‘The dance of darkness,’ for the beautiful, happy and vibrant Sharon Stern, became the dance of death.
Sharon Stern, 32, of Hollywood, Florida, aspired to perfect her performance of butoh, a Japanese style of contemporary dance. Instead, she lost her sanity and committed suicide, allegedly driven to despair by her butoh master, Katsura Kan, according to a lawsuit filed by her family.
“Katsura Kan brainwashed her against her family and her life,” said her heartbroken father, Tibor Stern, 65, of Hollywood, Florida.
“He made her forget everything that was happy about life, and told her she needed to experience pain and suffering, until he had full control over her.”
I just wrote this tragic story for the Daily Mail. Read it here:
My sympathy goes out to her family. What a horribly tragic story. As a dancer I have had some exposure to Buthoh. I had a Japanese neighbor that called it the fake dance for crazy people. The saddest part is that her talent was wasted on that loser.
Has Naropa University commented on this at all? Don’t they screen their faculty? I wish there was more of an awareness of the cultishness of all mainstream religions, not just Christianity & new agey stuff.
I’m not a fan of Japanese culture at all. My first husband was Japanese American. He has a tremendous sense of entitlement and self importance. I think Japanese culture enables this. I could go on and on…
This hits rather close to home, as I live in CO, dance in Boulder, and have considered going to Naropa. I actually studied at the sister school to Naropa in the 80’s in San Francisco. I’ve never heard of this form of dance but it looks and sounds very dark. As a dancer myself, I understand how the energy of a dance can take your life over. I really have to wonder about the type of person who would create this.
As far as Naropa screening their faculty, I will say that there are a lot of dance instructors, teachers, and new age healers who are very narcissistic. Many of them live in the Boulder area, and I’ve rubbed elbows with quite a few. I met one such person in Boulder in the early 90’s and dated him for over a year. The founder of Naropa himself, Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, though he was very beloved by his disciples, used to have sex with many of them and died of scerosis of the liver from drinking. His successor died of AIDS after having infected several of his students with it. I have a few of Trungpa’s books, and they are very powerful. I am astounded by his wisdom and compassion, and yet scandal followed him throughout his life.
The guy I dated for a year was a psychic healer from Boulder. He was a very powerful person, and he opened my eyes to a lot of things. He helped me get away from a dysfunctional relationship with an alcoholic. But as time went by, I noticed him distancing me more and more from my friends. He couldn’t relate to most of them, and he would put them down, considering them trite. He also never had a stable place to live. The final straw came when he came to stay with me for a few days at my home I was sharing with a close male friend. He started putting down my friend and gave out my friend’s number to his contacts so they could call him there, without permission. He would hang out and have intimate contacts with all kinds of women that he claimed were harmless. He tried to convince me that my jealousy was bad and something I needed to get rid of. Ironically, it was him who cheated on me with another one of the narcissistic healers I knew at the time (she was like a therapist to me). When we finally split up, it was a relief – I got myself back. But having been through that experience, I can understand how a person, group, community, or even an organization can fall under their spell. People like this challenge your thoughts and values. This can be appealing to someone exploring life and trying to find their way in the world. These narcissistic people can be fun and exciting and give you a sense of aliveness you never felt.
Wow Stargazer – thanks for the insights.
Kan probably fit all of the things that you describe. But what was worse was that when the family tried to rescue Sharon from his clutches, he refused to let go, ridiculed the father and found ways to contact Sharon. He promised Sharon that he would “love her for 40 years and beyond,” but coldly dumped her when she was broken and no longer of any use to him.
’40 years and beyond” is such an odd thing to say. My spath said, ‘forever and beyond. Another odd offering.
Wow, thanks for this information, Donna. I was considering going to Naropa, where I would be studying some form of dance therapy. Chances are I would bump into this creep. It’s amazing the spell they can cast over someone. Tragic that this girl committed suicide. I can only imagine the kind of turmoil she was in.
Katsura Kan is no longer at Naropa University.
According to the father, the only thing Naropa University said to the family about what happened is, “sorry to hear of your problem.”
Since the majority of credible Universities have a policy against student/teacher fraternization, it seems the family can file some sort of a complaint.
I wonder if they could pursue legal action in Japan? No one wants to go to jail in Japan…
The father is scheduled to speak this week at a conference highlighting the abuses of the Scientology cult. I hope the non-profit the family has started will help fill the gap left by the demise of the Cult Awareness Network, which was sued out of existence and even lost their name to a cult.
I feel very sorry for the entire family. They seem like utterly decent people who wanted so much to help this poor woman. It almost makes me wish for a return of the days of Steve Hassan-style deprogramming, even though I have no certainty that such a thing would have saved Sharon Stern. As sad as it sounds I think she just couldn’t take any more, and no amount of psychiatric care will help a person who can’t accept the help.
I’ve read the posts here regarding Naropa and “new age”. It seems like there are a lot of abuses in new age movements. Show me a “guru”, it doesn’t matter what kind of organization or movement it is, and I’ll show you a psychopath.
I also ‘dated’ someone who was a teacher, for a short time, at Naropa. It is a very alternative environment, and likely allows some things that a more conventional university would not.
The person I dated was the last psychopath, the one that broke through my denial and misguided thinking.
What better place to hang out than in an environment where you don’t need any validating evidence to support your creative or ‘therapeutic’ endeavors?
I also knew someone who studied with this Kan man (pun intended). This man I knew looked almost identical to Kan, and was disordered himself. Birds of a feather.
These two psychopaths I dated were both smart, talented, and able bodied. So, they were not without some kind of ‘value’ to people who didn’t get too close to them.
This is what was so heartbreaking about getting close to them and seeing that they were abusive, manipulative, and hurtful. Violent even. When they could do something so fun and beautiful, but then be secret monsters- it was just mind blowing.
My heart just broke reading about this young woman. I hope her family can heal through whatever action they take on her behalf.
[Note to self: Just stay away from Naropa.]