"In fact sometimes the greatest evil happens when we project the evil we cannot accept in ourselves onto another in a belief of righteousness. Their evil is not the same as our own, so our ego makes us feel justified in attacking it." - Blackhat.

I want to go back to what I said about fighting evil when we see it. It can take two forms. One is that it is a moral obligation based on a collection of principles we adhere to. For example, we might fight a law which discriminates, or a refugee policy which contravenes human rights. Or we might volunteer for an emergency relief operation. Or we might spend some time bringing a cult under the microscope in order to alert any prospective converts about what they are getting themselves into.

But when we start to see unbridled evil in another, and we attribute every word they say as being against some concept of Righteousness, then I believe we are in the power of what Jung called The Shadow. I believe David is in this loop, especially when he takes everything posted here as against God and Jesus, and Zeuszor also in a converse way. Apostate is right when he likens it to the fundamentalist extremists. When Jung wrote about this, he had the Nazi's persecution of the Jews as his current example.

The theory of The Shadow is as pertinent today as it was when Jung wrote it, and I would love any other posters who are familiar with it to give me their thoughts on this.

Just on a totally different topic, here's the latest viral video of Tom Cruise speaking about Scientology. It's banned mostly, so see it while you can!

[gawker.com]

www.theneighborsson.com

This is quite a substantial testimony. I am in awe of her courage and hard work. I can't imagine why David would so vehemently disparage her. This is all quite interesting, given my recent reference to the Nazis.

The evidence shows that she has much higher credentials than a guy who failed as a newsreporter and left an infamous cult to create another one based on his old teacher's writings!

Reading more, I guess she made a mistake in giving a confidence to Brian. Error of judgment on her part. When you walk with lions, hyenas are all around........

Blackhat, I would never accuse Reinhard of a crime I have no first or second hand knowledge off.

I have stated here before that I like Reinhard. He betrayed me during my LA visit to the JC base, but I have never held that against him realizing that everything the group does and thinks springs from Dave's paranoid brain and evil heart.

Yes, I consider Dave evil.

I consider myself blessed that my family and I don't have to deal with him. We are free of DM and glad it's over. However, we may choose to stick around purely to help others with encouragement who are not so fortunate yet.

I see Reinhard as a sad and struggling human being who has been duped.

Zeuzsor, you may want to take some time off to allow yourself well deserved rest. I'm not mad at you. I know you mean well, but please keep Reinhard's feelings in mind when you make unfounded accusations.

The JCs are far from a healthy environment for children and mothers are right to be bothered on many different levels.

What started as a discussion about two male Jesus Christians arrested after being found in a tent with a runaway schoolboy seems to have gone nuclear. Accusations have been made and legal action threatened.

I thought it would be helpful to clarify what is becoming a confused and heated discussion and with that in mind I found an article from a UK national newspaper, which names the two men arrested as Nigel David and Andrew Eagles:

[news.independent.co.uk]

However, the newspaper subsequently issued a correction and stated that the man arrested with Andrew Eagles was Reinhard Zunnor and not Nigel David:

[findarticles.com]

This set of archived media articles seems to bear this out:

[www.apologeticsindex.org]

One of the most disturbing things in one of the articles at the above link relates to the attempted recruitment of a 12 year old boy. The article states that Bobby Kelly phoned the boy and asked him to join the JCs. When the boy said he couldn't because of his age, a JC apparently intervened in the conversation and said "You can be any age".

Does anyone know if this media article is a fair representation of the facts and if so, does anyone know who made the "you can be any age" remark?

Blackhat, I liked your refrences to the Jungian Shadow. I do not know much about it, but definately agree with what you have presented here. If you have ever read the work of Philip Zimbardo on his Stanford Prison experiment you will see that he also became so enmeshed in what he was doing that he became influenced negatively by the experiment also. He became the "prison" supervisor, and began to act as though he had never been a psychiatrist conducting an experiment. He became frustrated and angry at any colleague who may have turned up asking him what his independent variable was in the experiment... or wanted to move all the students to a real prison facility to protect his experiment from being ruined by a rumored break out by other colledge students. Dave is very similar to Zimbardo in this. He has begun something and now he himself is trapped in it. As a result he is unable to listen to reason. Fortunately for Zimbardo his experiment only lasted a week before having to be shut down. Dave has been in his state of altered reality for much longer. Every time he wins a convert, this state of altered reality is reinforced. I would argue that the driving force behind evangelical type movements is more about maintaining this altered state of reality than it is about "saving" others. As a result they attribute an attack upon "God", or the teachings of Jesus when their reality is challenged. They become threatened at the prospect of having the light of day shine into their thought patterns. It really is a terrifying concept to them that they are wrong and that they are part of a failed experiment. Their are many "test" subjects who can attest to the abuse they experienced upon themselves, or what they did to others as a result of this altered state of reality.

Dave likes to make a hooha song and dance about there being no such thing as "brainwashing". There is plenty of solid evidence to show that we are influenced by the environment we are subjected to, and that we will do things under such environments that we would not do otherwise. To follow the Nazi theme, Germany in WW2 is a prime example, but lets bring it a bit closer to our time period, i.e. Iraq, Australia's inhumane treatment of refugees. In all the song and dance against the word "brainwashing" this important truth IS overlooked. This is what I feel is the more correct definition of a "cult", i.e. existing in an altered state of reality that resists outside influence to a more objective measurable reality. Being humans this is state we will never fully escape, but the least we can do is minimise the number destructive bubbles we can allow ourselves to full into. Zimbardo's suggestion on how to avoid the influence of "evil" is quite relevant and valid. It is a testament to how enmeshed Dave is in his life long "experiment" that he cannot see this and that he rubbishes it in front of his fellow "inmates".

Apostate,

Thanks for the tip on the Zimbardo experiment. I've just had a look at the slideshow presentation:

[www.prisonexp.org]

(in Windows environment, use F11 to maximise the screen)

This particular episode regarding Prisoner #819 was very relevant:

"While talking to us, he broke down and began to cry hysterically....... I took the chain off his foot, the cap off his head, and told him to go and rest in a room that was adjacent to the prison yard. I said that I would get him some food and then take him to see a doctor.
While I was doing this, one of the guards lined up the other prisoners and had them chant aloud: "Prisoner #819 is a bad prisoner. Because of what Prisoner #819 did, my cell is a mess, Mr. Correctional Officer." They shouted this statement in unison a dozen times.
As soon as I realized that #819 could hear the chanting, I raced back to the room where I had left him, and what I found was a boy sobbing uncontrollably while in the background his fellow prisoners were yelling that he was a bad prisoner. No longer was the chanting disorganized and full of fun, as it had been on the first day. Now it was marked by utter confomity and compliance, as if a single voice was saying, "#819 is bad."
I suggested we leave, but he refused. Through his tears, he said he could not leave because the others had labeled him a bad prisoner. Even though he was feeling sick, he wanted to go back and prove he was not a bad prisoner.

Chillingly relevant. Recommended viewing.

A very long rant about my last post has appeared on the Jesus Christians website.

Curiously enough, it didn't address the one question I actually asked, namely, which JC said in relation to the potential recruitment of a 12 year old boy "you can be any age"?

Quote
Blackhat
Even though he was feeling sick, he wanted to go back and prove he was not a bad prisoner.

A desire for acceptance is a powerful force which appears to drive people to put up with all kinds of abuse. Ross has been tossed out of the community quite a few times now, and it seems he has taken on a crunchier persona in order to "prove" his is not a "bad" or somehow "disabled" leader in Dave's and the rest of the JC's eyes. Dave used to refer to people who were not good at assertion as somehow disabled, relegating them to permanent "follower" status. In his "leaders" meetings he would generate discussions behind the backs of the followers on how best to deal with them. If you have met Ross, you will know that he is basically a fairly gentle person so it goes quite against his grain to have to present in such a manner as he is recently on their forum.