Defending Sai Baba
Author: Bon Giovanni
Publisher: The NEURAL SURFER
Publication date: May 1997
E-mail David Christopher Lane
directly at dlane@weber.ucsd.edu
I
want to go back to the home base now.
From: BON GIOVANNI
In DEFENSE OF SAI BABA
Hello,
The subject line was the title of one of the most posted
articles about Sathya Sai Baba, until I showed the author
was posting fiction.
>thanks for your note. And yes I would be happy to include your letter
>in the reply section.
Thank you David. As indicated in our previous correspondence,
I have now linked your current SCUMBAG article at
http://people.delphi.com/bongiovanni/carp.htm, maintaining
your earlier article on Hislop as well.
>But one curious question: Why are there so many (more than ten that
>I have heard from quite different sources) reports of Sai Baba
>masturbating young kids. I have a long letter from a 16 year old
>who describes Sai's "rubbing" his dick.
As to "why" you hear many reports, I cannot say why, since I
have no idea why-- but I hope you agree there are also reports
that Elvis was recently sighted in a McDonald's. Why are there
so many?
If ten folks wrote online about seeing the King eat a burger
with fries last Tuesday, would you post it online as a fact?
would you check the details in each post? Would you contact
that McDonald's manager so as to confirm the claim? Too, if a
16 year old boy then heard you believed the story, and so
wrote you a long letter describing how he was masturbated by
Elvis in the parking lot of that fast food store, saying he
could still smell the fries on Elvis's breath--would you give
him credence?
At any rate, I do not know "why" any story arises, but I would
hope all men of good will would confirm any story before
accepting it as factual, and so certainly would _first_
verify any letter-writer as an actual person with actual
experience in actual locales, before asserting on a webpage
the tales are factual. That said, did you confirm the
specifics of the claims about Sathya Sai Baba which you now
broadcast as fact on your webpage?
>Now it is fairly obvious to me that these reports are not made up
>(too many specific details, too many people who don't know each
>other, etc.), but I am curious on why Sai--who is allegedly Enlightened--
>would indulge in such behavior.....
I've read your earlier articles and so note how in the past
when you made assertions you had shown greater research skills
than saying `it is obvious'-- but apparently you have
changed your style in order to `expose' Sai Baba. I hope you
will however now state the `many specific details, etc'. For
now however I admit I have no idea why Sai does anything that
he does, much less why he would do what you assert he does.
(Apparently you feel you do *know* exactly what Sai does and
also know exactly why Sai does it).
How do you know?
Tal Brooke seems to be one of your sources about the
`manipulation of genitals'. That Tal took his autobiography
LORD OF THE AIR seriously is one thing, but that you believed
his report without checking with others present at the same
time said, suggests to me that in this matter you do prefer
assumption to research. To offer another perspective, I hope
you will soon read GOOD CHANCES by Howard Levin, (available
at the Toronto site linked on my webpage) since it shows
another view of those days than the one Tal claims as gospel.
As for the "many reports" you have since received... like
yourself, I have been active online for many years, and so
also received many reports in private email and in public
fora. Unlike you however I did not spread unsubstantiated
claims as if fact. Instead I ever urged folks to examine all
claims directly. Like you I too have received many articles
from various persons who claimed this and that experience
with Sai Baba. Some were complaints, some were braggings. I
investigated every item. You say you've received specifics.
Good! Will you share those specifics? If so, I will ask the
author specifically where the event happened, via a detailed
description, so as to compare it to my own knowledge of the
location. (Most of the time, the answer shows if the author
has or has not enhanced a story, told a fact, or just created
a fiction).
That scrutiny over specifics debunked in one week the
`confession of sex with Sai Baba', a treatise that made the
rounds three times in '93 in multiple Usenet fora. When it
surfaced again in '94 at soc.culture.indian I was able to
contact that author by telephone. In his article he had
claimed to have been a student in one of Sai's schools, yet
when I asked for specifics about the school's location, it was
found he did not recall the layout of the campus he claimed
to have attended for three years, nor the name of the railroad
station a block away that connected the school to the city,
nor would he name any of the professors on staff, even though
he had praised the staff in the article as exceptionally
honorable men!
Asking for specifics as to location however is only the first
step. After I determine the person really has knowledge of the
location he or she claims was the venue, I ask for the date
the experience occurred, then check to see where Sai was on
that day. He is after all not invisible, and his daily
location over the last fity-six years is a matter of record.
Deteriming his location is only the second step. If the place
and time prove factual, I then ask the claimant for specifics
as to who besides the claimant knew of the meeting time and
place, since all visitors are seen by many other persons.
You knew that, right?
No doubt you have confirmed directly that any person gaining
access to Sai during daylight hours is seen by all the
invited guests who wait in queue just outside his main door,
and any visitors who then get inside are also then seen
up-close by sevadals (visiting Indian guests who rotate
security duties fortnightly with volunteers from other states)
inside his residence. Visitors after hours however can access
Sai only by passing first through security, then by sevadals ,
then all visitors must pass through the line of college boys
stationed along the hallway leading to Sai's private room,
and then must finally pass by `the stairway boys' (elder
students who have gotten all A's in their last exams, who are
allowed to attend the direct stairway, sole entry to Sai's
private quarters, at all hours in hopes of seeing him even
for a moment).
If any visitor sees Sai, day or night, he or she would surely
recall some or all of that process and so have seen those
other people present en route, and so could describe that
passage with some detail. You see, no one `just walks in.'
Did you ask your correspondents for such details? Did they supply them?
Yes or no, you are certainly welcome to deduce whatever you
wish, however, if you make your `givens' as available to
scrutiny as your online conclusions, all can then see if you
are logical, or if you are spreading fictions as Premanand
often does.
Like him you have spread the rumour that videos exist
proving Sai a fraud, as if you are aware of the specifics.
(Will you name those videos? have you seen them? Did you know
they are not raw newsfilm, but are edited? Did you confirm how
they came into the hands of those who claim they are `proof
of fraud'?)
I ask because the gossip you post online is not new to me,
nor new to me are letter-writers who claim this and that. What
is new however is that in the past you took some care to show
your research when you made claims, but now you speak of Sai
with what looks like only assumption for your basis, but you
present it too as if equally proven fact. For whatever
reason you did that, I do hope you have confirmed, or will
confirm, the stories you now disseminate online, and offer
that data in full.
David, please tell me how you confirmed the specifics in the
stories you allude to? Did you confirm time and place and
description? Did your correspondents detail Sai's location,
attitude, clothing, demeanour, actions? Did any or all use the
same phrase you used : "masturbated"? If so, did any report
ejaculation? Did any report that Sai was breathing lustfully?
Did any say he forced them into compliance? If not, then why
do _you_ call it masturbation or abuse? After all, when a
doctor examines the testicles, it is not masturbation nor
abuse, is it?
Now you may say, "but Sai is not a doctor and so ought not be
examining anything", in which case I would remind you that
he is a doctor of the spiritual realm, in my view, and has in
fact healed more than one person via physical manipulation of
various kinds. Should you then announce that physical
manipulation has nothing to do with the spiritual realm, I
would reply that you might look into hatha yoga and Catholic
mass, hoping you might then reconsider your conclusion.
Still, if all or any of those who wrote you have called it
masturbation and/or abuse, then did any or all describe
themselves as passionate? did they describe Sai as passionate?
Do they all agree in any respects as to what it was like, how
much time was involved, where it was, what was said, how it
ended, what happened later, etc?
You say Sai abuses boys on a regular basis and you announce
he wants that kept a secret. Since you have given no
specifics, I wonder if your use of the words `masturbation'
and `abuse' and `secret' may more aptly describe your
assumption, than any actual fact. If I err, then please tell
on what basis do you deduce? Do you have confirmed reports
that Sai told whoever wrote you, that what transpired between
Sai and themselves is by his insistance SHHHH A SECRET? If
so, do all reports agree in all respects? If not, how is it
you announce them all as if proven fact?
I am sorry I went on so long, but your few paragraphs online
do suggest you have more assumptions going on behind the
scenes, more even than I have outlined here. Although I
repeated myself a bit, I hope you give your reply at least as
much thought as I have given your online article.
At any rate, thanks for considering my viewpoint.
*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*
In every course you take, have the LORD in mind:
He will see that your paths are smooth. Proverbs 3:6
*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*
*+*
http://people.delphi.com/bongiovanni/moral.htm
PS: Thanks for offering McWilliam's book despite the current
lawyer flap; I admire your decision to keep it available online.
E-mail The Neural Surfer directly
at dlane@weber.ucsd.edu
I want to go back to the home base now.
