Corruption in the Hare Krishna Movement: A Survivor’s Story with Nori Muster

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[00:00:57] And this is A Little Bit Culty. Cults are commonplace now. From fandoms to fads, we're examining them all. We look at what happens when things that seem like a great thing at first go bad. Every week, we chat with survivors, experts and whistleblowers for real culty stories told directly by the people who lived through them. Because we want you to learn a few things that we've had to learn the hard way. For example, if you think you're too smart to get sucked into something culty, you might be prime recruitment material. And who knows? You could already be in a cult.

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[00:02:08] Welcome back, everybody, to A Little Bit Culty. In our last episode, we interviewed Jason LaPere, a filmmaker who produced a documentary called Monkey on a Stick, Murder, Madness and the Hare Krishnas. In that episode, we dug deep into corruption and scandal within the Hare Krishna movement, a.k.a. ISKCON. If you want the full story, make sure you check out that episode first. And if you really want to help these episodes sing, watch the doc. Today, we're talking with Nori Muster, a former member of Hare Krishna who worked in the PR and media department.

[00:02:38] Nori was based in the L.A. sect from 1978 to 1988, and she was one of the editors of the Hare Krishna's in-house newspaper. When scandal popped up, the paper mostly covered it up and spun it. Eventually, though, Nori started investigating more closely. She interviewed several of the Krishna gurus and adopted a more unvarnished take on their corruption. Nori was featured heavily in Monkey on a Stick. She's here to tell us about her decade with the Hare Krishnas and her experience with helping make the documentary.

[00:03:06] We're looking forward to our insider's perspective, so let's welcome her to the show. Welcome to A Little Bit Culty. Thank you. And, you know, I don't know if you know this, but we haven't covered a lot of the big classic cults.

[00:03:34] Jonestown, Waco, Hare Krishna. What I didn't realize is that Hare Krishna was still going. Or ISKCON is still going. Yeah, it'll probably never go away. Wow. Well, we have lots to talk about and we're so excited that you've, not only are you a survivor, but you've had such an interesting, rich history with ISKCON. ISKCON and what do you refer to it as? Because there's lots of different names. I want to be respectful of your personal relationship with Hare Krishna.

[00:04:01] I call it ISKCON or we used to have nicknames for it like It's a Khan. So ISKCON is fine. Pretty close, yeah. And you're an ex-Khan. I'm an ex-ISKhan. Ex-ISKhan, not ex-Khan. I was an ex-Khan member. I knew what they called them. I'm not really an ex-devotee because I still revere the Hindu religion and Krishna and all the gods and stories, you know, the mythology of the Hindu. Mm-hmm. Well, we call ourselves ex-Nexians.

[00:04:30] I'm going to learn so much about that from reading your book. I always just thought of it like I saw the things about the lawsuit and everything and it just kind of went by like that. I really didn't know much about your group and I'm learning about that by reading your book. Yeah, it was in and out of the media pretty quickly. That's true. And it was the scandalous stuff that was in the media, not so much the… And Keith wasn't nearly as successful in bringing his message to the world like… Oh my God, pronounce it for me so I don't… Prabhupada.

[00:05:00] Prabhupada. Okay. Awesome. Oh, great. I do think… I know we're going to get to the healing at the end, but I was telling Nori earlier and it'd be that I think that cult survivors generally, especially if they have PTSD, have a hard time reading, which is why I'm a big fan of the audible, personally. I like the audio books. Yeah. Big fans. They go quicker.

[00:05:19] And also you can put them at 1.5 speed. Anyway, let's get your story. Nori, you have such an incredible journey. Tell us about who you were in what decade and what was going on when you joined the movement.

[00:05:32] Well, Prabhupada died right when I met the devotees. It was in my last year of college in 1977 and I graduated in 1978 in summer. And during that time… I only did my last year of college at UC Santa Barbara.

[00:05:51] So during that time I was looking for a spirit because I was in my last year of college and I hadn't found what I was looking for. Like I took art, I took sociology, history, psychology, but none of it answered my questions about life.

[00:06:07] So I was looking for a spiritual outlet, like a place where I could learn about why are we here and all that stuff. And then I met the Hare Krishnas in Santa Barbara. They opened a little preaching center near my college on the way to college. I mean, I would walk to school, so I would always stop there on the way home and on the way back. So I got indoctrinated. They wanted me to join. What was appealing? Like tell me about what the hook was for you.

[00:06:37] Well, actually, one of the men that's in the movie is the guy that got me to join. And he was just so lovely and he was so vivacious and he really loved to chant. He really loved the philosophy and he was a really honest person, like he was a good person. And I was lucky to get him in the movie with us. So just a really brilliant person. And then he kind of talked me into joining. I've given him a hard time about it.

[00:07:07] And when we were both out, he left a year before I did. And then I left. And then we started going to the ICSA conferences together and presenting at the conferences. And we would just crack each other up like, you know, because then you go to a conference and there's a hotel and you're in your hotel rooms a lot and coming down to the conference and that.

[00:07:27] And we would just crack each other up like we would laugh and, you know, like we it helped me. It sort of helped deprogram me, I guess, to have him. He's still my friend. I mean, I met him in 1977 at the Hare Krishna outpost. That's the year I was born, Nari. Oh, my. OK, well, I'm a lot older because I was already 22 or 21 when I met them. Was it the free meals?

[00:07:58] I did go to their Sunday feast. And, you know, all the people in the movie, I say that all these people I met at the Sunday feast were honest, good people. These were the people that worked for the BBT. The BBT is the Bakuridana Book Trust is what it's called. And they publish all these books. You know, so that was they were very competent people, like they were typesetters. They wrote articles.

[00:08:21] The guy that got me to join was one of the writers. He wrote all the, you know, forwards and introductions for the books. The Back to Godhead magazine was out of there, out of the BBT. And they were really competent people. But they, a lot of them were still in the group. And they're afraid to talk about anything about the 1980s.

[00:08:43] Like, if you talk about the 1980s, you're risking your job. They'll come along and go, you know, like, you're out. You can't talk about the gurus that way. Like, they just have to pretend like it didn't happen. Mm-hmm. You were a great subject for the documentary Monkey on the Stick, which, of course, you know, we watched and we talked to Jason in great length. And, you know, covering the Hare Krishna movement and his con, it could be a limited 10-part series.

[00:09:11] So we're trying to obviously cram in a lot of information into one small space. But just in terms of, before we get into the bad stuff that happened and the, how do we want to call it? The abuse. Let's call it abuse. The abuse and the more scandalous stuff of the 80s. Tell us a little bit about what it was like when things were good, like before things turned bad. The heyday. What was the heyday of the Hare Krishna movement? Tell, give us a day in the life of Nori at her prime.

[00:09:38] The heyday of ISKCON was in the 1960s. And it was, even in the 1960s, there was still stuff going on. I mean, it started right away. So the really good days of ISKCON were maybe a day here and a day there because it always had problems. The criminals were always there. They joined right at the beginning.

[00:10:05] And, you know, so it was always kind of like, I don't know, like they just joined thinking they could somehow take advantage of this, you know. And some of them were real devotees, like they believed in Krishna and they wanted to find spirit. And other ones were more like materially motivated, I think. Did you feel that right away or was that like a slow kind of discernment? Well, for me, I didn't even know about most of it until after I left. When I was doing the research for my book is when I found out most of the crimes.

[00:10:35] I mean, I was aware of the crimes at the time, but I didn't. I think we had a different attitude in the PR office. It was more like, you know, you would get these articles in the mail because we had a clipping service. And so that was part of my job was to open those clipping service envelopes and sort the articles out and tape them to pieces of paper and put them in the file cabinet. So I knew what was going on.

[00:11:00] But the whole systemic problem, I didn't understand that until after I left. So, and we will get into that, I promise. But I'm still just dying to know because I think it's important for people to understand what was good about it that kept you in. So when things were good, what did that look like? You'd get up, you'd chance. Good for me, not for the group. Yeah, for you personally. I loved the morning program. I loved to chant. I loved to take care of the deities.

[00:11:26] I used to go on there and wake them up in the morning and give them food and, you know, stuff like that. There were all these different ceremonies. I loved all the ceremonies. I loved the stories. I loved my friends. I had lots of friends there. And I had a good job. I worked with people that I really liked and they respected me. And they, like with my father, you know, he always was like really encouraging me to become a professional. He wanted me to become a lawyer.

[00:11:56] You know, my dad had really high expectations for me and so did the head of our department, the PR office. You know, they were always encouraging me to do more. Like I started as a secretary. So I was doing work that I really enjoyed. We bought a typesetting machine and the company allowed two people to go and get trained on the machine. So I learned how to do typesetting. And this is before I ever had a computer. This was in the 1980s when nobody had computers yet.

[00:12:26] And so I learned how to work a typesetting machine. And so I was editing the stories to fit in the paper. And then one day they just said, hey, we want you to be an associate editor on the ISCOM World Review. And we'll relieve you from all your secretary services and you just work on the newspaper. So I had a lot of freedom. I could do anything. I could use my time any way I wanted as long as we hit the deadline, a monthly deadline to put out this newspaper.

[00:12:55] And I loved the people I worked with. I ended up marrying the editor of the newspaper. So we were married. We've known each other more than 40 years. We were married for 11 years. And that was your primary role, to edit? Well, I wrote. I was like a copywriter. I would collect the stories that came in the mail because all the temples wanted to be in the ISCOM World Review. And back then there was no Internet. So they would just mail the stuff to us, like photos, stories, press releases. And while we were working on the paper, I'd just throw those in a basket.

[00:13:25] And then once we had taken the paper to the printer and mailed it out, I would get out that basket and look at all the stories and decide which ones we could use. Usually we used all the stories that we got. And I would write up the copy. You know, I'd write the article. And then we would have an editorial meeting and everyone would look over the articles and comment. And then we would decide which one should be on the front page. So that was my job. It is a paid job? They don't pay you in ISCOM.

[00:13:55] But your room? Room and board. Yeah. Yeah. You were living in the temple? I lived on Whatseekah Avenue for 10 years. And I loved it there. All my friends were there. We would get up at 4 in the morning and go to the temple and see each other and chant together. And we had – it was fun. I liked it. And I went to India three times. That was also a good time for me.

[00:14:21] And were there any, at this point, any red flags that you now know were red flags that you ignored? Well, yeah. Because the newspaper articles that were coming in, it was like, holy shit, what is that guy up to? You know, like with Hansa Duda. You know, he – like I said in the movie, oh, Hansa Duda is one of the gurus that they go over. There were red flags all over the place. But I ignored them because I was having a great time.

[00:14:49] Were the articles writing you to complain about them or just reporting? Like, did you feel they had a whistleblower feel to them? No, this was just the media responding to crimes that people in ISKCON committed. Wow. It was just normal – well, they told us that the media were demons and they just wanted to destroy our organization. But they were just reporting on crimes that happened. So you have this prime position running the newspaper.

[00:15:18] You're getting some news about what's happening in other areas. And for those who've listened to the first episode with Jason, the guru you mentioned is one of the 11 that Parabhad may or may not have given power to. So this is now the 80s where things are getting a little messy. Is that right? Yeah, because Prabhupada died right when I met the devotees. So that was in 1977. And I joined the next year and that was 1978 is when the Zonal Gurus took over.

[00:15:46] So I was there for that transition. And it was just a problem that Prabhupada was gone. And, you know, the crimes really got worse after he left. Because they were already doing the drug smuggling and getting busted for drug smuggling when he was still alive. I don't know if people told him about it. Maybe he died without even knowing about their crimes. So I don't know. Did you think that it was made up by the media because they were demons and they're trying to take down this con? No.

[00:16:16] God, no. I wasn't that stupid. Okay. So you knew that it was happening, but did you – you were like, but it's probably no big deal? Or how did you wrap your head around it? This is how we dealt with it. We had a very cynical, gallows humor that we exercised quite often in the public relations department. And I can give you one example.

[00:16:39] When we found out that Jayatirtha was murdered and his head was cut off, it came through on a fax. Somebody from England faxed us the articles. And I think my boss was there. I know my husband was there. And we were – I think we were all there when the thing came through the fax. And it was this article and the headline was Man's Head Cut Off. That was the headline, Man's Head Cut Off. And we cracked up.

[00:17:09] We were laughing. Like, oh, my God, man's head cut off. They could have given it a better headline than that. And we were, like, laughing and making jokes about it because the gallows humor was what saved us from going insane over there trying to cover up for those people. And actually, when they killed Sue Lochan – well, we can get into that stuff later. But when that happened, all of us were like, forget it. We don't do that kind of PR if they're going to go around killing people.

[00:17:37] I mean, anyway, let's get to that. Did you believe it? Or what was the – Yes, of course. I knew Sue Lochan. And I knew he was dead. It was really painful what happened to Sue Lochan. Because I knew that guy for – I first met him in 1980. So I knew him for six years. And they killed him. That's Steve Bryant? Yeah. Yeah. I was shocked. Just to remind our listeners, he was the whistleblower.

[00:18:06] He was the one who called out Keith Hamm for his transgressions and his hypocrisy. So when this happened, were you – I mean, at this point, were you ever afraid for your safety when you started to look into that? No. No? Because you became a whistleblower. Well, I worked really hard for ISKCON to promote them and to preserve the organization during that hard time.

[00:18:32] I probably helped them get through it, you know, without too much damage. And I regret that now. But at the time, I really cared about the organization. And I didn't want that to get ruined by these crimes that were – But I didn't know they were going to kill people. I didn't know about the child abuse. I found out about that in my research in the 1990s when I was writing my book, when I was finishing writing my book.

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[00:22:50] You've heard from our sponsors. Now let's get back to a little bit culty, shall we? What was your final straw? Yeah. So we kind of described it in the movie, but it gets kind of conflated. But first, I tried to interview Kirtan Ananda. And my boss said, don't interview him. I don't want you to interview him. So I did it anyway. And then we got a little sned about it. And then finally, it turned out we weren't allowed to publish that interview. So we didn't.

[00:23:19] So we went out of business for two months. We skipped two issues that year. It was 1987, I guess. 87. And so my father, who was involved with us as a consultant for the newspaper, suggested that my husband and I should write a new editorial policy that outlines what we can write about and what we can't. So we wrote something that was satisfying to us.

[00:23:49] Our boss approved it. And then I took it to a GBC meeting. I was called to stand and defend the newspaper in front of the GBC, the governing body commission. It's their board of directors. So I had to go before the board of directors and try to make my plea for saving the ISKCON World Review. And we went back into print.

[00:24:11] And then from that meeting with the GBC, the head of the committee, Ravinder Saroop, was the head of the committee that was going to oversee us. This was two years later in 1988. So I put together the newspaper like I usually did. And I had been down in Dallas for the GBC meeting. I did a few interviews down there. And they had a new Gurukula that was not based on abusing children. It was a good school.

[00:24:40] And I thought, oh, that's good news. I'm going to interview that, you know, the headmaster of the school and we can put it in the ISKCON World Review. So I interviewed him and he gave me a really good interview. And I said, I asked him, do you think the children should go to college after they finish Gurukula? And he said, yeah, that's a great idea. You know, a lot of my students are going to college. Well, Ravinder Saroop didn't like that one, even though he had a PhD. And so he changed the question. He wouldn't let them say that.

[00:25:10] He changed what the headmaster said. He rewrote it. Well, Prabhupada doesn't really approve of that, but some people could go to college. And then there was another question I asked him. I said, you know, I've heard in the past that the children weren't allowed to see their parents while they were in Gurukula. Well, Ravinder didn't like that question either. So he changed it. It was just so frustrating.

[00:25:34] Like if you do an interview and then some committee guy comes in and edits the person's answers, it's pretty frustrating. And so Dave and I resigned. Sounds like the committee stifling the truth. Yeah. Who was the committee made up of? And was it international? Was it – how was that put together? What was the ingredients there? Ravinder Saroop was the president of the GBC at the time.

[00:26:00] And he, I think, was the one who started the committee and wanted to do the committee. And when we went to the editorial meeting down in San Diego, and they were going to pretend that it was just a normal editorial meeting. And then my husband stopped everyone. He said, look, we came here to resign. Can we read our resignation letter? So that was the end. We read it. We met for another hour or two to discuss.

[00:26:27] Dave and I offered to do two more issues so they would have time to find new editors and get it all going again. And it did go on for about 10 years after Dave and I left. But that was it. We – I was done with them. So the committee was there really to control information? They formed the committee to hold me back. Yeah. Yeah, they didn't know I was going to write a book about them. But, you know, that happened.

[00:26:52] It's funny that you – like, not funny, but I totally relate to that, Nori, because I had so many red flags, too, that I didn't know what I was looking at. And then there was one particular moment like that with my colleagues and peers and upper ranks that you'll read when you get to my book about the way they promoted people. That was a really hypocritical and non-ethical thing. That was one of my final straws. They took away her job, in essence, with that move. Yeah. And in many ways, mine, too. They took away the whole – what was supposed to be the structure.

[00:27:21] Sounds like the reason you were there was taken away from you. To tell the truth, to report. Yeah. Yeah, to report on the truth. I think the real radical part – We were pretty submissive and ordinary for them for many years. But after they murdered Sulochon, or after the gurus murdered Sulochon, I kind of lost it. And I kind of went ballistic on them. And I was trying to do it in a polite way, but they didn't. They didn't like it.

[00:27:50] And then they figured, well, you know, this girl's just going to give us problems. Let's drum her out. Let's get rid of her. So I think they were really happy when Dave and I left. You know, that's what they wanted. But, you know, that's okay. I needed to get out of there. I wish I'd gotten out before they killed Sulochon. Sure. I understand. Now, when did you start to – like, did you feel that – did the word cult come into your mind at all during this time? Or when did that happen? No, it was much later.

[00:28:20] I never thought of Iskan as a cult. I thought of it as a branch of the Hindu religion. I mean, I still kind of see it as a branch of the Hindu religion. But it's a pretty bad – some of the leaders have done really bad things. And there's still people in the organization that were around in the 80s. But they have tenure. They're never going to get fired, even if they helped cover up for crimes like I did, or even more than I did. I was just ignoring the crimes.

[00:28:50] Well, they're not immune to law enforcement, are they? Does law enforcement know about it? Has there been due diligence in that area of it? Is there room for that? You know, the law came down on them when there were really overt things. Like when Hans Duda went around shooting machine guns at the Cadillac dealer windows. You know, that kind of thing. They would step in. But as far as the child abuse and other kinds of abuse that were going on, they would never report that to the officials.

[00:29:20] There was just that one incident at the Watsika Avenue nursery school. They did go to the police because it was just so – Los Angeles wasn't one of the really big – I mean, they had abusive teachers there, but it wasn't – What was the incident? Oh, in the movie, there's one segment where I'm standing in front of the old nursery school. It was like a pink house on Watsika Avenue.

[00:29:44] And the people who were put in charge of leading the nursery school were – there was a couple. And the man was a child abuser, and the woman was compliant. She didn't try to stop him or, you know, she was just letting it happen. And she didn't report it. So both of them ended up going to jail because the devotees and the police worked together to find them, you know, to locate them, arrest them. They had a trial, and they went to jail.

[00:30:14] So that's the way you're supposed to handle it. But that's the only incident of child abuse where they did contact the officials. They don't – you know, organizations like that goes on in a lot of cults now. There's a lot of – I think cults are like partly just to abuse children and women. Yeah, a lot of them end up there. We've come to that conclusion. Did you feel like that they had help or protection from law enforcement at any point? No. Like, no? No. Okay.

[00:30:52] How did you wrap your head around the hypocrisy of, you know, the tenet of Hare Krishna of rejecting materialism but then fundraising and having these opulent temples and making all this money? Like, where'd the money go? It was like serfdom. Yeah. How did they practice what they preached? You know, I've only really – like this year we did so much research about ISKCON. And I doubled my knowledge of ISKCON history just this last year.

[00:31:19] And I never really thought about that materialism. Like, Sankhirtan was – especially with the guru I had, which was Ramaswar, and he was the big – he really pushed that to sell the books and get the money. And I never really thought about it as materialistic when I was a member. And I never really thought about it that way. I didn't really think about how materialistic it is. But now I see it.

[00:31:47] And the way I see it now is that, like, imagine that you live in a neighborhood and that you have some friends that have a big mansion. And they have parties all the time. And it's this big opulent house. And then, you know, you're up there partying with them. But then later you find out they stole that house from the owners. The owners live somewhere like Madrid and they never come over here. They don't know what's going on with their house. There's no neighbors around to warn them that someone's been using their house.

[00:32:17] And that's what it was with ISKCON because they bought most of those properties with drug money combined with Sankhirtan money. You know, like that – those buildings were provided by materialistic, greedy money issues among the leaders. Sankhirtan is the practice of getting money, proselytizing and getting money on the street, correct? Right. Yeah. When people do Sankhirtan, it's supposed to be you're spreading the word because you're giving out books.

[00:32:45] And you meet the public and you give them a book and they give you a donation. So I didn't really have anything against it. I wasn't any good at it. I tried it one time when I – even before I joined, I was motivated to go out with some – one time to the airport to LAX. And so they gave me some books and I was supposed to go up and try to get donations. But, of course, I didn't know how their tactics worked.

[00:33:11] Like they would flirt with guys and, you know, try to lure them in and then they give a donation. But for me, like I went up to a guy and said, Hi, these books tell you the truth about why we're living here, you know, what God means. And they'd just look at me like, what? And then I'd never get any donations from anybody. So I would – I might come back to the temple with like 35 cents, you know. Why the airport?

[00:33:39] Why did they send Harry Christians to the airport? It was really busy. And this was in the days before they had all the ultra security. So you could walk right up to the boarding window. This was in the 70s and 80s. And so it was just a good place to find people and stop them and be friendly. You know, people are traveling. They're always pretty friendly and talking to people while they travel. So it was really easy to get the money. Like you could just walk around the airport.

[00:34:09] It's always crowded. And yeah, they did it other places too after that. The airport started to clamp down on them. So tangent but related, in the movie Airplane, there is a scene where you can choose between smoking or non. And there's some Harry Krishner selling chanting or non-chanting section. Was that considered a win or was that considered a dig by ISKCON? I love that. That is my favorite movie, Airplane, just because it makes fun of them. I love it.

[00:34:37] But at the time, was that like, yay, we're in pop culture or oh, they're, you know, like how is that taken by ISKCON? You know, I don't think I even probably saw that movie until after I got out. So a lot of things happened. You left with your husband. You realize later it's a cult. But I know you've done a lot of healing and recently you're part of this movie Monkey on a Stick.

[00:35:02] What's your perspective now on Hare Krishna that exists, on modern Hare Krishna? Well, I think that they need to come to terms with what they did in the 1980s. And instead of continuing to hide it, I looked at their list of who's still in power, you know, who's still in the GBC, who are the gurus now. And they have people there that were around in the 80s doing crime and in child abusing, and they're still in their positions.

[00:35:31] So I made a whole list and I, you know, checked with other. We did so much research this year. And I'm really glad we did because it helps me understand why ISKCON is still so dysfunctional. They still want to cover up the 1980s. You know, you can't really get over your shame unless you're willing to put the light of day on it, make some amends, check your own ego, find out what you're doing wrong, and change.

[00:36:00] Then you can forgive yourself and the people can forgive you if you change. And if ISKCON did change, I think a lot of Hindus and other people that have been involved with ISKCON would forgive them. But just everyone who gets involved with ISKCON ends up leaving because of some culty fuckery, you know, like you said, like you were saying. Mind fuckery. Culty mind fuckery. Mind fuckery. That was it. Yeah, I like that word.

[00:36:27] So a lot of – I've talked to Hindu people who were really disappointed with the sort of criminal vibe in ISKCON and they'd leave. So if ISKCON could just get that criminal vibe out of their system and turn into a really honest organization, I think they would have a lot better time at it. And the people who joined that would – but you know how it is. Like every – a lot of groups, if they have bad leadership, it'll turn into a cult because the power is –

[00:36:56] Are you at all optimistic that it's even headed that way? I mean, it's like saying – No. No. Yeah. But, you know, like I thought – It's more like saying our government get rid of corrupt politicians. Well – Until there's something there to checks and balance them. It doesn't seem like there's any incentive. It's kind of like a common problem for all of us because, yeah, the government tolerates this. People get away with stuff. That's exactly how it works in a cult.

[00:37:21] Like when we were in ISKCON and all these people were getting away with everything, like Hans Aduda, first he got arrested three times, and that was in 1980. And they told him to step back. Then in 1983 was when he was shooting – you know, he went around just shooting at things randomly. And that was when they kicked him out. So for three years, he was just a nuisance. He was still living there, and they never get rid of him.

[00:37:51] They would never stand up to him. So that's very culty. And it's – you know how cults sort of circulate through the whole system. Like a lot of families can be cultish. Couples can be cultish. Businesses can be cultish. It just happens anywhere. It's like immaturity, childhood immaturity. This has been the theme of our podcast over the past four years, and it's reinforced with every new place we find cultish behavior. So we are on board with you there.

[00:38:24] For more context on what brought us here, check out my memoir. It's called Scarred, The True Story of How I Escaped NXIVM, The Cult That Bound My Life. I narrate the audio version, and it's also available on Amazon, Audible, and at most bookstores. And now, a brief message from our Little Bit Culty sponsors. And remember, when you support our sponsors, you're supporting this podcast. Let's talk about undies. You like undies? Oh, yeah. I love undies. I really do. Some call them panties. Oh, shit.

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[00:41:22] where we go deep into notorious true crime cases. With significant research and careful analysis, we examine the psyche of a killer, their motives and targets, and law enforcement's pursuit to stop their spree. Follow Serial Killers wherever you get your podcasts and get new episodes every Monday.

[00:41:50] Break time's over, people. Let's get back to this episode of A Little Bit Culty. It's a good one. I want to make sure we have time to talk about your healing journey and how you use your skills that you honed with your, you know, your time in the Hare Krishna movement with ISKCON as a writer to take those skills and apply it to your own healing and helping others heal. Can you tell us a little bit about what your writing is and specifically myths and how myths have helped you heal,

[00:42:20] understanding the mythic journey? Yeah, I've been working on that. Well, I had to learn all the—I knew a lot of the Hindu myths and myth in the Jungian sense. So—and then learning the myths of the Hindus was wonderful. I love those stories so much. But I think mostly I wanted to write my book because I had a lot of things to say,

[00:42:45] and I felt like if I didn't say it, it would just be all clogged up inside myself, and nobody would ever understand what I had been through in ISKCON. And I also wanted to sort of clear my mind of any kind of guilt that I covered up for these people. And, I mean, it helped me with my guilt because I did speak out, but I still was left with a lot of guilt

[00:43:09] and blaming myself for other people's problems or blaming myself for things that have nothing to do with me. You know how cults can do that. They make you feel guilty about everything. Because they want you to take responsibility for everything is part of it, right? Yeah, for sure. For sure. I really don't understand the criminal mind at all, but I know that they have ways of forgiving themselves that ordinary people wouldn't forgive.

[00:43:38] Like, oh, well, we killed that guy. Too bad. We didn't get caught. Well, they don't have any morality. They don't actually think it's that bad. Right. Yeah, you're right. I don't think they – what allows them to thrive is they don't particularly have the conscience that most people do, and they know that. And they know that you do, and they're not limited in their minds by a conscience. Your conscience in their mind limits you from abusing people.

[00:44:07] They don't have that. So I think what happens is that they end up having to recognize that they have to hide that. And then it seems like, judging from the movie, that a couple people found a place where they didn't have to hide it. And they could be free with their abuse and justify it through whatever means and hide behind the model that was there to justify their actions, if that makes sense.

[00:44:35] That makes sense because I think that, you know, they made those 11 men gurus. Yeah, that to me was – And they all covered up for each other. Like it was like, I scratch your back, you scratch mine. Conspiracy. I'll smuggle your drugs. You smuggle mine. Oh, they all smuggled drugs. It wasn't just looking at the beach. They all did it. Also, I think to your point, Nori, not understanding the criminal mind is what they understand you don't understand. I had no – I was so innocent and young. Yeah.

[00:45:05] I didn't know anything. You were 22. Well, they see you as sucker. They see you as a willful – a sheeple, so to speak. I think that the higher-ups who were more – like you're talking about like a narcissistic personality disorder with no empathy for other people, and they just used people. So – but it wasn't like that in the PR office. Like we were – you know, they brought in my boss to do the work

[00:45:32] of covering up for the drug smuggling busts. But it just escalated from there, and we were covering up for everything then. And it was happening so fast. We just kept going. And then – you know, but it was a big turning point when they killed Sue Lochan. Like we were just like, hey, we don't do PR. You know, it would really help is if you quit killing people because, you know, the PR department can't do much to cover that up. You know, that's going to be in the news.

[00:46:01] That's why – that was when the Iskambur review became more radical because we wanted to print articles about what was going on with Sue Lochan's murder. Well, also in covering that up, you make a lot of other good people complicit and aligned with those behaviors. And I imagine that's got to be hard. Yeah. I think that it was – I think for me overall the experience in Iskambur was a good experience until it wasn't. It sounds like.

[00:46:30] Well, it also sounds like you were one of the few that had like – it's kind of similar to us. Like we gleaned the good parts out of NXIVM and kind of were doing our own thing. You know, it sounds like you had a certain amount of power and freedom, so you weren't necessarily, you know, receiving the brunt of it all like we see in Monkey on the Stick. I didn't experience what was going on with the other women. There were women who were being married to criminals, like arranged marriages.

[00:46:58] They would marry an innocent woman to a criminal. I have friends that went through that. It's really hard. And they'd have children and no money. Oh, wow. You know, traveling all the time, going to New Vrindaba and going to this temple, that temple with these creepy men that – who knows what they were into. Also just the blatant misogyny, like women's brains are smaller. Yeah. Doctrine. LSD trips too. Like it's like there's a lot. See, that's the kind of stuff that we used to make jokes about.

[00:47:28] Like we would joke about that. And one time in the office, you know, I was writing these cartoons where what is women's place in the movement? And then I'd have a picture of a woman sitting with a dunce hat looking, you know, sitting in the corner. You know, stuff like that. So we had this gallows humor that helped us get through it. They were awful.

[00:47:49] You know, like when I was in college, I took a lot of women's studies classes, like women's psychology, Western history, sociology of women, you know, all these classes. And I considered myself, you know, a feminist when I joined and I still am. So I never took any of it seriously and I was never treated that way. Hmm.

[00:48:13] That's interesting that like you were able to pick out what you wanted and discard the rest, which I wish we could say. Peripherate to the abuse. I guess it depends on your role in the company. Yeah, it depends on what level you're on. Like if they tag you like here's a woman, single mother, has these kids. Let's first of all, let's get the kids away from her. Let's put them in a gurukula where they could be abused and then we'll abuse her. Or it seemed like maybe they didn't think about it that way, but that's how they acted.

[00:48:42] And they would marry these single mothers off to some criminal. And they married little girls off to criminals too. I try to not compare cults which is worse and whose trauma is worse because it's all just terrible and shitty. The process is the same, right? Yeah. And it always leads to the same place, money, sex, or power, right? Money, abusing people. It's not even sex, you know. So rape and other kinds of sexual abuse are not sex. It's abuse.

[00:49:11] You know, they're there to abuse people. That's why they do it. It's not about sex. It's about abuse. And having power over somebody. Yeah. So, yeah. Let's talk about your healing journey. And I don't know if you know this, but Nippy and I are working on our second book together. And the middle chunk of that is what's worked for us in regards to healing. And I see that you've also written a handbook for survivors.

[00:49:38] And while I couldn't read it, I do see your chapter titles. And I think there's a lot of overlap. So we have family therapy, abuse recovery, in-depth psychology, 12 steps, mind-body healing for post-cult blues, art therapy, and gestalt, and post-cult spirituality. So, I mean, we could do a whole other episode just on this.

[00:50:01] But when you meet people and you want them to understand there's a healing journey, what would be like some of like maybe three key takeaways? I wrote that book right after I got my master's degree after leaving ISKCON. And those were the things that I studied in grad school, those subjects. And they're all good. I think, you know, when I was in grad school, I took a class on the 12 steps and I attended 12-step meetings. And I think that's a really good thing for people.

[00:50:30] I mean, the groups can be culty. So I don't recommend joining a group and just throwing yourself into it. But if you read the 12 steps and follow the 12 steps on your own or with a counselor, you know, a private counselor, you can really learn a lot about yourself because you do the searching moral inventory. You make amends where you face what you've done in your life. And you make amends when you can.

[00:50:59] And you improve yourself. Like you change yourself into a better person. So I think that's one of the best healing processes. When I left ISKCON, I was so angry. I was a really, really angry person. And I was really hard to deal with. And now I'm still kind of hard to deal with, but I'm getting better. I think I'm less angry. I've tried really hard to improve myself so that I can live with myself. And I'm happy with where I'm at.

[00:51:29] And doing this movie was a good release. I was able to tell the stories. I'm really grateful they made that movie. It's a process. You know, when you are injured, when you're damaged or abused when you're young, it may take the rest of your life to fix that, to make it right. And that's good if we live long enough to actually make it right. I agree. Okay. I agree.

[00:51:57] I also am with you on, I see in the subheading here that with post-cult spirituality is basically learning to keep the good parts of an experience and letting go of the bad parts that didn't work. And it's a hard thing to do. It seems like you've done that. And at least for us, we've tried to figure out where the good parts originally came from.

[00:52:19] And the teachings you learned in ISKCON, it seems like you've held on to that by figuring out the Hindu roots where they originally came from, separate from the abuse. Is that right? I don't think it's right to let go of the things that were bad. The way I see it is that's always going to be in our memory. We don't forget those things. But we could get used to it, get used to having those memories. You know, it's like you have these pictures in your head.

[00:52:48] And if you can get used to having them, like you accept them. Like, yeah, this is what happened. I'm not okay with it, but it happened. And then you could just put the picture up on your wall and that would be it. You don't have to worry about it or think about it too much. It's just something that happened. You just get used to that and live with it. Like when children are abused, they can't forget the abuse that happened to them, but they can get used to it.

[00:53:18] So it doesn't bother them as much. Yeah. They can take the power away from it. Yeah. When I say letting go, I mean, like, stop doing the practices from your time there that weren't helpful. Because there was a lot of things. Like, it was a very strict way of life, wasn't it? Like, and you're not doing all those things anymore. When I first got out, I did everything the opposite. Like, you're supposed to leave your shoes out by the door. I would wear my shoes in the house. You're supposed to offer your food to Krishna. Didn't do it anymore.

[00:53:48] You know, just everything I did, like, the opposite of what they taught me. That was when I was in grad school. I just rejected most of the demanding, weird things that they had us doing. Like, they made us fast every time there was an ecotasy moon. It was, like, twice a month. And then every holiday we were supposed to fast. And, oh, it's awful. So I just let it all go right when I left. I just didn't want to deal with it. No more sorries. No more. That's what I did. Did you?

[00:54:18] Yeah. Good. Yeah. I feel like I could get this elsewhere. And that's what I meant by letting go. Like, not to ignore the bad things. Because you do have to face them at some point. So I agree with you about that. Where are you spiritually at this point? Through your faith? How do you feel? I'm like a religious atheist. I'm not atheist, but, like, agnostic.

[00:54:42] So I was raised as an agnostic because my parents were atheists and agnostic. But, you know, even if, like, I believe in Krishna. And even if Krishna is just a figment in my imagination, that's all right. It doesn't matter what it is. Like I said in the movie, I think life is more like a dream. So I try not to take it too hard. It's just the dream I'm having now.

[00:55:08] Speaking of dreams, there's a very intense scene at the end where you, a dramatized scene where you got to confront your younger self. Yeah. I love that. You're not an actor, as far as we know. You did a great job. Thank you. How was that? Was that for you to do that, to do it and then to see it? I got to help write that scene. And the actress who played my younger self, Cassie Davidson, was just delightful. They filmed a lot more than what went in the movie.

[00:55:37] And we were just, at the end, they were having us kind of ad lib and just talk. And we were just both crying. And it was really fun. It was really interesting to do that, to actually talk to your younger self. And she actually gave me a lot of courage, too, because she's an actress and she's a pretty got-it-together person. And she was playing me in the PR office. She looked like she had it pretty much together. Yeah, she did.

[00:56:07] And so I was really happy that my younger self had it together like that. And when I told her, when we were talking and filming it later, I said, when we were filming the parts that weren't in the movie, I said, you know, please leave before the murders. You've got to get out of here now. And then we were just both crying. I mean, like, we were really crying. It was a really interesting interaction. And I wish that was in all the versions of the movie. But, you know, what can you do?

[00:56:33] So you should get Jason to release that as a little, like, a little behind the scenes or a little, like, short film. Oh, that's a good idea. Yeah, a little bonus content. Because that, I think, would be very therapeutic. Yeah, because that's what we all fantasize about in our stories. It was really gestalt. It was like, for me, doing that scene with her was like closing the gestalt because I got to talk to my younger self. And I found out she would have left if I had come back and talked to her.

[00:57:01] Because Casey Davidson was ready to leave. How healing. Well, even just speaking to you after watching Monkey on a Stick, which we loved, is healing and cathartic for us, too. So you're doing important work. And I hope that you feel that and can add that to your gestalt of healing experience. Well, thank you. That's so awesome. Yeah, sometimes you feel like you're never really going to get over it. I do.

[00:57:30] Yeah, it just gets easier. I don't know if it gets easier. It just goes on longer. Maybe the good starts to come in. But, you know, this world is always something. There's always some crazy stuff going on in the background, in the real world, and then in your life. I don't know. It's just an imperfect world, I think. Yeah. That's true. Always will be. Well, we know that most of your work can be found on norimuster.com.

[00:57:59] Is there anything else that you want our listeners to know before we let you get back to your day? I'd just like to get the real story out there. And it was a really interesting experience to be involved in this. I'm so grateful. We are, too. For everything. Thank you for sharing your story with us. It's lovely to meet you guys. Lovely to meet you, too. Okay. Until next time, please keep in touch. If you like the show, please consider supporting us by giving us a rating, a review, and subscribe on iTunes.

[00:58:29] Cults are commonplace now, and we're looking at them all, and every little bit helps. Hit that subscribe button so you don't miss an episode. Thank you so much for coming on the show, Nori. We always appreciate an insider's perspective on the subjects that we cover. To learn more about Nori's story, check out her memoir, Betrayal of the Spirit, My Life Behind the Headlines of the Hare Krishna Movement. And definitely make sure to watch Monkey on a Stick for a broader look at corruption within the Hare Krishna.

[00:58:59] Personally, I'm going to be flying in the non-chanting section. How about you, Nipi? Oh, no doubt. Thanks for listening, everyone. Till next time. Bye. A Little Bit Culti is a Trace 120 production.

[00:59:29] Executive produced by Sarah Edmondson and Anthony Nipi-Ames, in collaboration with Amphibian Media. Our co-creator is Jess Temple-Tardy. Audio engineering by Red Cayman Studios. And our writing and research is done by Emma Diehl and Kristen Reeder. Our theme song, Cultivated, is by the artists John Bryant and Nigel Aslan.