American Aghori

And now for something completely different.......... an American Cannibal.

Aghor has murky roots. It most likely originated in India, which continues to be the sacred center for Aghor adherents worldwide, although that country has outlawed some of the more extreme rituals followers have engaged in, like human sacrifice. A good deal of Aghoris do, however, still practice human sacrifice. In India, some Aghoris are found in and around the cremation grounds in Varanasi. But there are Aghoris in America, Germany, Italy, Russia, and Australia. In fact, once I learned that Westerners were among the devout, I traveled around the world six times researching this strange belief system. I lived with Aghoris in their ashram in Sonoma, California, and visited with a sect in Mezzago, Italy.

This is the subject matter for the book Michael Yon was working on prior to embedding in Iraq.

Read "American Aghori" a short piece, appearing in this months issue of Vice magazine , where Michael Yon introduces us to Gary Stevenson, a charismatic American cannibal and practioner of Aghor - an extreme sect of Hinduism.