by Rosie Bason, Mullumbimby, NSW

I practise as a Herbalist and as a massage therapist. I also work as a supervisor in a busy cafe in Byron Bay. I often attend Universal Medicine talks by Serge Benhayon as I find his presentations on health and medicine very interesting. They have inspired me to make some healthy changes in my own life and that has also inspired others in my workplace and around me to make healthy choices for themselves.

On Friday night (12th October 2012) I attended the talk – held at Lennox Head Community Centre – with my father, and two friends from work. We were all looking forward to going out and listening to the presentation and connecting with other friends there. What we experienced instead was such a shock.Serge introduced us to David Millikan; he said he was writing a book and just wanted to ask us a few questions… He said that he was a minister from the Uniting Church. He had only begun to introduce himself and then he went on to accuse us all that we were part of a cult and that we could not think for ourselves and that we were brainwashed. We were never given the chance to speak because he thought we were too brainwashed to even comment. Then it unfolded that there were cameras throughout the venue and we were being filmed… without having given any notice or asked permission. This guy said he was from a well-known television station and that he is getting paid by them to make this story. It felt like I was in some kind of set up, some strange scenario that can’t possibly be happening.

I am shocked that in Australia the media can just come in and make false allegations to a group of people and film us without any consequences. I felt the lack of respect, lack of privacy and I really object to being told and pointed at that I am part of a cult. I hope that this ‘well-known station’ is exposed for their tricks. They really should interview us all and do some proper research before they just bombard our talk. Surely there are more interesting things for them to make stories out of… like the rates of suicide, bullying, obesity, domestic violence to name a few, but instead they came to a medicine presentation…