the infantilizing effects of the techniques of cult mind control. The devotees' near-absolute dependency on the cult for the necessities of life infantilized them and caused their adult physiological characteristics to atrophy