BRAINWASHED BY A CULT
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Brainwashing is unethical influence to adapt political, social, or religious beliefs and attitudes.
The basis of brainwashing are the basic beliefs that:
1) you do not need evidence to believe things; and
2) you should not question you beliefs.
When religious parents brainwash their children, these are the fundamental beliefs that they impose on their children.
Anyone with these basic beliefs is easily brainwashed by unethical means. If someone has beliefs that are not based on evidence then those beliefs are arbitrary. If you have arbitrarily beliefs, then its very easy for someone to use unethical influence to impose a different set of arbitrary beliefs. They can get you to believe anything because you are not anchored by evidence. You will not question whatever beliefs are unethically imposed on you for the same reason that you did not question your old beliefs - because you think that questioning your belief is wrong.
The more religious your children are, the more likely they are to adopt beliefs that lead to involvement in drugs, crime, gangs and evil cult.
If you only believe what is supported by evidence, then you have an anchor to help prevent someone from unethically influencing you to adopt some evil and dangerous beliefs.
The basis of Ha mas brainwashing the 9/11 terrorists to murder thousands of people was the initial belief of the 9/11 hijackers that they should believe things without evidence and they should not question their beliefs. None of them ever asked, the important questions:
1) what is the evidence that Mohammad really talked with the angel Gabriel?
2) what is the evidence that the Quran is not fiction?
3) what is the evidence that there is a heaven that can be earned by murdering thousands of people?
when you say "faith" I think "evil lies"
when you say "god" I think "santa clause"
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The truth and evidence is found in faith, it's that simple, you must have faith in the quran or the bible, because if you don't then it's not true, and the evidence does not present itself. those without faith cannot see the truth or the evidence....come on dood it's that simple really.
Back up each of those claims with relevant studies, or you pulled them out of your ass. There, that is my demand for evidence. If you are writing a post about how important evidence is, then you should probably not make evidence-free claims like that.
"You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours."
British General Charles Napier while in India
Theists have arbitrary moral beliefs. Whatever they want to believe is moral then they just have faith (pretend) that its moral according to God. How can you expect your Children to have the same morality that you have when you're teaching them that morality is an arbitrary belief not based on evidence or their morel instincts.
see Cross-National Correlations of Quantifiable Societal Health with Popular Religiosity and Secularism in the Prosperous Democracies
If you do not have direct access you can see a summary of some of the results
A First Look by Gregory S. Paul
For correlation between suicide and belief in Satan see:
Religious Cosmologies and Homicide Rates among Nations
There is a study on correlation between religion and child abuse and wife beating in Florida.
The more religious you are the more likely your daughter is to have an abortion or to get a venereal disease.
when you say "faith" I think "evil lies"
when you say "god" I think "santa clause"
You might want to look at Gary F. Jensen's (Vanderbilt University) analysis while you are at it. I don't believe he was as convinced as patcleaver.
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
My late daddy and mommy taught (brainwashed) us 5 kids that we are god, as all is god, as all is one, that all religion god idol worship stuff was worse than stupid silly.
They said the message from an ancient jesus, who tried to say all is one, was killed because of religious greedy loons and innocent blind retards.
Mom cussed as she would say, we kids should be preachers of the jesus "oneness" message against the traditional separatist church teachings .... polite caring always sharing dad, a science, philosophy freak said, use science in your preaching message ....
It is fairly just recently dawning on old me, the lucky kid I was, as I today proclaim "we are god", and science humbly agrees.
Atheism Books.
patcleaver wrote:
"The more religious your children are, the more likely they are to adopt beliefs that lead to involvement in drugs, crime, gangs and evil cult."~~~~~~~
Umm ... Seems the prison statistics back that claim up a bit.
Seems we are miss reading pat and his OP .... ???
Atheism Books.
I'm afraid I have to point out that this is speculation on your part, as you have no way of knowing (and less of demonstrating) that none of the 19 hijackers harbored doubts, or asked these questions of themselves in the "bitter watches of the night", as the old Professor phrased it.
In fact, the people who have placed their self-worth in their faith all their lives who are most likely to take extreme action aren't the ones who haven't asked these questions (they're usually too dumb to really be useful), nor the ones who've come through such questioning with their faith intact (as they generally aren't insecure enough to take desperate measures on an issue of faith alone), but the ones in the grip of those very questions.
Make no mistake, religion, by placing people in that position to begin with, is an evil; an evil of deception and self-deception, but an evil that survives because for some, it still serves the purpose of meeting a personal need. For most adherants, this need is one of reassurance. Death is scary, the very idea of 'not being' is scary. Mostly it's scary because of two reasons: one, of course, is that we're driven to want to continue. Survival is our deepest instinct. The other is the element of the unknown. Religion offers comfort against both of those causes of fear: there's no need to worry about dying, because we survive death (as paradoxical as that is), and the other side of the greatest transition you'll ever experience isn't unknown: it's paradise. So why be afraid? But as useful as those can be to some people, the idea of certainty is a lie. At best, they are a hope, but a hope that there is no reason to invest even an iota of belief in.
The problem, though, comes when you have people who have invested not an iota of belief into that hope, but the entirety of their self-worth... because doubt is natural. Doubt is normal. Everyone experiences it. For those who see themselves as worthwhile only because of their beliefs, though, doubt is an attack on the only thing that justifies their existence. That they themselves are the attacker only compounds the issue, because it suggests that they themselves do not believe they deserve to exist. Ironically, the survival instinct, the impulse to fight off even the idea of being unfit to exist, becomes twisted in these circumstances into a drive to prove one's faith to oneself... and that leads to extreme acts, because there is, in the end, only one way to truly silence the doubts.
It is when we are forced to confront ourselves, and forced by ourselves to see that the entire paradigm by which we've lived has been false, that things are most dangerous: like all animals, we react intensely to threats when we feel cornered, and when the 'threat' is one we present against ourselves... there's no way to escape the corner, except to confront the threat, and to come out the other side with our convictions either renewed, or altered. It's important that we recognize this, that we do our best to try to make the process as nonthreatening as we can. It's important that we do our very utmost to make sure that those who are experiencing a crisis of faith, who are teetering on the brink of internal nihilism, realise that the choice is not between validity through God or rejection of self-worth, but that there is a third way, a better way: That self worth is truly found in oneself. It's the Great Mystery of Life that Paisley, Presuppositionalist, and all the others don't seem able to grasp: That the one true Ultimate Purpose of life... is Life. That the great and deep Meaning of Your Life is the one you give it.
That ultimately, the Answer to the Question: "Why am I here?" is "Because you are", and the real question ought to be "I'm here. I have my life. What do I want to make of it?"
It's important that when we find someone in that moment when they feel like their only choices are 'make a leap of faith' or 'fall into the abyss', that we make sure they understand that they can also choose to reject the chasm altogether and stand strong on solid ground... and that in doing so, they just might learn to spread their wings, and fly.
"You've got to remember that these are just simple farmers. These are people of the land. The common clay of the new West. You know... morons." - The Waco Kid
Unfortunately due to brainwashing a lot of kids never learn to think freely about this fundamental question. I know for a fact that a lot of christian cults even teach their children to mistrust their own rationality.
Does anyone of the atheists have any experience concerning "brainwashing cults"? And what is the difference between a "brainwashing cult" and a religion according to the theists?
"I do not think it is necessary to believe that the same God who has given us our senses, reason, and intelligence wished us to abandon their use, giving us by some other means the information that we could gain through them."
- Galileo Galilei -
I grew up in the Worldwide Church of God. 60 Minutes called it a cult in an expose. I've heard some theists call it a cult and others call it fundamentalist religion.
So far I have never seen a good definition of cult that really shows the difference between cult and religion. It is seen as a matter of extremism and separateness from the mainstream because of belief, but where exactly the cut-off between cult and religion lies is not well-defined. That's where you get the idea of mormons and scientologists no longer being cults in the eyes of some. They are simply too big and mainstream now to be cults, even though the underlying beliefs have not changed. High membership numbers lend credulity, which in turn means they are no longer fringe, therefore, not cults.
I wouldn't limit this comment to just cults(beyond just the problems with the definition of that word) . How many scientists are routinely called out by mainstream christians for being arrogant since they look to rationality instead of the word of god?
"I am that I am." - Proof that the writers of the bible were beyond stoned.
No, I do not know for certain, but I think its highly unlikely that the 9/11 hijackers ever considered whether their religion was false.
I think they had all believed that their religion was true since they were small children with the same level of faith that they believed that the people who raised them were really their mother and father and the same level of faith that they believed their parents loved them. For most religious people their religious beliefs seem like common sense.
The agonizing decision in the minds of the 9/11 hijackers was whether to be a coward and risk the failure of the entire mission or to bravely strike the infidel enemy for Allah. They certainly never understood that they were just dupes.
when you say "faith" I think "evil lies"
when you say "god" I think "santa clause"
All religions, that I know of, are evil brainwashing cults - including even the Buddhists.
when you say "faith" I think "evil lies"
when you say "god" I think "santa clause"
I could not find anything where Gary Jenson disagrees with the results of any of these studies. But I found this:
Jensen, Gary. "Can Religion Encourage Homicide?: Religious Cosmologies and the Structure of Lethal Violence"
In the article, Jenson claims that Homicide correlates with Christian beliefs about Satan almost as well as Homicide correlates with religiousness.
The problem is that there is a good explanation for why religious beliefs results in moral breakdown that is supported by the rest of the survey, and would lead to homocide, and there is no good explanation of why Christian or Muslim religious beliefs about Satan should result in Homicides.
when you say "faith" I think "evil lies"
when you say "god" I think "santa clause"
The two basic beliefs of any religion are that it is good to believe things without evidence (faith), and it is wrong to question your beliefs (doubt). This allows Christians to arbitrarilly adopt any moral belief they wish and to never question their arbitrary moral beliefs.
The arbitrariness of religious morality explains the correlation between religiousness and anti-social behavior.
A Christian can at anytime believe that its moral to do anything imaginable. That is why the christian Guards of German concentration Camps had no problems enforcing the regime of mass starvation and mass murder of Jewish prisoners. They simply had faith that what they were doing was morally alright.
If a Christian wants to believe that having premarital sex is alright then she just believes that its alright and never has to question it. If a Christian wants to believe that selling drugs is alright under their circumstances then she just believes that its alright and never has to question it.
when you say "faith" I think "evil lies"
when you say "god" I think "santa clause"
And how would you describe it considering your experiences? Or perhaps you've already done so in another thread? Anyway, I would love to hear from you what you would consider dangerous or harmful about cults in general and specifically your experiences considering "brainwashing".
So basically you're arguing that the difference between religion and cult is in the acceptance of the general population?
With this I do not agree, because I think this also includes a cultural element. What you would describe as a "mainstream christian" I would probably describe as fundamentalist zealot. This is because in the Netherlands, where I live, there are very few christians who see the Bible as literal history. Most consider it to be allegorical by nature and are therefor quite moderate in their beliefs.
So defining a cult by the degree of acceptance towards it by the general population is not that specific and uniform, and has it limits.
In my opinion a cult is a religious group which is highly organized (hierarchy), which is highly dogmatic and has a select number of "leaders" who control almost all of the personal lifes and decisions of those involved. (which is also the definition of "cult" in the dutch dictionary)
It's quite difficult to actually tell where and when a religion stops being a religion and becomes a cult.
"I do not think it is necessary to believe that the same God who has given us our senses, reason, and intelligence wished us to abandon their use, giving us by some other means the information that we could gain through them."
- Galileo Galilei -
That's exactly it: Time and scale. By the time Scientology hits 100 years, even the Germans will stop calling it a cult, unfortunately. The pushback, of course, is to start calling all organised religions 'cults'... which, you know, isn't even a misuse of the term, given that it's only the way we use it, not the word itself, that carries dismissive connotations.
"You've got to remember that these are just simple farmers. These are people of the land. The common clay of the new West. You know... morons." - The Waco Kid
Some days I call the church I grew up in a cult, but most of the time I use fundamentalist. This is purely due to the connotations of the words though as the word cult can really only be used more for emotional response than to actually define a group.
Fanaticism is more dangerous than liberal theism simply because of the actions people are will to take due to their beliefs. Beyond that, I don’t see much difference between “cults” and mainstream religion. Cults the it to a different level (think religion on steroids if you’d like) , but the underlying beliefs and methods are about the same. Come join our group and you will be a loved, chosen one. Don’t join us and you are a bad person who will suffer. Brainwashing is just keeping people from asking questions. It is a silencing of that inner voice that raises doubt. Mainstream religion relies heavily on brainwashing as well. (Even the interesting liberal christianity that I hear your country has. ) And, cults can be helpful. I know someone who was able to quit using drugs because of scientology. It's never all bad.
Yes. Definitely.
You do have a point here. Perspective does mean a lot when using a term like "mainstream christianity" - the same as perspective is a large part of defining "cult".
I do love reading posts from those of you who live in the Netherlands (and the Nordic countries) . The shift in perspective is refreshing. I will admit that I’ve never really understood moderate christianity. Why cling to a belief set if you disagree with much of that belief set? It just doesn’t make sense to me. However, I would much rather deal with a moderate christian than the fundamentalists I know. At least there seems to be some ability to reason in the mind of a moderate theist.
But the many mainstream of churches fit this definition. The pope interferes in the personal decisions of catholics. The fact that many European and North American catholics often ignore him is an aside. The civil laws of a number of countries are directly affected by his proclamations, with serious consequences for millions of people.
Also, you probably already know this, but I would be careful with straight translation from language to language. What English speakers think of when we use the word “cult” may only be similar to what you Dutch are referring to with your word.
It is interesting to look at the entire spectrum of religion as there is a good deal of difference between the deist position and that of a fundamental literalist. But the artificial division between “us regular worshipers” and those “crazy cultists” is an artificial construct that doesn’t really hold up well. Yes, there is a difference between a Jim Jones follower and some one who is a more moderate christian, but I don’t think the difference is as great as many people want to believe. Both still give in to belief when they don't want to reason.
"I am that I am." - Proof that the writers of the bible were beyond stoned.
Exactly, it's important to define what we consider a cult as objectively as possible. However since we all have our own opinions about religions and cults, we can never completely eliminate all subjectivity.
This moderate christianity in my opinion is a halfway house between the dogmatic christian belief system and agnosticism/atheism. A lot of people that I know of consider themselves christians but they do not attend a church or even read the bible. In my opinion it's more due to habit and tradition then "faith".
It's a lot easier and it doesn't take as much researche to become a convincing atheist as it does at remaining a somewhat enlightened theist. A theist, no matter how dogmatic or how enlightened they may be, can always drop the bomb in a debat: "It's just how I perceive it to be / It's just my belief that.."
That I would agree on, institutionalized religions such as catholicism are much bigger then for instance Scientology. However they use the same tactics of brainwashing the same flawed argumentation for their claims and are also involved with day-to-day decisions of their congregation.
I am aware of that, it is very important if one is involved in a debate that they should at least try to agree on language.
Could we agree that a cult has the same properties as religion, but that the general population decides where religion ends and cults begin?
P.S. Thank you for explaining your personal experiences/thoughts on the matter. It was really interesting to read for me. (because I do not have personal experience with this matter. )
"I do not think it is necessary to believe that the same God who has given us our senses, reason, and intelligence wished us to abandon their use, giving us by some other means the information that we could gain through them."
- Galileo Galilei -
While I do think you have a good idea of uses of the word "cult," I don't fully agree with your definition. Don't forget the element of time that BCMd mentioned. I would define it more as:
"If I think you're sane and normal, you're part of a religion. If I think you're weird and/or crazy, you're part of a cult. " With a clear emphasis on what I - the user of the word - feel about you.
Cult really is just a word with much connotative meaning and no exact meaning that is used to marginalize some theists. It's a good way for liberal theists to try and separate themselves from the aspects of religion they don't like, while still remaining theists and feeling good about the decision to be theists. I find a lot of hypocrisy in the use of the word.
Thank you for having good questions and thinking about the responses given to come up with more good questions. That kind of dialog is always fun!
"I am that I am." - Proof that the writers of the bible were beyond stoned.
Yeah the problem of communication, linguistic word definitions. So much of what we debate is simply the definition.
Atheism Books.
I certainly understand your definition of the word cult, and I have no problem accepting this definition for further debate. My definition was an attempt to describe the word "cult" in relation to religion and you have done so as well. We both agree that cults and religions are similar in method, but there is a distinct difference in degree.
Cult has much connotativea meaning, if I were to describe a person's religion as a cult it would almost certainly be felt as an attack on his person and beliefs. This also happens with words such as irrational and dogmatic.
You're welcome, I always enjoy debating to come to a better understanding of a subject. It's always fun to debate with someone who does not only care for the end result but also the method and definitions involved such as yourself.
@ I'm as god as you,
Yup, it took us half a page to come to agreement on what only one of the words in the original post ment. But then again, if you run headfirst into a debate without agreement on definitions you probably won't learn anything.
Assumptions about definitions lead to mis-understandings and does not help general discussion.
@all,
Are cults dangerous by definition? Do we need to be afraid of cults or should we accept it as a part of our society?
I would like to hear more about this since I'm still trying to form an answer to these questions.
"I do not think it is necessary to believe that the same God who has given us our senses, reason, and intelligence wished us to abandon their use, giving us by some other means the information that we could gain through them."
- Galileo Galilei -
"Are cults dangerous by definition? Do we need to be afraid of cults or should we accept it as a part of our society?"
Umm ???, Good cults, bad cults? "Cult" is another funny word. Are the science minded a cult?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cult
Atheism Books.
It's kind of a hard subject to discuss, since a cult seems to be difficult to describe quantatively due to the connotation associated.
So yeah, it is a funny word because it's connotation causes people to experience emotions which they would like to include in the discussion. If I were to have particularly negative experiences with what I consider to be cults I might not agree with a definition of the word cult whithout a negative connotation itself.
Connotation is so important in discussion subjects such as these, because in my opinion these grey areas give great insight in human psyche. After all, whenever we debat cultural phenomena we really study ourselves and society in general.
"I do not think it is necessary to believe that the same God who has given us our senses, reason, and intelligence wished us to abandon their use, giving us by some other means the information that we could gain through them."
- Galileo Galilei -
Indeed MeshaM .... studying the human earth "cult", the aliens might say, as they would view us as all the same thing. Basically fancy Ants ....
Just to add, I do see brainwash, religion indoctrination, and cults as connected concepts, that we need to rationally deal with.
Atheism Books.
A brainwashing cult is any religion that brainwashes children to believe that:
1. it is good to believe things without evidence.
2. it is bad to question your beliefs.
Nothing is more arrogant than believing that you can know things without evidence.
These Christians think they have the magic juju to discern truth without having to gather and analyze data. It is beyond arrogance - it is megalomania.
If there is a God then he can not even know without evidence, and it is blasphemy to believe that you have powers that even God does not have. I can not imagine any God who would not condemn such a person.
Proverbs 16:5 Everyone who is proud in heart is an abomination to the LORD; Assuredly, he will not be unpunished.
when you say "faith" I think "evil lies"
when you say "god" I think "santa clause"
I agree Pat,
Nothing is more arrogant than believing that you can know things without evidence, which is the basis of religion faith, which is ludicrous .... blasphemy, when it is preached as dogmatic truth. In this sense religion is all poison, terrorism, child abuse, sick ....
Atheism Books.
"I do not think it is necessary to believe that the same God who has given us our senses, reason, and intelligence wished us to abandon their use, giving us by some other means the information that we could gain through them."
- Galileo Galilei -
40% of scientists with bachelor degree in science believe that there is a God and 10% of scientists with a PHD believe there is a God
A medical degree is not a PHD. A medical degree is a practicing degree in medicine like a Jurist Doctor is a practicing degree in law.
An amazing 70% of medical doctors (including 40% of psychiatrists), and 50% of lawyers believe there is a God. Of course a lot of those are deists, pantheists, Unitarians, and very liberal Christians and Jews
In the US we have Chiropractors and Osteopathic doctors practicing medicine. These branches of medical arts have been thoroughly discredited and yet their wacky adherents continue to run medical schools.
In Europe homeopathic medicine is common. Homeopathy is just dressed up voodoo.
In the US we have nutty medical doctors giving patients oriental quack treatments such as acupressure and acupuncture and reflexology.
The AMA has approved these quack treatments as placebos. Placebos are treatments that have been proven to be ineffective except for psychosomatic effects. Traditional placebos were pills containing some neutral substance such as dextrose, rice flour, calcium carbonate, that were proven to be equally ineffective as a treatment for some ailment. The doctor lies to the patient or at least allows the patient to believe that the treatment is effective, and the patient believes in the treatment, and many patients report reduction of his symptoms. About 30% of patients report that placebos are effective for symptoms that cannot be physically measured such as pain, dizziness, nausea. Studies have shown that placebos are only effective if the patient believes that they will be effective, and specifically, that these new age placebos are more effective then sugar pills for those patients who believe that they will be more effective than sugar pills. However, having a medical doctor prescribing traditional quack medicine, and lying to his patient that the treatment will be effective, certainly blurs the line between medicine and snake-oil salesmen.
I have recently heard of doctors prescribing magnets for patients with arthritis, not as an effective medication, but as a placebo, because even though all studies prove that magnets are not generally any more effective than sugar pills, that magnets are a more effective placebo for patients who think they will be more effective. I cannot help wondering whether some doctors have crossed the line and become quacks by prescribing these alternative or natural medicines which are ineffective except for the placebo effect.
when you say "faith" I think "evil lies"
when you say "god" I think "santa clause"