Unfortunate slip of the pen for IYNAUS considering a CIYT of color is calling out IYNAUS for its history of racist and oppressive practices. The call to action is gaining momentum on Facebook, and interestingly most of the supporters are outside the Iyengar system, though I did notice a lot of #BLM virtue signaling by Iyengar Yoga Institutes and CIYT’s on social media. The POC CIYT signed the letter featured in a previous post which led to the independent investigation of Manouso Manos. I can only imagine he is wondering where his support is, and why all those senior teachers and the sanskrit scholars who signed the call to action about Manouso aren’t sounding the alarms and demanding action like they did for Manouso. Are they protecting their white privilege and their power? I am guessing with the recent threats of decertification for studying with Manouso, the lower ranks of Iyengar yoga teachers are afraid to support his call to action knowing that the ethics committee sent letters to Manouso’s teachers that assist him in his online classes. The letters demanded their resignation or risk decertification. Threats of losing your livelihood make people afraid to speak up against anything, let alone the glaringly obvious lack of diversity in the Iyengar yoga tradition. You may recall I posted the letter of resignation from the non-white Chair of Ethics committee. She has a PhD in Forensics and resigned because of unethical behavior on the IYNAUS board. All four female members of the Ethics Committee resigned over the handling of Manouso, and it’s worth mentioning that two of them were non-white. They have been replaced by three white-males and two females, one who is non-white. One of the three white-males is the former IYNAUS President– the very person the former Ethics Chair called out for unethical behavior, and coincidentally the POC CIYT is demanding his resignation for his inflammatory, racist responses to Black teachers who have labored on committees for free and who have endeavored to express to him directly their concerns about systemic racism within the structure of IYNAUS! Crazy town! It’s not clear to me why we need three white-males on the ethics committee of an organization that is predominately white middle age females. Here are some excerpts from the former Ethics Chair letter:
“Regret- that the Ethics Committee is marginalized and the Ethics chair and/or the entire committee appears to be foreced to step down because of its attempts to prevent potentially unethical and illegal actions i.e., handing over past confidential files to IYNAUS current and future presidents. Despite our efforts, there have been no attempts to assuage our concerns about potential illegal or ethical violations of confidentiality breach. The Board, in October 2018, voted for this agenda but it does not free us from legal and ethical ramifications. No rationale has been given to justify this breach of trust and confidentiality.”
Regret- that the silent majority appears to be enabling unethical practices of a small segment of this board. There seem to be no checks on the abuse of this power. The letter from the Iyengars and the letter ‘from the board’ to the Iyengars without input or knowledge of the board memers have not raised anyone’s concerns…
…There is nothing democratic about the decision making process because the decisions are being made by a small group without input or knowledge of the entire board…
…Finally, it is a relief to not have to defend anymore against false accusations by a few or to bang my head against a wall with silent passersby or to engage in unethical practices as forced by a majority vote by this board in its recent meeting.
Disillusioned With Iyengar Yoga 