From: dagoski	Date: November 14th, 2005 06:38 pm (UTC)		(Link)

I think there's been some research done on this, actually. Specifically with regard to cults. I'd try lit searches on moral development as well. Erickson(I think) developed a model of moral/ethical development that parallels the milestones you mentioned. I bet someone has done research into how kids in isolated communities develop. I would also try to see how Elfreda Chatman's work on Information Poverty might apply. She's an information scientitist so you'll find her work in librarian journals. Going darker, I would look and see if anyone's done any solid work about former members of The Hitler Youth, since they lived in an environment that parallels some of the more extreme dominionist groups. I hate to use the Nazi comparison, but it does seem to apply in many ways.

	From: dogemperor	Date: November 14th, 2005 07:17 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Actually, there's suprisingly *little* info on people who are walkaways from coercive groups.

This is due to three reasons:

a) Sadly, if someone is in a coercive group, very often one isn't even *afforded* the ability to walk out--people who do not walk away as teenagers who are raised in coercive groups often never successfully leave them. (This is why dominionist groups have such an emphasis on dominionist-run homeschool groups, "Christian Alternatives" to the Girl Scouts, and even dominionist-run *colleges* like Patrick Henry College--it's specifically to keep folks from ever having the *chance* to walk away.)

b) Most people who are walkaways who were raised in a coercive religious group are probably better known as *throwaways*. (This is the case with at least one of the studies performed, as well as with one of the single largest groups of dominionist "walkaways"--gay/lesbian/bi/trans youth.)

c) Because of the fact that (except in rare, exceptional circumstances) most people who are walkaways end up in therapy *years* after walking away (if they were raised in a coercive group) and come in maybe one or two at a time, very few people outside of exit counselors ever notice a pattern of abuse from the same group.

There *are* starting to be a few studies of walkaways who were raised in coercive religious groups, but these are quite recent (in the past few years, especially as it's being realised that "bible-based" groups can in fact be coercive). Rick Ross probably has had the most personal experience (as far as exit counselors) re dominionist coercive groups, and the Cultic Studies Journal does research including on the effects of being raised in a coercive group.

This is an area of research that is relatively new, though (it's actually only been within the past ten years that "Bible-based" groups in *general* have been recognised as potentially coercive, so it's only now that subsets like kids raised in those groups are being studied).

	From: dagoski	Date: November 14th, 2005 07:30 pm (UTC)		(Link)

I can certainly see why little work would be done. In order to study the community and its children, you'd have to get their permission. Good luck there. Maybe JR Bob Dobbs would persuasive enough, but I sense any psychologist/sociologist looking to a study that might come to unflattering conclusions would receive a hostile reception at best.

Still, you're talking about behavior that parallels(or flat out is) cult like. I'd have thought there would some work done in wake of 1970s and all the cult survivors left over from that period. I see a lot of work in information science done in disadvantaged and isolated groups that would probably apply directly. Unfortunately that's mostly work on adults. And it would be a stretch to work done on people stuck in poverty and isolation by circumstance vs people being actively restrained by a coercive group.

	From: dogemperor	Date: November 14th, 2005 07:42 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Again, most of the people who were walkaways at that point were people without children (or who had very young children).

It's also of note that many coercive religious groups (and this is by no means restricted to dominionist groups) will actively fight to keep children from being removed. Most people who have kids tend to involve themselves deeply within the cult, sadly. (In other words, by the time they involve themselves to the point they are raising a *family* in it, they're usually quite indoctrinated.)

It also does not in general help that most coercive religious groups (including dominionist groups) are hostile at best to psychological study (for obvious reasons).

There IS information available that could be of relevance (for example, to psychiatrists or social workers wishing to remove a child from a potentially abusive dominionist family or assist that child in applying for legal emancipation) regarding child custody and coercive religious groups that may be relevant in the larger role of longterm effects of coercive group involvement in kids:

http://www.csj.org/infoserv_articles/greene_ford_litigating_custody_with_cults.htm
http://www.csj.org/infoserv_articles/kandel_randy_litigating_cultrelated_custody.htm (details, among other things, longterm sequelae of kids raised in cults, including substance abuse being a *very* common problem, as well as suicide being a longterm risk; of special note to anti-dominionists, one of the highest rates of suicide is among gay/les/bi/trans "throwaways" in dominionist households)
http://www.csj.org/infoserv_articles/langone_michael_child_custody.htm
http://www.csj.org/pubs_co/guestcolumn/cultismandlaw.htm

	From: neadods	Date: November 14th, 2005 08:21 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Actually, there's suprisingly *little* info on people who are walkaways from coercive groups.

How much information can be gleaned from the publicly-available materials of dominionist groups? For example, chapter 1 of The Strong-Willed Child by Dobson is all about how much he loved the family dog, but that love is illustrated by a story he proudly tells of having beaten it half to death to discipline it. It's not too hard to extrapolate from stories like that, or Babywise (it's never too early to start hitting and regimenting them), etc.

(Dang, I have *got* to start that "Deconstructing Dobson" project I keep thinking about.)

	From: kittynboi	Date: November 14th, 2005 08:23 pm (UTC)		(Link)

""For example, chapter 1 of The Strong-Willed Child by Dobson is all about how much he loved the family dog, but that love is illustrated by a story he proudly tells of having beaten it half to death to discipline it. ""


O____O

>_<

Sheeeeeeeeesh. Thats something Dobson himself did? Beat the dog? You know, animal cruelty is one of the early signs of a potential serial killer, they say. I guess for Dobson, his pathology manifests itself in his twisted ideology.

	From: kitten_goddess	Date: November 14th, 2005 08:50 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Ick. I never knew Dobson was cruel to animals. May he get bitten by a thousand pit bulls!

What the heck is Babywise?

	From: dogemperor	Date: November 14th, 2005 09:02 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Actually, some of the most useful info (IMHO) is going to be not only from the works of the dominionist themselves (and the stuff on the dog-beating by Dobson is actually *mild* compared to what is taught in many dominionist circles; the Ezzos and Pearls actually advocate beating *infants* with chastening rods, for instance, and the Pearls even advocate pinching four-month-old infants who "bite" whilst breast feeding (not that three and four-month-old infants have TEETH to bite)).

In fact, one of the best ways IMHO to get info on what the dominionists are *really* telling their own is to look at even the publically available material geared towards dominionists.

Also telling are stories from the few kids who walkaway as adults; much of what we know about what goes on in the Phelps family compound, for instance, is based on court testimony of two of the three family members who have walked away/been thrown away (another family member, sadly, was "thrown away" and is still having rather severe problems with socialisation as a result). (By the way, this is why I tell walkaways that they need to tell their stories in a public forum so that people know that this is *not* an abberation but "standard operating procedure" in those communities.)

	From: dogemperor	Date: November 14th, 2005 07:02 pm (UTC)		(Link)

In regards to arrested development in dominionist households:

At least two studies I've found (and writing of a third expert) would fit with his observations--that there are problems with socialisation as a result of the coercive tactics, including normal development with milestones such as this (which in part are based on socialisation).

The fact that there is an overt hostility to logic and training in dominionist groups (to the point at least one developer of dominionist school curricula, A Beka, actually removed set theory (which is part of the foundation for logic as taught in mathematics) from its entire maths curriculum; in dominionist coercive religious groups this is often expressed as "walk by faith, not by sight") also does not allow for development of such things as learning cause/effect, etc.

In some ways, it could be argued (at least based on the *outward social signs*) that it's a mild form of induced autism (autistic withdrawal is actually thought to be the result of overstimulation--normal stimuli are often painful to autistics/aspies, and they will self-stim (the rocking, etc.) to block out painful stimuli). As it is, coercive religious groups are often big on behaviours that are used to "tune out" external reality (in the case of dominionist groups, a combination of fear of demonisation combined with tactics like repeatedly chanting biblical verses or speaking in tongues).

(This is actually an area that hits rather personally for me--many many people tell me I have traits that are almost a "textbook example" of Asperger's Syndrome which is essentially a form of "high functioning" autism. However, thanks to the abuse I've suffered growing up by dominionists, I'm still not sure how much is "aspie-ness" and how much is the result of dominionist abuse.)

At any rate, yes, the few bits of data regarding kids raised in cults DO show it causes arrests in social and psychological development, often severely, and one of the *major* issues for walkaways is catching up on social and psychological growth. (I have often compared the experience to that of a child raised by wolves--there is so much catchup to do if one has been raised in a coercive religious group. (At least wolves tend not to be abusive, unlike dominionists.))

Articles of note:
http://www.rickross.com/reference/recovery/recovery7.html (OCD as longterm sequelae of being raised in coercive religious group)
http://www.csj.org/infoserv_articles/furnari_leona_bornraised.htm (detailed discussion of developmental deficits in people raised in coercive religious groups, makes very similar observations; as there are often multigenerational dominionist households (grandmother/mother/kids) these issues may affect multiple generations in a household; notes anxiety disorders as likely longterm sequelae (probably related to complex PTSD))
http://www.csj.org/infoserv_articles/langone_michael_children.htm (notes arrested development as likely sequelae of being raised in coercive religious group; *specifically* mentions stifling of critical thought as major factor in arrested development; notes therapy is as much going to be "resocialisation" and teaching of skills as psychotherapy)

	From: dogemperor	Date: November 14th, 2005 07:27 pm (UTC)		(Link)

As a minor aside:

I myself am involved in what may be one of the few organised walkaway groups that has a substantial percentage of people who were *raised* in such a group (http://www.ex-pentecostals.org, which focuses on walkaway issues for people leaving coercive religious groups affiliated with the pente/charismatic movements).

Even in a forum that has had years of experience with walkaway issues, often people are specifically referred to professional help *because* there are longterm psychological and socialisation issues that it is sometimes *impossible* for people to deal with *without* some sort of professional help.

(I myself have seen a therapist re my own issues as a walkaway. Having an independent voice helps--one gets scared people are telling you things just to be nice to you (if you are raised in a coercive religious group and have essentially no real ability to trust people as a result), and a party to tell you that you AREN'T insane and who can help teach *productive* methods to deal with things helps much. One of the things I've had to specifically learn--and one which my husband tells me I need to practice :3--is how to relax and not be such a worrywart about things. A good therapist who helps teach things like that and doesn't rely on doping one to death is worth their weight in gold, especially if they are familiar with issues of spiritual abuse.)

Like I've compared it to in past...being *raised* in a coercive group is in many ways akin to living one's life in a pit with slick walls, sharp rocks, and zombified people dragging you down into the pit...and you have *no idea at all* what's outside of it, you're sometimes relying on curiosity but more often from the word of someone else who either fell in the pit from Outside or who lowered a rope for you. (Especially since the pit zombies kept telling you there was stuff even WORSE outside.)

	From: sunfell	Date: November 14th, 2005 10:22 pm (UTC)		(Link)

I just visited that ex-Pentecostal board. Wow. I didn't know that the hair was such an issue. But I am glad to see that walkaways are being addressed and cared for there.

After reading those posts, I count my lucky stars that my own 'gross encounters' with people like that were from the outside, where I was the 'enemy' who needed to be 'broken'. That experience was harrowing enough, but I could not imagine being raised in that environment and having to escape it.

	From: kittynboi	Date: November 14th, 2005 07:32 pm (UTC)		(Link)

""At least two studies I've found (and writing of a third expert) would fit with his observations--that there are problems with socialisation as a result of the coercive tactics, including normal development with milestones such as this (which in part are based on socialisation).""

My mother works in the public school system, and has had a number of jobs, including health assitant and registrar, so she's had considerable contact with incoming students. She's always said that those coming from the religious schools tend to be less educated, especially about sexual matters, that they seem more naive, for lack of a better term, and are generally less mature about the world in general. This is part of the reason I've nver bought the argument that religious schools are amazingly superior to public and non religious schools. (By and large, that seems to mostly apply to CATHOLIC schools. The protestant ones seem to fare much WORSE compared to public schools.)



Anecdotal, yes, but I've always found it fascinating. Besides, a number of people I've met who went to private religious schools have tended to be, for lack of any other term, more f-ed up than people who attended public school. They have often seemed more neurotic and emotionally fragile.

	From: dogemperor	Date: November 14th, 2005 07:59 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Besides, a number of people I've met who went to private religious schools have tended to be, for lack of any other term, more f-ed up than people who attended public school. They have often seemed more neurotic and emotionally fragile.

Anxiety-related disorders are actually a known sequelae of growing up in a coercive religious group (or in fact being involved in one, period); specifically it's because of complex PTSD that develops from longterm abuse (in particular, emotional and spiritual abuse but also physical abuse at times) in coercive religious groups.

Some info on complex PTSD:

http://www.bullyonline.org/stress/ptsd.htm
http://www.bullyonline.org/stress/shame.htm

Re Protestant schools--the schools in particular run by dominionist groups (AoG, SBC, and "non-denominational" charismatic/pente and "independent Baptist" groups in particular) as well as homeschool curricula used by dominionists are so educationally insufficient that students educated solely on Bob Jones University, A Beka and ACE curricula are being rejected by the University of California (because they'd have to do TOO much remedial education). Curricula by Lutheran or Episcopalian or Methodist groups may be better in quality, though.

Info on A Beka in particular:
http://www.livejournal.com/community/dark_christian/271101.html
http://www.livejournal.com/community/dark_christian/271301.html
(This is a two-part series where I informally note the major shortcomings educationally in the A Beka curriculum)

Info on dominionist curricula in general:
http://www.livejournal.com/community/dark_christian/209138.html
http://www.livejournal.com/community/dark_christian/264525.html (On University of California's rejection of dominionist curricula-only students)

	From: mirandaflynn	Date: November 14th, 2005 09:58 pm (UTC)		(Link)

"They have often seemed more neurotic and emotionally fragile."

That's what happens when they tell you you're sinking into hell in first grade, and you spend 7th grade learning about The Rapture and watching movies called "You've been left behind." There's a song too! Yay!

1st - 9th grade in a fundamentalist Baptist school using BJU science textbooks because Mom was convinced I'd be 'safer' than in public school. This school didn't admit minorities. I kid you not. I think we ended up with one Muslim kid who'd converted to Christianity and everyone was very proud of how he'd made his Mom cry because, hey, gotta forsake those earthly ties.

::shudder::

	From: dulcinbradbury	Date: November 14th, 2005 10:54 pm (UTC)		(Link)

It really depends on the schools in question. My local public high school had 3% of its students go on to higher education. My sister and I went to Catholic school -- it was the affordable alternative. We did have to sit through theology classes, but, we weren't getting it at home and they were progressive Catholic schools. (The general rule was that being a thinking, well-educated individual was critical to being a good Catholic. Sex education included *all* information on STDs, condoms & birth control, while strongly encouraging abstanence. Evolution was taught as scientifically correct with the aside that it was not in conflict with spiritual beliefs & could be seen as the mechanism of creation.)

That said, I knew people who came from public schools in very dominionist areas who still had the religion shoved down their throats & came into college without the skills they really needed for it.

From: angrywhitecat	Date: November 15th, 2005 01:42 am (UTC)		(Link)

The fact that there is an overt hostility to logic and training in dominionist groups (to the point at least one developer of dominionist school curricula, A Beka, actually removed set theory

That's disgusting, but not exactly surprising. I had a year of the A Beka and BJU curriculum in high school. I distinctly remember that the science book just couldn't shut up about young-earth creationism ("the Group 2 elements include calcium, which is often found in rock formations resulting from Noah's flood"), and the civics book saw Communist Liberal Secular Humanist plots behind everything. (And of course they're going to cut the most beautiful and elegant part of math, because math, like science, is just a tool for us to more effectively rule the world.)

So tell me, A Beka mathematicians: since you apparently have access to God's Own Math Book[0], is the Axiom of Choice true or false?


[0] Math 13:7: "You shall not have one among you who practices topology or differential geometry, for these things give the LORD a headache." That's right after Solomon settles a custody dispute by performing a Banach-Tarski dissection on the baby and giving the two resulting babies to the two mothers.

	From: dogemperor	Date: November 15th, 2005 02:55 am (UTC)		(Link)

Actually, much of why the A Beka writers *object* to set theory is BECAUSE of things like the Axiom of Choice--to them, this is a "secular humanist" way of "backdoor teaching that there are no absolutes".

Hence why essentially *no* modern maths are taught in it. :P

*LAUGHS LIKE A MADMAN RE THE SOLOMONIC TOPOLOGY COMMENT* Okay, you officially win at maths humour and the Internet :3

Oh, they'd REALLY hate me...much of why I got into computers was because of nifty stuff like fractals and topology and such :3

(BTW, yes, we are talking math geekery here. :3 The sad thing is, I'm actually *serious* re their objections to set theory being based on the existence of things like the Axiom of Choice. We do *not* want to think how dominionists' heads would explode in regards to the Banach-Tarski paradox (in which Solomon's problem is uniquely solvable :3).)

	From: dagoski	Date: November 15th, 2005 02:54 am (UTC)		(Link)

The depressing thing about this is that these anecdotes mirror studies on the information processing of desperately poor residents of public housing. In that case, one researcher noted that information was not processed individually, but by the group as a whole, meaning that the subjects tailored their individual information processing to group expectations. Only difference is that the subjects in the study I'm thinking about were poor by chance. In the case of these groups, they self create a state of information poverty.

I would be careful about the Aspberger's self diagnosis, though. That's damned to tricky to get right from what I've read of the DSM IV and the literature I've read indicates that it's an inherited(genetic disorder). However, a borderline personality disorder can very strongly resemble Aspberger's and that's now thought to be a disorder on the autism spectrum. Key risk factors for borderline include spending early childhood years in a state of fear. Starting to sound familiar? Anyway, nevermind the armchair psychology, here. I read up on just inform to develop characters in my attempts to write novels.

Good links as always! You've given me some ideas to chew on since I'm aiming to be a kind of education professional as a librarian.

	From: dogemperor	Date: November 15th, 2005 03:02 am (UTC)		(Link)

Honestly, the main thing that (in my case) doesn't cause me to discount the whole "you might be an Aspie" thing totally and assume it's all a bad kidhood is that I *do* on occasion have troubles with sensory integration (like with bright lights making my ears ring, or touch being physically painful if I'm stressed). I've not seen reports of that from complex PTSD so much.

As I've not ever been formally diagnosed, that's why I don't state one or the other. (In fact, I'm willing to bet thanks to my bad upbringing differentiating the two would likely be impossible anyways.)

	From: kitten_goddess	Date: November 14th, 2005 08:46 pm (UTC)		(Link)

I am very literal-minded and have always been that way. I am an adult who has consistently tested with a high IQ, got straight A's in school, etc. On one level, my cognitive development was not affected by my being a Dominionist for almost ten years.

In times of stress or sleep dep, I revert back to preoperational thinking. For example, around the time of 9/11, I was very disturbed to hear myself babbling about how God was punishing us for our sins and that this was the start of the End Times. Even more disturbing was that no one at work smacked me upside the head with a clue-by-four. Instead, they all agreed with me!

I'm the only person I know who gets church flashbacks. Yuck.

	From: dogemperor	Date: November 14th, 2005 09:16 pm (UTC)		(Link)

Actually, no, you aren't the only person who gets "church flashbacks"--in fact, it's a very common phenomenon among walkaways (the term in walkaway communities is "floating"). Many people upon receiving a "trigger" (which in dominionist groups is very often apocalyptic talk) tend to either "float" or have panic attacks relating to their PTSD (the former is more common for people who joined voluntarily or have recently left, the latter more common for people who grew up in it or suffered extreme abuse or have been out of the group a while).

In fact, I freely admit I was having panic attacks after Bush II's re-election partly because of much of the rhetoric being thrown about by dominionist groups hailing the election results. (I've had bad, bad nightmares about dominionist takeover which are in part fueled by what I had to deal with growing up :()

There are some dominionist groups that I am reluctant to visit even for purposes of research because the group itself or its attendant dogma triggers literal panic attacks with me. (One of these--a site that probably could stand research, but which I'm STILL reluctant to really touch with a 40-foot barge pole--is of both the shortwave radio station and the website operated by the specific AoG church I walked away from (if folks want a bit of a horror-show, hit http://www.wjiesw.com and some of the sites linked off of it). Too many bad memories for me. I actually twitch when I have to hit AoG-related sites for research on what dominionist groups are saying to their own.)

	From: ad_kay	Date: November 14th, 2005 11:46 pm (UTC)		(Link)

I wouldn't call my reaction "flashbacks" per se, and I don't have PTSD, but I do experience anger and disgust when I hear fundamentalist or Dominionist quotes or am forced to hear relatives burble about "the Lord." I was raised in a fundamentalist S. Baptist household, and while it did have some Dominionist overtones, it was nowhere near as batshit crazy as the AoG experiences that dogemperor suffered. I keep thinking that if I still have psychological reactions, even though my experiences were relatively mild, I can't imagine what dogemperor and others like her must go through.

	From: kitten_goddess	Date: November 15th, 2005 01:17 am (UTC)		(Link)

My experiences wre mild, like yours. I was born highly suggestible and literal-minded, which made the nonsense very easy to set itself up in my mind.

It was all voluntary on my part, too; my parents were intellectuals who had science and medical books all over the house. I have no idea where I got the religious nutcase impulse from.

If dogemperor wanted to make lots of money, she could write a true account of her childhood, call it fiction, and then outsell Stephen King.

	From: ad_kay	Date: November 15th, 2005 12:01 am (UTC)		(Link)

One group that should be studied are the teens and young adults who have either been thrown out or escaped from the Mormon cult run by Warren Jeffs. Hundreds of teenaged boys have been kicked out, ostensibly for violating rules, when in reality they are viewed as a threat by adult males, who want to claim teenaged girls as child brides. Girls and young women who manage to escape often never see their families (or their own children!) again.

	From: kitten_goddess	Date: November 15th, 2005 01:23 am (UTC)		(Link)

I read about Warren Jeffs and the rest of those pedophiles in Under The Banner of Heaven. Interestingly, the book claims that Joseph Smith (the founder of Mormonism) made up a document describing "plural marriage" because he couldn't keep it in his pants and wanted to go on playing the holy man.


Of course, the "plural marriage" bit got repudiated later by the mainstream Mormons, who consider polygamy to be embarrassing now. AFAIK, they're perfectly respectable, if conservative. I don't consider the Warren Jeffs of this world to be Mormons; they're just an odd form of Dominionist.