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In Reply to: Re: I'm curious. posted by curious_1285 on November 04, 2007 at 23:35:37:
I've been studying the group for several years. I was also a member in the 1970s.
I believe top leadership continues to practice Berg's original teachings, although in a somewhat modified way. Several people in the highest echelons of the group's leadership are known pedophiles who are protected from exposure by ordinary membership. Rank and file members are either ignorant of what their leaders are accused of having done or are aware of the allegations and refuse to believe anything bad about those leaders. Family members believe criticizing or thinking bad of a leader is the same as challenging God's authority.
I don't think very young children (toddlers) are as highly sexualized by adults in leadership positions as they once were. The business of nannies giving infant boys fellatio was largely to satisfy Berg's voyeurism. The same can be said about the production of seductive, semi-nude dance videos that include children. Those were for Berg's pleasure. On the other hand, the current leader (Karen Zerby) has said she sees nothing wrong with fondling children. So God only knows what sort of covert sexual grooming takes place with naturally inquisitive 5-year-olds.
Once a child in TFI hits puberty--around age 12 or 13--I think it's very likely that a couple of the top leaders who have developed a taste for young girls can and do avail themselves of a child bride after a period of sexual grooming. There's evidence this took place after the Charter went into effect and supposedly banned this sort of thing.
I also think there are some high-ranking aunties who have developed a liking for initiating young boys into sexual activity. I would expect Karen Zerby to engage in this sort of thing as a way of reinforcing her weak ego. She's 60 years old--clearly no longer in her salad days as a seductress. Yet her self-image is highly dependent on being viewed as sexually desirable, and she has risen to power by employing sexual energy to her service. What better way to reinforce a sense of power and personal desirability than to take a young buck to bed? Or, given the a lack of available young men, she no doubt finds solace in the bodies of young women in a menage with Peter, who appears to have erectile dysfunction like a lot of older men.
The inner leadership circles have always practiced deviant sexuality among themselves, long before it was practiced by ordinary membership. There's no reason to think top leadership has ended those practices among themselves and their children and grandchildren, even if that type of behavior has been banned among the ordinary membership. In TFI, the more one breaks down sexual boundaries, the more spiritual the person is deemed. It's logical that the people who are viewed as most spiritual and closest to God--the top leadership--would continue to abolish sexual boundaries among themselves.
