Lessons from Jonestown
The mass suicide of People's Temple followers 25 years ago teaches psychologists what happens when social psychology is placed in the wrong hands.
http://www.apa.org/monitor/nov03/jonestown.aspx
Bangalore
Lessons From Jonestown
by Bangalore 6 Replies latest watchtower scandals
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moshe
'Jonestown, they say, offers important lessons for psychology, such as the power of situational and social influences and the consequences of a leader using such influences to destructively manipulate others' behavior."
I am certain that politicians are using psychology to manipulate the voters, too. A small group has tremendous power, if they have the support of the major news and Internet media.
Why is it no longer kosher for reporters to say "illegal immigrant'?-- - is this not social mind conditioning to change public opinions? Who has the right to decide that those opinions should be changed?
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moshe
btt
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Mum
When the Jonestown massacre happened, I was still a dub. I must admit that it hit me hard because I had been convinced that blind obedience was "right" and was going to save me.
Shortly after the Jonestown mass suicide, there was an article in the Watchtower or Awake! about the need to have a strong mind and not to be a blind follower. That set up some cognitive dissonance! More Watchtower doublespeak, that's all.
Anyway, the poor, doomed People's Temple folks had no choice. Jones killed the children first, so the adults would not want to live anyway. He would accept no reasoning on the subject. One old lady survived because she hid under her bed. Some others were able to run into the jungle and get away.
The lesson is that we don't join religious groups with paranoia about the rest of the world, regardless of the "good" they are doing for the community. Jones' isolation of his followers is one of the characteristics of an abuser. They isolate the victim(s) from, their support system so they have nowhere to turn for help.
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Witness My Fury
Time for this timeless quote me thinks:
"When your own thoughts are forbidden, when your questions are not allowed and our doubts are punished, when contacts with friendships outside of the organization are censored, we are being abused for the ends never justify the means. When our heart aches knowing we have made friendships and secret attachments that will be forever forbidden if we leave, we are in danger. When we consider staying in a group because we cannot bear the loss, disappointment and sorrow our leaving will cause for ourselves and those we have come to love, we are in a cult... If there is any lesson to be learned it is that an ideal can never be brought about by fear, abuse, and the threat of retribution. When family and friends are used as a weapon in order to force us to stay in an organization, something has gone terribly wrong."
Deborah Layton, Jonestown survivor.
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Phizzy
Just an aside that is slightly off topic, in our early days of leaving the WT, I left that quote from Deborah Layton, given above by WMF, lying about, Mrs Phizzy read it and said "You shouldn't leave stuff like that about the WT lying around" .
Says it all really !
I then pointed out the very small attribution at the bottom of the page that she had not noticed, I think it was from then on she never objected when I called the WT a Cult !
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Bungi Bill
Jones was yet another person who reckoned he was The Messiah;
- another reason why all similarly deluded nut jobs are very far from being "harmless", as has been claimed by some on this discussion board.
Bill.