Site Updates
| 2023 |
|
| Spring 2022 |
|
| Jan. 2015 | AR trumpets its gay cure. Here's a typical letter-to-the-editor from an ARist promoting AR's "gay cure" back in the day. |
| June 2012 |
"My parents disowned me." A member and her parents were in AR. When the member left, her parents refused to speak to her...all the way up until their death decades later. (more...) |
| December 2011 |
Recovering from your Aesthetic Realism experience. Here's a list of books, counselors, and other resources to help you cope with what you went through. (more...) |
| November 2011 | "Aesthetic Realism — a crackpot cult lodged down in the woodwork in Greenwich Village". The Arts Editor of New York Magazine doesn't pull any punches! (more...) |
| November 2011 | "The Victims of Aesthetic Realism".
We tracked down an old article by a journalist who infiltrated
AR to discover the group's methods of mind control.
Powerful, scary stuff. (more...) |
| February 2011 |
Growing up in Aesthetic Realism. My own mother finally breaks her silence and describes what it was like to be born into a cult. (more...) |
| May 2010 | "There isn't any question: Eli
Siegel killed himself." A former member
who had sought AR's "gay cure" explains how the group's
leaders admitted that the founder took his own life. (more...) Village Voice ad from 1962. The Aesthetic Realists deny that they're a cult in this ancient ad they bought in the Village Voice. This shows that people were saying they were a cult as far back as 1962! There are some more juicy bits, too. (more...) The Hypocrisy of the Aesthetic Realists. Continuing my new series of calling a spade a spade, I list several examples of how the AR people are guilty of what they complain about in others — such as being full of hate, writing anonymously, and proffering falsehoods as though they were true. (more...) |
| February 2010 |
Directed Origination — AR's favorite mind control trick. How does a group actually get its hooks into someone's mind? Here's an exposé about AR's favorite trick. (more...) |
| Five Reasons You Can't Trust an Aesthetic Realist. For starters, most of them eventually leave. Today's zealot is tomorrow's ex-member. See this and four other reasons (more...) | |
| Lies Aesthetic Realists tell. For the first six years I ran this site, I avoided using the "L" word (lie), preferring to just describe their dishonesty without using that particular pejorative. But their dishonesty is just so pervasive and extreme that the gloves are finally off. (more...) | |
| April 2009 | "The Moonies of poetry". I just found an old article from Harper's (1982) with some choice words about the Aesthetic Realists. Of course, whenever the media looks at AR, their conclusion is rarely favorable. (more...) |
| AR's double-page ad in the NY Times. The Aesthetic Realists probably blew close to a third of a million dollars on a double-page ad in the NY Times in 1990. They used that opportunity to tell the world that their founder, Eli Siegel, was "the greatest man in the history of the world". (more...) | |
| Aesthetic Realism Glossary. We explain the real meanings behind the loaded language that AR people use. (more...) | |
| Updated the "Cult Aspects of AR page". Added lots more examples and sources. (more...) | |
| March 2009 | Transcript of a secret AR meeting. This might be the ultimate AR scandal, a transcript of an inquest of a person who didn't stay "cured" of his homosexuality. (more...) |
| May 2008 | Help for journalists - Media FAQ. After answering a lot of the same questions for reporters — and seeing how the AR people are trying to mislead them -- I put together some info to help reporters covering AR stories (more...) |
| AR gets public funding — and we get it canceled. AR was able to finagle a grant from the NY state budget. After we alerted the media it looks like the funding has been pulled. (more...) | |
| AR member admits AR founder Eli Siegel killed himself! Do you suppose they'll now stop calling me a liar for saying that's what happened? Nah. (more...) | |
| Feb. 2008 | Who's afraid to debate? Here's a video of me challenging AR devotee Arnold Perey to debate, while he ignores me. (more...) |
| Oct. 14, 2007 | AR parallels. I compare AR to The Secret, and give the scoop on the gay cure episode of South Park. (more...) |
| Oct. 14, 2007 | AR's "colossal arrogance". A former member explains how AR people feel qualified to lecture others about everything, including how others should react to some personal tragedy. Gives a good insight into the warped mindset of AR. (more...) |
| Oct. 14, 2007 | Judgemental, round 2. Right after the former member above wrote in about how judgmental AR people are, a non-member wrote in to complain about an AR person criticizing her and her son. (It's one of the comments at the end of this article) |
| July 13, 2006 | AR in the public schools. A former high school student says he got poor grades for not buying into AR like his teachers were pushing. (more...) |
| Mar. 14, 2006 | A real AR consultation! We got the holy grail — a transcript of a real Aesthetic Realism consultation. Now the public can see what really happens in an AR therapy session. (more...) |
| Mar. 14, 2006 | Cut off from his family. Wayne Smith describes how AR tried to change him from being gay, and convinced him to not spend Christmas with his family. (more...) |
| Feb. 8, 2006 | High school Spanish teacher spent more time pushing AR than teaching Spanish. That's what a former student of his says in her blog. (more...) |
| Feb. 6, 2006 | "I want Ellen Reiss questioned!" Yet another former member writes to share her experiences, complaining about the mind control techniques, and wondering aloud why there hasn't yet been a class-action lawsuit against the group. (read it...) |
| Oct. 26, 2005 | AR recruits on dating sites? A reader thinks an AR member is using dating websites as a vehicle to recruit new members. I think it's more likely that she was really looking for a partner, but any partner also had to be a potential convert. Anyway, see what our reader has to say... (in the orange sidebar) |
| Oct. 24, 2005 | Transcript of my lesson with Siegel. The wait is over — I've finally gotten around to posting a transcript of my lesson with Siegel at age two. |
| Oct. 24, 2005 | AR's sneaky advertising tactics. Find out how the AR people are abusing Google's ad system. |
| Oct. 8, 2005 | Hate mail to my mom. An AR student has taken to sending hate mail to my mother because of this website. Real classy. And so much for their claim that they welcome criticism. (on the cult aspects page) |
| Sept. 25, 2005 | A scientific challenge. A former AR student has challenged the AR Foundation to provide scientific evidence of the efficacy of its gay cure. (in the sidebar on the "gay cure" page) |
| Aug. 26, 2005 | Yet more craziness. Anonymous email insults from an AR supporter, and a supposedly former member throws a fit about the fact that I have a donation form on this website to help me pay for it. Oh, and an AR supporter says that *I'm* afraid to debate, when I've had an open offer to debate, which has been posted on this website for months, and even after I called the foundation twice to invite them directly. (Not a single AR person has even acknowledged my debate offer, much less take me up on it.) (more...) |
| July 20, 2005 | The NY Post article. Here at long last is the infamous 1998 article on AR, the first exposé in the major media. |
| July 20, 2005 | Coerced into signing. Yet more embarrassment for AR: As we suspected, not everyone who signed the "We Have Changed from Homosexuality" ad did so willingly. (more...) |
| July 16, 2005 | New page: News and Commentary. I started a new page to highlight the various things that are going on, like the protest at AR's headquarters, and AR's refusal to debate. |
| July 16, 2005 | Thoughts from the outside. An unbiased reader with no experience in AR reads both our site and AR's, and concludes that they're a cult. |
| May 12, 2005 | More details on Eli Siegel's suicide. A former student shares more details about Eli Siegel's suicide, and breaks the news that Siegel wasn't the only person in the group to kill himself. |
| May 7, 2005 | "I consider my "study" of Aesthetic Realism to be one of the factors that led to the eventual breakup of my marriage, to my eternal sorrow." Read the heartbreaking story by yet another former student. |
| May 7, 2005 | More on the Wikipedia controversy. I added background on the controversy over at Wikipedia, to the "Other Sites" sidebar at right. |
| May 5, 2005 | More on Eli Siegel's suicide. A former student adds some more info on Eli Siegel's suicide. |
| May 5, 2005 | "They told me there would be no further consultations until I incorporated AR more radically into my life." Read the latest story by yet another former student. |
| May 5, 2005 | AR Reunion, Fri., June 17! See the sidebar at right about joining the reunion in NYC this summer. |
| May 5, 2005 | #5 in Google. We moved up to #5 in Google for a search on "aesthetic realism". AR has only themselves to blame: If they'd taken my mother's name off their website like I asked them to, I never would have created this site in the first place. |
| April 5, 2005 | A tale of getting sucked in. Yet another former member shares his experiences. This story is unique because he describes exactly how he initially got drawn in, and how he then kept getting more and more involved. (read his story) |
| April 5, 2005 | Google rankings continue to improve. We inched up another notch to spot #6 for a search on "aesthetic realism", and got two more spots on the front page. |
| April 5, 2005 | New sidebar o' quotes. So many former students have written in to share their stories I've now been able to amass a nice selection of quotes, which appears in the sidebar at right. |
| April 5, 2005 | Aesthestic Realists continue their attack on free speech. Aesthetic Realists keep removing any mention of this site and criticism about AR in general from resources like Wikipedia — as well as any mention that their founder Eli Siegel killed himself. Particularly amusing was when a Wikipedian tried to add some balance to the article, and cult member Arnold Perey said he was full of bias and unfair to AR. Paranoid feelings of persecution, anyone? |
| Feb. 12, 2005 | A former student describes how he was kicked out of AR because he couldn't change from homosexuality. Powerful stuff. (read his story) |
| Jan. 30, 2005 | AR founder acknowledged that others saw his group as a cult. There's a telling quote by Eli Siegel that I found in the transcript of my lesson I had with him at age two. (in Cult Aspects) |
| Jan. 29, 2005 | Freedom of Mind goes to the front page of Google. The page about Aesthetic Realism on cult expert Steve Hassan's Freedom of Mind website joins us on the front page of Google for a search on "aesthetic realism", thanks to our help. Just as important as moving up is who we pushed down. When AR is a Cult and Freedom of Mind went to the front page of Google, EliSiegel.net and AestheticRealism.net went down. |
| Jan. 28, 2005 | Our Google rankings go through the roof. We're now #1 for "aesthetic realists" and we moved to the front page for "eli siegel". We also now have two out of the ten positions on the front page for "aesthetic realism foundation". |
| Jan. 24, 2005 | WOW! A former Aesthetic Realism member who was involved for over ten years into the 1990's and at the highest levels of the group sent us their incredibly detailed account of what life inside AR is like. This puts to rest once and for all any possible lingering question about whether AR is a cult. The AR people will not be able to "counter" this on their Countering the Lies website because this account is from one of their own, and because it's so exhaustively detailed. One of the tricks that AR used on Countering the Lies is to fudge the truth without telling the full story. For example, AR put up a bunch of testimonials on their website about how members aren't prevented from seeing their families. What the AR people don't mention is that AR started allowing family visits only after the press reported that former members complained that family visits were banned. Basically AR started allowing family visits specifically so they could claim that they do (which is exactly what they're doing on Countering the Lies). Often when AR members protest "We don't do that!" they neglect to add the words, "...any more." (or "as much as we used to"). But even these seeming improvements are just cosmetic window dressing. AR is still as much of a cult as it ever was. This is just one example. All over Countering the Lies AR does such a seemingly good job of countering because they never tell the whole story. But they can't get away with that any longer. This powerful new statement by a former member describes in excrutiating detail not only what happened in AR, but how AR tries to spin it to deny the allegations. AR won't be able to defend themselves against this one. In the 60+ years that AR has existed, to my knowledge this is the first time anyone, anywhere has offered such an exhaustive account of its practices. It's so powerful I'm hopeful that even current members will be moved by it and decide to shake off their chains and leave the group. I'm not exaggerating when I say that I believe this article is the most important thing ever written about Aesthetic Realism. (read their story) |
| Jan. 21, 2005 | Reworked the Gay Cure page. |
| Jan. 21, 2005 | Added more evidence of the group's paranoia about an alleged press boycott to the Cult Aspects page. |
| Jan. 21, 2005 | A civil rights activist slams AR's new book against racism, suggesting that AR is "pimping" the struggle of black people for its own purposes. |
| Jan. 20, 2005 | Another former AR student confirms that those in AR don't see their families, are discouraged from attending college, and shun former students. |
| Jan. 20, 2005 | AR supporter Marvin Mondlin says of me and this site: "So much for the stupid lying of Mali, Bluejay and the other liars...Why is he doing this? Feeling himself to be a failure in his own life, and joining with others also seeking revenge for essentially the same reason—notably Adam Mali—'Michael Bluejay' seeks the triumph of making himself important by looking down upon others." So much about AR's philosophy of not having contempt for others! (in Aesthetic Realism Strikes Back!) |
| Jan. 18, 2005 | An Amazon book reviewer recommends staying away from Aesthetic Realism students (in the sidebar of the Cult Aspects page) |
| Jan. 16, 2005 | Non-member agrees that AR is a cult (in the sidebar of the Cult Aspects page) |
| Jan. 14, 2005 | AR says their founder's works are greater than the Bible or Shakeseare! (in Cult Aspects) |
| Jan. 13, 2005 | We move to the front page of Google for a search on "aesthetic realism" (and pass the Countering the Lies site). |
| Jan. 13, 2005 | Why we call AR devotees "members" even though AR says it has no members (in What is Aesthetic Realism?) |
| Jan. 12, 2005 | AR has to revise their book when their "success stories" snap out of it and leave AR (in Gay Cure) |
| Jan. 11, 2005 | "This is merely one example of the way people were controlled and humiliated if they stepped out of line." Another former member tells it like it is. (more....) |
