from Krishna-kirti Prabhu’s blog:

Giri-nayaka Prabhu: “ISKCON is greatly missing communication between public and leaders.”

Ekendra das: To them this is neccessary to keep us submissive. If we start to know things we might form opinions before they have a chance to present the information in a way that makes them appear infallable.

Giri-nayaka Prabhu: “Even short regular reports from leaders would bring great peace to our society. Imagine having daily ISKCON newspaper, where all political things and resolutions from all arround the world would be published. We would be fully peaceful, and happy to have such qualified leadership.”

Ekendra das: If the GBC reported all of the political things around the world at the moment, many people would leave ISKCON and donors would freeze their funds.

Giri-nayaka Prabhu: “But no information is hell. Nobody will give his life for something that he has no information about.”

Ekendra das: Revised … “No rational person would give their life to something they have no information about.” There are plenty of irrational and/or desperate folks eager to give themselves if they can get something tangible in return (immigration to a first world country, a position of influence over others, etc… ). In many countries of the world (Ukraine, Russia, etc…) ISKCON represents more than a path of self-realization; it represents hope for a brighter material future also. In these places you will see a strong display of loyalty and surrender to the institution as this mentality does serve an immediate purpose in such an environment.

Giri-nayaka Prabhu: “No faith, no commitment, no surrender, and no success. How have we come to this? And how far will it go?”

Ekendra das: I blame ignorance for this. Many of the early leaders weren’t fixed in the spiritual attitude of service to Srila Prabhupada, rather they wanted to BE Srila Prabhupada. And many of the early followers were gullible enough to participate in the chaos. saṁstutaḥ puruṣaḥ paśuḥ . And since then our movement has hobbled along with some successes and some abhorent failures -> most notably the ravaging and rape of our young by predatorial subhumans who easily infiltrated a surrealistically skewed society.

Please note that none of my above opinions have been expressed as a blanket accusation. There have been and are many sincere devotees within and without ISKCON and plenty of leaders of saintly character who serve within the institutional parameters. This is where I pin my hope as I feel that Srila Prabhupada will forever attract souls from this material world who are genuinely ready to complete their material experience. These good souls aren’t always the ones who come to power within our institution, at least at the moment, yet I am convinced that within time the devotees will learn to accept nothing less than saintliness and integrity in their leadership. Even now the GBC has very little real influence over the lives of most of its supposed constituents. In general, most devotees support who they want to support and avoid those who they want to avoid. This is completely normal when enlightenment is the goal over and above institutionally manipulative directives.