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Goodbye Jesus

Indoctrinated By "christian" Music


JenniferG

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My brain has a HUGE library of Christians songs with which I've been indoctrinated for several decades since childhood. Patriotic songs, military songs, cult songs, religious songs seem to be one of the tools used to brainwash the gullible.

 

Every so often a song or hymn will pop into my head. My brain can retrieve every verse and chorus and yet it it finds it hard to memorize beautiful poetry! Sometimes the song will be hard to shake and will stay with me the entire day! It's so irritating.

 

No doubt Christians would say it's the Holy Ghost witnessing to me or something inane like that.

 

Are there any other former Fundies who experience this? Just wondering?

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Eh, occasionally I'll get one of those annoying contemporary worship things in my head and it takes a while to leave; they are usually catchy and hard to eradicate, argh. I think it was "All in All" yesterday. When that happens I try to think of something else to sing to get rid of it.

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I like to sing Diana Ross' "It's my Turn"

I can't cover up my feelings in the name of love, or play it safe, for a while that was easy,

And if living for myself is what I'm guilty of

go on and sentence me

I'll still be free

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I was a worship pastor for the last fourteen years, so yes I know what you mean. :D

 

I haven't listened to a single worship song since February 14th. But yes, they still pop in there on occasion.

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8 years later, they still pop up. I glare at them mentally and start singing a jazz song I'm learning. Almost prayed today when my car wouldn't start. Car after car left the lot without helping. About an hour later a guy pulled up and offered a jump. Thank you fellow human!

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I was a worship pastor for the last fourteen years, so yes I know what you mean. :D

 

I haven't listened to a single worship song since February 14th. But yes, they still pop in there on occasion.

 

LOL, I was trying to squish that bug on my screen, when I realized it's your animated graphic!!

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This used to happen to me all the time, not so often anymore. The thing too is, I'm pretty sure that words put to music have much more staying power in memory than spoken words or words on a page. So that may be why you have a harder time memorizing beautiful poetry, although poetry, in turn, because of it's rhyme and cadence, is easier to memorize that regular writing. 

 

The effectiveness of singing in indoctrination is no joke. In every church I went to, You sing for a while before the sermon, and you sing for a while after. Well, as it turns out, not only do the words in the songs emblazon certain images and ideas and feelings onto your mind, but the group singing alone, has a very interesting effect on you physically:

 

 http://ideas.time.com/2013/08/16/singing-changes-your-brain/.

So in church, the group singing gets those feel good relaxing chemicals going, and once everyone is buzzing and relaxed and synced up, they deliver their message, then at the end, more group singing. 

 

In my opinion, this is likely a large part of why many people leaving church on a Sunday afternoon feel, as they describe, "full of the spirit", or uplifted, is the flow of these chemicals in the brain, in part, caused by group singing.

 

Group singing has been shown to have health benefits, it's a pity that it's used as such a terrible tool of manipulation. Using group singing to associate good feelings with such a negative message...

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I was a worship pastor for the last fourteen years, so yes I know what you mean. biggrin.png

 

I haven't listened to a single worship song since February 14th. But yes, they still pop in there on occasion.

 

LOL, I was trying to squish that bug on my screen, when I realized it's your animated graphic!!

 

That's my goal. wink.png I tried to squish someone else's bug in another forum and liked it so much I decided to do it here. biggrin.png

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I have a huge susceptibility to ear worms. For example, if I listen to anything by Al Stewart such as "Road to Moscow", I can't get it out of my head for days. I like Al Stewart's music, but I never listen to it for that reason. :) ... Once in a while I will hear some song from the Orthodox liturgy, but it's not nearly as bad as those ear worms from some pop songs.

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My daughter is a tween, so I hear plenty pop songs that I would rather not have in my head. Like every freaking Maroon 5 song.

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Ear worms. That is such a good way to describe it!

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Ear worms. That is such a good way to describe it!

I've heard that expression before. Nice one

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This used to happen to me all the time, not so often anymore. The thing too is, I'm pretty sure that words put to music have much more staying power in memory than spoken words or words on a page. So that may be why you have a harder time memorizing beautiful poetry, although poetry, in turn, because of it's rhyme and cadence, is easier to memorize that regular writing. 

 

The effectiveness of singing in indoctrination is no joke. In every church I went to, You sing for a while before the sermon, and you sing for a while after. Well, as it turns out, not only do the words in the songs emblazon certain images and ideas and feelings onto your mind, but the group singing alone, has a very interesting effect on you physically:

 

 http://ideas.time.com/2013/08/16/singing-changes-your-brain/.

So in church, the group singing gets those feel good relaxing chemicals going, and once everyone is buzzing and relaxed and synced up, they deliver their message, then at the end, more group singing. 

 

In my opinion, this is likely a large part of why many people leaving church on a Sunday afternoon feel, as they describe, "full of the spirit", or uplifted, is the flow of these chemicals in the brain, in part, caused by group singing.

 

Group singing has been shown to have health benefits, it's a pity that it's used as such a terrible tool of manipulation. Using group singing to associate good feelings with such a negative message...

Thanks for your succinct reply. Yes. Group singing can be used for good or for evil purposes. Think of film footage of Hitler's youth singing praises to him. Same in North Korea.

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My undergraduate degree is in music.  I quite enjoy listening to music.  There is so much music out there.  I suspect contemporary "Christian" music to be less that 1/10th of one percent of what you can listen to.

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My undergraduate degree is in music.  I quite enjoy listening to music.  There is so much music out there.  I suspect contemporary "Christian" music to be less that 1/10th of one percent of what you can listen to.

I found contemprary Christian music is so annoying - insipid girlfriend/boyfriend songs to God or Jesus. And why do the Fundies sing them over and over! Part of the indoctrination process, before you're hit with "The Word"

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My undergraduate degree is in music.  I quite enjoy listening to music.  There is so much music out there.  I suspect contemporary "Christian" music to be less that 1/10th of one percent of what you can listen to.

I found contemprary Christian music is so annoying - insipid girlfriend/boyfriend songs to God or Jesus. And why do the Fundies sing them over and over! Part of the indoctrination process, before you're hit with "The Word"

 

 

 

 

The lyrics are quite predictable, as are the melodic, harmonic and rhythmic content of the music.  It's quite mediocre.  But much music is mediocre.

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They're all too aware of the emotional effect music has on people, it can easily be used as a manipulative tool and the lyrics are the same old repetitive shit but that's how you brainwash people. Thankfully I don't get those annoying songs stuck in my head anymore because I don't have to hear it anymore.

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It happens to me, too! A lot of the lyrics are just stupid.

The same is happening with bible verses I once memorized. I sometimes also almost pray.

It's been about ten, fourteen years I have been out.

 

I think it just takes a long time to get all those habits out of our system. Years and decades of brainwashing just can't be deleted in days or weeks, especially because a lot of the brainwashing is done on an emotional level. It's like "emotional memories". Just think of other important emotional stuff that happens in our lives - it's stuff that stays with you.

 

I have found that those "urges" (prayer, bible verses and songs popping up) fade. I also find it helps to fill your brain with other stuff (literature, movies, new experiences - it's a bit like "overwriting" the old code...

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Yes, I still get the songs in my head for no apparent reason. Sometimes they stay there all day.

 

I've come to see it as kind of funny. I just sing along now and laugh at the words. And, as often as I can, snicker at the double entendres, and subtly change the words to make them more blatant.

 

Look, we spent most of our lives doing one thing, and then we abruptly stopped. We can't expect that the memories and habits will be gone immediately. It took about a year for me to stop having the impulse to pray all the time. I still have passages of scripture randomly pop into my head. And then there's the song thing. These are all nothing to be concerned about. Try to smile about it and carry on.

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Wonder if they gave an award to the song about the sloppy wet kiss? wink.png

 

"Best lyrics repeated 149 times in a row" haha

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Wonder if they gave an award to the song about the sloppy wet kiss? wink.png

 

"Best lyrics repeated 149 times in a row" haha

Haha.

 

I used to really like that song. And church people made me change it to "unforeseen kiss" like the way David Crowder does it. But one day I decided that I liked the original better because it was hard to sing without feeling uncomfortable, and I felt like that was ok. So every time we sang it from then on it was "sloppy wet kiss." Emphatically. :D

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I hate Christian music anymore. As soon as I deconverted I changed all the presets on my car radio. If I find myself humming a Christian tune, I force myself to sing a secular song I like. It makes me angry that it is so ingrained in my brain.

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Huh? Sloppy Wet Kiss? Haven't come across that one! lol

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Huh? Sloppy Wet Kiss? Haven't come across that one! lol

 

It's at the 3:20 mark.

 

I actually still like John Mark McMillan. He has some pretty sweet songs. I haven't listened to a single praise song since my deconversion, but if I did I would listen to him, Gungor or All Sons and Daughters.

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