13: "This is the essence of the growing anti-science, the disdain for experts, the denial of a shared reality."
Premie: "...there is relative truth and there is essential truth... For me it renders relative truth immaterial."
Susan: "this religion seems like it was designed for predators."
Susan: "All cults have an ends justify the means type thinking..."
Prem Rawat (paraphrased from when he paraphrased Krishna): Arjun freaks-out and expresses his fear and reluctance to Krishna when he sees his own relatives on the other side of the battlefield:
"Go ahead and kill'em. Kill'em all. It won't make any difference because they're part and parcel of me. Then Krishna revealed his infinite form."
Prem Rawat (paraphrased): Shortly after one of his sons began posting publicly about Prem sexually molesting him when he was a child:
"Any pain or confusion someone with Knowledge experiences is their own fault because they have the option of focusing solely on their breath."
Strikingly, a common thread of all this unspeakably toxic bullshit seems to be that ANYTHING, from child sexual molestation, human trafficking, lies and corruption to far worse, can be justified by the "essential truth" inherent in God, Knowledge, religions, political extremism, etc. Justifications by twisted or damaged minds that believe "essential truth" transcends right and wrong, moral turpitude and even the last shreds of human decency as if no actions in this duality-infested realm of existence matter.
To make matters worse, they go further by claiming that anyone who doesn't understand this "ultimate truth" is living in darkness and ignorance: duality! CONCEPTS!! Anyone ever hear Prem Rawat spout off about that? I've heard more than enough of this crap from Prem, his sycophants, apologists and other followers who'll resort to anything to defend the indefensible when it comes to their duplicitous master.
Only two more things:
My last straw before I finally broke down and peeked at ex-premie.org was when several well-connected premies - instructors! - proposed (you can tell this was shortly after Prem's toxic team trainings) a bait-and-switch scheme or tactic to lure the public in for what amounted to an introductory event, an event promoted as something that it wasn't. I was harshly criticized and branded as "negative" when I objected and cited the need for honesty and transparency when dealing with the public. Apparently, I had CONCEPTS!! Foremost in my mind was the obvious corruption of otherwise good people brought about by their "essential truth/ends justify the means" mentality.
It was the profound implications of 13's "denial of a shared reality" that prompted all this. That boggles my mind. It certainly doesn't mean you can go around making stuff up and declaring it to be real... then elevating made-up crap to the level of "essential truth" and using it to justify whatever suits you.