And I'll bet Perez doesn't even realize he is being played by Gafni exactly because he has already been critical of me. If it weren't sad, it might be funny.
As is always the case, Gafni tries to obscure the message by smearing the messenger (for example, women who broke his sacred container, Vicki Polin, Luke Ford, any and all other detractors, and most recently John Dupuy).
John had the audacity to speak out, so Marc responds with so much love and nuance, so much righteousness, and also with a not-very-well-veiled threat:
I did not threaten John with a lawsuit or any other such threat. Simply not true. I said to John that I would be forced to reply in a way that shares the deep context of my relationship to John and the great disappointment that I have felt around John and his character which I have called him on directly many times. That would then unmask much of the conscious or unconscious motivation behind John's blog. I wrote a long blog post which does precisely this. I am no longer sure wether anything would be served by posting it. The blogosphere is really not the place for genuine loving conversation between friends.Two of his favorite ploys are on display here - he said/he said games that can never be proven one way or the other, and threats of exposing personal issues from the past that may or may not be problematic.
So now the "smear Bill Harryman campaign" is in full swing. Joe's big piece of ammunition against me is to accuse me of intellectual property theft. I addressed this in the comments to one of the posts where he again leveled the same accusations, so here is my "defense":
I have never posted anyone's work on this blog without attributing author and source, with links. Often I have permission to do so, and equally often the authors are grateful for the additional exposure. I guess I still have not met the legal standard (or your ethical standard), so yes, I am guilty of "egregious intellectual property theft." If I have hurt anyone by posting their work here, I am deeply sorry. I have never meant to "steal" work, which is why I always include links to the original source.So there it is - both an admission of being guilty as charged and an apology to anyone who has been hurt by my actions. Wow, that wasn't so hard. Why can't other people do that?
He says that accusing Gafni of plagiarism (actually, it wasn't me - it was Rocky Anderson, one the owners of the stolen work, and whose "letter of support" from Gafni's last resurrection is still posted on Ganfi's site) is hypocrisy because I am an intellectual property pirate. He isn't accusing me of using other people's work, verbatim, and putting my name on it as though I had written it, so I think we are talking apples and oranges here.
Are these accusations supposed to discredit the letter from Tami Simon on the original post? Is this supposed to discredit the other woman Gafni was sleeping with (mentioned in Tami's letter), in addition to the senior student, Marcy (who wrote in his defense), while not publicly disclosing his separation from Mariana? Or is it supposed to discredit the message by discrediting the messenger?
More and more, as this wears on, I feel sorry for Mariana - she is a new mom with her first child and her world is collapsing around her. She willingly chose Gafni and in full-knowledge of his past, although she believed his retelling of the story with him as victim (always the victim), so she holds her own share in this situation.
And then there is Zion - babies sense the emotions of those around them - what is this doing to him and his future? How I know I have contributed to the suffering of Marc, Mariana, and Zion by telling truths that no one else was willing to tell. I am sad about that. Like each of Gafni's previous children, he will probably grow up without his father - and eventually with the knowledge that his father was a deeply wounded man.
6 comments:
Dear William. Telling the truth is never a bad action.
In fact, karmikally speaking, you are helping both Mariana and Marc to awake and heal, since the process always starts by acknowledging what happened.
About Zion, it would be just plainly criminal to accuse you of any possible damage to that kid. And opposite to that, it is realistic to say that you are indirectly helping him, as kids (and awaken adults) can feel the truth-field around them, that is, they KNOW when something is wrong, and NOTHING cause more pathology and neurosis than feeling something that is contradictory to what we are being told.
With some luck, imagining a positive scenario, Marc will realize what he is doing and start a process of change. By the moment Zion will be big enough to understand cognitively, his father could be reasonably healthy and repented and purified of what he did.
That is SUCH a better scenario than growing up in a family where the father just have multiple relationships without commitment in secrecy causing hurt and lying around.
So please see that you are doing good, not bad.
Truth is always sister of Goodness.
May we speak the truth.
Love,
Federico
Bill, you said: "Like each of Gafni's previous children,..."
Excuse me - he has others?! Does he see them at all?
James Barrow, UK
Thank you for this, William. It's mind-boggling that after years of Marc defending himself from scandal after scandal using documents, emails and various manipulative techniques, and then repeatedly betraying his supporters' faith by continuing to lie and screw around, that anyone would still think his perspective has any validity whatsoever. Joe Perez chose the wrong cause to get behind, and he will be humiliated once the truth comes out.
The current crumbling of Marc's world (even his staunchest helper Kelly Bearer is no longer involved with CWS) must feel very familiar to him, as he's been involved in far more scandals that most Integral folks are aware of, including being thrown out of every denomination in the Jewish world. This recent post from a Jewish source gives some history and expresses frustration at his latest rise to power:
http://zeek.forward.com/articles/117387/
And yes, Gafni has three grown children: a daughter from his first failed marriage, which he left when she was a baby, and two sons from his second failed marriage (read his third wife's testimony to learn what kind of father he was). Zion will certainly be better off without him. Once Mariana fully processes her tragic experience -- which will probably take years -- she'll have a great deal of valuable wisdom to share around discernment of spiritual teachers (the book The Guru Question SHOULD have been). Unfortunately she'll be unlikely to fully disclose the whole truth about her experiences because Marc is the father of her child.
Wow. I think this is about as ugly as I've seen it yet, from William and his Attaboy Squad. Shame on you all. Really, shame--that would be the appropriate emotion for what you're doing. Shame would allow you to feel bad enough to examine your motivations closely, and especially the impact of what you're doing (not cricitism per se, but how you are "arguing".) You all expose loving, enlightened relationships and this is what you spew, making Marc not only a sexual predator, but an abuser of his poor, victimized partner (Marianna), and a defenseless little child (Zion). Again, shame on all of you.
I remember a roommate years ago, a good solid progressive and liberal, who was all about peace and love until his back got up against the wall, and then the righteous violence came out. Seems like this is your MO as well, William, that when you get called on your shit, you run crying foul, and then take out the stops in "defending" yourself and your pet cause. You apparently stop caring what damage you might be doing, and just cut loose, righteously. How would it feel, for instance, if I used you for my argument, something like, "That poor Harryman, he thought he was doing his best to defend the victims, and here he becomes a victim himself! We need to stand up for such victims, because he obviously cannot stand for himself! That poor, defenseless man!" Would you feel used and made victim?
As usually, and unlike Perez, you cite no facts, nor, especially, hold a frame of complexity in which the "victims" can also have complex agendas and backstories that would shed light on the "content" that is posted here and there. You like to speak in generalizations, theory that dominates the data, and emotional reasoning. What is especially dishonest, is that you then discredit any critics (Jesus, can you have a more civil critic than Perez?) not by addressing their points or arguments, but by writing them off as "tools." Again, now in terms of intellectual honesty, shame on you.
Oh, and criticizing Marc for "he said/he said"--it just makes me sputter with the hypocrisy, as you've been baseing so much of your position on he said/she saids. Again, have some shame.
MartyC
(p.s. Please don't make yourself look like an ass and not post this, as you did another of my posts, as it will just go up elsewhere and just go to make my point.)
MartyC,
If that is your real name, why not use all of it so you are not another anonymous person, such as those you have ranted against.
I have posted all of your personal comments here. What I have not posted is your reposting of Marcy's letter and the reposting of Marc's blog post. If Marc wanted to post his defense here he could have - all I asked of him was that he tell the truth. He chose not to post here but on his own blog instead.
If you want to make accusations, you should try to be remotely as honest as you claim I am not.
May I address Joe Perez? He is not accepting comments on his latest post about Marc Gafni - perhaps he will see them here.
Joe Perez says Gafni denies any recollection of promising Tami Simon that he would not sleep with his students any more. Does he recollect this?
"Never again will I risk the integrity of my work for the sake of a post-conventional personal relationship." -Marc Gafni, from the Official Marc Gafni website.
Joe Perez says Ken Wilber call Marc Gafni Uniqe Self "seminal" and blah, blah. Ken Wilber also says "Nonetheless, there is some truth to these allegations because of grave wrongdoing on Marc's part, and I believe this wrongdoing is due not just to bad judgement on Marc's part, but to a pathology or dysfunction affecting Marc." - Ken Wilber's weblog, May 2006. (in regards to sexual allegations in Israel.)
Joe Perez says in his post of September 25th: "Remember, the matter involved nothing more sinister than a man separated from his wife (who knew he had no intention to be monogamous)..."
Marc Gafni says: "Our topic is the question of whether it is possible for a student and a teacher to be sexually romantically involved in the New World of contemporary spirituality." ... "On the practical level this questions is irrelevant to me. I am delighted to be in a life long committed monogamous relationship with my partner Mariana Caplan." -Integral Theory Conference 2010 paper.
I could point out other areas of concern in your posts, but honestly, isn't this enough? Gafni is using you for his mouthpiece. Half your posts are about him, now. He only has a few supporters left and you are the only one with a blog. You are being used.
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