Quick, this is a quiz, Name the three signs?
Couldn't do it, could you?
However, we spent every weekday in rules rap,the seven step rap and the three signs rap and sexual confession rap (boys and girls rap).
Okay, lets start with what the three signs were;
1) Think, think, think
2) First things first
3) easy does it.
They were posted on the wall, silly.
Next quiz question, what were the purpose of the three signs and the endless "raps" about these special powerfull tools that we used to get straight?
This is my take. They were meaningless except as a demonstration of cultic submission. The actual content was so meaningless,You didn't even remember what they were, did you?(hahaha).
my explanation. The three signs were held up as one of the special methods Art gifted us as tools to the straight seedling life. In actuality, the "sign raps" were used, just like the rules rap, to demonstrate our submission to the group and our readiness to adopt cultic group behavior.
We would enter into these raps in a weakened emotional and physical state. We would be tired, hungry restless. We were made to look straight ahead at the rap leader, to "motivate" our excitement at our participation, and weren't even allowed to sit back in our chair without knuckles poked and prodded into us from behind. Any failure to completely submit and comply, not matter how small, would result in immediate and severe punishment.
It would be then that the sign rap would begin. John Underwood or some other tyrant would come sit in the stool and bellow "Okay someone tell me what the first sign is and what it means to you".
This is when anyone actually thinking (ie: cult slang-getting into your head) would have to stop doing so and motivate his/her desire to answer this question.
answer:
"the first sign is Think, think think. This means to me that........"
Now, it was TOTALLY UNIMPORTANT what it meant to you. What was important was that you answered in the manner and method expected by the cult.
You had to answer the question in your own words but expousing the group philosophy. If it sounded insincere, you were "come down on" for giving "pat answers". If it was some alternative explanation derived from your actual thought process, you were in even bigger trouble. What was important was that you could convincingly regurgitate the cultic line in your own words in a sincere and convincing fashion.
If you cleared these hurdles, the leader would say "okay, who can tell me the next sign?"
"first things first means to me to always put my sobriety ahea.........."
regurgitate cultic group identity/behavior.
What the three signs actually were mattered not one iota. what mattered was the regurgitation of the group meaning and the adoption of the group identity as your own.
The three signs could have easily been this;
1) jack be nimble jack be quick
2) run don't walk
3) slippery when wet.
The point being that the content was irrelevant, it was the action that mattered.
Discussion?
