corboy Wrote:
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> Cult leaders hate being accountable to objective
> guidelines of any kind, hate anything that is a
> reminder that there is something outside of their
> group that they cannot control, standards where
> they are falling short.
>
> So...one cult building strategy is for the leader
> to persuade us that these objective guidelines are
> necessary but only for inferior people, timid
> people --not for bold spirits, not for us.
>
> Nothing's more effective than using charisma and
> group pressure to get us to
> regard "religion" aka virtue as something behind
> the times, that keeps us childish,
> unsophisticated, something that makes
> us ridiculous.
>
> Once a trusted charismatic leader gets just a few
> disciples to share this
> perspective, a group norm is created. Peer
> pressure can be applied to new
> members so that they come to regard virtuous
> behavior as "religious" and
> therefore undesirable....
>
> There's a similar strategy used by cult leaders in
> non Christian faiths - "Crazy Wisdom".
>
> It is used to excuse vile, shocking behavior.
>
> I am sorry to say I bought into this crap, because
> I stayed in some situations
> for far too long.
>
> In this scene, it is postulated that there is not
> one truth, but two truths, a truth that is higher,
> beyond all good and evil, beyond illusion,
> accessible and understandable *only* to those who
> are enlightened.
>
> Relative truth is the world of illusions,
> consensual reality, the world of right and wrong.
>
> The assumption is that the cult leader is so
> enlightened, so special that he/she cannot be held
> to standards of conventional morality.
>
> Such a person may be rude, lewd, exploitative,
> harmful by conventional standards, but is actually
> dismantling our enslavement to conventional
> morality so that we can attain this same higher
> wisdom.
Wow, corboy. This just about sums up what happens in both Bible-based and other types of cults as well. That explains a lot. Create a new group norm outside of the parameters of conventional behavior. Then use peer pressure to ridicule people who have a problem with the new normal.
As I have mentioned before, my first experience with this strange upside-down world within the Walk was after Robert Kennedy's assasination. I discovered, to my horror, that JRS and his "intercessors" really believed that JRS had caused RFK's death in order to "save" the country from another Kennedy presidency. I imagine that he also felt that God, through him, had caused JFK's death as well.
I was also made aware, early on in the late sixties, that Martha was "evil" and that people were praying for her death years before the "violent intercession" began. Supposedly, people doing the praying were shown this by revelation from God. But, as corboy and others have said, cult leaders have ways of hinting at what they want their followers to know. People who are intuitive are able to follow the clues, and BAM, now they also have received a confirming revelation.
I don't know how I was able to ignore these gross examples of dark magical thinking. As I said, I was a teenager, following a parent into the trap of a strange mystical religion. Brother Stevens, as he was known in those days, was extremely convincing and charismatic. He knew how to play to his audience. If we heard of another leader saying such things, it would have been obviously wrong and evil. But if you were there, in that atmosphere, it all began to make some weird kind of sense. You began to want to please JRS, so you ignored and followed.
-------------------------------------------------------
> Cult leaders hate being accountable to objective
> guidelines of any kind, hate anything that is a
> reminder that there is something outside of their
> group that they cannot control, standards where
> they are falling short.
>
> So...one cult building strategy is for the leader
> to persuade us that these objective guidelines are
> necessary but only for inferior people, timid
> people --not for bold spirits, not for us.
>
> Nothing's more effective than using charisma and
> group pressure to get us to
> regard "religion" aka virtue as something behind
> the times, that keeps us childish,
> unsophisticated, something that makes
> us ridiculous.
>
> Once a trusted charismatic leader gets just a few
> disciples to share this
> perspective, a group norm is created. Peer
> pressure can be applied to new
> members so that they come to regard virtuous
> behavior as "religious" and
> therefore undesirable....
>
> There's a similar strategy used by cult leaders in
> non Christian faiths - "Crazy Wisdom".
>
> It is used to excuse vile, shocking behavior.
>
> I am sorry to say I bought into this crap, because
> I stayed in some situations
> for far too long.
>
> In this scene, it is postulated that there is not
> one truth, but two truths, a truth that is higher,
> beyond all good and evil, beyond illusion,
> accessible and understandable *only* to those who
> are enlightened.
>
> Relative truth is the world of illusions,
> consensual reality, the world of right and wrong.
>
> The assumption is that the cult leader is so
> enlightened, so special that he/she cannot be held
> to standards of conventional morality.
>
> Such a person may be rude, lewd, exploitative,
> harmful by conventional standards, but is actually
> dismantling our enslavement to conventional
> morality so that we can attain this same higher
> wisdom.
Wow, corboy. This just about sums up what happens in both Bible-based and other types of cults as well. That explains a lot. Create a new group norm outside of the parameters of conventional behavior. Then use peer pressure to ridicule people who have a problem with the new normal.
As I have mentioned before, my first experience with this strange upside-down world within the Walk was after Robert Kennedy's assasination. I discovered, to my horror, that JRS and his "intercessors" really believed that JRS had caused RFK's death in order to "save" the country from another Kennedy presidency. I imagine that he also felt that God, through him, had caused JFK's death as well.
I was also made aware, early on in the late sixties, that Martha was "evil" and that people were praying for her death years before the "violent intercession" began. Supposedly, people doing the praying were shown this by revelation from God. But, as corboy and others have said, cult leaders have ways of hinting at what they want their followers to know. People who are intuitive are able to follow the clues, and BAM, now they also have received a confirming revelation.
I don't know how I was able to ignore these gross examples of dark magical thinking. As I said, I was a teenager, following a parent into the trap of a strange mystical religion. Brother Stevens, as he was known in those days, was extremely convincing and charismatic. He knew how to play to his audience. If we heard of another leader saying such things, it would have been obviously wrong and evil. But if you were there, in that atmosphere, it all began to make some weird kind of sense. You began to want to please JRS, so you ignored and followed.