Andries,

I think you missed my point.  My point is that ex-premies don't need the validation of someone who has studied Prem Rawat and his cult. We lived within the cult, therefore we know what happened first hand. 

Those NRM scholars may not be important for you but they are very important for outsiders, like me, who are caught in the middle of a propaganda war and do not know whom and what to believe anymore about Rawat.

You are in the propaganda war by choice, Andries.  No one asked you to do what you've been doing.  I find it astonishing that you say you really don't know who to believe anymore.  There is a vast amount of testimony in the forum archives and on EPO that has been provided by former devotees of Prem Rawat.  Those testimonies were made over many years and came from people who were involved with Rawat on many different levels, from so-called "fringe premies" to inner circle premies or PAMs.  What more do you need? 

I have to admit that it was somewhat inappropriate to post this to Mike, who explicitly wrote that he was not interested in collecting evidence for his essay "denial of the past"'.

I agree.  Although I can't speak for Mike, it's my opinion that he doesn't need evidence from some scholar of NRMs to discuss his involvement with Prem Rawat or to validate that he's telling the truth. I find your thinking on this to be strange.  It's my strong opinion that the scholars should be getting their information from Mike.  That's one of the biggest problems I have with the NRM sociologists:  Generally, they don't interview former followers of personality cult leaders.  When they do bother to interview former cult or NRM members, they generally dismiss their testimony as unreliable.  Introvigne has been especially inflammatory when discussing those he labels apostates, as if former members of cults or NRMs don't have a right to speak or write about their experiences in a cult or it's leader without being labeled as cyber-terrorists!  When it comes to ex-premies, these scholars are just observing from afar.  Their writings are not evidence, Andries.  The evidence is the testimony that can be found here and on EPO.

I may sound like a broken record if I say that I think it is wrong to generalize about CESNUR afiliated scholars. I also think that is wrong to generalize about all their academic works. And at least people should read their academic works before critizing them.

Unfortunately, you do sound like a broken record, Andries.  I have read a lot of the writings by those scholars.  I wouldn't bother to tell you what I think about them if I hadn't. 

Dr. David C. Lane wrote, "Melton is a genuinely nice guy and has a wonderfully encyclopedic mind, but I think in his desire to legitimize new religions he loses sight of how sinister these gurus can be."

So what?  Anyone can come across as a "nice guy."  That proves nothing.  Sometimes I think you are mesmerized by these people, Andries.  There're just people like you and me.

I don't think in NPOV.  But, now I'm feeling like a broken record on this subject.

Cynthia