Proof they are not a cult??

by lriddle80 34 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  carla

  Ok, I will feed the troll today. Here a just a few reasons why jw's are a cult- from Steve Hasaan bit model- learn more here https://freedomofmind.com/bite-model/

  Behavior Control

  • Promote dependence and obedience
  • Modify behavior with rewards and punishments
  • Dictate where and with whom you live
  • Restrict or control sexuality
  • Control clothing and hairstyle
  • Regulate what and how much you eat and drink
  • Deprive you of seven to nine hours of sleep
  • Exploit you financially
  • Restrict leisure time and activities
  • Require you to seek permission for major decisions

  Information Control

  • Deliberately withhold and distort information
  • Forbid you from speaking with ex-members and critics
  • Discourage access to non-cult sources of information
  • Divide information into Insider vs. Outsider doctrine
  • Generate and use propaganda extensively
  • Use information gained in confession sessions against you
  • Gaslight to make you doubt your own memory
  • Require you to report thoughts, feelings, & activities to superiors
  • Encourage you to spy and report on others’ “misconduct”

  Thought Control

  • Instill Black vs. White, Us vs. Them, & Good vs. Evil thinking
  • Change your identity, possibly even your name
  • Use loaded language and cliches to stop complex thought
  • Induce hypnotic or trance states to indoctrinate
  • Teach thought-stopping techniques to prevent critical thoughts
  • Allow only positive thoughts
  • Use excessive meditation, singing, prayer, & chanting to block thoughts
  • Reject rational analysis, critical thinking, & doubt

  Emotional Control

  • Instill irrational fears (phobias) of questioning or leaving the group
  • Label some emotions as evil, worldly, sinful, or wrong
  • Teach emotion-stopping techniques to prevent anger, homesickness
  • Promote feelings of guilt, shame, & unworthiness
  • Shower you with praise and attention (“love bombing”)
  • Threaten your friends and family
  • Shun you if you disobey or disbelieve
  • Teach that there is no happiness or peace outside the group
• 

  DesirousOfChange

  1 out of every 262 American is a Jehovah's Witness.

  Can anyone verify or debunk that? The ratio was over 300 -to-1 in the past as I remember. (Or, is it that now that they have added Hawaii and other islands to the US figures that the ratio has improved?)
  
• 

  Finkelstein

  Carla
  

  People who are in a cult cant clearly discern if they are in one or not and they cant necessarily be put to fault upon that fact.

  Ten warning signs of a potentially unsafe group/leader.

  1. Absolute authoritarianism without meaningful accountability.
  2. No tolerance for questions or critical inquiry.
  3. No meaningful financial disclosure regarding budget, expenses such as an independently audited financial statement.
  4. Unreasonable fear about the outside world, such as impending catastrophe, evil conspiracies and persecutions.
  5. There is no legitimate reason to leave, former followers are always wrong in leaving, negative or even evil.
  6. Former members often relate the same stories of abuse and reflect a similar pattern of grievances.
  7. There are records, books, news articles, or television programs that document the abuses of the group/leader.
  8. Followers feel they can never be "good enough".
  9. The group/leader is always right.
  10. The group/leader is the exclusive means of knowing "truth" or receiving validation, no other process of discovery is really acceptable or credible.

  Ten warning signs regarding people involved in/with a potentially unsafe group/leader.

  1. Extreme obsessiveness regarding the group/leader resulting in the exclusion of almost every practical consideration.
  2. Individual identity, the group, the leader and/or God as distinct and separate categories of existence become increasingly blurred. Instead, in the follower's mind these identities become substantially and increasingly fused--as that person's involvement with the group/leader continues and deepens.
  3. Whenever the group/leader is criticized or questioned it is characterized as "persecution".
  4. Uncharacteristically stilted and seemingly programmed conversation and mannerisms, cloning of the group/leader in personal behavior.
  5. Dependency upon the group/leader for problem solving, solutions, and definitions without meaningful reflective thought. A seeming inability to think independently or analyze situations without group/leader involvement.
  6. Hyperactivity centered on the group/leader agenda, which seems to supercede any personal goals or individual interests.
  7. A dramatic loss of spontaneity and sense of humor.
  8. Increasing isolation from family and old friends unless they demonstrate an interest in the group/leader.
  9. Anything the group/leader does can be justified no matter how harsh or harmful.
  10. Former followers are at best-considered negative or worse evil and under bad influences. They can not be trusted and personal contact is avoided.
• 

  stillin

  Even if the definition of cult is fuzzy around the edges, the members are "owned" in a closed society.

  The size and scope of the religion is not a part of the consideration anymore. This is a new world. Everything is bigger. However, I respect the non-racial attitude that the Witnesses have.

  Yes, the JW's have finally adopted modern technology! After years of brow-beating anybody who had a VCR or (God forbid!) the Internet! Now the Kingdom Halls are filled with people who all have tablets and do exactly the same things at the same time! The peer pressure to own an iPad or similar was intense. Actual Binle readers are seen as stubborn dinosaurs.

  Conformity is very important in this non-cult!
• 

  Finkelstein

  the members are "owned" in a closed society.

  Good point stillin
  

  As in the case of the WTS it made people its own loyal servants/slaves into supporting the WTS and its leaders unquestionably, done strategically by implying that their organization is the only organization that is truthfully worshiping Jehovah, all others are pointed out as being false.
  

  It also made a social environment to serve its means and purpose as a publishing house, add in the constant proclamation that judgement day is soon and you create an social environment of power and control.
  

  When one looks analytically into the operations of the WTS you can see its formative corruption and why it works as it does psychologically onto people..
  
• 

  ttdtt

  WOW the STUPID Topics just keep coming?

  Has JW headquarters assigned someone to start doing this?
• 

  tiki

  So cult or not a cult....immaterial. They condone child abuse and hide sexual predators. They overtly condemn education and critical open minded thinking skills. They endeavor to deprive their adherents of personal fulfillment physically, intellectually, and emotionally. They preach love, but their attitudes display indifference down to sheer cruelty, as indicated by parents cutting all ties with children and or family members who choose a different route in life. Interesting, most cults display parallel approaches to their captive ones....
• 

  tepidpoultry

  Poster dumps and ditches

  I could be wrong

  But if it smells like a...
• 

  stillin

  TP, the OP covers any possible response. You can't have any other opinion if there is a know-it-all in the room.
• 

  Finkelstein

  I had to laugh at this one ......
  

  8. Not many of us know the name of the President of our headquarters because we do not pay any reference to him He is a fellow servant of God just like the rest of us are.

  Really ? these people are the main and only creators of the doctrines which everyone of the JWS has to follow obediently, like being obedient to god as it were, a matter of fact when your baptized as a JWS you have to make vow of servitude to these men and their directives..
  

  They are far more than just fellow servants of god they are the hierarchical spiritual channeled directors of the entire organization. They hold the controlling power over all of the membership of the organization.
  

  The real problem to why the JWS got their doctrines of faith so screwed up is because of these novice bible theologians and their positions of being the head editorial writers for the Watchtower Publishing house.