Well this is really hard....
I feel like there has been so much positive benefits I’ve gained from the practice and I do feel like there are great things to it.. but there was just red flag after red flag.
I quit SGI
It just seemed like the more activities you did the more they expected from you and the more they tried to instill this sense that “Daisaku Ikeda is your mentor” “the oneness of mentor and disciple” “the eternal vow for our great mentor, Daisaku Ikeda blah blah” it is like they worship him. Like he is the Current Buddha incarnate. How the hell can you have a mentor that you have never met in person!?
What set me over the top was my region leader . He keeps touching me in inappropriate ways and making be feel highly uncomfortable. He told me he “wants to make me feel uncomfortable”
Then at a Gajokai meeting, another leader said then . “Do not leave the SGI, when you leave the SGI, you begin to make causes against the SGI, and when you make causes against the SGI, you make an enemy of the Buddha, and you do not want the Buddha as your enemy” I was shocked when I heard this and also thought it was a big red flag...
And in order to “officially leave the organization” you have to write a letter and return your Gohonzon ??? But I that scroll is mine and it has been mine for the past two years as I PAID 20 dollars for it
I have always felt it was a little culty but I recently brought a ton of my close and true friends to my district meeting ( I am a district leader) and they all told me they felt like there was no room for independent thought and that it felt culty and didn’t feel like real Buddhism. These have all been my friends for over ten years of my life and I trust them. But I can’t help getting rid of this feeling inside of me now that I just feel cheated and like I want to vomit in disgust.
Also how should I go about leaving? I do feel a need to call out my region leader for how he kept touching me.
Also Steve Mortan cursed at my during a soka group shift for not being in the “proper” position even though that was where my in charge told me to be? If someone so high up in the org curses at someone for something like that!? That’s just pathetic and I want nothing to do with it. Because staring at a wall for seven hours straight definitely has SO MUCH BENEFITS YOU WONT BE ABLE TO FATHOM THE KIND OF FORTUNE YOU WILL CREATE. I am done being indoctrinated.
By the way, does anyone know how much money per year these directors make? Like I said even though I decided this is no longer for me, it hurts internally.
Ptarmigandaughter:
ReplyDelete"It takes courage to act on red flags when you see them, no matter how many red flags there are or how uncomfortable you are. So, I recommend you take a moment to reflect on that, and let it sink in that you are doing a good thing, even if it is hard.
So...it’s logical that you are ambivalent...that you have both positive and negative feelings about the SGI and your practice just now. If you were entirely negative, after all, you would have already quit. Most posters here start out very positively during their early practice, a period that’s characterized by love-bombing affirmation while the group embraces you, before the demands start and the red flags surface.
That said, inappropriate touching is a HUGE no, and justifying it as purposeful is alarming, bordering on dangerous. This is yet another example of the SGI appointing unqualified and un-vetted people to positions of authority, and failing utterly to train, supervise, or maintain even the minimum necessary accountability. All by itself, absent everything else you report, this is reason enough to quit today. By comparison, this would qualify as harassment in the workplace, and you would be well within your rights to pursue a formal complaint, potentially leading to compensation.
As for your question about salary, very few SGI officials are paid. Members are expected to contribute their time, talent, and treasure from top to bottom in the organization, even in administrative/clerical/customer service roles that would otherwise be considered employees. I did know a leader who worked as the administrative assistant to the General Director some time ago, and her earnings were entry-level. The big money is paid only to the top insiders, nearly all of whom live in Japan.
I could not agree with you more about the absurdity of the SGI’s present-day focus on all things Ikeda. Those of us who joined before SGI’s excommunication from Nichiren Shoshu know this is a result of that schism, and it has been intensifying with each passing year. Given that Ikeda has been kept from public view for nearly a decade, and obviously will never again participate actively in the SGI, it’s hard to imagine how the organization intends to navigate his death. Instead of preparing for the inevitable and laying the groundwork for succession, the SGI has hidden his retirement behind a smokescreen of ghostwriters, doubling down on Ikeda and Ikeda alone as the one and only voice of doctrinal and organizational authority.
Ptarmigandaughter, thank-you for contributing on this site, for your presence on Whistleblowers has always garnered my full attention. Also,I would ask if I may, are you making inroads to alleviating your chronic condition?.....Mark, being a Family Medical Doctor, and I - perhaps, just an overly sensitive worry-wart - have commiserated over Infinategratitudes's chronic illness.....and then, so suddenly, you made it be known....so, how are you doing?
ReplyDelete.....after my own debacle with SGI/NSA....I became obsessed with the complete absence of WISDOM of it's practitioners - as evidenced with the above testimonials....at first, and with one foot still in, I felt so badly for these well-intentioned victims of the 'yet another example of the SGI appointing unqualified and un-vetted people to positions of authority'...that, I wanted to contact all those personally and apologize on behalf of the Org., and then, hunt down the persecutors and slap them in the face...now, with both feet out, one has to ask about that promised acquisition of WISDOM through their methodology/ practice, which is so diametrically opposite to the adherence to the tenets of the Lotus Sutra and Nichiren Buddhism....which, thus explains this 'being hit over the head with the Staff of Stupidity' syndrome, so pervasive with their adherents. "Sr. Leaders of SGI, can you not see the folly here with these abuses and the turn-off of Ikeda worship...how can you possibly believe that humanity will suddenly come around to embracing this faux religion and and to boot, save the World?!...be brave and forthright and explain yourselves!!!!.....by max.....
ReplyDeleteOOps.....just realized my mistake above....well, anyone reading this will at least know our good intent!
ReplyDeleteBad Bad man Maxwell. Everyone makes mistakes except for Sensei (Daisaku Ikeda). Hehe
ReplyDelete