The Hungarian blog critical of the TM movement, tm.meditacio.hu, has published a revealing article about Tony Nader’s latest falsehood. “The UN has declared December 21 as International Meditation Day, as stated on the organization’s website. Dr. Tony Nader, the leader of the international Transcendental Meditation movement, who owns two offshore companies and lives lavishly in a mansion worth nearly 10 billion HUF, has taken control of the narrative and latched onto the high-profile event like a leech: he is lying about being the sole keynote speaker at the official UN celebration. Firstly, the UN is not hosting any official meditation event. Secondly, the organization promotes mindfulness meditation on its website and various YouTube channels. At the same time, neither TM nor Tony Nader is mentioned on the official UN site,” the blog reports.
Dr. Tony Nader’s Shame – The Decline of TM
The World Meditation Day page on the UN website can be found at https://www.un.org/en/observances/meditation-day. The UN’s website features a video from the United Nations Academic Impact YouTube channel under the subtitle: “Unlocking your Emotions to Achieve the SDGs: Mindfulness & Meditation in Government.”
This UN YouTube video discusses the application of mindfulness and meditation in government, featuring interviews with Danny Penman, author of Mindfulness: Finding Peace in a Frantic World, and Chris Ruane, a Member of Parliament who advocates for mindfulness training in politics. They highlight the benefits of mindfulness for reducing stress, anxiety, and depression, improving decision-making, fostering empathy, and enhancing conflict resolution. The speakers emphasize mindfulness’s role in cultivating crucial soft skills—like compassion and cooperation—essential for navigating complex organizational settings and global challenges. The discussion includes the implementation of mindfulness training programs in various parliaments worldwide and its potential to improve governance.
The UN website also promotes another mindfulness-related video titled “Mindfulness in UN Work and Diplomacy: A Conversation with Jon Kabat-Zinn”, featured on the UN Human Rights YouTube channel.
Tony Nader’s Propaganda Machine in Action
On December 15, 2024, the TM movement registered the domain worldmeditationday.world. Among other things, they use this website to spread the false claim that Tony Nader will be the sole keynote speaker at an official UN event.
Dr. Tony Nader to Inaugurate World Meditation Day
Tony Nader, MD, PhD, MARR, the globally recognized Vedic scholar and successor to the renowned Maharishi Mahesh Yogi as world head of the Transcendental Meditation® organization, has been invited by the core group of organizing UN member states as the only keynote speaker at the UN’s official celebratory event in New York City on 20 December. This will also coincide with a non-stop program of meditation that will circle the Earth on Saturday, 21 December 2024, starting at the same time in New Zealand.
Dr. Nader says, “At the very beginning of its preamble, the Constitution of UNESCO famously states, ‘Since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defenses of peace must be established.’ Now, the 193 nations of the UN have resolved to use the power of meditation to do this. I invite every meditator in the world to take a first step in establishing world peace at 8:00 AM in your local time and again at 5:00 PM on World Meditation Day.”
“Our goal is to have large, permanent groups of experts in the TM and TM-Sidhi program, including Yogic Flying, in many locations—in schools, colleges, and universities; in workplaces; in the military—wherever people routinely come together. This will produce enough coherence in our collective world consciousness that violence of all kinds will subside. Then, collective meditation will not be for just one day but will be happening 365 days every year, and our world will at last be at peace.” – as reported on the website.
Tony Nader Lies on His Own Social Media
Tony Nader’s lie highlighted in red,
photo-credit: facebook.com/DrTonyNader
Spreading Lies Through Press Releases
The falsehood propagated by Tony Nader is also disseminated in the form of press releases—below is an example issued by the Australian TM movement:
And the Reality
Dr. Tony Nader, who collaborates with Hindutva nationalists, will indeed give a speech, but not at an official UN event. Instead, it will be at a private event organized by a few UN members, as detailed below.
The official UN event page at www.un.org/en/collection/54315/6826 does not list the event imagined by Dr. Tony Nader and his misled followers.