Thanks, Stephanie! I only know about Steve Hassan’s site, so the rest of them will be of GREAT interest. I’m glad you have a life outside the Bunker, though…we ALL need some Real Life…

Hi Betsy … sorry so late in reply. Life away from the Bunker has been a bit overwhelming. I have some great links for you to explore re hypnosis and cults. Also check out the Amazing Randi and Steve Hassan’s Freedom of Mind website.

https://www.freedomofmind.com/

Here are all the other fascinating sites:

http://www.carolgiambalvo.com/unethical-hypnosis-in-destructive-cults.html
http://www.decision-making-confidence.com/hypnotic-mind-control.html
http://www.culthelp.info/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=32&Itemid=6
http://www.hypnosisnetwork.com/articles/beware-the-cult-of-personality
http://www.drlwilson.com/Articles/HYPNOSIS.htm
Have fun digging in! Steph

Getting right to the intelligent substance, bravo!

I know the feeling well lol.

That’s a relief! I thought my memory had slipped very badly. No worries.

I am the one that is confused. I am so sorry. I have realized that I got you mixed up with gabbyone. She is the one that had the $cien dental horror story. I thought it was you. Oy vey.

Oh okay. I’ll link you to it with a reply. It might take me a few minutes to find it though.

We’re getting closer. I found the blog and the article about the dentist. Remind me what I said. My memory isn’t what it used to be. I’m 72. Not that that is an excuse, but it seems to be my current reality.

I was glad you mentioned the hypnosis thing! That seems to be a major part of what happens to people in cults. I didn’t know about it until Jon Atack talked about it in his second-day Dublin talk. Then Mockingbird gave out the Margaret Singer site. Apparently a lot of study has been done on this. A “light trance” effect, which Hubbard actually mentioned in one of his early talks, happens when people stare at something in the middle distance (like one of the TRs) for a long time; or when they have learned to focus on a single thing to the point that they “disassociate”…temporarily lose their connection with things around them. In real meditation situations, like those in Buddhism, this phenomenon is understood and meditators understand that it is not a “real” state and simply observe it. But in meditation cults and Scientology, to name a few, it is hyped as a special power…like LRH’s thing about externalization. So followers are actually encouraged to disassociate. This is one more way of cutting them off from reality…and preparing them to do things they wouldn’t have agreed to do before the cult.

I’m really interested in this! It’s actually (I learned from Jon Atack) closely related to the techniques hard-sell salesmen use to get people to buy things they don’t want! In other words, it’s a form of manipulation that occurs in everyday life, in much less concentrated ways than in cults, of course, but it affects our ability to use critical thinking about, say, political movements. Chris Shelton is also looking at this.

If you find any interesting stuff relating to this and are interested, I do hope you’ll let me know. (Save the notification you get of this reply to you, and you can respond on this page, without worrying about disrupting whatever the Bunker is discussing.)

Sure. The dentist thing is on his blog entry dated March 2nd. The link for the front page of his blog is:
http://scientologybollocks.blogspot.co.uk/

Oh, and his e-mail is: media_lush@hotmail.com