--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "TurquoiseB" wrote: > > It was in that setting that I first discovered the quantum mechanics of > Trickle-down Groupie Status. Hot bands attracted hot groupies, hot to > trot. But when it came down *to* trotting, there was a definite "pecking > order" of groupie status. Top of the list -- hottest groupie prize -- > was the lead singer in the band, if there was one. Next came the lead > guitarist, or guitarists. Next, interestingly enough, came the drummer. > Then the bassist and the other sidemen. All of them were pretty much > guaranteed to score at the end of the gig, if 'scoring' was what they > had in mind. > > Next came the band's manager, and after that the roadies. The guys who > produced the concert and manned the light show were dead last. But, even > so, there were more than enough groupies to go around, so fun -- and the > groupies -- were pretty much had by all.
Just to follow up with something more immediately related to FFL and its concerns and interests, I tend to see pretty much the same groupie dynamics acting themselves out in spiritual communities. At the top of the pecking order, of course, is the teacher or guru, and the game is to get as close to them as possible. People even have special Woo-Words for *why* they want to get close, such as "darshan" and "grace" and all that Woo stuff. Next in the pecking order come the groupies who have managed to get close to the teacher or guru and stay close for some time. In the modern TMO, that would be the Bevans and Hagelins and people like that; in past eras it would be Larry Domash and Harold Bloomfield. And, of course, many of them took full advantage of their perceived groupie status to cut a wide swath through the female population of TM teachers and students who came flocking around them. On residence courses, a well-known phenomenon that we in the Regional Office always had to warn prospective teachers of these courses about was called (by us) the Gotta Fuck The Course Leader phenomenon. Both men and women course leaders were equally perceived as having groupie status, so put them in a closed environment with a lot of horny men and women made even more horny by rounding, and as a course leader you often found yourself hearing knocks on your door in the dead of night. Often this ended benevolently, with nothing more serious than a one-night stand happening, but occasionally it caused a mini-scandal or two, and caused the breakup of marriages. That is why we warned prospective teachers to be wary of the phenomenon, so that it didn't take them by surprise. The one thing I never saw in the TMO in terms of groupie status pecking order was it following the *hierarchical* pecking order created by the TMO itself. That is, "Governors" weren't perceived as having any higher groupie status than regular old vanilla TM teachers. I was never around during the Raja days, but I would assume that the sight of grown men running around in long white robes and Burger King crowns didn't exactly do a lot for *their* groupie status, either. :-) As for the women, well...there were so few of them who ever gravitated to positions of power or influence in the male-dominated TMO that the issue of groupie status rarely came up. Except in terms of competing with each other. It's not, after all, as if anyone secretly lusted after any of the Mother Divine ladies; their idea of charisma was about as sexy as a chastity belt. :-)
