MICHAEL KROHNEN THE VULGAR LIBRARIAN AT KRISHNAMURTI FOUNDATION AMERICA KFA

Also See:

Pages About Grohe & Gang and their influence mongering in Krishnamurti foundations, KFT, KFA:




“You can easily judge the character of a man by how he treats those who can do nothing for him. — Goethe


MICHAEL KROHNEN THE VULGAR LIBRARIAN AT KRISHNAMURTI FOUNDATION AMERICA KFA


Shocking Witness Statement

First let's look at the statements of a gentleman who witnessed Michael Krohnen assaulting me.

The witness gentleman called Michael Krohnen / "they" as fascist and said they had done the same thing to him.  

He saw Krishnamurti in 1979 for the first time and went to all the talks since then in Ojai, and traveled to India and Europe to attend K's talks. This is what he told me, on a recorded line, as per his agreement, and he agreed to testify in any court as a witness that Krohnen assaulted me. He was in total disbelief as I was, when Krohnen outright assaulted me because of the vulgar bully that he was. 

He wanted Krohnen who was standing nearby to hear him so he said these with a loud voice. 

Reza: Let’s go on that side, he [Michael Krohnen]'s sitting there. 

The witness had entered the grounds a big early, prior to the event, to enjoy the ambiance and beauty of the land.

“I want the <a word> to hear what I’m saying. I was in the front of the archive building, in the sun, I did some exercises and I was resting to gather energy before the talk. Here comes the <a word>. 'Are you camping here?'. I looked at him right in his fucking eyes. I said, you think I’m camping here? He said 'Yes you’re camping here. Is that your car?' He  knows my car, I worked here before, we worked to change this place but things went wrong, they lost money in the stock market and so on [due to Mark Lee's reckless speculation with Foundation money against K's express wish]. He said 'Yes, you’re camping here and I’m kicking you out right now'. I said look, you fascist <a word>. This is not the first time you’re approaching me with this fucking attitude. I want you to shut up and leave me alone. He went on saying something, I said, listen, you leave me alone because I don’t know what’s next. And this is not the first time you’re approaching me with this ugly ugly attitude. I went for a walk just to let it go but I ended up being 5 minutes late for the talk – I came early to be on time but had to go for a walk because of him."

He came to KFA to help make it a better place. He was fired because of a letter Krohnen wrote, and previously Krohnen had used the F words on him -- which he found shameful given the sanctity of the land there. But now, he was so mad because he was harassed by Krohnen, and later he witnessed Krohnen assaulting me like a stupid crazy bully. So he served Krohnen plenty of F and A words. 

He called Krohnen a "dog". "This dog has to leave this beautiful piece of land because look what  happened here [shows bare land] – look what’s happening – we can’t finish the project because of people like him – we can’t do nothing – this thing has died now – look [shows bare land]".

He believes Krohnen is a racist and that's why Krohnen wrote a dishonest that led to his firing. Krohnen also wrote an extremely dishonest letter to the Trustees in response to my complaint. Despite witnesses that saw him physically assaulting me -- totally unprovoked -- like a crazy madman bully -- he lied to the Trustees and deleted the assault from the story line as though it did not happen! 

He offered to be there and tell his story any day and to testify as a witness and he saw that the idiot bully assaulted me and he was not the only one who saw it because this was in bright daylight in a room with many people there other Witnesses as well

Witness: "Somebody Like you and me must open our mouth because this dog has to leave this beautiful place. He's a dog and he think he can bite but he cannot bite. He's a stupid dog but he still creates a problem. Look at us. We could be be sharing something here but we're talking about that <a word>."


The witness encouraged me not to accept apology. "This <a word> has to leave this beautiful land."

 He asked for my help because he says he cannot do it because of his circumstances. They fired people 15 of us including people who have been here for 20 years period - beautiful people. The reason he [Krohnen]'s here is because he licks <>". That is so true. I've never seen a bigger brown-nose. Kissing up to Diane White who has a lot of  money -- or Friedrich Grohe who has a lot of money and power and gives him free trips across the Atlantic -- but his character shows in relationship to people who are below him or whom he views as a threat, or people he's jealous of because he's shown to be caught in comparison and image making -- and shown to be clueless about K's teachings -- a fanatic follower who likes to repeat what K said as an authority whilst K clearly warned against that: he always said find out for yourself. That takes intelligence, which was not Krohnen's strength. It's much easier to repeat, and then get worked up, loud, and become a thug, a bully, when the believe is challenged.

Witness: "People do not come in the library because of this[Krohnen] <a word>. Trust me on this." He said he's willing to sign - he's willing to testify and he's one of the several people who are willing to have their voice heard about "this ugliness".  He said he knows other people who have been wronged by Michael Krohnen and don't want to go to the library because of him.

Also see the story of the lady who was harassed by Michael Krohnen: https://www.rezamusic.com/writings/on-j-krishnamurtis-work/michael-krohnen-mistreating-lady-visitor-to-kfa-krishnamurti-library-ojai


I heard that after assaulting me and harassing the witness, and harassing the lady, and getting caught, Krohnen whined to Friedrich Grohe, blaming us his victims -- to win points and sympathy, especially given I had published a massive report about the Grohe Gang, documenting their reckless actions in regards to Krishnamurti's work (see The Fifth Foundation Report: https://www.rezamusic.com/writings/on-j-krishnamurtis-work/the-fifth-foundation ). Krohnen provoked Friedrich Grohe against me after my report was published, again as an ass-kissing gesture, to win points with the big money boss.  Subsequently, Krohnen did receive perks, as he had before, including a trip from California to Switzerland to attend the summer gathering, paid by Friedrich Grohe.



Here are some correspondence about Krohnen assaulting me in the Library in Ojai:


Notice of Illegal Activity by Michael Krohnen

 

Dear KFA Trustees:

 Those of you who "know" me for a long time may know that it takes a lot for me to write the kind of document you find herein. I don't escalate things easily, but this one is really bad.

 Last year Michael Krohnen acted totally inappropriately in a number of ways (e.g. making foundation policy, threatening, bullying) and demonstrated a disturbing level of illusion and a self-made reality which was out of touch with facts, but I let it go.

 Recently it repeated again, but in a much worse degree, involving physical violence, profanity, and total disrespect for the space of the library he's entrusted with. It is now time to say something to you about it -- not as a complaint, but for your information.

 This letter is solely intended to inform you of a side of the behavior of your librarian which is not always revealed to the powerful and rich.

 Krishnamurti was not a vulgar man. The least the foundations can do is to put people in charge of running his libraries who are not vulgar. But having been close to K is apparently used as a criteria for staffing decisions. All this will change in a hundred years, so I'm not worried :-)

 THE INCIDENT
 ============
 It's a long story. I was invited to participate in a talk in one of the libraries. Before the talk I was talking to a friend and her adorable 9-month old son when your employee rudely interrupted this peaceful, affectionate exchange and shouted from the back of the room, "Reza come here".

 Absolutely, 100% unprovoked, he demanded in his loud voice, as though he was addressing the whole place, that I should apologize for something I had written some years ago. Of course I feel no regret whatsoever about what I had written and last time he had an emotional eruption about the same subject ("the earlier incident"), I invited a mediated session and asked him to point out exactly what he has a problem with and I will review it. He failed to do so but objected to anyone outside the foundations making comments about the work of the foundation. This is also an invalid point and the best  proof is a recent case where I pointed out something which resulted in a foundation resending their group mail and deleting a reference to a tabloid written about K.

 I have documented both this and "the earlier incident" in further detail. If you like a copy let me know. I rewrote the event in this email in order to present it in a briefer format.

 ILLEGAL ACTIVITY: PHYSICAL VIOLENCE. AND PROFANITY
 =============================================
 The vulgarity didn't stop there. I invited him to carry his (irrational) argument outside but he continued, clearly aiming to make me react which I did not. I asked him if he's representing the person he's speaking for, and in return he said, right in the middle of the K-library while he was on official duty, "F--- You" (100% unprovoked). I felt intimidated and began to move away. He took a step, turned and blocked me, and hit me in the chest. This is against the law. He provoked me to respond at his level: to cuss or hit him back, but I absolutely did not, because that is not my style  -- I remained calm, in total disbelief of witnessing how illusion can lead to violence.

 Because I am friends with the foundation, I did not file a police report but another person might have, and you run that risk with this kind of behavior.

 WITNESS
 ========
 The discussion was wonderful. It was recorded and you can hear it if you wish. Some of you were  there. After the meeting one of the people who had seen this saga came up to me and said the librarian's behavior was a shame. He called his act and the foundation as "Fascist". I don't know about Fascist but your employee appeared mentally imbalanced.

 OUTSIDE
 ========
 On the way out, the librarian had his hat and coat out and as I left, he followed me. He grabbed my arm. I was outside the door. He was inside. I said: "don't touch me" and ran out of fear. One of the trustees was walking towards us and was the only one out there. I told him, instinctively, as I ran, that this guy is attacking me. I did not know any better. An hour earlier he had attacked me verbally and hit me in the chest. If he was so violent inside, I would not want to be with this emotionally unbalanced, violent guy outside in a dark night.

 NEXT DAY
 ========
 The next day, after a mutual friend / trustee talked to him, he approached me to talk -- I requested a physical distance due to fear of another physical attack -- he continued his crazy demand, but after I reminded him of his crazy behavior the day before, he not only apologized but he totally retracted his demand that I should apologize for what I had written. It did not sound sincere as it seemed rooted in fear, but it was helpful of course because when a person sees their wrong action, if they do, it's a step in the right direction.

 He rationalized his grabbing my arm as I left the building as a friendship gesture. I don't know of any culture where cussing, hitting, and backstabbing (which he's done plenty of in his efforts to win political points and other goodies) are acts of friendship.

 WRONG ROLE?
 ============
 This person has no respect for the space of the library whatsoever. Do you think he’s placed in the right role? He has positive qualities and talents, but it's a typical management error to put the right person on the wrong job, which ends up exposing them to many risks and problems. So, as a friendly suggestion, you may wish to revisit how you allocate your resources.

 Krishnamurti's legacy might deserve better than to have an irrational vulgar person in charge of his library.

 OTHER NOTES
 ============
 - It is undoubtedly not his business to make the demand he made because he absolutely had nothing to do with it, and no such role was delegated to him by anyone.

 - What he says about my writings is very cluttered. Unnecessarily and unfortunately, he has churned the subject so much in his head, and in gossip, that he has developed a number of highly illusive, distorted, senseless, and untrue conclusions about the subject. At times he engaged in the old trick of “shoot the messenger” and character attacks to win points. Remember how K warned about pitfalls of concentration on the man vs. the message? That’s a long story…  So take everything he says on the subject with a grain of salt. My published writings are all on my site -- I urge you to read and think for yourself. If there is a trustee who think it is wrong to write (one condemns them without having claimed he has not read them), that outsiders have no business commenting on the foundation, there are several trustees/staff in different foundations, and others, who appreciate my writings and find some value in them. Anyway, I don’t write to win appreciation.

 - Even if he had a perfectly reasonable case for discussion, it would be inappropriate and disrespectful to the space of the Library for him to make such a public scene. The fact that he was being irrational and unreasonable in his demands (proof is the next day he completely withdrew his demands for which he made that whole scene the prior day) makes it more disconcerting.

 - The offense took place while he was on official duty, working and representing the foundation.

 - It is extremely alarming that he takes the liberty to make imaginary policies for the foundation in order to bully others (this is explained in the expanded version of this as stated above), and then falsify the foundation's stance in his communication to public. He has abused his power as such on more than one occasion. Is having been close to K, and apparently having security in one's job for life, a license for this reckless behavior which exposes the foundation to serious risks?

 - There are a number of people who are reluctant to go to K library because of the librarian's attitude. This was never the case in the last 28 years. Perhaps the comfort and job security together with a feeling of possessing K, a self-imposed sense of authority due to proximity to K, lots of illusive thinking, emotional and mental imbalance, deep frustrations, being put in the wrong role, or whatever it might be, has created a situation that management ought to be aware of. That is the sole purpose of this letter. I have no claims but will be happy to answer any questions.

 Best Wishes
 Reza Ganjavi



UNCOVERING OF MICHAEL KROHNEN’S LIES


 

-- 19 April 2011 By Reza Ganjavi

 

Version 2 – 20 April 2011 – added remark “affiliated” & feedback

 

SECTION 1. DISCLAIMER

 

1. I don’t care if Michael Krohnen or anybody else lies. I only care and am pointing these out because he is representing the foundation in saying some of these lies. My aim is not to influence you. The decisions you make for running the foundation is your business. All I want is for the foundation to be a little philosophical, wonder, explore, question, try to find out the truth of the matter. We all owe that to K’s legacy to not settle with any image, politically favorable or not.

 

2. A holistic look at this problem of your librarian bullying and attacking someone who was explicitly invited to come there reveals more about the problems with the power structure of the foundation, namely James and Mark's roles, than just the librarian's mindset and vulgarity. It also indicates to me as a professional engaged in resourcing decisions, that the foundation may have made errors in role assignments, terminations, and non-termination. K was quick to fire people. But these days, it seems the opposite is true.

 

3. James should be reminded that I am not writing this for the heck of it, I'd much rather not having had to spend this time, but it is critical that you see the other side of the image and story they're feeding you.

 

4. I must be from an old fashioned school because I view truth as the most important thing in life. Truth has tremendous power. It does not need falsehood in order to stand. I absolutely have no reason to speak any falsehood here or elsewhere. If I write about a fact, it is a fact. If I express an opinion, it is tentative.

 

5. I also come from my father’s school of thought, who had a stellar legal career, that litigation should be avoided unless it is absolutely choiceless. That, plus my friendship with the foundation, prevented me from seeking prosecution against Michael Krohnen for battery and related torts. I understand he mentions hoping to get a restraining order for harassment, after him having attacked me! Talk about class!! In fact I would encourage him to proceed with such a wishful idea because for once he will be forced to put some substance behind his crazy claims.

 

6. As I have said before, my responsibility is to approach all parties mentioned herein with a blank mind next time we meet, if there is ever a next time. I have no hard feelings against anyone. Each person’s regard or disregard for truth alone will determine their faith.


 

SECTION 2. INVITATION TO QUESTION

 

In case you're interested to question some of the vague charges stated by Michael Krohnen, let me provide a few details which he either is misinformed or uninformed about, or prefers to ignore, eliminate, or lie about. When people start lying in order to hang on to positions of privilege we have a case of corruption. Politically convenience can not be put ahead of truth. It is always worth asking why K dreaded having organizations around his name.

 

While it seems there is a dynamic fresh aspect to KFA's board, there is also a heavy handed authoritarian aspect which reportedly had a hand in the incident I was a victim of. Where there is reason there is no place for violence. But in dictatorial mindsets the attacked is at fault no matter what. Michael Krohnen attacked me as I was talking to a mother and her child, and I will probably end up being the bad guy -- because he's backed by two guys who blessed his irrational action which invariably led him to engage in violence.

 

Here are some facts you might not know but have heard distorted inferences to, because the biggest image maker is guarding the work of a man who considered the mechanism of psychological image making as detrimental; a man with disregard for truth representing a man whose central theme was the importance of finding truth. If resorting to falsehood in order to maintain power and position is not corruption İ do not know what is. I am not alleging these out of the blue. I have proof:


 

SECTION 3. LIES, MISREPRESENTATIONS, AND FALSE, UNTESTED ASSUMPTIONS

 

1.    Michael Krohnen's entire argument around <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated> as a justification for his attack is frivolous. Here's why:

a.     There has never been any grounds for that ridiculous idea, period. I have been a friend of the foundations and schools for years. The reason Michael Krohnen cites for this “almost” status is involvement in the Diane saga. Please see below for discussion how the other trustees had me involved and continued my involvement and were totally ok with it. So that reason can not be true.

 

b.    If the Board had ever investigated the matter they and heard my side of the story they would know they’re missing some critical details about how their own members had me involved (which I have proof of). In a nutshell, if there were ever an objective investigation, the conclusion would have been there’s no grounds for PNG and if there was anyone to blame it would be the Trustees who had me involved, e.g. James. If you want to make the escape goat, that’s a different story.

 

c.     Having written to the trustees reporting on some actual occurrences associated with Diane and providing exactly when and how she misrepresented the truth and abused her position does not constitute grounds for being declared PNG. James and Mark were involved in these discussions as well and they had me involved for a long time, and there was never a single objections to anything I said or wrote, and in fact I was being motivated and encouraged in engaging in the discussions (one example being James’ discussions about the plans to “Kill the King” – that he is so powerful that you have to make sure if you kill him he’s dead).

 

d.    It could have been the case that some of the Board members (e.g. Mark and James) thought, we don’t like the fact that Reza reported these political dramas publicly, but you’re dealing with a member of public, whom at the same time as being involved by you for political purposes, is being blamed, so the least I could do is to tell the story of what had happened. Why should anybody ever be afraid of facts? There was nothing secret about it. I did not invade anybody’s privacy. I did not have malice towards Diane at a personal level. I only reported how she was abusing her official role. If this is grounds for making a person PNG, please go right ahead, make my day.

 

e.     There could not have been a Board decision, present or past, which he was enforcing. The proof is, the very next day, he told me, you are welcome to come here anytime. What happened to the PNG status?!! So before he made policy, and if says he didn’t and the policy already existed, he was now reversing policy !!

 

f.      If there was a PNG decision why did he say “almost” – and if it was truly “almost” talking Rowan and her beautiful kid was not a violation to take that “almost” level to an absolute level.

 

g.     If there was such a decision, why wasn’t it ever communicated to me with a rational, well-investigated, non-dogmatic reason – not a decision based on like or dislike or prejudice? I had no communications on the matter except 2 times Michael Krohnen having emotional eruptions.

 

h.    I had never disrespected any of your facilities, events, never violated your rules and policies. There was never any grounds for this crazy idea except dislike, which I try to explore hereunder.

 

i.      So fact is, there was no case, and because of that, Mark, James, and Michael Krohnen resorted to bullying. If there had been a rational sensible reasonable formal decision, all they had to do is hand it in. There was no reason for that savage behavior of cussing and hitting me while James is sitting on the couch, smiling, and enjoying his dose of free entertainment.

 

j.      They were making foundation policy without Board’s approval (abuse of power). Their aim seems to be to provoke me, make me act uncivilized, and that would give them grounds for what they wished, which they didn’t have; and they didn’t get it. In all of the 25+ years I’ve been coming to this town, nobody has ever heard me shout, let alone respond to a bully at his level. I can write what I see.

 

2.    He conveniently skipped the part where he cussed and hit me in his declaration of what happened.

 

3.    He is lying about me having written to Claudia Herr, and that I distorted the event. I did not. I happened to be writing to FG on that same Sunday and mentioned the subject. I did not write to Claudia Herr at all – I almost never do, unless she writes to me on Friedrich’s behalf and I answer her. It was a brief email and there was nothing distorted in it – just a summary of what had happened in a short paragraph.

 

4.    He is misrepresenting the truth about his confronting me in "Saanen". Michael also saw it upon himself to protect Friedrich -- not protect, but rather provoke. He wrote a letter to him after I published a report on “the Fifth Foundation” (available on my website). He got his flight paid for Switzerland that summer to attend the gathering. And there, he was giving me dirty looks – we didn’t talk much at all really. He had nothing logical and rational to say, to the best of my recollection. It was comical and sad that the organizer of the same event, a trustee of another foundation, whom I believe her home-based center probably still gets financial assistance from Friedrich (or an organization affiliated with him), was telling me how wrong I was to have attacked him – I didn’t – I just wrote some important things about his organization which helped raised awareness and made a positive difference (read some reader comments in the same file – including from many trustees).

 

I asked her if she had read the report that she was condemning. She said no. This is how illusive it gets in these circles. Michael Krohnen’s reaction was of the same turf-mentality. Meanwhile, Friedrich and I discussed the subject and moved on and enjoyed a good relationship while these “protectors” seem to be stuck on an attack that never happened! That caused some tension but we got over it. I am only mentioning it because Michael Krohnen referred to it.

 

Michael Krohnen came back to the US reporting falsehoods to Mark which when Mark told me I was blown away at the level of illusion. The organizer who had not read the report told me not to go that year – I didn’t – but after she cooled off and realized she should have at least read the report, and that just perhaps, I didn’t attack Friedrich like she imagined it, I went the following year and after that I chose not to go because

 

 

5.    Michael Krohnen is lying about me having brought vicious accusations about the schools. He can not cite a single such case to back up his lie.

6.    Michael Krohnen is lying that I fabricated anything. Why should I have? I prefer to spend my time playing guitar than dealing with this nonsense. I was attacked. I reported it just as it happened.

7.    Michael Krohnen is lying that I lied about things. I am listing his lies. He is not able to provide a single lie I ever said. Talk is cheap, and illusions abundant!

8.    Michael Krohnen makes vague accusations about being judge and prosecutor, etc. – it’s so vague I can not respond to but just to say it has the character of gossip grapevine which never wants to see the light of day because otherwise it will dissipate.

 

SECTION 4. A NOTE ABOUT MARK & JAMES’ ATTITUDE

 

If you look at history, specially at the medieval period, organizations have always hated independent people. Organizations want people to conform, to not question their ways. Michael Krohnen has specifically said that people outside the foundation have no business commenting on the work of the foundation. We know this dogmatic view is false because such outside views have sometimes helped the foundation.

I recently found a letter from Mark from 1983 or 84 thanking for the volunteer service and inviting me back to help in next year's talks. I organized and played for fundraisers, and volunteered on a variety of projects and events.

 

Mark and I have been friends for many years – been to his house many times, shared many meals, and traveled together (e.g. we did the first Santa Sabina dialogues driving up with Frode).


 

THE DIANE WHITE SAGA


Mark was involved in the discussions around Diane. He told me how terrible she was just as James did, and they both, specially at an extensive level, James had me involved in the whole Diane saga. They both later turned against me, IMO, so as to shift the blame for the whole thing on me. So be it!

 

Michael Krohnen on the other hand, never knew about the fact that I was explicitly involved in this by James and a couple of other trustees, and concluded all his illusions and later went on a mission to protect Diane – but I wasn’t even attacking her. I just pointed out that she was apparently put in the wrong role. The document is there on my site, you can read it for yourself. I did not mention her name to protect her identity.

 

James was publicly talking against Diane. He caught her lies just as I did. She boosted the level of cunning political games in the foundation and that attitude still seems to remain. Several trustees wanted her out – James was counting the votes -- and my role in all that started when I got fed up with Diane's lies and I wrote to the trustees about it. James had me involved, and I have records of this just in case anyone's interested, so I don’t understand all this nonsense echoed by Michael Krohnen about why was Reza involved. Michael has a problem why I wrote she often wears black. But that’s a fact – I have never seen her wear any other color.

 

James further appeared to have a genuine interest in me sexually based on several comments he made but I was never interested. I further disagreed with him on the views his expressed about nature of sexuality. I remained straight. This is only significant, IMO, as they say in Persian, “a cat can’t get to the meat and he says it stinks”. I am only guessing why these two people turned antagonistic. Michael Krohnen’s case is clear: lots of illusions and misinformed conclusions.

FRIEDRICH GROHE'S KLI


I believe Mark also became antagonistic because he flip-flopped his position on Kinfonet and I reflected his view from the time before the report was written. Just guessing.

 

SECTION 5. <the lady Krohnen harassed>’S CASE IS TOTALLY INDEPENDENT OF ME

Michael Krohnen’s notion that <>'s case is somehow distorted, exaggerated, or influenced to meet some hidden agenda of mine is totally frivolous. I do not have a hidden agenda. I don’t care if he’s fired or not. I don’t care what the foundation does. I assume <> told her story as it happened. I do not know that either. I was one of several people who suggested to her to write to the foundation as a way:

 

 

 

Some feedback

 

“courageous letter!”

 

“Thanks for sending the letter Reza, I read the entire document and I appreciate the communication.”

 

“This may be more about the person who put him in this position than the guy himself. The guy may be corrupt but the guy who put him in that position may be more corrupt”.

 


Update


Not sure which version I sent:

Version 1 

With apologies for a second email, and taking your time again. Wanted to share with you an mail I sent to Michael Krohnen today.  (see below after the intro text). I always try to keep emails to a minimum.

By the way, the letter I wrote you earlier today "Amendment to the notice about Michael Krohnen" was also sent via KFA's website. Let's see if it can find its way to you, in case email doesn't, without getting distorted by KFA's management with psychological images. 

KFA has done a lot of good work but in my opinion, its character is no different than any ordinary organization in certain ways. One would of course hope that a "K organization" would be philosophical, in the sense of being eager to find truth, and also, to live 'the teachings' of its founder. It is not for anyone to judge whether any party lives the teachings or not, but there is sufficient evidence to suggest that KFA, has had an "organizational ego" and that it has engaged in "institutional image making" meaning where off the bat, a person is characterized and handed over to people who do not know him, with a very subjective image, of course, falsely presented as truth.

There are always motives behind such actions, mostly, as means of self-protection. KFA has had a nasty past in dealing with a number of people in this way, upsetting many people, but let's move forward not back. I only mention this because it seems that same approach is still in effect, as evidenced by M.Krohnen's bullying.

My interest in taking the time to write these things is from a philosophical standpoint. It is interesting to witness what happens to a great man's work after he dies, and in some ways I feel responsible, having known him, to, at the very least, point out what I see. 

The Krohnen case was a perfect example of a form of corruption: turning a blind eye to mistakes, fostering a bully, empowering a bully to go after people instead of dealing with them rationally and in a civilized way. These are rooted in fear. If KFA could deal with events rationally and sanely it wouldn't need to bully people like Krohnen tried to do to me and several other people. He's never had a case. I tried to hear him out several times. His reasons for bullying have been frivolous and rooted in false conclusions, lies, and illusions. He accuses people of lying because he lies himself in order to protect his position. But he has not been able to point out a single place where I've ever lied. 

Why else would you need to bully? Violence begins where reason ends.

With that long intro, here's the email to him. I feel affection for him, and back to my management science roots, I believe it's a fault of the management for having placed him in the wrong role, having empowered him and rewarded him, apparently, in the wrong way. But I understand we have a new foundation with new trustees who are hopefully not intimidated by Krohnen, his buddies, and their self-protective conclusions.

Good wishes

Reza Ganjavi


Version 2

Dear Trustees

 

By the way, the letter I wrote you earlier today "Amendment to the notice about Michael Krohnen" was also sent via KFA's website. Let's see if it can find its way to you, in case email doesn't, without getting distorted by KFA's management with psychological images.

 

KFA has a track record of trying to discredit the messenger in order to discard the message, and typical of Dark Ages organizations (which may be why K was so wary of organizations), it has a track record of "institutional image making" meaning where off the bat, a person is characterized and handed over to people who do not know him, with a very subjective image, of course, falsely presented as truth.

 

There are always motives behind such actions, mostly, as means of self-protection. KFA has had a nasty past in dealing with a number of people in this way, upsetting many people, but let's move forward not back. I only mention this because it seems that same approach is still in effect, as evidenced by M.Krohnen's bullying.



Letter to Michael Krohnen

 

I am sure by now you know that I have written to the KFA about the incident at the Library. If you happen to have seen a copy you will see that it was not a complaint or claim but it was to inform them what had occurred. I don't have anything personally against you despite all the troubles you've created for me over the years to cater to the rich and powerful -- I don't think about those. However, I thought it was important that the trustees know what had occurred. They can judge it for themselves if they want to. Often these things are partly a management problem because they put people talented in one area into another area or push them into roles they might not be able to perform well at. I do not know if this is the case here -- just speaking generally.

 

Of course all the material facts I reported were factual. I absolutely had no reason to make up any of that. If you find any inaccuracies in the material facts reported of course you're welcome to address it with me -- I am always willing to retract / correct what I've ever written if a reasonable and rational case is reported.

 

Again, as I was last time I met, I have a responsibility to meet you fresh, without a trace of the past, with a quiet mind. I had love for you last time I walked into the library before you turn it into a horrible situation.

 

As for friendship, I think we have very different values, too different to be friends per-se, but again, I am always open to relating in a civilized mutually respectful way in the present if our paths cross again.

 

Take care and good wishes


Reza



LONG VERSION OF THE COMPLAINT ABOUT MICHAEL KROHNEN'S VULGAR, ILLEGAL ASSAULT 


 THE LONG VERSION

[ This was the first letter I wrote but it was too long so I shortened it and didn't send this version) 

LIBRARY’S MANAGEMENT

 

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

This is written in the utmost spirit of friendship. It is an act of friendship and not a claim or a legal threat. I hope that this report will help you mitigate your future risks better because what happened to me could happen to someone else who might react differently. I could have pressed charges against your librarian but didn’t. Someone else might.

 

The librarian of a Krishnamurti library recently had an emotional explosion which led to him polluting the space of the library with profanity, threats, and illegal battery. The matter was 100% unprovoked. The following article contains the sequence of events, opinions on possible motives, and discussion on why this reaction was utterly crazy and unjustified.

 

Presently the foundations are faced with a challenge which will not be a long term one: Do people who were close to K get a special privilege, and are resources allocated based such a privilege, or based on their character and qualifications?

 

Everyone has talents and the challenge of good management is to utilize those talents effectively, if there is a need for it, and if not, to put people in the wrong roles usually leads to disasters.

 

PREFACE

This document is solely intended to inform you of certain facts regarding a couple of incidents in relationship to the management of the library, and simply share with you a set of observations through the eyes of a fellow human, a professional management consultant, and someone who cares for this work. There is no hidden agenda, and no axe to grind. The first incident occurred recently. The second occurred last year and is only recollected here to indicate that the recent incident was not an isolated event.

 

In the past, the organization has been quite “political”, and facts were twisted to suit political agendas and power play. But it appears that something has changed and it is moving in a good direction. Hopefully, you strive to make the foundation free from the kinds of weaknesses which K challenges us as humans to be free from, such as psychological image making. And as a philosophical place, it ought to strive to find truth and not settle for anything less.

 

That has not always been the case, and possibly the following incident is an example of the residue of this attitude, and consequences of fake power which is assumed by proximity to K.

 

INTRODUCTION


I have been a victim of bullying by an employee of KFA, Michael Krohnen, on at least a couple of occasions, and that doesn’t count the number of times he’s backstabbed me for his political gains which I ignored. I can handle bullying but not at the vulgar and uncivil level the bully intends. I deal with it rationally – as long as there’s some rationality left in the world – and attempt to find out what the problem is, and if it’s solvable to take actions to resolve it, and if not, move forward.

 

Your bully shouts, cusses, threatens, hits, and engages in vulgar behavior which I do not engage in because it’s not my style. Such behavior is the result of lack of clarity and rationality. When reason runs out violence begins. Truth has its own power; it never needs violence to supplement it.

 

In life there are people we befriend, find synergy, and enjoy spending time with, and those whom we acquaint but not necessarily need to deal with them. I have “known” Michael Krohnen for a long time and have always been respectful to him but in too many incidents it was proven to me, that he’s not a kind of guy I could trust; we have different values, and different temperaments.

 

The respect I mentioned was a basic respect we owe to everyone: to relate without an image. In both of the incidents below, I entered the situation with inner quietness, with no shadow of the past, and with affection for Michael Krohnen. Both unprovoked situations were turned into bitter confrontations which I refused to get dragged into at the level he intended.

 

My concerns which led me to write this, are:

1)     That this person may have been placed in a wrong role. In organizational behavior it is well known that the best of people put in the wrong role could create problems for the individual and the organization. That is for you to look into if you wish to. I have no intentions to insist on this possibility.

2)     That having been close to K by itself is not a privilege that can be abused.

3)     I believe that the space that is guarded by Michael Krohnen deserves much more respect that it is getting now.

4)     Continuation of this type of behavior poses the organization at undesired risks. I was actually hit by Michael Krohnen, absolutely unprovoked, and as far as I know this is against the law. Of course, being friend with you and this work, I’d rather just to report this to you and leave it in your hands.

 

INCIDENT 1 – PROVOCATION & ILLEGAL CONTACT

Recently I visited the library as per an invitation by a speaker who was there. Met Michael Krohnen upon entry, with no image, no fear, no past, with greeted him with affection.

 

About 10 or more minutes before the program starts I was talking to a friend and adoring her beautiful, precious, alert, 9-month old little king when X rudely interrupted this tender exchange by proclaiming in a loud voice from the back of the room: “Reza come here” and continued with the same volume, issuing a decree that I should apologize to Y, a wealthy woman, ex-trustee, who was actually sitting next to the little king’s mother and there was a peaceful atmosphere until Michael Krohnen erupted. For what? For something I had written three years ago which had nothing to do X and there was nothing in it that was false, malicious, defamatory, or anything that I regret or should apologize for, and plenty of time has past since its publication for any claims, but X was not even mentioned in it!

 

I suggested to him, that out of respect for others who didn’t need to hear this loud, emotionally charged, irrational decree – and out of respect for the library’s space – to take this to another room. But he was on a roar and continued his offensive and open invitation for confrontation by saying you’re almost not welcome here and you know it. No, I don’t know it at all, and in fact I was welcomed there by the owner on a number of occasions, and for this event, I was invited there by the speaker himself and felt very welcomed by the love of many friends there. That happens to be against the librarian’s dithered sentiments but the librarian can’t make policy. Policy is made based on rationality and facts not like and dislike based on a bunch of illusory images.

 

He publicly provoked me to respond to him in his vulgar way but I did not because I cannot relate to that vulgarity. He was obviously intending on making a public scene that would lead me to react and then he’d have a case against me. As it stands he has zilch, nothing, against me except a bunch of illusions.

 

Instead, the response he got was my saying “you’re entitled to your opinion”. I meant it. But I do know as a fact that his opinion regarding this matter is not the foundation’s opinion. He’s obviously making it up and the proof is simply the fact that there is absolutely no ground for it whatsoever, has never been, and will never be. In the event that a person is not welcome it is the responsibility of the organization to communicate such a sentiment and specify the specific reason. For the librarian to communicate his irrational emotions to people as a statement of policy is inappropriate.

 

The response I received from Michael Krohnen when I told him he was entitled to his opinion was "F___ you!"

 

I tried to move away from who seemed to be an out of control, mad man, and a strong one – I truly felt scared a bit not knowing what he’d do next – could not believe what I was witnessing – and almost by instinct tried to move towards the front of the room where there were more people.

 

Michael Krohnen blocked my way by turning and taking a step in front and hit me in the chest. I was bewildered but remained calm. I have a black belt, but this situation only called for calmness. I guess he was out of options because threatening cussing and hitting didn’t get me to react, reciprocate, or say, do, or make a single vulgar move. I was calm yet concerned. X left the room as I gently move away from him.

 

The meeting was excellent. We spoke about deep philosophical questions of life. The welcome spirit continued after the meeting with an old friend appreciating one’s contributions.

 

WITNESS

A man came up to me after the meeting and said he saw the whole thing, how Michael Krohnen attacked me, said the librarian’s behavior was a shame and called it/the foundation fascistic. The event certainly resembles something that would happen in the Dark Ages.

 

AFTER THE MEETING

After the event Michael Krohnen followed me as I was leaving, having his jacket and hat on. He grabbed my arm as I stepped out in what appeared to be further provocation and I ran away out of fear. If he behaved as he did inside in front of other people, I didn’t want to imagine what he could do outside in the dark.

 

NEXT DAY

Michael Krohnen walked up to me the next day – for safety reasons I asked him to keep a distance because of the practical image I had from yesterday’s attack (this is the right place of images!)

 

I had to remind him that he hit me yesterday and he uttered profanity in that room and grabbed me on the way out. He said the physical contact was a gesture of friendship because “in your culture” they touch each other. I don’t know what culture he’s talking about but in none that I know of, what he did was a sign of friendship. I found out that a mutual friend had talked with him and apparently it had some effect – he apologized for using the F word and I think once he realized the scope of his yesterday’s action he changed his mind within minutes: His first statements that morning were a reiteration of the same crazy demand about something that is none of his business at all and there is no grounds for it whatsoever (see MOTIVES section below). Within minutes, he took back that demand.

 

PROVEN FUTILITY OF Michael Krohnen’S DEMAND


If the matter was so important as to make such an irrational public scene out of it, how is it that in less than 24 hours the matter was not important any more. One day he was threatening, yelling, cussing and hitting me in reference to a crazy demand of his. The next day, he totally withdrew the demand without me having made a single move in meeting that demand. I’ll let you draw the logical conclusion about the validity of that demand, and its significance as a justification for his outburst!

One day he threatens with “almost not welcome” and next day “you can come anytime, ask questions, make comments…”

 

INSIGHT VS. FEAR

I certainly welcomed the apology not as an ego-soothing step but as a sign that he may have realized what he did was uncivil and wrong. However, given the circumstances, I was not convinced of its sincerity because it smelled like it had an element of fear.

 

We can change instantly upon insight, and we can change instantly upon fear. These have different qualities. Let’s hope in this case it was the former, although life experience shows that generally, the probability of a person changing fundamentally is much less than not changing. The old mind is caught in such a deep mold of status quo that deep fundamental change in that structure is pretty rare. But it can happen.

 

MOTIVES

Possible motives I can think about for Michael Krohnen’s irrational behavior:

1)     Placing himself in a position of authority as a representative of another (I asked him if he was representing another, and the answer indicated it was not the case because if he was, he would have said yes instead of resorting to profanity. The person he pretends to represent has never said a word or objected to anything I’ve said (probably because she knows what I said was true and was said not in a spirit of malice or personal attack but only in relationship to her apparently being put in a wrong role).

 

2)     Psychological imbalance or cognitive unclarity -- the reason I suspect this as a possibility is because I cannot justify in my mind how anybody could be so worked up over another person’s comments about a third person, to the point of polluting a special place with profanity and committing battery, without being a representative of the third party or authorized by an organization. Personal dislike ought not lead to such an extreme behavior. But then again we live in an insane world and the misapplied mechanism of thought and its image making process is at the core of that insanity.

 

3)     Desire to win points -- unfortunately this is a real possibility because I know of another case, by way of proof, where Michael Krohnen provoked a person against another in what appears to be a desire to win points. This is not so out of place in the pre-reorganization history of the foundation where its culture seemed prone to politics and power-play (games to maintain, gain, or regain power). There is plenty of material in K’s work pointing to his attitude towards organizations, which were related to these types of issues and their consequence. (Things could be different in a 100 years when none of the people who were close to K would be around, and maybe not even the foundations as we know them).

 

4)     Placing himself in a position of authority as a self-designated spokesperson for the foundation. I have failed to get a clear statement from Michael Krohnen as to what exactly he objects to. What I have gathered so far is the fact that he has stated that he doesn’t think people outside the foundations should comment on the work of the foundation -- and some fuzzy paraphrase of things I supposedly wrote which I did not write -- which in either case, is none of his business because what he’s objecting to was not written about him, he’s not representing the party I wrote about, and he’s not a representative of the foundation the party was a member of. So he’s sticking his nose in a matter which is not his business beyond the means of suggestion an comments. And he seems to be doing that as a self-imposed position of authority.

 

5)     A human is complex entity and true motives of another may be impossible to understand, but here are other common possibilities which often influence behavior, e.g., jealousy, and “causeless hatred”.

 

In order to keep this letter short, if you like to read about the second incident, it is available here. In summary, it demonstrates another case of power abuse where the librarian assumes a policy making role, exhibits unfounded anger, poor communication skills, illusions and images based on conclusions which turned out to be nonfactual. I initiated a moderated session

 

INCIDENT 2 – ABUSE OF POWER & BULLYING

Last year I was shocked when (the same) Michael Krohnen blasted at me outside the healthfood shop for having written something in the far distant past. I was immediately alarmed over a few things:

 

a)     The kinds of things he was objecting to seemed highly illusory vs. facts of the matter. If he had only bothered reality-checking a few of his conclusions and images he wouldn’t be so angry.

 

b)     He had accumulated all this anger without ever expressing a single sentence about it, which would have allowed me to present my point of view which may have shattered his image/reality. This is precisely why ignorance is cherished in our world: if we look, our images might just have to drop. “The light of truth dispels darkness” but only if the curtain is up. 

 

c)     He put himself in a position of authority over the foundations’ matters and was implying that he was making a policy which I was sure was not officially the case as there has not been a single, sole reason, ever, to justify his crazy idea other than his accumulated illusions.

 

d)     He seems to assume authority because he was close to K for practical reasons; being put in an actual position of authority seems to exacerbate this.

 

e)     I wonder if being “close” to K is enough to guarantee any person a position of security, and what are the consequences of feeling such a security? Seniority and friendship are valid factors in staffing decisions as long as it’s a right match in qualification. Another factor ought to be the level of respect for the quality, quietness and peaceful energy of these places, which he clearly does not have.

 

f)      Given their history, these places should be respected and ought to be immune from expressions of anger, filthy language, violence, and other crude ways of the world. Visitors should feel safe in attending these places, and should expect to be treated with basic respect. I have come to the libraries for years and have never heard of people being intimidated to go there until several cases recently.

 

It occurred to me that I have to hear Michael Krohnen out and proposed that we meet, together with a moderator because I doubted he’d be able to have a rational conversation given his irrational and emotional state and his history of getting into this intense emotional state in dialogues.

 

We had a meeting with a mutual friend and I was shocked at the level of illusions that had been built up in Michael Krohnen’s head which fed further illusions. For example, he said that I had written the article about K’s attitude towards stimulants because of what X had said. Talk about the egocentric predicament! The fact is, I did independent research and X had nothing to do whatsoever with what I had written. I did not quote nor paraphrase him nor even hinted at anything he had ever said.

 

The list of such baseless accusations was long (e.g., the utterly stupid assumption that I write to the world instead of talking to a person directly, which is absolutely false, and that I just sit down and write a circular off the cuff and send it, which is also absolutely false: my circulars sometimes take a year to write). Once the illusion train rolls there’s no stopping it, and in this case the locomotive was his belief that people outside the foundations have no business commenting on the work of the foundation. He specifically said this in response to the point raised by the moderator. Obviously, observations made by outsiders has helped these foundations, and there are a number of recent examples of this.

                                                 

I told him that I am totally prepared to review and as needed retract, correct, add, modify, any statement that I ever published, if he points out to me specifically what he objects to. To date, he has not pointed out a single specific sentence that he can say is not factual, is not moral, and should be retracted. He has once made a vague reference to something without understanding the context, and he’s even admitted that he does not read what I write carefully, because he doesn’t value them, because I am an outsider.

 

It’s each person’s business if they want to fact-check their conclusions, or if they want to live in comfortable illusions, or if they are angry or not (as long as they don’t violate another person’s rights). But when a staff member threatens another person with an imaginary policy statement based on the staff member’s thought-and-image content which was not fact-checked, not communicated, or given a single opportunity to be responded to, I’d say this person is abusing his power and bullying.

 

I wish Michael Krohnen well and next time I see him I will pay the same respect I’ve always paid to him and others: to be inwardly quiet, to have no image – and by being in the present, love has no barriers.

 


Letter to KFA trustees


Please note the following remarks in relationship to the letter I sent you about Michael Krohnen's behavior while on official duty:

 

1) As stated in my letter, I accrued no grudges against Michael Krohnen despite his history of manipulative behavior. The incident I reported was a new incident that occurred and that's why I wrote about it -- it was not to rehash the past.

 

2) Everything I said in the letter aside from items which are clearly opinions, are absolutely facts. It is a history of KFA and Michael in general, because he apparently has no problem lying, is to accuse me of lying. Truth of my word is extremely important to me. I can not convince you that I am truthful but I can just tell you, even in rudimentary every-day life events, I try not to speak what is not true, even in situations that would not matter.

 

3) It is a habit of KFA and Krohnen to discredit the messenger in order to discard the message. My credibility is clear and my history speaks for itself for those who want to listen. You can see hundreds of personal and professional and academic references on my site rezamusic.com (direct link: http://tinyurl.com/36kaeus ). My credit rating is over 90% of population. I am saying these because of KFA's past vicious way of accusing any critic, internal or external, as having a credibility problem.

 

Krohnen and a couple of other people at the KFA in particular, like to discredit me but it's always behind my back, because they know they can not accuse me of lying on any occasion because I do not lie, I do not manipulate, because I have no reason to. KFA, IMO, is a minimally-necessary organization to carry the work of a great man whom I met on a number of occasions and have helped me explore so many depths of life. That perfume goes on in daily life and in many people I come in contact with on daily basis. It has nothing to do with KFA. I have much better things to do than to try to be manipulative or envious about K's cook or a foundation whose big boss wanted to have sex with me and now is ignoring me because he thinks I am a sucker for attention (which is absolutely not the case). Anything they accuse me of that has to do with meddling with KFA's affairs was things they specifically had me involved in. Again, I don't want to go into this for the sake of writing space, but their character attacks are baseless, without any specifics which can withstand cross examination.

 

I can get so much more reward playing guitar for people, talking to youngsters about problems of smoking and about the possibility to end their problems by understanding them and so on -- I have seen many lives transformed out of these contacts. I do not claim any credit for this, but the point is, my life, thank God, is so rich, that I do not need to find occupation or get attention by writing about the work around K. I write the circulars when enough material come together for different reasons, and each time, the intentions are stated. The problem is, those who denounce them are usually those who don't even bother reading them, like Mr.Krohnen himself.

 

4) My guess is that Krohnen would tell you that I made up what I wrote, but again, I remind you, that everything I told you in the letter, actually, factually, occurred. He hit me and he said "F--- you" in Mary Z's living room, absolutely unprovoked. I am willing to stand behind every single statement made. Krohnen needs to say which statements are lies, and he will not be able to do so looking in my eyes, because I would not be crazy or stupid (or legally so ignorant) that I would lie about him. He could sue me if I made up those stories about him but he can't because what I said was true.

 

5) I did not go into the history of his crazy demand to save you time, but as I said, what he accuses me of having to apologize to, which I absolutely do not feel it deserves an apology, is posted on my site -- you can find it at the bottom of my site under the circulars section of the psychology/philosophy section.

 

6) Lastly on the subject of the lady who has accused him of improper behavior, I know about her case. She told me about it through a friend. She was very upset about Krohnen. I heard her case out. I was shocked and questioned her about it in different ways in order to see if she's making this up or not -- I could not believe my ears. I determined, for my own sake, that she was being truthful. She wanted to contact the foundation and I spoke with one of the trustees if I should relay her account. I was advised that would raise the question of the distortion factor, which I fully agree with. I told her I would not be relaying her account. She chose to tell her story in another way. That is completely her business and I am sure that most of the trustees have enough judgment to decide for themselves if what she says really happened or not. I believe it did, and it was very wrong.

 

The kinds of statements he made to this lady, aside from the physical contact, were a total shame for KFA. She goes to the library to meditate and she gets instructions on frequency of sex, gets interrogated on pornography, and so many other very disturbing things that MK said to her, to the point that she went crying to another visitor of the library. I suppose you know about it (as I understand she's filed a complaint with you).  I was impressed with this lady (not interested in any other way as I have a really lovely girlfriend already) because of her character and humanity. She seemed like a good person who is going through a downturn in her career, as many of us have had, and in this low point, she reaches to MK for help and she gets treated like this. It is not my business -- I did not report it to the KFA but she has completely according to her own decision.

 

Can you imagine how MK would have reacted if someone else had done things one-tenth the intensity of his vulgar behavior? So many times he's made something out of nothing to win political games at the expense of stepping on others. Despite all this, I have no hard feelings about MK. I am not out to get him except in his imagination. KFA has sometimes lived in a dark-ages type of mentality of preferring to ignore things. Perhaps this ignorance is an essence of corruption and perhaps this is why K was so much against having organizations. It was my obligation to tell you what happened that day, as it happened to the best of my ability and utmost attempt at total truthfulness and accuracy. These are values that are very important to me and are essential for "philosophy". The kind of behavior Krohnen has exhibited, are so contrary to philosophy, love of truth. Truth is what is, not what we want it to be.

 

As I said in the original letter, from an organizational standpoint, I believe it is management's challenge to use its resources in the appropriate way. In my many years of corporate career, I've seen many cases where people are put in the wrong roles and they create problems for themselves and the organization, but that's just a friendly tip - I'm only looking at it from the outset. I have no hard feelings for Michael Krohnen and wish him well for his future. When and if we meet again, it will be my responsibility, as always, to meet him with inner quietness, totally in the present. Last time there was the same attitude, and there was love, until he verbally and physically attacked me for no reason. When reason is out the door, we're back to dark ages, and organizations have a talent, a habit, for being un-philosophical.

 

If you have any questions about anything i say, it is best to come to me directly, by email or phone -- with apologies if there's a delay in response as I am managing a big project these days, as well as running a band with several performances coming up, having several writing projects, and trying to find enough time for writing music, taking care of the body, and for nothingness :)

 

Love and good wishes

Reza Ganjavi


 

Bullying at a Krishnamurti Foundation

 

I have been a friend of KFA for many years and tried to help them in any way I could – by volunteer work or financially when I was able to do so – these days if I have money to donate I just give it to the schools. My volunteer activity goes back to days of K’s talks at the Oak Grove where I did a variety of volunteer work during the talks. I recently came upon a letter from Mark Lee thanking us and asking us to consider volunteering at the next talks. I have a number of other letters from the school in similar tone. I organized and participated in some fundraisers for the school and did an IT project for them. I have visited the school and foundation over the years on numerous trips to the area, playing soccer at the school, ate lunches there, been traveled with and been to the homes of the various directors and have plenty of friends there. I am not bragging but the point is I have had a friendly relationship and tried to help these people over the years.

 

On the other hand, I have an interest from a philosophic and historical perspective in how these foundations operate, specially, since K had such a strong attitude and dislike for organizations and almost dissolved one of the main organizations around him as has been discussed in past circulars.

 

At the same time, I respect their privacy and have never tried to dig into something that I should not know. Everything I know has been presented to me with no prior understanding that it is private because the foundations, at least the KFA is a non profit organization regulated by the State Attorney General, and much of its business is indeed public, e.g., minutes of the board meetings can be reviewed by the public.

 

Over the last years I have seen a tyrannical side of KFA. KFA is nothing without its people -- there are good people who work there, and specially in the course of the last couple of years new blood has arrived with some good new members in the board of trustees, and you can already see the result in some of the good activities they’re undertaking. However, there is a old-world, backward, tyrannical side which is very unfortunate. I have been interested in documenting this not only as a citizen journalist, friend, and person interested in this work, but also as a victim of this tyrannical mindset.

 

I have experienced that KFA has a problem with “freedom of speech” which is protected by both Federal and State laws. They appear to prefer people to just shut up and not make any comments about their work. I have been told explicitly that in the opinion of one of the tyrants who luckily does not have a high position in the organization, that it is not ok for people outside the foundations to make remarks about the work of the foundation. I have a witness and am not just making this up. I have no reason motive or intention to make up any of this, but KFA’s tyrannical side has no problem with lying or accusing others of lying in order to protect its own power and position. 

 

Yes sir or madam, it all seems to be about power and position. And it seems to be by the people who were closest to K and who seem to be totally clueless about what K talked about. This is not a baseless judgment. When the poor man spent 60 years talking about a certain point which then someone in the foundation clearly demonstrates he has no clue about it doesn’t take a Federal Judge to issue an opinion that he has no clue. There are trustees I’ve spoken to who believe what K meant by saying nobody had understood him was a reference to people closest to him. (some of them were there when he spoke about this).  (See “The Myth of ‘Nobody Got It’” originally published in my 2008 circular: https://www.rezamusic.com/writings/on-j-krishnamurtis-work/michael-krohnen-the-vulgar-librarian-at-krishnamurti-foundation-america-kfa 

 

As a detour, I repeat the story that when I first started reading K I didn’t want to have anything to do with anyone else because I felt I need and can explore this alone. I surely had no interest in any organizations and to this date I don’t. And I had read many cases where K seemed unimpressed and wary of organizations. Generally speaking organizations can get corrupted and people can start to disregard truth in order to hold their power and position.

 

In the case of K circles, there are official organizations and unofficial ones and money and power does seem to have both a positive and negative effect. The positive is clear:  it can help projects, dissemination, etc., but the negative side is that money seems to have a negative effect in groups and organizations as it becomes a much more important factor than just purchasing power – it becomes a factor in forming groups with the standard divisive, polarizing consequence. It becomes a means to power which corrupts. I do see some of this in some K circles, where the basic idea of philosophy, love of truth, is forgotten in favor of what is politically right, and what soothes the group mentality, what wins favors. It is really an uninteresting subject, and disheartening at times but it is no different than the story of humanity and what has been going on forever including what was happening to the organizations that were active around K’s work when he was a young man. The point is, the dynamics are not simple, specially when there’s money involved.

 

Anyway, I wrote about a trustee who was tyrannical, whom I had seen to be violating certain values which I had seen present and cherished in the foundation for many years, and again, probably because of presence of money, it was being tolerated. At the same time there was a movement to oust her and I was being made aware of it because I finally voiced my concern after my rights were being violated.  There was never an understanding that what I was being made aware of is private and I did not think it was beyond the name of the person whom out of respect I withheld it in publishing the account of the event. This did not bode well with the very parties who were either double faced about the situation or had ulterior motives, sexually or otherwise, which I better not get into here.

 

My sin was to publish a story stating a number of facts and opinions, none of which were defamatory or invading any particular person’s privacy. The tyrannical mindset didn’t like it. But they didn’t say anything about it until a year later when I ran into one by chance and he spewed his images and objections, angers and violence, and I was astounded at the level of illusion. I asked a mutual friend to join us for a mediated talk and I was even more astounded at the level of illusion. See my September 2010 circular on www.rezamusic.com‘s writings section).

 

Among the demands that were made on ey by the tyrannical element of KFA, their bully, Michael Krohnen, was to retract what I had written about the ousted trustee. Keep in mind, to this date, I have not heard a single official word from KFA about this matter – this is all unofficial stuff – and the reason is officially they had no case, period. They had nothing to object to because I did not lie, I didn’t make up any of that story, and they would look really foolish in trying to officially quash one’s freedom of speech simply because one or two people in the foundation doesn’t like it (like I said, let’s not get into the motives).

 

So there was no case against me but they tried to bully me.  If they had a case, if they had a rational argument, there was no need for bullying. And I haven’t even explained how bad this bullying got (read on).


 

 

More on the Bullying at Krishnamurti Foundation America

  

A few nights ago after reading text of what Michael Krohnen said and his attack, I had a nightmare about a dog attacking. Getting bullied at KFA out of all places was beyond imagination and I still feel the pain.

 

I had nothing against Michael Krohnen -- for a long time he was picking on me and I always thought he has the right to have his opinions however illusory and out of touch with reality they were -- I have concrete examples of this -- and meanwhile when possible I tried to communicate the side he was not seeing. But then it got worse and culminated in him attacking me at the Krishnamurti Library. Poor Krishnamurti! Poor Mary Zimbalist to witness such vulgar act in her own living room where K hanged out often -- such an act of utter disrespect for them let alone my rights to be there and be safe from verbal and physical violence. It has taken me a while to come to grasp what his intentions were but it is clear now that it must have been, in my opinion, an intention to provoke me to react in the same vulgar way he acted so that he has grounds for banning me from the place -- his illusory "almost not welcome" was just that, an almost, meaning he had no grounds for unwelcoming me, that it was just a matter of dislike for whatever stupid motives, and certainly, at the heart of it, as he had stated, was his dislike that I speak my mind. 


But he was not alone in carrying this act of aggression. He was backed, according to his own declaration, by Mark Lee and James Paul who gave him the green light, without knowledge of approval of the Board of Trustees (which by itself is a huge governance issue with this hopeless, idiotic foundation, in my opinion) to bully me. Their stupid bully, Michael Krohnen, in his stupid mind, thought as a former cook of Krishnamurti, and a current "librarian" who has harassed library visitors previously (see https://www.rezamusic.com/writings/on-j-krishnamurtis-work/michael-krohnen-harassing-lady-visitor-to-kfa-krishnamurti-library-ojai) including harassing me -- that he somehow has the right to violate my rights by taking illegal action against me, assaulting me, and demanding that I apologize to the dragon-woman Diane White, a horrible former Trustee (see https://www.rezamusic.com/writings/on-j-krishnamurtis-work/notes-related-to-the-work-around-j-krishnamurti-2008) just because I exercised my right to free speech, and in good faith reported important facts about her in relationship to her role as a Trustee of a non-profit, tax-exempt entity that's accountable to People of California. 


Of course, the stupid bully had no grounds for such a stupid demand and the following illegal assault which he committed in Krishnamurti's own home, which is also ultimately disrespectful, criminal and neurotic given there was absolutely no rational reason for it other than trying to kiss up to the wealthy dragon woman.  


The stupid bully Michael Krohnen's stupid plot fell on his face, and left him embarrassed and at risk of losing his job and free home, because it is not his business to stick his nose in the subject of whatever I wrote which he was objecting to -- he was not a party to it and the only reason he made it his business is because he is a thug, a bully, trying to kiss Diane White's behind, to win points with her, because she's wealthy. 


That was not his first one. Krohnen tried to protect anther rich person, Friedrich Grohe, and provoked him against me after I made statements showing inconsistencies and counter productive contradictions in his organization. And that friend long forgot that and we discussed and moved forward but Michael Krohnen continued the subject and was apparently more upset than the friend himself, for possibly as senseless reason as Gisele who discarded my article as terrible without having bothered to read it because it was, in her interpretation, an attack on Friedrich (which it wasn't -- Friedrich is not his organization and even then characterizing the statements as attacks is purely subjective -- a lot of facts were documented along with opinions based on earnest research ). 


Judging something without examining it first hand is as bad as it gets in these circles, and then she has the nerves to tell people she told me not to come back to her summer gathering as the reason I had not been back. It is true that when she passed on that ignorant judgment she added to it by saying I should not go there that year but I spoke with her later and went to her public event which she still characterized as a "Krishnamurti Gathering" and not some exclusive private club, only to get bullied by another person who gets money from Friedrich's, Javier, to a degree of unreasonable and vulgarity that Friedrich's own one or two "gang" members as they refer to themselves, condemned Javier's attack. I did not go back to that gathering for a number of reasons but non whatsoever was any rejection from Gisele -- there was no such rejection. 


I didn't go because I didn't want to get ganged up on again by "the gang"'s Javier and his disgusting attitude. Sorry, I don't worship him as some may do, and it was only after I wrote about the subject of how KLI has such a prevalent presence in these Swiss summer mountain gatherings that they toned down having KLI members as facilitators and presenters and leaders. I also haven't gone because of a number of other factors including inconvenient travel route, and not being attracted to some of the regulars who are either extremely complicated psychologically, or are confused by their own admission after being at that work for years -- that quality of an elephant missing the boat completely is not attractive. I come to new comers who grasp this with a swift mind and unburdened heart like a robin outside any of these circles and circuses. Don't forget, as far as I understood, K was very much against circuses and organizations built around him and almost dismantled his official organizations, but now we have even more of them.

 

The subject of Mark Lee and James Paul's support of Michael Krohnen's -- as reported by Krohnen himself -- attempted plot is a chapter by itself. If they had a case they could have done it in a much more civilized way. Bullying at a organization built around a guy who was so much against this kind of behavior is totally unacceptable.



James Paul, Mark Lee

James Paul is a retired orchestral conductor, an open homosexual person (who has talked about it openly in public areas as well), who became a Trustee of KFA. He was reportedly taken to KFA via Diane White "Dragon Woman", a horrible former Trustee, whom James Paul later tried to oust by conspiring with a couple of other Trustees, and help from me (I was a volunteer at KFA at the time). 

Michael Krohnen told the Board of Trustees that James Paul and Mark Lee had given him green light to attack me verbally, which he did, and he followed up by attacking me physically while I absolutely showed no resistance because I am not a fist fighter type -- I was thrown back by the stupid vulgar bully's punch and I stood there in total disbelief. A witness called Krohnen a fascist who had done similar things to him. 

James Paul seeing that his stupid plot was thawed, instructed the Board of Trustees to ignore my complaint against Krohnen, because he knew a thorough investigation would put the blame on him for having been so irresponsible and horrible as a Board Secretary to order such action without Board approval and totally out of line with everything Krishnamurti stood for. 

The homosexual aspect only plays a role in this saga in that James Paul made sexual overtures to me which I found to be extremely inappropriate and it is a matter of public interest because he did so while he was a Trustee of a tax-exempt, non-profit, supposedly "charitable" entity which is accountable to People of California. He told me I should try it -- I said no, I am not homosexual and I have no desire to try it -- and he tried to persuade me again and again by saying stupid things that I absolutely did not buy. He developed a resentment towards me when I rejected him because I am not a homosexual and I am not sexually attracted to men, and have no desire to try it. He even promised me to take me to the archives and show me things that are not accessible to the public. 


4/16/2011
 

Jame and Mark should consider resigning from the Board. There is indication that they were behind Krohnen's carrying an illegal attack against me in the Library. They apparently empowered him to do so, so the three of them are responsible for this illegal attack. And that perfectly explains James' attempt to discredit me by prefacing the mail I trusted him to forward to the trustees with prejudice -- that is right in line with Lee-Krohnen duo's outdated lame approach that they have used on people in the past.  I was nice enough not to report it to the police so far but I've checked with my lawyer and he has indicated that Krohnen has indeed broken the law by hitting me. I have a witness. I am not threatening you. I am friends with most of you and am not planning to take action against you.

 If you wanted to declare me as an unwelcome person, the Board should have made that decision -- they never have done so because there has never been any grounds for that. If I was involved in the discussions on the James and Mark's attempt to get a trustee fired in the past, that's because they had me involved. But even that, being involved in a discussion, writing a letter expressing how a trustee actually lied and providing proof for it, doesn't constitute grounds for banning a person from visiting the grounds. There has never been any grounds for any such ban. So Krohnen's talk about that ban is ridiculous. Lee-Paul-Krohnen resorted to bullying because they had no reason, no decency, and no grounds to approach the matter rationally.

 There was never such a decision by the board. It's not in any of the minutes, and it was never communicated, because, again, it's a totally baseless, ridiculous idea. I have several letters of appreciation from you and the school, whether for volunteering at K's talks in 83, 84, 85, or at the school, and other things -- they are all positive. I have never had a single event of communication from the foundation that remotely justifies Krohnen-Lee-Paul ganging up on me. They have other motives. Let's not go into that now.

 Even if there was ever such a decision, in a civilized organization the person would have been notified officially of any such decision that s/he is not allowed to be on our premises for rational reasons, and not your medieval, lame style of "management by bullying".

 Mark has done a lot of good work. He's retired once (or more times?) already and I hope he will enjoy his retirement.

 I also hope James can find a more thrilling hobby than empowering a bully, then sitting on that couch listening in, as the bully executed the plan. How shameful. This is what people do with power, and perhaps these are specifically why K was so incredibly wary of having any organizations in his name.

Excerpt


Mark and I go back to the early 80's. We've been friends for many years - shared many dinners and many songs (he's also a Beatles fans). He got on my case years ago when Albion Patterson was criticizing some aspects of the foundation and I voiced some of those concerns. He was involved in the discussions about Diane -- my understanding was he wanted her out -- and with James and Craig they were counting how many votes they could collect to oust her. My role in all that started when I got fed up with Diane's lies and I wrote to the trustees about it. James had me very much involved, and I have records of this just in case anyone's interested.


I mentioned the sexual aspect in the last mail because I believe it has something to do with James' attitude. At the time it appeared that he really wanted to have sex with me but my not being homosexual (or bi-sexual) was somehow hard for him to understand. I have no idea what went on behind the scenes but I can just guess that he might have gotten heat for having had me involved in the Diane ordeal, and he turned against me. I never viewed the Diane case as a private matter because of the way James was talking about it publicly, in restaurant, with other people as well, talking about how horrible she was (and she was!). 


Keep in mind in the document I wrote I did not mention Diane's name once. I protected her identity. And what I said was not personal attacks on her but just observations. Michael has a problem why I wrote she often wears black. It's a fact!

Mark, I believe also got distressed over the letter I wrote about Friedrich's organization. He was first against them, then he was for them, and this flip flopping, led to whatever distress he experienced -- but I'm just guessing. All I know he was critical of Kinfonet before I write the report, but once I echoed that view he apparently changed his mind. 

Of course later Mark hated my reporting of the facts surrounding the huge financial loss of KFA which many blame on him because he was the Executive Director and the buck stops at the top - and - K had explicitly warned against making speculative investments. 

I also did a thorough report on Mark's lies about K -- very troubling disinformation that Mark promoted as fact, I guess just to boost himself as (fake) Mr. Everything Krishnamurti, as a former Executive and Trustee of KFA and good friend of K puts it. Here's the documentary: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBYY55YDhEE


An unfinished unsent message about Michael Krohnen, James Paul, Mark Lee 


As a victim of the bullying by your staff member, I am closer to this than any of you, so let me perhaps help in critical thinking and exploring some of the implications of the matter.

I believe what occurred in the library when I was attacked by Krohnen was a form of corruption and I will explain why.

Krohnen apparently has a strong interest in protecting his privileged position even if it involved lying. That by itself, IMO, is corruption.

I think I understand the reason why K dreaded having any organizations associated with him. K was very fast in firing people but these days not only people who make big mistakes are not fired, they even reincarnate in different capacities. I am not saying you should fire Krohnen. That’s your decision.

Krohnen’s idea around <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated> has some serious logical deficiencies. The Board could not have a decision that I was a <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated> because:

1) There has never been any grounds for that ridiculous idea, period. I have been a friend of the foundations and schools, participated in a number of charity events for them, volunteered on a number of occasions starting way back during K’s talks. Things went sour as a result of the Diane Saga, which is specifically the reason Krohnen has cited for this “almost” <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated> status. But fact is the board never investigated it, never heard my side of the story, are missing some critical details about how their own members had me involved (which I have proof of). In a nutshell, if there were ever an objective investigation, the conclusion would have been there’s no grounds for <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated>.

2) If there were ever a case for declaring a person a <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated>, any sensible Board would require an investigation. In this case, an investigation would have revealed the reason Krohnen states for this crazy idea is totally frivolous as James Paul had me involved in this Diane ordeal explicitly (all details are available upon request). His motives is another story.

3) There was no ground for such a decision. And having written to the trustees reporting on some actual occurrences associated with Diane and providing exactly when and how she misrepresented the truth and abused her position does not constitute grounds for being declared <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated>. James Paul and Mark Lee were involved in these discussions and they had me involved for a long time, and there was never a single objections to anything I said or wrote, and in fact I was being motivated and encouraged in engaging in the discussions (one example being James Paul’s discussions about the plans to “Kill the King” – that he is so powerful that you have to make sure if you kill him he’s dead).

4) It could have been the case that some of the Board members (e.g. Mark and James) thought, we don’t like the fact that Reza reported these political dramas publicly, but hey, you’re dealing with a member of public, whom at the same time as being involved by you for political purposes, is being chastised, so the least I could do is to tell the story of what had happened. Why should anybody ever be afraid of facts? There was nothing secret about it. I did not invade anybody’s privacy, and some trustees were engaged in the discussions and continued it without showing any sign of resentment. They welcomed all the help they could get in lining up enough votes to oust Diane. All I did was to report certain observations of facts to the trustees about Diane’s cunning ways. You can not have someone involved, be ok with it, and then declare them as <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated> because he was involved.


Krohnen's stupid lies

[draft]

Krohnen has stated in the past that he believes people outside the foundation have no business making comments about the foundation. Many disagree with that dogmatic view.

Assuming a person is in fact a PNG by the decision of the Board after investigation of the allegations of wrongdoing. In that case, that decision needs to be communicated to the person in a civilized manner. No such decision had ever been made nor communicated.

The only reason Krohnen chose the uncivilized way of bullying was because he had no case.

Assuming he was really representing a Stone Age Board who had decided to communicate the decisions it made (without investigation), not using civilized means, but through a bully. Why did he then tell me “you’re almost a <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated>”? What’s the “almost” all about? Another proof there was no decision.

Furthermore, without me doing a single thing, the next day he declared that I was a person who was welcome there anytime, and that was it was entirely up to me to apologize to Diane or not, that it’s no longer his business. That’s further proof that there was no <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated> decision, that Krohnen was making and executing policy for the foundation without the Board’s approval, and he reversed his policy the next day.

Therefore, his attack was totally without justification and his argument that I was indeed a <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated> and that he was doing official work with approval of Mark and James, is completely frivolous.

The fact is James, Mark, and Michael K were making an important Foundation decisions without the approval of the board, and then, not based on reason but based on dogma, each in their own way, for reasons which I can only speculate. And because their decision was totally dogmatic, their bully, Krohnen, had to resort to violence. If their decision had been reasonable, they didn’t need to cuss and punch to get it across.

Krohnen’s aim was to create a cause for kicking me out, but he failed at it. I remained calm and didn’t play it at his vulgar level.

Krohnen’s claim that his aim was to "bring the matter to a simple, peaceful close" refers only to his fascist approach of threat and intimidation to get me to conform to his wish and make an apology to his rich friend, Diane (for which there is no grounds at all – I have said nothing to be regretful for – here’s the document: http://tinyurl.com/3eykmbb).

Krohnen’s claim that “he simply moved away” misses a key point: I moved away after he said “F--- You”, and he blocked my way and took a step in front of me, and hit me in the chest. He did not mention these things. Thank God I have witness and Krohnen can not once again lie through his teeth around this incident.

 Krohnen claims that my goal in writing the report to the Trustees was to destroy him. My sole goal was to inform them of what happened, otherwise these kinds of corrupt acts and attitudes continue.

 Krohnen claims that I want to make the trustees fire him. What the trustees decide is their business. I have no intention to influence their decision - I only reported an incident as it happened. I do believe, having read K’s biographies and heard his accounts of dealing with staff that he was very quick at firing people. In this case, possibly, all three of them, but not sure if Mark is fire-able; he’s back from retirement and was involved in making a key foundation decisions on the spot with Krohnen.

Krohnen claims "I would confront Reza Ganjavi concerning <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated> ”. He’s totally lying about “schools”. By “groups” he means KLI, and by “individuals” he means Diane. He made a statement to me once in Switzerland for about 15 seconds that he didn't appreciate my writing about Friedrich Grohe's organization. I respected his opinion and moved on since he had nothing specific to complain about and since I knew his trip was paid by Friedrich Grohe, and I knew Krohnen had written a totally out of line letter provoking him against me after I wrote the above mentioned letter, which to date, I stand behind, and it has had some positive effects in how the Fifth Foundation runs. Here’s the document with lots of reader feedback including from several trustees who appreciate it: http://tinyurl.com/42paszr .

 Krohnen complains about “The way in which he ingratiated himself”. It appears that Krohnen is talking about himself. I have no reason to kiss up to the rich and powerful. He apparently does. Why is he trying to protect Diane and Friedrich, two people he even claims are his rich contacts. This is hearsay but a guy told me on the day after the incident that Krohnen has held on to his position by (sorry I can't repeat this phrase, but it means) kissing up to the powerful people in the foundation. What is worrisome is that now he’s resorted to lying in order to protect his position. This is corruption. Why should people be so dependent on a position to have to lie to maintain it?

Krohnen claims “his <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated> ”. Another baseless accusation he can not state a single example to back it up with. Ask him for an example. He can’t name one unless he lies again.


 Krohnen states “and <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated> ”. He has not referenced a single lie, because I have not lied. But he says these things because his aim is to discredit the messenger so the message is discarded. That’s one old dirty trick of the past cunning ways of running of KFA. My credibility speaks for itself. Those of you who do not “know” me can have a look here: https://www.rezamusic.com/testimonials


 Krohnen: “He seemed <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated> .” Ask for an example. There is none. Unlike his illusive mind, I try to examine things. He assumes I sit on the computer and write an article and send it out. False. It sometimes takes a year of work and research. And what I say, I stand behind. And if I make a mistake and it’s pointed out, I correct it. So far, he has not contested a single specific item, only generalities, and second hand repetition of gossip by people who have not even read my writings.

Krohnen states:  “only <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated> ” Well the fact is, I happened to be writing to FG on that same Sunday and mentioned the subject. I did not write to Claudia Herr at all. It was a brief email and there was nothing distorted in it – just a summary of what had happened in a short paragraph.

Krohnen continues: “This subsequently <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated> ”  Krohnen is lying through his teeth again to protect his position of lifetime security due to the privilege of his practical proximity to K. That is a classic case of corruption: lie in order to maintain power and position.

 I think the trustees have an obligation to ask MK, what lie was exactly added to the account. He can not state a single lie because I reported it as it happened. Unlike him, who is eager to maintain his power which he’s been abusing at any price, including stepping on truth, which is stepping on the whole legacy of K, I have nothing to gain here.

Again, just as in the case of Diane, I don’t think Michael is a “bad guy”. As a student of management science, and professional project manager, I always wonder if problems are not there because people are put in the wrong roles.

The cost of all this for me is stress and wasted time. The least you can do, is, if he was sincere in his apology, he can put that in writing. I think Mark and James should at least apologize to the Board. But their way, has always seem to be, point the finger outward. Kill the messenger then you don’t have to deal with the message.

Lastly, Krohnen has accused me <blah blah nonsense the dishonest bully thug fabricated>. This can not be farther than truth. See details here: https://www.rezamusic.com/writings/on-j-krishnamurtis-work/michael-krohnen-harassing-lady-visitor-to-kfa-krishnamurti-library-ojai 

Good luck.

PS – let me just say something about case of the lady who was harassed by Krohnen. I encouraged her to find a peaceful solution. I also told her if she wants legal advise she should contact an attorney. Krohnen’s allegation that it is driven by me is absolutely false. I am not out to get Krohnen – he attacked me and I reported it. That’s all there is to it. I happened to meet the lady who was devastated by Krohnen’s treating her like a whore, grabbing her behind, and all that sleazy talk. I found her to be a classy person, educated, intelligent, and a good spiritual person. Her case is her business. Don’t mix it with my report. They’re absolutely independent of each other but in some ways similar. Her case is just another signs of corruption associated with power.


KFA's Bully

 

Recently I was in Ojai and attended Rajesh's talks. He did a very nice job. He asked me to go to the talks, out of love of friendship.

 

Once, before he comes in the room, I was talking with Rowan and her adorable young son, when Krohnen called me up and tried to bully me into apologizing to Diane for having written something about her being put in the wrong role in the foundation (fact is several trustees wanted to oust her and for whatever reason, I was engaged by them in the discussions). Of course I had nothing to apologize for. Then he cussed at me with the F word, and when I tried to move away, blocked my way and hit me in the chest. This is a fact.


 A witness came to me afterwards and called him/"they" fascist. Reportedly, Krohnen had asked Mark Lee and James Paul who were there to take action against me if I didn't apologize to Diane (I had done nothing wrong - I only reported relevant facts), if they'd back him up, in other words, had the green light to try to bully me, and if it failed to kick me out, on no grounds whatsoever -- and all these decisions were being made not by the Board of Trustees but on the spot by Mark, who is theoretically retired from an executive role, James, and the bully, Michael Krohnen.

 

I remained calm because it was obvious they had no case and wanted to create a scene in order to find something against me, but they got nothing.

 

The talk was excellent. The next day, after another trustee talked to Krohnen, he came and said I was welcome to be there anytime -- so from a imaginary persona-non-grata to being welcome anytime, Krishnamurti's cook makes policies that impact people's lives at KFA.

 

I have nothing against Krohnen but I sense corruption at the KFA. They might have put the poor chap in the wrong role. We see this in the technical world all them time, when an engineer is made into a manager and he miserably fails at it. KFA fired good experienced librarian in favor of K's cook. But Michael Krohnen abused his position of authority. Doesn't this remind you of all that talks K gave about why he dreaded organizations?

 

I explained the story, with total honesty because there is no other way. And also in the second document "uncovering Krohnen's Lies", I demonstrated logically why the basis for Krohnen's attack was totally frivolous,  and also explored Mark Lee and James Paul's "management by bullying" and some background about what could have shaped that attitude.

 

Of course, in the KFA world, which is somewhat corrupt ("willing to act dishonestly in return for personal gain"), the finger is often pointed outwards. They'd rather have nobody say anything -- Krohnen has made the dogmatic statement that people outside the foundation have no business commenting on the work of the foundation!





KFA Trustees' Internal Attempt To Oust Trustee Diane White


At the same time KFA was going through a big turmoil regarding trustee Diane White. I always tried to steer clear of Diane White because I perceived her to be a very negative person - she was often badmouthing people - even her own subordinates. She had come from a brutal performing arts industry and that was an excuse people used to justify her attitude. Apparently she had become a trustee because she was wealthy. Mark Lee and the Board liked wealthy people. 


James Paul, a retired orchestral conductor, was also a Trustee and between him, Mark Lee, they were talking about ousting Diane White. Mark Lee was the Executive Director and because of his role and because of his general attitude to go with the flow especially if the flow goes direction money, he was trying to remain neutral but it was obvious that he was also fed up with Diane White. Craig Walker was also in the discussions which were led by James Paul as Diane's White's most fierce opponent. 


I think James Paul had a good point. I viewed Diane as a terrible trustee at least because of her extremely negative attitude. 


I could no longer avoid and ignore Diane White when she started pulling the same garbage she was pulling on other people, on me. Now she was messing with the wrong person. I called out her BS in a polite and rational way as is always my style. 


James Paul and Mark Lee became aware of my pushing back against Diane White's garbage. And somehow I got involved in the discussions about ousting Diane White. I felt I was being used in the political plots that were being orchestrated but I didn't mind because I shared their sentiment about Diane.


One of James Paul's memorable lines which I think he was paraphrasing Emerson's line: “When you strike at a king, you must kill him.” Of course, otherwise the king will kill you instead. So James Paul was strategizing to oust Diane from the Board once and for all. He did not succeed. My involvement was merely to write to the Board with my experience with and sincere impressions of Diane, which I would have done regardless James Paul's efforts. 



Trustee James Paul Homosexual Overtures


James Paul was (is) an open homosexual -- he's spoken about it openly in open public spaces so it must not be a secret. He had (maybe still has, a bunch of big and small erect cacti on his front lawn which looked odd and appeared to be a way of boasting his liking about big erect cylindrical objects; he openly talked about sexuality, and even in a restaurant he was bragging about the size of his private part at a volume of voice which people at other tables could also hear. I was shocked. It was 4 or 5 of us. He was also interested in engaging me in a sexual relationship but I told him multiple times that I am not homosexual. He kept insisting. He'd say, everybody is a homosexual but they don't know it -- and that if you try you will like it. I did not buy that argument and had no desire or inclination to "try it" and I did not. He was pressuring me and I did not like it. And I kept insisting that I am not homosexual, have no attraction to men sexually, and I do not believe what he's saying about everybody being homosexual!! And I am not interested in trying it. 


James Paul even offered to take me to the restrictive archives, which felt like a  carrot. That didn't work either 😂.


James Paul got on my wrong side. I don't know if it was because I rejected him but I can't think of any other reason. 


James Paul Conspiring With Mark Lee to Have Michael Krohnen Provoke Me In The Krishnamurti Library (K's Own Home)


According to Michael Krohnen, James Paul and Mark Lee authorized the stupid bully Michael Krohnen, during a talk by Rajesh Dalal at Mary Zimbalist's living room where I visited her multiple times in a house where Krishnamurti lived -- that was K's living room (his bedroom was at the adjacent cottage -- and now it's used as a library. So Krohnen say the most stupid, out of place thing to kiss up to Diane White, a wealthy former Trustee, and to provoke me - which I did not get provoked and simply asked if Krohnen is White's lawyer at which point he assaulted me. There were witnesses to this as the room was full of people and one man told me Krohnen is a fascist for doing this which he had done to him as well. This is explained in more detail here: https://www.rezamusic.com/writings/on-j-krishnamurtis-work/michael-krohnen-the-vulgar-librarian-at-krishnamurti-foundation-america-kfa


After I complained to the board of trustees, Krohnen pointed the finger at James Paul and Mark Lee - both of whom were trustees at the time. James Paul was the Secretary of the Board (highest position) and Mark is still a trustee -- has been -- will always be -- as Karen Hesli said once he's like a <> that comes back -- he's also liked to the chandeliers or fixtures that are part of a building).


 

Email to James Paul - Former Horrible Secretary of Board of Trustees of KFA 


Subject: institutional image making

Date:  Thu, 14 Apr 2011 

To: James PAUL <batonmanrs@yahoo.com>

 

James, I think the least you could do, as the current head of this organization, is to abide by the basic teachings of its' founder, i.e.,  the problem of image making. I know, and you know, that you have tried to dither views of other trustees against me. That's institutional image making. If you're really interested in improving the KFA, which I know you are, and you have, in certain areas, I would think it makes sense to be aware of the "we are the world" concept that your personal image making, extended to the organization, becomes organizational image making, and in fact, this organization has suffered, over years, from that kind of attitude which you seem to be new to. Can an organization be philosophical? Strive to find truth, and not settle for anything else however politically and financially rewarding.

 Thank you
 Take care
 Reza


 

James Paul Conspiring With Mark Lee to Have Michael Krohnen Intimidate Me In The Krishnamurti Library (K's Own Home)


According to Michael Krohnen, James Paul and Mark Lee authorized the stupid bully Michael Krohnen, during a talk by Rajesh Dalal at Mary Zimbalist's living room where I visited her multiple times in a house where Krishnamurti lived -- that was K's living room (his bedroom was at the adjacent cottage -- and now it's used as a library. So Krohnen say the most stupid, out of place thing to kiss up to Diane White, a wealthy former Trustee, and to provoke me - which I did not get provoked and simply asked if Krohnen is White's lawyer at which point he assaulted me. There were witnesses to this as the room was full of people and one man told me Krohnen is a fascist for doing this which he had done to him as well. This is explained in more detail here: https://www.rezamusic.com/writings/on-j-krishnamurtis-work/michael-krohnen-the-vulgar-librarian-at-krishnamurti-foundation-america-kfa


After I complained to the board of trustees, Krohnen pointed the finger at James Paul and Mark Lee - both of whom were trustees at the time. James Paul was the Secretary of the Board (highest position) and Mark is still a trustee -- has been -- will always be -- as Karen Hesli said once he's like a <> that comes back -- he's also liked to the chandeliers or fixtures that are part of a building).


Krishnamurti Foundation America's Dysfunctional Governance

 

Reportedly James Paul encouraged the Trustees not to respond to the very disturbing report of Michael Krohnen having assaulted me -- why did James Paul do that? Because he had allegedly authorized the intimidation, together with Mark Lee, based on what Michael Krohnen told the Board of Trustees, in order to justify his horrible vulgar crazy action, to physically hit me while I absolutely had not provoked him, had nothing to do with him, had done nothing wrong but to exercise my 1st Amendment right and factually report on Diane White to whom Krohnen was trying to kiss up to.


I was just talking with Rowan and her child when Krohnen like a crazy madman with his loud vulgar voice called me and said something stupid and assaulted me. Krohnen was just trying to win points from that materially wealthy former trustee – and his thuggish, absolutely stupid, crazy behavior was a total disgrace to Krishnamurti, his home where this happened at, and his Foundation. But two of the Trustees of the Foundation, Mark Lee and James Paul, reportedly authorized him to intimidate me – and then James Paul has the never to tell the rest of the Trustees who knew nothing about this and had NOT authorized it (because there was no rational reason for it) to not respond to my complaint. In my view and view of several others people who cared deeply for this work, that dysfunctional KFA’s governance even worse as time went by, fast-tracked by the Executive Director, Jaap Sluijter.

 

~~~

 

After Krohen called me and said something stupid, it went downhill from there: I stayed very calm, and asked Michael if he is Diane's lawyer, and he hit me on the chest which made my body get thrown backwards some meters. He is a big guy, fat and strong, and he's not that intelligent. Anyway I absolutely made no moves towards him - I didn't even walk towards him - he walked to me and assaulted me, in order to win points with Diane White.

 

A witness that saw this, called Krohnen a fascist "these guys are fascists" and said Michael Krohnen had done that to him too.

 


To KFA Trustees About James Paul's Self-Serving Gossip


 Dear Trustee


I have heard that James Paul has represented me to those who do not know me, prefaced the email I entrusted the foundation with forwarding to you with loading it up with a pre-conceived prejudice  / image,  that I am somehow feeding off controversy. That's pretty cheap!!

 Nice job James. That's a perfect example of "institutional image making" which has been one of the things maybe the new management can try to clean up. Come on, let's be philosophical. That's the least we can do with K's legacy. Where's the place of all that talk about importance of inquiry and finding truth? How about the dangers of image making.

 Why did James need to push his images onto you? This is one old KFA nasty habit of trying to discredit the messenger in order to discard the message. It's lame, and outdated. It's an insult to K's legacy. I was reporting to you an incident that actually happened. I wasn't fabricating a situation or writing that letter for the heck of it or to have controversy. Why did James try to discredit me off the bat? What a shame that he didn't allow you to read the account of how Krohnen attacked me without an image? Wasn't he trying to protect Krohnen? I had no claims people !! I was just reporting a factual situation. If KFA chooses to discard it as nonsense, as a fabrication, that is entirely your choice, and it sounds like your Chairman wants you to do just that.

 I trust you realize the implications of this kind of approach and attitude. Right back in Dark-Ages. Right in line with Krohnen's behavior. His behavior is no longer surprising to me. He must have been empowered to try to bully me. If you / him / KFA had a good case, why would you need to resort to bullying?

 I don't need these answers. I carry on my way, as I always have. A couple of you understand my intentions. And a couple perhaps "know" me well enough on a personal level to know that I don't live with conflict. That is a part of the perfume of this great teachings. That's why to accuse me of feeding off this ugly energy of conflict can not be farther from truth. FYI, I am a lot more interested in the quality of energy where there is no conflict. That's how I live. I have most energy when there is no conflict. And part of refinement and growth as a human being is just that: to end those things that create conflict at any level. And K's teachings has been most helpful in that regards, in raising the awareness necessary to see what is which by an almost "natural law" undergoes transformation through that very awareness.

 No ladies and gentlemen, James Paul is way off base. His attack on me has a difference source. He is possibly upset that

 a) He could not have sex with me despite his promise to take me to the archives of KFA to have access to an item which is not released (which I now understand he's now allowed to).

 b) Maybe he is upset that I am no bi- or homo- sexual and that I didn't buy his idea that everybody would be bi- sexual if it wasn't for cultural conditioning,

 c) Or maybe he's upset about what he told me about how some of the trustees were trying to oust Diane which came to no surprise because she was lying about people behind their back and if I accused her of lying it is because she lied, it is documented, and Mark and James know it very well.

 She even lied about Krohnen behind his back, and now he's trying to kiss up to her, because she's rick -- that's not the first time he's trying to "protect" the rich. He pulled the same thing about Friedrich -- trying to provoke him to win points (and he did !).

 Unfortunately he's being empowered in his bullying, vulgar attitude because that attitude has been rewarded by KFA. Mark and James apparently don't mind it. It apparently fits in their style of management. Violence starts when reason ends.

 If it wasn't for K, I would just turn a blind eye to all this and not want to have anything to do with some of these people. I wrote to Krohnen today actually, reminding him that everything I wrote in my report actually happened because I know he tries to say I made up this story. Thank God I even have a witness because these elements in KFA are as un-philosophical and bigoted as it can get.

 I trust you will steer KFA out of its sometimes Medieval ways.

 Good luck!

 Love
 Reza Ganjavi


KFA Trustees' Internal Attempt To Oust Trustee Diane White


At the same time KFA was going through a big turmoil regarding trustee Diane White. I always tried to steer clear of Diane White because I perceived her to be a very negative person - she was often badmouthing people - even her own subordinates. She had come from a brutal performing arts industry and that was an excuse people used to justify her attitude. Apparently she had become a trustee because she was wealthy. Mark Lee and the Board liked wealthy people. 


James Paul, a retired orchestral conductor, was also a Trustee and between him, Mark Lee, they were talking about ousting Diane White. Mark Lee was the Executive Director and because of his role and because of his general attitude to go with the flow especially if the flow goes direction money, he was trying to remain neutral but it was obvious that he was also fed up with Diane White. Craig Walker was also in the discussions which were led by James Paul as Diane's White's most fierce opponent. 


I think James Paul had a good point. I viewed Diane as a terrible trustee at least because of her extremely negative attitude. 


I could no longer avoid and ignore Diane White when she started pulling the same garbage she was pulling on other people, on me. Now she was messing with the wrong person. I called out her BS in a polite and rational way as is always my style. 


James Paul and Mark Lee became aware of my pushing back against Diane White's garbage. And somehow I got involved in the discussions about ousting Diane White. I felt I was being used in the political plots that were being orchestrated but I didn't mind because I shared their sentiment about Diane.


One of James Paul's memorable lines which I think he was paraphrasing Emerson's line: “When you strike at a king, you must kill him.” Of course, otherwise the king will kill you instead. So James Paul was strategizing to oust Diane from the Board once and for all. He did not succeed. My involvement was merely to write to the Board with my experience with and sincere impressions of Diane, which I would have done regardless James Paul's efforts. 


Trustee James Paul Homosexual Overtures


James Paul was (is) an open homosexual -- he's spoken about it openly in open public spaces so it must not be a secret. He had (maybe still has, a bunch of big and small erect cacti on his front lawn which looked odd and appeared to be a way of boasting his liking about big erect cylindrical objects; he openly talked about sexuality, and even in a restaurant he was bragging about the size of his penis at a volume of voice which other tables could also hear. I was shocked. It was 4 or 5 of us. He was also interested in engaging me in a sexual relationship but I told him multiple times that I am not a homosexual. He kept insisting. He'd say, everybody is but they don't know it -- and that if you try you will like it. He was pressuring me and I did not like it. And I kept insisting that I am not a homosexual, have no attraction in men sexually, and do not believe what he's saying, and am not interested in trying it. 


James Paul even offered to take me to the restrictive archives, which felt like a  carrot. That didn't work either 😂.


James Paul got on my wrong side. I don't know if it was because I rejected him but I can't think of any other reason. 



Nightmare


Sometimes you rely on someone’s understanding to realize their own foolishness. But when they don’t get it and keep pushing, what do you do? I was quiet and let love be. But they took that as turning the other cheek and slapped again. At some point enough is enough.


24 June 2011 - More on the Bullying at Krishnamurti Foundation America


A few nights ago after reading text of what Michael Krohnen said and his attack, I had a nightmare about a dog attacking. Getting bullied at KFA out of all places was beyond imagination and I still feel the pain. 


I had nothing against Michael Krohnen -- for a long time he was picking on me and I always thought he has the right to have his opinions however illusory and out of touch with reality they were -- I have concrete examples of this -- and meanwhile when possible I tried to communicate the side he was not seeing. But then it got worse and culminated in him attacking me at the Krishnamurti Library. Poor Krishnamurti! Poor Mary Zimbalist to witness such vulgar act in her own living room where K hanged out often -- such an act of utter disrespect for them let alone my rights to be there and be safe from verbal and physical violence. 


It has taken me a while to come to grasp what his intentions were but it is clear now that it must have been, in my opinion, an intention to provoke me to react in the same vulgar way he acted so that he has grounds for banning me from the place -- his illusory "almost not welcome" was just that, an almost, meaning he had no grounds for unwelcoming me, that it was just a matter of dislike for whatever stupid motives, and certainly, at the heart of it, as he had stated, was his dislike that I speak my mind. But be was not alone in carrying this act of aggression. He was backed, according to his own declaration, by Mark Lee and James Paul who gave him the ok to intimidate me, for which there was absolutely no grounds for. After his plot was thawed Michael Krohnen admitted that it was not his business to stick his nose in the subject of whatever I wrote which he was objecting to, I suppose, in order to kiss up to his rich friend. Why was he not intelligent enough to see this before he committed his vulgar attack?!?


That was not his first one. He tried to protect another rich friend and in fact provoked him against me after I made statements showing inconsistencies and counter productive contradictions in his organization. And that friend long forgot that and we discussed and moved forward but Michael Krohnen continued the subject and was apparently more upset than the friend himself, for possibly as senseless reason as Gisele who discarded my article as terrible without having bothered to read it because it was, in her interpretation, an attack on Friedrich (which it wasn't -- Friedrich is not his organization and even then characterizing the statements as attacks is purely subjective -- a lot of facts were documented along with opinions based on earnest research ). Judging something without examining it first hand is as bad as it gets in these circles, and then she has the nerves to tell people she told me not to come back to her summer gathering as the reason I had not been back. It is true that when she passed on that ignorant judgment she added to it by saying I should not go there that year but I spoke with her later and went to her public event which she still characterized as a "Krishnamurti Gathering" and not some exclusive private club, only to get bullied by another person who gets money from Friedrich's, Javier, to a degree of unreasonable and vulgarity that Friedrich's own one or two "gang" members as they refer to themselves, condemned Javier's attack. 


I did not go back to that gathering for a number of reasons but non whatsoever was any rejection from Gisele -- there was no such rejection. I didn't go because I didn't want to get ganged up on again by "the gang"'s Javier and his disgusting attitude. Sorry, I don't worship him as some may do, and it was only after I wrote about the subject of how KLI has such a prevalent presence in these Swiss summer mountain gatherings that they toned down having KLI members as facilitators and presenters and leaders. I also haven't gone because of a number of other factors including inconvenient travel route, and not being attracted to some of the regulars who are either extremely complicated psychologically, or are confused by their own admission after being at that work for years -- that quality of an elephant missing the boat completely is not attractive. I come to new comers who grasp this with a swift mind and unburdened heart like a robin outside any of these circles and circuses. Don't forget, as far as I understood, K was very much against circuses and organizations built around him and almost dismantled his official organizations, but now we have even more of them. 


The subject of Mark Lee and James Paul's support of Michael Krohnen's -- as reported by Krohnen himself -- attempted plot is a chapter by itself. If they had a case they could have done it in a much more civilized way. Bullying at a organization built around a guy who was so much against this kind of behavior is totally unacceptable.



MICHAEL KROHNEN'S BOOK: KITCHEN CHRONICLES "1001 Lunches with J. Krishnamurti


It's funny to read reviews that review Michael instead of the book. One reader gave 5* saying he had not read the book yet but he was a friend of Michael's.


Another reviewer theorized why Michael was a devotee. It is true that Michael seems to be a devout devotee but I can't accept that this is so because as the reviewer says, for not having a father. I've heard him quote K on a number of occasions saying K has said it therefore it is true. Lutynes wrote that sometimes people closest to the sun burn. K has said something that a few people closest to him interpreted as meaning that nobody who was close to him got it.


~~~


By: Mr. S. Radhakrishnan


This review is from: The Kitchen Chronicles: Lunches with J. Krishnamurti (Paperback)


Money-making through the sales of this book seems to be the main aim of the author - excusable, actually, as a number of others have done so too with books on J. Krishnamurti: Krohnen is in exalted company, actually! He exploits his accidental association with a man of great charisma and wisdom for self-enrichment. A rather unweildy collection of used jokes - and many jokes that Krishnamurti made were picked up by K himself from others - laced with a few menus do not a good book make! And being K's cook for 10 years does not necessarily confer on anyone the right to portray K's character in however sketchy a manner! The book does not provide any insight into either K or the author and since there is still a commercial value - fast diminishing, I admit - on anything related to K and his life, Michael Krohnen has struck while the wok is hot! I believe the menus aren't very inspiring either! It is lucky for Krohnen that Krishnamurti was rather bored by food and never felt hungry! If he did Krohnen would have had short shrift! No doubt he has a lot to be thankful for in his association with Krishnamurti!


~~~


By: Mr. Reza Ganjavi 


A vulgar librarian who was no philosopher. The book ignores the important non-kitchen chronicles! 


Michael Krohnen and some others around Krishnamurti thought they're philosophical but that doesn't rub off another if you're vulgar and crude inside and spend your Life in a protected organization, where you are not challenged to the realities of proper conduct. Krohnen assaulted a visitor in the Krishnamurti Library, totally unprovoked. He also said sexually inappropriate things to a lady visitor of the Library which made her leave while crying. Cooking for Krishnamurti apparently gave him the level of arrogance to think he can get away with such behavior. So chronicles outside the kitchen are just as important. When challenged, Krohnen lied through his teeth. Krishnamurti spent a lifetime talking about the importance of truth but Krohnen apparently just picked up the jokes. K himself said Krohnen was not very intelligent, and that also shows in the lies he says which are constructed so unintelligently.


~~


UPDATES


One of the Trustees of a K foundation, an old friend and an excellent person in every possible way, sent me the announcement of Krohnen's death. While I wish him well, I am not sad he died :-) 

"Thank you. Saw that. A horrible guy - very dishonest and vulgar and stupid. But I wish "him" well...

He harassed this lady visitor who left the library crying:  https://www.rezamusic.com/writings/on-j-krishnamurtis-work/michael-krohnen-harassing-lady-visitor-to-kfa-krishnamurti-library-ojai

He assaulted me in the Library during the Rajesh talk: https://www.rezamusic.com/writings/on-j-krishnamurtis-work/michael-krohnen-the-vulgar-librarian-at-krishnamurti-foundation-america-kfa

There is a difference between people like you and I and people like him. I heard that K said Krohnen was kind of stupid which he was - loud and stupid, kissing up to the rich (Friedrich Grohe, Diane White who was a horrible Trustee I wrote about in 2008: https://www.rezamusic.com/writings/on-j-krishnamurtis-work/michael-krohnen-the-vulgar-librarian-at-krishnamurti-foundation-america-kfa), etc.

Best wishes

Reza


~~~

From a Reader:


"With the #metoo movement, #womensmovement and many others, these people who are responsible for mismanagement throughout the years and their abuse should all be dismissed immediately. They take advantage and use and abuse the little bit of power they think they have. Karma eventually catches up. Keep up the great work! Happy 2024!!"


"I don't wish RIP for him, perhaps he'll come back as a piece of <> on an ant. Sorry Reza for the language here.


He's probably floating around in the astral plane with the demons. When people are in the spiritual field and they do wrong deliberately, their karma is bad, I have seen it happen so many times.


I remember you said he hit you in the library, you should have called the cops and pressed charges because that was an assault. Oh well, he got cancer and who knows what force pushed him to fall. Good riddance to bad rubbish we say in the UK.


George Carlin says, 'dumber than a second coat of paint'. I'm glad he is gone, he cannot spread any of his poison on earth.


Hang in there, it doesn't rain everyday, the sun eventually shines on life."