Rocky

1 hour ago, Stayed Too Long said:

One of the lyrics is, “Image no possessions. It’s easy if you try.”

John certainly did not live up to this standard, as  he had wealth and justified being wealthy. 
https://www.cheatsheet.com/entertainment/john-lennon-felt-guilty-having-money.html/
 

 

 

 

What's the standard in that lyric? 

The action word is "imagine," isn't it? Did he imagine? Did he try to imagine what he'd do with or without money?

I appreciate the story at that link. Thanks. 

3 hours ago, chockfull said:

This thread is about cults and their similarity of operation to TWI.

It is not about ants or the struggle of humanity as a broad topic.  Please keep comments on topic.

Is not the topic of cults inherently related to the characteristics of and interaction of social animals (humans), groups, and that of leaders?

Why would you not be interested in imagining, or exploring evolution of cults, social animals, groups, and leadership? Just asking. 

3 hours ago, chockfull said:

Good perhaps if it is important to pay attention to you should start a thread on that topic

Oh, okay.  

3 hours ago, chockfull said:

[quoting Rocky] My current understanding of Victor Wierwille's ministry and organization approaches it as a very definite collective imagination which many of us embraced FOR A TIME.

Oh, okay.  

Ants predate humans by hundreds of millions of years. They have evolved with ways to avoid many of the conflicts we humans still struggle with.

I hope it won't take humanity that long to figure out how to solve such problems/conflicts.

Ants at Work by Deborah Gordon.

14 hours ago, Stayed Too Long said:

You are going with your comments. Please start a thread dealing with your concerns.

1 hour ago, chockfull said:

Calm down.  Nobody is demanding anything. I was answering a question directly.  Your post does seem to reflect what you have quoted in bold pretty well.  The reason you would manipulate would be within yourself nothing to do with me at all.

It might have to do with the stats showing you have 14,000 plus posts when nobody else has even half that many.

I have noticed and did mention this to you that whenever the frequency of my posting increases so does the frequency of you correcting, contradicting or attacking my posts basically.  So maybe your perceived status on this site threatened or I don’t even care enough to need to know why.  I just know when the behavior occurs I am not caving in to it any more.

I was speaking in general terms regarding why I would care.

Reiterating STL's gentle request regarding you again seeming to think you (might) know what's going on inside my head.

Quote

...whenever the frequency of my posting increases so does the frequency of you correcting, contradicting or attacking my posts...

In case you would like to actually know, you could start that other thread as STL so gently requested, and ask me for clarification. In which case, I would simply add that it is my understanding that it is NOT contrary to GSC rules to DISAGREE with points you make, positions you take, claims you state. If YOU feel attacked, that's something YOU might do or feel, not something I do to you.

1 hour ago, Nathan_Jr said:

It’s something to pay attention to. Why this need to belong? Maybe it’s not a problem, but how can we know unless we inquire? How can we see what we are doing unless we look?

The older I get, the more comfortable and secure I am with myself, the less I feel a need to belong to any group in order to feel comfortable and secure. 

1) Because humans are inherently social animals.

2) The older you and I get, we are indeed more comfortable and secure in our own skins. Is that because we have FOUND our "tribe?" Those with whom we most relate and from whom we receive/give the most mutual support? I think, maybe.

Also, I read something a few days about about the prevalence of organisms, from individual cells to individuals, to colonies, to populations functioning more naturally together, than independently. If I can find that piece, I'll share it here. 

And I certainly DO agree it's something important to pay attention to.

8 minutes ago, Nathan_Jr said:

“Above all, stand.”

”Commitment”

”Just beleeeve it.”

”Rely NOT on your own understanding.”

And WHY do we buy those demands? It's certainly NOT logic.

Could it be the human condition of needing/wanting to belong to a group with whom we FEEL comfortable, sharing beleeefs in common?

1 hour ago, chockfull said:

Because it would be a real response that could have personal insight in the subject matter.  The more authentic you are the more you are believable.  

Why I would care is that as an introvert I desire real connection and fake or inauthentic connection is irritating to me.

Why would you believe you have a right to demand or expect obedience or compliance or anything else from anyone?

As I understand it, that's not how life works.

Whether or not I am authentic is not something, from my perspective, that's at all dependent on whether I ever meet your expectations.

In case you MIGHT be interested, here's a gentle reminder of something someone important to me shared recently on FB. If you're not interested, by all means, disregard it.

"When someone is at war with themselves, it will be very hard for them to be peaceful with you. Remember that." 

If you want "real connection" with me, you've been going about it all wrong.

As far as what I want, from you or anyone else, is to honor emotional boundaries. I can't expect if from you by demanding it of you. I am NOT trying to woo or control or influence or manipulate you for ANY kind of relationship.

As I DID say to you recently, you and I have NO relationship of any kind that would cause me to want to manipulate you for any reason. My wholeness (emotional or otherwise) is in no way dependent on you or anyone else, either here or IRL.

1 hour ago, Nathan_Jr said:

Fair, but I'm not sure this is an argument against my claim.

Indeed, most humans can't see the influence of cultural hegemony on their lives. Cultural hegemony requires duped beleeevers and the willfully ignorant for the influence to be effective.

Ideologues and their ideologies are problematic, whether religious or political or social. And verbiage is the Soma captivating the masses and lulling them into submission. We are as easily impressed by the quacks on the pulpits as by the "life coaches" on Instagram.

I think we have to suffer through this before seeing it clearly, unfortunately. But once seen, it can't be unseen, then we might see it everywhere.

The only thing I challenge(d) was that willfully ignorant people were the only ones who couldn't/wouldn't recognize it.

Those who are blissfully ignorant (by default) usually can't see it either. Perhaps that's why pictures of crowds of Germans saluting their fuhrer and only one person declining to do so is so stark.

Human nature is human nature. Having to suffer before people begin to recognize the absurdity is part of human nature, perhaps unfortunately. 

Gramsci argued that consent to the rule of the dominant group is achieved by the spread of ideologies—beliefs, assumptions, and values—through social institutions such as schools, churches, courts, and the media, among others. These institutions do the work of socializing people into the norms, values, and beliefs of the dominant social group. As such, the group that controls these institutions controls the rest of society.

Cultural hegemony is most strongly manifested when those ruled by the dominant group come to believe that the economic and social conditions of their society are natural and inevitable, rather than created by people with a vested interest in particular social, economic, and political orders. [...]

In his essay “The Intellectuals,” written between 1929 and 1935, Gramsci described the power of ideology to reproduce the social structure through institutions such as religion and education. He argued that society's intellectuals, often viewed as detached observers of social life, are actually embedded in a privileged social class and enjoy great prestige. As such, they function as the “deputies” of the ruling class, teaching and encouraging people to follow the norms and rules established by the ruling class.

50 minutes ago, Nathan_Jr said:

Logical fallacies, errors and stupidity are embarrassingly apparent everywhere. They literally leap off every page. Only the willfully ignorant and the duped intent on beleeeving them into accuracy can't see them.

I disagree with your claim as to who can't, won't or doesn't see them. It's a matter of cultural hegemony. Most Americans, IMO, CANNOT even see the problem because of the cultural hegemony of Christian thought in our society/culture.

Unfortunately, countering cultural hegemony takes much more than pointing it out. It takes. IMO, significantly pervasive artistic expression. 

Cultural hegemony refers to domination or rule maintained through ideological or cultural means. It is usually achieved through social institutions, which allow those in power to strongly influence the values, norms, ideas, expectations, worldview, and behavior of the rest of society.

Cultural hegemony functions by framing the worldview of the ruling class, and the social and economic structures that embody it, as just, legitimate, and designed for the benefit of all, even though these structures may only benefit the ruling class. This kind of power is distinct from rule by force, as in a military dictatorship, because it allows the ruling class to exercise authority using the "peaceful" means of ideology and culture.

3 hours ago, chockfull said:

...doubling down on his material has to be the most illogical choice of all the possible choices available.

How true. Unfortunately, logic is pretty much not associated at all with cult decision making anywhere.

3 hours ago, chockfull said:

So after rereading some of all this your post here comes off like this is your personal story that was published in a paper.  It took reading through a couple times to determine that is not the case.

Your personal backstory which people can find on this site is you went through a contentious divorce heavily negatively influenced by the Way and relations to your one child were strained but now are healed over.

Did you have any detail to comment on this topic from your personal story?  

 

Why would I? Why would you care?

I realize this is but I ask Stayed Too Long's indulgence.

More than a decade ago, I faced a hurricane of a storm in my life. My GSC posts at that time reflected the storm I was then immersed in.

I came out of the storm not the same person. I'm thankful for having gone through the storm and survived and grown as a person. 

18 minutes ago, Stayed Too Long said:

Religious children are meaner than their secular counterparts, study finds

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/nov/06/religious-children-less-altruistic-secular-kids-study

The study found religious children, especially older ones, are meaner than their seculure counterparts.
 

 

That's sad, but I don't doubt the veracity of the study.

Another excerpt from the WaPo article some of you may find this interesting:

Religion offers ready-made answers to our most difficult questions. It gives people ways to mark time, celebrate and mourn. Once I vowed not to teach my children anything I did not personally believe, I had to come up with new answers. But I discovered as I went what most parents discover: You can figure it out as you go.

Establishing a habit of honesty did not sap the delight from my children’s lives or destroy their moral compass. I suspect it made my family closer than we would have been had my husband and I pretended to our children that we believed in things we did not. We sowed honesty and reaped trust — along with intellectual challenge, emotional sustenance and joy.

Those are all personal rewards. But there are political rewards as well.

My children know how to distinguish fact from fiction — which is harder for children raised religious. They don’t assume conventional wisdom is true and they do expect arguments to be based on evidence. Which means they have the skills to be engaged, informed and savvy citizens.

We need citizens like that.

Just now, chockfull said:

Oh so you CAN’T explain how your statement fulfills the characteristics of an “I” statement?

Interesting…

I don't wish to continue bickering with you at this time. Are you willing to leave it at that?

5 minutes ago, chockfull said:

This is an “I” statement.  It is totally not about Rocky and Stayed.  Did you know gaslighting and lying are kissing cousins?

https://www.happierhuman.com/gaslighting-vs-lying-wa1/#:~:text=%235.-,Lying is a tactic to hide the truth while gaslighting,the case with compulsive lying.

From Washington Post, today October 3, 2023: (all readers are able to read the rest of this WaPo essay for no charge because I subscribe by clicking the link)

I like to say that my kids made me an atheist. But really what they did was make me honest.

I was raised Jewish — with Sabbath prayers and religious school, a bat mitzvah and a Jewish wedding. But I don’t remember ever truly believing that God was out there listening to me sing songs of praise.

I thought of God as a human invention: a character, a concept, a carry-over from an ancient time.

I thought of him as a fiction.

Today I realize that means I’m an atheist. It’s not complicated. My (non)belief derives naturally from a few basic observations:

1. The Greek myths are obviously stories. The Norse myths are obviously stories. L. Ron Hubbard obviously made that stuff up. Extrapolate.
2. The holy books underpinning some of the bigger theistic religions are riddled with “facts” now disproved by science and “morality” now disavowed by modern adherents. Extrapolate.
3. Life is confusing and death is scary. Naturally, humans want to believe that someone capable is in charge and that we continue to live after we die. But wanting doesn’t make it so.
4. Child rape. War. Etc.

And yet, when I was younger, I would never have called myself an atheist — not on a survey, not to my family, not even to myself.

2 minutes ago, chockfull said:

Cool.  Can you clarify how your post about definition #1 is really an “I” statement?  I didn’t read much “I” in it.  It was mostly about what you were not saying about me.  Plus the gaslighting def #1.  The only thing I felt was representative of the post you linked to about the “I” statement was you saying it was an “I” statement.  The content was not congruent to me.

It's NOT about YOU. That's all I'm going to explain about it at this time.

Not everything you (might) take personally is actually about you.

24 minutes ago, chockfull said:

I don’t know what is going on inside your head.  Just what you post.

Please remember that. It's actually what I statements are ALL about.

56 minutes ago, chockfull said:

Rocky your apology was for contradicting me which 100% of the audience knows that wasn’t what I called you out on.  And in the same post as your “apology” you called out my mental health in question.  So you and your apology can ride out on the same horse.

Respectfully, on this thread, I don't find anywhere that I apologized to you for anything. I suppose you disagree with that. If so, please point it out, specifically.

Thank you.

I wish you nothing but health and happiness, all your days. (this is NOT related to anything I may have said that you believe contradicts what I said herein).

What causes me to scratch my head is that your words seem to be saying (what you believe) is going on inside my head. Please clarify how you may have come to search out and determine what's going on between my ears. Thank you.

40 minutes ago, chockfull said:

Rocky your apology was for contradicting me which 100% of the audience knows that wasn’t what I called you out on.  And in the same post as your “apology” you called out my mental health in question.  

I have no insight about any aspect of your health, mental or otherwise.

I disagreed with you. I did not make any statement, implicit or explicit about you.

Not only did I refrain from making any assessment of any aspect of your life or health, I also did not make any statement about what you may or may not remember about anything. Further, I did not direct you to do or refrain from doing anything whatsoever.

I wish you only health and happiness.