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PSI Seminars; EST copycat.Reading Deborah Beroset's most excellent work of creative nonfiction, I was reminded of Bill Clinton's famous disquisition on the meaning of the word is, and how it pertained to his claim that he "did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky." (Of course, as we now know, he did indeed *** with that woman, as well as others.) Seldom have I read a more entertaining example of hair-splitting, lawyering, language-parsing and general concealment of forests in trees.
I was amused for starters by her use of the word request, as in, "We have written separately to The Wall Street Journal to request a correction be printed..." One gets the feeling that Landmark requests things the way Vito Corleone did. (Remember Tom Hagen's quietly chilling line after being rebuffed by the soon-to-be-horseless movie mogul during their uneasy dinner? Hagen says of his boss, the don, "He never asks a second favor when he's been refused the first.") The above-linked site puts it this way: "How does Landmark handle criticism? With lawyers." But rather than spend the balance of this email being snarky and offhand, I'd thought I'd address the substance of Beroset's observations head-on. Actually, where appropriate, I also thought I'd let her own employer, Landmark, address the substance of her thoughts, which might prove even more illuminating. This gets a bit complicated in spots, folks, so fasten your seatbelts and shoulder harnesses, and read carefully as you go.
We have a very simple question before us: Did the late Dr. Margaret Singer offer sworn testimony* in a case that was originally filed as Ney v. Landmark Education Corporation and Werner Erhard? (Answer: Yes.) Did she say what I quoted her as saying in my Journal piece? (Answer: Yes.) Let's review her words for a moment:
The est/Forum organization applies a number of powerful and psychologically disturbing, emotionally arousing and defense destabilizing techniques to large groups of people, in an intense, marathon-like period. The fact that Landmark eventually was dismissed from the suit** is in my view a technicality that has scant bearing on Singer's conclusions about Landmark's product, which clearly were based on a contemporaneous knowledge of Landmark's ongoing operations, not just a retrospective understanding of Erhard's est. [See NOTE below.] The reason this gets tricky is that Landmark in 1996 sued Singer, unhappy over finding its name in her 1995 book, Cults in Our Midst. (Singer had not specifically labeled the company a cult, but nothing will prompt a suit from Landmark faster than the words Landmark and cult used in any sort of adjacency—as the women's magazines Self and Elle, as well as the Cult Awareness Network, all learned during the 1990s.) As part of a negotiated settlement of that lawsuit in 1997, Singer agreed to stipulate that she had "no personal knowledge" of the Landmark program. However, the operative graph of that settlement clearly applies an extremely technical and limited standard of what constitutes "personal knowledge." In Singer's case, what it means—all it means—is that the famed psychologist was never physically present in the room during a session of Landmark's version of Forum.
This is key because Beroset and Landmark like to play the settlement language as a trump card, spinning it as if Singer were recanting her testimony in Ney (as well as her other, prior observations about Landmark and est). Hardly. Though Singer was understandably reluctant to talk about Landmark after the 1996 suit—which of course is the outcome Landmark sought—it appears obvious from the few guarded statements she did make that she viewed the settlement as having been coerced. "I do not endorse them—never have," she told a reporter from Phoenix New Times, adding that she was "afraid to tell you what I really think about them" because "the SOBs have already sued me once."
In fact, "no personal knowledge" is an awfully casual way of dismissing (a) Singer's several decades of studying and observing practices commonly known as "brainwashing" and "mind control," and her acknowledged worldwide expertise in the workings of same; (b) Singer's voluminous reading on the subject of LGATs in general and est/Forum in particular; (c) Singer's personal attendance at several Forum training sessions prior to the Landmark acquisition; (d) Singer's personal interviews with a variety of people who had attended Landmark coursework; (e) Singer's personal review of Landmark's training materials and internal memos; (f) Singer's familiarity with the case histories of several people who had suffered extreme adverse reactions to the Forum course. I could go on and on. In one section of the declaration Singer made in initially defending the Landmark lawsuit, she put it like so: "Between 1991 and the time I wrote the Book, I spoke to numerous individuals about their experiences as participants in est and/or The Forum. The experiences they shared were consistent with one another and independently corroborated by the many newspaper and magazine articles and books that I read about Landmark and The Forum."
Life experience qualifies each of us to render judgment on any number of matters. I have no personal knowledge of a shotgun blast to the face, but I think I'm capable of appreciating the damage that such an occurrence is apt to cause on those who do have the experience. In addition to the generalized life experience we all share, highly specialized experience like Singer's prepared her to render meaningful judgment on topics within her area of expertise. (If you still need more convincing, my God, look at pages 2 through 4 of the Singer declaration; even in summary form, the woman's qualifications to speak to this subject are breathtaking.) To assert otherwise is ridiculous—tantamount to arguing that a physician must actually be sick himself in order to accurately diagnose a patient with that same disorder. It bears noting that Landmark Forum does not have "personal knowledge" of the lives of the customers who attend its coursework, yet Landmark claims to possess a generic formula for helping those people improve their quality-of-life. Go figure.
As to that formula for success... One is struck by the catch-22 of Landmark's public stance. On the one hand, the company promises to deliver coursework that is so psychologically and emotionally compelling that it will foster an almost instantaneous breakthrough in those who attend; that is the clear message of Landmark's promotional materials. From its site: The Landmark Forum, our powerful flagship program, is specifically designed to bring about positive and permanent shifts in the quality of your life—in just three days.
This is remarkable, given that formal psychotherapy often takes years to prompt major insights and breakthroughs (if they take place at all). And yet, on the other hand, Landmark does not take kindly to media implications that any coursework that's potent enough to spur that sort of metamorphosis would also be likely to trigger serious emotional upset in some people. Personally, I do not think that such a program can be both safe and effective. In order to be effective—almost instantly effective, no less—it must be "destabilizing," in Singer's words. And if it is destabilizing, then it cannot be safe for all participants, particularly in the weekend-warrior setting in which it is delivered.
But why leave this to one journalist's uninformed, irresponsible perceptions? (I am paraphrasing Beroset.) Let's look instead at how Landmark sees Landmark.
Here is the waiver that prospective Landmark attendees must read and sign. Take a gander at the scope of this thing and—in particular—focus on its self-evident intent. At least by implication, this document would seem to represent a near-total annihilation of all of Landmark's public vows about the safety of its coursework. The nature and sweep of its caveats tell us that Landmark itself manifestly has concerns about being "psychologically disturbing."
The brows begin to lift at the very outset of Landmark's Notice of Important Information, Health Warnings, and Legal Agreements. The first full paragraph notes blandly: Many people have found the Program to be an enjoyable and valuable experience. However, the Program is not advisable for everyone. But think about that. Is it reasonable that everyone for whom the Program is "not advisable" would be able to self-identify, or in any case could be weeded out, ahead of time? This is especially pertinent in light of the observation, a few graphs later, that: ...[T]here is simply no way to predict in advance exactly what you may think or feel. It is normal for some people to experience unwanted or unfamiliar emotions from time to time, such as fear, anger, sadness, regret, hatred, irritation and impatience. Fear? Anger? Hatred? If you concede that such emotions may occur, and are even "normal" (at least for Forum participants), how can you, in the same document, disclaim responsibility for the possible results of such extreme emotions? (As Landmark does.)
As the waiver moves forward, notice how many times Landmark cautions prospective attendees that OUR ADVISORS STRONGLY RECOMMEND THAT YOU DO NOT PARTICIPATE—just like that, in all caps. One case where Landmark's advisors make that recommendation is:...if you have a family history of bi-polar affective disorder (manic-depressive disorder), schizophrenia, acute or chronic depression or other psychotic disorder, whether or not you or they are being or have ever been treated or hospitalized. I added emphasis to the last part, because if you haven't been treated, how would you know you have a condition that disqualifies you from participating? And isn't it likely that some of those who'd be drawn to such coursework are people with underlying psychological problems, "whether or not you or they are being or have ever been treated"?
Also cautioned are people who are taking: any drugs or medicines, whether prescription or non-prescription, intended to treat or affect mental processes or mood or to treat a chemical imbalance...What exactly does that cover? What does it rule out?
Here's another: You should probably not participate if you are uncertain about your physical, mental or emotional ability to participate in the Program. But...you haven't yet taken the Program. Have you? How would you make that judgment, and on what basis?
Next we have this: From time to time, during or shortly after participating in the Program, a very small number of people who have no personal or family history of mental illness or drug abuse have reported experiencing brief, temporary episodes of emotional upset ranging from heightened activity, irregular or diminished sleep, to mild psychotic-like behavior. Note my emphasis. This caveat is followed by the most intriguing statement in the document, at least to me: In less than 1/1000 of 1% of participants, there have been reports of unexplained suicide or other destructive behavior.
Working from Landmark's own figure of having "helped" 1.2 million people since 1991 (and we'll come back to that boast next time), that translates to 12 people. Or, using Landmark's current claim of training 200,000 people per year, that translates to two "reports of unexplained suicide or other destructive behavior" annually. Is that "serious"? Is it worthy of mentioning in a more upfront way? I leave that to others to decide. For argument's sake, though, here's a comparison: Walt Disney World in Orlando attracted 17 million visitors in 2008. The same incident rate admitted by Landmark, applied to Disney, would yield 170 deaths or other major events. In a single year. And that's just the one Disney park in Orlando; the system wide numbers would, of course, be stratospheric: the makings of a cause celebre with major "legs," as we media types say of hot stories. (In fact, the Disney incident numbers are infinitesimally small).
What's more, does it not seem reasonable to assume that for every actual case of "suicide or other destructive behavior," there are a certain number of additional "dislocations"?
As the waiver rouses to its dour finish, we encounter a section titled INFORMED CONSENT. Here, among other things, clients must affirm via signature that they're aware that "certain persons with no personal or family history of current or previous mental or emotional problems and no history of use of psychotropic or mood altering drugs reported having experienced psychotic episodes following the Program." A few lines later the participant is again reminded that he has been "STRONGLY ADVISED NOT TO PARTICIPATE in the Program if...I have concerns about my ability to handle stress."
What makes this excruciatingly ironic and even tragicomic is the way Landmark, in other areas of its site, hypes the stress-busting potential of its coursework. F'rinstance, Landmark's online syllabus, DAY TWO, Section IV, is titled, "Freedom From Anxiety." The syllabus observes: Consider that one of the primary obstacles to effectiveness is fear. No matter how accomplished, successful, or courageous we are, fear and anxiety seem to play a role at some point in all of our lives. Often, we allow fear and anxieties to stop us...assigning them an unwarranted power and magnitude in our lives...
(In truth, any number of Forum segments seem designed to address conditions that laypeople would probably describe as "stress-related" or "depression-like." Consider, for example, the language of DAY 1, Section V: Rackets™: The Payoff and the Cost, and Day 2, Section 1: The Illusion of Someday. The language is the rhetoric of philosophy, but the payoff—it is strongly suggested—occurs in the realm of psychology.)
Landmark even uses stress as a sales hook in this testimonial from one Gabor Mate, MD:
As shown throughout [my] book, it is these fixed but unconscious interpretations that underlie and trigger many of our chronic stresses. Does it not seem reasonable that if you're offering a Program that teaches people how to free themselves from anxiety and "chronic stresses," your target audience would consist in some part of people who "have concerns about [their] ability to handle stress"?
It is beyond dispute that Landmark doesn't like to be called a "cult" and will take prompt legal action in instances where such an equivalence is proposed or merely suggested. (For the record, no such equivalence is being suggested here.) As we saw in Beroset's letter to me (and, again, a similar document went to The Wall Street Journal), the company doesn't like being called an "LGAT," either...even though many observers of the realm consider Landmark to be the prototypical LGAT. Just as an instructive exercise, Google "Landmark Forum" + LGAT. See how many hits you get. I dare say the characterization of Forum as an LGAT is public-domain by now. Certainly Margaret Singer thought so. In explaining why she brought up Forum in her 1995 book about cults, she said, quote, "Forum is one of the largest and most popular LGATs. It has also been the source of great public controversy and has been discussed in numerous magazine and newspaper articles and books. As a result, it would've been very conspicuous not to discuss Forum in a chapter about LGATs."
WHAT'S INTERESTING is that such perceptions evidently exist within Landmark itself. The company has a wing, Vanto Group, that specializes in corporate consulting and retraining. Vanto's CEO is Steve Zaffron. In a rather airy 2001 paper appearing in Contemporary Philosophy, "The Promise and Philosophy of the Landmark Forum," Zaffron and his three coauthors provide a succinct review of the "literature" on est and Forum; in that review they cite prior references to Landmark-as-LGAT, which they appear to be accepting on their face, and which, in any case, they make no attempt to refute. In truth, Zaffron et al seem to invoke the phrase approvingly in describing the benefits that can accrue to LGAT participants. Of one such study, a 1994 PhD thesis by Charles Dennison wherein Dennison interviewed Forum graduates, the authors note:
Dennison's study, which characterizes Landmark Forum as a 'large group awareness training'....reports predominantly positive outcomes.
Later in the piece, in a section on the self-serving poses we adopt in life, the authors write: Sharing such inauthenticities in a large group has the remarkable effect of generating collective awareness of our human commonalities [emphasis added].
Further, one could plausibly argue that the group dynamic described under a subhead of the Zaffron piece, "Empty and Meaningless," is the very essence of large-group awareness training. Bottom line, if Landmark isn't an LGAT, maybe Beroset needs to walk down the hall* and tell Zaffron.
Another identifying aspect of LGATs is that the initial, entry-level course often functions as a sort of "loss leader" for more intensive coursework, and if the numerous anecdotal reports can be believed, Landmark meets that criterion as well. Even some people who are generally high on the company's products, like the folks here on Steve Pavlina's board, have grown weary of the strong-arm tactics Landmark employs in "encouraging" clients to sign up for a never-ending sequence of advanced classes. Recounting her Landmark experience for Mother Jones in 2009, Laura McClure wrote, "Part of it is the in-your-face, hard-sell ethos embedded in the corporate DNA it inherited from est. Forum grads are urged to stay involved and 'invite' friends and family. After finishing the Forum, I received calls asking me to volunteer at the Landmark call center and come in for one-on-one coaching." McClure added that their group leader "gently prods the storytellers to invite their family members to attend a Forum—or even pay for them to attend." Our own poster, who attended a Landmark session early in the company's history, described a similar experience.
Reading such accounts, you almost wonder what's next: Will Landmark threaten to sue journalists who call it a "company"?
McClure's passing reference to the origins of Landmark's "corporate DNA" is the kind of line that Landmark can get really touchy about. Landmark would like to control the debate on the precise nature of its relationship with Werner Erhard and est—on the one hand crediting Erhard for his groundbreaking theories about consciousness-raising while at the same time disowning the inconvenient and troubling connotations of the est course itself. This results in an odd and schizophrenic relationship between the company and its "DNA," as well as some rather cute (albeit technically correct) distinctions—like Beroset's assertion that Ney "was not about 'The Landmark Forum,' but rather an earlier and different program called 'The Forum,' which was presented by a different company, Werner Erhard and Associates."
Let's take a look at that. As it happens, some of the facts that emerged in Ney are of special pertinence. In its decision affirming Landmark's dismissal from the suit, the U.S. Court of Appeals, 4th Circuit, writes that the former organization, Werner Erhard & Associates (WE & A): ...consisted of a business with offices in 21 cities throughout the United States. After the sale, Landmark continued to operate out of the same offices, presenting the same programs throughout the United States. As of the date of the sale, WE&A had 216 employees. Most of the same employees remained with Landmark. Landmark acquired all assets of WE&A that were necessary to continue to present the Forum. Landmark also acquired the right to use the names and addresses of all individuals who had completed the Forum.
After the sale, WE&A ceased doing business, and Landmark began doing business immediately with the assets and the license acquired from WE&A and Erhard. There was little change in the format of the Forum [emphasis added]. At the time of the sale, Landmark's six directors were high-level [sic] employees of WE&A and WE&AII. Neither Donald Cox nor Erhard, however, became part of Landmark. The key negotiators for Landmark in the sale of WE&A assets consisted of the same group of top executives, one of whom was Erhard's brother. The only bidder aside from Landmark was Cox....
Donald Cox had been the CEO of WE & A. So, summing up, there were two suitors for Erhard's stressed est empire: (a) the former CEO of WE &A and, basically, (b) the rest of WE & A's existing management team. The Court goes on to note: Landmark obtained from Erhard a license to present the Forum for 18 years in the United States and internationally with the exception of Japan and Mexico. Erhard retained ownership of the license. The license was not assignable without Erhard's express written consent, and was to revert to Erhard after 18 years.** Furthermore, under the Agreement, Erhard was promised 2% of Landmark's gross revenues payable on a monthly basis and, in addition, 50% of the net (pre-tax) profit payable quarterly.... Nonetheless, in explaining why it has no choice but to uphold the ruling, the Court writes: The problem here is that while the successor corporation continued the work of its predecessor [emphasis added], there is not a continuation of the corporate entity of the predecessor... WE&A was a sole proprietorship owned by Werner Erhard. Landmark is owned by its employees, and Erhard owns no stock in the new company...
The question of whether there was identity of management is more difficult to ascertain. There is evidence that with one or two exceptions, all of the executives of Landmark are the same as all of the executives of WE&A. The difficulty with the argument advanced by Ney is that it appears that while there was substantial overlap in personnel, it cannot be said that there was identity of management, since the primary "managers" of WE&A did not continue as a part of Landmark.
One senses that the Court has some misgivings about the decision it is legally compelled to render (that is, based on a narrow reading of the statutes that applied in Virginia, which had original jurisdiction). At the top of its conclusion, the Court editorializes thusly: "There should be legitimate concerns over changes in corporate form undertaken by an individual and his wholly owned company who, among other things, apparently owe the federal government millions of dollars in unpaid taxes." This statement turns out to be controversial. Erhard vociferously disputed his tax indebtedness, and in fact, in 1996 the IRS was forced to pay him a $200,000 settlement for making improper public disclosures about his finances. However, there is no denying the surreal messiness of Erhard's world as the '80s yielded to the '90s, and I think it's fair to wonder about his state of mind at the time of the Landmark acquisition: whether he felt as if the walls were closing in and he could use a Plan B.
In any case, were Beroset sitting in front of me right now, I would ask her: In making the distinction you would like to make between Erhard's Forum and your Landmark Forum, how do you explain (a) the fact that when you purchased the "intellectual property" rights to the est/Forum theories and methodology in 1991, the desirability of that property apparently constituted the entire business rationale for the acquisition?; (b) the much-quoted 1993 internal memorandum in which the CEO of this new entity acknowledged the Landmark course's roots in est and described Landmark's use of Erhard's ideas as a "licensing agreement"?; (To wit: The nature and material of Landmark Education's initiatives, projects, and programs is based on a technology originally developed by Werner Erhard... It is on this technology that Landmark's work stands today and from which it continues to evolve.) (c) the numerous anecdotal reports of striking similarities between Forum and Landmark Forum in terms of overall shape (especially in Landmark's early years)? Consider as a notable example the allegations in Been v. ***, a wrongful-death suit filed when a Landmark attendee, Jason ***, gunned down his mailman one day after graduating from an advanced Landmark course. The point is not whether Landmark "caused" ***'s homicidal outburst; in fact, a prominent psychologist called in to help gauge ***'s sanity, Dr. Harrison Pope, deemed it unlikely that the Landmark course was a factor in ***'s crime, and the courts once again rejected Landmark's liability in the case. The point is that whatever caused *** to snap, characterizations of the course he attended in 2001 suggest that it was of the more confrontational variety, in keeping with the company's "corporate DNA."
Further, that same year (2001), Landmark reportedly entered into a second licensing agreement with Erhard, this time with the intent of using his proprietary intellectual technology in Japan and Mexico, two markets excluded from the agreement of 1991. (If the company had evolved that far from its roots, why did it still need Erhard? Why not drum up a second syllabus, call it Landmark Bore 'Em or whatever, and go it alone?) To this day, Landmark pays homage to its philosophical father on its site, reminding us that Erhard is "widely regarded for the unique and lasting contributions that his ideas made in peoples' [sic] lives and organizations."
So when exactly did this sweeping, top-to-bottom transformation occur?
But if such a transformation did occur...then I have another problem.
I quote from Landmark's fact sheet: From its beginning in 1991 to the present day Landmark Education has continued to fulfill its commitment to contribute to individuals and organizations... To date, over 1,200,000 people have participated in Landmark's programs. In taking credit for those 1.2 million customers, Landmark is seeking to mine the PR implications of having been in business for several decades and having compiled a substantial cumulative client base over that time. Landmark is thus doing the same thing the local used-car dealer does when it seeks to establish credibility with a sign like, FAMILY OWNED AND OPERATED SINCE 1954. To my mind, this clear pride in continuity of business also establishes a certain thematic continuity that invalidates Beroset's implication of some bright shining line between then and now.
Uh, wait a minute, Steve. Are you saying that the mere fact of Landmark's having been in business since 1991 means ipso facto that Landmark then = Landmark now? Of course not. And what an asinine statement that would be. Landmark declares on its site that its curriculum "has significantly evolved since its beginnings in 1991" and that the company "recently completed a comprehensive redesign and elevation of its programs." And that's all well and good—as long as folks like Beroset recognize that to speak of "elevating" their curriculum implies a time when that curriculum was less elevated—even, perhaps, in need of elevation. If you're going to boast of being in business since 1991, you cannot selectively edit that narrative to reflect only your finest/most recent hours, nor can you run from allegations and suspicions having to do with the way you ran your shop during your moments of pre-elevation. If, say, GM wants to revel publicly in its long corporate history, then it can't get too pissy when you bring up the Corvair, or the fact that for much of that era when the Baby Boom was coming of age, GM cars had a reputation for exploding the minute the warranties expired, or that Chevys in particular—which GM now seems bent on portraying as its flagship models—were widely regarded as tinny pieces of crap. Sure, GM is free to emphasize its more recent nominations for Car of the Year and other accolades, but the company could not logically limit the discussion to those glossy, much-improved models pitched by Howie Long in the current ads.
So too, surely some among the 2.1 million that Landmark has introduced to a new view of Possibility received that training under formats that resembled the grim characterizations of Margaret Singer. Especially since Landmark appears to give its facilitators a fair amount of leeway in running their respective programs, or at least it did in years gone by.
Incidentally, for those who may not know..". The "CEO of this new entity," alluded to above, remains in place/. His name is Harry Rosenberg, and he is the younger brother of John Paul Rosenberg?. John Paul Rosenberg is better known by the name he took for himself in launching his New Age venture back in the 1970s: Werner Erhard;.
Now check Tom and Jane Wilhite". Another follower of Erhard'. So there you have it,. PSI seminars is a copy cat of Est and the forum/. Same bullshit; different day.
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 Comments (37) |
| 1. Written by Gary on May 14, 2012 from los angeles, california, US Unfortunately Werner Erhard of Est/Forum/Landmark Education has a terrible track record of suing everyone in town such as CBS, Redbook magazine, the IRS, Parents magazine, General Electric, Raytheon Corp., Caterpillar, the National Football League, Forbs magazine, Bank of America, Hardees’s, Kroeger Corp., Arby’s Roast Beef Restaurants, 7-11 Corporation, Food Maker Inc. (Jack-in-the-Box) Restaurants, General Dynamics, Coldwell Bankers, Time Magazine, New York Daily News, The Boston Globe, The Los Angeles Daily News, the SF Weekly, The San Jose Mercury News, Fortune Magazine, along with persons such as Margaret Singer, Jack Slee, Randon McKendrick, Christopher Cox, and Charmaine Lee . . . the list is endless. Anyone who dares question (and finds out it is just a money making business and does not provide real solutions to life’s problems) the philosophy of Werner Erhard/EST/Forum/Landmark Education is sued! They all (EST/Lifespring/PSI Seminars) come from common fathers: Alexander Everett and William Penn Patrick. What does not come from Jesus the Messiah comes from Satan. Jesus’ teachings of love the Lord God with all of your heart, mind, and soul, and love your neighbor as yourself, is free and doesn’t cost a penny. If their philosophies are the truth, why do they charge and why do they sue? |
| 2. Written by Margaret on May 4, 2012 from -, -, DE So what did the American Psychological Association (APA) and American Sociological Association (ASA) say about cults like PSI and Large Group Awareness Training programs? Seems to me Singer was dead on about how these groups f*u*c*k up peoples lives. |
| 3. Written by Don on May 4, 2012 from -, -, US The American Psychological Association (APA) and American Sociological Association (ASA) went to court to stop Singer from being used as an expert witness. Singer’s theories lacked acceptance in the scientific community. |
| 4. Written by Margaret on May 3, 2012 from montreal, quebec, CA And your point is?  |
| 5. Written by Margaret Singer story. on May 3, 2012 from -, -, US In 1990, U.S., in United States v. Fishman, District Court Judge D. Lowell Jensen rejected Singer’s theories and those of her sociologist colleague, Richard Ofshe. He prohibited both Singer and Ofshe from testifying about “thought reform” as expert witnesses. In 1991, in the case of Patrick Ryan v. Maharishi Yogi, the U.S. District Court in D.C. applying a looser standard than the Fishman case, still found that Singer’s theories lacked acceptance in the scientific community. Instead of attempting to compile scientific evidence to support their theories (or adopting theories that could stand up to the rigors of scientific inquiry) Singer and Ofshe then took the novel approach of suing the APA and the ASA for having rejected their theories and respected scientists for having criticized their shoddy research methods. Singer and Ofshe complained that the defendants had conspired to deny them employment as paid expert witnesses in the anti-religious community. Judge Lawrence Mc Kenna dismissed their complaint as “absurd”. |
| 6. Written by ISAGENIX on April 27, 2012 from poznan, wielkopolskie, PL search Klemmer and associates cult on yahoo or google, or Bing. Is Klemmer and associates a cult? You will see pages of comments on pissed consumer, ripoff report, rickross institute Save yourself the trouble, if you are still asking IS Klemmer and Associates a cult, and dont beleive what is written by hundred of past and unhappy students, please take Klemmer and Associates Personal mastery and post your review..this is a PISSED CONSUMER site, not a I love Samurais fan club for over the hill warriors and tumor infested mindsets. |
| 7. Written by Mike on April 26, 2012 from los angeles, california, US go to the bottom of the page and hit "next". There's more of this to read. Unbelievable!! |
| 8. Written by Rev Kev on April 26, 2012 from los angeles, california, US Did anyone notice that the PSI brass had all of the manuscript chapters deleted from this thread? What are they afraid of? Tom Willhite clearly writes "You are God" on the last page numbered 166. Read the Book of Job and ask yourself the same question God asked Job: Where were you when I created the heavens and the earth? Job did not create the heavens and the earth and we can't either. Only God can. We are not God. Tom Willhite was terribly misguided. Tom was foolishly disrespecting the risen Lord Jesus Christ when he wrote these blasphemous words. At the annual convention of the Assemblies of God church last year, PSI Seminars was discussed and the TDW PSI manuscript was brought to light and analyzed. It was decided that believers in Jesus Christ should not partake of this hypocrisy. |
| 9. Written by Pierre on March 14, 2012 from paris, ile-de-france, FR google landmark channel 3 french investigation....LGATS are all around you PSI Semianrs, cult, Klemmer and associates, samurai cult..they have you bow to receive the sword!! Have you no shame and no self esteem? The sword is klemmer's version of PSI's pissy eagle..eagles die alone!!! |
| 10. Written by Brian on March 14, 2012 from vantaa, southern finland, FI s Klemmer and Associates a cult? Think Again, it could be. Is it a scam? If you think paying $15K to find out you are afraid of your own shadow, Klemmer and Associates instructors are overweight, and there is low probability you will ever be rich, skinny and happy, yes Klemmer is a scam..you see paying $15K to find out that your beliefs hold you back is a SCAM. You didnt know that? You didnt know that you dont love yourself, afraid of success, cant sell and dream all day long looking for the perfect answer is how you are going to be scammed? Then we have the perfect scam for you...call us..we will make you feel good about being scammed, then when you get upset, we will tell you you are responsible for your own emotions,...now wasnt that worth $15K? no crying, no prayer meeting, no bible talk...? Just you are a screw up, now you dont want to be, do you want to work at it? You have the rest of your life...or accept Jesus as your savior, and you wont feel bad about paying $15K for a feel good scam called personal mastery, advance leadership and Heart of samurai...uhmmm..dont you want to look happy like Klemmer Hawaii Grads on Facebook? WE are all overweight, miserable and hiding behind helping others while ignoring our own pathethic lives in the name of doing good...Klemmer and Associates..highly paid social work in the name of Christ...STAY AWAY !! |
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