NEW Stupid Republican Idea of the Day (Part 1)

The BBQ Pit
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Yes, in fact this particular lawsuit is tailor made for grift even more so than the election overturning ones. The suit is being filed as a class action suit alleging that the social media platforms unfairly banned conservatives in general.

So not only will giving money help gods chosen servant aka Trump, not only will it make liberals cry but if you give them the funds they need to win, then it will mean a big payout to you personally. Facebook is worth one trillion dollars, if one million people each contribute $35.00 each month doubled, then each of those people will get back a million dollars!

It’s a straight up Spanish Prisoner scam, except that it is not saying anything that is provably false.

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Operators are standing by. Or click the button below and follow the prompts to enter your credit card number, date of birth, social security number, blood type, home address, and t-shirt size.

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Thank you for asking this question, I’m glad I have to an opening to go a little deeper.

I define the fundamentalist groups that I’ve been talking about as cults because they engage in specific types of serious financial, sexual and relationship abuse as a matter of doctrine. These groups also engage in other behaviors that define them as such, such as isolating their followers from the outside world and creating their own vocabulary, full of what are known as “thought-limiting cliches.

I’m very cautious about defining any group as a cult unless they are engaging in behaviors that harm their followers physically, financially, or emotionally. There’s nothing incredibly wrong with a group of like-minded people that enjoy an activity spending a lot of time together even if they become obsessed with that activity. It can be annoying to outsiders, but as long as they don’t rip you off too much and let you leave, I’m not labeling them a cult.

Alcoholics Anonymous is based around the same techniques that cults use. They have a their own language full of thought-limiting cliches. They urge their members not to associate with drinkers. They have sessions where they confess their weaknesses to other members. If they adhere to the tenets of the group, they are welcomed and loved, if they slip they must confess and repent or be cast out. Still, I hesitate to call them a cult because they don’t advocate for or systemically engage in any abusive practices, they use the techniques in mostly in service of a good cause.

I believe I’ve mentioned two groups recently, IFB (Independent Fundamentalist Baptist) churches and Scientology. I believe I also said that calling the IFB a cult was not without controversy. I said that because it is a very large group, with upwards of 10 million members. They don’t practice polygamy. They don’t fully arrange marriages, although they exert a lot of influence over the matches. They don’t take control of their member’s finances, although they can require hefty donations to the church in order to stay in good grace. But that’s semantics, if it’s not a cult it’s a really noxious church.

They require women to be completely subservient to their husbands and children to be completely subservient to their parents, and they enforce this hierarchy with severe physical abuse. Understand, this is not a case of “oh well, a lot of parents that happen to belong to this church whip their kids.” Their doctrine tells them that this is what God demands. The church provides instruction manuals and age-based guidelines on the size of the rods. They start hitting their children as infants (church tip: glue sticks really hurt without leaving big marks) if they cry when they are dry and fed. In older children, independent thought and critical thinking are punishable offenses.
They also maintain their own substandard educational system, which limits the ability of young adults to find employment outside the group - they run a network of unaccredited bible colleges.

That is why I consider this group to be cult.

Now I’m not as fresh on Scientology, I read one good memoir but that was several years ago. Now, it’s different from the fundamentalist cults because it recruits members from the outside. It’s a different dynamic. There are lots of people on the fringes that are just marks, overpaying for class after class, learning the language and uttering the thought-limiting cliches,chasing a promised outcome that’s never going to be delivered - but not subject to the abuse dynamic that prevails in the inner circle.
But deep inside use techniques like family separation - breaking up marriages, separating parents from their children by sending them to a cult school or to live with another family -as punishment and they have intelligence and security forces that conduct surveillance on member to make sure they’re adhering to church tenets, and they’re strongly resistant to letting anyone leave. This is why I consider them to be a cult. Other people may feel differently.

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At an actual news-channel, this egregious falsehood would mean either an on-air apology from the liar, or the end of her on-air career.

At FoxNews, this egregious falsehood means that McEnany is now well-positioned to move into one of the prime-time show spots, should any calamity visit Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, or Laura Ingraham.

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ETA
@mikecurtis
Please know I have nothing against organized ( or disorganized) religion. I grew up in a liberal Episcopalian church, I have good memories of it and even though I never practiced religion as an adult, the principles I learned in my religious education have served well me. In fact, now that I’m living in the town I grew up in and the pandemic is over, I’m going to be joining one of their women’s circles.

One of the books I recommend in the other thread is Joyce Zichterman’s I Fired God.

After Joyce and her husband left the church, the had trouble adjusting, they couldn’t find work because of their substandard education. They began attending a megachurch in a nearby community. That church was extremely supportive and gave them employment opportunities and financial help. When her family came around looking to harass them, church security ran them off at her request. They gave her and her husband extensive counseling, and they forced him to take accountability for his role in her abuse. They title of the book comes from something a counselor at her church told her — that she could fire the God she grew up with and get another one. They helped her get her agency back. I was deeply moved by this story.

And I apologize for sounding a little bit flippant when I referred to Adam Kinzinger as a cult survivor. I was hoping someone would question it so I could explain it more detail without derailing the P&E thread. And you did. Thanks.

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I have tremendous respect for your wisdom and knowledge @Ann_Hedonia, and I don’t want to hijack this conversation. But I’ve had a fair amount of experience with AA and al-anon both professionally and personally. It was always my experience that people were welcomed and loved no matter what. At the height of my involvement, I attended al-anon three times a week. I never said a word out loud in a meeting except to introduce myself (which is a ritual at the beginning of every meeting), but every time, I felt buoyed up on an ocean of love. I truly did. From a roomful of compassionate, non-judgmental strangers.

And I’m not aware of anyone in AA being required to repent and confess. As for being cast out – definitely not. Even when people relapse, and frankly, most people do at some point, I always heard them talked about (if at all) with compassion and love. One guy I worked with said they referred to relapsers as “AA Reserves.” I’m wondering where you got these ideas, but to go into that would just be a further hijack, so let’s not.

They’re not the only recovery game in town, but they’ve been around a long time and have done a lot of good work. I tend to rush to their defense if I see them being misrepresented.

Returning to the main discussion…

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Thank you @ThelmaLou, I was going to post the same thing.

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I find Steven Hassan’s BITE model (PDF)* a pretty even-handed predictor of cult behavior. BITE stands for control of

  • Behavior
  • Information
  • Thought
  • Emotions

*Skip to the second page to get to the good part.

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Fucker Carlson has been communicating with known Russian assets in an attempt to secure an interview with Putin.

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I consider you to be a thoughtful and concerned poster here; the opposite of flippant.
My issue here is not that IFB doesn’t exhibit cult like traits (you’ve given more than enough evidence for your belief in this matter) or that Scientology isn’t ultimately a scam designed to separate the faithful from their money. My issue comes from using those facts as de facto proof that one of it’s adherents is fundamentally flawed in some way.

I grew up as a Catholic. And thought I haven’t been to church in decades, I’ve never “officially” renounced my religion and I’ve not been excommunicated by the church. As far as the outside world can tell I’m still a member in good standing. Knowing that, do you think you know my stance on the death penalty? Abortion? Clergy sexual misconduct? Do you think you could predict how good I am at my job? Or even how I would go about doing it? Of course you don’t. And, I believe, that no one would even attempt to infer how I feel about those things. But, it seems it would be fair game if I was a Scientologist or a Calvary Baptist, or a Branch Davidian, or a SubGenius. For centuries, Catholicism was considered a cult by much of the world. That it’s members were enthralled to the Pope and would do his bidding. It was for this reason that it was such a big deal that Kennedy was to be President, and why, even today, Biden gets a lot of heat for his religion.

The counter argument seems to be "well, these aren’t really religions, they’re cults and you can’t trust cult members. Well, besides being grossly unfair to the members, who gets to decide what is and isn’t a religion? If it’s because it’s leadership has been littered with con men and charismatic personalities, then that rules out just about every religion ever.

We should not condemn the adherents for the sins of the Church, is all I’m saying.

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The Flynn family is suing CNN for claiming that they were saying the QAnon oath when they were just saying the family motto that just happens to use the same words as the QAnon oath.

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But if you can not punish the Church without punishing those within it, what have you got?

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And they think that makes it better?

6136

Maybe Ghoulani is branching out to new clients.

I can see grifting here for their “defense” fund even though they are the ones suing.

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Oh wow, I see I missed the mark with that one.

The point I was trying to make is that the word cult is problematic because of the negative connotation, and that some of the specific techniques that cults use are also used by other groups towards a positive end and that there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. I picked AA because it was the most positive example I could think of. So-called thought-limiting cliches, like HALT, can be a very good thing if the thought you are trying to limit is “Why don’t I have a drink?”

I think I just made some bad word choices. I was trying to reframe it using religious terminology and it came out sounding harsh. By confess I just meant that if you slip, you’re supposed to own up to it, right?And if you want to unburden, you can…I didn’t mean to imply you HAD to. And although you aren’t ostracized, there’s some psychological penalty, in that your number of days sober resets to 0. This exerts some psychological pressure towards sobriety, and that’s a good thing.
And by cast out, what I was referring to is that if you decide to screw sobriety altogether and not even try anymore, you won’t have the loving group anymore. It’s your choice, not theirs, but you still lose it. This would have a tendency to keep you at least trying for sobriety, I would think. And it’s similar to the pressures that keep people in bad cults.

Anyway, I think the world cult is seriously overused, and we really need a new word. There’s nothing wrong with a strongly bonded group of people spending a lot of time together over a common goal or interest, whether it’s worship, exercise, or sobriety. It’s only a problem if it becomes abusive, then the same psychological forces that conspired to make the group dynamic a good thing can flip around and make it a bad thing.

The best analogy I can come up with, and I may be setting something off here, is that abuse being the difference between the thing I don’t have a word for and a cult is that its like consent being the difference between lovemaking and rape. It’s only one thing, but it’s everything.

I hope I explained it better, it’s turning out to be hard to put this into words,

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Lauren Boebert: “COVID-19 mutated into Communism a long time ago.”

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“Wordy words are comin’ outta my wordhole! Looka me!”

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If you ever decide to retain a Scientologist for legal representation, let us know how it turns out.

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I’m not going to beat you up on this, 'cause I like you too much!

Suffice it to say that I learned the following in al-anon (and it blew my mind!): “The alcoholic’s drinking is none of your business.” :scream:

Likewise people in AA and related programs do not police each other or consider the other person’s behavior any of their business. It’s all support-- period. (Obviously, within reason.) There is a lot of misunderstanding about these 12-Step groups, one of them being that you have religion crammed down your throat. Believe me, nothing gets crammed down anyone’s throat. Since anonymity is one of the basic principles, the groups do not defend themselves or promote themselves except by word of mouth. Enough on that subject.

I learned something else in al-anon: “Take what you like and leave the rest.”

Some cults absolutely feel it is their business to police and punish members’ behavior (I’m lookin’ at you, American Catholic bishops. :rage:)

Carry on.

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I read in the P+E forum that the lawyer for the QANON Shaman made another plea for pretrial release.

Then I read the actual court documents with the arguments they made and the court response.

Based on these documents, here’s what I think happened in that courtroom.

Judge - Oh, it’s you again? Are you still unclear on the meaning of the word “no”.?

Lawyer - We have new evidence as to why our client shouldn’t be in jail!

Judge - I seriously doubt it. Bring it on, but make it quick.

Lawyer- This is a game changer. We have proof that the tip of the spear my client was carrying when he was hunting the Vice President of the United States was held onto his flagpole by a mere flimsy zip tie. Therefore, if he had caught a Mike Pence and attempted to stab him, the spear tip would’ve collapsed faster than Guiliani’s dick after a bottle of whiskey. Permit me to demonstrate……(lawyer pull out spear and starts fiddling with the tip)

Judge - Put that shit away. Don’t you know how to READ? We aren’t keeping your client under lock and key because we are concerned that he’s going to run around Phoenix stabbing people with his stupid shaman spear. He’s locked up because their are thousands of morons out there looking to give him lots of money so he can escape.

Lawyer - We also have multiple videos of our client not fighting with cops while in the Capitol. This is a clear indicator that he was an invited guest, otherwise he would’ve been beating up the cops.

Judge - Do you really think this argument helps your client? And once again, can’t you read? We aren’t keeping him in jail because we thinks he’s going to go on a shamanistic cop-beating spree. Again, we are keeping him locked up because we think his moron cult will spirit him away, so to speak, if we let him out.

Lawyer - But you need to understand that my client doesn’t like being in jail.

Judge - He’s not supposed to like it.

Lawyer - But he really really doesn’t like it. He’s a law abiding citizen and being locked up in jail is making him feel like he did something wrong. Will you let him out if his mommy promises to watch him and pinky swears that she won’t let him escape?

Judge - No.

Lawyer - His mommy has a sister that can keep an eye on him whenever she goes to the bathroom? Does that help? I keep telling you that he really really doesn’t like being in jail, and you don’t seem to understand that.

Judge - For the last time, no. We think his mommy might be happy if he escaped, that fool can’t be easy to live with.

Lawyer - Well, how about this. We have a secret house in a secret location and a secret plan that will absolutely ensure he can’t escape.

Judge - Wow! If you had this information all along, I’m wondering why you waited until this late in the hearing to pull it out of your ass, but I’ll play along. Fill me in on the details. Where is this place, and whose going to be watching him and how will they keep him there?

Lawyer - I can’t tell you that, it’s a secret. If I tell you, a liberal might find out and make mean jokes about it. Don’t you know what the words “secret plan” mean?

Judge - No, but I do know what the words “contempt of court” mean.
On the other hand, I’m no longer wondering why you waited until the end of the hearing to pull this out of your ass. Now get the fuck out if my courtroom before I toss you to the curb myself. And your client’s staying in jail until the trial.