New Weinland Blog

[Mr. Arkadin]

This is a difficult post for me to write, but the responsibility of the cog-pkg debacle does not rest entirely on the shoulders of RW, we must also place the onus on his followers for continuing to be complicit in RW’s dog-and-pony show.

RW’s followers are not interested in facts, nor do they care about their relationship with loved ones. They proudly stand in defiance of reality, and consciously chose to follow an alternate reality that suits their egocentric need for transcendent importance no matter how ridiculously phony it might be.

These are not nice people - they know that RW is a fraud, but their misguided pride is reminiscent of those who continued to shout “Sieg Heil” to their Fuhrer no matter the obvious atrocities that were committed in his name.

I can longer tolerate their intellectual dishonesty and blatant hypocrisy of the majority of cog-pkg members, and I will totally sever any remnant of communication with these people until they leave RW’s circus of deception where they actually enjoy jumping through the hoops of lies - I find this repugnant and they must be held equally responsible as RW going along with his imperious charade.

RW’s followers are not just beguiled victims, they are conscious participants in his destructive system who have nothing but contempt for their loved ones.

Maybe it is the “Identification with the Aggressor Syndrome,” whatever it is they have become as underhanded and uncaring as their idiotic leader RW, and I’m beyond analyzing the reasons for this phenomenon because I believe I know part of the answer: the followers’ characters are similar to the character of RW - and that’s a bitter pill to swallow.     

[Michael]

I just watched a movie called "Idiocracy".  Now, if that doesn't describe the world as I see it.  I feel like a character in another movie called "sixth sense".  I feel this way because I'm ready to tell all of you my secret now.........................I see idiots..............................They're all around me and they don't even know they're idiots.
Think about this.  Who makes more sense when you listen to them speak, ANY of your teachers from grade school or ANY politician, local or national news broadcaster, talk show host.....................starting to see any trend here?  Everytime I turn on the television, I see reruns.  Even the movies are trampling over the same old stuff.  Pink Floyd had it right.  "The sun is the same in a relative way but your older.  Shorter of breath and one day closer to death."  I'm actually starting to think that if we could live more than a hundred years that life would get down right boring.  The same old wake up, bath, cloth, work, wait, eat, needless worry, sleep routine.  Over and over and over again.
Or think about this.  One thing you will never be able to do for the rest of your life is experience things the way you did as a child.  You will never feel the way you felt on those early Christmas mornings.  You will never feel the way you did when you wore those new clothes to elementary school.  You will never feel those butterflies that came from your first real crush.  The songs you fell in love with will never make you feel as alive as they once did.
Pretty demoralizing, huh.  That's what following those COG's want you to feel.  And if you are visiting this site for the first time, you probably feel what I just described.  But read on.  There is hope.  You are not at the end of the rope.  You are at the beginning.  You have a life.  Make the most of it.

[Marie]

This is a difficult post for me to write, but the responsibility of the cog-pkg debacle does not rest entirely on the shoulders of RW, we must also place the onus on his followers for continuing to be complicit in RW’s dog-and-pony show.

Arkadin - you are right. It's really hard to face that family members - at some point - become complicit in the madness, but, they do. I THINK I know why my family is still hanging on, but, I will reserve my opinion for a while longer until I know for sure. I am sure the full reasons will come clear in the next few months. I HOPE I am wrong about my gut instinct about it.

From our side of the fence there is not much that can be done in the way of talking sense. In my case it is a completely closed subject. It is such a surreal circumstance. I have actually had more contact with my family in the last 3 weeks than I had in the previous 3 months and they act almost giddy. It is just so strange. And worrisome.

But, they are definately complicit to the plan of RW at this point. I see that. I don't count them as guiltless in the mess. They are perpetuating the lies - even if it is among their own children and paying into the "system" that is no more than a  brood of vipers spewing poison over the internet.

So sad. Hang in their Arkadin. Hopefully there will be a light at the end of the tunnel one of these days that will not be another oncoming train.

[PurpleHymnal]

Marie,

It's good to hear that your family has increased contact with you. The "giddiness" I have no answer for, except maybe they believe Weinland may be affecting "the critics"? I base this on the letter Bob Thiel received, exhorting him to "admit his personal health problems". As I said on the blog, I can't tell whether or not this indicates that Weinland and his elders are telling followers that the Two Witlesses are being successful in the slow-quick-deaths category, because of the silence on the subject of all things Weinland lately, or if they are actually naming Thiel and saying he's on his way out (he isn't BTW) because of the Witlesses and their "fiery words".

Have they said anything at all about "if by Pentecost"? Even to offer a rationalization for it? Or are you just not asking?

I wish you the best, and I hope everything turns out well for your family.

[Marie]

Hey PH,

I have not spoken directly with my family members in PKG about the Weinland comments in quite I while. I am just being open and available should they bring the subject up. Because of prior conversations they know my stand. I am also considered to be totally among the decieved since I practise Christmas and go to church on Sunday.

Having said that, I do have a sibling that has had some recent conversations with PKG family about Weinland's comments - in particular about setting dates. My PKG family seem to be hanging tight until sometime in July. I frankly find no comfort in that because I am afraid they will follow Weinland's lead and push that date back. But, I could be wrong. I have an idea as to why the are sticking around which I don't want to comment on right now, because I HOPE that I am wrong.

After the weekend and kind of thinking about their behavior - I wonder if they are not trying to overly compensate because they know the whole family (including the ones in Merideth's group) just think they are close to jumping off a cliff should Weinland suggest it. I did warn my PKG family a couple of years ago when I first started realizing what Weinland was preaching that HWA was on a similar prophetic path that ended in a big mess. My PKG family was so young when all that went down that they really couldn't relate to what I was saying at the time. Maybe some of my words from that conversation has been ringing in their ears.

I'm not sure. It could also be somewhat embarrassing to them because they have staked so much on Weinland being right. It is rather akward to face the truth of matters and deal with some of the folks you kind of cut off at the ankles. I remember feeling compelled to repair some damage to extended family members from my parent's decision to go into WCG cult. I was old enough to be the go between parents and the grandparents who were out of their minds with worry when we gave all the family up for WCG. That tapered off over the years as we stayed in WCG, but, it was very hard for me for the first 2 or 3 years my parent had joined.

After the exit from the cult - I did apologize for some of the really tactless ways my parents had handled family situations. My apology meant a whole lot to my grandparents. I was glad I was able to do that before they passed away. It was really part of a healing for me, too.

Hopefully some of the experiences I have went through post WCG will be helpful to my family in time. I appreciate your well wishes. It is helpful to vent some of the frustrations here, so as to be somewhat more grounded when the opportunity arises to speak with the PKG family.

[Mr. Arkadin]

Hi Marie and PH,

I hesitate to go into too many details about what prompted me to write a post clearly aimed at my family members in cog-pkg due to wanting to keep my anonymity intact.

As I stated before, one of my family members is actually an “elder” in cog-pkg, and with the conversion of the second family member me and my wife are treated more like acquaintances than family.

There is little interest in our lives since the second family member converted, me and my wife have become shadows within the family system. Marie, this question is directed toward you: do you think that the cog-pkg zealotry is a façade for deep-rooted family dynamics that are anchored in unresolved family conflicts?

I strongly feel that there is hostility that is cloaked in cog-pkg, both internal and external, that manifest in the guise of religious intolerance towards those who don’t belong (me and my wife) while in reality it is a way to act out previously concealed tensions in an indirect manner.

I have friends who converted to Buddhism and I never felt an ounce of rejection or hostility. I even know people who are born again evangelicals and they treat me and my wife with great concern and care.

I believe that the rejection of loved ones due to cog-pkg is a convenient method to act out unconscious or preconscious hostility toward family members circumventing honest discussion surrounding these issues.

What do you think?   

   
       

[Marie]

Arkadin - I was not going to comment on my gut instincts about the situation - but - since you asked a direct question, I will answer. I think you are exactly right on. 

It's like this whole religious thing with PKG members is possibly a direct response to deny dealing with a reality in the family dynamics rather than about God or "end-times" or anything else. It is like the whole experience is a covering; sacred in their minds, but see-through PLASTIC covering for deeply ingrained hostility and self-righteousness. It might not be that way for every member in PKG - although I believe they are all running from dealing with something.

I know about keeping anonymity and won't go into specifics either. But what you describe is EXACTLY my gut feeling - and it really makes me hurt in the pit of my stomach. Recent family gatherings can only be described as surreal. I am not exaggerating.

You are right we are treated as acquaintance. It is like we are diminished in importance as a loving family member. Complete rejection appears to possibly be imminent. My feeling when I am around them is that I just walked into a room of people that have been talking badly of me and they shut up and smile and put their "game face" on. I'm telling you it was all fake, fake, fake.

I believe it's a passive/aggressive response initiated to leave those who are the target as helpless to address it - because they are above reproach and above answering questions. We have been dismissed because of our belief - or in their terms -  unbelief.
 
I believe my parents had a version of the same issue when they were drawn into WCG decades ago. It just appears to me that Weinland's group is more harsh and intolerant in their stance.

Do you believe there is any hope that your family will renounce Weinland at some point in the future?

[Mr. Arkadin]

Marie, passive-aggressive behavior is a perfect, succinct description to describe my family members.

Me and my wife are treated with those phony smiles that mask hostility. The air of superiority of my relatives is palpable, it is filled with self-righteousness and is totally hypocritical.

Since my family members have been “chosen,” they lie with the greatest of ease. The lies are nullified because they are lying to we heathens, thus relieving guilt feelings surrounding their deceptiveness, but I believe that those feelings were present way before cog-pkg. They just feel more justified in their disingenuousness because they are in some psychotic piety that dismisses us with their righteousness intact.

The family member who is an elder will never renounce RW, he is too far gone and is a very controlling bitter man. If cog-pkg dissolves, he will just join another splinter group, he has done this in the past.

The other family member might be salvageable, but she not only worships RW, she worships her now blessed son. Talk about sibling rivalry!!!!

The elder is too entrenched in Armstrongism and can be quite nasty. The other family member still calls, although the conversations are nothing more than dancing around important issues concerning me and my wife. Support for us has evaporated - I don’t know if it will be rekindled somehow.    

[Marie]

Arkadin - my heart connects with the situation you and your wife are in. It sounds all too familiar. There are just so many similarities, it would seem, with people who are attracted to such manipulative psychological devices. To me, this is not spiritual in nature, it is psychological manipulation. And as you stated - there are perpetrators (Weinland) in the beginning and then some of the victims then become collaborators that turn into perpetrators. Sick process - I say!!

I was thinking about it today as I was driving between appointments, when you wrap your mind around a way of thinking so tightly, it begins to consume your identity. There is no openess or genuine dialogue - hardly - past the weather. And even that subject has now been hi-jacked by the all consuming Weinland theories! Thus, my anger at the waytendsaw and Todaysfate type talking that defends Weinland by being so consumed with current events being pounded into some prophetic event of biblical proportion.

I mean - tell me WHAT conversation you can reasonably engage in with the cog-pkg family member?

Politics - HELL no - there will not be a president sworn into office in January.
Weather - NO - already mentioned above
Health - NO - we are either on the "death list" or could be because of our mockery
Economy - NO the Euros are taking over soon.
Religion - double Hell NO -

You tell me - what CAN be reasonably discussed with your family member?

Then, if you are in a position of NEEDING support from family members due to some personal crisis you may be facing - well - for crying out loud - don't you know that WOULD BE YOUR FAULT because you have rejected Weinland.

Jimminy Crickets!! What a mess!!

One good thing on my end, the family is not yet bitter. Just superior in every respect.

[Mr. Arkadin]

Marie, this has been a wonderful and enlightening exchange, I sincerely thank you. The similarities between our situations is striking, and what you have posted touched me deeply due to our commonality concerning our families.

It’s time for me to hit the sack, I’m exhausted, but this has been the most informative discussion I’ve had on this forum.

I will keep you abreast of any changes in my family situation.

Have a goodnight and a wonderful day.

[Marie]

Mr. Arkadin, have a wonderful night, too! I must be hitting it, big day tomorrow with the sandbags.

[PurpleHymnal]

I know I'm coming in late, and likely a conversation that has already concluded, but I do want to say that Marie and Arkadin's descriptions of their family's attitudes and demeanours pretty much described the bulk of my childhood, when dealing with extended family members.

If it makes either of you feel any better, I was a "true believer" --- and I managed to turn around my attitudes OK I think. At least with regards to extended family.

What you were saying, about having "a gut feeling" you know why your family members are still going along with it, and why they now seem to be collaborators, fits very closely with what Lifton described as "Mystical Manipulation", to wit:

MYSTICAL MANIPULATION (Planned spontaneity)

• Extensive personal manipulation
• Seeks to promote specific patterns of behavior and emotion in such a way that it appears to have arisen spontaneously from within the environment, while it actually has been orchestrated
• Totalist leaders claim to be agents chosen by God, history, or some supernatural force, to carry out the mystical imperative
• The “principles” (God-centered or otherwise) can be put forcibly and claimed exclusively, so that the cult and its beliefs become the only true path to salvation (or enlightenment)
• The individual then develops the psychology of the pawn, and participates actively in the manipulation of others
• The leader who becomes the center of the mystical manipulation (or the person in whose name it is done) can be sometimes more real than an abstract god and therefore attractive to cult members
• Legitimizes the deception used to recruit new members and/or raise funds, and the deception used on the “outside world”

So, while your family members may appear to be collaborators in the Weinland fiasco, in reality they may not be completely responsible for their complicity in controlling others within the group. That is a fairly broad generalization though, and may not apply to someone in a leadership position in the group, as they are more likely to not have any belief whatsoever in the totalitarian doctrines that are being preached.

I hope this helped, and hang in there! July will come, soon enough. Hopefully Weinland can only move the dates ahead so far, before everyone wakes up. (Or at least the bulk of the membership does.)

[Sunny]

Mr. Ardadin, Marie and PH,

You each, in your discussion, have TOTALLY described my situation and family dynamics.  I don't have the vocabulary or literary skills to put it into words, so I'm Thankful you guys had this discussion.

I can tell you and any reader's of this forum, a person MUST REALLY WANT a relationship with family who are members of PKG or ANY of the splinter groups for that matter if you continue to deal with them in this situation.  It is much easier to count it all as a loss and move on.  I have sections of my family that are totally unknown and might as well be dropped off the face of the Earth because when my folks joined WCG, they no longer communicated.  After years of "separation" (yet still within easy driving distance) the family ties just aren't tied any longer.  People who join WCG or its splinters...just DO NOT CARE about their families.  They will NOT fight to keep the relationship going...as time passes, if you leave it up to them, you won't see them anymore.  You MAY receive a call when they die for funeral notifications...

Anyone in the splinters who deny this are LIARS!

I've been wondering for the last couple of weeks if I should just stop calling, emailing or "bothering" them anymore.  See if they EVER call me...??  Okay...here let me tell you, MOST...MOST of my immeadiate family and IN-laws (including in-law siblings) are IN various splinters.  Praise GOD, I have ONE sibling and their family who left WCG when I left.  EVERYONE else is in it...  I seriously doubt I would hear from MOST of ALL of my DNA shared people and my husband's DNA shared people except once every FEW YEARS if it were left up to them.

It's all crazy.  The family that isn't really a family...

I don't know what I'm going to do...  My kids say their grandparents, their aunts/uncles, wouldn't cross the street to save them from a flood....

:-(

[Marie]

PH - I have read most of the links you provide about Lifton. It is really amazing how the cult techniques and resulting mentality can be described in such detail in psychology!

As you state, we really don't know the depth our family is involved -whether they be victims or perpetrators or somewhere in between. I HOPE and PRAY they are not in as deep as it seems in my case. I can only wait and see.

I'm pretty much thinking from Mr. Arkadin - PH - and Sunny's post that this is just par for the course for WCG type organizations and the splinters that have formed along the way. And Sunny is totally right when she says that it takes an incredible amount of effort to maintain relationships with any of the cog's. I have one family member that is in a splinter that is becoming more and more receptive - I am almost wondering if there is something in the works toward exiting. That would be such a great thing! But, I definately will not get my hopes up or hold my breath for fear of turning more purple than the old hymnal. 

It pretty much makes me sick at my stomach that I was involved in such a system. I elevated myself above people in school and such when I was a teen - thinking I pretty much had life figured out and KNEW the truth. Gag! There were soooooo many people I realized I need to apologize to after the blinders began falling off.

Sometimes a situation will happen and these AWFUL words I once spoke to some poor soul come ringing back into my rembrance. I really ask God to forgive me and promise that if I ever see that person again I will apologize for my self-righteous - know - it - all attitude! I could cover my face in shame sometimes for the thought of it!!

Thankfully, we all - that are posting here who have renounced Armstrongism - are making a good life for ourselves; seeking truth and keeping our heads up and looking around rather than burying them in the sand hoping that the world will end soon so that we don't have to deal with our problems.

Thank God for clear, sunny skies!
And if you don't believe in God - thanks for clear, sunny skies!

[PurpleHymnal]

Sunny is right about those death notifications --- the converted parent ended up not going to quite a few family funerals, thanks to that side of the family being "enslaved by the great whore of babylon"

The few times we did visit while we were in, I felt (and probably acted like) An Anthropologist on Mars!! It wouldn't have been so bad, except for the endless fights about (you guessed it) church and food. I always packed several layers of books, found a good corner to hide in, and stayed out of the crossfire. While siding with the converted parent of course.

There are things I regret from my past, and the British-Israelism and anti-Semitism are two big things I will never forgive myself for. Even though I had absolutely no way of knowing any better, and I would have probably self-censored anything approaching the REAL truth about such beliefs that chanced to cross my path anyways.

The more I read Lifton, and the old church literature, the more I see how very, very, very, very brainwashed I actually was.