Was talking with a friend today about “shamen” and the conversation took a turn to Leonard Crow Dog-AIM’s resident “spiritual” adviser.
So I decided to take a look around the net and see what the “chief of chiefs” as he’s proclaimed himself to be was up to or offering for sale today.
Seems as though it’s always the impoverished who are targeted as the demographic below illustrates-perhaps that is because they seek hope, some validation of their circumstance or life, something to believe in-if so it makes them easy prey just as many within the nations have become.
More likely though it is those with some measure of comfort and disposable income, as these “ceremonies” are a for profit business, and the “take” is the bottom line.
Sun Dances in Mexico-yeah that makes sense, about as much as those sweat lodges and ceremonies in Europe…but then the AIM/Crow Dog philosophy has always been to go where the money is-even Japan, which seems to be a favorite of Crow Dogs and Dennis Banks, another self styled “spiritual leader” looking to cash in.
The below is from Looking Back Woman’s blog, and having once been given permission to do so I am reprinting it from there and adding the following comment to LBW:
After having fought the good fight for years and the opportunity to rest the current circumstances may have provided I would encourage you to mount up and join the fray once again- every voice is needed, every strong heart.
More intel in from the South about Leonard Crow Dogs spiritual scam…
Posted on February 22, 2012 by Looking Back Woman-Suzanne Dupree
We are glad, HakiktaWin to see you have been sharing some of the intel on Leonard Crow Dog and his spiritual scamming apprentice cronies on your site that we have sent your way….. perhaps you could include another bit of telling info in the reference you made to Crow Dogs sidekick, Valerio Cohaila… who runs the “Pachamama Church ” in Peru.
The same web site reveals that the cost per person for the Peyote Tipi Meetings-Ceremonies is $ 150.00 US per person.(About 2 months wages for a Native person in Peru… lucky enough to even have a paying job).
It is not unusual for these tipi meetings to have 30 to 50 & up to 70 people in them = pretty good haul 5,000 to 10,000 dollars US for one night, in a country where the minimumwage is under 3 US per day!! Obviously Cohaila has learned his marketing strategies well from his mentor, Showdog.
This is in line with what they charge for Leonard Crow Dogs ”Sun Dances” in Mexico, a country where 50% of the 10 million 1st Nations people have no income, those who do…. make 4.00 or 5.00 dollars US a day. LCD’s cronies charge at least $300 US per vision quest, mandatory prerequisite for dancers to attend, there they pay an additional 1000 pesos ( $80.00 US) and even the supporters who don’t dance are charged 500 pesos or $40.00 US to just watch the show, with several hundred people in attendance.
And, their goal to replicate the Crow Dogs Paradise scene where the dancers sometimes number in the hundreds, pretty attractive business potential for 3rd World economies!! & they-Crow Dogs cronie apprentices complain that other “unauthorized” people are copying their modus operandi!!
Just thought you would like to share this exploitation of Lakota Ceremonies by Leonard Crow Dog to the WORLD!