Treatment Abuse, Behavior Modification, Thought Reform > The Seed Discussion Forum

Group Think

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marshall:
http://www.cultsock.ndirect.co.uk/MUHom ... index.html

Excerpts from the link:

"When we find ourselves in groups we inevitably find ourselves in the minority occasionally. Generally speaking, we will feel a little uncomfortable with that situation, which explains why we generally seek out groups with interests similar to our own. Imagine, though, that you are in a group where you are sure you are right and everyone else is wrong. Would you yield to group pressure and go along with everyone else?

In Asch's experiments, a group of people were seated around a table. Of these all but one were actually the experimenters confederates. The group was shown a display of vertical lines of different lengths and were asked to say which of the lines was the same length as another standard line.

One after another, the members of the group announced their decision. The confederates had been asked to give the incorrect response. The subject sat in the next to last seat so that all but one had given their obviously incorrect answer before s/he gave hers/his. Even though the correct answer was always obvious, the average subject conformed to the group response on 32% of the trials and 74% of the subjects conformed at least once.

On the face of it, an astonishing result. The correct answer was entirely obvious. Subjects had to override the very clear evidence of their own senses to give an answer conforming to the others'. Why did they do it?  When interviewed afterwards, subjects all said that they had been influenced by the pressure from the rest of the group. This, on the face of it, may appear to be an example of 'groupthink'.

Many said that they did not want to appear silly. That ties in with Rom Harré's claim that one of our secondary needs is a need for 'social respect', which includes the need to avoid looking ridiculous in front of others, the need to avoid criticism from others. That need would be likely to motivate us to seek compromise with others.

 There have been other experiments which have tended to confirm Asch's results by and large. Crutchfield's lengthier and more complex experiments seem to confirm a correlation between high intelligence and other personality traits and low conformity."

groupthink - the phenomenon whereby members of a group will not wish to risk any danger to group cohesion by expressing 'deviant' opinions. The decision of Kennedy to invade Cuba is often given as an example. Many of his advisers actually disagreed with his decision, but were unwilling to express deviant views. More recently Reagan's Strategic Defence Initiative ('Star Wars') seems to have developed in a similar way."

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This experiment (Asch) seems to suggest that we could have been told that black is white or most any outrageous falsehood at the Seed (or other peer-pressure based program) and a large proportion of us would have gone along with the group and agreed. If our need to conform is so basic that most of us will agree with the group even when this contradicts our own senses, those types of programs could indeed be used to sway thinking in any way chosen by the group leaders. I would guess that the effect would be even greater on younger adolescents or children.

Note too that the Asch experiment involved a one-time judgment, not an ongoing series of contradictory information on a daily (10 or 12 hours per day) basis. It's hard to imagine the power of such a concerted effort over months or years. Oh wait. I don't have to imagine it! :silly:

Antigen:

--- Quote ---On 2005-12-18 22:01:00, marshall wrote:

This experiment (Asch) seems to suggest that we could have been told that black is white or most any outrageous falsehood at the Seed (or other peer-pressure based program) and a large proportion of us would have gone along with the group and agreed.

--- End quote ---


Yup, and to some degree, this seperates us from normal folk who have not been served a potent slice of it. But step back and take a broader view. Let's take something that's been in the papers a lot lately; school yard bullying. We all had our opinions and strategies when we were kids. But that all had to fit somewhere within the given social framework. Otherwise, it was a mighty hard row to ho and we all did have at least some choices.

So how did we do that? You must admit that some horrible things happened in school and in the neighborhood. And we all checked each other's faces before deciding what to make of any of it.

The Program, and it's victims/veterans/survivors, are not really that unique and seperate from the rest of society. It's a matter of degrees. We got a potent slice of it served up by a bunch of self important do-gooders. I think we're all (who bother to stay in touch, anyway) either alergic to it and/or addicted to it. But it's really all the same ingredients, isn't it?
Suppose you were an idiot.  And suppose you were a member of Congress.  But I repeat myself.
Mark Twain
--- End quote ---

Johnny G:
These are the ingredients for the police state - lack public dissent against the "leadership" everyone (except a few "true believers) has doubts or knows the prevailing view to be bullshit however...

Anyone who questions the status quo is immediately shouted down or worse. Everyone is pulled in to participate in the punishment of the unfortunate dissenter, thereby showing their loyalty.  This prevents any cohesion among the opposition and reinforces the aloneness of the dissenter, and strength of the group.  

The easy path is to not stick out, mouth the party line when spoken to, put the radio by the door so the secret police can hear you listening to the furhers speech.

As said earlier, this is what keeps the group going, the signs and steps are immaterial;  Fear and peer pressure are the main ingredients.  You are either with us or against us, seeling or a druggie...

I think what makes stepcraft survivors different is that we have participated in the Asch experiment writ large, and know what we (and others)are capable of in that situation.  

After a while on the program, the ideals of loyalty, honesty, integrity, and character start to seem pretty hollow as you realize what you are and are not capable of while sitting in the group watching someone you thought was your friend get humiliated in front of the world - and you look like you want join in (you have your hand up, don't you?)  

The sad thing is how many of us felt the same, but were afraid to express it.

We are conditioned thru a year of pre school, a year of kindergarden, 12 years of school, the church (most any church wil do) to listen to the authority (the teacher, staff member, boss) to do as we are told, the authority has the answer - not you.  this creates good little citezens and workers.  

And you thought school was here to teach you to read.

It sounds so simple but how many are really willing to exercise free will when it might hurt?

Anonymous:
I guess thats where having balls comes in ::bigsmilebounce::  ::bigsmilebounce::

cleveland:
Good comments, Johnny G.

It is amazing how hard it is to resist peer pressure.

I was just reading a book by David Sedaris, and he wrote this whole chapter about being a kid and wanting to be cool, and how ashamed he was to be caught trying to be accepted. About how badly he wanted to have this suede vest, and how when he bought it it was imitation, and that when he wore it, the hippy girl he was trying to impress laughed at him.(Book title: Dress Your Family in Courderoy and Denim). He ends the chapter with how much, looking back, he can hardly wait to be the person who can dress as they want, talk as they want, and think as they want without imagining how it is coming off to everyone.

And while the Seed gave me the ability to stop trying to be 'cool,' it set it's own standards of conformity that were even steeper in some ways.

It doesn't take 'balls' to be yourself - it takes having empathy for others and realizing that we're all human. I suppose that is maturity.

[ This Message was edited by: cleveland on 2005-12-20 12:58 ]

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