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In Reply to: Importance of our experience in The Family posted by Bart on May 19, 2003 at 15:36:22:
There are many things that stand out to me about my experience in the Fam. cult. One is that I would consider Berg and other cult or cult like leaders to be power hungry and in Berg's case CRAZY people that are very intelligent. I believe Berg was a studied person in how he went about forming and reinforcing the cult. I also know that when people join, they are ALL vulnerable in some way. This is where we vary, imo. I do believe that the vast majority of us had varying degrees of idealism, or saw our ideals failing and heard and believed the group's message of having all the answers to all our problems and all of life's problems all wrapped up in a seemingly neat little package.
Hindsight is clearer (not always 20:20) and it is easier to look back and see what was wrong with the package after getting out. For those that choose to look back, or are forced to when emotions wreak havoc after years of bottling them up.
What I see about my own experience is that I was very young, on the sts. in L.A., disillusioned with the ideals and hopes I had for a better world. Then I saw all these cults which sprang up first on the West Coast. They all said they were the answer. I visited the Khrishnas. Luckily with a couple of very devoid guys that ridiculed them, or I might have joined them. All of this stuff was very new. The family had a singleness of mind and beamed this programmed "love" and message which was reinforced with "inspiration" sessions every night. As a new person, making a "choice" about getting into it is similar to a bug making a choice to fly into a spider web. You just don't get the big picture unless you wriggle out of it and get away.
I see the leaders of cults like the spiders, only I would compare them more to ticks and just imaging that they weave webs to catch their victims. When a tick sinks it's feeding tubes into a person, they have an anesthetic that dulls the area. The person doesn't even realize that the tick was there until it is already engorged with their blood.
Here are some tools that the tick used to anesthetize and feed:
Love bombing, group re-inforcement, repetition-repetition-repetition, fear tactics such as persecution skits, being dealt with, separation from family or loved ones, moving without knowing where to, testimonies of people that died "because they backslid" or people close to them died "because of their backsliding", implanted belief that God was there, like a hitman ready to pull the trigger and erase you if you stepped out of his perfect will, the family.
There was continual confusion of doctrine and belief. Constant "revolutions".. On one hand we would read about Victor Frankl and on the other we would use Acts to say that Jesus was like Karl Marx. Whatever we said we were becoming one with the people around us to "win souls and influence others". When things came up that went against our innate set of morals or ideals, if the family said it was okay it was our spiritual weakness and sickness that rebelled.
I say bull shit. Getting out of the family is harder than getting out of the mafia. Congrats to all of us that managed to do that. What an accomplishment! I am proud of that. It is something well worth supporting each other about.
Sometimes it takes studying the nature of the beast to realize just exactly what I survived. Otherwise I could get sucked into something similar or drown myself in despair and addictions. I say congrats. to all of us who survived. And condolences and love to those that left but were unable to hang onto what was left of their lives after leaving, and have surrendered themselves seeing no way out. Some to the point of taking their lives. I wonder if stats have ever been published on the death and destruction toll of cults? I am sure it far exceeds any "good" that was done.
There were positive experiences. But those experiences were, for me, more to do with nature, travel, excitement that most people don't experience. Kinda like going to an exotic land and coming back with malaria and infested with bugs. The sunsets, mts, oceans, cultures, were great. They would have been greater without the fam. But if I put everything on a losses and gains sheet, I believe the losses far outweigh any good. And NONE of that good is connected to the tick. ;)
