Deprogramming Premies

Ted Patrick Deprogramming, for our purposes, is the attempt to convince a person to abandon allegiance to the Rawatism "cult", whether the organisation was Divine Light Mission or Elan Vital. The practice typically involved the kidnapping of adult children by persons acting for their parents and the attempt to convince them of their mistaken allegiance to Rawat while holding them prisoner, usually with family members present to allay their fears. This often worked surprisingly well. Similar practices, when done without force, are called "exit counseling".

This practice became extremely controversial because of the illegality of the kidnapping and the arguments over freedom of religion, civil rights and "brainwashing". It was discontinued as the courts in the USA began to jail the people involved or award significant fines in civil cases against them. Prominent deprogrammers the courts disciplined include Ted Patrick and Rick Ross. Critics of the practice focus on the often illegal and violent activities by untrained and unlicensed practitioners while supporters of deprogramming, who were mainly concerned relatives of members, highlight the deceptive, even coercive, religious conversion practices by those groups they considered cults.

According to Rawatism dogma, premies (ie "lovers" - followers of Rawat) could not be deprogrammed because they had an "experience of life" qualitatively beyond normal consciousness and not just a set of beliefs in Prem Rawat and the efficacy of practising his "Knowledge." However, deprogramming premies turned out to be much the same as deprogramming members of other New Religious Movements commonly considered cults such as the Hare Krishnas and the Moonies. "Jim Ardmore" was deprogrammed in 45 minutes of conversation with Ted Patrick and went on to detail his involvement and subsequent deprogramming in Youth, brainwashing, and the extremist cults. He had been slicing tomatoes for 6 hours using an electric meat slicer as part of a team making 20,000 cheese and tomato sandwiches at Millenium '73 which Prem Rawat then calling himnself Guru Mahaaraj Ji called "most Holy and significant event in human history" when he severely damaged his fingers. His mother contacted Ted Patrick to come and talk to him while he was at his parents' home recovering.

Maggie Shivers was successfully deprogrammed and when 28 and a student at Yale university gave testimony before the Judiciary Committee of the House of Delegates in Maryland considering a bill, introduced by Del. Ida G. Ruben (Democrat-Montgomery) which would allow a court to appoint a guardian for 45 days when families could produce evidence that a family member was under some kind of "mind control". She had joined the Divine Light Mission when she was 19 and rose through the ranks to become an administrator at the Divine Light Mission International Headquarters in Denver. During her deprogramming she was told "You know Maharaji has a half dozen expensive cars around the country", and she said, "Hell with you, I'm his accountant and he's got 32 of them, if you really want to know!" Nevertheless her deprogramming was successful and she gave evidence about Rawat's gold plated fittings in his Boeing 707 and his teaching that "premies would shatter into a million pieces if they left".

Richard Cooper, premie of Prem Rawat (Maharaji) Richard Cooper was kidnapped on Feb. 2, 1979 by Ted Patrick and men working for him after Patrick was paid $6,000 by Cooper's mother when she learnt her son drank water in which Prem Rawat's feet had been washed (charanamrit). Cooper was held for19 days before he escaped from the Harry G. Fabe home in Cincinnati by climbing out a third story window. He suffered a fractured hip in the fall, he said. He sued for $8 million for violation of his constitutional rights. he was awarded $50,000 but Patrick had already been bankrupted by litigation and was unable to pay. Cooper testified he was no longer a celibate monastic in the Divine Light Mission ashram but did not explain that this was a unilateral decision by Rawat to close the ashram and not by Cooper's choice.

Cooper remained a devotee until his death in October, 2006 and shilled for Rawat in vanity publishing ("Leaders magazine") and he headed the so-called "Legitimacy Project" in which Rawat's followers attempted to rewrite his career and present him as a renowned international teacher of peace and philanthropist through the use of maximum publicity for the Prem Rawat Foundation's relatively meager donations to charity and the hiring of halls in prestigious institutions to connect Rawat's speeches to their status eg Oxford University, Harvard, the United Nations.

The Emily Deitz case received significant press during the trial of her father and stepmother, deprogrammer Joe Alexander Jr and others for kidnapping her on April 8, kidnapping and holding her prisoner for 14 days until she jumped from a second-story window at night and hitchhiked to a truck stop. When she originally told her parents, "I'm going to a 'Knowledge' session, I'll be gone all day," they paid little attention. Ms. Deitz was a straight-A student who dropped out of college after joining the followers of Guru Maharaj Ji. Mrs Deitz became an anti-cult activist and testified at Maryland Judiciary Committee of the House of Delegates hearing. Though it would be conducted under the shadow of coercion, the deprogramming planned was a simple matter of talking and reasoning with Emily to help her overcome the psychological and emotional control of the cult. If the process was a success, Emily possibly would thank her parents as many successfully deprogrammed cult members have afterward. Their aim, the Deitzes said, was not to dissuade Emily from her beliefs, but to restore her ability to think critically and exercise her own free will. But Emily believed, "I have experiened truth, I have experienced the real, practical experience of the source and essence of this creation."

The personal story of a former premie who joined Divine Light Mission in 1975 and was deprogrammed in 1978 by Ted Patrick is available at Journeys. His parents were moved to arrange the deprogramming once Peter told them he was going to enter a Divine Light Mission ashram and would only be able to see them with the permission of the ashram supervisor.




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