par4dcourse Posted July 26, 2007 Share Posted July 26, 2007 Greetings to all. I'm a relative newbie to the group. I haven't really believed the xtian dogma for many years, but living in the babble belt with strict xtian parents, I've only in thel last few years let my disbelief in the ridiculous god story become known. I've been reading daily from the forum posts and take great comfort that I'm not the only one to see gaping holes in the god story. I've got a question that has plagued me for years, and some of you enlightened thinkers may provide an answer. How do otherwise intelligent, rational people get caught up in these ridiculous cults? My primary source of frustration is John Travolta. Accomplished actor, dancer, singer, and the guy is even licensed to fly commercial airliners. (I have an interest in aviation although diabetes ruined my personal experience). This otherwise bright man believes in Scientology! Perfectly rational, intelligent folks show up at my door handing out Watchtower tracts! In short, why do intelligent people insist that their lives are ruled by nonexistant spooks, boogers, and things that go bump in the night rather than, logic, reason, and proved science? My suspicion is that the human race is deathly afraid of taking responsibility for their own actions. Larry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Llwellyn Posted July 26, 2007 Share Posted July 26, 2007 A lot of people are instructed in certain religious ideas at an age where they are too young to apply a critical filter to them. In my case, I was taught that "Jesus is God" before I learned my ABC's. It is simply unrealistic to expect that such a person will not come to hold the religion of their parents. In the case of people who convert to a dogmatic religion as adults, it often comes because they are experiencing severe problems in their lives, for example alcoholism, drug addiction, depression, or sever loneliness. Religion offers them "salvation" from their problems, and in some circumstances, it works. As for John Travolta, I've never gotten the impression that he was an intelligent man. He's probably below average in terms of intelligence, and much less intelligent that the typical poster here. It doesn't surprise me that such a person could come to believe in "engrams," and "Xenu," and "auditing." Tom Cruise is pretty brain-numb as well. He has dyslexia and probably has never read a book cover to cover. Just because they're famous doesn't mean that they are intelligent. Anna Nicole Smith was super-famous, right? Lindsay Lohan cannot compose a sentence without spelling and grammatical errors. We mostly elevate to the Pantheon of Fame people of below average intelligence. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwc Posted July 26, 2007 Share Posted July 26, 2007 Welcome to the site. A great site on Scientology is Operation Clambake. Usually, intelligent people get snookered the same way idiot's get snookered. CoS, when it comes to celebs, deals with them a bit differently than normal people though since they really want them in the fold but it's basically the same. They tend to love bomb them. Then isolate them. Then play little "us vs. them" paranoia games. Then they own you. The CoS doesn't force the celebs down the same path as the others so they don't end up as "slave" labor somewhere but that's really just a minor issue in the tactic. Celeb's usually are insecure so that's the isolation mechanism. But telling someone they're highly intelligent and "above the rest" could work to isolate as well. The same could be said for the JW's or most any "cult" for the most part. They all use the same basic steps to embrace and separate you from those around you to create a "reality" that is one more to their liking. You then exist within that reality. Any attempt to separate from that reality is faced with real and/or imagined consequences for you and/or people you care about. It's a simple, yet powerful, control mechanism. It works so well that people that are being controlled can spot it being used on others but not on themselves. This is why "intelligent" people fall in with the rest. They don't know they're being controlled. mwc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thurisaz Posted July 27, 2007 Share Posted July 27, 2007 How do otherwise intelligent, rational people get caught up in these ridiculous cults? 1. Welcome pal, greetings from storm-beaten Germany (in the good old days the storms waited until Fall before bothering us... oh well... ) 2. There's such a thing as "objective/subjective" evidence, and of course there's brainwashing. Not much needs to be said about the latter I trust... and as for the former: Strictly speaking, I'm also delusional inasmuch as I adhere to a religion without any objective evidence too. That's not to say that I see no evidence, however... it's just of a kind that won't convince any skeptic because it's not verifiable. If I told you that, for example, I was watching a far-away thunderstorm one night, spontaneously shouted a "Hail Thor, nice to have you around" into the sky, and immediately there was one long chain of lightning exactly above my location before it continued far away... would you say this proves my faith is true? Of course you won't - there's no way to know that I'm not lying or... well... delusional. As I see it, pretty much everyone has some things she accepts/believes/whatever without verifiable evidence (needn't be of the religious kind)... it's the "what do you believe and how much does it affect you" that's the question. Compare the average morontheist with all its gay- / abortion- / evolution- / whatever-hating with someone (like me) who 99 % of the time acts like everyone else around him Everyone has a right to (dis)believe whatever she sees fit... as long as she doesn't intrude on others' freedoms of belief et cetera. IMHO that should be the single criterium, really. And while one can easily get the impression that the problem is with religion as a whole (if you're surrounded by morontheists I guess it's hard to not come to this conclusion), methinks the real problem is dogma. Anything that mustn't be challenged. Whenever I think about it I find that whenever humans start embracing dogma, of any kind, disaster will follow. Just my 2 cents of course. Feel free to disagree. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Idoless Posted July 27, 2007 Share Posted July 27, 2007 Tom Cruise is pretty brain-numb as well. He has dyslexia and probably has never read a book cover to cover. Dyslexia doesn't equal stupidity. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carolyn the Red Posted July 27, 2007 Share Posted July 27, 2007 I've got a question that has plagued me for years, and some of you enlightened thinkers may provide an answer. How do otherwise intelligent, rational people get caught up in these ridiculous cults? My primary source of frustration is John Travolta. Accomplished actor, dancer, singer, and the guy is even licensed to fly commercial airliners. (I have an interest in aviation although diabetes ruined my personal experience). This otherwise bright man believes in Scientology! Perfectly rational, intelligent folks show up at my door handing out Watchtower tracts! In short, why do intelligent people insist that their lives are ruled by nonexistant spooks, boogers, and things that go bump in the night rather than, logic, reason, and proved science? Can I suggest a book? Why People Believe Weird Things has a chapter on why smart people believe weird things. I've studied a little psychology, and I've started to get more insight into how I make mistaken leaps of logic. I like to think I'm smart, but I've been taken in before. It's easy to say people fall for things because they aren't intelligent, but that makes it easy to not examine your own conceptions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
michie_s Posted July 27, 2007 Share Posted July 27, 2007 In short, why do intelligent people insist that their lives are ruled by nonexistant spooks, boogers, and things that go bump in the night rather than, logic, reason, and proved science? My suspicion is that the human race is deathly afraid of taking responsibility for their own actions. Larry Hi Larry, Welcome, I'm new here too. You raise a very interesting question. As someone that became a xian as an adult my situation was this. I was going through a very painful divorce at the time and xianity was a way to deal with those emotions. I got suckered in by the love, warmth, caring and understanding of the pastor and others at the church. They surrounded me with compassion and offered a solution to my needs - little did I know at the time that nothing comes without a price. In exchange I accepted the so called "free gift" of salvation and committed my life to god/jesus/it?!! By the time I was no longer in need of the church I was so deeply involved I was not event thinking for myself anymore. I was a successful, intelligent person outside of church but a moronic fundie-bot inside of it. There's no other way to put it. You give up so much to become and remain a xian, that in a sense you give up your mind as well. At least some brain cells survived and I eventually saw the cult for what it was. But when you are in it, everyone outside of your xian universe seems to be stupid not you! Michie S Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Llwellyn Posted July 27, 2007 Share Posted July 27, 2007 Tom Cruise is pretty brain-numb as well. He has dyslexia and probably has never read a book cover to cover. Dyslexia doesn't equal stupidity. That's right -- I'm sorry I said that. People with dyslexia can be very intelligent and even genius. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShackledNoMore Posted July 28, 2007 Share Posted July 28, 2007 Actually, I think there is a negative correlation between intelligence and belief. More intelligent individuals ARE less likely to believe the god myth. That being said, there are a few brilliant xians out there, as well as some non-believers who fall pretty low on the curve for intelligence. Intelligent or not, people believe for a variety of reasons: that they've been indoctrinated, or out of fear, out of basic insecurities--because they don't trust themselves control their darker impulses, or for other reasons. These reasons can apply to more gifted minds just like they can apply to the less astute. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WilliamFWN Posted July 28, 2007 Share Posted July 28, 2007 Tom Cruise is pretty brain-numb as well. He has dyslexia and probably has never read a book cover to cover. Dyslexia doesn't equal stupidity. That's right -- I'm sorry I said that. People with dyslexia can be very intelligent and even genius. Einstein's the poster-boy for intelligence and he had dyslexia. That's whom you were thinking about, right? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eccles Posted July 28, 2007 Share Posted July 28, 2007 This "religious madness" explains why so many countries have a poor opinion of Americans. Yanks are so thick and just because they have been brainwashed into believing the USA is a Christian Country they believe the buybullshit and all those preachers who use that stupid book to suck the money out of gullible people. As far as Scientology is concerned, how can it be accepted by law as a Church when it does not even believe in a 'god' and does not worship one. L. Ron Hubbard of course got it registered as a church for the tax exemptions. Freedom of Religion as part of the Constitution has proved to be dangerous. The "Holy" Roman Catholic Church has the best of both worlds: tax exempt status plus Vatican City is a sovereign state and exempt from the laws of any other country. Law breakers like paedophile priests can be moved to the Vatican to escape punishment. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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