Pat and Trish, please post this on our sites when you get the chance. If anyone has any more information on him, I'd like to hear it. Pass this around to any list with Europeans interested in NDNs. Thanks again to the Swedes I met who came forward for their help.
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New Age Fraud Warning: Kenneth Diner or Dineh
and Swedish Indian Association, formerly called Sun Dance
For over a decade, no single person has dominated the scene in Sweden of those with an interest in American Indians as Kenneth Diner. At the same time, no one, absolutely no one, has done more harm to Native causes in Sweden as Kenneth Diner. No one else has abused or lied to more people or made it more difficult for honest or sincere people in Sweden to learn about or help Native people than this abusive cult leader and his organization, the Swedish Indian Association. Diner has left behind him a trail of disillusionment, sexual abuse, and deception that, even among New Age imposters posing as Native medicine people, stands out as appalling.
Diner’s record of deception goes back as far as the 1980s. At the time married to a Chilean woman and with a daughter, Diner claimed to have been taught by a Chilean medicine man “in a few weeks.
This was the first of a long series of ridiculous claims by Diner that would have gotten him laughed out of town if he tried to say them to actual Native people. But in Sweden where there are extremely few Native people and even fewer good sources on Natives, there is little to contradict his lies.
Any actual Native person would tell you that it takes DECADES, not weeks, to become a medicine man. Diner has also claimed to be an adopted Navajo, an adopted Lakota, and an adopted member of an unnamed tribe in New Mexico. But today actual adoptions by Native tribes are extremely rare, and they do NOT make one qualified to do ceremonies. Diner also claims to be part of an “elders circle??? that would meet every year to impress each other with tricks. Most Americans would laugh at that. Diner’s silly claim is stolen straight out of the famous novel Ceremony by Leslie Marmon Silko!
But back in 1995, Diner first claimed to be Inuit. He said his parents were from Denmark, sometimes also saying one grandparent was from Greenland. Whether Diner actually has any Native blood is unknown, but it does not change the most important fact. Diner is NOT an elder or medicine man from ANY Native tribe. His own history shows a complete lack of knowledge about Native beliefs and cultures and a lack of character that would disqualify him from ever being accepted by any Native people as a healer or elder.
Diner’s worst practice is preying upon vulnerable women, telling them they need healing and then trying to seduce them within moments of meeting them. He uses “crystal healing???, “stone healing???, and “healing with Indian energies???. NONE of these are Native healing practices. Worse still, he insists on “healing??? gullible women who are told they must topless or nude. He molests them in these false versions of ceremonies, trying to sexually excite or seduce them, all the while telling them they must be open minded. NONE of this is part of ANY Native traditions anywhere, or is acceptable behavior for healers of any background. What Diner is doing is sexual assault, and he belongs in prison for this abuse of women.
Almost as bad is Diner’s habit of “borrowing??? money, from a few hundred up to ten thousand crowns, and never paying it back. Sometimes he claims the money supposedly is going to Big Mountain, but it keeps repeatedly disappearing. In 1998 he urged members of Swedish Indian Association to collect clothes for Navajos. Many of the members raised money to send these clothes, but again the money vanished. Many also held lotteries to raise money, or gave money directly to Diner. But the Swedish Indian Association cashier never saw most of this money and often did not even know about it.
