Excellent post from P.D. from way down the board

This one was several pages down and a few people might have missed it. But it's so touching that I just had to repost it. She wrote:

I do agree with your assessment, that we are responsible for giving over our will to brainwashing.

But I think that religious brainwashing is one of the strongest forces there are. You are basically a Christian, you believe the Bible, you want to do your best for God, and someone starts telling you and using the Bible to convince you to follow their program, the pressure is then not from that person, but from God, and who has a strong enough will to stand up to God.

Well, I can name a number of people who probably would stand up to God, but they are mostly people who have gone through the cult and seen the power of religion used against them in a negative way. Unfortunately it seems that a lot of people are easily duped by religious authority, and fall for it. Why do we have so many various religions and beliefs all stemming from the same Bible? Because people came up with their own interpretations and managed to convince others that theirs was the right one.

I'm just trying to think back to my father. He joined the cult when he was about 23, and left 5 years later. But it was always in his blood to return, he tried several times over the next 7 years, and finally made it. His first choice I would say was made out of naevity (spelling?) and a sincere desire to serve God, which was what he wanted to do since he was a boy, the second choice was more stupidity and brainwashing, he had been convinced by Berg and the group teachings that they were the one and only way to serve God.

How many meetings, letters etc were written to convince you that if you left the group you were worse than someone who had never joined? The pressure used against you in God's name was intense! It was hard to go against once you got yourself in that place.

My Dad is to blame for the abuse that happened to my sister, he is to blame for our lack of education as children, for lack of a steady living environment. But I find it hard to blame him entirely. Perhaps having been older that most other SGAs, I was more privy to the type of pressure being put on the adult group (as well as the teen groups) to 'follow God' and be yielded and not rebellious.

It was a combination of so many factors that there really aren't any black and whites, blame can't entirely land on my father, neither can it entirely not land on him. He acknowledges his role in our past, he has realised over the years that being our father he is ultimately to blame for our past. But at the same time (I have to let you know that my sisters don't agree with me entirely) I also understand the pressure he was under, how subtly it worked at you, how it chipped away at your common sense of right and wrong, and how God, an ultimate power, was used to force you to submission.

So, brainwashing, while I do agree that the individual who allows himself to fall into that situation is to blame, and in the end they will have to live with the consequences of their choices, which is probably the worst punishment one can receive, but I also disagree that the individual is entirely to blame.

Would you not say it's true that we are all brainwashed to some degree, and what we accept today as right may be considered tomorrow to be wrong? Television, newspapers, our friends and relatives all contribute to helping form our opinions and decisions, I don't believe any of us are truly free from some form of brainwashing.