That's a pretty accurate assessment Joe, I'd say, but I don't particularly agree that it could've been a lot worse.It was bad enough as it was. Given the background of the majority,as you point out,the level of committment was pretty impressive, although in terms of the 110% which Rawat constantly demanded, it may not have seemed so from the perspective of those who lived in the ashram.In an organisation where the essential goal was to get closer, preferably physically as well as 'spiritually', to the leader, then those who were unable to aspire to that for whatever reason, were looked down on by many higher up the food chain, & felt the rejection. In fact it was almost impossible to resist this mindset. Keeping some sort of sanity depended on it, for when one listened to Rawat's rantings, at least one could say to oneself.........ok,I don't live in the ashram,but I'm doing the best I can, so it isn't me he's really talking about,it's those guys who live up in the back of beyond,who grow their own dope & only show up at satsang once every 2 months.
Christ knows who they thought he was talking about when they attended the festivals, lol.
I think it's important not to forget the basis of all this,which it's easy to do when looking at it as an outside observer would.
The fakir trick which provided the 'proof' that Prem Pal Singh Rawat was Greater than God; the difficulty of reconciling the exhilirating potentiality of that, with the demands for total surrender from the Guru; the anti-authoritarianism of most premies & the consequent conflicts they felt with the 'Mission'; all of this fucked up many thousands of people to a greater or lesser extent,at a time in their lives when they should've been concentrating on real reality. Then there's the fate of those who got closer to the burning flame of insatiable greed & megalomania.Their stories haven't by any means still been told.
However, if you look at it from the perspective of society at large, then I'd have to agree that it was pretty innocuous. There was no idea or dogma beyond sending money to Rawat,& the role of the 'organisation' for the majority was little more than a glorified travel agency. One of the striking features of any large scale Premshow, at least in the UK, was the absence of cops to control the crowds afterwards........ smart people who are paid to be so,had us sussed a very long time ago.
We need someone like Rennie Davis to explain how the revolution got defanged...........derrr. Not that I mind really, seeing as how I seem to have turned into my father, politics wise. Maybe there's something in ancestor worship after all.
Seriously though, if Rawat had been anything other than a spoilt greedy brat then he could've used us, or some of us, to cause mayhem, maybe. Fortunately that's something we'll never know.
