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cait
Have no doubt - Cherry is as much a victim as anyone else who has chosen to submit their lives to Dave's control

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zeuszor
This is logically contradictory. How could anybody be the victim of David McKay, if they CHOOSE to stay with him?

Zeuszor has solved the problem. There are no victims. There is no longer a need for this forum.

[blog.vici.ro]

Dave McKay and his wife, Cherry, are co-founders of a string
of religious communities located in Kenya, England,
Australia, and the United States. He is the author of a novel
“Survivors” which has recently sold one million copies.

OK. Here we go again.

FYI--People appear to be physically free in cults, but are nevertheless most often held captive psychologically and emotionally through thought reform/coercive persuasion techniques.

These are the basic building blocks of cults and the control they exert over members.

Psychiatrist Robert Jay Lifton defines cults simply.

See [www.culteducation.com]

Certain psychological themes which recur in these various historical contexts also arise in the study of cults. Cults can be identified by three characteristics:

1. a charismatic leader who increasingly becomes an object of worship as the general principles that may have originally sustained the group lose their power;
2. a process I call coercive persuasion or thought reform;
3. economic, sexual, and other exploitation of group members by the leader and the ruling coterie.

Lifton defines thought reform.

See [www.culteducation.com]

A discussion of what is most central in the thought reform environment can lead us to a more general consideration of the psychology of human zealotry. For in identifying, on the basis of this study of thought reform, features common to all expressions of ideological totalism, I wish to suggest a set of criteria against which any environment may be judged - a basis for answering the ever-recurring question: "Isn't this just like 'brainwashing'?"

These criteria consist of eight psychological themes which are predominant within the social field of the thought reform milieu. Each has a totalistic quality; each depend upon an equally absolute philosophical assumption; and each mobilizes certain individual emotional tendencies, mostly of a polarizing nature. In combination they create an atmosphere which may temporarily energize or exhilarate, but which at the same time poses the gravest of human threats.

1. Milieu Control
2. Mystical Manipulation
3. The Demand for Purity
4. The Cult of Confession
5. The "Sacred Science"
6. Loading the Language
7. Doctrine Over Person
8. The Dispensing of Existence

Another detailed explanation of coercive persuasion techniques is offered by a sociologist Richard Ofshe who expands on the themes developed by Lifton.

See [www.culteducation.com]

Coercive persuasion and thought reform are alternate names for programs of social influence capable of producing substantial behavior and attitude change through the use of coercive tactics, persuasion, and/or interpersonal and group-based influence manipulations (Schein 1961; Lifton 1961). Such programs have also been labeled "brainwashing" (Hunter 1951), a term more often used in the media than in scientific literature. However identified, these programs are distinguishable from other elaborate attempts to influence behavior and attitudes, to socialize, and to accomplish social control. Their distinguishing features are their totalistic qualities (Lifton 1961), the types of influence procedures they employ, and the organization of these procedures into three distinctive subphases of the overall process (Schein 1961; Ofshe and Singer 1986). The key factors that distinguish coercive persuasion from other training and socialization schemes are:

1. The reliance on intense interpersonal and psychological attack to destabilize an individual's sense of self to promote compliance

2. The use of an organized peer group

3. Applying interpersonal pressure to promote conformity

4. The manipulation of the totality of the person's social environment to stabilize behavior once modified

Thought-reform programs have been employed in attempts to control and indoctrinate individuals, societal groups (e.g., intellectuals), and even entire populations. Systems intended to accomplish these goals can vary considerably in their construction. Even the first systems studied under the label "thought reform" ranged from those in which confinement and physical assault were employed (Schein 1956; Lifton 1954; Lifton 1961 pp. 19-85) to applications that were carried out under nonconfined conditions, in which nonphysical coercion substituted for assault (Lifton 1961, pp. 242-273; Schein 1961, pp. 290-298). The individuals to whom these influence programs were applied were in some cases unwilling subjects (prisoner populations) and in other cases volunteers who sought to participate in what they believed might be a career-beneficial, educational experience (Lifton 1981, p. 248).

Psychologist Margaret Singer makes distinctions between various forms of persuasion including education, advertising, propaganda, indoctrination and thought reform.

See [www.culteducation.com]

Sociologist Janja Lalich calls the type of choice made by cult members a "bounded choice."

See [www.amazon.com]

It is important when discussing cults and the victims of cults to have an understanding of these issues.

There is a recovery section also included at this Web site.

See [www.culteducation.com]

The articles linked can be helpful in sorting through issues after leaving a cult.

Survivors that have left McKay's group and other groups called "cults" deserve our sympathy if not empathy from those that have endured similar circumstances.

Lets try to keep all this in mind when posting here.

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aghast

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cait
Have no doubt - Cherry is as much a victim as anyone else who has chosen to submit their lives to Dave's control

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zeuszor
This is logically contradictory. How could anybody be the victim of David McKay, if they CHOOSE to stay with him?

Zeuszor has solved the problem. There are no victims. There is no longer a need for this forum.

That's not what I wrote. Of course there are victims. DM has victimized many people over the years. People like DM deny those they prey upon the luxury of informed consent when attempting to recruit and retain members of thier groups. It's also true that nobody can be trapped in a cult (that's basically what a cult is: a situational trap, or series of situational traps) without some degree of their own complicity. What I wrote is that it is a logical contradiction to state that somebody is the victim of another person who they CHOSE to be involved with. "...a victim as anyone else who has chosen to submit their lives to Dave's control." To me, this sentence makes no sense and is self-contradictory. But that's just me.

Again, in expressing these things I am looking neither for revenge nor am I trying to be cruel. I am trying to help inform people so that they can make a choice which is based on facts. People like DM deny others the right to make a free choice through a process of information control and obscurantism.

[forum.culteducation.com]

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Oerlikon
What follows is a pertinent extract (pp. 20-21) from a book entitled Bounded Choice: True Believers and Charismatic Cults, by Janja Lalich. I recommend Bounded Choice for anyone seriously interested in understanding the psychological dynamics of the cult phenomenon.

[books.google.com]

Individuals in a cult context are constrained not only by a bounded reality-one product of the self-sealing system-but also by bounded choice. This occurs when the individual reaches what Lifton described as a state of personal closure. ("Closure" in this sense does not mean completion, as it is sometimes used, but a turning inward and refusal to look at other ideas, belifs, or options.) I suggest that a state of person closure should be considered the individualized version of the larger self-sealing system. Thus, as a person identifies and unites with the bounded reality of the group and its belief system, becoming a devotee by making that charismatic commitment to the self-sealing worldview, another process begins to take place. That is, individual perspective and personal decision making become limited and constrained, and that restritction comes as much from within as from without. In the context of closure and constraint, choices may exist, but they are severely limited. In such situations, the person can be described as being in a state of bounded choice.
From:

[www.icsahome.com]

The interaction between the individual and the charismatic system is the key to understanding bounded choice theory. The believer responds to the intellectual and emotional pull of the group with commitment that is renewed through ongoing interaction, and in the process develops a new self. The leader’s vision of the path to salvation has transformational power.

Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 05/24/2010 06:45AM by zeuszor.

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zeuszor
That's not what I wrote. Of course there are victims. DM has victimized many people over the years. People like DM deny those they prey upon the luxury of informed consent when attempting to recruit and retain members of thier groups. It's also true that nobody can be trapped in a cult (that's basically what a cult is: a situational trap, or series of situational traps) without some degree of their own complicity. What I wrote is that it is a logical contradiction to state that somebody is the victim of another person who they CHOSE to be involved with. "...a victim as anyone else who has chosen to submit their lives to Dave's control." To me, this sentence makes no sense and is self-contradictory. But that's just me.

To puit a finer point on it: what I mean here is that it is a logical contradiction to state that somebody is the victim of another person who they CHOSE to be involved with, provided that they understand the true nature of the person that they choose to associate with. If I go up to a rattlesnake that I find in the street and try and play with it, and the snake then bites me and I suffer injury, then I am not the victim of a snake, I am the victim of my own bad decision. The snake was only acting according to its nature. So I say that she knows exactly what she is doing, same as DM, and is every bit as sick and evil as he. Not to mention, just as accountable.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/24/2010 07:09AM by zeuszor.

Oh oh, .............back to "Cult 101."

Cults don't present as rattlesnakes. They present as Warm Fuzzies. They "love-bomb".

Cultic relationships don't begin as a matter of choice. By the time the situation is clear to the victim, it is too late. The power is totally in the perp's hands. That is why women will even sacrifice their children if the relationship demands it.

There seems to be some dissonance in trying to understand Cultic activity in terms of a Texas Showdown with a rattlesnake. It ain't like that....

When I myself first met the JCs, there were no warm fuzzies. They did not love bomb me. They gave me the cold pricklies. A fellow named James (husband of Ufuoma, both of whom are out now) told me on the street that my very salvation depended on joining the group. They quoted a bunch of Scriptures to me (Luke 14:26-33, James 1:23, Ephesians 2:9-10, and others) and made me feel like I had to "forsake all" RIGHT NOW or else risk losing this "window of opportunity" to enter the Kingdom. Then I went for a trial week and preliminary "Bible study" and Fran read something called "No More Mister Nice Guy."

People that are controlled in cults don't typically choose to be so involved.

It's a gradual process that largely depends upon a slow gradual process of deception.

Lifton, Ofshe and Singer explain this succinctly.

To think otherwise can easily be seen as "victim bashing."

And victim bashing is not what this message board is about.

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rrmoderator
People that are controlled in cults don't typically choose to be so involved.

It's a gradual process that largely depends upon a slow gradual process of deception.

Lifton, Ofshe and Singer explain this succinctly.

To think otherwise can easily be seen as "victim bashing."

And victim bashing is not what this message board is about.

No one is victim bashing here. And I could tell right away upon meeting the JCs in person that I had just walked into a group of people who were very much being tightly controlled. Go back and read some of my older posts in which I describe my first impressions of them. I could tell that something was very wrong with that picture, right away. I was not love-bombed by them. They tried to manipulate my guilt and fear.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 05/24/2010 10:16AM by zeuszor.

Dear Moderator,

I appreciate the referenced notes to Lifton and the other useful sources of reference.....


....the distinction between "victim" and "perpetrator" becomes difficult to make where an individual remains within a cult. Surely one might then just as cogently argue that David McKay, Chris Butler et al....are ultimately just victims of themsleves....I'm somehow though, not in a rush to seek to "comfort" either or any of them...

In relation to Cherry, I am reminded of Principle IV of the Nuremburg Trials,

[en.wikipedia.org]


Principle IV

Principle IV states: "The fact that a person acted pursuant to order of his Government or of a superior does not relieve him from responsibility under international law, provided a moral choice was in fact possible to him".

This principle could be paraphrased as follows: "It is not an acceptable excuse to say 'I was just following my superior's orders'".

Previous to the time of the Nuremberg Trials, this excuse was known in common parlance as "Superior Orders". After the prominent, high profile event of the Nuremberg Trials, that excuse is now referred to by many as "Nuremberg Defense". In recent times, a third term, "Lawful orders" has become common parlance for some people. All three terms are in use today, and they all have slightly different nuances of meaning, depending on the context in which they are used.

Nuremberg Principle IV is legally supported by the jurisprudence found in certain articles in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which deal indirectly with conscientious objection. It is also supported by the principles found in paragraph 171 of the Handbook on Procedures and Criteria for Determining Refugee Status which was issued by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Those principles deal with the conditions under which conscientious objectors can apply for refugee status in another country if they face persecution in their own country for refusing to participate in an illegal war.

Where it would thus seem to me, grossly inadequate for Cherry McKay to claim that she was simply a "dutiful wife", obeying "God" in accord with the scriptural command for wives to "obey" their husbands (an idea that I suspect she has frequently tried to reassure herself with....)

Say for example, in relation to the psychotic campaign to defame David Lowe (McKay of course feeling that's he's back in control if he can successfully "out" his enemies....even if completely inaccurately).....or in relation to knowledge of the internal accounts of the JC's (Has Ash for example, ever received a cent from the "cost reimbursements" that accompanied his kidney donation.....or did it all indeed just end up in "consolidated revenue" in accounts that either David or his appointed cronies, directly control....?) ...or Vicki and her children (amongst dozens and dozens of others) having been booted out, without a cent in recompense, for the years of unpaid service they put in to the cult, once they "outlived" their usefullness (by daring to question David's directions?)

I acknowledge the professional comments you have referred us to in respect of Janja Lilich and the "bounded choice" facing members in cults....

You will of course recall though the Nuremburg defence being employed not only by the Nazis, but continues to be called upon, say in the more recent trials of the Argentian soldiers responsible for drugging dissidents and then forcing them out of aircraft over shark-infested waters to fall to their deaths....while different in degree, I think that the prinicple would hold, that Cherry has clearly "benefitted" from an association where she has been part of a confidence racket that has defrauded others(i.e. David McKay's religious empire)...

Here, I acknowledge that having had the experience of living under her thumb, I personally loathe the woman and would love to see her suffer decades more under David's (mis)direction...

My loathing of her though would not to me, seem to suffice to invalidate the observations I may have made here....