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Re: Theos-World Jerry- Fundamentalist misrepresentations of the Bible

Mar 26, 2006 11:31 AM
by Bart Lidofsky


The way I see it, the management in the TS has been getting steadily more oligarchical. It is not physically difficult for an outsider to become part of the oligarchy, but, in order to do so, they have to become, well, part of the oligarchy. I'm not as certain that membership in the coMasons, LCC and ES are all necessary; I think it's in the other direction: the kind of people the oligarchy wants are also the kind of people who would join those organizations (I have pointed out, quite openly, the hypocrisy inherent in belonging to the both the LCC, an organization that thumbs its nose at the 1st Object, and the ES. And the rules of both the coMasons and the ES specifically prohibit showing favoritism to members of the respective organizations, which brings the level of hypocrisy even higher). Be that as it may, I have also pointed out a number of things which have been done in the past few years to strengthen the oligarchy.

First is the discouragement and blocking of those who are not "in" to be able to communicate with the membership. The membership list is available to those already serving on the board, but forbidden to anybody else, giving a major leg up to those who the existing board members wish to encourage, and a major barrier to those who aren't on that list. A number of attempts that have been made in the past to create direct communication between lodges have been quietly discouraged by Wheaton, as well (including two projects of mine; one to have lodges physically near each other share lists of speakers willing to travel, to create local versions of the "national speakers" program, and the other is the theoslodges list, which was supposed to be to create a backchannel of communication between those active in lodges).

Then, there is the move towards eliminating lodges altogether, encouraging people to be "members-at-large" (something that used to be discouraged). As I have mentioned before, National has even created a pseudo "National Lodge" (which is not a lodge at all).

In addition, there has been the combining of districts, so that somebody who, in spite of the efforts of National, builds up a local reputation, STILL can't get elected to the Board.

The major difference between the TS Adyar and the other Theosophical Societies is that the TS Adyar is, theoretically, democratic on organization. The blocking of communication, and the constraints put on any member running for office who is not in favor with those currently in office, is definitely against the spirit of the organization.

Bart




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