Brainwashing

Originally posted by sonship
[b] The most basic thing one can do is ask *why* you believe something or follow someone. Is the answer because of evidence, or because you were told you need to believe?
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There's a sign on the lane near where I live that reads "25 MPH".
For some reason I have a ne ...[text shortened]... t road at 60 MPH I could get hurt or get in trouble with the local police.

Am I brainwashed?[/b]

Originally posted by twhitehead
I had a classmate that I knew reasonably well in Secondary School. In University, he changed quite dramatically and spent all his time talking about God and holding a Bible etc. He also failed quite miserably because he didn't do much school work. Was he brainwashed?

There is a biblical scripture (sorry didn't look it up) that says something like:

"Teach a child the way they should go and when they are older they will not depart from it"

Is this brainwashing?

Before all you southern baptist types turn on me, I'm thinking not just about this scripture at face value, which I believe promotes wholesome spiritual education, but also the methods the extremists use.

Originally posted by sonship
[b] The most basic thing one can do is ask *why* you believe something or follow someone. Is the answer because of evidence, or because you were told you need to believe?
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There's a sign on the lane near where I live that reads "25 MPH".
For some reason I have a ne ...[text shortened]... t road at 60 MPH I could get hurt or get in trouble with the local police.

Am I brainwashed?[/b]

Originally posted by FMF
I certainly think there are elements of brainwashing that you start to recognize and that need to be analyzed, evaluated and - if necessary - overcome when one is trying to extract oneself from religious dogma.

Originally posted by divegeester
There is a biblical scripture (sorry didn't look it up) that says something like:

[b]"Teach a child the way they should go and when they are older they will not depart from it"

Is this brainwashing?

Before all you southern baptist types turn on me, I'm thinking not just about this scripture at face value, which I believe promotes wholesome spiritual education, but also the methods the extremists use.[/b]

Originally posted by divegeester
I wasn't thinking of political brainwashing but now you have mentioned that, what about atheistic brainwashing?

twhitehead how do you know you are not brainwashed?

I'm probably going to regret asking that, but couldn't resist it 😵

Originally posted by divegeester
There is a biblical scripture (sorry didn't look it up) that says something like:

[b]"Teach a child the way they should go and when they are older they will not depart from it"

Is this brainwashing?

Before all you southern baptist types turn on me, I'm thinking not just about this scripture at face value, which I believe promotes wholesome spiritual education, but also the methods the extremists use.[/b]

Originally posted by whodey
Wasn't your brain washed by the blood of the lamb brother Son?

Originally posted by whodey
So why is corporate American not banning the Koran?

Originally posted by whodey
So essentially you started out with brain washing only concerning things with God associated with it?

Now that's just silly.

How does adding God to the mix make things any different?

Originally posted by FMF
It's a political issue.

Originally posted by Suzianne
So why is corporate America not banning the Koran?

Originally posted by whodey
It's pretty simply really, if you don't agree with me you have been brain washed.

Brainwashed is perhaps a strong term, except in extreme cases. I think that we are all conditioned by family, religion, culture beginning before we have language skills (e.g., by nonverbal responses to certain behaviors), but especially as we learn language. Broadly, I’ll just call what we learn “cultural norms”. These can include religion, morals—a complex worldview generally. We absorb these bit by bit over the years—

You've got to be taught
To hate and fear,
You've got to be taught
From year to year,
It's got to be drummed
In your dear little ear
You've got to be carefully taught.

You've got to be taught to be afraid
Of people whose eyes are oddly made,
And people whose skin is a diff'rent shade,
You've got to be carefully taught.

You've got to be taught before it's too late,
Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate,
You've got to be carefully taught!

—From Rodgers and Hammerstein’s South Pacific (my emphasis).

Of course, not all of the cultural conditioning needs to be negative—and perhaps little of it is, generally, part of a consciously deliberate program. I only suggest that most, if not all, of us were “carefully taught” many things before we were “six or seven or eight”, or twelve. We observed, we listened, and we learned—we absorbed. Perhaps some were even taught to question what they were taught—even at a young age; I was not.

I suggest that it’s a bit like a slow, cumulative hypnosis, leaving more or less automatic responses, rather like post-hypnotic suggestions. As we develop reason, we can begin to question these—but it can be a long process because of all the complexities, and we need access to information from outside that “cultural matrix” to do so. Sometimes that new information can seem threatening, and we might use our reasoning faculties to rationalize all those deep-rooted views, rather than questioning them. Rather like someone under hypnosis who, when asked why they reacted to a hypnotic cue-signal by (say) removing their jacket, reply: “Oh, I was getting warm.” A moment later, responding to a similar cue by putting the jacket right back on, they say: “Oh, it seems it is getting cooler in here.” A bit like that perhaps.

Sometimes, discovering that some of their deep-rooted views are false (or so concluding), people can react by adopting some counter-script as a kind of “life-line”, and accept that counter-script with little questioning as well.

Willingness to continue questioning—applying logic and critical thinking skills, as best we can, and keeping open to new information, new perspectives—seems the only solution. But I doubt that it’s a guarantee. And it can be a strenuous ongoing process. Epicurus, as I recall, recommended relaxing the urge to certainty. I might feel certain of some things. I might be right. But I might also be confronted with some new information that throws that certainty into question—and I need to accept that possibility. I might also die believing many false things. So be it. I do the best I can—which may not be the best for someone else. “Is that good enough”? I don’t understand the question . . . .