Weemie
MyPTSD Pro
This one's been in my drafts for a long f*cking time. Mostly because to speak of these things requires definition && it is challenging to come up with an overtly scientific explanation of what exactly these things are. Yet it is apparent all over the world and in a variety of situations and demographics including ethnicity and age that this phenomenon exists on some level.
The context that I am interested in discussing is within the realm of organized groups. Whether they be the military, re-education camps, organized crime, rebel groups, cults and religious groups, gangs, and/or other violent non-state parties. According to Wikipedia, indoctrination is defined as:
Brainwashing is conversely defined as:
As a relatively scientific person and having attempted to tackle these concepts very recently in therapy I have encountered a variety of materials some of which are more fantastical than others. The concepts of mind-control seem far-fetched to me, and yet I spent a significant portion of my childhood convinced that my superiors could read my mind and thus I refused to allow myself to think in ways that contradicted their demands on me. This contributed to my compliance with their expectation that I act autonomously (without being physically forced by them).
My first introduction to this was as an 8 year old and at 8 it is said that human beings are still forming the finer intricacies of affective empathy (a common refrain in the book I'm currently reading is that "often, the adults were more petrified of the children than other adults, as the children could not be reasoned with and had no concept of the value of human life.")
This was the seductive nature of my training. I was told that if I was strong, I could do what I wanted & would never have to be told what to do ever again. When I was in school and someone said something to me I attacked them. I broke their bones. I screamed and lunged and terrified them and they quickly left me alone and avoided me. I took what I wanted, I did what I wanted, I said what I wanted. There was no fear. You could not punish me or ground me or take away my toys. If I wanted drugs, or money, or toys, or booze, I got it. If I wanted others to fear me, they did.
Yet I also experienced a form of cognitive dissonance whereby I understood what was happening was wrong & took steps, as futile as they were, to try and protect others from our circumstances. So, as "brainwashed" as I was, I was still not completely subsumed by my environment. One phrase that comes up frequently in my research is something known as appetitive aggression which is the concept that the more exposed to violence people (& especially children) are, the more they internalize violent impulses & gain pleasure and enjoyment from them.
Most of my opinions that were influenced by these people came as a result of my own personal experiences with other groups as well as the police. I was not just beaten and tortured until my mind bent around this new moral structure, I also witnessed the truth of what they were saying at the time. As well as witnessing violence against us and experiencing it against me. It was obvious to me that these people were the enemy. && while we were not "the good guys," I had accepted my role as a bad guy who belonged to this family & anyone who aggressed against us deserved punishment or even death.
Yet in the military of North America, the minimum age of admission is generally in adulthood && boot camp can produce similar results even in those who have a solid moral, ethical and personal foundation (aka an adult). One of my old friends, an ex-marine, described it as "totally and completely, 100%, brainwashing. && if one was resistant to it, they would be discharged as a failure-to-adjust."
One aspect of indoctrination that I believe is very difficult & challenging for outsiders to fully grasp is that it changes the way you view the world and it changes your morality and it changes the way you view yourself. As easy as it is for others to tell me that it isn't my fault, I cannot believe that because I viewed myself as an equal member of my group and I wanted to be viewed as such and respected as such. The idea that I was not at fault and ergo not responsible for my behavior, means that my sense of myself is wrong. My family was not my family, my people were not my people, I was not myself.
There are also conflicts when dealing with indoctrination of the potential actions that said parties are forced into. With indoctrination there is a goal, a purpose beyond mindlessness: the goal is to replace your current moral structures with the moral structures of the group. The group is right and those who would oppose the group are wrong. There are specific thoughts, feelings and values that are repetitively pressed upon you. And when this occurs as a child, it calls into question something called mens rea, or "guilty mind." Meaning, if one commits a crime as a result of being indoctrinated, are they morally responsible for said crime?
So what happens when mens rea intersects with forcible, repetitive, long-term conditioning? And is this something only applicable to children or is this also something that we may see in adults? Look at the epidemic of police brutality in the United States today. The culture of policing in the USA (& indeed in many countries around the world) is specific and insular.
Police officers are encouraged to protect one another even in the face of corruption && and as a result, some police officers may feel entitled to act with impunity. They, much like myself as a child, believe that they can do whatever they like without consequence and this behavior is potentially reinforced by their environment. Is this a form of indoctrination, or at the very least coercive peer pressure?
In the case of Patty Hearst (who was abducted at 19) it was somewhat obvious that she was manipulated into partaking in her crimes -- though like myself, she did maintain a "moral sense" of her own even if it was fractured into multiple pieces. & during the commission of one of her crimes, repeatedly asked the victim "are you OK, are you OK?" & during the robbery, the other members of the organization pointed their weapons at her instead of their victims, presumably so she would comply more deeply with her role. Yet, when she was interrogated, her affiliation was undeniably with them & she became enraged and angry at the insinuation otherwise.
And at what point do you stop being indoctrinated and start being responsible for your own agency?
A lot of this post is definitive: it attempts to define the circumstances of indoctrination and brainwashing and different common examples. But as this is Let's Talk, the ultimate purpose is to open a conversation around the subject that encourages people from all walks of life to discuss their experiences with these topics. As this is a fairly sensitive topic the typical rules of this series apply. Respect others, respect their experiences, tread carefully && take care of yourself if you need a break.
It [brainwashing] can also be a theme in science fiction and in political and corporate culture, but is not generally accepted as a scientific term.
The context that I am interested in discussing is within the realm of organized groups. Whether they be the military, re-education camps, organized crime, rebel groups, cults and religious groups, gangs, and/or other violent non-state parties. According to Wikipedia, indoctrination is defined as:
Indoctrination is the process of inculcating a person with ideas, attitudes, cognitive strategies or professional methodologies (see doctrine). Doctrine (from Latin: doctrina, meaning "teaching, instruction") is a codification of beliefs or a body of teachings or instructions, taught principles or positions, as the essence of teachings in a given branch of knowledge or in a belief system.
Brainwashing is conversely defined as:
A forcible indoctrination to induce someone to give up basic political, social, or religious beliefs and attitudes and to accept contrasting regimented ideas. Brainwashing (also known as mind control, menticide, coercive persuasion, thought control, thought reform, and forced re-education) is the concept that the human mind can be altered or controlled by certain psychological techniques. Brainwashing is said to reduce its subjects' ability to think critically or independently, to allow the introduction of new, unwanted thoughts and ideas into their minds,[1] as well as to change their attitudes, values and beliefs.
As a relatively scientific person and having attempted to tackle these concepts very recently in therapy I have encountered a variety of materials some of which are more fantastical than others. The concepts of mind-control seem far-fetched to me, and yet I spent a significant portion of my childhood convinced that my superiors could read my mind and thus I refused to allow myself to think in ways that contradicted their demands on me. This contributed to my compliance with their expectation that I act autonomously (without being physically forced by them).
My first introduction to this was as an 8 year old and at 8 it is said that human beings are still forming the finer intricacies of affective empathy (a common refrain in the book I'm currently reading is that "often, the adults were more petrified of the children than other adults, as the children could not be reasoned with and had no concept of the value of human life.")
I liked it in the army because we could do anything we liked to do. When some civilian had something I liked, I just took it without him doing anything to me.
This was the seductive nature of my training. I was told that if I was strong, I could do what I wanted & would never have to be told what to do ever again. When I was in school and someone said something to me I attacked them. I broke their bones. I screamed and lunged and terrified them and they quickly left me alone and avoided me. I took what I wanted, I did what I wanted, I said what I wanted. There was no fear. You could not punish me or ground me or take away my toys. If I wanted drugs, or money, or toys, or booze, I got it. If I wanted others to fear me, they did.
Yet I also experienced a form of cognitive dissonance whereby I understood what was happening was wrong & took steps, as futile as they were, to try and protect others from our circumstances. So, as "brainwashed" as I was, I was still not completely subsumed by my environment. One phrase that comes up frequently in my research is something known as appetitive aggression which is the concept that the more exposed to violence people (& especially children) are, the more they internalize violent impulses & gain pleasure and enjoyment from them.
Most of my opinions that were influenced by these people came as a result of my own personal experiences with other groups as well as the police. I was not just beaten and tortured until my mind bent around this new moral structure, I also witnessed the truth of what they were saying at the time. As well as witnessing violence against us and experiencing it against me. It was obvious to me that these people were the enemy. && while we were not "the good guys," I had accepted my role as a bad guy who belonged to this family & anyone who aggressed against us deserved punishment or even death.
Yet in the military of North America, the minimum age of admission is generally in adulthood && boot camp can produce similar results even in those who have a solid moral, ethical and personal foundation (aka an adult). One of my old friends, an ex-marine, described it as "totally and completely, 100%, brainwashing. && if one was resistant to it, they would be discharged as a failure-to-adjust."
One aspect of indoctrination that I believe is very difficult & challenging for outsiders to fully grasp is that it changes the way you view the world and it changes your morality and it changes the way you view yourself. As easy as it is for others to tell me that it isn't my fault, I cannot believe that because I viewed myself as an equal member of my group and I wanted to be viewed as such and respected as such. The idea that I was not at fault and ergo not responsible for my behavior, means that my sense of myself is wrong. My family was not my family, my people were not my people, I was not myself.
People who have been morally compromised in this way experience “moral dislocation.” When people are morally compromised, the standard rules of moral exchange might not apply.
There are also conflicts when dealing with indoctrination of the potential actions that said parties are forced into. With indoctrination there is a goal, a purpose beyond mindlessness: the goal is to replace your current moral structures with the moral structures of the group. The group is right and those who would oppose the group are wrong. There are specific thoughts, feelings and values that are repetitively pressed upon you. And when this occurs as a child, it calls into question something called mens rea, or "guilty mind." Meaning, if one commits a crime as a result of being indoctrinated, are they morally responsible for said crime?
Think about the way parents respond to their children’s bad actions; parents start holding their children responsible for what they do at an early age. Even if they lack the same sorts of reasoning capacities or impulse control as adults, we still see them as the authors of their actions and we still hold them accountable albeit in different ways. We might think their mens rea is diminished, but it isn’t absent.
So what happens when mens rea intersects with forcible, repetitive, long-term conditioning? And is this something only applicable to children or is this also something that we may see in adults? Look at the epidemic of police brutality in the United States today. The culture of policing in the USA (& indeed in many countries around the world) is specific and insular.
Police officers are encouraged to protect one another even in the face of corruption && and as a result, some police officers may feel entitled to act with impunity. They, much like myself as a child, believe that they can do whatever they like without consequence and this behavior is potentially reinforced by their environment. Is this a form of indoctrination, or at the very least coercive peer pressure?
Now, new research published today in the journal Nature Human Behavior suggests that retaining misbehaving officers in police organizations may have far worse consequences than leaving accusations unaddressed: It could actually propagate misconduct itself.
In the case of Patty Hearst (who was abducted at 19) it was somewhat obvious that she was manipulated into partaking in her crimes -- though like myself, she did maintain a "moral sense" of her own even if it was fractured into multiple pieces. & during the commission of one of her crimes, repeatedly asked the victim "are you OK, are you OK?" & during the robbery, the other members of the organization pointed their weapons at her instead of their victims, presumably so she would comply more deeply with her role. Yet, when she was interrogated, her affiliation was undeniably with them & she became enraged and angry at the insinuation otherwise.
And at what point do you stop being indoctrinated and start being responsible for your own agency?
“The time you are threatened all the time is when you are still new. But when you are a real soldier, a good fighter already been trained, you are now respected.”
A lot of this post is definitive: it attempts to define the circumstances of indoctrination and brainwashing and different common examples. But as this is Let's Talk, the ultimate purpose is to open a conversation around the subject that encourages people from all walks of life to discuss their experiences with these topics. As this is a fairly sensitive topic the typical rules of this series apply. Respect others, respect their experiences, tread carefully && take care of yourself if you need a break.
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