To whom it may concern:

Cult groups often try to create unreasonable fears about the outside world. They also may find ways of labeling critical thinking negatively in an effort to shut down independent evaluation of what they do.

Here are some links that explain "thought reform," "coercive persuasion" or what is commonly called "brainwashing."

[www.culteducation.com]

[www.culteducation.com]

This type of persuasion is quite different from education, advertising, propaganda or indoctrination.

See [www.culteducation.com]

Thought reform techniques of manipulation and control are a major component of what defines a cult.

See [www.culteducation.com]

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daddylonglegs
Earlier in the thread you posted a link to the Newsday article. That was the first time I had ever read it or got story behind the "big break-up" of the 80's. I was very young then, and the actual events leading up to it were never discussed. When asked, the adults just said "Abba was accused of some things that were not true." That is it. I believe most of the "youth" never got the real story. I went back to reread, and the link is broken. Is it a possibility to repost it?
Thank you.

Try this link:
[picasaweb.google.com]#

Confused you wrote: Those things sort of go together as implied threats. Again these were all the teachings of JH. I haven't heard any mention of any of this recently. But I also don't hear anyone confronting it, and saying that those things were a bunch of garbage. Maybe as Fallen eluded to, it will all just fade into the background.
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Confused you believe that? You believe things are better under the leadership of Gary Coons and that the bad teachings of Jack Hickman will simply fade away as the better teachings of Gary Coons emerge? Why? Why is everyone willing to say ''yeh, the dead leader was bad but his ''first born'' and ''high priest'' is much better?
This is a cult. Let's just say that Gary Coons' ONLY crime is trying to ''hold it together''. OK. That means Gary Coons is trying to hold a cult together. It is a cult. That's not good.
When Godfather dies in the movie is his next in line just some ''nicer guy trying to hold it together''? Maybe.
Is it still a mafia familiy? Yeh. Yeh it is. A cult with a sex offender as it's leader. That's what this was/is. As long as Gary Coons has ultimate authority and everyone is hypervigilant in their defense of him and he refuses to answer any critical questions and an unreasonable fear of outsiders(regardless of why) is not addressed, etc..
then...this is a cult. A bad cult. A bad cult which was developed by a pervert who had to leave NY and go into hiding because he had become so outrageously confident in his lunacy that he was stupid enough to tell all of Long Island....''yeh...I ejaculated on a teenager ..... I'm not sorry....god told me to....I might even do it again''. (paraphrasing)
Gary Coons is not a good guy.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 11/11/2009 12:35AM by Sallie.

Longlegs, It is pretty clear to me that if everyone IS being watched, by people who do not feel that the JH group is an abusive and controlling cult, they are watching for ulterior motives constituting an implied threat. "WATCHING" the thread to see what others are doing and to try to figure out who they are, for personal or group purposes, is a completely different thing, than reading for interest without writing. As you say people on here ARE being watched. That IS clearly an implied threat and perhaps not even so “implied”. It doesn't matter if the watchers are fallen angels or devils or people hiding behind trees. It is a fear tactic meant to control others and as you said make them feel they need to be extra vigilant in their obedience.

To whom it may concern:

Unreasonable fears are part of the "cult" game to control people.

No one here has anything to fear or worry about.

You can remain anonymous.

Don't disclose details about yourself personally that would tend to identify you through your posts here.

Be careful regarding the disclosure of information through private messaging.

Maybe the supposed "watchers" will learn something from following this thread that will help them to better understand how cults work. Understanding the control mechanisms of cults is an important part of the process of breaking free.

A good analogy is that when Dorthy in "The Wizard of Oz" realized that Oz was only the little man behind the curtain running a machine, she knew there was nothing to fear.

Cults often rely upon a similar false perception of power.

daddylonglegs wrote

The "Watchers" that Hickman talked about are aliens/fallen angels- and are our enemies, as they know our every thought, and try to put thoughts in our heads to lead us down the wrong path. Another absurd teaching of this cult that is just another way to make people think they are always under attack, and therefor need to be extra vigilant in their obedience to "The Way
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I think that is a little too vague. To be more CLEAR.....the above statement is the part of the Christian lingo that Hickman STARTED with.
Hickman was raised with Baptists. The Baptist religion is NOT CREATD to justify law breaking.
Hicman's religion WAS CREATED to justify law breaking.
Hickman knew that a Southern Baptist who might want to try drugs or commit adultry could be told .....''it's the devel(aka fallen angels), he wants to get you to do wrong. Just pray and ask God for help to do right'' Christians originally called themselves people of ''The Way''. Hickman knew that.
Anything illegal or bizarre about that? Not so much...not with step number one.
Now let's be clear about......
STEP TWO WHICH YOU FORGET TO MENTION.....
Hickman then replaced ''God's teachings according to the Bible''....with...''special knowledge taught by Gary my first born''
Correct?
Is that correct?
What thoughts????
Thoughts like ''I want to try drugs''.....that bad thought....what Christians think might be bad because it's illegal.
Or are you referring to thoughts like....''I want to call the cops and tell them this guy shot sperm at me''?

Moderator: Thank you for those links. They are extremely helpful. From my experience many of the things I and others I know have experienced has been very well described in the book you have linked, "Thought Reform and The Psychology of Totalism" by Robert Jay Clifton, especially the section on "mystical manipulation".
Mystical Manipulation
Quoted from chapter 22 of the "Thought Reform and The Psychology of Totalism" by Robert Jay Clifton. "The inevitable next step after milieu control is extensive personal manipulation. This manipulation assumes a no-holds-barred character, and uses every possible device at the milieu's command, no matter how bizarre or painful. Initiated from above, it seeks to provoke specific patterns of behavior and emotion in such a way that these will appear to have arisen spontaneously, directed as it is by an ostensibly omniscient group, must assume, for the manipulated, a near-mystical quality.

Ideological totalists do not pursue this approach solely for the purpose of maintaining a sense of power over others. Rather they are impelled by a special kind of mystique which not only justifies such manipulations, but makes them mandatory. Included in this mystique is a sense of "higher purpose," of having "directly perceived some imminent law of social development," and of being themselves the vanguard of this development. By thus becoming the instruments of their own mystique, they create a mystical aura around the manipulating institutions - the Party, the Government, the Organization. They are the agents "chosen" (by history, by God, or by some other supernatural force) to carry out the "mystical imperative," the pursuit of which must supersede all considerations of decency or of immediate human welfare. Similarly, any thought or action which questions the higher purpose is considered to be stimulated by a lower purpose, to be backward, selfish, and petty in the face of the great, overriding mission. This same mystical imperative produces the apparent extremes of idealism and cynicism which occur in connection with the manipulations of any totalist environment: even those actions which seem cynical in the extreme can be seen as having ultimate relationship to the "higher purpose."


At the level of the individual person, the psychological responses to this manipulative approach revolve about the basic polarity of trust and mistrust. One is asked to accept these manipulations on a basis of ultimate trust (or faith): "like a child in the arms of its mother." He who trusts in this degree can experience the manipulations within the idiom of the mystique behind them: that is, he may welcome their mysteriousness, find pleasure in their pain, and feel them to be necessary for the fulfillment of the "higher purpose" which he endorses as his own. But such elemental trust is difficult to maintain; and even the strongest can be dissipated by constant manipulation.


When trust gives way to mistrust (or when trust has never existed) the higher purpose cannot serve as adequate emotional sustenance. The individual then responds to the manipulations through developing what I shall call the psychology of the pawn. Feeling himself unable to escape from forces more powerful than himself, he subordinates everything to adapting himself to them. He becomes sensitive to all kinds of cues, expert at anticipating environmental pressures, and skillful in riding them in such a way that his psychological energies merge with the tide rather than turn painfully against himself. This requires that he participate actively in the manipulation of others, as well as in the endless round of betrayals and self-betrayals which are required.


But whatever his response - whether he is cheerful in the face of being manipulated, deeply resentful, or feels a combination of both - he has been deprived of the opportunity to exercise his capacities for self-expression and independent action" quoted from the book Thought Reform and the Psychology of Totalism" by Robert Jay Lifton.

Confused, The moderator hit the nail on the head. This is a public forum in which the participants remain anonymous. My hope is that some reading this will catch a glimpse of the real history here. I never knew any of it until I read the Newsday article posted here a few years ago. That was my first questioning of who "Abba" actually was.
It is also a forum that is read and known about by members. Call it watching, reading, monitoring, whatever, but I'm sure there is SOMEONE reading who is trying to figurre out who is who. That is why those of us who are close to people involved, or involved in some way ourselves remain anonymous. At least in my case it is not my physical safety I fear for, it is hurting my family who is completely devoted and losing my own family and lifelong friendships.
Of course people are going to "watch" a forum where the subject is their own cult. The "implied threat" comes from a lifetime of being told that we have to keep everything secret, that we are going to be persecuted against if it was known, that the "watchers" are watching, etc. This is the type of fear this cult uses as a control tactic today with the children especially, along with the fear that the world is ending in our lifetime and the only ones who can "save" us are our families who have all the food and supplies stored.

geraldtsmith, thank you for posting that link. It worked. I didn't realize until rereading that this group actually started in the 60's, and that some of our parents "grew-up" in the cult too.

This article clearly describes the characteristics of a cult and its leader:
The Harvard Mental Health Letter/February 1981
By Robert Jay Lifton, M.D.
"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".

All three of these general principles have been at work in this group. Many people agree that the sexual acts are a thing of the past however the other characteristics continued until the death of JH in 2004.

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Fallen 49r
I don't believe anyone is making "threats" about the legitimacy of this group, saying, "I'm on the inside, and we're keeping tabs on the RATS." It's quite clear to me that anyone saying they're "in" is either expressing their frustrations and helpless, or saying "you guys won't believe the crap they think is true," or both.

I still think that there are people on here who are on the "inside" and are continuing, active believing members, who would very much like to know who the posters actually are, and what they are saying, for more than a benign interest.