My husband is attending Landmark Forum this weekend. It was suggested to him as a tool to help his biz be more succesful. He called me and asked me to go to Tuesday night with him and wants to enroll our kid in the child program. He keeps telling me how emotional the experience has been. I decided to google Landmark Forum after he asked me to go and I found all this info on it being a cult. How worried should I be? I really don't want to go to Tuesday with him after reading all of this.

I am waiting for tomorrow night so I can get a feel of how he is acting after going to this seminar for a whole weekend. I will definately be looking for changes in his behavior. Can anyone give me some ideas of things to watch for as tell-tale signs he's been brainwashed by these guys?

I feel a bit impatient and hungry so I will give just give a terse reply...

if he acts like a stranger, loses his capacity to reason, insists you must go do Landmark and/or that he must go to further courses. if he creeps you out.

and trust your instincts.

If he speaks using words in novel and peculiar ways.

"Being in integrity'

"Taking a stand"

"Racket/s or Running a racket"

“rackets,”

“incompletions”

These are endowed with a meaning special to Landmark and different from coventional dictionary definitions--which sets LEC people apart from the rest of the community.

(See discussion of Integrity below)


Keep in mind that your husband may be high, and that experience feels quite wonderful for him. During that high period, he will have been given lots of encouragement to recruit others. And he will feel a passionate loyalty to those he shared the group high with.

Very different from the sobriety of traditional marriage vows "For richer or for poorer, for better or for worse, in sickness and in health, till death do us part." Those lines speak of a commitment that was not based on fluctuating moods.

Back to Landmark speak.

"Taking a stand' comes up a lot in conversations with persons who have been through Landmark.

Integrity is a word that is heavily re-purposed within LEC. Being 'in integrity' is an example. LEC jargon takes words that have conventional usage, then turns them around often, breaking grammatical rules to do so.

Integrity

Being 'in integrity'

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Integrity is a noun.

It has a range of definitions. adherance to steadfast moral or ethical principles.

Coherance, strength, structural integrity.

Usually we speak of someone possessing or having integrity

Have is a verb, usually transitive, with ‘integrity’ as its object.

To refer to someone as being ‘in integrity’ disrupts usage and it’s a thought stopper. “In’ is a proposition, referring to one’s position within some location or bounded space or defined set of limits.

To be “ in integrity” (what a bloody awkward useage!!) an object or system must have no missing parts and no extraneous or unnecessary parts

“integrity for a person is a matter of a person’s word.”

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Roth subjects one woman to “public humiliation” before hundreds of participants and calls her an “asshole.” After being berated by the Landmark leader for about an hour she breaks down in tears while he insults and mocks her.

In this segment the audience is also introduced to some of Landmark’s jargon, comprised of thought-terminating cliches such as “racket” and ”inauthentic.”

Terms Roth routinely uses to dismiss anyone** that asks him questions that he doesn’t really want to answer.

In the second segment a lawyer and “brainwashing expert” explains that Landmark “breaks a person” and he labels its methods ”totalitarian.”

On balance an interview is included with Landmark’s designated spokesperson, Sophie McLean, flown in from New York.

For entire article again, read here

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**(Corboy: This is what makes LEC uneducational, contrary to its name. It meets the features of being indoctrinational--but produces a group high that is powerful and then linked in with feeling loyalty, while forgetting the many put downs "asshole" one submitted to or witnessed others submit to.)

If you go with your husband to the graduation expect to be urged to support his Landmark commitment.

Thin end of the wedge.

Visitors report.

[www.culteducation.com]

@Dontknowwhattothink - Your husband has indeed been through a very powerful emotional weekend. That is how landmark hooks people. They basically take you on an emotional trip, through huge highs and lows, in which you bond with both the person 'leading' and the other participants in a strange way because people are encouraged to discuss extremely personal and intimate details of their lives in a way that one would never do with strangers in any other type of setting. Landmark is adept at creating a pseudo intimacy, which is what happens when people sit together in one space with no windows for days at a time.

Your husband is currently on an emotional high. Landmark works by bringing people down (telling them their lives don't work, they are no good, they are 'inauthentic', they run 'rackets', they are jerks, they are assholes and all sorts) and then taking them 'up' and releasing them into the world on this high. He probably feels great, invincible, compelled to bring people to the forum, believing that (as landmark says) that his life won't work unless he 'shares' his 'transformation' with his loved ones, and gets them to 'get it' like he has got it.

Bear in mind also that landmark positions itself as if it is talking about the truth, rather than just their cobbled together version of various theories (transactional analysis, Zen, bit of Scientology etc), and they present all of the ideas to the participants as if they are scientifically studied and objective facts. They tell people that landmark works on 'what you don't know what you don't know' and that they reveal 'blind spots' to you that you didn't know about before. SO, at this point, your husband most likely thinks that YOU don't know what you don't know, that you don't yet realize what your blind spots are and that these blind spots are holding you back and you will only see them if you do landmark - as he himself has done.

Landmark creates a new filter for people - so he will start hearing what you say as your 'rackets' and your 'strong suits' and your 'already always listening' and your 'story'. Landmark tells the participants that they are now 'transformed' and everyone else isn't. They need to now go and spread this 'transformation'. Beware of this because this is where things can start to fall apart in relationships. He is most probably now listening to you through the landmark filter.

I would suggest, if you haven't already done so, that you sit and ask him about the weekend. Ask him how it went, what he learned, what he discovered and so on. In detail. Just listen to all of it. Let him get it out of his system to you. What happens with landmark is that because people are taught so much jargon and their normal language is redefined to fit landmark's definitions, it is hard for them to talk to people who haven't done the forum because those people will literally not understand what they are talking about. So, they are then compelled to go back to landmark people to discuss their experiences and feelings because it now seems as though landmark people are the only ones who understand them (which they are, since they are all now using this new language, with new definitions etc).

I would also recommend asking him questions, in the least threatening way you can.... Ask him what he thinks you'd get out of it? What do they do at the forum exactly? What is so great about it? What is their background etc? this may get him thinking for himself again. He will probably just tell you how great it is and that he can't explain it to you and you must just see for yourself (landmark tells people that doing landmark is like "getting balance" when you ride a bike, and that nobody knows how to explain balance, and similarly landmark is inexplicable).

Just be aware that he may think at this point that you doing landmark will be necessary for your relationship. Landmark often tells people that if your partner doesn't want to do the forum, there must be something wrong with the relationship. So, perhaps also continue to express your commitment to your relationship, how much you love him etc etc. ANDDDDD remind him of your past together, what you've been through, the great times. Landmark basically demonizes the past and doesn't care whether the past was good, it wants people to break ties with their past and create a new future/new possibilities. It tells people that their past was bad and that they have told themselves that they are alone and don't belong and that there's something wrong - so your husband may even have (probably does) a totally different perception of his past than he did when he went in. So in your husband's mind, currently you may be part of that past that was bad, and he needs you to join him in the future, in his new 'possibilities'... It may help for you to remind him of the good stuff that you've already shared/experienced together in your past.

Landmark is truly evil. I'm sorry to say. I hope your husband hasn't got the virus too badly. It may be that he comes down from the landmark high soon - at which point he may crash (what they call a 'breakdown' - it literally is one) and may start looking for the next landmark fix (at which point, the ten free seminar sessions come into play).

The tell tale signs that your husband has been brainwashed are there already - he wants you to do it and he wants your kid to do it. He will probably want to do the advanced course too - that's the next step in brainwashing.

You can't unbrainwash him - but I recommend trying to keep him as rooted in what you had before landmark as possible, emphasizing how great things were and even showing him photos etc if necessary. landmark subverts normal memory, replacing it with their own memories. Alternatively, you might just have to hang on in there and hope for the best. Good luck.

There might be another phrase 'already always listening'

[www.google.com]

Its the sort of sentence that induces confusion. It contains two adverbs, one right after the other, and is non grammatical.

Winning Formula may be another.

[www.google.com]

[www.google.com]

Add these two to the list mentioned above

"Being in integrity'

"Taking a stand"

"Racket/s or Running a racket"

“rackets,”

“incompletions”

b]If Going to Landmark Introduction, Take Your Own Taxicab or Car--by Yourself[/b]

If they want you to go to the intro as part of a company event, be very, very careful. They may require you all to go by van or bus. If you are required by your company to go to one of these introductions, use the time to contact your employee union and the state or federal agency that governs workers rights---being processed by an LGAT should NOT be a condition of keeping your job. (See the citations for Cafe Gratitude

This is not a time to cave in to assertions that you need to be nice to the planet and save fuel--and dont accept any last minute plea that you car pool someone else to the event, either.

If a newly graduated friend or family member urges you to attend a Landmark (or other Large Group Training) 'graduation' or 'introduction evening', keep total control of your own transporation so that you can get up and LEAVE at any time. Make sure you are not obligated to transport your friend or anyone else. At the very least, be prepared to leave by yourself, by taxi if need be.

If someone has you don a name tag on you, they do not own you. You remain a citizen with freedom to come and go as you please, and have NOT been arrested or become a jail detainee.

Quoted from a visitor report. This was from 2000 and is one persons description of how a friend of hers did LEC and the kind of language she used.


[www.culteducation.com]


This persons description of how her newly graduated friend set her up. This was in 2000. Procedures may have changed.

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After meeting her out front at the Forum building, where I was told to show up at a certain time*--she took me inside into a large room with about 150 people. But then* my friend told me that I could not stay there with her and had to go with one of the attendants.

**(Corboy note how well this was coordinated. First our informant is led by her friend to point A and then told by the 'friend' that she could nto stay at Point A with her, and then passed her to one of the attendants.)

When I asked her when and where the graduation was, she just coyly smiled and said that that she had a surprise for me*; I was actually going to attend a mini class. I would need to be patient and trust her and everything would be explained soon.

Before I left with the attendant she firmly insisted that I should not leave the building until she picked me up in a couple of hours.

*Corboy. Look closely. Our informant is told she is going to attend, not her friends graduation but a 'mini class', and on top of it, is informed that she 'should not leave the building until she picked me up in 'a couple of hours'. Metaphorically speaking, our newly graduated 'friend' had tied our reporter up like a Thanksgiving turkey just before its placed in the oven to bake. A 'couple of hours' is a very long time in this context. A

I was then ushered out of the large room, into a much smaller room, which was occupied by two other people who looked as bewildered as I did.

*(Note that our informant is not the only person feeling bewildered. Ingredients for bewilderment: expectations confounded by landing in a mini class, rather than attending a celebration event for a friend--and suddenly put in the hands of strangers. And being told one will be in this mini class for a couple of hours. Plus being instructed by the 'friend' who has abandoned you that you must not leave the premises until you he or she returns.)

Behind us, right outside the door was a white clothed table surrounded by an absurdly happy looking staff. After the attendant departed I was promptly given a nametag, and asked to fill out forms, which included such information as my work and home addresses and telephone numbers.

[i]**(Corboy. This seems well organized, not spontaneous. Note the bit about being escorted from a larger room into a much smaller room. If you have just a few people, being in a very large room can feel uncomfortable. One feels as though one is rattling around. But in smaller space, that same number of people feel more close, more 'snug' and it is easier to create a feeling of rapport. Note the check in process and that now the subjects have been passed through the hands of a couple of strangers.)[/[/i]i]

Fortunately, even though I still did not know what was going on, I had enough sense to fill out this paperwork with false information.

@corboy - Yes, "already always listening" is a core landmark concept. They assert that everyone listens through a filter from the past (what they call 'your already always listening' - what in layman's terms could be one's internal dialogue - and which landmark seeks to destroy/destabilize) and assert that people dont' really hear what is said, but what they themselves are saying about what is said (ignoring the fact of course that some people are much better listeners than others in the real world). They encourage people to 'turn off' and ignore this internal dialogue. In fact, in either the forum or the advanced course, they actually get you to say "I don't listen, I never have, I never will, not even now".

"Winning formula" seems to be used in some forums and not in others. I had it used in one experimental forum (yes, I was an unfortunate guinea pig). It is similar to what they call a "strong suit" - ie the 3 things they say people use to succeed in life, but which also cause them to fail (a contradiction in terms there) and which they claim make up one's 'identity' (how reductive to believe that someone's personality is made up of only 3 facets). They also seek to destroy this 'strong suit' - ie your personality and sense of self.

Your description of what happened when the person was taken into a separate room from their friend is exactly what happened to me. Landmark does not do this anymore though. They got hip to the fact that it scared people - now everyone stays in the room together (which has been found to increase the number of people who sign up).

One thing @dontknowwhattothink needs to know is that landmark puts people into a trance state and uses hypnosis in a number of exercises and implants suggestions in them. Most people are totally unaware that this is what happening to them.

Know your rights and know that you can say no to them, walk away, do whatever you want.

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Your description of what happened when the person was taken into a separate room from their friend is exactly what happened to me.

This was not my description. It was taken from a visitor report dated 2000 entitled "Hard Sales Pitch"

[www.culteducation.com]

This 'already always listening' isnt just a concept. It violates rules of grammar.

Stuff like that induces confusion.