Indoctrination & Cults

I'm reading "The Running Grave" by Robert Galbraith (J K Rowling). It's a huge book, 1200 pages, all about a Cult.

Indoctrination is the process of teaching a person or group to accept a set of unshakable beliefs uncritically & often irrationally. We can see evidence of indoctrination in educational institutions, the state, the arts, culture, and the media. People are indoctrinated in many ways;-

• Selective presentation: Presenting only certain facts and ideas to support specific beliefs
• One-sided arguments: Using incomplete or biased arguments
• Suppression of evidence: Deliberately withholding or falsifying evidence
• Emotional slogans: Using impassioned slogans to promote a belief
• Preaching: Using a preaching style instead of teaching

 This is achieved in a variety of ways in cults;-

• Separating new members from their families, friends, and jobs
• Forcing new members to give up their money, belongings, and bodies to the cult
• Compelling new members to marry people they just met
• Using punishment, deprivation, and other tactics to wear down new members

The more I observe what is happening in our country & the world in general, the more concerned I get that people are being manipulated & even indoctrinated by our very sophisticated technological methods of communication. The very fact that the BBC now has to have a department devoted to fact checking & the secret services have the 77th Brigade shows how unreliable the information we are presented with can be. 

I no longer take any information from news media for granted. I certainly distrust social media & the internet in general. I always try to check out my sources of information & look at several. The most important facility I have is my gut reaction to information. If it doesn't walk like a duck & quack like a duck, then it isn't a duck.

But I have the time to do all that. I am well educated & most importantly I tend towards critical disbelief of information that seems "off". The really worrying fact is that quite a lot of people will accept information, however bizarre, at face value. You only have to look at the many 2024 "conspiracy theories" to be seriously concerned;-

• Vaccine efficiency
• October 7th Denial
• Severe weather generated by bad actors
• Trumps assassination attempts a PR stunt
• False narratives about the Israel Hamas war

Worryingly indoctrination does work on some people. If that indoctrination begins in childhood via parents or schools, it can be lethal. It can be really difficult to separate truth from fiction especially for young impressionable minds. False news is everywhere. People with power, money & influence are realising just what they can achieve in our instant news era.

We all should be very aware & very afraid. We all need to value truth.