Perpetual Cognitive Dissonance

by sabastious 16 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  sabastious

  Revelation 7:9NWT - After these things I saw, and, look! a great crowd, which no man was able to number, out of all nations and tribes and peoples and tongues , standing before the throne and before the Lamb, dressed in white robes; and there were palm branches in their hands.

  Every year, as an adolescent Witness, I would eagerly await the arrival of the annual "Watchtower world report" issue to come out. It had always bugged me that we were not in ALL the lands even though purporting to be the one and only "Great Crowd" decribed in the verse above. For some reason I felt comfort in the numbers indicating our growth even to the point of slight obsession. Likewise I felt equal discomfort in our seemingly vain efforts in India where our Witness to citizen ratio was in the millions. My mother and father would hate when I brought this up.

  Now, at this point in my life, I don't see why it matted so much to me. Why care about the numbers so much of our own time anyway? The verse quoted above was written thousands of years prior to any of the nations, tribes peoples and tounges of the last 120 years. What about the Native American's? The Aborigines? The people of the Stone Age? Incas? Mayans? Chinese? To name a microfraction... According to this scripture a sample from all of them form this "great crowd", none are left out.

  When I really think about it the more nonsensical it sounds. How could we be the only people this verse is speaking about? How can we march into other countries and tell them they are wrong? They are just a different nation or tribe within a nation or a tounge of a tribe within a nation. This verse has them all covered.

  Which would be why no man can number the great crowd: it's unknown.

  So all this is pretty basic logic when you break it down. Even a small child would be able to see the contradiction of any group claiming this "title". That's how it works to be raised in the Organization. You get a case of perpetual cognitive dissonance that haunts your mind until who knows how long

  -Sab
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  Teary Oberon

  The curious thing about 'cognitive dissonace' (if it even exists, which Teary still debates with himself about), is that you can't really KNOW that you have it while you have it -- you can only know you had it or didn't have it in retrospect. It is like some quantum particles: once you realize that you have it you don't really have it anymore (or maybe it is like, if you know that you are crazy then you aren't really crazy). A Witness reading this thread might have CD about his current beleifs, but the OP of this thread might also have CD about his current set of beliefs and not even realize it.

  The other thing to think about, is just how wide spread and common the phenomenon is. Is a rare thing that only effects this one tiny group of individuals that call themselves "Witnesses," or can it crop up in all kinds of places that we wouldn't normally associate CD with? What about normal churches, like Baptists or Lutherans? Are they somehow immune? What about atheists? Buddhists? Ex-Witnesses? If CD is merely discomfort because of "holding conflicting ideas simultaneously" caused by subconcious doubts about ones current set of ideas, then you would think that the theory could apply to just about all of humanity in every type of group and social construct.

  Because remember also, CD says nothing about the truth or falsity of one's ideas -- it is more a feeling, or a value judgment, than it is a factual thing. A Protestant might experience CD because he subconciously feels his current set of beliefs are wrong and that Muslims beliefs are more logical, while a Muslim might experience CD because he subconciously feels that his current set of beliefs are wrong and that Protestant beliefs are more logical. So anybody anywhere could have CD so long as any doubt at all exists in their mind, regardless of whether those doubts are justified or not.
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  wobble

  Cog. Disss. is the ability to hold two or more conflicting ideas at once, and rationalise them to your satisfaction.

  There are various methods of doing this, but all involve not facing up to facts and reality.

  Just as a fairly neautral example, take the smoker who has puffed for forty years, he /she knows that the chances are it will get them in one way or another, but they look to the example of the cousins friends uncle who smoked more than them and lived to be a hundred twelvety.

  I think that the sad part is that deep down, all practitioners of Cog. Diss, know that they are fooling themselves at least a bit.

  It does no harm to shake them up a bit and make them face reality, especially JW's, tell 'em like it is, they need to face the real world.
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  dogisgod

  I think that anyone who "believes" anything without fact has CD.
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  N.drew

  Cognitive dissonance is so real. The brain lying to itself is what it is. I wish I had written down all the instances where I have seen it. It is actually a wonderful thing. I will keep it in mind to notice any instances of it and record it. My theory so far is it is an unconsious attempt to frustrate the mind of the opponent out of desperation. God only knows why an argument ever needs it. Someday science might know, what it is and why for goodness sake is it necessary or perceived so.
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  Teary Oberon

  "There are various methods of doing this, but all involve not facing up to facts and reality."

  You are still confused on the concept it seems. CD doesn't necessarily have to have anything to do with facts or reality. The only real qualifier is "conflicting."

  Interestingly enough, both of the conflicting ideas could be completely irrational (or two different people with opposite views could have CD involving the ideas of the other person) -- it is more a matter of what the INDIVIDUAL feels is right than it is of what is logically true and factual in the real world.
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  N.drew

  Yes, that is correct. It is what the individual believes, but to another person it appears impossible for both opinions (in the one mind) to be believed as believing them both defies logic, which we all love and treasure, do we not?
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  Teary Oberon

  What an individual considers "impossible" is again, rather relative.

  An atheist would consider all spiritual or religious belief to be logic defying and 'kooky,' while a theist would consider an atheist's complete reject of God to be logic defying.

  As a famous television show once said: "One's perception of truth depends heavily on the narrow perspective from which they choose to view it."
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  Retrovirus

  An interesting topic, that, IMHO, is being dragged into undebatable territory, aka waffle. Who could tell whether there is any discomfort in holding conflicting irrational beliefs?

  Following the example in the OP, I'd suggest we stick to the cognitive dissonance felt when a deeply held belief is contradicted by facts or logic. The holder of the belief cannot refute the information and so dismisses it, but feels the pain.

  From the OP:

  Likewise I felt equal discomfort in our seemingly vain efforts in India where our Witness to citizen ratio was in the millions. My mother and father would hate when I brought this up

  The discomfort felt by the poster and parents when statistics published by the wt itself contradicted belief in the effectiveness of the preaching work is a classic CD symptom.

  Of course, CD it not confined to the wt or to any religion. I'm sure nobody completely escapes it.

  The intensity of the dismissal of undesirable information is an indicator of CD discomfort. When jws attack "apostates", and quickly label people as "opposers" "deniers" etc, the pain is obvious.
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  ziddina