Chopra, Rhymes With Oprah
I was caught off guard
the other day - Deepak Chopra sells vitamins? The Chopra Market website
that offers his 80 books also hawks an endless list of vitamins, colonics,
massage oils, herbal teas and more. How does his uncompromising message “You
are what you think”, square up with a need for external supplements?
Evidently few others find this puzzling. Paul Offit, in his book Do
You Believe in Magic?, states that Chopra’s business grosses over $20
million a year. Chopra has accumulated immense wealth tapping into two
unregulated industries (vitamins/supplements and self improvement) that
together generate sales of $50 billion a year in the USA
Chopra can thank Oprah
for most of this. After his first appearance on her show in 1993, his
book Ageless Body, Timeless Mind sold 130,000 copies the
following day. Evidently the guests on Oprah’s show are either not
vetted or the findings are ignored. Prior to Chopra coming on the
show, a lengthy article appeared in The Journal of American Medical Association
which chronicled decades of Chopra being caught red-handed in plagiarism,
fraud, misinformation, bait-and-switch and bald-faced lies. Chopra
responded by filing a SLAPP suit against the author and a JAMA editor for $194 million. The documentation supporting the litany of Chopra’s
misdeeds was such that the suit was quickly dismissed without
prejudice.
I had to look up
“SLAPP” and found that it stands for “strategic lawsuit
against public participation” and is
a lawsuit that is intended to censor, intimidate,
and silence critics by burdening them with the cost of a legal defense until
they abandon their criticism or opposition.
The JAMA article’s detailed coverage of
Chopra’s exploits paints the picture of an old fashioned flim-flam man. The escapade I favored the most was a
TM-Sidhi yogic flying course he put on at the University of Massachusetts
In 2007, Oprah turned another self improvement
guru into an overnight success. James Arthur Ray had co-authored The Secret (a New York Times best seller) and
co-narrated a film with the same title. When Ray appeared on the show
Oprah encouraged her viewers to watch the episode with their children. Once again the show either failed to delve into
the guest’s past or ignored it altogether. Since 2000 Ray’s week-long retreats
had included risky activities (sleep deprivation, fasting, fire and glass
walking, sweat lodge) which had resulted in numerous serious injuries and one
death.
Two years after he was anointed by Oprah, 50
people who had paid up to $10,000 to experience a 5-day “Vision Quest” led by
Ray, crowded into an improperly-built sweat lodge near Sedona , Arizona
Prior to the criminal trial, suits brought
against Ray by the 3 victim’s families were settled out of court for $3
million. The information
that I still find chilling is Ray’s attempt to smooth over the situation. Ray conducted a conference call with
some of the survivors, one of whom recorded the conversation. During the call a self-professed
“channeler” took part, claiming to have communicated with the deceased and said
they "were having so
much fun" out of their bodies that they didn't want to return.
Unlike James Frey, author of a book promoted by
Oprah that turned out to be a lie, Ray hasn’t returned to the Oprah show to
receive a tongue lashing from the host. Oprah has chosen to remain silent
on the matter. However, in November of 2013, Ray appeared on The Piers
Morgan talk show to announce the re-launch of his self improvement
business. I was surprised
that any show would agree to provide an opportunity for Ray to pick up where he
left off. It eventually
came to light that both Morgan, whose ratings were abysmal, and Ray have the
same manager, the aptly-named John Ferriter.
On Ray’s new website he refers to the sweat lodge tragedy as an
“accident” for which he assumes no responsibility whatsoever. This is indeed strange since the law
of attraction, the basis of The
Secret, does not allow for accidents.
The law of attraction dictates that all experience is the result of your
thought and there is no escaping complete and direct responsibility for
everything that occurs.
Despite what has taken place, Oprah seems to be able to skate by
so far as an unwitting enabler. Her latest addition to her stable of self
improvement stars appears to be Tony Robbins. In 2014, Oprah attended one of
his 4-day seminars, taking a seat in the $2,995 section. She even participated
in the closing ceremony where she walked across a bed of hot coals. I
think she likes what Robbins has to say but I can't help thinking that she also
appreciates the business model that Robbins shares with Chopra and Ray.
After all, why be loaded down with the overhead that comes with a
full-blown cult? How much more efficient it is to rent an arena for a
week and then push merchandise and coaching sessions via telephone. It
makes no sense in this day and age to have to permanently incarcerate, cloth,
feed, manipulate and control a group of strangers. It's complicated,
messy and the resources required severely limit your ability to expand.
Robbins performs an average of 3-4 events a month that generate
over a half million dollars a piece just in ticket sales. This excludes
what the attendees spend on merchandise, tapes and books. In addition,
attendees are encouraged to sign up for post-seminar sessions with an assigned
coach via telephone. I found a copy of a 2004 RRI (Robbins Research
International, Inc.) contract on the internet for 6-months of follow up coaching.
The agreement included 3 half-hour sessions per month for 6 months for
$3,400, or an hourly rate of $378. There was no make-up provision for
missed sessions and if you wanted to walk away at any point there was a
cancellation fee of $295. Using 2004 dollars, if a mere 5% of the attendees
signed up for 6 months of coaching, each event would generate an additional
$700,000.
Albert Einstein, said "Only two things are infinite,
the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."