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On 27 Dec 1995, Carol2180 wrote:

> Then you don't have the same packet from AFF that I've seen -- the
> articles in those packets come from secular magazine and newspapers, not
> fundamentalist Christian organizations.  There are organizations who look
> at cults from a Christian perspective.  But AFF is not one of them and
> neither is CAN.  They are secular and look merely at the behavior and
> techniques used by groups, not belief systems.  You're talking about the
> wrong perspective from the wrong organizations.

Disclaimer - I do not work for Landmark, I am not authorized to represent 
landmark in any official capacity.  I am just a satisfied customer.

They start with more nationally recognized more credible information.  
The final articles clerify the agenda.

List of articles:

	"The Winds of Werner" 	Forbes, Novermber 1985  
		( $15 Million "loan scam" - settled since publication)
	"EST by Neil Chasanow"	Publication name unavailable - pre 1990.
		(Skeptical, concern over forceful leaders...)
	"Checking Up on EST"	Cosmopolitan - June 1986.
		(Distinctions given in this Forum are obsolete.  Forum leaders 
		 try very hard to keep people alert and awake - 
		 very few visualization exercises)
	"Suit Against Erhard Dropped"	San Francisco Chronicle 10/26/85
		(Describes settlement, and Wifes Divorce claims - both 
		 settled and paid)
	"Hungry for Converts"		New Internationalist June 1995	
		(Describes Hunger Project relationship to Erhard.  Hunger 
		Project and Landmark are no longer affiliated)
		Anyone involved in "Emerging Markets" coverage and 
		investment is benefitting from the Hunger project.  The goal 
		is to encourage investment - give people nets and teach them how to fish 
		- that feeds the hungry.  If you just pass out food, you 
		have more hungry people next year.
	"The Dangers of EST"		Boston Phoenix September 6, 1983.
	Karen Lee Ziner
		(Describes man dying in EST seminar - Landmark screens 
		 participants for health issues much more carefully. They don't 
		 do that excercise any more.  If you are a recent rape victim, are 
		 suffering from mental disorders, or have a delicate medical condition, 
		 they will not let you do the Forum.)  When I did the Forum, 
		 my father told me that he had a secretary who did EST back
		 in 1980 and committed suicide about 6 months later.  

Sometimes people try to use EST/Forum/Church/NLP/... as a substitute for 
acute emotional conditions.  Landmark gives you an application which 
includes warnings against taking the Forum if you have been hospitalized, 
have had incomplete therapy, or are in therapy and have not consulted 
your tharapist.  If you are in therapy, they require that your tharapist 
sign a form stating that you are capable of participating in the forum.  
There are center managers who can communicate with the Doctors, and one 
of the Forum leaders is a licensed therapist who can answer questions for 
therapists who are unsure of the safety.  On with the Countdown:

	"Good Morning, You're Terriffic"	The American Lawyer August 1981.
	Katherine States
		(Describes a worker who was harassed into taking the Forum)
		I have invited subordinates and coworkers to attend 
		introductory sessions, some choose to enroll, some don't.
		You are asked several times if you have been "pressured" 
		into being there, including within the first 10 minutes of the
		Forum itself.  If you are there because "my boss said he'd 
		(fire, promote, hire, protect,...) me if I did the Forum, 
		you get a full refund, a formal apology from a paid staff 
		member (a shareholder in the company).  In addition, your boss
		gets a stern warning not to do that again.  If you are not 
		there because you choose to be there, you shouldn't do the Forum.

		The staff and volunteers will support you in completing your 
		registration.  This is based on that you are choosing to be
		in the forum and have bumped up against circumstances (time, money,
		babysitters, family support...).  The registration team is 
		well trained at having people engage with those 
		circumstances.  The questions is - who is making the choice, 
		you or your circumstances.

	"The Business of Teaching Children..."	New York Times - August 22, 1980.
	Nadine Joseph.
		Children are still taught that they are responsible for 
		the the consequences of their actions.  They are still 
		taught that acting out of anger rather than "getting off it" (letting go 
		of the anger and forgiving) has consequences just like stealing.
		The kid's Forum is much like the Adult forum, except that it 
		only runs from 9:00 AM to 4:30 PM.  Kids have less past to hang onto.
	"An Est Experience"			Our Town March 2-March 8, 1980.
	Kevin Garvey.
		Talkes about the uses of visualization exercises as "mass 
		hypnotism".  The Forum is best accomplished when you are 
		fully concious, keeping the issues you are committed to having a 
		breakthrough right in front of you, and are awake and 
		alert.  They do fewer visualization exercises now because 
		they found that people kept falling asleep.  I have been 
		hypnotized before and after doing the Forum.

		The purpose of hypnotism is to quiet that little voice 
		that's always "filtering", saying "that's right", "I agree", or "I 
		already knew that".  The voice that tells us "why bother, it 
		doesn't make sense".  The Forum addresses this directly, 
		invites you to try on suggestions "like a suit".  When you 
		have a Forum full of Lawyers and Engineers, the sessions can get
		very long because they want to argue.

		The fear exercise is no longer done as described in the 
		article, and the Forum Leader is constantly checking to make sure
		everyone is well, as are at least two people (supervisors) 
		in the back of the room.

	Anatomy of Erhard's EST.		Our Town (New York's) March 9 1980.
	Kevin Garvey.
		Discusses some of the Dubious legal maneuvers of Erhard's 
		Lawyer the early 1970's.
		Erhard no longer owns the company.  Landmark is now a 
		corporation subject to all Federal Laws.
	EST and the Hunger Project.		Our Town April 6, 1980.
	Kevin Garvey.
		(Describes the hunger project and point out that it doesn't 
		 actually give any food to anybody, also describe "religion" of 
		 EST.)
		The projects within the hunger project have resulted in 
		capitalization of businesses in "3rd World Countries".  If 
		you actually want to "feed starving orphan children", don't give to 
		the hunger project.  If you want to see 3rd world countries 
		developing industries, providing goods and services with wich they can 
		buy their own food and agricultural equipment, then you may want to keep 
		an eye on the hungar project.  The accounting is much more rigorous now.

		Landmark is no longer directly associated with the Hungar 
		Project.  I have heard a small amount from 3 or 4 graduates who invited 
		me to a "Bowl-a-thon".  Personally, I give to other charities.

		As to the "religeon of Est", the fundamental principles of 
		the Forum are printed on the blackboard as you walk in:

			There is limited return on the reality in which you live.
			Breakthrough performance is predicated on breaking 
			up that reality and empowering you to create new ones.
		
		As stated in most introductions:
			The Forum is not designed to "Fix" you.  The 
			assumption is that you are whole, complete, successful, and 
			responsible, that you are a "winner".  People don't 
			invite "losers" to do the Forum.

			Given that we are winners, there are still areas in 
			our lives where we are "stopped", "stuck", or just frustrated.
			For example:  I was successful in business, but I didn't consider 
			myself a leader.  I had friends, but wanted a breakthrough in romance.

		Much of what stopped me was perceptions, based on past 
		experiences.  In many cases, things I had decided were 
		"real" when I was seven years old  (when the class didn't 
		 vote for me as president, I decided I wasn't a leader, even after
		 being a deacon and and elder in my church, a state level representative
		 in a 12 step organization, and doing service work on a 
		 national level committee)  my "reality" wouldn't let me see 
		 myself as a leader - even if I had been president of the United States.

		 I also saw myself as "unlovable" when the girls in SECOND 
		 GRADE wouldn't chase me and kiss me.  Women in my life had 
		to practically kidnap and rape me to get it into my thick skull that they 
		loved me because I knew I was "unlovable".  I have asked women for 
		dates, given women my phone number, and actually flirt 
		seriously since the Forum.  I have had 3 love affairs since 
		the Forum.  I'm still looking to get married (I'm 40, 
		single, 6' tall, 15 years sober, earn a substantial income (upper 2%, 
		and am relatively attractive).  Mostly, I just need to learn 
		to call a woman when she gives me her phone number, or ask her for her 
		phone number.   Some of these "Basics" I didn't learn in 
		high school because I was "Unlovable".

Sometimes something unpleasant happens, and we make a decision.  When
I was 5 years old, I went the the hospital for asthma.  The beautiful nurses
and doctors gave me shots and stuck me with IV needles (27 attempts).  The
older, heavy nurses gave me baths and chest rubs.  I decided pretty women
were "Dangerous".  Had the effect of making attraction repulsive.  After
"breaking up that reality", I saw that I could be attracted to a woman and
not end up having her stab or playing darts on my arms.  I also confronted
the fear of being stabbed and poked -- by donating blood once a month
(platelets). 

I still have a God, but I don't see him as the dealer in a "rigged game" 
anymore.  I have actually gone to churches that used to be a source of 
deep resentment.  I am also less inclined to make others wrong for their 
beliefs and practices.  Back to the list:

	Hunger Project:  Erhard's EST Laboratory	Our Town  April 13, 1980
	Kevin Garvey

And NOW, we get an insight into who Kevin Garvey realy is:
	The Serpentine Serenity of EST			Christianity Today, January 1977
	(Describes Erhard's "Damascus Like Awakening", and EST's "Antichristian" philosophy)
	"He confronted original sin, but instead of seeking God's redemptive 
	grace, Werner determined to make himself his own redeemer.  He justified 
	his own sin." (Quoting Garvey).  The remainder of the article covers 
	the "demonic nature of EST".

	If this article, the first chronologically, had been the first 
	article in the packet, you would have dismissed it as another "crackpot 
	religous freak".

	In most of the Forums in which I have either Participated, Assisted, 
	or Observed.  The issue of God shows up, particularly around Sunday 
	afternoon.  The Forum leader says something like "Good - if it 
	empowers you, keep it, build on it, embrace it.  This is a chance to 
	"give it up" with any part of your relationship with God that doesn't 
	empower you".  I know, for myself, that I had a few resentments 
	against specific religeous leaders.  I was able to stop making them 
	wrong and start listening for the principles they were expounding.  The
	funny thing is that I could hear the Preachers sharing the same 
	principles that I had come to understand in the Forum.

Then we have:
	The Strange World of est.	from Spiritual Counterfeits  (1979).
	Landmark has "cleaned up it's act" in many ways since that time.  
	The leaders don't swear.  Values like integrity, commitment, 
	service, and forgiveness are a fundamental part of the program.  The
	"boot-camp-drill-seargeant" approach isn't used anymore, and the
	goals and values are now openly declared, posted in a conspicuous 
	place in each site.

	Werner Erhard is still a citizen of the United States living in 
	self-imposed exile.  He has settled most of his financial 
	obligations (including with his wife and children), and has 
	cooperated with government agencies in their investigations.
	The sharp lawyer is no longer with the company.

	There is less of an air of infallability as well.  The Forum Leaders 
	hold each other to very high standards of integrity and morality, 
	but they are human, and are quick to admit it, in front of the
	entire course.  For the 60+ hours they stand in front of the Forum, 
	they are focused on serving the participants.  When the Tuesday Evening 
	session is over someone takes them to the airport.  They just want 
	to have some quiet time. -- Before it starts in the next town on 
	Thursday afternoon.

	Everyone loves "their Forum Leader", but the Forum leaders 
	themselves discourage any form of "Idolitry".  In fact, in the 
	"Advanced Course", after stripping away myths and superstitions 
	about reality.  One is left with a sense of wander at the 
	possibility of God, as a possibility.

	There are other concepts which have been stripped of their 
	"Mistical" interpretations.  Most importantly, any personal feelings 
	Werner Erhart may have had about God, are not present in the Forum.

	"What has EST done for us lately" isn't dated, but the attendence 
	figures quoted would indicate a pre-1979 date.


	Finally, we have a really impartial viewpoint:

	The Forum: Repackaged EST?	The Cult Observer  April 1985.
	Werner's interest in landmark was sold so that he could settle
	some of his obligations.  The Forum has thrived without Erhard, who 
	is now doing work of his own in the former Soviet Union, the Middle 
	East, and in China.

For $18 dollars, you can get the 200 page "Packet", most of which is 
obsolete, much of which clearly written "By Christians for Christians"
Landmark has undergone a series of organizational shifts and 
restructuring since the newest of these was written (over 10 years ago).  
Things I might have said about the Forum in 1991 wouldn't apply in 1995.

Much of this is just good journalizm.  Erhard was the focal point of 
several contriversies from the time of the "Jonestown Incident" to the 
time of the 60 minutes story in the early 1980s.  Good journalists know 
that a story from the point of view of "The Forum is just great" don't 
usually get printed.  Editors expect the reporters to "dig".  Erhard put 
his skeletons on display (His real name Jack Rosenburg) was changed to 
evade child-support collectors.  If Werner Erhard applied for the 
position of Forum Leader today, the man Werner Erhard was in 1976 
wouldn't even qualify for the entry level leadership program.

Other "suspected cults" of this period included Alcoholics Anonymous, 
Narcotics Anonymous, several Drug Abuse Rehabilitation Programs, and 
several "Treatement Communities".  In these cases, breaking u

Landmark has actually taken steps to prevent cult-like behavior, 
including making sure that no single member of the staff becomes a "Guru",
making important decisions and goals as a group, not being affiliated 
with other causes or groups, not being a "charity" subject to the whims 
of outside contributors and benefactors, and a series of monitor and
screening procedures.

Finally, note the disclaimer at the bottom of the cover page:

	The opinions expressed in this public service packet, which consists 
	largely of magazine and newspaper reports, do not necessarily 
	reflect the opinions of the American Family Foundation...
	The compilation of a packet on a particular group does not 
	necessarily mean that it is a cult or is destructive, only that AFF 
	receives many inquiries about it.



	Rex Ballard - Director of Electronic Distribution
	Standard & Poor's/McGraw-Hill
	Opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect
	the Management of the McGraw-Hill Companies.
	http://cnj.digex.net/~rballard






From rballard@cnj.digex.net Tue Jan  2 14:38:51 1996
Newsgroups: alt.self-improve