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On September 1, 1986 I
wrote an open letter to Malcolm Carnahan which included a short, clearly
stated list of specific questions regarding The Stelle Group’s Trustees’
proceedings and agreements with Richard. The response from Malcolm was zero—
letter was not acknowledged and the questions were not addressed. A few weeks
later I had a conversation with Malcolm in which Malcolm described Richard as
deceitful, self-seeking, mercenary, incompetent, and seriously, gravely
mentally ill. Malcolm was clearly 100% convinced that his perceptions of
Richard were absolute, universal truth. There was no room for discussion,
dialog, or doubt. I am not the only person he made such statements to; that
fact can be documented. I again wrote Malcolm. I asked him several more
specific questions and requested that he provide me with some specific
information on what for me were key and pivotal issues. He declined to
respond to several of my major points, writing me that he did not see any
benefit in pursuing these points since “they only seem to be digressions from
the central issues.” Thus my attempts to question, challenge, and clarify
matters for myself, to come to my own conclusions, integrate my own
perceptions, find my own truth, encountered at the very outset an enormous,
immovable stone wall labeled “THE TRUTH,” subtitled “Malcolm’s perceptions.”
I have come to learn over the past six months that I’m dealing with a number
of people like Malcolm with this absolute mind set—their truth is THE TRUTH.
Anyone who doesn’t see it their way has got some kind of problem. Well, I’ve
got news for you, my truth, my perceptions, have equal validity
in the universe with Malcolm’s or anyone’s: God may have arrived at absolute
truth; but any human being who is sure he has-arrived at absolute truth is
playing God, is deluding himself, and is a dangerous fool. Each human being,
to function and grow fully, needs to function in a mode or process where
individual perceptions and “truths” can co-exist, co-express, and
co-communicate. But I encountered Malcolm’s private truth—Richard is a very
bad, mentally ill person—as an absolute truth which shut out any other person’s
private truth. Then The Stelle Group
Letter published “A New Chapter” and I encountered Malcolm’s (and Robert’s)
public truth. At a joint TSG/TAO meeting I read a statement at that time in
which I said: “In
addition to bringing in to serious question Richard’s character and mental
health, our office have been making an information packet available under
very controlled conditions and distributing documents to insiders which purports
to bring into grave question the truthfulness, validity, and credibility of
Richard and TUF, casting serious doubt on the authenticity of Richard’s
claims of Brotherhood authority; his alleged association with the
Brotherhoods’ Great Plan; his alleged, stated titles and mission; and his
predictions of future events.” “Yet,
simultaneously, we continue to use TUF to attract and hold donors,
participants, students and customers who have not had full disclosure of all
proceedings, documents, petitions, events, viewpoints, allegations, and
so-called facts of recent months, including knowledge of the existence and
full contents of the above-mentioned information packet, which calls Richard
and TUF into grave question...” “If
you don’t think TSG is now projecting dishonestly and running a virtual scam,
read the front page of the most recent TSG Letter, “A New Chapter,” which is,
I feel, a complete public relations whitewash of the truth we have lived, the
reality we have experienced since the trustees removed Richard out of his
office. This letter is sent to current and potential donors and participants.
How dare we keep the full truth from these people who are giving us their
money and considering giving their lives to our work? The article states that
we are committed to proceeding “with the work as outlined in TUF.” The work
outlined in TUF is a Great Plan of the Brotherhoods coordinated by
Brotherhood-Appointed Emissary, Richard Kieninger, implying to the world at
large that TUF is true and valid and that we have authorization from the
Brotherhoods to implement Their Great Plan. From whom do we derive this
authority? We can’t possibly make such a claim without a direct communication
from a Brotherhood Emissary. How dare we project in this way when we distribute
internally documents that call Richard and TUF into grave question? The
Lemurian Brotherhood is coordinating The Great Plan, and according to their
Mundane School, which has tried to woo TSG members to itself, Richard is a
usurper. We in turn, appear to be usurping the alleged usurper while implying
that we are still an official part of The Great Plan. The only word I can
think of to describe what we’re doing is scam. Are we too numbed by recent
events to see clearly? Where are our consciences?”.... “It
is amazing that so many members and leaders abhor and cannot tolerate Richard’s
not giving full disclosure in his private, romantic life and in not sharing
secret, confidential information he gets from his Teachers, though doing so
would in both cases create a severe dilemma for him regarding private
confidences and betrayal of trust. Yet virtually no one seems bothered by the
massive dishonesty in the way in which the groups are seen dealing with
donors, students, non-resident affiliates, and purchasers of Richard books
and tapes.” Response to my statements from
Malcolm and most others was zero. They didn’t counter my statements that we
were deceiving donors and supporters by giving them a whitewashed version of
the truth in “A New Chapter” and concealing from the then Trustees package
which attacks Richard’s validity. They didn’t deny that our actions
constituted massive dishonesty. No one denied that the donors were being
deceived, no one expressed concern about deceiving the donors, and no one
expressed any interest in taking action to correct this morally
unconscionable situation. In addition I learned from
LPS students and from a donors’ letter to Richard that Malcolm and his
followers were presenting their private deceptions to persons while blocking
Richard from telling his side, Malcolm was not telling these people that,
counter to what was stated to donors in “A New Chapter,” there was a vocal minority
with different perceptions and views. Thus, on December 10, 1986, I, issued
the following Announcement to all TSG and TAO participants: Karen Robertson: “Recently
some Stelle Group supporters called TSG offices to ask what had happened
between the group and Richard and were told by a Trustee [Malcolm] that
Richard was authoritarian, used manipulative strategies; made freehanded use
of donated funds, exposing the group to legal prosecution; misinformed the
group about key objectives of the Great Plan; and exploited his position to
foster sexual relationships, while, in fact, none of those statements are
true. These people felt a one-sided story was potentially gossip until the
other side was heard. Having Richard’s address, they contacted him and heard
his side. It would seem the Trustees are quite willing to tell their story if
it were the only side, but Richard himself and some others have quite a
different story to tell which people are not hearing or even being told
exists. “In
The Stelle Group Letter, in A New Chapter,’ phrases like all of us agreed’
and ‘the response of the memberships of both organizations was to renew our
personal commitments to proceed with the work as outlined in TUF’ imply that
we all agree and are united. Little did the unsuspecting reader know that an
entirely different statement, Richard stating his truth, was not published.
Neither Richard nor the minority participants were consulted or represented
in the final version, which is a cover-up story generated by one or more
Trustees. “In
a November 6 letter to supporters, a Trustee cites the desire of “the
overwhelming majority of members to continue to move forward with the work”
with no reference to the fact that Richard and the minority have a voice
which is not being heard. “I’ve
previously stated my shock and astonishment at the blatant misrepresentation,
the unethical withholding of truth from supporters, and the false
presentation of the group in relation to the Brotherhoods and the Great Plan
which have characterized the Trustee’ strategy. The paid Trustees who are implementing
policy, I hold particularly responsible. I’m as tired of writing these statements
as you are of reading them. It’s clear that the Trustees are more interested
in justifying their actions than in righting wrongs. Concealing truth is
wrong. Hence, to right that wrong, an independent, ad hoc, action Committee
for Truth has been formed. Our motto, quoting a letter from Lee Gilbert, is, “You
shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” Honesty is the best
policy. We’ve heard much about “getting the word out.” “Getting the truth out”
is our right, our responsibility, and our goal.” In the first letter which
the Committee for Truth sent to TSG donors/supporters, the statements were
repeated almost verbatim from the statement I had read to the entire group a
few weeks earlier. The most overwhelming evidence of the group’s policy of
concealment and deception in regard to outside supporters and donors is that
the Trustees and members sat silent and passive while I read these statements
to them; then turned around and fired me, expelled me, and sued me for
providing these identical statements to our other supporters. It is your
own such irresponsible actions that damn you in the supporters’ eyes. Another irresponsible
action by the Board of Trustees is the December 12 memo from Malcolm, for the
Board, to all members of TSG with a copy of the Committee for Truth’s first
letter stating, “No person has signed the letter. We have checked the
addresses on the letter and have found out that they are private postal
drops. We have no idea who is behind this.” How could the Board of
Trustees have no idea who had sent the Committee’s letter when every member
had received a memo from me announcing the Committee’s formation and intent?
What further evidence is needed to demonstrate that we weren’t listened to
at all by the Trustees? If we had intended to write these letters as a
secret, underground group, would I have put a signed announcement of the
Committee’s formation and plan in every mail box before the Committee’s
letter was mailed? We didn’t put individual names on that first letter
because it was a matter of issues and policy, not personalities. We
immediately issued a memo giving everyone in the group full information about
the committee; we subsequently wrote to the donors again, stating who we were
and again emphasizing the fact that we were expressing our truth and our
concern that Richard’s side was not being heard, This is the next area of
concern I wish to address. We have a great deal of
documentation backing that initial response by donors in a letter to Richard:
People who called TSG office were given evasive, biased responses; were lead
to believe that there was no way to contact Richard; TSG was implementing a
policy of opening and answering mail addressed to Richard even though Richard
had requested that his mail be sent on to him. Quoting from a December 12
letter to Richard from Malcolm: “For
the present. the staff will continue to open all mail addressed to you to see
if it is business mail, If it is obviously personal, then it will be
repackaged and forwarded to you. Otherwise, we will treat it as we always
have in the past.... [Citing postal regulations] ‘Mail addressed to
corporations is delivered as addressed or to an authorized agent. Where
disagreement arises among corporate officers and others connected with the
company, the mail is delivered in accordance with the order of the president
of the corporation.’” Richard responded: “First
Class Mail addressed specifically to me is usually intended for me as an
author and is directed to TSG as the publishing company. Publishing houses do
not open or process authors’ mail, but rather stamp or label an author’s home
address on the unopened envelope for forwarding by the U.S. Post Office....To
intervene in or block such personal communications is to interfere with the
mails.....what [mail] I do receive is not business mail; so it is not
for you to decide if TSG is to open it, answer it, or act unbidden to provide
secretarial answering services for me.” This brings us to another
major point: the projection of TSG as a
corporation. The Stelle Group was founded as and is projected to the public,
especially the donors, as a not-for-profit educational organization. A
non-profit organization is able to take donors’ money without paying taxes on
it because it is conceived of as an organization which belongs to and serves
the public, and in particular, its donors. It is the exact opposite of a
for-profit business corporation. Thus it was amazing to me to see The Stelle
Group project itself in its lawsuit against us as a private corporation with
a confidential donors’ list which was its property. It is amazing because
forming confidential records is a violation of the letter and spirit of the
statutes under which the organization was formed. By statute, all records,
particularly financial records of a non-profit organization, are available to
the public for inspection and copying. The Adelphi Organization is currently
violating this statute in concealing certain of its records, by statute are
public records, from Betty Van Dyke, forcing her to go to court to get the
records released. Thus, by statute, you have no right to maintain
confidential records with financial information of any type. TSG’s only so-called
justification for claiming confidentiality has been a letter introduced in
court in which you stated that the froup did ot five donors’ names and
addresses to outsiders without their permission. While, as members, this
stipulation did not apply to us, the group, by statute, has no right to claim
such confidentiality. In the current situation
the claim of confidentiality is ludicrous in regard to the several hundred
hand-picked people we wrote to since. Betty Van Dyke corresponded with all of
them in the past for other reasons and has personally met a quarter of them. These
people have individually and freely claimed their right to have received
correspondence (including all Committee for Truth mailings) and to continue
to receive correspondence from and communicate freely with me. Betty, Marge,
and Richard but we are not outsiders. We are being charged with violating the
high tenets of the Philosophy as written in TUF because our letter was sent
without invitation. In fact, most of the people we wrote to invited us to
have written them and to continue to write them. The Trustees, are blocking
such communication counter to the donors’ expressed desire. To say that these hundreds of
peoples’ names and addresses are property which has been taken and used
illegally is ludicrous when these people have freely and willingly provided
their names and addresses. They don’t want their names and addresses to be
confidential in this instance. For The Stelle Group to make such a claim
counter to the donor’s individually expressed wishes violates their
Constitutional right to freedom of communication. The TSG Trustees have
initiated damages lawsuit citing me, Betty, Marge, and Richard and the correspondence
we have sent as responsible for the
choices some of these hundreds of donors have made to stop their financial
donations. These people have freely and individually claimed that all gifts
or tithes have been, are and will be their freewill expression determined
solely by them on the basis of information gathered from many sources
available to them and that they have not withheld donations because of
correspondence from me. Betty, Marge, and Richard. Robert Machiz, in a
February, 1987 letter to supporters, states, “It has now become clear that
the efforts of the three women’s “committee for truth” have seriously
undermined The Stelle Group’s base of financial support.” This is a libelous
statement directly countered by statements made by the hundreds of people we
contacted. It is also a ludicrous statement because you are telling them the
reasons for their own actions, totally counter to their statements, thus
underlining the fact that you are acting counter to their desires and intent
in suing us and expelling us for contacting them. Every action you take
against us further alienates the people we contacted. They do not support
your court actions against us. They do not support your expulsion proceedings
based on our contacting them. They want integrative solutions. They’re not
interested in your rhetoric. They’re watching your actions. And the shameful
yet predictable scenario you’re playing out speaks volumes to the hundreds of
observers. You’re always talking about the majority. They’re the true
majority. I have reached out to these
people in quite a different way from you. I see these people not as names and
addresses on a list or as checks that come in the mail but as brothers and
sisters in the Brotherhoods’ Work. For the most part they’re feisty,
autonomous people. They don’t see The Stelle Group as a corporation. Their
connection is with Richard and his work for the Brotherhoods. In that regard, I was
interested by a statement Lee Gilbert made at a group meeting last month. He
said that the current membership would “handle the task that was given to
Richard originally.” There is a profound logical error at the base of such
statements. The flaw is uncovered by the wording of Lee’s statement: “the
task that was given to Richard originally.” People will cite the
statement in TUF that no one person is indispensable to the Work or the Plan.
Taking that quote and the fact that the Brotherhoods support democracy, some
TSG/TAO members have the erroneous notion that assignments in the
Brotherhoods’ Work can be determined by majority vote within either group.
But listen again to Lee’s wording: “the task that was given to Richard.
The task was given to Richard by the Brotherhoods. And only the
Brotherhoods can take that task away. How will that be manifest? As always: by
where the people and money are directed. In that regard you would do well
to study the history of The Lemurian Fellowship, Dr. Zitko’s World University,
and The Stelle Group itself. History does repeat itself. Initially,
over a million dollars was directed to The Lemurian Fellowship. Since they
went off track, they haven’t done anything. I corresponded with them
beginning over twelve years ago and have a number of their publications going
way back. They just sit there, decade after decade, a handful of people on
that huge site, talking self-righteously about how important and pivotal they
are and how philosophically elitist and selective they must be and how they’re
the center of this mammoth plan to save mankind – and they don’t do anything.
Dr. Zitko’s World University displays a similar syndrome. With all their
high-blown prose, their big annual activity consists of a handful of people
getting together in Tucson at the Winter Solstice to gain “inside information”
from Phylos. And look at what happened to the last people who tried to do
what you’re trying to do now—claiming that Richard is bad and mentally ill
and that you’re taking over the tasks given to him. Gail, David, and Jim made
those same claims. They claimed they were the “real” Stelle Group, that the
tasks originally given to Richard were now given to Gail. They held the
offices, they wrote the checks, they expelled or pressured out dissenters,
they circulated the Special Communications privately. The same scenario. How
did it end? The money and the people weren’t directed to them. They didn’t
hold together a year. You may, as you’re claiming, be taking over the tasks
given to Richard. But then again you may have separated yourselves from the
Brotherhoods and their Work. I deny that I have violated
any laws. My action in contacting TSG’s deceived donors upholds the high
principles set forth in TUF to the fullest, contrasting powerfully with the
actions of Malcolm and TSG Trustees, concealing information, misrepresenting
the true situation, and now making claims and filing suits regarding TSG
supporters which run counter to their stated desire and will. The strongest
documentation showing the degree to which supporters were deceived is the
content of The Stelle Group Letter, “A New Chapter,” contrasted with the
content of the current Stelle Group Letter, where, at last, a good portion of
Malcolm’s and Robert’s private truth comes out. Now thousands of people can
see for themselves the degree to which they were deceived by the original
whitewash article. However, since you showed no concern for the deceived
donors back in October, I wouldn’t expect you to be concerned about them now
as individuals with rights and desires and wills. What you’ve really made
clear to them is that you haven’t the slightest interest in them but
have an obsessive and possessive interest in their money. The fact
that you’re expelling me for contacting them when they’ve stated that they
want to have two-way communication with me, that you’re suing me for damages
when they’ve stated that their donations are their freewill choice, will
alienate them further. You seem so locked up, so
caught up in fear, anger, and blame, expelling me is an easy way to avoid
taking responsibility for what you have brought into your own environment. |
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