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The Anticult
Its a shame there is not more education and awareness about these subtle methods of persuasion.

I second that!

I just read "Loving What Is." I wasn't really interested in reading it, but someone I know recommended it. I had a feeling it wouldn't be for me.
The dialogue between her and the woman who had been sexually abused (raped)as a child turned my stomach.
I understand about projection, but I feel this goes too far. You can not hold a child responsible for this type of thing--ever. It's very cruel, to say this to any one suffering any sort of past trauma. I guess that's my point--there is no heart in this and I don't believe it's the truth either. It's a dishonest representation of projection. Why couldn't this whole dialogue only be a projection of the author? Her projecting on this woman her idea about reality.
Well, the part of "I abused myself." Then, "I abused the abuser." I don't see the rationality of this. I tried to find it, but am unable to see how this is rational! And, then to say that this was the way the child was gaining attention, by a rape. I cannot understand how any person could condone this twisted definition of "projection." I'm not a therapist, but have known many personallyover the years, and I doubt they would feel this was true, too.
I know projection is a "real" thing, but I know, too, that this is not a real example of it.
As far as the one size fits all "You create your reality." I've thought of this much during the last years since it's a phrase in your face alot, but I don't see it as a simple thing. Yes, in some ways we do, but there is also genetics, family history, a thing I call "fate" and other factors that define our reality. Maybe in the vast scheme of things, much larger than ourselves, we do create a large part of it--but,I think no one can know this exactly. No teacher is God, nowhere. We are all just guessing really. When it gets down to it, we do the best we can.
I looked at Amazon.com's reader's responses and saw a few negative comments regarding this specific occurrence, but only a few. I was really surprised, to say the least.
I guess it sadenned me that women, especially, after reading this would not be out in the streets protesting and making some noise about this!!
We need our emotions to sift through life, and all parts of ourself, too. If we just throw out things that are "disturbing" to us, what kind of a life is it, really? Is there any honesty to only thinking what you want to think?
Another statement "Abuse never happened if you don't think it did." Well, I live in a time/space where "events" did happen. I will not argue with that reality. The past is a reality--it lives in our bodies, unconscious minds and emotions. We can't just think it away or choose to forget it.
I do agree that we don't have to bombard ourselves with thoughts that disturb us either. Fine line between "it didn't happen if I don't think it did" to "it happened, but it's in the past and it doesn't have to define the future."
I feel her teachings in the book go so far as to actually exclude reality. Suffering is a part of the human state. Every old and weathered text talks about this. You cannot deny those parts of life that hurt, are uncomfortable, etc.. Maybe it's just balance that is needed in most aspects of life. I find that anything that goes to far off my "center" doesn't work for me.

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The Anticult
The average person needs to know that Byron Katie is not just some kooky old lady yacking away. She is a master hypnotist, and mass persuader, very sophisticated and technical.
Its all detailed in these threads.

I'm not sure that "hypnotism" is a term that's ever been rigorously defined scientifically. Surely, for the vast majority of people in this discussion, the words "master hypnotist" conjures up images from old movies, sit-com plots, and Vegas lounge acts. My point here is... to call someone a "master hypnotist" says next to nothing. If anyone gives a teaching that I don't like, I can ALWAYS say, "He/she's is just hypnotizing people." If my sister says she's in love with someone and I don't approve, I can ALWAYS say, "She's not really in love, he just has her hypnotized."

As far as being a persuader... pretty much everyone is persuading all the time. Persuading, after all, is far far better than forcing your views on others.

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The Anticult
There is ZERO evidence Byron Katie helps anyone. ZERO.
Just Testimonials, which are not evidence.

There's ZERO evidence that psychiatry helps anyone. We don't even have a definition of what "help" is! That's why each of us has to decide for ourselves what helps our life, and what hurts it. "Help" and "hurt," after all, are entirely relative to what we WANT in life. And that's an entirely personal decision. It's not proven by evidence, so we can't assert objectively what's helpful. We can only try our best when it comes to our own lives, and leave others alone to do the same, as much as possible.

If I feel that, e.g., doing the Byron Katie work has been harmful to me, then I can try to communicate clearly what my experience was, and why I define it as harmful. This gives information to others, who can then make more informed decisions. But the ultimate decision of what's helpful/harmful is made by each of us within our own value-system.

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The Anticult
Complaints can protect future consumers from also being victims of unlicensed abusive group psychotherapy, due to warnings received.
Consumer Activism can force abusive organizations to be less harmful, and protect other consumers from sustaining damage that can last for years.
Please post and link to this information in relevant locations.

Another alternative would be to try to persuade people to avoid the teachers and groups you disapprove of. That way, you offer information to anyone interested in getting involved with Katie (etc etc), leaving the ultimate decision to the individuals themselves. This would be the better option, if you believe it's generally better for people to have the freedom to guide their spiritual/psychological paths for themselves, rather than having the government force choices on them.

The question is: when you believe that a teacher or group is abusive, harmful, damaging... is that the final word that should be forced on everyone? If we see "abusive" etc as subjective value judgements, then there's room to allow other people to see things differently.

When we force our value judgements on others (by forcefully preventing them from getting involved with Katie or other teachers or groups), we shouldn't be surprised if it creates an atmospher where our own freedoms get trampled when others don't approve of our own choices.

The Byron Katie folks seem to always take a similar tact.
They always ignore the fact that Byron Katie does DOZENS of obvious LGAT techniques she has taken from others, and claims she made it all up herself.
Its an outright falsehood.
She also claims she is not doing any techniques. Which is also false.
Anyone who gets involved will see her do the same "act" time and time again. Its a performance.
They always seems to ignore that part of it.

But again, more falsities.
"Psychiatry" has lots of objective scientific evidence that certain methods work. For example, CBT has hundreds of studies that show it can work. Hundreds of scientific studies. HUNDREDS.

Byron Katie has ZERO studies. ZERO. Nothing.
She has no credentials. She hides her techniques to try and be outside of any regulation for doing group psychotherapy with people.

As far as "hypnosis" they try to deflect there too, which is smart. Byron Katie works with Stever Robbins who is an NLP expert and into Ericksonian Hypnosis. So they have to deflect from that or it won't work on people. Byron Katie and her senior people know exactly what hypnosis is, and what it is not, she is an expert at it. That is what she does for a living.

then they says everyone is persuading, as if LYING is the same as talking? Sounds like Byron Katie or Werner Erhard. According them them, there is no such thing as lying either. Literally.

When someone in one of these groups like Byron Katie is claiming to ELIMINATE DEPRESSION, that should be illegal, and probably is illegal. If its illegal, then they should be shut-down.

No one is forcing anyone to do anything, or trampling on free speech. Quite the opposite, if they take time to research this forum.

Watch out for the Byron Katie organization. There are slick, they are aggressive, they have no regard for the truth, as they don't even believe in "truth".
Its a deep rabbit hole, and you don't want to fall down into the Byron Katie hole.

The Byron Katie companies are also on a large internet PR offensive right now.

No wonder Byron Katie took her book LOSING THE MOON, out of print.
There are still a few scanned ebook excerpts online, for now.

The book is Katie confusion-speak bigtime, and some real culty worship coming from some of her "friends".
She was also selling herself in the "Non-Duality" area at the time, which gives a person an excuse to say anything. Its interesting to see her writings from before she was shaped by the mass marketers and clean-up.

She says...

"As God, I'm watching my image. Its called you...I woke up as the image. Not God. And God."

She just goes on an on like this.
This is all Programmed Confusion language they use in NLP style hypnosis. Most of it is literally just meant to confuse you and throw you off-balance by confusing the conscious mind, so they can get to the unconscious programming.

QUOTE from LOSING THE MOON: (page 29)
__________________________________________________
Friend: You've said that the heart will do whatever it takes. It will rape a child, it will murder 6 million Jews. It'll do whatever it takes. I really just got that, really, literally.

Byron Katie: It is love, and we can tell all the stories we want about how its not, and it is. Its not even misguided. It is what it is, always. [..] even the suicidal things are natural. Everything is natural...every taste, every thing is God. [...] I hear the word "Katie" its the name of God. "I" God.
_____________________________________________________

No wonder Katie has suppressed this book! This is only a tiny bit of it, she goes on and on like this.
So Byron Katie has said that child-rape is "love", and the Holocaust is "not even misguided" and is love and the work of God, and even "is God"?

She also says that "Katie" is the name of "God".

It appears that the book LOSING THE MOON is a smoking gun, and this is why it was suppressed and taken out of print.
-----------------------------------------------

on page 35, of LOSING THE MOON, Byron Katie starts talking about Nazi's taking babies from Jewish mothers and throwing the babies into a firepit near the end of WWII.

QUOTE:
_____________________________________
"If Someone (God, "what is"), pulls my baby from me - if that's what it takes, I'm there. Take the baby. Tear my baby from me. Throw it in the fire....My discomfort is my war with God. [...]
You see, there are NO choices. What is, is. [...]
But when we get to the baby thing, we're getting down to our sacred little concepts now....You take my baby from me, you're messing with the illusion of I'm the mommy, this is the baby, there's the daddy...
But tearing the baby away- that's the higher. That's the higher, because it snatches your story from you and makes it apparent in your face - nothing's real short of reality....
That's it. That's what is. That's love. That's absolutely Un-describable love. That you, God, would even give me that.
Can you know that Hitler didn't bring more people to realization than Jesus? On your knees - God. God! God! But our stories of reality keep us from the awareness of God is Everything. And God is Good. [...]

There has never been evil and there never will be. Evil is simply a story about what's not...
But I have trashed the baby when I have trashed the Nazi...
I am the baby going into the pit. I am the one throwing the baby in the pit..."
___________________________________________________

Byron Katie just keeps going on and on from there.

So according to Byron Katie, Nazi's mass murdering Jewish women's babies by burning them to death alive while the mothers watch, is the loving work of God.
As a matter of fact, Byron Katie says that baby killers are "higher" than the illusion of mommy.

There is something very seriously wrong with this very sick person, who is now hiding her true beliefs behind whitewashed manuscripts.

Just how are any of us using force here, Stu? We are speaking up. That is all.

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RandomStu

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The Anticult
Complaints can protect future consumers from also being victims of unlicensed abusive group psychotherapy, due to warnings received.
Consumer Activism can force abusive organizations to be less harmful, and protect other consumers from sustaining damage that can last for years.
Please post and link to this information in relevant locations.

Another alternative would be to try to persuade people to avoid the teachers and groups you disapprove of. That way, you offer information to anyone interested in getting involved with Katie (etc etc), leaving the ultimate decision to the individuals themselves. This would be the better option, if you believe it's generally better for people to have the freedom to guide their spiritual/psychological paths for themselves, rather than having the government force choices on them.

The question is: when you believe that a teacher or group is abusive, harmful, damaging... is that the final word that should be forced on everyone? If we see "abusive" etc as subjective value judgements, then there's room to allow other people to see things differently.

When we force our value judgements on others (by forcefully preventing them from getting involved with Katie or other teachers or groups), we shouldn't be surprised if it creates an atmospher where our own freedoms get trampled when others don't approve of our own choices.

There is one correction to be made about Byron Katie being functionally an Atheist. After reading some of her suppressed book "Losing The Moon" its clear she is not an atheist.
She is also not a Humanist, more an Antihumanist.

Byron Katie literally says its the hand of her "God" literally creating child-rape, and the Nazi mass murder of Jewish babies by being burned alive in firepits at a train station at the end of WWII.
(So the orders of Hitler at the end of the war to murder those children, according to Byron Katie, are literally the work of the "God" of Byron Katie. Its right there in the text...which is why the text has been suppressed).

The material in "Losing The Moon" was pulled from the market and suppressed to save those type of extreme beliefs for deep initiates only. She changed to the "Bait and Switch" method.
They serve a similar purpose to the "lighter" Byron Katie metaphors like being robbed by gun and enjoying it.
Byron Katie does not believe that for herself, its only for you.

This is all a type of dark, twisted deep persuasion of the highest order.
Its meant to be close to the final step, where she sweeps away your entire sense of reality and identity, and replaces it with her own.
Just reading the book "Losing The Moon" will put you flat on your back, it will knock you out, which was clearly its intent. That is why they pulled it off the market. They probably deliver the same material now only in more "advanced" seminars, and don't write it down so they can't get in trouble.

But the intent is clear, its meant to be close to the last step in the process, where Byron Katie takes over, by sweeping away even your most cherished beliefs. Knowing most of her followers are women, she aims to even sweep away the instinct for motherhood, to destabilize your entire identity and personality, so then you only have Byron Katie left to grasp onto.

The text in that book actually needs to be reported to antisemitism authorities and Holocaust Denial and genocide reporters.

And Oprah Winfrey is about to get caught in the middle.

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helpme2times
Just how are any of us using force here, Stu? We are speaking up. That is all.

When you advocate brining in the government to shut down "unlicensed abusive group psychotherapy" (as is being done repeatedly in this thread), you're advocating the use of force. The government has men with guns, and it operates with force and threats of force. (Katie's org, on the other hand, doesn't force anything on anyone.) Just because you're getting someone else to hold the gun... doesn't mean that you're not responsible for the force used by your proxies. Do you want people to have the freedom to choose whatever religion or therapy they like for themselves? Or do you want to forcibly impose your choice on everyone? It's a very important issue for society, and it shouldn't be denied or glossed over by pretending that calling in the government is no different from "speaking up."

There's a huge difference between expressing personal opinions about the teachings... and calling in government force against it. Why not be clear that you're crossing a line here?

Stuart



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/27/2008 12:21AM by rrmoderator.

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The Anticult
But the intent is clear, its meant to be close to the last step in the process, where Byron Katie takes over, by sweeping away even your most cherished beliefs.

Our "cherished beliefs" have a most profound affect on our lives. It's entirely in our own power, and our own responsibility, to examine these beliefs, observe their effects, and decide whether or hold them or question them. Focusing on external boogiemen like Katie... is denial of this power, and avoidance of this responsibility.