Looking for the good from bad events is a good quality to have, but it must be used judiciously. The largest concern I have with people trying to find the good from their cult/cult-like experiences is even though they realize the cult was wrong it is difficult for them to fully accept they made a mistake by participating in it. Thus, they search for something "good" from the whole experience. Unfortunately, that is part of the recruiting tactics. If they can convince you that it's not all bad, even though you say you don't recommend it, you really are recommending it because people reading this will think that maybe it's not all that bad. Maybe they will have a "stronger" will than you. After all landmark inflated the forum to be this grandiose event that you don't want to be left out of. Others will think that they may be able to take the "good" such as you think you did and be able to leave not realizing how tightly they can reign you in.


For years after I left landmark, I would think, "Damn! If this jackass would just take the forum and nothing else, he/she would know just how much of a jackass they are and stop being one." See how the thinking always ended up with others needing to take the forum even though I knew that the only purpose of the forum was to get people involved with landmark so they could take more courses and bring more people. It was actually stated on the leadership training material that the forum was only for bringing more people in to take their other courses. In fact I remember seeing that they had some data stipulating that those who took the advanced course where more likely to stay with landmark and take their other courses. There was nothing they hated more (except the dissenters) than people that constantly re-attended the forum but never took any other courses.

I tried to find the good, but I have to admit that any good I thought I found was just me lying to myself. It was really hard to admit that all that time was wasted, but it really weas. dpa10 probably doesn't mean to be a cult apologist. I know it seems incredibly absolute to say no good came from it, but it took me 9 months of therapy plus years of self-reflection and watching other people to understand why all of landmark is bad.

In the last post Alexis wrote:

"I tried to find the good, but I have to admit that any good I thought I found was just me lying to myself. It was really hard to admit that all that time was wasted, but it really weas. dpa10 probably doesn't mean to be a cult apologist. I know it seems incredibly absolute to say no good came from it, but it took me 9 months of therapy plus years of self-reflection and watching other people to understand why all of landmark is bad."

I understand this is true for you. And for others a diifferent opinion is rendered. Ana323 and dpa10 had overall positive experiences. Mine with Est was positive as well. But I didn't go as deeply into as dpa10, gc4062 or yourself. I was forewarned by my girlfriend to not get involved . It was obvious after a couple of seminars, I think it was called "Be here now" , but it should have been called "Be here now with guests". But so what. I didn't buy into it.

It has come as a revelation that so many people had similar reactions as you did. But don't discount that others took away something entirely different. I gained a great deal from the Est Training and when my "bullshit meter" pegged into the red zone I simply left. It didn't take long for this to happen. I met Werner a few times and that did it.

My mother has contended for years that she was traumatized by the nuns who taught her in high school. I believe her. Yet I went to a Catholic Prep school and had a wonderful experience. No nuns though, just monks!!!

We live in a common reality. If everyone believes that each other's reality was just that person's opinions or imagination, then our society starts to disintegrate. I have read others' replies to posts where the answers were very much like what you wrote to me - that it was true for me. You don't even realize that you just trivialized my experience to just "my story." And as anyone who has been involved with landmark knows, they see your opinions or "stories" as fiction. If people can't trust their own minds to processes reality a majority of the time, then how can they function in society?

It's like saying it's Merriam-Webster's opinion that "coerce" means "to compel to an act or choice." (Only one of the 3 definitions Merriam-Webster gives.) Total disregard is given to how the definition became defined, or how I came to the conclusion I did about landmark.

Other responses I see are to negate post like mine because we are not licensed professionals. Once your trust has been broken, it is hard to know whom to trust. Since LGATs fundamentally change how you evaluate people, I understand the criticism but also know it is not justified. Your response to me only shows how deeply the est training truly lies within you.

I stand behind what I said before. To put it more bluntly - by saying you received "good" from the forum, you are unwitting pawns in their recruiting practices even if you don't recommend that anyone attend their courses. You are conveying a contradiction to people. They are left wondering, "If he/she said he/she got some good from it, then why does he/she tell me not to attend?" All that does is create mystery and excitement for the person pondering whether or not to take landmark's courses. And creating mystery and excitement is one of landmark's recruiting practices. Hence their statements that to the understand the forum you must experience it. They instruct you not to tell potential recruits anything that really happens during the forum, but instead to concentrate on how it supposedly "transformed your life." They purposely instruct you to avoid telling the truth to create mystery.


I also was raised Catholic. And I can say that I have learned that any person can take any doctrine or belief and construe it to feed their own egos. The Catholic Church is not inherently a cult. Neither is Judaism or Muslim or any other religion that teaches people to live good, upstanding, moral lives. But there are sects that pervert their teachings and in essence are not truly following the religion they claim to be.

People make the mistake of thinking that cults, or what it is that makes cults problematic, has something to do with religion. Cults can be about anything. It's not the doctrine or the dogma that distuguishes these groups. It is those tactics of persuasion, indoctrination and control that they utilize.

(Good post, Alexis.)


Ellen

In my humble opinion the critical difference is in the personality structure of the group. Any group, religious, political, self improvement, you name it....

What Cleckly, writing nearly 50 years ago defined as Psychopathic may be spoken of today as Malignant Narcissism. If a difference exists between the two I have yet to see a compelling side by side comparison of the two words, so I believe it is safe to assume that they are essentially the same creature.

Is the group directed by its leader towards a M.N. style of interaction, even if not all individuals within that group, as individuals, would tend to behave that way ? Is there the use of emotional sadism to gain compliance-obedience ? Is there an ability, or lack thereof, of group leaders to "take a spoonful of their own medicine" ? If there is an M.N. vibe to the whole thing, Cleckly may remain as good of an interpreter as we have come across.


perhaps this quotation from Hervey Cleckley's seminal work _The Mask of Sanity_ would clear the air:

"Some of the psychopath's behavior may be fairly well accounted for if we grant a limitation of emotional capacity. Additional factors merit consideration. The psychopath seems to go out of his way to make trouble for himself and for others. In carelessly marrying a whore, in more or less inviting detection of a theft (or at least in ignoring the probability of detection), in attempting gross intimacies with a debutante in the poorly sheltered alcove just off a crowded ballroom, in losing his hospital parole or failing to be with his wife in labor just because he did not want to leave the crap game at midnight (or at 3 A.M.), in such actions there seems to be not only a disregard for consequences but an active impulse to show off, to be not discreet but conspicuous in making mischief. Apparently he likes to flaunt his outlandish or antisocial acts with bravado.

When negative consequences are negligible or slight (both materially and emotionally), who does not like to cut up a little, to make a bit of inconsequential fun, or perhaps playfully take off on the more sober aspects of living? Dignity might otherwise become pompousness; learning, pedantry; goodness, self-righteousness. The essential difference seems to lie in how much the consequences matter. It is also important to remember that inclination and taste are profoundly shaped by capacity to feel the situation adequately. A normal man's potential inclination to give the pretty hatcheck girl $100.00 would probably not reach awareness in view of his knowledge that this would result in his three children's not having shoes or in his having to humiliate himself by wheedling from a friend a loan he will never repay.

If, as we maintain, the big rewards of love, of the hard job well done, of faith kept despite sacrifices, do not enter significantly in the equation, it is not difficult to see that the psychopath is likely to be bored. Being bored, he will seek to cut up more than the ordinary person to relieve the tedium of his unrewarding existence. If we think of a theater half-filled with ordinary pubertal boys who must sit through a performance of King Lear or of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, we need ask little of either imagination or memory to bring to mind the restless fidgeting, the noisy intercommunication of trivialities, the inappropriate guffaws or catcalls, and perhaps the spitballs or the mischievous application of a pin to the fellow in the next seat.

Apparently blocked from fulfillment at deep levels, the psychopath is not unnaturally pushed toward some sort of divertissement. Even weak impulses, petty and fleeting gratifications, are sufficient to produce in him injudicious, distasteful, and even outlandish misbehavior. Major positive attractions are not present to compete successfully with whims, and the major negative deterrents (hot, persistent shame, profound regret) do not loom ahead to influence him. If the 12-year-old boys could enjoy King Lear or the Ninth Symphony as much as some people do, they would not be so reckless or unruly.

In a world where tedium demands that the situation be enlivened by pranks that bring censure, nagging, nights in the local jail, and irritating duns about unpaid bills, it can well be imagined that the psychopath finds cause for vexation and impulses toward reprisal. Few, if any, of the scruples that in the ordinary man might oppose and control such impulses seem to influence him. Unable to realize what it meant to his wife when he was discovered in the cellar flagrante delicto with the cook, he is likely to be put out considerably by her reactions to this. His having used the rent money for a midnight long-distance call to an old acquaintance in California (with whom he bantered for an hour) also brings upon him censure or tearful expostulation. Considering himself harassed beyond measure, he may rise from the dining room table in a petty tantrum, curse his wife violently, slap her, even spit on her, and further annoyed by the sudden weeping of their 6-year-old daughter, throw his salad in the little girl's face before he strides indignantly from the room.

His father, from the patient's point of view, lacks humor and does not understand things. The old man could easily take a different attitude about having had to make good those last three little old checks written by the son. Nor was there any sense in raising so much hell because he took that dilapidated old Chevrolet for his trip to Memphis. What if he did forget to tell the old man he was going to take it? It wouldn't hurt him to go to the office on the bus for a few days. How was he (the patient) to know the fellows were going to clean him out at stud or that the little bitch of a waitress at the Frolic Spot would get so nasty about money? What else could he do except sell the antiquated buggy? If the old man weren't so parsimonious he'd want to get a new car anyway!"

I wrote in a previous post responding to the harm Landmark caused Alexis:

I understand this is true for you. And for others a diifferent opinion is rendered. Ana323 and dpa10 had overall positive experiences. Mine with Est was positive as well. But I didn't go as deeply into as dpa10, gc4062 or yourself. I was forewarned by my girlfriend to not get involved . It was obvious after a couple of seminars, I think it was called "Be here now" , but it should have been called "Be here now with guests". But so what. I didn't buy into it.


It wasn't my intent to trivialize your experience. I believe you are telling me the truth. I don't think it's fiction. I don't think it's "just your story."

But, let me also have my reality. It wasn't the same as yours.

You said:

"I stand behind what I said before. To put it more bluntly - by saying you received "good" from the forum, you are unwitting pawns in their recruiting practices even if you don't recommend that anyone attend their courses. You are conveying a contradiction to people. They are left wondering, "If he/she said he/she got some good from it, then why does he/she tell me not to attend?"

Firstly, who is recruiting? The Est Training seized to exist almost 20 years ago. I was long gone when they switched to the Forum. I didn't recruit anyone then, why would I start now. Let them pay some salepeople or advertise on TV if they want to promote their business. But it doesn't negate the fact I thought it was good.

Secondly, if you want to call me "an unwitting pawn in their recruiting practices" go ahead. I'm an anonymous poster and nothing you say can change my reality. Bu you have to ask yourself who is engaging in "invalidating" other's experiences?

It seems that any form of disagreement on this forum is met with anger, contempt and name calling.

What's up with that?

The fact you were insulted by "unwitting pawns" shows you have a button for being "a victim." I won't go into the "victim" spiel taught by the forum/est, but they have absolute disdain for the very word. My use of the phrase was not an insult. It's a fact.

>> It seems that any form of disagreement on this forum is met with anger, contempt and name calling.<<

This is a discussion group about cults and cult-like groups. Did you really think no one would disagree with you? We were all supposed to agree with you despite the fact that some of the people responding had been with landmark/Erhard for years and have countless accounts to base their judgment? Pleeeaaase. To quote my daughter, "Whatever!"

Now for your remarks in other posts on the board:

The comparison between the Catholic Church and landmark is completely invalid. It shows a lack of research on your part. The priests who committed the molestations and the bishops who covered it up were in direct defiance to their oaths as priest and bishops and committing sins against God and the Catholic Church. The Church admitted people were hurt. The Church settled with defendants instead of having lengthy litigations. They set up a fund for counseling for the victims from money that was from property sold or from interest on investments.

The sole purpose of landmark is for them to make money while under the guise of transformation. The "transformation" is completely how they want it to be, not based off of what transformation would be best for the person. If they were really offering meaningful transformations, people would FLOCK to them. BUT, and it's a big BUT, people don't. I never saw anyone ask to take the forum because they looked up landmark education in the phone book. As far as I saw, most forum participants were there because they just couldn't stand being asked one more time.

landmark entices people by appealing to their nature to improve their lives. They play on our own desires to improve ourselves. If someone feels mentally molested (AND it is mental molestation), landmark blames the person as being mentally unstable. At most, you Might, and it's a big MIGHT, get your money back for the "course" less deposit. No counseling. Just blame on the victims and how they are unable to be "transformed" or that they are in "their mind" or "already always listen." Well, if the mind is really just mush, take someone's out and see just how long they will function without it. They won't. They'll die.

Plus, landmark (and I met people from the est days) considers people like you as the ones who just didn't "get it." Yes, the ones like you, Wary, who took the course and say you received good but wouldn't "share it" because you didn't like recruiting, are nothing but selfish %&*$#@$% (they used words I won't repeat here) that never "got it." That is what landmark/est thinks of you. They see you as a fool AND they finish off by saying, "We can get him back and everyone he knows."

I was told time and time again, how there are people that can't "fully digest everything est/forum has to offer." And though they consider it regrettable that some people just aren't smart enough to "get it" the first time, there's always the second, third, fourth .... fiftieth time for taking the forum.

And landmark DOES talk about est once they think you are one of them. The first time I asked about Erhard (someone I was trying to recruit brought up his name), I was told how wonderful Erhard was, that he "invented" the "technology" used in the forum. I was also told the forum was very much like est except they let people go to bathroom because they found out they could get more people to take the "training" if they could pee and poop at regular intervals. AND I was then told that the need to go to the bathroom was all in people's head and that it would be better if the forum was like the old days of est. Then people would "really get it."

As for the 9/11 comment, to insinuate that one person's comment is how the entire board feels is just ludicrous AND you know it. So quit playing your games of accusations with no real proof to back it up. From reading your post, I see just how much your est "training" is really ingrained in your mind.

And as for the quote from Hervey Cleckley, if you were really understanding what Cleckly had written, you would realize that landmark's/Erhard's behavior is more aligned to psychopathy than ours.

For the points I have below I am quoting Cleckly:

Point 1:

"A saying current among psychiatric residents, secretaries, medical associates, and others familiar with what goes on in my office may illustrate this point. The saying is in substance that excellent evidence for the diagnosis of psychopathic personality can be found in my own response to newcomers who seek to borrow money or cash checks. It is rather generally believed that only psychopaths are successful and that in typical scams success is inevitable. Although I argue that some exaggeration has perhaps colored this story and overemphasized the infallibility of my reaction as a test, I must admit there is much truth in the matter. Even after so many years of special interest in the subject, I am forced to confess that fairly often observers have had the opportunity to make a snap diagnosis from my response to this sort of appeal and see it gain full confirmation in subsequent events. I might add that no such loan has ever been repaid and that all such checks have bounced."

Well, landmark succeeds in taking money and makes refunds very difficult if not impossible. They bait you in by "see how much my life has improved" rehearsed tactics.


Point 2:

"After being caught in shameful and gross falsehoods, after repeatedly violating his most earnest pledges, he finds it easy, when another occasion arises, to speak of his word of honor, his honor as a gentleman, and he shows surprise and vexation when commitments on such a basis do not immediately settle the issue."

In landmark speak, "the past is in the past, live in the here and now." Since landmark teaches people not to rely on the past as means to evaluate how they are as people, all checks and balances are destroyed leaving no foundation to draw on, in essence teaching people to think like psychopaths.

Point 3:

"The psychopath apparently cannot accept substantial blame for the various misfortunes which befall him and which he brings down upon others, usually he denies emphatically all responsibility and directly accuses others as responsible, but often he will go through an idle ritual of saying that much of his trouble is his own fault. When the latter course is adopted, subsequent events indicate that it is empty of sincerity-a hollow and casual form as little felt as the literal implications of "your humble and obedient servant" are actually felt by a person who closes a letter with such a phrase. Although his behavior shows reactions of this sort to be perfunctory, this is seldom apparent in his manner. This is exceedingly deceptive and is very likely to promote confidence and deep trust. More detailed questioning about just what he blames himself for and why may show that a serious attitude is not only absent but altogether inconceivable to him. If this fails, his own actions will soon clarify the issue.

Whether judged in the light of his conduct, of his attitude, or of material elicited in psychiatric examination, he shows almost no sense of shame. His career is always full of exploits, any one of which would wither even the more callous representatives of the ordinary man. Yet he does not, despite his able protestations, show the slightest evidence of major humiliation or regret. This is true of matters pertaining to his personal and selfish pride and to esthetic standards that he avows as well as to moral or humanitarian matters. If Santayana is correct in saying that "perhaps the true dignity of man is his ability to despise himself," the psychopath is without a means to acquire true dignity."

landmark portrays the image that any wrongdoings are not the fault of landmark but always the persons with the complaints. Their immediate action is to sue when any article, news broadcast or book exposes what is really going on. I have seen and heard staff and volunteers blame themselves if participants don't "get it," then immediately turn around and blame it on the participants for being "unwilling to be transformed." landmark consistently functions as an institution that is blameless stating that any deaths, mental problems or financial problems are the fault of the participants.


Point 4:

"Despite the extraordinarily poor judgment demonstrated in behavior, in the actual living of his life, the psychopath characteristically demonstrates unimpaired (sometimes excellent) judgment in appraising theoretical situations. In complex matters of judgment involving ethical, emotional, and other evaluational factors, in contrast with matters requiring only (or chiefly) intellectual reasoning ability, he also shows no evidence of a defect. So long as the test is verbal or otherwise abstract, so long as he is not a direct participant, he shows that he knows his way about. He can offer wise decisions not only for others in life situations but also for himself so long as he is asked what he would do (or should do, or is going to do). When the test of action comes to him we soon find ample evidence of his deficiency."

Landmark teaches that our world is made possible because we speak it; that we only live our lives through the words we speak since words "make it happen." Their word was that participants could be transformed by "experiencing the forum." Their word was not you must constantly take "courses" and get everyone in your life to take these "courses"? But on a more troubling note, many people when attending their various "courses" are made to state things they will do that just cannot be done. One example: In the beginning, the person feels "inauthentic" because they just can't believe they are told they must say they will bring 1000 "guest" to the next introduction. They were taught "you are your word." But as time goes on the feeling guilt related to true authenticity for not being able to produce what you say is completely pushed aside and substituted with landmark's version of "authentic," mainly I will say what I need to say to make the leader happy. The moral boundary of trying to do what you say you will do becomes cracked to the point that you are not bothered by the fact you don't really do what you say you will do.

Truly chilling how close landmark is to creating psychopaths.

Point 5:

"The psychopath is always distinguished by egocentricity. This is usually of a degree not seen in ordinary people and often is little short of astonishing. How obviously this quality will be expressed in vanity or self-esteem will vary with the shrewdness of the subject and with his other complexities. Deeper probing will always reveal a selfcenteredness that is apparently unmodifiable and all but complete. This can perhaps be best expressed by stating that it is an incapacity for object love and that this incapacity (in my experience with well-marked psychopaths) appears to be absolute.

Terms in use for what we experience as "emotion" contain much ambiguity, and their referential accuracy is limited. This contributes to confusion and paradox which are difficult to avoid in attempts to convey concepts about such a matter.

In a sense, it is absurd to maintain that the psychopath's incapacity for object love is absolute, that is, to say he is capable of affection for another ill literally no degree. He is plainly capable of casual fondness, of likes and dislikes, and of reactions that, one might say, cause others to matter to him. These affective reactions are, however, always strictly limited in degree. In durability they also vary greatly from what is normal in mankind. The term absolute is, I believe, appropriate if we apply it to any affective attitude strong and meaningful enough to be called love, that is, anything that prevails in sufficient degree and over sufficient periods to exert a major influence on behavior.

True enough, psychopaths are sometimes skillful in pretending a love for women or simulating parental devotion to their children. What part of this is not pure (and perhaps in an important sense unconscious) simulation has always impressed this observer as that other type of pseudolove sometimes seen in very self-centered people who are not psychopaths, which consists in concern for the other person only (or primarily) insofar as he enhances or seems to enhance the self. Even this latter imitation of adult affectivity has been seldom seen in the full-blown psychopath, although it is seen frequently in those called here partial psychopaths. In nonpsychopaths a familiar example is that of the parent who lavishes money and attention on a child chiefly to bask in the child's success and consciously or unconsciously to feel what an important person he is because of the child's triumphs. Although it is true that with ordinary people such motives are seldom, if ever, unmixed, and usually some object love and some self-love are integrated into such attitudes, in even the partial psychopath anything that could honestly be called object love approaches the imperceptible."

I think these paragraphs above show the distinction between a legitimate religion or social group versus cults or cult-like groups. True love, true concern for any person's well being is not possible when the emphasis is to promote the "group" at all costs in an ends-justifies-the-means manner that is always displayed in cult and cult-like groups.


I could just go on and on …… but the sake of space, I won't.

Alexis wrote:

The fact you were insulted by "unwitting pawns" shows you have a button for being "a victim."

Iwasn't insulted at all by what you said. You can attack me or call me names all day. In fact, that's what I expect at this message board.

Thanks for illustrating my point for me.

again, from my experience, it isn't nearly so simple as being an unwitting pawn versus a fully autonomous being. Both are simplisitc caricatures that understate the complex nature of human interaction. Paradoxically, some of the easiest people to dupe are those who have had the benefits of good education, the fortune to associate with truthful, high quality people. That's because they have frequently come to assume that people mean what they say, they can be taken at their word, and good intentions are sufficient for good outcomes.

My ex-wife had the opportunity to work in a high risk youth halfway house, these were kids who wouild have otherwise gone to prison for fairly serious crimes but were given one last, highly structured chance to pull themselves together. One screw up, and they went directly to prison, no qustions, no recourse.

I got a chance to spent time with both the male and female population when I visited. I was genuinely shocked at how intelligent these kids were as well as how much disfunctional environments had warped their social perspectives. However, they had simple awesome bullshit detectors. You could not get over with them with even slight prevarication. Once I reflected on this, it made perfect sense. These kids had lived among sociopathic personalities from an early age and they knew all their angles.

Unwitting pawns they weren't. Deprived and abused they were. But they could smell a sociopath a mile away.

Wary,

Saying you are not insulted, then saying that I'm attacking you or naming-calling really means you are insulted and are "choosing" to ignore what you perceive as an insult.

So I'll analyze your post for everyone to expose the landmarkian/Erhardian behavior:

>> I wasn't insulted at all by what you said. You can attack me or call me names all day. In fact, that's what I expect at this message board.<<

1. The classic "you don't know what you don't know you don't know" concept. So in other words, you are saying I don't know how to interpret your post. In an earlier post in this thread, you stated "….. disagreement on this forum is met with anger, contempt and name calling." Is "name-calling" not associated with "insulting" or "offending"? Why, yes it is!!! It does not take a great leap of logic to come to the conclusion you felt insulted. You used the word "attack" in the quote above. "Attack" was once a common synonym for "insult." If you had not felt insulted, then you would never have posted the reply you did.

2. Yes, the ever so common, "it is a problem within you(meaning me, Alexis, and the message board)" attitude. It's my "racket" that refuses to let me agree with you. Your implication is that my judgment is so utterly impaired since I can't see it your way. Yes, I suppose you could say the same thing about me. The difference is intent. I know where mine lies; it's easy for everyone to tell just from reading my post. Your intent is hard to discern since you say you want nothing to do with est/forum but then say they do do good. You post in such a manner as to suggest our disapproval for landmark is nothing more than personal vendettas that have no base in reality. You completely ignore any evidence to support our disapproval, constantly siding with landmark/Erhard statting that we are 3 out of 7 whom received no "benefit."

I have no proof, but the more you post, the more I am convinced you are a forum leader or paid staff or gung-ho volunteer. I'm sure you will deny any such association. Like I said I have no proof, but your wording and understanding of the world you present on this message board is so typical of what I saw of landmark's staff and volunteers.

Socrates,

I agree too things are not so simple, but they are not so complicated they could not be reasonably understood either. Some things are black, some things are white, many are shades of gray. Sound like a paradox, but it's really more ironic since black and white mixed together to make shades of gray.

As for the children/young adults you met in the halfway house, I bet their lives were a little like this:

There came an age in their lives where they didn't understand why their parents/siblings/caretakers don't want to spend time with them. They were confused as to why they were pushed aside. They maybe even stole or lied to try to get the approval they so desperately sought; that all children desperately seek. Then with more age they came to the terrible realization that what their parents/siblings/caretakers were doing was wrong, illegal. Because of the behavior they had seen all their lives, there came a moment when they realized they doubted if the I-love-you's were real. They were used, pushed aside and didn't really know if they are wanted in the world. The fact that they either could have been used as unwitting pawns of their parents/siblings/caretakers or saw their parents/siblings/caretakers treat others in that manner developed their bullshit detector.

Perhaps it would be better to break down the phrase "unwitting pawns."

Unwitting:
1 : not knowing : unaware
2 : not intended : inadvertent

pawn(s):
1 : one of the chessmen of least value having the power to move only forward ordinarily one square at a time, to capture only diagonally forward, and to be promoted to any piece except a king upon reaching the eighth rank
2 : one that can be used to further the purposes of another

So, an "unwitting pawn is a person that can be unknowingly used to further the purpose of another or someone who is inadvertently used to further the purposes of another.

I don't think unwitting pawns are unknowing chessmen of least value having the power to move only forward ordinarily one square at a time, to capture only diagonally forward, and to be promoted to any piece except a king upon reaching the eighth rank …..unless they're in a wizard's chess game, perhaps?


Maybe your getting wrapped up in the negative connotation of the phrase?