Henry Doktorski: I am Not A Good Devotee!

An important message to all my Krishna Facebook friends:

More than a year ago, after my first book about the Hare Krishnas, “Killing For Krishna,” was published, I began receiving Facebook friend requests from devotees. Hundreds of requests. For a couple months, I ignored their friendship requests. Yes, of course, I have some Krishna Facebook friends, but they are mostly people I know personally; friends from many, many years ago when I myself was a Krishna devotee.

But I hesitated to accept these new friend requests, because I knew that most of these people would be disappointed to discover that I am not a Krishna devotee. Yes, I wrote a book about the Hare Krishnas, about the conspiracy to murder a devotee. I wrote the book specifically for Krishna devotees, not the general public. I felt that Krishna was charging me with the task of telling an important story, a story with an important lesson: beware of deranged devotion.

I was humbled by the hundreds of copies of books that were sold only by word of mouth, and by the dozens and dozens of letters of appreciation I received from former and current ISKCON devotees. I responded that I felt that any credit must go to Krishna, because He inspired me to research and write this book. 

He inspired one New Vrindaban devotee years ago to give me the entire Keith Gordon Ham / Swami Bhaktipada Archive; tens of thousands of pages of classified New Vrindaban documents, investigative reports, trial transcripts and hundreds of letters from Bhaktipada’s personal correspondence. In this archive I discovered confidential documents which revealed in great detail the activities of the members of the murder conspiracy. After discovering this information, I decided that it was my sacred duty to share this information with others.

Anyway, I hesitated to accept these friend requests from Krishna devotees, because I knew they would be disappointed in me. I am not a great devotee. I am not even a devotee. I am not a disciple. Nor am I a follower. I’m just a karmi. But I consider myself a friend to the devotees. I have a few life-long friends who I knew at New Vrindaban, and while we may not agree on many things, due to our shared history we have a friendship. But what about all these hundreds of new Facebook friend requests from people I never heard of?

After a few months, I decided, “Oh, what the hell! I’ll accept these friends requests, and deal with the consequences.” Soon after, I began getting messages from discouraged or critical devotees.

One fellow in Croatia, a man I admire and respect, who posted a very favorable review of my book on his web blog, and who is also dedicated to fighting corruption in ISKCON, happened to notice a photo of my cat which I posted on Facebook. He wrote to me, “I am extremely disappointed. You are a ksatriya. Your book reveals great courage by an author who dares to point out corruption amongst very powerful and wealthy ISKCON leaders. But I am disappointed because you keep a cat in your house. That is not something a great ksatriya would do, keep an unclean animal in the house.”

[PADA: That is of course Hanuman Croatia, who is still promoting the GBC's guru program -- because he STILL says we all need to worship one of their "voted in" members like Jayapataka's bucket boy Bhakti Vikas swami. OK but the average person on the street who owns a cat, would never tell others to worship a "voted in" member of an illicit sex with men, women and children guru's lineage? 

In sum, the average cat lover knows more about who are God's guru successors -- and who is not -- than Hanuman Croatia. Of course Sulochan used to say -- even a cat will not worship an illicit sex guru's program, cats have more God given sense. Therefore, these people would be better off to worship a cat.]

And that's just the start! Besides keeping an unclean animal in the house, I am also a member of the San Diego Scotch Whisky Club and I attend monthly events in which my buddies and I taste unusual and rare whiskies. This is one of my hobbies. It brings me pleasure. I’ve been doing this for decades. Soon after I left New Vrindaban in 1993. I’ve got quite a few Facebook friends who also appreciate fine whiskies. We have a camaraderie.

But after I posted some photos on Facebook about this hobby, some of my Krishna Facebook friends became critical. “Oh! This man drinks alcohol! He is sinful. He must be shunned.” One extremely critical Facebook "friend" (by the way, this fellow is extremely critical to lots of people, not just me) reposted my photos on his own Facebook wall, with derogatory comments. Really, do I need “friends” like this?

A few others wrote me personal messages. One fellow in Italy, a scholar whom I admire and respect, wrote to me, “Kindly clarify for me the rationale of promoting the use of heavy alcohol as a 'sublime' consumption, while being considered by many as a good devotee... of course, your private life is none of my business, anyone can do whatever s/he wants... but exposing things like that on your Facebook page gives a wrong message to all the thousands of your followers... Please, don't mind and get no offense: I just need to understand how you allowed this to happen... a kind request from a puzzled friend...”

Another person, a female devotee in Germany, wrote, “I do not understand Prabhu Henri Doktorski why you post in public such topics as love for whisky. Are you on that way asking help or you are only cool with that. I need your honest answer because I do not understand your motives. So I do not comment you too much on your wall to avoid more disturbances. I also sometimes drink beer or some alcoholic myself, but I will never post that on my wall. I think any kind of weakness is our business, not to make us targets to be criticized on any wall.”

[PADA: Great. So this woman drinks alcohol, but says we should not make that a public issue. That is fine, lets hide our vices. Except various GBC and Gaudiya Matha folks, and even a number of so-called "ritviks" drink alcohol, smoke pot, and / or sell pot and so forth. We really do not have to make a big effort to have that made public, or not made public. 

Its already pretty much known in the devotee communities and / or even in various public media accounts -- that "devotees" of various stripes are not too strict, including various GBC's "gurus." Of course HKC Jaipur folk's shiksha saint Bhakta das was arrested for drug sales, some sort of sex crimes etc., all of which was in the newspapers. Its not like the public is not aware that many so-called "devotees" aren't very devoted. Nor is it a secret a lot of these people are not reliable sources of information. Then again, maybe we could still quote someone like Bhakta das if he has something useful to add, or he could expose some GBC guru's illegal wrong doing somewhere, but he has been a big supporter of the "living gurus."

We have even had some "ritviks" die of alcohol poisoning, die of drug overdose, be sent to jail for various things and so forth. So to admit this or not admit this is not solving the real point; one "big reason" a lot of bad things have gone on (and on) in and around ISKCON is -- that too many devotees were too self-righteous, wrong headed, motivated, foolish, aloof, if not intoxicated, to deal with these problems. 

Henry might drink here and there, but its self-evident he has a good investigative journalism propensity and his book is a better researched document than anyone else has done, or probably ever will do. Of course if people who are sometimes drinking have to investigate, research and resolve our actual ISKCON history here, then what? This begs the question, "Why are the bogus PADA and / or the so-called drinkers class of folks having to write ANYTHING at all, where are the strict devotee writers"? And what is the hold up, 1977 was a VERY long time ago and they cannot come up with any better writings in all this time?]    

Most of my Krishna Facebook friends have assumed that I am a good devotee! In this regard, they are in error! In my book, I NEVER claim to be a good devotee. I NEVER claim to be a devotee. They make an assumption which is not true! Then, when they discover that I enjoy “sinful” activities, like tasting whisky, they become bewildered or critical. But that is okay.

Interesting enough, from my experience, most Krishna devotees break the four regulative principles. Frequently. I have a Krishna friend, a well-known kirtan leader who has his own band. He performs at Ratha-yatra festivals and makes money from his career. When I visited him at his home (a mobile home he shares with his wife), he shared with me his love of fine beer and we tasted several excellent malts.

One of my best friends, a godbrother I’ve known for 40 years who still serves in ISKCON overseas, visited me a few years ago. In great affection, I offered him a private whisky nosing and tasting, which we both enjoyed.

Many devotees smoke marijuana. In fact, I once dated a devotee woman, a wonderful lady, who invited me to take Ecstasy with her. It’s something she does from time to time, and she thought I would enjoy and even benefit from the psychedelic effects.

Not to mention the devotees in ISKCON leadership, even gurus, who do not follow these principles, but break the principles in secret and then cover up. Yet their disciples and followers worship these people as paramahamsas! In my opinion, better to be an honest karmi than a dishonest devotee.

I post these things on Facebook for my friends who also enjoy the things I enjoy. If my devotee Facebook friends have a problem with that, that’s their problem, not mine. If anything, I hope they realize who I am; I’m not a good devotee. I’m not even a devotee. But I am a friend to the devotees, and I am honest. That is why my book has such potency: not because I am a good devotee, but because I am thoroughly honest.

There is a saying that Srila Prabhupada liked to tell: a village woman went to a hermit sage in the forest and asked him, “Please tell my son to stop eating sugar!” The sage said he would, but not until the next day. The woman asked, “Why can’t you tell him today?” The sage responded, “Before I instruct someone to stop eating sugar, first I must stop eating sugar myself. Tomorrow I will tell him.”

Similarly, if I write a book exposing dishonesty and hypocrisy in ISKCON, first I have to expel any dishonesty and hypocrisy in myself. Otherwise I become just as dishonest and hypocritical as those I criticize. I try to be perfectly honest and transparent in my life, and I expect, as much as possible, for those who are close to me, to also be honest and transparent. I hope this helps answer your questions.

Henry uvaca.

P.S. Here are a few photos of my whisky (whiskey) collection!

[PADA: Yep. This is the type of thing we have faced all along. Well PADA is driving a taxi, so he would be better to drop all his writings and go to computer college and get a better job. "PADA needs to be taken off the internet" etc. Fine, then there would be less opposition to the molester messiahs agenda, ok, that is what our opponents really wanted all along. 

Even if one does not drink alcohol (like me) then people like GBC's folks and / or the HKC Jaipur's thugs will make things us and post nasty articles claiming we are drunkards and associates of prostitutes. In other words, child molesting and suicides are fine and wonderful for these folks; And the odious abuse process needs to be continued, because a person complaining about this process is a debauchee. What difference does it make if the person complaining about child abuse is himself a debauchee? That is simply an excuse to allow it. This is called, chopping the legs off the opposition to the abuse agenda. 

Or worse, that means what they are really saying is, only the debauchees class are objecting to their child molesting regime's process. The "strict devotees" are allowing these crimes to continue, the "debauchee" devotees are the only ones objecting. What kind of advertisement is that for being strict devotees? Only the debauchee class devotees have enough common sense to object to child molesting and crimes, the strict devotees are walking away and not fixing this? Only the intoxicated and fallen "fringies" protest that deviants are being worshiped as messiahs, the "strict" devotee do not know this is wrong? Then why would anyone bother being a strict devotee? Its a bad advert.

In other words, the defenders or de facto defenders of the homosexual and pedophile acharya's program are not happy that they are being exposed, this really has nothing to do with our drinking alcohol or not. Sulochan was also criticized in so many ways, because they could not defeat his idea that deviants are not Krishna's appointed guru successors. 

They are simply infuriated that their agenda is being thwarted. At the same time we have to ask, why haven't these so-called "more advanced" "strict" alleged non-drinkers come up with a better written expose plan in all this time, and they seem to be hiding in the bushes somewhere rather than confronting these issues. Why did any of us have to write anything at all ever, whatsoever? Why didn't these so-called strict folks do all the writing from square one? So they are armchair warrior internet trolls, at least as Jagannath das says.

Sounds like a lot of sour grapes at this point. Anyway, all these strict devotees need to start to write better histories and documents. However, they better get going, all of us (and them) are going to be dead pretty soon and our documents will thus stand as the main accepted versions if these strict people don't get off their armchairs and start writing better versions. Heh heh heh.

Its really a question of getting the job done. As Krishna tells Arjuna, if you do this service, you will get the credit. That is our siddhanta. So, if PADA writes, or Henry writes, or Sulochan writes, or Monkey on a Stick writes, or anyone else writes, then so be it. Do better and lets see how that works! 

ys pd]